by Cheryl Bolen
With an oath Griffin flung himself onto his own mount, desperation rising inside him as he watched the half-crazed girl hurtling away on the charging stallion. Sweet God, she was going to kill herself—break her cursed neck!
He urged his gelding after her hopelessly. He knew full well he could never catch Macbeth.
... cannot stay... God, what have I done... Her cry cut at Griffin as he struggled to keep stallion and rider within his sight. Three times she almost fell, and once the half-mad stallion nearly slammed her into an overhanging limb in an attempt to brush her from his back.
Griffin cried out a warning. He watched, desperate, as he saw Beau rein the stallion toward what seemed a solid wall of trees. The woodlands were treacherous with undergrowth, and they seemed to swallow her whole.
The sound of crashing hooves through brush, the lashing of branches against horse and rider made Griffin's hands clench tighter still on the reins as Isabeau disappeared from his sight. He drove his gelding with a savagery that stunned him, goaded by the image of her lithe, infinitely sweet body lying on the ground, bloodied, broken.
Dead.
Nay, Griffin told himself, a shaft of foreboding lancing deep inside him. Beau was the most gifted rider he'd ever seen. But at that instant it was as if the fates were jeering at him. A horrible equine sound split the air, and that sound was lost in a human scream more awful still.
He leaned low over his gelding's neck, plunging on down the ragged path Isabeau and Macbeth had cut in the brush. It seemed an eternity before he broke into the hidden clearing and saw the massive stallion plunging about in raw terror, some bond of loyalty keeping it from abandoning its mistress despite what looked to be some poacher's carnage scattered all about.
Griff's nostrils were assaulted by the stench of rotting flesh as his eyes swept the carcass of a lamb, it’s throat slit, it’s wool red with blood. A stag dangled, butchered, in a way that bespoke a cruelty that would have sickened Griff were he not nearly mad with fear. Like a child's doll Beau laid crumpled in the shadow of gray stone ruins.
The half-crumbling structure seemed as still and eerie as a tomb.
Griffin flung himself from his gelding's back, unable to think or breathe as he ran to her side. He crashed to his knees, not feeling the stones cutting into his flesh, feeling nothing save the most crushing panic he had ever known.
"Isabeau!" The harsh, animal cry could not be his own. "Isabeau, for God's sake!" His hand searched frantically for a pulse. Her skin was warm, but her face was a waxen white.
His heart almost stopped as his eyes locked on a smear of dark crimson upon the blue camlet. His mind raced in denial. Surely a fresh wound would be bright red—bright. The blood could not be Isabeau's.
Suddenly a shudder went through her slender body, a sob shaking her shoulders. She whimpered, and the sound of it made Griffin's own throat go raw.
"—should die... deserve it for... for what... I did—" she choked out. After a moment of relief Griffin's stomach tightened in knots at the thought that this broken, devastatingly vulnerable woman was his wild, bold Isabeau. He pulled her into his arms, cradling her against his chest, stroking the hair back from grimy cheeks.
"Shh, now," he murmured, sliding his hand down to check for broken bones. "I never heard anything so absurd! What the devil could you have done that was so horrible in that tiny scrap of time it took me to walk from the stable yard to the inn? You were bloody beaming with happiness when I left you, love. Babbling to that cursed man-killer of yours. I know you've a dastardly temper, but I doubt even you could have stirred up Armageddon so quickly."
She opened her eyes and they were pools of pain. "I saw her, Griff. Saw her with that... that beast pawing her! Would have sold my soul for my pistols to... to blast him away."
"Of course you would," Griffin agreed, as though she were a child, "and a mighty handy job you would have done of it."
"It is my fault... my fault that she had to... to do it. But I thought Jack was taking care of her. He promised me. Promised he would, and I... I trusted him." She buried her face in Griffin’s chest. "But the whole time I was playing at grand lady, fighting with you, kissing you, Molly was scared and... and alone... and... Nell was forcing her to go off with those men who hurt her."
Griffin leaned his cheek against her tumbled hair, feeling her tears dampen his shirt, sear his heart.
"Beau," he whispered, "surely it is not your fault. This Molly, Jack, Nell, whoever these people are, they have a free will, can care for themselves."
She yanked away from him, her head cracking into his jaw so hard he winced. "What do you know of it?" she lashed out, her eyes spitting outrage, her hands knotted into fists. She looked pale and sickened by something Griff could not understand. "You, in your fancy house with your servants running about to kiss your bleeding feet if you want them to. What do you know about being abandoned? Being hungry? Having to—to sell yourself in order to survive?"
Hurt streaked through Griffin. Although he could see her pain, could sense that she was beyond reason, beyond hope, he felt sick with horror. His brave, beautiful Isabeau endured a similar fate?
"Beau," he said brokenly. "Sweet God, you did not... were not..."
"A whore?" She jammed herself to her feet, stumbling, wobbling, but when Griff leapt up to steady her she ripped away from his fingers, eyeing him with such loathing his breath caught in his throat. "Nay, I was no whore. But only because I took up the pistols and bolted off for the highroads. If I'd not been able to ply that trade, God knows I would have been forced into the other."
Griffin's jaw clenched. Beau gave a harsh laugh. "An empty belly and a city full of snow are even poorer bedfellows than a groping man would be."
"Then you robbed to feed yourself? To care for—"
"For myself, aye, and for Molly as well. To save her from having to... to go with them..." Beau's lips curled in a sneer, a laugh that was half sob rising in her throat. "Why the bloody hell did you think I rode? Because I had nothing better to do than try to get myself hanged?"
"You seemed to take such pleasure in running about recklessly, seemed to be so blasted proud of your father." Griff battled to defend himself, more confused than before. "I thought—"
"I am proud of my father. Aye, and of all the knights of the road," Beau cried. "I'm proud of them for not curling up and dying—starving to death—while high-and-mighty aristocrats like you bleed them dry."
The words were a knife thrust to Griffin, and he stood there staring at her, watching her outrage turn to anger, then into regret. The silence was crushing. Beau turned away, pacing to where a dead tree writhed skyward.
"I didn't mean that," she said at last, her voice quavering. "I mean about you. You are... are a generous man, so... giving and caring." She turned the full light of tear-filled eyes upon him, her face washed with a solemnity and an earnestness that transformed her fiery beauty into that of an angel.
"You're wrong, Isabeau. I'm as guilty as the rest of them. Sometimes"—he dragged his fingers through his hair—"sometimes I think I am worse. For I pretend to be most liberal, a blasted philanthropist dashing about with my radical opinions that all life is of value. That everyone deserves to be safe, well tended. Yet I do nothing to bring it about."
"You touch what lives you can. And you are a kind master. And me... look what you have done on my behalf."
"What have I done? I've managed to imprison you in a place you hate. I've forced you to change all that you are—swaddled you in skirts, made you learn to bow that proud head of yours in a curtsy to women who are not fit to wipe the dust from your slippers. Even your riding—I commanded you to do it according to my expectations. And never once... never once did I consider that you had a life before you tried to rob me. Never once did I consider that you most likely had people who loved you. Depended on you."
"I've known joy with you, Griffin Stone." There was a catch in her voice, some emotion that bewitched him glowing even through the sorrow in he
r eyes. "Even when I wanted to toss you out a window you understood me in a way no one... no one ever has before. It is strange, is it not? We just met, but I feel as if I have known you my whole life. Sometimes, even before you speak, I know what you are going to say. And I know just how to make you angry. Just how to make you smile."
She looked down. Her shoulders stiffened as she moved toward him, then her hands came up to frame his face. "I'll remember you, Griffin," she whispered, tears welling in the corners of her eyes, spilling from her lashes. "Always. But I have to go back, don't you see? Back to Molly, back to the only way I know to carve my place in life."
"Nay. Isabeau, I can't let you... let you..." Can't let you go away from me, his heart protested, tortured by visions of her laughing, dancing in the rose salon. You will leave my life barren of joy, he thought.
"But I have to go. Molly—"
"Let me tend to Molly. Help her. I'll send you off to London and catch up with you after I've tended to things here."
"Molly is my responsibility. My friend. I must do this."
"Beau, for the love of God, let me do this for you. Trust me.
He saw the misery deepen in Beau's eyes, and he remembered that some bastard named Jack had promised to help her. Then he had betrayed her when she trusted him to care for her friend.
"Come now, milady rogue, you promised me a month, and you are a full week short of your wager. You gave me your word. Now I give you mine. I'll not disappoint you, Beau," he vowed. "I swear it upon my life."
Slowly she slipped her hand downward, her small, trembling fingers sliding into his own. She was offering him her trust, he knew, yet his whole body ached with tenderness, longing, regret.
For it was as if, in that instant, she were offering him infinitely more.
Chapter 16
London's inevitable fog clung to its rooftops, the blend of smoke, soot, and moisture seeming to spew like fresh-sheared wool from countless chimneys and steeples. Inside the Stone townhouse of Ravenscrest Isabeau paced across the music room, trailing her fingers over the keys of a gilt-trimmed pianoforte. The melancholy tones soughed like the wind upon a night road.
Beau sighed. She had been here three days watching the clocks tick away the hours, listening for any sound that might signal Griffin's arrival. He had promised to come soon, and yet it seemed as if years had passed since she'd last looked into his eyes, seen his smile, heard his solemn promise that Molly would be saved.
But the only word Beau had received was a cryptic note that had arrived by messenger two days before, hastily penned in a bold, masculine scrawl. All well. Things to tend to. Yr. obedient servant, Lord Griffin Stone.
At first relief had surged through her, then joy, but as the time passed with no more word of what things he had to tend to, and what the devil "all well" meant, Beau had begun to chafe, starting at the sound of every coach or rider that passed by until she felt flightier than a bee dancing on boiled honey.
Finally she had scolded herself soundly, forcing herself to ignore the clatter and bustle that surrounded the ducal residence.
But she could not so handily dismiss thoughts of the man who had invaded her heart. There were hints of him everywhere within the elegant house. The assorted bric-a-brac made her remember his expression the day she'd shattered the Ming; the silverware reminded her of their lessons in the rose salon, while every time she put on a gown remembered what he had said about the fabric or the trim or how it suited her face and hair.
Yet the place Beau felt most bedeviled by thoughts of Griffin Stone was in the music room, which was where she spent most of her day.
Beau grimaced. She was lonely. Her eyes shifted to the ornate fireplace. Above the carved mantle hung a portrait of a small boy beside a fat pony. The youth's round cheeks were babe-soft instead of beard-stubbled, the chin a sweet curve rather than a stubborn jut that shrieked of pride. But the eyes danced with devilment, and the lips were compressed with impatience—no doubt to take that noble steed adventuring. They were Griffin's own.
He looked dashed uncomfortable in the portrait, all strangled in a white neckcloth, red velvet and gold galon swathing him from chin to knee. He seemed every inch the tiny monarch ruling over some small kingdom, choked by the myriad of rules and regulations the ton demanded.
Beau looked deeply into those painted blue eyes, knowing the sorrow that lurked behind them. She wondered if Griffin had ever known wild abandon in his childhood. By the saints, his poor pony would most likely have shied if he'd seen her as a child—a red-curled imp pilfering some merchant wares. She wondered if Griffin had known the pleasure of Fair Day. Whether he had ever stolen a peek at a three-headed goat and shivered with delicious horror. Or whether he had watched a juggler toss daggers in a wondrous danger-filled circle.
If Jack had managed to place her in the arms of the Devereauxs, she could have shared Griffin's childhood.
As Beau had wandered about the elegant townhouse these past three days, suffering the fittings of the countless London seamstresses, she had felt a stirring of new respect for the woman who had borne her. And Beau had felt deeply sorry for the child Griff had been. She had longed to strip him of his laces, his jewels, and his title, and to take him off to revel in some merry country fete.
She loved him.
The certainty shocked her, stunned her with its whiskey-warm desires, filled her with aching and need and fiery-fierce passions.
Yet she had never suspected that the emotions the poets rhapsodized about could make her so infernally miserable.
For the man whom she loved—loved with a depth she had never known she possessed—had carted her off to London to polish her up enough so she'd not give her grandmother apoplexy when he dumped Beau on her doorstep. So he could be rid of her. Dispose of her, even as he was off disposing of the difficulty with Molly.
Beau sighed, shaking out the folds of a lilac-pink gown Madame Charmande had completed the day before. In truth, Beau thought glumly, she should be worried that something had gone amiss with Griffin's plans. He said that all was well, and yet had she not believed that was the case when Jack had left Darkling Moor that long-ago night?
Beau cursed herself inwardly. She hadn't even questioned Griffin about his plans for Molly. She had merely nodded and bundled herself off obediently into the Ravensmoor coach bound for London.
Yet as the hours passed and her innate impatience grew until she felt she would explode, Beau had felt a thread of some emotion within her so strong, instinctive, that she could not deny it.
She trusted him.
It was strange that after Jack's betrayal she trusted this man she had not even known a month ago. It was odd that the feeling should be so clear, so undeniable. Yet it was there.
From the time she had been a child she had known that the fairy-tale love her parents shared was wondrously rare, a dream that few were fortunate enough to stumble into.
She had seen the ugly side of love countless times at Blowsy Nell's. Had seen lust, had seen jealousy so ruthless it had resulted in broken bones and dark bruises.
She had seen, as well, the breezy amours of the brigands who roved the night, avowing eternal devotion to one before racing off to another woman's bed.
Yet there was nothing ugly in Griffin Stone's smile. None of that brittle, shallow emotion that had tainted Beau's views of the dealings between men and women.
There was honor in Griffin Stone. There was strength—strength enough to lean upon if one needed it. Strength enough to allow others to stand on their own. Strength enough to leave himself vulnerable to hurt, to pain, to life.
Beau flushed at the memory of his hungry mouth on hers, his hands eager on her body, as if he were seeking something so ephemeral he did not know whether it existed at all.
He had wanted her. But he had been too honorable, too noble to follow the path to which their passions had led.
Beau pulled a face, glaring into a gold-framed looking glass that hung upon the wall. Scruples could be
damned inconvenient at times. But she was glad Griffin Stone possessed more than his share.
For without them she would never have been carried off to Darkling Moor, never have felt the brush of his fingertips against her skin as he dressed her in silver tissue, never have learned to dance while he hummed an off-key minuet.
"Where the blazes is he?" she muttered, plunking herself down upon the pianoforte's stool. Her hands struck the keys, the sound so frightful it would have driven any music master in London to dive into the Thames.
The noise faded away slowly as she leaned her forehead against her dainty sleeves. The confection of curls one of the servants had coaxed her hair into that morning crumpled shamefully under such ill usage. She wanted to kick something.
The sound of a soft rap at the door was flint spark to tinder, and her head jerked upright, sending her carefully arranged ribbons askew. "What the blazes do you want?"
The door swung open, and she saw blue eyes so bright with suppressed merriment she leapt to her feet.
Love should have changed the way she saw him, Beau thought numbly, should have shaped a devilish rogue into some dreamy-eyed knight. But when he stood before her she still saw the rakehell who had set the London ton upon its ear, the blackguard who could devastate any lady at twenty paces with his infernally brilliant smile.
She scowled at him uneasily as she faced him for the first time, having admitted to herself the depth of her feelings.
"Mistress DeBurgh?" Griffin swept her a bow, the play of his well-honed muscles beneath his perfectly tailored, travel-dusted clothes sparking awareness through every fiber of her being.
"It is about time you showed your face about here, Stone," Beau said. "I've had seven proposals and one abduction attempt, and I am eloping to Gretna Green next Thursday."
"Felicitations. Anyone I am acquainted with?"
"A count or viscount or some such. Or was it a duke? I misremember."
"Well, in that case, as a proper guardian, I shall need to provide you with a few necessaries. It seems that the seamstresses have almost finished what might serve as your trousseau," he said, running appreciative eyes over her gown. "And if the man is eloping with you—well, the bounder does not deserve to get your dowry. I shall give you pin money, of course."
