Entwined (13 page)

“Eamon!” Lucinda screamed.

Arnold’s body blocked her view but she saw Eamon stagger then fall down. A red haze fell over her eyes as she surged upward, her body vibrating with anger. It was as if she became another person, feral and intent.

Her hand wrapped around a length of iron. The heavy weight seemed insubstantial as she smashed it down upon Arnold’s back. Arnold bellowed and turned. “Bitch!”

Her world slowed as Arnold grabbed the wooden handle of the crucible that hung over the forge. The cauldron, full of bubbling, molten metal pitched toward her, and she could only duck down with a cry, holding her arms up for protection. But then Eamon was there, his big body covering hers as the metal poured down upon his back.

Hot metal snapped and popped as it hit Eamon and the floor, and Lucinda screamed. She looked into Eamon’s eyes and saw not pain but rage.

Their gazes held for one moment, his roaming over her face as if to assess her injuries, and hers in utter shock for he was not writhing in agony.

“Eamon,” she breathed, but he did not flinch. Nor did he burn.

He pivoted, rising up like a cresting wave. She could only gape as the molten metal began to swarm off Eamon’s back, beading and gathering in brilliant orange pools as if it were alive. The moving mass of metal crawled along Eamon’s flesh and down his arm as he grabbed Arnold about the neck with one hand and wrenched him away from Lucinda.

Arnold thrashed and fought to get free of Eamon’s hold. But he could not. And as if it were attacking, the metal flowed over Arnold, invading his neck and face, and an agonized scream tore from him. Smoke rose from his skin as he shook. He was burning.

The screams grew, the scent of roasting flesh filling the air.

“Lu!” Eamon snapped, not looking at her. “Go. Now!”

Somehow she found her feet and ran.

* * *

Lucinda didn’t know how long Eamon had remained in that hellish room; from the moment she’d fled, time had gone hazy. She was curled up on the grass, shivering and ill to her stomach, when Eamon found her. His steps were slow as he approached. When she didn’t move, he crouched down beside her.

“Lucinda?” he whispered. “That’s your name, then?” He made a soft sound, bittersweet in the night. “I always thought you couldn’t be a Luella. Lucinda suits you better, a beautiful light in the darkness of my life.”

A wobbly smile pulled at her lips as she blinked down at the grass. But it ebbed.

“I was born Lucinda Jones,” she said, not raising her head, “the bastard child of my father and his housemaid Ann. She died at birth, and though it surprised the staff, my father let me stay. I was a kitchen girl by age five, and by age thirteen, I became my sister Luella’s companion and lady’s maid.”

Her eyes prickled. “I loved Luella, and she loved me. We were the best of friends, despite the social chasm between us. She…” Lucinda took a choking breath. “She died a month after your father made his agreement with mine. Scarlet fever.”

Even now, it hurt to remember Luella staring blankly with eyes that would never see again, and then her father and horrid Dr. Arnold bearing down upon her with their threats.

“I was given the choice of eviction or being Luella.” She swallowed back her tears. “I took the coward’s way out, Eamon. But I tried in my own way.”

“The letters.” Eamon’s voice was rusty. “You wanted to dissuade me, just as I sought to dissuade you.”

“Yes.” Save she fell in love with him and, in doing so, saw her way to salvation. “Do you know,” she said with a ragged breath, “I haven’t thought of myself as Lucinda since the moment you called me Lu.” In truth, she never considered Lu as a nickname for Luella but for her, for Lucinda. Her eyes filled, and she blinked hard. “You promised to always call me Lu.”

Eamon took a great, shuddering breath. “So I did. And so I will.” They didn’t say another word, nor did he try to reach for her. It was a long moment before he spoke again.

“That is my truth,” Lucinda said.

“And now you know mine. The very worst of me.” Sorrow weighed down his voice.

“You killed him.”

“I did.”

Lu shuddered. It had been awful. Even far away from the forge, she’d heard the screams until they died out. The silence had been almost worse. Oddly, none of the staff came out of the house. Had they known?

“Were you… How were you not injured?” The image of the red-hot liquid metal moving as if alive over Eamon’s flesh haunted her.

He sighed. “Metal is… I touch it, and it does my bidding.”

He was silent for a moment, his big body shifting a bit as he adjusted his weight onto his heels. “The heat needs a place to go. Into me, into another. The heat doesn’t harm me, but others? They are not so fortunate.”

Slowly Lu raised her head. Eamon’s handsome face might have been sculpted marble. Only his eyes were alive, watching her with a weariness that hurt her heart. He blinked and his expression turned fierce. “I did not want to kill him. But I won’t regret defending my heart and home in the way that I did.”

Hesitantly, he reached out and touched a lock of her hair that hung limp over her shoulder. “Because you are my heart, Lu. And my home.”

Lu took a deep breath, ready to tell him that he was that to her as well. But all that came out was a weak sob, and as a shiver wracked her body, Eamon stood and backed away. “Let us go inside,” he said woodenly. “You need rest.” He did not touch her as she rose. And she did not protest his withdrawal.

* * *

Lu slept. She slept through the night and far into the next day. A dreamless sleep of one returning home after a long journey. And not a soul disturbed her. When she finally awoke, her mind was clear and her body twitched with the need to move.

All was quiet as she drew herself a bath and then eventually put on a dressing gown.

Eamon’s room was empty. Not surprising. She’d been expecting it.

Sliding on a pair of slippers, Lu went to the smithy.

The sound of metal clanging against metal filled the air and grew louder as she let herself into the sweltering room. Oh, but he was a sight. Shirtless and wearing a pair of dirty, low-slung trousers, he was bent over the anvil, sweat making his skin gleam as he pounded out a piece of steel.

Eamon Evernight was utterly glorious. Nature had given him beautiful proportions, long legs, wide shoulders, a graceful back. Hard work had given him immense strength.

She didn’t know where to look: the rounded caps of his shoulders, the great slabs along his back, the hard rocks of his biceps. He seemed cut from granite, yet with every blow of his hammer, his muscles bunched and twitched. They
rippled
, for God’s sake.

The fires in the forge colored his skin gold and bronze. A shock of red hair fell over his brow. He was a living flame. A bronzed god. And he was hers.

Mine.

The knowledge and the want were undeniable.

He noticed her then, and his hammer froze midair. Heaven help her but his chest was just as delicious as his back.

“Lu.” He lowered his arm. “Are you well?”

“I am.” She came closer. The heat in the room was nearly unbearable, and she was glad for her light gown. Sweat pebbled over Eamon’s chest and ran in rivulets along his neck and down the valley of his abdomen.

But his scent was clean, hot metal and soap.

His teeth bit down on his bottom lip, and he wouldn’t quite meet her eyes. “I know what you saw, what I can do, must be…” He searched for a word and his cheeks went ruddy. “Shocking.”

“Yes.” How could it not be? It was wondrous and strange. Much like Eamon.

He flinched, all of his muscles bunching tight. Lu came closer still. “And yet it doesn’t change a thing.” Taking a breath, she said what she’d come to say. “I still want you, Eamon.”

He closed his eyes as if her confession brought him pain, looking like a man who didn’t believe himself worthy. And her heart squeezed. “The question is,” she went on, “do you want me now that you know who I am?”

He looked at her then, his eyes like polished lapis in the flickering light. “Names mean nothing. I’ve always known who you are. Inside.” He turned his head as if it hurt to look at her. “And I’ve always wanted you, Bit.”

“I lied to you.”

He laughed without humor. “And I to you. It doesn’t matter. Not to me. I want you still.”

“Then why do you stand there? Shying away from me?” No matter how much she wanted to go to him, she needed him to meet her halfway. Call it pride or insecurity, she did not know. But she needed him to open his arms to her.

He set the hammer down and stared into the flames. “I killed my father.”

After last night, Lu rather thought that might be the case.

“I did not intend to,” he said quietly. “I did not even know I could.” He turned then, his expression guarded and pained. “He caught me reading your letters.”

Lu’s breath hitched.

The corners of Eamon’s eyes creased as though he were looking inward upon the memory. “He accused me of trying to steal my brother’s bride.” A short, harsh laugh left him. “I suppose I was.”

“Eamon—”

“He came at me much like Arnold did, swinging an iron like a club.” Eamon’s face went white. “He wanted to kill me. His own son.” A shudder went through him, and she couldn’t stand still.

Lu went to him, wrapped her arms about his waist, and held him tight. Eamon didn’t move to embrace her but stood stiff. “I grabbed the iron. I knew it wouldn’t burn me. But I didn’t know what would happen to him. Not then.” His throat worked on a swallow. “Ah, well, Bit, you know what happened next. All that heat went directly into him and he was lost before I realized what I’d done.”

“Eamon, love, I’m so sorry.”

His arms came around her then, so tight and hard that her ribs flexed. He did not cry but simply held her to him as his body shuddered in waves.

“I am never leaving you, Eamon,” she said against his chest. “Never. Do you hear?”

His hand smoothed over her hair and along her back. “Yes, Lucinda. I hear.” There was a smile in his voice, and his tension slowly ebbed.

“Good.”

They held each other for a long while, softly swaying in a soothing motion that had her going boneless, and she pressed her cheek to the smooth swell of his pectoral muscle. His flesh was wonderfully firm and warm. A dusting of auburn hair covered his upper chest, playing about his small nipples and swirling in the center. The hairs tickled her cheek as he breathed, and she found herself nuzzling him with her nose. Eamon stilled, his grip on her growing more secure.

Lu’s body went wonderfully tense, a tight sort of ache that made her sex throb and her stomach clench. Barely daring to breathe, she grazed his chest with her lips, and his skin prickled. A smile pulled at her lips as she trailed them over him, heading toward his tight little nipple.

A raw sound tore from him when she nipped the bud. With the tips of her fingers, she drew a path down the center of his chest. His pecks jumped, a small twitch. A light trail of dark red hair gathered below his navel. She traced it with one finger, loving the way he began to pant and his flat, rippled abdomen rose up and down in rapid, agitated movements.

With a strangled gasp, Eamon gripped her upper arms, and he pulled away. They stood apart, merely a handspan in distance, yet the separation seemed only to heighten the sensation of being surrounded by his strength and warmth. They stared at each other, breathing light and fast. He held her gaze as the backs of his fingers touched her collarbone and then drifted down her bodice.

Lu’s breath hitched. His touch was so light that his knuckles barely skimmed the fabric, yet the whole of her feeling was centered on it. He traced the path of the buttons fronting her dressing gown. When he met the rise of her breast, his exploration grew even lighter, a mere tickle that had her heart pounding.

Eamon stopped at the button between her breasts. “You smell nice.” His voice was so low it felt like an intimate caress against her skin. He fingered the tiny shell button, circling it with the blunt tip of his thumb, and a shiver went through her. “Had a bath, did you?”

He was teasing; her hair was still damp, falling in a dark wash down her back. But she found the strength to answer. “Yes.”

His gaze darkened. And she knew that he knew she wore nothing beneath her dressing gown. He said not a word, but fiddled with her button, driving her mad. When her lids began to flutter down, he gave her a reprieve.

His thumb pressed against the button, twisting it slightly as he pushed it through the buttonhole. And her breath hitched in a small hiccup. Button undone, her bodice gaped between her breasts. Eamon slipped a finger inside.

The rough tip grazed her nipple. “Oh!” Lu sucked in a breath.

Eamon’s dark gaze held hers, and he worked his finger back and forth, slowly, lightly.

Her sex clenched hard, wetness flooding her. The tormented nipple grew stiff under his ministrations. So hard that it throbbed. Lu’s fingers opened and closed on air. She wanted to grab him, wanted to beg him to put more pressure on her aching nipple, pinch it perhaps. Do anything. But she remained still, hating him, loving him.

“Shall I tell you a secret, Lu?” The light rhythm of his fingertip did not abate.

She could scarcely breathe much less nod. But he told her anyway. “I used to take myself in hand thinking of seeing your breasts. I’d spend myself, dreaming of sucking, oh so gently, on their pretty tips.”

She swayed, catching the hard slab of his waist to steady herself. “Eamon,” she said weakly, struggling to keep her head from falling forward.

His breath grew quicker, agitated, the packed muscles on his abdomen clenching. “Show them to me, wife. Show me your breasts.”

Her head grew light, and her insides dipped. Panting lightly, she lifted her hands to the buttons. Her fingers shook as she pushed each button through, fresh air chasing along her skin, marking her progress. She couldn’t look Eamon in the eye, but focused on his throat, where his pulse beat a visible tattoo just above his collarbone.

The bodice grew loose and gapped. When she got to her waist, she was shaking.