Bride (47 page)

Knifing back his elbow, he drove a fist into her belly.

She retched. Blackness seeped in at the edges of her vision. She felt Grably rend her bodice apart. He squeezed her breasts cruelly and laughed. Crazed now, he shoved a hand beneath her skirts and wedged her thighs apart with one knee.

As the light began to go out, Justine saw the face that had the power to overcome any fear, any pain.

Yelling like an enraged animal, Struan fell upon Grably, knocking him off Justine.

Struan was taller and heavier. Grably was driven by some demon Justine felt and knew she had never encountered before.

The two men rained blows that thrashed bone and broke flesh. Blood ran from Struan's nose and mouth. Grably's eyes, already swollen almost shut from Justine's efforts, now oozed bright red at the corners. His habit hung in tatters over the shirt and breeches revealed beneath.

He landed a crushing clout to the jaw, and Struan slid slowly to the ground only inches from the edge of nothing.

The pistol lay a few feet from Justine. On her stomach, she inched forward, arm outstretched, fingers reaching.

Grably scrabbled to lift an evilly rough boulder from the talus. Grunting, he hauled it to his chest and staggered toward Struan.

He would smash Struan's head!

“Glory!” Grably gaped up the trail. “Damn you, you bitch! Glory!”

Justine's fingers closed on the pistol butt.

Filthy and bloodstained, Struan lay still.

“Glory!”

A grinding noise heralded the slow start of the carriage as it pulled away from the trail head. Nudge, the butler from the lodge, was pushing Buttercup into the coach. He jumped in behind her and slammed the door. Left behind was a cart with no horse.

Desperately trying not to distract Grably, Justine rose to her feet. Holding the pistol in both hands, she raised it until the wobbling barrel pointed at the monk's head.

“Glor—” He spun toward Justine and dropped the rock. It slithered from the trail. She heard it bounce and bounce and echo away into the deep distance.

Grably smiled at Justine, a smile that fixed his gray eyes. “You're a brave woman, my lady. I like that. Beautiful, too. We shall do very well together.”

Her knees threatened to give out.

“Give me the pistol. A gentle creature like you could not commit such a vile act as to shoot an unarmed man.”

“To save my husband, I could do a great many things, sir.”

“Your husband is beyond saving.” He stood gracefully aside. “See. He is dying even as we speak. But I am a merciful man. If it pleases you, help him by all means.”

Justine's lips parted. She crept toward Struan's still figure and fell to the ground beside him. “Struan? Oh, Struan.” Hesitantly, she stroked the side of his bloodied face and bent over him—and threw the gun over the cliff.

“You should have kept that,” Struan murmured.

She almost jerked away.

“Stay, sweet lady. Do as I tell you. When he pulls you from me, make no fight. Rest your head upon him and cry.”

“I will tear out his throat.”

“Later. For now, do as I tell you.”

Even as he finished speaking, Grably dragged her into his arms. “I'll need you now, my lady. Seems I've come up against a little mutiny. Time enough to deal with that later. For now we must do the best we can.”

Justine pressed her lips together, leaned heavily on Grably, and contrived to sob—not that sobbing came with too much difficulty under the circumstances. He automatically embraced her.

Then, clawing at the air, he released her and sent her staggering away.

She clutched her bodice over her breasts and dared to gulp fresh air. Struan brought Grably down and fell upon him, pummeling the hateful face with both fists.

“Hit him, Struan! Stop him!” Her pounding heart kept time with the throb at her temples. Gravel embedded torn flesh on her palms, her elbows, her knees, yet the stinging pain was only a faint echo behind fear and desperation.

Grably howled and tore at Struan's hair—and heaved onto his side.

And Struan slipped over the edge …

He just slipped.

Justine screamed.

Then she saw Struan's clinging fingers.

Grably shoved himself upright. Staggering, laughing insanely, he stood over his victim's last hold on life. “I'll win after all, you know, Hunsingore.” He gasped each word.

“What of Saber?” Justine asked, desperate to distract him. “Where is he? Will he help you now?”

“Chance,” Grably said. “He was making inquiries in a certain London entertainment establishment. Fine establishment, too. One of my favorites. He wanted to know about a girl who used to be there.” He raised a foot above Struan's slowly slipping fingers.

“What girl?” Justine walked toward Grably. “Ella?” She must not let Grably see her looking at Struan's hands.

“That's the one. Young Avenall was in his cups. Had someone arrange a meeting with me later. Hated your dearly departed husband's guts. Thought he was rutting with the girl while he pretended to be her father. Avenall held back nothing. Sentimental fool. Using him was useful and simple. In the end he didn't do anything, poor sop, but he'll be blamed for it all. I'll see to that. The girl's locked away at Northcliff Hall with your coachman and those idiot butlers.” He laughed. “Thanks to the assistance their dratted cousin gave me, they don't know anything. Your Nudge was useful—until now. But he'll suffer. They all will.”

“Good-bye, Hunsingore.” The foot rose higher. “I'll take great care of your wife.”

Calum peered through the bushes. “Shoot, dammit. Now. Before he kills him.”

Arran held up a silencing arm. “We're too far away. I'm as likely to hit Struan or Justine.” He knew too well the potential inaccuracies of firearms.

“I can't believe it,” Blanche moaned. “Those poor young things. Wait till I get my hands on that rogue. Man of the cloth, indeed. Man of the devil, more likely. I followed him here twice and he was up to no good either time, I can tell you. I should have told someone then. I felt foolish, but it shouldn't have mattered.”

“You've done the best you can now,” Arran told Blanche. The woman had more spirit than he'd ever dreamed possible.

“Oh, my
God”.
Calum rose from his hunched position behind the bushes a hundred yards or so from the unfolding drama.

Grably's foot descended—and missed.

With Justine's arms wrapped around his standing ankle, Grably overbalanced, flailed in slow motion as he toppled sideways, and disappeared amid an endless bellow—almost endless.

“Move,” Arran ground out, already in motion.

He and Calum arrived at Justine's side together. Lying flat, she clung to Struan's sleeves. Each man locked one of Struan's wrists in powerful hands and hauled him to safety.

Crying, Justine stretched beside him, stroking hair away from his swollen, bloodied face, feeling his body, leaning to look into his eyes.

Struan's grin was a pathetic sight. “Good as new, you see, my love,” he said through thick lips. “Thanks to the tiger I married. I love you, you know.”

Arran looked at his boots and felt Calum do likewise.

“I should think you do love me,” Justine said. “I suppose I love you, too.”

“You
suppose?”

“I shall have to analyze what I feel for my book.”

“You do that. Would you mind just holding me for the moment, though?”

“Not at all.” Cradling his head, she rocked him against her. “Hold you. Fight fires. Fight bad men with guns. Climb mountains. This cripple can do anything, just like you said she could.”

“You are not—”

“No, I'm not,” she said quickly. “I'm not because you make me whole.” With her face pressed to her husband's neck and his arms encircling her, Justine, Viscountess Hunsingore, became quiet.

“Look at that, dammit,” Calum said suddenly. “To the right.
Listen
to it.”

Bursting into view from a copse of trees several miles along a trail above, a carriage shot into the air. Even at a distance it was easy to see the vehicle had thrown a wheel.

“Poor devils,” Calum whispered as bodies soared, arms flailing, then fell amid the wreckage of the disintegrating carriage to the ravine far below.

“Poor devils, indeed,” Arran agreed.

Puffing to join them, Blanche murmured, “God bless them.”

Trunks and boxes whirled and broke open.

Early rays of sun glittered on exploding showers of brilliant debris.

Epilogue

Castle Kirkcaldy, 1825

S
now drifted through naked trees. The struggling young year had yet to shrug the mantle of the old.

Trailing between the company gathered within sight of his mother's portrait in the red salon, Struan saw the beauty of the outside world with Justine's eyes—as she had taught him to see so many things in the past months.

“Sit, Struan.” Grace, Marchioness of Stonehaven, looped her arms through one of his and smiled up at him, her brown eyes startling against pale-blond hair. “You will exhaust yourself with so much walking. Then what good will you be to Justine?”

He patted her hands. “How long has it been now?”

Arran stirred on his chair near the windows. “Five minutes longer than when you last asked. Do sit, Struan.”

“I should have engaged a second physician.”

“This man is the best,” said Philipa, Duchess of Franchot, who was herself increasing for the first time. She and Calum rarely left each other's sides. At the moment, they sat together on a red brocade chaise close to the fire.

Calum nodded sagely. “The very best.”

“As if
you
would know,” Struan said, in no mood for empty appeasement.

“Calm down, young man.” The Dowager Duchess of Franchot, with Blanche Bastible behind her chair, favored Struan with a disapproving scowl. “This is the physician who attended Grace during two confinements—and he will attend Philipa. I assure you that were he not the best, he would certainly have been eliminated from consideration for the birth of the next duke.”

“Can girls be dukes?” Max asked, his green eyes innocent.

Laughter rippled around the salon, bending the tension.

The dowager almost smiled. Almost. “You are impertinent, my boy.”

Ella did not smile. She hovered near the open door and darted into the passageway each time she heard a sound.

Arran looked out through the floating snow. “Come here, Struan. We are not alone in our vigil.”

Struan did not care to go to the windows. “They are all there, aren't they? The tenants? The villagers? Please God they will not have much longer to wait. I must go to Justine.”

“Tell him he mustn't,” Blanche said to the dowager.

“It isn't appropriate,” the old lady said obediently.

To the amazement of all, Blanche had become the dowager duchess's companion and now made her home at Franchot Castle. The duchess had even, if disapprovingly, settled certain gambling debts that came to light when one of the late Reverend Bastible's relations tracked Blanche to Cornwall.

“Papa,” Ella said clearly. “
I
think it perfectly appropriate for you to be with Mama. It has been many hours. She would wish you to be at her side.”

Max, grown taller and more sturdy, joined his sister in the doorway. “Ella is right,” he said in the tones Justine had worked so hard to produce. “Please, Papa, go to her.”

“Young man—”

“And ask her to
hurry,”
Max added as if he hadn't heard the dowager speak.

Struan hesitated a moment longer, then strode from the room, pausing to receive his adopted children's quick kisses as he passed.

The dowager's voice, upraised in disapproval, followed him until he was too far from the salon to hear her. The physician had chosen Kirkcaldy for the confinement, pointing out that it was better appointed than the lodge. Secretly, Struan thought the pompous little man considered himself very grand and the castle, therefore, more worthy of his presence.

Struan passed a maid carrying a covered basin and soiled cloths. He broke into a run.

Justine labored in a beautiful apartment in the tower called Revelation, once Arran's bachelor quarters. Struan heard a cry as he entered the anteroom to the bedchamber.

Justine's cry.

God, would it never be over? The door that separated him from his wife opened. Mairi hurried out to pick up a kettle of boiling water from the hob at the fireplace. She saw Struan and glanced toward the open door.

The next cry came so soon, and lasted so long.

Struan strode into the bedchamber and halted. The physician, his shirtsleeves rolled up, consulted with the nurse he had brought to Scotland with him. Gael Mercer and Mrs. Tabby, another tenant woman, busied themselves about the bed. Mrs. Tabby bathed Justine's face and stroked back her thick hair. Gael spoke steadily into her ear.

And Justine cried out again.

Struan closed his eyes an instant and struggled against a wave of faintness. She needed him.

He went to her side. “My darling?” He bent until her dark eyes focused on his face.

“My lord!” The physician noticed him for the first time. “I must ask you to leave at once.”

Justine reached for Struan's hand, held it with enough strength to crack bones, and smiled.

“And I,” Struan said to the physician, “must ask you to go about your business while I attend to mine. You are doing well, Justine. This will soon be over.”

The nurse clucked disapprovingly and muttered something that sounded like “false hope.”

“Your lordship,” Gael Mercer whispered. “If ye could help her ladyship t'sit, t'would help. It's been a long time and she's a wee bit weak. Ye could be the strength for her. I can see the babbie's head.”

Struan swallowed. He gazed steadily into Justine's eyes and sat beside her, drawing her up to lean against him.

Gael and Mrs. Tabby occupied themselves elsewhere. He saw Gael applying hot towels between Justine's legs. “The heat softens,” she said. “Makes the tearin’ less.”

“We may have to consider a surgical procedure,” the physician announced. “Risky, of course, but the child often does very well.”