After Midnight

by Teresa Medeiros

  Adrian opened his mouth to deny the words, but before he could, Julian was gone.

  “Julian! Julian! Where are you going?”

  That winsome cry echoed off the stone walls of the ancient bailey that had once hosted tournaments for kings, knights, and their fair ladies.

  Ignoring it, Julian blinked the rain from his lashes and continued to stalk toward the stables. He didn’t know where he was going. Even with the sky a sullen mass of clouds and rain pouring from the heavens, it wasn’t as if there was anywhere he could flee to escape what he had become. Despite the careless boast he had hurled at his brother, he doubted that even hell would welcome the likes of him.

  “Julian! Why won’t you answer me? I won’t be ignored, you know, so you needn’t try.”

  He bit back a groan. There was no question about it. Portia Cabot was even more persistent than his brother. And infinitely more alluring.

  He whirled around so quickly that she nearly stumbled into him. He wanted to reach out a hand to steady her, but was afraid of the consequences, so he simply stood gazing down his nose at her as she awkwardly regained her footing on the slick grass.

  She was gripping a parasol in her gloved hand—a ridiculous confection of silk and lace that was in danger of crumpling beneath the weight of the rain. With her dark blue eyes aglow and her damp curls threatening to tumble out of their hairpins, she looked like a bedraggled sprite.

  “Shouldn’t you be at your sister’s bedside?” he demanded.

  She wrinkled her pert nose at him, plainly taken aback by his brusqueness. “I’m sure she’ll be just fine now that she has Caro to look after her. I was concerned about you. You looked so pale back there in Vivienne’s room that I was afraid you might be taking ill yourself.”

  He snorted. “I’m afraid there’s no cure for what ails me. At least none a doctor can provide.”

  “Is that why you and your brother quarreled?”

  “How do you know that?” He narrowed his eyes, lowering his gaze to study the faint circle of dust that marred the snowy muslin of her skirt. “Were you kneeling at the library keyhole, by any chance?”

  A guilty flush tinted her delicate cheekbones as she brushed at her skirt. “I was getting ready to knock when I accidentally dropped my handkerchief. It was only by pure happenstance that I heard your raised voices.”

  Julian quickly deduced that was all she had heard. If she had heard him denounce her as a “lovesick puppy,” he doubted she would still be dogging his heels.

  “My brother was simply delivering his standard lecture. He thinks I drink too much,” Julian confessed, surprised to find himself inching so close to the truth. He’d grown very accomplished at lying in the past few years, especially to himself.

  “Do you?” she asked, looking genuinely curious.

  He raked a hand through his hair, finding it suddenly difficult to meet her eyes. “On occasion, I suppose.”

  “Why?”

  He shrugged. “Why does any man drink? To dull the thirst for something else he wants desperately, but can never have.”

  Portia moved almost imperceptibly closer to him, boldly capturing his gaze. “I’ve always felt that if you want something badly enough, then you should be willing to move heaven and earth to get it.”

  Julian gazed down at her dusky brows and lush lips, thinking it ironic that such an angelic face could bring him such hellish torment. With a restraint he didn’t know he still possessed, he reached down and gently tweaked her nose. “You should be thankful, bright eyes, that I don’t ascribe to the same philosophy.”

  Turning on his heel, he continued on toward the stables, leaving her standing all alone with her parasol drooping in the rain.

  Leaning forward in the chair she’d drawn next to the bed, Caroline gently stroked her sister’s golden curls from her brow. Vivienne’s condition had neither improved nor worsened throughout the long day and night. She simply looked as if she might continue in her unnatural slumber forever.

  The footman had returned to the castle just as night was falling and the rain was tapering off with word that the doctor was attending a difficult birth and might not arrive until morning. Portia was napping in her bed, while Constable Larkin had insisted upon keeping his own vigil in the sitting room that connected the two chambers. The last time Caroline peeked in on him, he had been nodding off over a cold cup of tea, his stocking feet propped on an ottoman, a well-worn volume of Tyburn Gallows: An Illustrated History sprawled in his lap.

  Vivienne sighed in her sleep and Caroline wondered if she was dreaming. Did she dream of Kane’s blue-green eyes dancing in the sunlight and wedding bells? Or did she dream of darkness and surrender and bells that eternally tolled the midnight hour? Just as she had a dozen times before, Caroline drew back the collar of her sister’s nightdress to study the creamy expanse of her throat.

  “I gather you didn’t find what you were looking for.”

  At that somber drawl, Caroline glanced over her shoulder to find Kane’s dark figure silhouetted against the moonlight. Why should it even surprise her that he was standing not by the door, but the open window?

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Caroline lied, deftly knotting the ribbon at the throat of Vivienne’s gown. She had searched every inch of her sister’s pale flesh, but found no mark at all, no evidence of foul play.

  He started forward. Caroline rose, once again placing herself between him and the bed.

  This time he didn’t stop until he was near enough to touch her. “Why won’t you let me get closer, Miss Cabot? Are you afraid for your sister? Or for yourself?”

  “Do I have reason to be, my lord?”

  His searching gaze caressed her face. “If you believe me such a despicable villain, then why don’t you scream for Constable Larkin? I’m sure he’d like nothing more than to rush in here and rescue you from my dastardly clutches.” Almost as if he couldn’t resist the urge, he lifted his hand to her face, the back of his knuckles brushing ever so lightly over the curve of her cheekbone.

  At first Caroline thought the anguished moan had come from her own lips. Then she realized it was Vivienne. Turning away from Kane, she rushed back to her sister’s bedside.

  Vivienne was muttering and thrashing restlessly beneath the blankets, her cheeks no longer pale, but mottled and flushed. Caroline touched a hand to her sister’s brow, then cast Kane a helpless glance. “She’s burning up with fever!”

  “We have to get her cooled down.” Brushing Caroline aside, he ruthlessly stripped the heavy blankets from Vivienne’s limbs, then gathered her limp form and carried her to the window.

  Caroline’s protest died on her lips as she saw that he was simply exposing her sister’s overheated flesh to the cool night air. He braced one hip against the windowsill, his strong arms cradling Vivienne with such unmistakable tenderness that Caroline had to look away.

  She found Larkin standing in the doorway, his penetrating gaze traveling between the three of them. The shadow of reproach in his eyes might have only been a figment of her stinging conscience.

  “A messenger just arrived,” he informed them curtly. “The doctor is on his way.”

  As they huddled in the sitting room outside of Vivienne’s bedchamber, waiting for the doctor to finish his examination, the hazy glow of dawn began to soften the edges of the sky outside the window. Portia was curled up in the corner of a damask-draped sofa, her expression unusually pensive. Larkin restlessly paced the cozy room, his long legs carrying him from the hearth to the closed door of Vivienne’s chamber and back again. Caroline sat stiffly in a ladder-backed chair, her hands folded in her lap while Kane leaned against the wall by the window, lost in his own thoughts.

  Everyone but Kane jumped when the door swung open and the doctor emerged, trailed by the freckled young maid Kane had addressed as Mattie.

  Although the physician’s questioning gaze immediately went to the viscount, Caroline rose and stepped forward, with Larkin hovering just
behind her shoulder. “I’m Caroline Cabot, sir—Vivienne’s eldest sister.”

  Dr. Kidwell had both the stature and demeanor of a small, ill-tempered frog. He glowered at her over the top of the steel spectacles riding low on his pug nose. “Has your sister been exposed to the elements recently? Suffered a period of protracted dampness perhaps?”

  Hampered by exhaustion, Caroline searched her memory. “Well, it was raining three nights ago when we arrived at the castle. I suppose Vivienne might have—”

  “Ah-ha!” he crowed, cutting her off. “Just as I suspected! I believe I may have found the culprit.”

  It took the last ounce of Caroline’s flagging willpower, but she managed not to look at Kane.

  Dr. Kidwell snapped his fingers at the cowering maid. She crept forward and he whisked an object out of her hands, holding it aloft. Caroline blinked, recognizing it as one of her sister’s leather half-boots. Flushed with triumph, the doctor slipped his finger between the sole and the scuffed toe of the boot, exposing an enormous gap.

  Both Caroline and Portia gasped. When Aunt Marietta had invited Vivienne to come to London, Vivienne had inherited all of the lovely gowns and kid slippers intended for Caroline’s debut. But there had been no money left over from their sparse allowance to buy new boots.

  “There’s another one just like it tucked beneath the bed,” the doctor informed them, “along with a wadded-up pair of stockings that are still a little damp.”

  Caroline remembered wading through the muck of the coaching inn courtyards, their shoulders beaten down by the pouring rain. She shook her head in dismay. “It would be just like Vivienne to ride for hours without complaining once about the holes in her boots or her soaked stockings.”

  Larkin rested a hand on her shoulder, giving it a comforting squeeze. “Miss Vivienne seemed perfectly fine at supper the night I arrived. She was a bit pale, but other than that, she showed no signs of distress.”

  The doctor’s bulging eyes were not unkind. “Sometimes these things lurk in the lungs for a time, sapping the strength and the appetite before they make themselves fully known.”

  Caroline took a deep breath before asking the most difficult question of all. “Will she recover?”

  “Of course she will! She’s young and strong. I suspect she’ll be back on her feet in no time. I’m going to leave ingredients and instructions for a medicinal mustard poultice.”

  Caroline nodded, a belated swell of relief making her knees go weak. Larkin’s arm went around her waist, bracing her.

  Portia scrambled eagerly to her feet. “What about the ball, sir? The viscount’s masquerade is less than a week away. Will my sister be well enough to attend?”

  “I would think so,” the doctor said. “Just apply the poultice twice a day and bundle her up well before she goes outdoors.” He wagged a chiding finger under Caroline’s nose. “And make sure the child gets some new boots!”

  “I will,” Caroline vowed. She would see to it that both of her sisters had new boots, even if that meant she had to go crawling to Cousin Cecil on hands and knees.

  “Oh, please, sir, is she awake? May we see her?” Portia asked.

  The doctor turned his stern gaze on her. “As long as you promise not to giggle and bounce on the bed, young lady.”

  “Oh, I shan’t, sir! I’ll be as quiet and still as a church mouse,” Portia assured him, nearly bowling him over as she galloped gracelessly toward the door.

  Larkin took an involuntary step forward, then glanced down at Caroline, his uncertainty reflected in his eyes. She nodded toward the door, giving him her blessing. As he followed Portia into the bedchamber, Mattie ushered the doctor into the corridor, leaving Caroline and Kane alone in the sitting room.

  Caroline glanced over to find him surveying her, his blue-green eyes more inscrutable than ever before. She bit her lip, battling an emotion that felt dangerously like guilt. She had proved herself only too willing to believe the worst of him. But what else was she to do when he refused to defend himself against even the most outlandish of accusations? How could he condemn her for betraying his trust when he had never offered it to her in the first place?

  Determined to dredge up an apology, however inadequate, she cleared her throat and said, “It appears that I misjudged you, my lord. I believe I owe you an—”

  “That’s where you’re wrong, Miss Cabot. You don’t owe me anything.” Turning on his heel, Kane went striding from the room just as the first rays of the morning sun came spilling over the horizon.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Sunlight streamed over the stone wall surrounding the castle garden, transforming the motes of pollen into sparkling fairy dust. Beneath the leafy green branches of a linden tree, a pair of robins hopped about, chirping and fussing over which twigs and bits of moss would best put the finishing touches on their spring nest. A gentle breeze wafted in from the east, bearing on its wings the heady fragrance of blooming honeysuckle.

  As Caroline strolled the garden’s winding cobblestone path, she longed to turn her face to the sun. But her gaze kept being drawn back to the third-story window overlooking the garden. Only a mullioned pane of glass separated them, yet the sun-drenched garden with its verdant greenery and flitting butterflies might have been a world away from the castle’s shadows. Somewhere behind those towering stone walls, its master slumbered, his dreams and secrets known only to him.

  Kane hadn’t betrayed so much as a hint of reproach toward her in the days since Vivienne’s collapse. He seemed to have neatly and ruthlessly severed the invisible cord that had bound them. If he still felt its irresistible tug whenever she walked into a room, he hid it behind a mask of polite indifference. There were no more witty rejoinders, no teasing spark in his eye when he looked at her. He was behaving with perfect propriety, almost as if he was already her brother-in-law. One would have thought that they had never shared a midnight rendezvous on the Lover’s Walk or a soul-shattering kiss.

  Although she continued to bolt her balcony door each night before retiring, Caroline suspected that there was no longer any need to do so. She slept the entire night through and woke up feeling bereft—as if someone dear to her heart had died.

  “Please, sir, would you ring for some more tea?”

  As Vivienne’s voice drifted to her ears, Caroline paused beneath the shade of the linden tree, her hand on its smooth trunk.

  Her sister was reclining on a chaise at the bottom of the hill, a woolen lap rug tucked around her slender legs. Constable Larkin had just risen from a stone bench and was hastening toward the house. Judging from the open book he’d left on the bench, he had apparently been reading aloud to Vivienne. Caroline smiled in spite of herself, wondering if he was reading Tyburn Gallows: An Illustrated History or perhaps The Halifax Gibbet: Dance of the Damned.

  Since her collapse, Vivienne was no longer content to suffer in silence. She actually seemed to enjoy ordering the constable about when the viscount wasn’t in attendance, asking him to “fetch my shawl” or “ring for another heated brick wrapped in flannel, would you please, sir?” whenever he showed signs of relaxing his vigilance.

  “There you are, Caro!” Vivienne called out, spotting her. “Won’t you come keep me company while Constable Larkin fetches some fresh tea?” She waved her over with the regal grace of a young queen, leaving Caroline no choice but to obey.

  “You seem to have made a most miraculous recovery,” Caroline remarked, taking the seat Larkin had vacated.

  Vivienne nestled deeper into the freshly plumped pillows and covered her mouth to muffle a rather unconvincing cough. “I can manage well enough as long as I stay out of the drafts.”

  At the moment, with the afternoon sun picking out the golden glints in her hair and the breeze teasing the roses back into her cheeks, she appeared to be positively glowing with good health. Had it been Portia, Caroline might have accused her of malingering.

  “Lord Trevelyan’s ball is tomorrow night,” Caroline reminded her. “Are
you sure you’re going to be well enough to attend?”

  Lowering her lashes to veil her eyes, Vivienne toyed with the chain around her neck. The cameo was still tucked safely into her bodice. “I’m certain I will. After all, I couldn’t bear to disappoint the viscount after his many kindnesses to us.”

  As if on cue, Portia came hurrying down the walk from the house, struggling beneath the weight of a wooden box that was nearly as large as she was. Her face was wreathed in a delighted smile. “You won’t believe what one of the maid-servants just delivered to our chamber, Vivi! I couldn’t bear to wait until you returned. I knew you’d want to see it now.”

  Her own curiosity piqued, Caroline rose so Portia could rest her burden on the bench.

  “It’s simply the loveliest thing I’ve ever seen!” Portia proclaimed, whisking the lid off the box with a flourish.

  Caroline and Vivienne gasped in unison as yard upon yard of tulle in the most ethereal shade of maiden’s blush came spilling out of the box. The tulle was draped over an underskirt of glossy white satin.

  Portia held the gown’s low-cut satin bodice up to her chin, taking care not to drag the deep blond flounce of its scalloped hem on the grass. “Isn’t it beautiful?”

  “Exquisite,” Caroline murmured, unable to resist running her own fingertips over the row of gleaming pearls that adorned the gown’s rose-colored satin sash.

  “It’s like something a princess would wear,” Vivienne said, her own lips curving in a besotted smile.

  Still gripping the gown as if loath to surrender it, Portia reached back into the box to retrieve a card of ivory vellum. She handed the card to Vivienne. “I may have opened the box, but I wasn’t so impertinent as to read the card.”

  “It’s nice to know you haven’t lost your scruples,” Caroline said dryly. Portia poked her tongue out at her.

  Vivienne studied the card. “It’s a gift from the viscount,” she said, her smile fading. “He means for me to wear it to the ball tomorrow night.”