Darling Beast

by Elizabeth Hoyt

  She nodded. “I see.”

  He tried to extricate his hand from hers, but she seemed to hold him fast. “Tell me, Mr. Smith, and know that it is a mortal sin to lie to a blind woman: have we met before?”

  The strangest expression crossed Caliban’s face. Lily wasn’t entirely sure, but it seemed to be sadness. “No… my lady. We’ve… never met.”

  “Ah,” she said, finally letting go of his hand. “My mistake, then.”

  Caliban turned to Mr. MacLeish. “I shall be… happy to show… you about the garden… such as it is… sir.” He hesitated and glanced at Lily. “I believe… you were… interested in the… garden as well… ma’am? Would… you like a… tour sometime… after luncheon? Say… three of the clock?”

  Lily felt suddenly breathless, but she managed to say calmly enough, “I shall look forward to it, Mr. Smith.”

  He nodded. “Then… if you’ll all… excuse us?” He gestured with one arm, rather gracefully. “This way… if you please… Mr. MacLeish.”

  “Of course,” said that gentleman. “Lady Phoebe, Miss Goodfellow, a positive delight to meet you both. I do hope our paths will cross again.”

  “As do I,” Lady Phoebe replied, smiling.

  Lily dipped another curtsy and murmured her farewells.

  Mr. MacLeish sobered as he touched his hand to his hat. “Captain Trevillion. A pleasure.”

  “All mine, I assure you,” the soldier drawled, so drily he might as well have been exhaling dust.

  They watched the two men stride off, Caliban already explaining his plan for the garden.

  Captain Trevillion pivoted back to the ladies. “If you’re ready, my lady, I do seem to recall you had some ‘important’ shopping to accomplish this afternoon.”

  “Shopping is always quite important, Captain,” Lady Phoebe replied in a very serious tone. “But Miss Goodfellow has been so kind as to consent to give me the secret to her jam tartlets.”

  “Has she.” The soldier’s tone was flat, with only a very small hint of disbelief.

  Lady Phoebe smiled cheerily. “She has. Please be so kind as to wander a ways off so that we may consult on the matter. I’m sure the place you chose to speak with Mr. Smith was far enough away that you might not be overheard. Perhaps you can wait there.”

  Captain Trevillion bowed woodenly. “My lady.”

  He limped away and for a moment Lily felt almost sorry for the man. He was so very proud and it was obvious that Lady Phoebe used him a trifle hard sometimes.

  But then the lady herself leaned close to her and whispered, “Is he far enough away?”

  Lily glanced to the soldier’s back, now a distance away. “I think so, my lady.”

  “Do be sure,” Lady Phoebe muttered. “I swear the man has the hearing of a dog.” She crinkled her nose. “That doesn’t sound quite right. Anyway, the hearing of some animal that has very good hearing. Terribly annoying.”

  Lily felt her lips twitch. “Yes, my lady.”

  “Now tell me quickly before he comes back and sticks his long nose in: what does Mr. Smith look like?”

  Lily blinked in surprise, her own voice lowering instinctively. “He’s very big—over six feet, with wide shoulders and large hands. He has brown eyes and brown hair worn long. He’s not handsome.”

  Lady Phoebe frowned thoughtfully. “Does he have any mark about him?”

  “I don’t think so, unless you consider an especially large nose a mark?” Lily shrugged helplessly.

  “What do you know of him? His family? His friends?”

  “Nothing,” Lily whispered quite truthfully, dread filling her heart. “Nothing at all.”

  “Blast,” said Lady Phoebe.

  “What is it?” Lily asked, afraid of the answer. “Who do you think he is?”

  “Oh, no one.” Lady Phoebe waved an impatient hand. “It’s just that the captain is so mysterious. I vow he does it simply to vex me. Is he still watching?”

  Lily glanced up to see that the captain was indeed staring at them. “Yes, my lady.”

  “Of course he is,” Lady Phoebe muttered. “Well, might as well wave him over. I thank you, Miss Goodfellow, for a most enjoyable morning. I hope I may call on you again someday?”

  “I’d be honored,” Lily replied as Captain Trevillion again joined them.

  “If you’re quite ready, my lady,” he said.

  “Oh, all right,” Lady Phoebe replied, getting to her feet.

  Captain Trevillion moved adroitly to place his arm just where her hand would land when she rose. “I, too, shall bid you farewell, Miss Goodfellow.”

  “Sir. My lady,” Lily murmured.

  The captain tipped his hat and she watched as they left.

  But the feeling of dread stayed with her. Who had Lady Phoebe thought Caliban was? For despite her disavowal, Lily couldn’t help but think the other woman had had someone particular in mind when she’d asked her questions.

  Lily glanced down at the remains of their tea. The question was this: how dangerous was it for her to become involved with Caliban when she didn’t know who he was?

  DESPITE MAKEPEACE’S IRE, MacLeish wasn’t a bad sort, Apollo thought late that afternoon—although he was very young to be designing and building independently. But he did seem to at least understand the concepts of architecture. The proof, Apollo supposed, would come when the architect showed them his designs for the theater and opera house and whatever else the duke wanted and was willing to pay to have built in the garden. Until then Apollo decided to give the lad the benefit of the doubt.

  Now, though, he found his steps quickening as he walked to the theater. He wanted to see Lily again—without inquisitive strangers or odd architects turning up and, if at all possible, even without her scamp of a son and her disapproving maidservant. He’d forgotten, in those long years in Bedlam, through fear and grief and pain, what it was like to simply be with a pretty woman. To tease and flirt and yes, perhaps steal a kiss.

  He didn’t know how she felt about that kiss—or if she’d let him kiss her again, but he was certainly going to try. He had lost time to make up—much of life itself to live. He’d spent four years in limbo, simply existing, while others found lovers and friends, even started families.

  He wanted to live again.

  But as he neared the theater he heard first the sound of voices raised—and then a male voice shouting.

  Apollo broke into a run.

  He burst from the trees to find a slight man in a purple suit and a white wig standing intimidatingly close to Lily. She wore a shawl over her red dress as if she’d been prepared for their stroll. The two stood in the clearing outside the theater.

  “—told you I needed it,” he was saying, his face thrust into hers. Apollo could see spittle flying from his mouth. “You’ll never sell it on your own, so don’t even try it.”

  “It’s my work, Edwin,” she replied to the lout, bravely enough, but there was a waver in her voice that made Apollo see red.

  “Who are… you?” he demanded, advancing on the two of them, hands clenching and unclenching.

  The man swung around and blinked at the sight of Apollo as if he hadn’t heard him draw near.

  “Who’m I? Who… who… are you, you great ox?” he asked, mocking Apollo’s halting speech.

  He didn’t much mind that—he’d had far worse than verbal jeers in Bedlam—but he didn’t like the way Lily’s face had grown pale at the sight of him. “Caliban, please.” She gripped her hands together as if to keep from wringing them. “Can you come back in a bit? Perhaps half an hour or so?”

  Her voice was too low, too controlled, as if she was afraid of setting the man off. As if she’d set him off before and hadn’t liked the consequences.

  “You know this… oaf?” The man spat the word at her, then threw back his head in cruel laughter. “I vow, Lil, your taste in bedmates has come down. ’Fore long you’ll be lifting your skirts for common porters, if this is the sort—”

  The end
of his vicious rant ended in a satisfying squawk as Apollo backhanded him. The other man staggered and fell on his arse.

  “No, don’t hurt him!” Lily cried, and Apollo hated to think she cared for this man.

  “I won’t,” he assured her in a level tone. He stared at the sputtering rogue for a moment and made up his mind. “But neither will I… stand by while he… abuses you.” So saying, he picked up the man and tossed him over his shoulder. “Wait here.”

  The man made a sort of moan and Apollo hoped he wouldn’t toss his accounts down his back. He’d bathed and changed into a fairly clean shirt before coming to see Lily.

  Pivoting, he marched toward the dock, the man still over his shoulder.

  “Caliban!”

  He ignored her calls. He didn’t really care who this ass was—as long as he was nowhere near Lily or Indio.

  “Put—” The knave had to gasp for breath as Apollo leaped a fallen log, jostling the man’s stomach against his shoulder. When he could draw breath again he swore foully. “Do you have any idea who I am?”

  “No.”

  “I’ll have your head.” The other man gulped and tried to kick.

  So Apollo let the man roll off his shoulder and onto the ground. They were far enough away from the theater anyway by this point.

  The villain stared up at him, pale with rage, his wig fallen to the side. His own hair was nearly black and cropped short. “I know people—people who can and will cut off your blasted cock.”

  “I have no… doubt.” Threats were two a penny. Apollo straddled the prone dandy and leaned down into his face, intimidating him as he’d dared to do to Lily. “Don’t come… back until… you can talk… to her with a civil tongue.”

  He nimbly avoided the kick aimed at his groin and left the knave there on the ground. Lily, after all, hadn’t sounded too pleased when he’d left.

  Nor was she looking very happy when he got back. She was still in the clearing, pacing.

  She whirled on him as soon as he appeared. “What did you do to him?”

  He shrugged, watching her. “Dumped him… on the ground… like the rubbish… he is.” His throat ached, but he ignored it.

  “Oh.” She seemed to deflate a bit at that, only to puff back up a second later. “Well, you shouldn’t have interfered. It wasn’t any of your business.”

  This was not how he’d hoped to spend the afternoon.

  “Perhaps… I wanted it to… be my business.” He approached her cautiously as he spoke.

  “It’s just…” She waved one hand, obviously frustrated. “You just can’t. He’s…”

  Apollo cocked his head. “Indio’s father?”

  “What?” She turned and stared. “No! Whatever made you think that? Edwin’s my brother.”

  “Ah.” The knot that had been pulled tight in his chest ever since she’d started defending the dandy loosened. Family was another matter. One couldn’t choose family. “Then he… should speak… to his sister more carefully.”

  She screwed up her face rather adorably. “He’s not himself. He lost quite a bit of money and he’s anxious about it.”

  He caught her hand and tugged gently as he turned down a path into the garden—away from where he’d left Edwin. “I see. And this is… your fault?”

  “No, of course not.” She frowned, but let herself be led, so he counted that as a contest won. “It’s just that he makes money from my plays.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “How so?”

  “Well, they’re published under his name, you see,” she said, peering down at her steps. She didn’t seem to notice that he still had hold of her hand, and he felt no need to bring it to her attention. Her slender fingers were cool in his. “He’s… well, he’s better able to sell the plays than I.”

  “Why?”

  She kicked a stone in the path. “He has better acquaintances. Better friends.” She blew out a frustrated breath. “He just is better at it, is all.”

  He was silent, but felt confused. How did “better friends” make it easier to publish a play?

  “My father was a porter,” she finally muttered, sounding faintly ashamed. “A common porter. Apparently he often fetched things for the actors in the theater where my mother was appearing. Costumes and props and a cooked hen for dinner and whatever else needed moving or fetching from one place to another. Oh, you know what a porter is.”

  He squeezed her hand gently instead of replying.

  She broke off a twig from a tree as they passed. “Edwin’s father was a lord—well, a lord’s son, which, compared to a porter, is much the same thing. Mama said my father couldn’t even read his own name. But he was handsome, so there’s that, I suppose.”

  “You…” His damnable throat tried to close, but he forced the words out. “You did not… know… your father?”

  She shook her head, glancing at him apologetically. “Mama had a great many lovers, I’m afraid, and none ever stayed long.” She inhaled and shook herself. “Anyway, Edwin’s been very helpful, taking my plays and finding where to sell them. He keeps some of the money and gives all the rest to me.”

  “How much?”

  “What?”

  “You write… the plays—very good plays, I’ll… warrant—and he trots off… and sells them. How… much does he… pocket for such… hard work?”

  She stiffened and attempted to pull her fingers from his.

  He didn’t let her.

  She glared, her lichen-green eyes sparking. “I don’t think that’s any of your business.”

  He stopped and faced her. They were nearly at the pond, at the site where his oak had toppled. He’d found the lead branch broken from the fall and ordered a new tree, but it had not yet arrived. “How much?”

  She held his gaze defiantly for a moment more and he couldn’t help but admire the way the late-afternoon sun’s rays made a nimbus around her face of the fine hairs escaping her coiffure.

  Her eyes dropped. “Twenty-five percent.”

  “Twenty-five percent.” His voice was flat, but inside he was horrified. “Does he know… you don’t have… acting work?”

  “Yes, he knows, that was partly what we argued about.” She’d raised their joined hands to her chest level and was examining his fingers, probably appalled at the ingrained dirt. “I told him that I wanted him to take only twenty percent. But Edwin isn’t always very practical when it comes to money, you see.”

  Apollo would bet his right hand that Edwin could be entirely practical when it came to his own money. “How do you… even know he’s… giving you the proper… amount?”

  She looked up, startled, from his hand. “Edwin wouldn’t lie to me. You must understand.” Now she was holding his hand between her own two. “He… well, Mama drank gin, you see, and by the time I was born she was no longer very much in demand, either in the theater or with men, and it was hard for her.” She ducked her head, studying his fingers, spreading them against her own, comparing their lengths. His hand dwarfed hers. “Very hard. And later there was Maude, but when I was very small, all I had was Mama and Edwin. He made sure I had a place to sleep—for often we moved, from theater to theater or even from one rental room to another. He made sure I had food and clothes and taught me to read and write.” She curled her fingers into the spaces between his, tightening them as if she wouldn’t ever let go. “I owe him… everything, really.”

  “Perhaps you… do,” he said softly, for he knew what it was to be beholden to someone who is unable to fully reciprocate one’s devotion. “But do you… owe him Indio’s life… as well?”

  She looked up at him, her brows knit. “What do you mean?”

  “Indio needs… food and clothes and… a place to sleep, doesn’t he?”

  She nodded.

  “Naturally… he does,” Apollo said. “And how… is he to have… all those things and… more if you let… your brother leech… from you?”

  “I just…” She bit her lip. “I don’t want to hurt him. I know Edwin is
fickle and cruel at times, but he’s my brother. I love him.”

  “How can you not?” he replied, and brought their twined hands to his lips, kissing each of her fingertips one by one.

  When he raised his head she was watching him in wonder. “I don’t know you at all. First I thought you a simpleton. Then you couldn’t speak. And now you can, but you won’t.” She stood on tiptoe and brushed her lips along his jaw, her touch soft and searching, more intimate than any kiss on the lips. “I don’t know you, but I want to. Can you let me in a little?”

  He closed his eyes. This was playing with fire. “What do you wish to know?”

  Chapter Ten

  The youth’s name was Theseus. He and Ariadne were escorted to the labyrinth and pushed inside. Then Theseus turned to Ariadne. He was tall and fair but when he saw that she had brought the spindle into the labyrinth, he laughed in scorn. “You’ll have no use of that here. Better you follow behind me and let me kill the beast.” So saying, he took out a short sword he’d concealed in his robes and, turning right, disappeared into the labyrinth…

  —From The Minotaur

  What did she wish to know? That was easy: Lily wanted to know who Caliban truly was—a name, an identity, something to place him in the world in relation to her.

  But he couldn’t answer that, she knew, so she started with a simpler inquiry.

  “You seem to know about family.” The sun was beginning to set and even with the smell of burnt wood, the garden was a magical place. Birds had begun their evening song around them in the golden rays. “Do you have family?”

  He nodded. “I have… a sister.”

  She smiled up at him, into his muddy-brown eyes surrounded by such beautiful, lush lashes. She was relieved that he’d answered that much—hadn’t rejected her question out of hand. “Older or younger?”

  A corner of his wide mouth cocked up. “The exact same… age as I.”

  “A twin!” She grinned in delight. “What’s her name?”

  He shook his head gently.

  But she wasn’t so easily disappointed now that he’d let her in a little. “Very well. Do you like her?”