“Did you get my post?” Amelia asked, blinking away her tears of gratitude.
“More than an hour ago. We’ve been fretting over Mr. Riley’s welfare. Huxley came home last night; wanted to ensure we had the doctor here waiting for him.”
“Is Huxley here?”
“Left this morning; haven’t heard from him since.”
Liam, the footman, ducked his head into the carriage. “Where’s his injuries? I want to avoid them if I can.”
“His right shoulder,” Amelia answered, knowing neither would see the bandage under Nick’s shirt. They hadn’t taken the risk of putting on his jacket. The fewer clothes he wore right now, the better they could get to his bullet wound, should it start bleeding again.
Liam climbed in, making the interior of the carriage smaller by the second. “Slide on out, Miss Gr—Mrs. Riley. I’ll turn him around and take his weight. Mrs. Coleman can take his legs with Cook’s help.”
She did as she was asked and watched Joshua, who was the cook, climb in to where she’d been sitting.
Amelia started to shiver when a gust of wind whipped up against her. It was no warmer in the middle of the city than it had been in Highgate. She pinched her lips closed to keep her teeth from chattering and backed up toward the stairs, wrapping her arms around herself, trying to warm up with the friction of her hands rubbing over her chilled body.
She didn’t go into the house until Nick was carried up the stairs.
“Doctor, I wish we were seeing each other again under different circumstances,” she said to the man who walked up the stairs with her.
“I hear his fever has not yet abated,” the doctor said.
“It hasn’t. I’m afraid for him.”
“Let me take a look at the wound before you worry yourself further.”
“How can you remain so calm?” she asked.
“It’s what I do, Mrs. Riley. I promise to do everything within my power to aid your husband. He’s in good hands here. I have colleagues standing by, should their expertise or assistance be required.”
At the doctor’s assertion, Amelia took the first breath of relief she’d taken since finding her husband in his current state.
“Your reassurance goes a long way in settling my nerves,” she admitted.
He took her arm, leading her inside, and the staff looked at her and the doctor for direction.
Amelia didn’t take time to think; she acted, running up the stairs ahead of everyone, leading the way. “He needs to be set up in his room,” she shouted down at them. “Mrs. Coleman, will you get some cold water and linens? We need to bring down his fever; he’s been burning up since early morning and it’s doing him no favors.”
“Right away, Mrs. Riley.”
“Jenny,” Amelia said to one of the maids who had followed her up the stairs, “bring up some strong spirits. Whiskey, bourbon—it doesn’t matter as long as it’s strong enough to burn away any infection we note when we change his bandages.” The doctor was at her shoulder, silently abiding by her direction. “Is there anything I missed?”
“Nothing. We need to look at the wound before we can make any other plans.”
They all made haste, understanding their employer’s dire condition. Amelia threw open Nick’s bedroom door and rushed toward the bed so she could toss the blankets and sheets to the foot. As Liam and Joshua set Nick on the bed, she saw the first sign of life from him in more than a day and nearly screamed in excitement at the development. He rolled his good shoulder, stretching it as he slept, and turned his head to the side.
Amelia exhaled in a rush. Had she been holding her breath, waiting for that exact thing to happen? She thought she might have been, and the relief that filled her gave her extra hope and determination to see Nick well as soon as they could manage it. But she supposed a lot depended upon him. She would just have to give him reason to come back to her . . . and the waking world.
“Nick?” she said softly, hoping his eyes would open so she could talk to him again, see the smoldering gray that always filled his gaze and looked upon her with nothing short of need.
She looked away, saddened by the fact that he didn’t stir. That didn’t mean she would give up on him. He’d always been there for her, and she wouldn’t hesitate to do the same.
Amelia placed her hand to his forehead and was disappointed that sweat beaded on his brow.
“His fever is worsening.” The starkness of her own words sliced a streak of fear though her bones. “Doctor, will you help me remove his clothes?”
The doctor was already standing there, scissors in hand. “Probably better to cut his shirt off.”
Amelia nodded and let the doctor take over, doing everything he asked her. He washed away the yarrow that filled Nick’s wound and pressed the skin to test the coloring.
“The fever is doing its job,” he said.
“And what precisely is that?”
“Fighting any infection. The wound is in good shape and ready to be stitched.”
“Can we not pack it with more of the herb?”
“Can’t risk it,” the doctor said, opening his bag of instruments and pulling out thick thread and a needle.
Amelia took a calming breath. It was part relief, part dread she felt. But with the doctor here, she could almost see the light around the corner.
Nick heard his name through the darkness, like a beacon attempting to draw him nearer. It was faint, but it was there. His focus was on the dream before him, reenacting a scene that was full of sick depravity. Not the worst of his memories but the only one to etch a physical memento on his body.
His hands were bound, unable to move and protect the rest of his body. Cold air licked across his skin, as chilly as frost on a winter’s morning. He was already tired, having fought against being tied up in the first place. He was sure his shoulder was dislocated, as it wasn’t working properly and seemed to throb with an ache so painful it made him want to throw up.
There were no fewer than two broken noses and three cracked ribs among the vicar’s followers. He’d never been happier that he’d been bigger than the rest of the children in the school. How else would he have defended himself? No one else had stood up for him or tried to stop the vicar. They’d held Nick down, forcing him into compliance. Nick would have none of it.
“Nick.” The voice he’d heard earlier was closer now, repeating his name over and over again. It was familiar, and he wanted to go toward it.
He turned back to the scene so clear in his memories, which seemed impossible, because how could he see himself this way when he’d been the one bound, not the onlooker by any means? There had been so many onlookers. They were all as guilty as the man who had wielded the whip.
The first lash of many fell hard and cutting against his back. The sound repulsed him. He couldn’t use a riding whip when they were given the opportunity to ride on horseback. He refused to hurt an animal helpless to his whims. The same rule did not apply to the vicar. He was a cruel man. Bent on a path of destruction. Filled with so much hate, Nick was sure the man’s soul was black as pitch.
The demon who delivered the blow hid in shadows, but Nick knew the man from memory. Nick knew upon whom he needed to exact his revenge to stop these dreams. To keep away the memories that haunted him.
“Tell me, boy—who is your master?”
“No one,” his younger self replied.
Snap.
“Repeat after me if you want to walk away from this,” the devil said.
“You will not own me. No one will.”
A lesson his mother had taught him. While her trade was sex, she was not a victim of the whims of men. Nick would not be a victim and give in to the man who wanted to own him.
“Willfulness is the devil’s work upon you. I will beat it out of you if I must.”
Snap.
Nick was no longer standing, his wrists pulled against the ropes; he was limp, weakly held in place only by the rope that restrained him.
The
whip cut raw welt after raw welt into his back. Yet Nick refused to give the vicar what he wanted.
“I will break you, boy.”
“Fuck you,” Nick said in response, spitting on the floor.
He wiped away the remaining spittle against his bare arm. There was blood on his mouth, probably from biting his tongue the last time the lash fell against him. But he didn’t care. He would do this until he was dead before he would give in.
Snap. Crack. Snap.
The painful strokes came in quick succession.
Nick lost track of how many times the leathers fell against his back. Hot, scalding pain burned through him with every hit. Liquid ran over the back of his bare legs, tickling toward the front like warm fingers defiling his skin.
He couldn’t get his feet under him anymore. He just prayed the vicar’s arm tired before he lost more blood than he could afford. Before he lost his ability to stay lucid and the vicar tried to take him, like he had the other boys, like he had watched the vicar take his friend, Michael Shauley.
“What have you to say now, demon child?”
“I cannot be broken.” Though his voice certainly was. “You will have to hit me harder,” he said spitefully.
Nick probably shouldn’t have said that, but the more he thought about the fate that awaited him if he gave in, the more he wanted to kill the vicar with his own two hands. He remained strong and finally got one foot under him and pushed himself up so he wasn’t hanging by the rope. The feeling tingled back into his arms, and the throbbing at his shoulder intensified.
“Nick!” called the lyrical voice again, drawing him away from the bloody scene that kept repeating and that he seemed trapped to relive over and over again.
He wanted to go toward the voice. He needed to pull himself away from the nightmare he watched unfold for so many nights now that he wondered if he imagined it in the first place. He tried to reach behind him to touch the scars on his back, but his hands wouldn’t move. Was he bound even now?
He struggled against the restraints, growing more panicked by the minute. It was like he was both part of and a witness to his past.
He couldn’t escape it.
He’d never been able to run far from it. His dreams wouldn’t free him. They bound him as sure as the rope had bound his body to the whipping post.
“Nick.”
Louder this time.
Closer.
He wanted to reach out and touch the sound that echoed around him, that was the only thing drawing him out of the darkness.
The coolness of the room made him shiver; his teeth chattered. Softness brushed against his skin. Not like the trickle of blood that had run over his broken body; this was different, soothing, kind. Like hands covering him all over at once, warming him, urging him away from the darkness he was helpless but to stare into.
He didn’t want to leave the past. He wasn’t ready to make that change. He could not forget those he must repay for their sins.
Crack.
Nick’s body swayed limp beneath his restraints once again. His body was broken, bleeding. The pain was unbearable as his feet tried and tried again to get under him, to lift him up, to give him the strength he needed to get through this. But the blood on the floor made it impossible to find steady ground.
What did this memory hold that was so important he couldn’t let it go?
His past was inescapable. It existed just like this in his memories.
Why did he want to stay here?
To remember. To destroy the man who had done this to him and so many others. He needed to always remember where he came from. Remember the faces of those against whom he sought revenge.
“You can’t leave me like this,” a sorrowful voice whispered in his ear.
He didn’t want that voice to be sad. And that was when he realized he didn’t want to be trapped in this reality anymore.
Nick opened his eyes, squinting at first as he pulled himself out of the somnambulant state in which he was trapped. The simultaneous itch and burn in his arm had him twisting, trying to get comfortable where he lay. He tried to raise his forearm to block the sun from his eyes, but it didn’t move. He shielded out the harsh light of day with his other hand.
“Nick! Thank God.” Amelia’s voice was like a thousand shards of glass crashing around him, and he flinched. His eyes squeezed shut to put him back in darkness. His vision wavered, even as he tried to blink them open again.
“Sorry,” she said in a much quieter tone. “Here. Drink this.”
A spoon parted his lips, allowing water to slide over his dry tongue. He took every drop greedily, rolling it around to hydrate him. He was so thirsty it was like he hadn’t had a drink in a year.
Nick blinked a few more times until his eyes came into focus, and he was staring at the canopy of his bed in London. They’d been in Highgate. Why weren’t they in Highgate now? He needed to be there to exact his revenge. Then he recalled his last moments of lucidity. He’d been shot. He had to find Shauley and kill the bastard. The list of men who would be repaid for their misdeeds was ever growing.
“How long have we been here?” Nick asked, his voice groggy and sounding not like his own.
“Two days. I had to bring you home to be treated by your doctor. You grew feverish . . . Nick, you scared me half to death . . . I can’t tell you how glad I am to see you awake. It means you’re on the mend.”
Her words were rapid, as though she had a million things she needed to tell him all at once. But he could barely comprehend all that she said. Still unable to move his tongue around, he let her fill the silence with her chatter. Her voice had a musical quality to it. One to which he could fall asleep.
She squeezed his hand and placed the spoon up to his mouth again. “Don’t you dare fall back to sleep. Try to stay awake, darling. The doctor will want to examine you.”
With his good hand he reached for the arm that burned. It was held tight to his body by linens tying it in place, keeping it stationary. When his fingers prodded his shoulder he hissed in a pained breath and dropped his good arm to the bed. It fell like a dead weight, and Nick hated nothing more than being weak and helpless to defend himself.
“I had to keep your arm steady,” she said apologetically. “Your nightmares grew worse over the last day. You were struggling and moving around so much I thought you’d tear all your stitches.”
He could imagine.
“Huxley?”
“A missive arrived from him an hour ago. He said he would be back in London before the dinner hour. That’s the first I’ve heard from him since you were found in the courtyard of the inn. No one knows how you got there, Nick. Do you remember what happened?”
“Shauley.” His tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth; the name came out garbled.
As Amelia came closer, the mattress dipped by his hip. “Let me help you sit up so you can take a glass of water. It will help you talk. But you don’t have to say anything yet if you don’t want to. All that matters is that we are home, and you are going to be all right. I was so afraid, Nick. God, I was so afraid you were lost to me.”
Gingerly, Amelia slid her arm behind his back and pulled him up enough that she could prop him up with a few pillows. Nick rotated his aching shoulder, feeling the pain that rushed through his arm with the movement. Pain meant he was alive. Pain meant he was on the mend and could find the strength to track down Shauley once and for all.
“Be careful with your movements. We had to stitch the wound, and you might pull the stitches loose if you aren’t careful.”
A cool glass pressed to his lips and water washed over his tongue. He drank it down, taking the glass from her with his good hand before he was finished and handing it back to her when it was empty.
He would not be treated as an invalid, not even by his pretty wife.
Cracking his eyes open, he found the light still bothered him, but the pain in his head had lessened. “Can you draw the curtains?” he asked.
“Of
course.” She scrambled off the bed and yanked the heavy brocade material closed, blanketing the room in shadows. When he opened his eyes again, he was able to focus on his room and on his wife. Amelia approached the bed with tentative steps, sat on the edge of the mattress, and placed a hand over his forearm where it rested across his abdomen.
Amelia’s hair was down and braided to one side. Dark circles were visible beneath her eyes, as though she hadn’t slept in days. He reached out and placed his hand against her cheek. She nuzzled into him with a soft sigh. “I’ve missed you beyond expression. I’ve missed you so much, Nick.”
“I’m sorry to have distressed you. I have caused you pain, and that’s not something I take lightly.”
“You have nothing to apologize for, just . . . just let me take care of you. The doctor said it would be a few weeks before you were back to your old self. I almost didn’t believe you would come out of your fever, and when you didn’t wake after that, I thought you were lost to me.”
“Never lost. I could hear you calling my name. I wanted to come back to you with every whispered word.”
Amelia stood and kissed his forehead as one might a sick child. He grabbed hold of her arm so she couldn’t escape him again. “Don’t leave. Not yet.”
“I have to call for the doctor.”
“The doctor can wait.”
“Nick.” There was admonishment in the way she said his name.
“Sit with me. We have things to discuss before the doctor interrupts us. I have all these holes in my memory I need to fill. To understand what happened.”
She gingerly sat on the edge of the bed again, the back of her hand pressed to his forehead, checking his temperature.
With a heavy sigh, she said, “I will humor you for a while. But my instructions were to call on the doctor immediately.”
“In Highgate, who found me?” he asked.
“The innkeeper. But news went around the village shortly after you made your way to the inn courtyard. Everyone wanted to know what had happened, if you were alive.” Amelia took an audibly unsteady breath before she could continue. “The fear that paralyzed me when I saw you . . . ”
Desire Me Always Page 15
