She settled her gaze on his face.
“Well, Your Grace? Do allow me.”
She meant a drink. Orwell was sitting there, after all. Besides Gull Wrysen was standing as if she was Medusa and he’d been turned him to stone. But hopefully this was purely temporary.
“Thank you, Lizzie,” she added, seeing that only Lizzie’s jaw had moved and that was in the direction of the floor. “Yes. As you can see, I will deal with this. And please shut your mouth while you’re about it. It’s wholly bad enough you look like a tombstone. We don't want you adding trout to the mix. Not when Mr. Wrysen and I have things to discuss, regarding the house.”
She waited for Lizzie to win every prize going in the collecting her jaw and sailing like a doom-ridden ship away competition, before setting out two glasses. Gold rimmed ones from the set that added perfection to her Christmas Eve when she finally sat before the fire in the cavernous, leather armchair and treated herself to a measure of port. Glasses she’d be keeping now if this went her way. Why shouldn’t it? She was cursed, not incapable.
Yes. This man wasn’t so bad. Fair hair would have reminded her of Ennis, who, some might say was probably birling ten times in his coffin. Not the man to think of and face this one standing in the candlelit shadows in his mud-spattered boots and greatcoat, holding his hat beneath his arm as if he’d no idea what to do with it.
Well, she knew, she knew exactly. She slipped the top off the decanter, inhaled the rich ruby scent. If it came right down to it here, she could cook and dust, if need be. If he wanted to bring in a woman, if need be, she’d say nothing. After all, there would be nothing to say anything about on her part. No jealousy. Nothing. She wouldn’t insult Ennis’s memory with that kind of thing that betrayed low moral fiber.
“But perhaps I am being presumptuous with your drink and your servants, now Doom Bar Hall has fallen to you, Lord … Lord …?”
“Me?” He shifted uncertainly, the ghost of a smile hanging to his lips. Totally unnerved. No bad sign. “Oh, good God, no, Miss … Miss Rhodes, isn’t it?”
“Well, it’s not the devil incarnate, though there's plenty round here who certainly say so."
"Good. I mean ... No, I mean I think there's been some kind of mistake."
She nearly clattered the decanter top onto the sideboard. Some kind of mistake? My God. Damn Orwell. And yet, Lord love him. A mistake. It was all a mistake. Thank God she'd had enough moral fiber not to open her mouth.
“I mean … You mean you’re not Gull Wrysen? And you’re not here to take Doom Bar Hall from me? Well, I never.” Especially given how close she’d been to offering herself. ”You know, I just can’t believe how I—well, never mind, have the drink anyway.”
“Gull?” Gull Wrysen lips twitched as he reached for the glass. “I’m not Gull Wrysen. Not that I know of anyway, unless I’ve been re-christened. I’m not Wrysen either. My name, so far as I know my name anyway, is Gil. Gil Wryson. And I’m not a gentleman either. Well … again… Not that I know of.”
“I see.”
Damn Lizzie. As ever, she won first prize in the being spat on by the Fates competition. After they fell about the floor laughing at her first. Why hadn’t she known no man would be called Gull? And Wrysen was a Cornish pronounciation? Still, she could surely weather a blob or two of spittle seeing as this was all a mistake?
“Although that’s not the mistake,” he added.
Damn the Fates to hell. Still, one mercy in a drought dropping from the heavens? She hadn’t danced about the floor waving her drawers in the air. Whether he was a gentleman or not, was neither here, nor there, when it came to getting him to agree to this. And she would, so long as her own name was Destiny Rhodes, she would. Now. She'd have to. Just swallow what rose in her throat, forget about the fact that when everything she touched turned to dust, the pity was he didn’t drop at her feet, and do it. Pray God the smile she dragged from God knew where, was warm, earthy.
“Then ... let’s get straight to the point. I’ve always been a frank talking kind of girl.”
“The point, Miss Rhodes?”
“Doom Bar Hall is not just my home, as well as my brother, Orwell’s, it has been my whole life since my husband, Ennis, died. You look surprised?”
“Only in that—”
“I seem young to be a widow? Well, I was and I am, I suppose. Of course I could have lived at Pangbury, the family home but we were guests there ourselves, him having a younger brother with family. So I put the money he left me into Doom Bar Hall, because it has been in the Rhodes family for generations. I returned to my maiden name too. I think you’ll find I’m quite a woman of the world, however.”
It was the most tactful way to put what she was about to propose, which was why she turned away. Not before she saw Gil Wryson’s gleaming black eyes were searching her face, with its warm, earthy smile hopefully still attached, in bemusement. But perhaps he simply couldn’t believe his luck? She knew she couldn’t. Believe her luck that was. Certainly at having got this far.
“I suppose what I am trying to say to you, is that I am in this house,” she added. “Yes. It is in me even though you may have won it from my brother, Orwell.”
“I think you’re mistaken there, Miss Rhodes.”
“Really? Well I don’t. You did win it. I’m not going to argue about that, or how easy it probably was, knowing Orwell’s drinking habits, to diddle him of his left pinkie. His thumb too.”
“Perhaps. But it … ”
Must he keep interrupting her when she was doing her level best here to get up from the pit, soar to the sky and secure the roof above her head? And the desperation he might refuse, lay like a lather on her bones? She glided forward then turned to face him.
“Doom Bar Hall is too precious to me. As you will see when I show you around, I am in every scrap of this place. In fact you might even say I am this place. That is why you should also know something.”
"What?”
“I come with it.”
Start as you mean to go on. Finish too. The blank cut-out she was inside meant it was nothing for her to stand here and offer herself like this. Once. Perhaps. But now? Given the alternative? Although equally, some might say she had risen to this with a surprising fervor.
“I’m sorry?”
“Oh, I am too, Mr. Wryson, but I honestly have no choice.”
He blinked, as if he hadn’t known what was coming, or didn’t want her, although he did have the good manners to smile. “Am I to understand? Are you … are you suggesting … ”
Orwell’s boots scraped on the scuffed floorboards.
“Dstny. Dsny, old girl, thart’s what … you see … it’s like this … I relemmber now ...”
“Oh please, Orwell, do be quiet for once in your sorry life. Let’s just agree I’ll handle this, shall we? You can go to the devil for all I care. In fact, shall we say Truro marketplace if you don’t button up?”
Yes. Gil Wryson wasn’t the devil and he wasn’t Divers O’Roarke--not that the devil troubled her, if she’d to narrow that list down. Divers O’Roarke now? Exactly how likely was he to be here in Cornwall?
Ignoring the wind banging the shutters, the batter of incessant rain cutting a silver stream down the moonlit glass, she continued,
“Now then, Mr. Wryson, these are the terms I place honorably on the table before you. They are very simple. Doom Bar Hall is my life. I will not be separated from it. So if you take Doom Bar Hall, you take me, to do what you will with. I’ll be your queen, your housekeeper, I’ll be your whatever you desire, because no-one knows this place like me. If you can’t do that, if you have some other agenda, some other woman, for that matter, whatever you have, walk away now. I know I have not won Doom Bar Hall from you, that in a million years I may not have done that, but then again I never lost it in a devil’s hand of cards, played against a man too drunk to know his own name, let alone the family one he’s thrown away. These are my terms. I’m not leaving here, unless it is in a box. Do y
ou understand?”
“Miss … Lady … ?”
Ignoring him, she lifted the glass to her lips. Courage flowed into her veins, all the way to her pounding temples. It always did when she made up her mind.
“In the circumstances, you may call me, Destiny.”
Orwell tried again to struggle to his feet. “Dstiny. Don’t. You … you don’t know … "
“Orwell, I asked you to stay out of this. What you do is up to you just as this is up to me. I am doing this. I am keeping our home.”
Her shell would anyway. What followed behind, a pallbearer at an unspeakable funeral might wince. She waited, a prisoner of the silence, the one existing in her soul, for Gil Wryson to speak. His lips cinched uncertainly, as if he didn’t know how to approach this. Gentlemanly of him, but not the point.
“Destiny?”
“Yes.”
“Well, I … I’m sure I can call you that, Miss … Miss Rhodes, if that’s acceptable ... ”
“Why shouldn’t it be? We’re going to be things to each other, after all. Let’s drink a toast to it.”
“But what I was trying to explain, maybe not terribly well, that is true, and perhaps your brother—"
“Oh, him? He doesn’t count for anything where this is concerned. Go on. Drink up. Plenty more where that’s from."
“-- is too, is that I didn’t actually win the game. So really … ”
Her heart beat in such hope it almost felled her, although hope was something that had lived in the dark for the last two years. Doom Bar Hall wasn’t lost at all.
Relief washed like an ocean, ambushing her as she stood there encased in tortuous, threadbare velvet. Her cheeks pulsed. To think she’d abased herself for nothing. But what did that matter? She downed the drink in one, wiped a mittened hand across her mouth.
“Then … if you didn’t win …? What are you doin--?”
“No. I suppose that’s what I meant when I said I wasn’t a gentleman.”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Wryson, you will think me thick as a sea mist—"
“Not at all.”
“--but the truth is I really don’t understand what you being, or not being a gentleman, has to do—"
“I’m acting on behalf of my employer.”
“Your employer?”
So it was true? She’d lost Doom Bar Hall. Still, she’d made that decision before this man walked in here. How he looked, how old he was, who he was, had made no difference then. Why should it now?
“He thought there would be difficulties, you see.”
“Apart from me brother lying drunk I can’t imagine how.”
“Well he did. And that was why he asked me to spy out the lie of the land, if you will. After all, this is quite a house to lose--”
“Do you think I don’t know that? That is why my offer is the same because I don’t intend to lose it--”
“Especially when there’s past associations.”
“Past associations.” She resisted the urge to finger her throat, which prickled as if a moth’s wing was stuck in it somewhat of a sudden. “What do you mean?”
“I mean my employer once lived—not in the house itself—but on the estate, and is known to you.”
“Known?”
She swallowed the astonishment sitting cold as marble in her mouth. There was only one man she could think of who’d done that but of that one man, she didn’t want to think. Not when the blood drained from her face, the floor loomed so perilously close she struggled to stand in her black slippers and Orwell staggered to his feet.
“Dstny … I triled to tell you. But you … you … Anyway, you’re nlot seris … ”
“Unless the name Divers O’Roarke is unfamiliar to you, Miss Rhodes?” Gil Wryson’s voice was oiled velvet.
“Divers O’Roarke?”
How did she say the name as if it was nothing to her, the name of the man who had cursed them, cursed her loudest of all?
Because she must.
“No. I believe I have some vague memories of him.”
“Good, because he is waiting outside. I will be sure to pass the details of your offer to him if you still desire it.”
Before she could think whether she did or not, whether some might say this was putting it rather strongly, or she should change her mind, a footfall sounded in the doorway behind her.
“Good evening, Destiny,” clanged the sounding bell of hell and a voice she sort of recognized from there. “I see you haven’t changed.”
CHAPTER TWO
“Not changed? Oh, I think you’re mistaken there, Divers, in ways you can’t possibly begin to imagine.”
Really? Well, just because she’d got in there faster than him didn’t mean he’d no imagination.
If you let her speak to you, it is already too late.
"But let’s not quibble when it’s actually so very nice to see you back here in Doom Bar Hall again,” she added, as if it wasn’t already too late the first time she opened her mouth. She offered her pale, paper-thin hand for him to kiss too.
Destiny Rhodes? Or an abandoned place? A shadow that flickered on the wall while she’d burned away. Face whiter than blotting paper, eyes black as ink. Destiny Rhodes. Hadn’t she always been glossed as lacquered furniture, eyes like gleaming black diamonds, lips lush as ripe peaches, fashioned in hell, every bit of her held lovingly in place by satirical design? But this?
Where the hell was the scent of ambergris and decadence, she’d breathed so freely, mainly over him? What the hell had she done to her flowing raven hair? Hacked it with garden shears, then hacked the comb? And what was this, ‘nice to see you again’ stuff, as if he wasn’t enough of a plague about the place the first time round? A pox on it too.
If you let her speak to you, it is already too late. It always was.
Ignoring the hand she'd extended for him to kiss--that would be right--he set his hat down on a side table. Anything less would show it wasn’t just too late, it was ten hours past midnight when it wasn't even a quarter to. The last thing he’d expected tonight? To bump into Orwell Rhodes in Daindridge’s. Now he had though ..?
“Now then Destiny, there’s no need to lie.”
If his curses really were this effective though, maybe he should curse Lyon and be done with all this?
If you let her speak to you, it is already too late.
"Who says I'm--"
“I do. What’s more I think I should tell you now, I overheard your little suggestion.”
“Oh, it wasn’t little, Divers. I think we can both agree on that given the things we once were to one another."
"Were we?" As for her being even remotely fazed that he'd heard her outrageous suggestion? Chance would be a fine thing. He shrugged off his coat, taking care not to breathe the subtle scent clinging to her like cobwebs—lavender? “You tell me. Well, little, or large, I daresay we can all make a mistake at times.”
“Who says it’s a mistake?”
“Well, the thing is, I do.”
“I see.”
“And, in case you haven't noticed, I now own this fine house.” He slung the coat onto a chair. "So?"
"Well, so your friend there was say--"
He nodded to Gil to leave, thrust his thumbs in his waistcoat pockets. “That’s why, for old time’s sake, I’m going to suggest to you that you have till midnight to follow Gil there, out the door, also there."
“But …"
"Now."
"But that’s only three hours away.”
“It’s four actually.” He flicked his fob watch open. “One thing I have learned is how to tell the time. That’s why I also know enough has been wasted. Midnight, Destiny. Before, is preferable. You know where the door is, I’m sure. You've lived here long enough."
A half full bottle of burgundy stood on the heavy oak sideboard, a set of hideous gold rimmed goblets by its side. It was time to snap his fob watch shut and taste what the house had to offer. He crossed the floor, stood with his back to her as the red
liquid splashed like the unruly sea into the glass, the noise it made a sharp reminder of the sound that same sea made washing onto the sand at times.
He held the glass under his nose, sniffed. A tang of blackberries. A definite winter bouquet. When it came to smuggling it was always the taste that counted though. Clearing his throat, he raised the glass to his lips.
“I’d offer you one but I don’t want to take up any more of your valuable time.”
Yes. Physicality was everything in this job. And what exactly could undercut it in this instance? Certainly not her standing there with her dead eyes crouching in her skull.
"Oh, I'd hardly say it was--"
The French doors crashed open, the walls juddered, wind tearing around the room like a howling banshee. And with it ...
Rose.
He coughed. Jesus. As if she was right here, the vapor of her dead breath, anyway, whispering on its dregs around the book lined walls. So he struggled to stand here.
Rose.
If you let her speak to you, it is already too late.
Rose.
Christ. How he wished they were all other things now. When not once in all the years since he’d lost her had he felt her presence, not the times spent in bitter longing, the times he’d hung tales of his own deceit on the soundless stars, the only damn things to truly own the night sky.
Why the hell did he feel her here now, scuttling round the wainscoting of his life? Because she knew that what he should be here for, was the one thing he couldn’t give her?
Not if his limbs were pulled apart by the four horsemen of the apocalypse. If he was asked to dig his grave with her same breath.
Revenge.
He swallowed. If he did not speak, he was finished. In every way.
"So?" If he did not sound as fine as a summer's day as he grasped the French doors and snapped them shut against the gale nearly taking them off their hinges, too. "The things we were, eh?"
"Yes, Divers."
"Maybe what you mean is the things we did to one another as children? Because it’s so long ago, I honestly can’t remember what we were. If you want to sit there like patience on a monument, pouring over the past and all the tiny and tedious things that happened there, wasting your valuable time that could be spent procuring lodgings—"
O'Roarke's Destiny (Cornish Rogues Book 1) Page 2
