Demonwood

by Anne Stuart

  But some nasty, niggling little part of me, perhaps only my overactive Irish imagination, kept saying, "It could be true. It could have happened. Just because you're attracted to the man is no guarantee that he's a white knight in disguise. Other women have been in love with murderers." I didn't sleep well that night, even though Maeve controlled her rapacious appetites for the time being and refrained from creeping through my room.

  The next day dawned leaden and cloudy, with the sullen atmosphere thick in the air that augured a bad storm. Tempers were on edge—Lillian and Maeve spent the morning flinging veiled insults back and forth as if it had only been a few days since they'd last seen each other; Daniel whined constantly, and after Connell shouted at us all he disappeared into his study, leaving stern instructions that he wasn't to be disturbed by screaming women and crying children.

  I wasn't sure into which category I fitted. It was with an overwhelming sense of relief that I escaped the charged atmosphere of Demonwood and made my way down the pathway to the deserted farmhouse that was my refuge and haven.

  I soon had the living room toasty warm by the simple expedience of shutting the doors to the other rooms of the spotlessly kept house, and, curling up in a comfortable overstuffed chair by the fireplace, I made the mistake of falling asleep in the cozy, book-lined room. I felt so warm and drowsy with my deliciously bare feet tucked up underneath me and my cape around me for extra warmth, that I shut my weary eyes for just a moment. And when I opened them several hours later I was looking straight into Connell Fitzgerald's smoky blue eyes.

  The room was dark by that time, lit only by the dying embers of the fire I'd built. His face was in the shadows, and I couldn't read his expression. I knew I should jump up, full of apologies and nervous explanations. I didn't move.

  "You've been missing for hours," he broke the silence, and his lovely deep voice was harsh in the still air.

  "I fell asleep," I replied, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

  Through the shadows I could see a smile flit across his handsome, somber face. "Obviously. Half the men in the area are searching the woods for you. Peter Riordan is checking up by Perry's Ledge. I imagine he's hoping I threw you off."

  "Why should you do that?" I asked after a long moment.

  He leaned back in the rocker, at ease in the quiet, lonely house. "Surely you've heard by now, Mary? I murdered my first wife. I threw her and our unborn child off Perry's Ledge."

  I felt a little frisson of horror run through me at his impassive tone, followed by a swift irritation at my own gullibility. "Really?"

  His jaw hardened. "No. Not really. But most people seem to believe it anyway. Why shouldn't you?"

  I certainly wasn't about to throw my poor battered heart at his feet, so I merely shook my head. "That still doesn't explain why you'd want to kill me."

  He stripped off the elegant leather gloves he was wearing, and I noticed for the first time what beautiful hands he had. They were large and capable-looking, with long, well-shaped fingers. The kind of hands that could control a team of strong horses or throw a woman to her death, perhaps. The kind of hands that could hold a woman . . .

  I shivered again, and drew my eyes away from him to stare into the fire, wondering what had brought on this strange and violent mood, after the almost graceful gentleness of yesterday afternoon when we'd picked up Lillian.

  "I can't imagine why I'd want to kill you, Mary," he said in a low voice. "Or perhaps I can." He rose abruptly, and in the dying firelight he was very tall. "We'd better get back to the house before someone ends up here. I can imagine the kind of scene Maeve would throw if she knew we'd been here together. I doubt you'd fare too well."

  "What made you look here?" I questioned curiously, stretching luxuriantly like a sleepy cat.

  He looked down at me, an enigmatic expression on his dark face. "Perhaps I know you better than you think I do," he replied shortly. "Where are your shoes?"

  With a gasp of dismay I pulled my bare feet back underneath me. No man outside of my family had ever seen my naked feet, and there was an embarrassing intimacy about it that made me blush furiously. I pointed mutely to the corner where I had deposited my wet and snow-covered footgear, and he fetched them without a word, reluctant amusement in his usually cynical eyes.

  "This is not the best climate for going barefoot, Mary," he observed, moving away to stare out the window at the softly falling snow. "Perhaps you'd be happier back in Cambridge."

  "Why do you say that?" I kept my voice admirably calm. For not the first time I realized how desperately I wanted to stay in Vermont. With him. "It gets almost as cold there," I continued.

  "I wasn't thinking so much of the climate," he replied with his back turned. "It might be better for all of us if you were to leave."

  Lacing up my boots, now dry and stiff from being next to the blazing fire, I kept my voice light. "Better for Daniel?"

  He paused, and I could feel emotions warring within him. But instead of answering my question he said, "I saw your brothers last time I was in Boston. They're very fond of you."

  "Yes."

  He turned back, his dark expression lightening for a moment. "You must have been a complete hellion when you were growing up. I can scarcely believe some of the stories Seamus told me."

  "You'd be wise not to," I replied. "Seamus is the biggest liar east of the Mississippi."

  "And Father Ronan too? He had a few enlightening remarks to make about your character."

  "Well . . ." I hesitated, remembering some of the pranks I had pulled on my quiet, introspective brother Ronan before he had entered the priesthood. And the few I had perpetrated since. "I suppose I was rather lively when I was younger . . ."

  He laughed, and it was a warm sound in the rapidly chilling air. "I heard about the lovely confession you made three months ago—poor Father McShane nearly had a heart attack."

  "He needed something to brighten his day," I defended myself with mock virtue.

  He was suddenly very close, so close that I could smell the faint odor of tobacco and wet wool from his greatcoat. And the odd scent of gunpowder from a scorched mark on the arm. "You're very good at doing just that," he said in a husky voice. "Mary . . ." he bent down, and in another minute he would have kissed me. And I would have let him. I even shut my eyes, waiting for his mouth to claim mine once more- it seemed so long since that day on the train platform.

  But the moment passed suddenly, and he drew away. "You can open your eyes, Mary," he said in a cold, dry voice. "I have no intention of forgetting myself again, at least not anymore than I have already. As I said before, I'm not in the habit of seducing innocents. Put on your cloak." He tossed it to me, and I caught it with numb hands. He kicked at the dying coals with a sudden cold rage, and started for the door without a backward glance to see if I was following. The room was dark and silent, and some wanton devil in me made me long to fling myself in his arms, and see how unyielding he'd be then.

  I pulled the cape around me, tying the ribbons at my throat. Preceding him out the door, I was unprepared for the blast of cold wind and snow that stung my face.

  He slammed the door behind us, an inscrutable expression on his face. "It's been snowing all afternoon. If it had been one hour later we wouldn't have made it out of the house tonight."

  Wicked creature that I was, the thought warmed me. I would have enjoyed being trapped with him, forcing him to open up to me once more, as he had so seldom. I could have made him come out of that shell of distrust and contempt, made him smile at me as he had before. I knew I could. But fate had denied me the chance. It was just as well; the thought of returning to Maeve's and Lillian's disapproving faces was enough to daunt even my stout heart. I was already seriously frightened of what Maeve was contemplating for her blameless son as punishment for my disobedience.

  "It would be better if you didn't come back here," he added, as he stepped off the porch into the whirling, drifting snow, "The snows are particularly bad
this time of year—you could lose your way and be lost until spring."

  "Are you forbidding me?"

  "No. I'm merely suggesting. If you find my old house so welcoming, then it's up to you. I'm sure Maeve and Lillian couldn't care less what happens to the old place."

  "Why don't you live here?" I questioned, struggling after him through the drifts.

  "That should be rather obvious," he answered shortly. "My wives prefer splendor."

  I was insatiably curious about Kathleen. I stumbled ahead eagerly. "Did your first wife plan Demonwood?"

  "I would have thought that was obvious also," he snapped. "She had a taste for grandeur, just like your cousin."

  "I prefer the farmhouse," I said in a low voice.

  He stopped, turned, and stared down at me in the dark night, wind whipping around us. "But then, what you prefer doesn't really matter, does it?" he asked coldly, and I felt a twist of pain at the cruelty in his voice. He turned and started onward, and I kept silent, preoccupied with the difficult going and the absurd tears that were welling up in my throat and spilling onto my already icy cheeks.

  The faster he walked, the more I struggled, the more I struggled, the faster he walked. And through it all the tears kept pouring down my face. Until finally we reached the edge of the woods, and the fields surrounding the dark and forbidding shape of Demonwood.

  "Mind the drifts," he snapped, but I could barely hear him, with the wind taking his voice and spinning it past me. The snow was sharp, stinging needles in my face and eyes and I could see only a few feet in front of me. I tripped and fell, but Connell kept doggedly onward with not so much as a backward glance, so gamely I picked myself up and trudged ahead. The next time I fell down I stayed down, surrounded by the cold, wet, hateful snow, tears of pain and rage and discomfort pouring down my face and into the neck of my dress.

  "What are you doing?" I heard Con's angry voice demand.

  "Go away, damn you!" I wailed. There was nothing I wanted to do more at that moment than stay in my miserable pile of snow and cry.

  Connell, needless to say, was not so obliging. With a less-than-gentle yank he pulled me to my none-too- steady feet and peered down at my tear-streaked face in the snowy darkness.

  "What are you crying about?" he questioned crossly.

  I tried to pull out of his iron grip, but only succeeded in losing my precarious balance and falling against him. I would have liked to stay right there, weeping copiously, but my rescuer righted me without a word. "Why are you crying?" he repeated.

  I had had enough. "Because you're a dirty, rotten bastard," I howled. "You're a mean, nasty, selfish, uncaring brute. You're . . . you're . . ."

  Words failed me, and I stood glaring at him, filled with rage and misery and longing in the snow-filled night.

  "Is that all?" he asked in an ominously still voice after a moment or two.

  I considered whether I had any more epithets to hurl at him. My outburst had relieved some of my immediate misery, and I was slightly shocked at my daring. "Yes," I answered meekly.

  "Good." He scooped me up in his strong arms and started forward, ignoring the small yelp of protest I made. "Stop squirming," he said calmly. "Obviously the snow's too deep for you."

  "I'm too big to be carried," I protested weakly, feeling very small and fragile indeed.

  "Don't be absurd—you're little more than a child," he murmured under his breath.

  After my struggles through the ever-deepening drifts I was more than willing to give myself up to Connell

  Fitzgerald's strong arms. I was chilled to the bone, angry and miserable, and I told myself I had every right to snuggle against his unyielding shoulder and hide my head from the biting snow. Father McShane would have seen through such excuses, I knew, but I refused to worry about that right then.

  We met none of my would-be rescuers on our way in, and Connell strode through the back hallways past the staring Mrs. Carpenter without a word, straight into the cozy library. A warm fire was crackling merrily on the hearth, and the room was filled with a reassuring warmth. With less solicitude than I would have cared for, Con dropped me onto the loveseat by the fire, poured me a good stiff shot of Irish whiskey, and handed it to me with the stern injunction to drink it down fast.

  My teeth were chattering so hard I could barely speak, and I held the glass in shaking fingers.

  "Mmmmmy . . . father . . . always said . . . to sip the good Irish," I shivered.

  "I don't give a damn what your father said, drink it down." He poured himself a glass and tossed it back as if it were water. Throwing off his coat, he went over and poked the already adequate fire into Pompeiian grandeur. He turned back and glowered at me, and hastily I drank the warming stuff, enjoying its fiery path through my frozen body.

  He brought the Waterford crystal decanter over and poured me another glass of equal depth, then began untying my snow-packed cape with impatient fingers. It brought his face alarmingly close to mine, and I averted my head stiffly and proudly. He put one strong hand under my chin, forcing me to meet those dark, unfathomable eyes.

  "What were you crying about, you silly girl?" he asked softly, the barest trace of a smile on his face, for once devoid of cynicism, and my heart melted. "You should know better than to listen to my bad- tempered ravings."

  "Indeed she should," Maeve's light voice floated from the doorway. "I'm so glad Connell found you, Mary. But then, I knew he would. I was sure he'd know just where to look."

  Connell had straightened and moved away from me when we had first heard her voice, not with any haste. It was I who was guilty of lustful thoughts, not him. "She was lost in the woods, Maeve. Up in the west pasture . . . I found her wandering around half- frozen."

  "Poor little Mary," she clucked, her eyes missing nothing. "And so you had to be such a heroic gentleman and carry the poor creature through the snowdrifts. You could have put her down when you got to the house, Con." Her voice turned waspish. "You've never bothered to carry me two feet, even in the worst weather."

  "You've always been more than able to fend for yourself, my dear," he replied with a cool boredom, totally at variance with his previous gentleness toward me. A gentleness I cherished. Before she could respond with the justified outrage she was feeling, he continued smoothly, "Your cousin was already too tired to make it much farther on her own. If you would have preferred me to let her struggle ahead on her own two feet, we would still be out there."

  "I'm sure you did the right thing, Con, darling," she purred. "You always do, don't you? In the meantime, Mary would be much happier out of those wet clothes. Lillian's waiting for you, Mary. Go and change."

  Reluctantly I rose from my exceedingly comfortable seat, letting out a small gasp as the wet, snow-soaked hem of my dress slapped against my legs. I was dizzy from the heat, exertion, and Irish whiskey, no doubt, but I was not a Gallager for nothing. I smiled regally at them, my eyes only slightly glazed, and sedately made my way to the door and through the hallways, barely hearing Maeve's voice hissing, "And you've made her drunk, I can see. It's a shame I came and interrupted your charming little tête-à-tête. In a few more minutes you would have divested her of all those wet, nasty clothes, I'm sure."

  And his voice floated back to me. "I'm sure I would. It's too bad you weren't out with your stalwart young groom. But then, he was too busy shooting at me to waste time on the charming widow-to-be. It must have given you a great deal of disappointment to see that he missed."

  "I don't know what you're talking about," Maeve's voice came to me, bland and unconvincing.

  "There you are," Lillian broke through my eavesdropping and I jumped nervously. Her brown silk figure bustled up to me and one surprisingly strong arm slid around my waist. "Bed's the place for you, my dear. Come along." And blindly, unthinkingly, I went, my mind still back on the scorched mark on Connell's elegant tweed coat, and the bullet that apparently had caused it.

  "Will you come to Mass with me?" Lillian appeared at my bedroom d
oor the next morning, a frumpy black hat clamped firmly down on her bowed head, her muddy brown dress rustling. "We haven't had enough time together since I've been back from Europe. I thought an early service might be nice for us both. I'm sure we're both in need of a little spiritual guidance."

  I stopped in the doorway, one hand resting on the gilt doorknob, a small example of Maeve's ornate decor that had made its way all the way up to the attic, while I considered how to refuse her invitation without sounding churlish. Connell would be waiting at the breakfast table, watching for me, I hoped, perhaps with the tenderness he'd shown so briefly last night. Even his not infrequent looks of scorn would be preferable to missing him when he was so seldom here. And I knew deep in my heart that my self- indulgent days in his presence were numbered.

  Lillian's nut brown eyes watched me with far more acuteness than I could have wished. "Con's already eaten and gone, Mary," she said sharply.

  I started guiltily, feeling a deep color flood my face. "I don't know what you mean," I said mendaciously, keeping my eyes wide and innocent. "And I'd love to go to Mass with you. Just wait till I get my cloak."

  Lillian nodded, not fooled for a moment. "Father Lejeune has been asking for you," she murmured. "I believe it's time you took your immortal soul more seriously." Her mouth pursed in gentle disapproval, and it was all I could to keep from telling her to mind her own damned business. Because, of course, she was right, and motivated mainly by worry for me. I nodded meekly, and went to get my wrap.

  The Mass dragged on interminably, and for once the familiar peace that usually filled my tense body eluded me. It seemed that everyone was staring at me, whispering, their eyes cold and dark and disapproving. And I felt they could all read the one thing that preyed on my mind throughout the service—my guilty passion for Connell Fitzgerald, a sin I could not and would not give up.