Wherefore Art Thou.

by Melanie Thurlow

  But a small, miniscule part of him wanted to know what she would do if he said “yes.”

  He wanted to see her shock, see her finally realize that she was asking for too much.

  He wanted to teach her a lesson.

  It was more than just one sip of scotch.

  This was life.

  This was her life.

  Clearly, she had been given too much free reign with her life as it was. Now he was giving her boundaries, and she was beating on the walls. He should let her continue to beat until her throat turned raw and her fists red, until she relented and realized that this was what was in her best interest, that she could not continue on without a care in the world. Life was about sacrifice and not getting what you wanted. It was high past time that she learned that.

  This was a girl who Desmond suspected had never been told no.

  So, he said, yes. Just so that he could prove to her that no choice comes without strings attached, that every bad decision made has a consequence.

  Desmond would teach the young lady a lesson.

  He held out his glass.

  “Bottoms up, my lady.”

  Chapter 9

  One small corner of her brain, she was certain, held on to sanity.

  It was in there. Somewhere.

  She merely hadn’t the means to look for it. Because she rather suspected she was drunk.

  But it was not as though one’s sanity could just drip out one’s ears, so it was not like she had to worry about losing it.

  Or had she already lost it?

  She looked down into the glass that was emptying of the amber liquid contents of its own volition. She certainly didn’t drink it all herself. At least, not that she remembered.

  How many had she drank?

  In the bottom of her presently empty glass, she was fairly certain she could see just a teeny-tiny speck.

  Yup, that was where her sanity had gone.

  She shoved her hand down inside of it, preparing to pull her sanity back out. But for some reason her fingers seemed to triple in size and lose all dexterity, and the glass fell out of her hand and went skittering across the carpeted floor, landing at the feet of one very handsome gentleman.

  He might have been older than she and have a rugged, weathered look about him, but that only served to add to his masculinity, and to her attraction toward him.

  She giggled, and the sound was so cute to her ears that she did it again just to hear it.

  She liked the sound of her laugh.

  No. No, she loved the sound of her laugh.

  “I’ll get t-t-that,” she slurred as she swung her legs over the edge of the bed.

  The drink had worked to dull the soreness of her muscles and alleviate the stiffness in her joints, but it didn’t stop the world from spinning. In fact, it made it spin faster.

  Fancy that.

  She wondered if it was moving in double time, if morning would come twice as fast.

  Well, she would just have to have another glass of that drink and surely she would find out.

  The man stood, though, he didn’t move to halt the progress she was making to stand. He merely looked down upon her with that hard expression of his that was impossible to read. She had, by now, positioned herself to sitting, her feet dangling what she hoped to be closer to the floor than it felt.

  It was funny that he hadn’t tried to stop her. He always stopped her. He never let her have any fun. He was a spoilsport, old sauerkraut. The man was a dud. His handsomeness certainly did not compensate for his solemnity.

  But when she opened her mouth to tell him just what she thought him, the words were not readily available.

  Something shiny caught her eye and she was once again reminded of what she was doing.

  Right. She needed to get the glass. And her sanity.

  If she had lost it at all. That bit was still up for debate.

  However, was it considered a debate if there was only one participant in the dialogue? She supposed one person could have two different points of view, but wouldn’t they inevitably combine, making it nearly impossible to discern between the two?

  Her head started to spin faster than the room seemed to be.

  And now, standing before her were three Lord Thornton’s. As if one wasn’t enough.

  She closed one eye and tried to focus on him with the other. “Now, you just stand still so that I may use you for balance.”

  “You should stay in bed,” warned his gruff voice.

  Needless to say, she did not heed his warning.

  “Oh pooh,” she said, her lips puckering on the p. “What I need is to find my sanity.”

  “I could not agree more,” the man drawled.

  She huffed her exasperation and set to standing. And of course, Lord Thornton moved so that she missed him entirely, leaving her to resort to using the bed she had just departed for support. Not that it had to support her for long, for as soon as she put weight down on her right leg which had, up to that moment, felt not even a speck of pain, a sharp pinch had her losing her footing and falling to the floor which seemed to be much farther away than it ought to be.

  Well, not entirely to the floor.

  She was swooped up in the wind before she actually plowed into the hard surface below her.

  She spread out her arms as if to fly away like a bird, at which point she realized that she was not in the air at all, she was in Lord Thornton’s arms and he was setting her back down upon the bed.

  Or at least he was trying to.

  Stuffy old cod, she thought.

  She felt the world teeter, then totter, as Lord Thornton crashed down above her onto the bed, his balance apparently disrupted. Perhaps she wasn’t quite as good at flying as she thought.

  However, he did not fall entirely on top of her. Well, he was technically on top of her, but he’d had the sense, and quick reflexes, to catch himself. He was presently suspended by his arms, his hands pressing into the bed on either side of her.

  And she just had to giggle. Because the look on his face was nothing short of hilarious. She had never seen a man’s eyes widen as far as Lord Thornton’s had when his face was a mere foot away from hers. Well, perhaps she had, but it wasn’t as though she could remember it.

  It was all so comical, but confusing in the same moment. As his heat began to circle around her, she felt her chest growing tight and her vision narrowing, fading the world out of view so that it only contained one man. She was gazing directly into his eyes, unable to move or breathe or do anything that might make the odd sensation she was feeling disappear. At which point, Lord Thornton jumped from the bed as though he had caught fire.

  Immediately, the giggling died from the room.

  It wasn’t him. It was her. It was like she had been, briefly, living in a fairytale and was just thrust back into reality. And she didn’t much care for the reality that came crashing back in.

  Reality was that she hadn’t a clue as to who she was. How depressing was that?

  She swallowed as her throat seemed to compress.

  She was certain that she was not the sort of person that cried, but in that moment, her head heavy with drink and her inhibitions lowered, she wanted to cry.

  It was simply so sad. And what was even sadder was that it was happening to her.

  Her sudden change of emotion did not go unnoticed by the man who had put almost the entirety of the small room between them. “What is wrong?” he spewed.

  “I’m sad-d-d-d,” she slurred. She tried to concentrate on her syllables when she opened her mouth to once again speak, but it didn’t sound much improved. “I-I-I-I-I don’t like bein’ nameless. It’s like no one knows I exis-s-s-t. And if I don’ exis-s-s-t, then who’ll notice if I die? I don’t want to be alone when I die. But at least I’d be buried outside. I can’t even seeee outside,” she said, punctuating her frustration by slamming her arms from hand to elbow down on the bed. “It might not even exist anymore. I could be dead for all I know. I could be
dead and this could be my Hell.”

  She had no sooner stopped talking than the world began to shake.

  Why did it have to keep doing that?

  She clung to her sheets as she felt the bed moving beneath her, for the first time crying out for Lord Thornton to come to her rescue.

  He may not have been the most affectionate of aristocrats, but he had been a considerably good sport these past days, all things considered, and at every turn he had protected her. Even from herself.

  Where was he now?

  It felt as though a hole were about to open up in the floor and swallow her, bed and all, so where was he? Wasn’t this the perfect time for him to come to her aid?

  “My lord?” she shouted, because the world shaking was making quite a lot of racket.

  Until it stopped. Abruptly.

  She opened her eyes to find her world shifted.

  To her right was a window that she could have sworn had been across the room just moments ago.

  She turned quickly around so that she could face the man who had made it possible.

  Lord Thornton was resting, leaning against the nearest bedpost, panting from the exertion he had undertaken.

  “Now you can see outside. I don’t know who you are, but you are alive,” he insisted. “This isn’t your Hell. Far from it. I’ve been there. I know.”

  “That was so-soo-sooo kind,” she said, moving a hand up to his chest. It wasn’t a slur, nor was her gratitude an exaggeration. “You moved the window for me,” she added gleefully.

  If he heard her, he didn’t make a response. He just stared down at her hand that was trailing slowly down his chest toward his naval because it was far too heavy for her to hold in place. And how he was warm, the heat radiating off him sending shivers down her spine.

  She stared up at him, and he stared back, his gaze flicking between her eyes and her lips. Her lips which she licked in anticipation.

  He was going to kiss her.

  The thought stopped everything. It stopped the quiet whispers of the night, the unsteady beat of her heart, the unnatural spinning of the room.

  He was going to kiss her, and she was ready for it. She’d never wanted anything more. Not that she knew of.

  The drink might have lowered her inhibitions, turned them muted, pliable, but her senses were somehow heightened. She didn’t understand it, didn’t understand the pooling of heat in her belly that called for him to lean closer, called for her fingers to wrap themselves about his shirt and pull him closer.

  Her mouth began to water as her lips went dry, her entire body tingling in anticipation for the kiss that was imminent.

  When her hand had nearly reached his naval, he seemed to break both of them out of the stupor they were in. Jumping back, he easily put three feet of distance between the two of them. Again. Making some excuse about the hour, Lord Thornton ran from the room, slamming the door to his adjoining bedchamber as he disappeared from sight. He literally bolted, leaving her dizzy and confused.

  She knew she’d had a bit to drink, and by now she had figured out that the world wasn’t spinning. It was her head, the result of too much spirits. And now it was spinning tenfold in reverse.

  She looked back upon the moment that had seemed so clear up until then, but which was now wrapped in a haze she couldn’t understand. She hadn’t imagined what had just occurred. One moment there was nothing but their eyes and their lips, and the certainty that Lord Thornton was going to kiss her.

  And the next, he was simply gone. Run away.

  She replayed the moment over, again and again, analyzing each second in the hopes that she could discover what had happened that caused him to suddenly take on the appearance of a trapped animal, finding no answer in her more-than-slightly tipsy memory.

  Then the answer was found. Or as much of an answer as she could create.

  For the past three days since she had come to be here, Lord Thornton had taken care of her. He’d hired a doctor, had one of the maids at the inn take care of her personal needs, and he’d made certain that she remained in bed. He was protecting her health. Was he now protecting her virtue? She would still, no doubt, be thoroughly ruined once she did finally restore the memory of who she was and was returned to wherever she came from, but at least she wouldn’t actually be ruined.

  And for some reason that made her feel rather melancholy.

  Oh, it wasn’t as though she wanted to be ruined. It was just…

  She just wanted…

  Well, she just wanted to be wanted, she supposed.

  Lord Thornton was the only constant in her life at the present, the only person with whom she could talk, really, and he very clearly didn’t want to talk to her. He rarely came to see her, and when he did he was always stiff and faraway, both in mind and in demeanor.

  Except for tonight…

  But now he had gone and literally run from the room.

  Was she that deplorable?

  Sure, her face was bruised, and basically half of her body was, as well, but her reflection was still that of a young woman who must surely be considered pleasing to the eye.

  So why didn’t he want her?

  Why wouldn’t he get close?

  And why, the one time he did get close, had he bolted?

  They were all questions she would never ask. But she required their answers just the same, and she would receive them, one way or another.

  She brushed back her curtains further so that the moon’s light shone more fully onto her face, making her feel sun-kissed in the darkness, and maybe not so alone.

  It was absurd, but his rejection left her feeling silly and alone, more alone than she had in the entirety of her memory—which, admittedly, wasn’t very long.

  She looked up as tears flooded her vision. The stars were flickering in their places in the sky, sharp pin-pricks of perfect white light.

  Her memories were stars washed away by the light of day, night never quite coming to them so she could see their bounty and revel in their light. She knew that they were there, but she couldn’t see them, they were too far beyond her reach.

  She wanted her memories returned.

  And if she couldn’t have them, then she wanted something else.

  That something apparently didn’t want her back.

  Lord Thornton appeared, as if summoned by her traitorous thoughts.

  Not in her bedchamber of course—she would be surprised if he ever returned to her room. He was below, dressed all in black, breezing across the small courtyard her window looked down upon.

  Her body moved of its own volition, leaning her closer to the window pane so that she could afford a better view.

  It was dark and he was a sizable distance away, but she knew it was him. It wasn’t that she could make out his tense shoulders or that she recognized the way that he walked. It was simply one of those things that she knew deep down in her gut.

  It would be him.

  If he were to simply turn his face so that she could see his profile, his imperfect nose would be outlined in the night, a signature that could be only his.

  But he didn’t need to turn, because it was he.

  And then it wasn’t, because he had disappeared from sight.

  Well, she didn’t need to see him to know.

  Nor did she need him to want her.

  She certainly didn’t want him. He was an obtuse man.

  She had enough going on in her life, having to remember who she was and all. The last thing she needed was an idiot of a man filling her thoughts in the stead of her lost memories.

  She would regain those memories. Night would fall on them and they would all shine gloriously.

  She was certain of it.

  Chapter 10

  Her eyes opened to reveal a room flooded with far too much light for the far too early hour, and immediately closed again.

  Stomach rolling in discontent and head throbbing with the memories of the night, she rolled back onto her stomach, hopeful that the pillow
would smother the reality of the day. Instead, she planted her face in a pool of her own drool. Lifting a heavy arm to wipe away the moisture, she groaned and flopped onto her back. And despite her eyes being closed shut, the world insisted on spinning madly about her. She could feel it, as though the bed was moving beneath her.

  Fair eyelids flew open to reveal irises the color of a pale morning sky. Her bed. Picking up her head, she looked to her right and saw the window, the courtyard below.

  He’d really moved her bed. She couldn’t believe it was true. And yet, it was. It wasn’t that she had so much to drink that she’d forgotten, but it certainly seemed like a dream.

  Her arm fell across her eyes, attempting to block out the sun and shield herself from the embarrassment she felt. She’d acted like a complete and utter fool. She’d practically thrown herself at the man. Oh, he’d think her a harlot, and he had every right to believe it, but that wasn’t her, that wasn’t who she was. She was sure of it.

  But it wasn’t as though she was going to be able to change his mind now.

  Sighing, she resolved to forget about the whole mishap. But, of course, her pounding head and queasy stomach would not allow that. For as soon as the bubble of emotion escaped her lips, her stomach turned over causing her mouth to water with a metallic promise of what would happen next.

  Throwing off her covers, she leapt from her bed, just barely clawing her way to the chamber pot across the room in time for the contents of her stomach to be released into the bowl. She knelt there, gagging for several minutes, before finally sitting back, cold sweat squeezing out of every pore on her body.

  Leaning her head back against the bureau, she closed her eyes and breathed through her nose, each inhale burning more than the last as the acid she’d vomited up ate away at the lining of her throat.

  If only she had a bit of water to wash her mouth out. But even the thought made her nearly heave.

  There was nothing more that she wanted to do in that moment than curl up on the floor and fall asleep forever. But just minutes on the hard floor had already caused her body to send alarms of discomfort to her mind, her bruised body screaming from the exertion and position. She needed to get up and get back into bed.