Read Move Heaven and Earth Online
Authors: Christina Dodd
“How beautiful.”
Her words were nothing but an exhalation, but he heard them. He gazed again, squinting against the glare of the sun. He’d seen it that way once.
She stepped up beside him. “I can see forever.”
He looked at her, and realized he could see forever, too. The wind made that possible as it blew the fine blue cotton of her dress against her body, molding every curve. She looked as if some man-elf, far gone with drink, had put her together as his ideal. She was petite, short enough that her head would fit under Rand’s chin—if he could stand.
But she wasn’t skinny. Nice curves. She was pretty, too. Not beautiful, but striking. Even in repose, her face told him that she liked to laugh, for the fine lines around her wide mouth and wide eyes slanted up. But her hair—was that blond or white that slipped among the brown strands?
“How old are you?” he demanded.
“I’m twenty-seven years old.” She answered his question coolly, and asked right back, “How old are you?”
Then he remembered he wasn’t supposed to ask a woman her age. It had been so long since he was made to be polite to anyone, so long since he cared what anyone thought of him, that he had forgotten even that rudimentary rule. But he refused to apologize for such a minor infraction.
He’d done so much worse these last few months, and to people he loved.
“I’m thirty-six years old, going on one hundred.”
“Aren’t we all?”
The birds catapulted on the wind. She studied them,
and he studied her. So white did mark her hair. Her skin glowed like that odd-shaped pearl his mother wore on special occasions, and her big green eyes sparkled as if she’d laughed her whole life, but at some time, for some reason, tears had etched betraying lines into the delicate skin.
“Let’s go there.” She pointed to the flat place down on the first rise.
“No.”
“We could lean against the rock and it’ll protect us from the wind.”
“You’d never get me back up.”
She let her gaze linger on him. “With those muscles,
you
could get yourself back up.”
Suddenly, he realized the wind revealed more than
her
shape. It revealed his, too. What he had brazenly flaunted in the house seemed flagrant exhibitionism now. What was he doing on the cliffs in a robe?
He wrapped the flaps over his chest and tugged the tie at his waist. Then the chair moved, headed down the path under her guidance.
“Don’t!”
He reached for the wheels, but she returned quickly, “Don’t! I’ll lose control.”
Lose control
. Oh, God, that nightmare phrase. He froze as she guided him down the gentle dip, and they came to a stop on the flat stone. She backed him up so he rested in a hollow. Removing her pelisse, she folded it and placed it on the ground, then sat at his feet.
She didn’t say a word. He couldn’t say a word. He was in danger here, he knew it. It was too open, too wild. This exposure whipped his skin raw, dried up his lungs, and chilled his soul.
Yet Sylvan’s wide mouth, which looked as if it should
be in a constant motion of smiling and speaking, remained serene. Her hands rested in her lap, palms up. The incongruous lines in her face smoothed, and she watched the Atlantic as if her salvation existed in its depths.
She’d placed herself to block his chair.
She was saving him from himself.
At one time, he had come here when life became too frenetic, when he needed to make peace with the wildness of his soul. Now the predictability of the breaking waves began to work on him. The seabirds’ calls, the salt tang on his tongue…The tight knot in his stomach loosened. For the first time in months, he didn’t think, he didn’t feel, he simply was.
And what made it better was that his companion seemed likewise affected.
Yet when she looked at him, he realized she felt compassion for him.
He was sick of pity. “What the hell’s your name?” he demanded.
“Sylvan.”
“Sylvan what?”
“Sylvan Miles.”
That sounded vaguely familiar, and he glared. “Do I know you?”
Light and shadow danced across her face as if it were the land beneath a cloud-specked sky. The very lack of expression in her voice told him much. “We danced once.”
Remembrance hit him in the gut.
She had been in Brussels before Waterloo, like so many other English ladies. They’d made a mockery of the greatest battle in modern Europe with their parties and soirees, and Sylvan had been in the middle, flirting with every man, captivating them all, laughing and gossiping,
dressing in the most stylish costumes, riding a fine steed, and…dancing.
Ah, yes, how well he remembered.
“By God.” Rand struck the arm of his chair with his fist. “You were with Hibbert, the earl of Mayfield. You’re Hibbert’s mistress.”
Her serenity shattered, she jumped to her feet. “Don’t you call me that.”
“Why not? It’s true.”
“No, it’s—” She closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them. Quietly, she said, “No, it is not.”
By Jove, he had her now. She was sensitive about her past, as well she should be. “You’re the same as every other female nurse,” he said with relish. “Loose with your morals. But you weren’t a nurse when you were with Hibbert.” Tapping the arm of his chair, he used his ugliest, most insinuating tone. “He wasn’t married, and until you, he’d never kept a woman.”
She lowered her head like a bull about to charge. “Hibbert was my dearest friend, and I’ll listen to no slander about him.”
“Why would I slander Hibbert? I liked him, and he died a hero on the battlefield of Waterloo.”
“Which is more than you did.” She made her own tone derogatory when she said, “Your brother has never married, either. He’s a duke, he needs an heir, and he must be nigh on to forty years old.”
Oh, ho. That explained everything. She was a fortune hunter, like every other woman who pretended interest in Clairmont Court. He reared back in his chair. “Did you come here to catch a duke? Because I warn you—”
“No, I warn you.” She took a breath. “Don’t say another word.”
“I won’t let you make my brother’s life a misery. I’ll
tell Garth the truth—that you’re a whore of the first water.”
Wheeling around, she started up the path, and he watched with savage satisfaction. He’d chased her off, the little tart, and—“Hey, wait!”
She turned back, a tight smile on her lips.
“You can’t leave me here.”
“Oh, can’t I?”
“Dammit!” He maneuvered his chair in a half-circle. “I can’t get back by myself.”
“Can’t you?”
“You know I can’t.”
“You should have thought of that before you insulted me.” She twitched the material of her skirt. “I’ll see you at the house.”
Raw fury and fear bludgeoned him. “I’ll see you in hell.”
“I already know that territory.” She nodded congenially. “If we must meet in hell, I’ll run circles around you there, too.”
He stared as she walked away. Walked away! His only consolation was the clear outline of her buttocks, molded by the wind, as she strode toward the house, and even that was no solace—or shouldn’t have been. Without wanting to, he appreciated that trim outline.
And why not? If he did what must be done, it would be his last memory.
Turning himself again, he gazed at the sea.
After all, what better place to put an end to the one and only madman the Malkin family had ever produced?
Rand’s gaze burned through
Sylvan’s gown as he used the assistance of the wind to see what should be hidden. She knew it was so, although she refused to look back. Instead, she whipped up her anger at his incredible rudeness. Rand had to learn, and immediately, that he couldn’t treat her so offensively. No relationship could exist between them until respect prevailed, and she had seized the first opportunity to teach it to him. This wasn’t cruelty, it was instruction.
But what if he really couldn’t get up the slope?
She pressed her hands to her mouth.
What if he were so far gone he refused the challenge? What if he slipped backward and plunged…
She slowed and almost turned back, but she could still feel his animosity lapping at her. He was angry and hostile but surely not suicidal. No, she was doing the right thing. She strode into the sparse growth of trees on the manor house lawn.
She knew when Rand lost sight of her. The heat of his regard disappeared, and in its place the wind chilled her. She’d left her pelisse behind, and she hesitated. That would be a good excuse to return and check on him.
That would ruin all her progress thus far.
“Sylvan!”
She looked up with a frown and found Rand loping toward her.
Rand? No, Garth. She placed a hand on her suddenly thumping heart. She hadn’t realized how much the brothers resembled each other.
Yet they didn’t. Their height appeared to be much the same, but Garth sported a slight paunch which Rand, even with his forced inactivity, had avoided. Their features were almost identical, but Garth’s brown eyes watched those around him placidly.
It had been that quality that convinced Sylvan to come to Clairmont Court. She’d never met a man who’d set her at ease so immediately, or who so intuitively saw her dilemma at home.
“Sylvan, I’ve been watching for you. Where’s Rand? It’s all uphill from the cliff. Weren’t you able to push him back? I’ll just go after him.”
He chatted, this man who had impressed her with his quiet stolidity, and she realized his anxiety for his brother. Quickly, she moved to intercept him.
“I left him on the cliff.”
“You what?” His slow smile faded. “You left him…on purpose?”
“He was rude and surly.” She tucked his hand into the crook of her arm and tried to drag him forward. “He’s got to learn he can’t insult me.”
Hanging back, he glanced down the path as if expecting
to see Rand. “He’s always rude and surly since his injury. I did warn you—”
“No, you didn’t.” Looking him in the eye, she said, “You said he was a broken man, totally overcome by his injury.”
His smile curved his lips just enough to be smug, and he pointed out, “I didn’t exactly say that. You jumped to that conclusion, and I didn’t correct you.”
Remembering the interview between the two of them, she grudgingly conceded he was right. He had insinuated much and said little, leaving her imagination to do the rest. These were intelligent men, these Clairmonts, and she would do well to remember it in her dealings with them. “Very well. I jumped to conclusions, and you did likewise. You want your brother to overcome his bitterness, I think, and I will do what I can to return him to you as a normal, functioning human being. When you came to my home and convinced me to help Lord Rand, you gave me free hand, remember? You promised—”
“I know what I promised, but I didn’t expect you would leave him exposed to the elements overnight.”
“Neither did I, but desperate circumstances require desperate measures.”
They stared at each other, neither willing to give way.
“I won’t let you kill him,” Garth insisted.
“But it would be such a tidy reprieve.” Garth gasped, and she pressed him. “You wouldn’t have to bear the tantrums and the rudeness and the disappointment of seeing your brother reduced to a cripple.”
“How dare you? I want my brother regardless of his condition!”
His outrage revealed very clearly why he had resorted to deception to get her to Clairmont Court. He would have done anything to bring her, for he would do anything
for his brother. She reminded him, “He’ll be more agreeable when he’s housebroken.”
“But I’m not going to have him put down, regardless of our success!”
“Good,” she said mildly.
His eyes narrowed as he realized how she had tricked him, and he rubbed his face with stained hands. “You’re a clever miss.”
“I’ll need free rein to train Lord Rand, when he’s been resourceful enough to train all of you.” Garth chortled, not at all offended, and she asked, “How long until sunset?”
“Probably three hours.”
“If he’s not in sight in two hours, we’ll send someone to get him.”
“You mean you think he can get himself back up to the manor without help?”
“What do you think?”
“I think he…well, I think…” Garth paused. “I always said Rand could do anything he set his mind to. I guess it’s a question of whether he’ll set his mind to staying there, or coming home.”
“I don’t know your brother well, but my guess is he’ll stay on the cliffs until he’s chilled, then come back on his own schedule.” She smiled. “Just to show me he can.”
Garth scratched the back of his head. “You might be good for Rand.”
She dipped in a curtsy. “Thank you, kind sir.”
“You might be good for all of us.”
She didn’t appreciate that comment as she should. It recalled Rand’s accusation on the cliff—that she’d come to win a duke. She stepped forward with determination. “He looks very strong.”
“He is. He hates this helplessness, and he insists on doing everything possible for himself.”
“Then
you
think he can make it back?”
“Oh, yes.”
“And you don’t think—” she hesitated, hating to put the thought into his mind, but she needed more reassurance than her own instincts, “he would consider throwing himself off the cliff?”
Garth laughed out loud. “Rand? Never. Rand thrives on a challenge, always has. As I told you when I met you before—and coaxed you here—I’m surprised he’s still so disturbed about his condition. It doesn’t seem consistent with his character, somehow, but I suppose none of us knows how long the process of recovery should take. Do we?”
She could see the manor clearly now. Someone had placed boards over the shattered windows in Rand’s room, but even with that bizarre addition the structure no longer looked like an architect’s experiment. It looked only like a place to rest. “I certainly don’t.”
A couple came out onto the terrace. Sylvan recognized the dark clothes of the vicar she’d seen inside, and she presumed the woman to be his wife. He held her firmly as she stumbled down the stairs, and Sylvan wondered if she drank.
Garth insisted, “You know more than anyone, so Dr. Moreland says.”
When the couple gained the flat ground, the vicar shook his wife, then marched her down the drive with the firmness of a perturbed father. Sylvan didn’t envy the wife—she’d dealt with her own perturbed father. “Dr. Moreland was a sneak to tell you that.”
“He said he’d never seen a woman work so hard to heal the wounded, and he’d never seen anyone, man or
woman, who had a better instinct for the workings of an amputee’s mind.”
The couple disappeared from sight, and Sylvan banished them from her thoughts. “Your brother’s not an amputee. From what I saw today—and I saw quite a bit—he has everything he was born with.”
Garth reddened from his chin to his hairline, and she saw one more difference between the brothers. Garth’s forehead was quite a bit higher than Rand’s—his hair had lost the battle of Waterloo, and now made its long retreat.
With a gulp, Garth said, “I’m sorry about his…ah…lack of proper clothing today. He loves to offend our aunt Adela with his outrageous behavior, and removing his shirt is his new tactic.”
“From the little bit I heard from your aunt Adela, offending her would pleasure a saint.” He stopped and stared at her, and she realized she’d overstepped the bounds of courtesy. “Forgive me, Your Grace. It was insufferably rude of me to speak so of your aunt. If you would make allowances for my travel-weary mind—”
He cackled. “Pleasure a saint, eh? I confess, it pleasures me, and I’m no saint. When we were boys, Rand and I used to have contests to see who could best offend Aunt Adela. Of course, I always won, for as duke, whatever I did counted more than whatever he did. And whatever James did, poor cousin, counted more than whatever I did, for he is third in line for the dukedom—and, most important, her son.”
“That must be a difficult role to fulfill.”
“It weighs on him. She would do anything to advance his cause, and he would do anything to make her happy and keep her from nagging.” Abashed, he asked guiltily, “But you never properly met any of them, did you?”
“There wasn’t time.” Mounting the steps to the terrace, she kept one hand on the rail to steady herself.
He summed her up shrewdly. “You never changed from your journey nor took refreshment. Betty will have my head for this.”
“Betty?”
“My…the housekeeper. She bosses us all—except Aunt Adela, of course. Aunt Adela knows what’s proper, but Betty knows what’s hospitable.” Cupping her elbow in his hand, he led her up the stairs and tried to move her to the house, but she resisted.
“I think I would like to sit out here,” she said. “Just until Lord Rand comes into sight.”
“I’ll watch for him,” Garth volunteered.
“I think not.” She sank into one of the chairs set about the terrace to take advantage of the afternoon sun. The light struck her directly on the face, and the warmth the seat had absorbed prowled through her gown until it sank into her bones. “You’d go after him, or at the least hover anxiously.”
“I confess.” He lifted his hands. “I am anxious.”
“He’s not a child.” She leaned her head back and thought how pleasant it would be to fall asleep. Her anticipation at meeting Lord Rand had disturbed her the night before, and the night before that, she’d been awake anticipating the trip. “He shouldn’t be spoiled like one.”
“So I have repeatedly said.” Lady Adela swept onto the terrace. Dressed as if she were attending a fashionable tea, she came to a halt before Sylvan. “I didn’t greet you properly when James introduced us. I bid you welcome to Clairmont Court.”
Garth’s eyes narrowed, and he called, “Mother, come out so
you
, as duchess, can greet our guest.”
It was the cut direct, but Lady Adela nodded. “Quite
right. I shouldn’t have thrust myself before the dowager duchess.”
“Not at all.” Lady Emmaline Malkin stepped onto the terrace and shaded her eyes against the setting sun. “I don’t mind, you know that, Adela.”
“Emmie, you’re the dowager duchess, and you have the right—”
“I know, but I don’t want to thrust myself—”
“You’re wrong, dear. You should—”
Garth cut them off with a gesture. “Ladies, if you would please let me finish—”
“Garth, our guest hasn’t even taken tea yet.” Lady Emmie, petite and concerned, bustled over. “You can’t drag out these courtesies.”
From Garth’s shrug, Sylvan deduced the greetings were over.
Lady Emmie’s gaze darted around. “Er…where is Rand? I didn’t see you pushing him when you arrived.”
Sylvan’s worst suspicions were confirmed. The family had had their noses pressed to the windows the entire time she walked with Rand, and they hovered now in expectation of some further tragedy. Her failure to bring him back, she feared, would be viewed as catastrophic.
Garth stepped in before she could speak. “Rand’s making his own way back, Mother. Sylvan thought it would be salutary for him to learn how much he can do.”
Lady Emmie’s mouth moved without a sound.
“Remember, Mother, we discussed this,” Garth said. “Sylvan knows better than any of us what is right for Rand.”
If only that were true. Sylvan hoped her dismay at their misplaced confidence didn’t show.
But Lady Emmie recovered with all the grace of a true-born English lady. “Won’t you come inside, dear Sylvan? May I call you Sylvan?”
“I’d be honored, Your Grace, but I prefer to stay out here, thank you.” And cast fearful glances toward the sea.
“Then we’ll stay with you.”
“I’d rather you didn’t, Your Grace. I hate to have Lord Rand think anyone is apprehensive about his ability to return.”
As if she didn’t hear, Lady Emmie sank onto a sofa-length seat, her ample bosom sloshing within the constraints of her low-cut bodice. Sylvan held her breath, waiting for the gelatinous creatures to lap over the edge, but the lady seemed to have them well-trained, for they settled as she did.
Sylvan tried again. “Really, Your Grace, I’d prefer—”
“I hear you say we’ve been spoiling Rand.” Rand’s mother touched the fichu that hung around her neck, then tucked it into her cleavage. “We haven’t spoiled him. We just—”
“Emmie, don’t be a fool.” Lady Adela sat beside Lady Emmie. “You’ve spoiled him terribly.”
“
I’ve
spoiled him? I think I’m not alone in this.”
“You don’t mean to insinuate I’ve spoiled him?”
“No, not you. You’ve always maintained a proper distance. But what about
your
son?”
“Oh.” Lady Adela sighed so that Sylvan knew the despair of a woman whose son had failed her. “James.”
“You called, Mother?” James sauntered out.
Malkin blood must run strong in the veins, Sylvan thought, noting the family resemblance between James and his cousins. But James displayed a freer quality, as if he’d escaped the burden of responsibility and reveled in his luck. He wore the finest tight pantaloons, tied his
cravat in the most intricate knot, and had his brown hair cut into the latest style. His boots shone in the sun and a monocle hung from a chain around his neck. In town, he would have been a dandy. In the country, Sylvan had to wonder who the display was meant to impress.
“The nurse here, Sylvan…” Distracted, Lady Adela pursed her lips. “Young woman, where did you get that dreadful name?”
“My mother is a country girl living in London. She misses her home terribly, and when I was born she named me for a wood fairy.”
Lady Adela sniffed. “Common.”