Once in a Blue Moon (35 page)

Her chest heaved; she couldn't seem to get enough air. At last she sucked in a great breath, and with it came a raw and impotent fury. Damn him. Damn McCady Trelawny for trying to leave her again. Always, always he left her.
"I
shall never forgive him for this," she raged aloud. "What was he thinking of? He's the earl now, he's not supposed to be going down into mines."

Duncan expelled a deep sigh. He plucked a lantern off a peg on the wall and slammed a hard hat onto his head. "They said the load looked rich. And he's that desperate for the blunt, Miss Letty."

"Is he dead?"

Emily tottered down the cliff path, the wind whipping at her blue hussar cloak, flattening it against the bulge of her stomach. Her face was the thin, translucent white of an eggshell. "Please tell me he's not dead."

Jessalyn took her arm, steadying her. She felt so frail, as easy to blow away as a dry leaf. "He's been trapped by a fall, but they're digging him out." Saying it aloud, she could believe that it was true, that he would come out of it alive and whole.

She tightened her grip on Emily's arm as Dr. Humphrey lumbered past them on the narrow path, the long tails of his frock coat slapping his legs. He carried his black bag in one hand, while the other kept his wig anchored to his head. Emily swayed, buffeted by his wake.

"You mustn't try to make this climb," Jessalyn said, gently pushing her back up the path. "It's too dangerous, and you've the babe to think of. Come, I'll wait up on the bluff with you."

They sat, side by side, with their backs braced against the rocks where the land fell sheer to the sea. The tall brick tower that was Wheal Patience thrust up from the promontory below them, like a rocket poised to fire. The sun set behind it, limning the bricks with a silver light.

The sea wind cooled Jessalyn's face. She rubbed a chin that was tacky with dirt and the sweat of fear against her drawn-up knees. She could still taste the brown dust in her mouth, like chalk. Beneath her bottom, the ground vibrated with the steady pulselike throb of the engine, pumping water from the depths of the earth where he lay buried, but not dead.... Please, God, not dead...

The core bell hadn't clanged that evening, but the men on the night shift were already there. Word of the fall had spread, and they had come, carrying their picks and shovels and drills. Their women had arrived, as always, in the late afternoon to get hot water for their washing and had stayed to keep the vigil.

Only a faint bit of daylight showed now on the horizon, dying behind clouds that were torn and ragged like a beggar's cloak. Frothy waves flashed white and sharp like knife blades.

The darkness made the waiting worse. Down there, where he was, the dark would be utter and absolute, smelling of death. Her fear for him was a scream in the back of her throat that kept threatening to burst out. She wrapped her arms around her bent legs, hugging herself.

Beside her Emily stirred. Her voice came, gentle on the wind. "You love him, too, don't you?"

A tightness squeezed Jessalyn's chest, and tears stung her eyes. She was too soul-weary to lie. "It seems that I have loved him my entire life."

The tide washed against the rocks, again and then again. Emily ripped up a handful of marram grass, sending a tiny avalanche of pebbles splashing into the sea. "I am his wife, but you are his... I was going to say heart, but that's not it. His obsession, I suppose."

Jessalyn held herself still, afraid to move, afraid to speak.

Emily twisted around, and her face in the deepening twilight looked brittle as old parchment. "But he is my husband. Caerhays is mine."

Jessalyn's breath stopped in her throat. "I know... I know."

Emily's shoulders hunched, and she smothered her mouth with her knuckles. "Oh,
God,
I love him so. He is my night and my day." She pulled down her fists, tilting her face to the night sky. "And he—he is kind to me, but that is all."

Emily's fingers pleated and unpleated the soft wool of her cloak. "That night of the fire, I started to come into the library, and for some reason I got distracted—it was Duncan, I think, coming to tell me that the rain had doused the flames, and there was no longer any danger of its spreading. And I heard Caerhays shouting through the closed door. 'Dammit, Jessalyn,' he said, bellowed really, and I could tell that he was quite angry with you. He is never anything but unfailingly polite with me, no matter what I do or say. The few times I tried to provoke him into feeling
something
for me, even if it was rage, he simply left the room." She vent her frustration on the grass, tearing it up by the roots. "Kindness! I think that it is possible to kill with kindness—"

"Miss Letty!"

The tinners' women had gathered within the shelter of a copse of wind-twisted hawthorn. Little Jessie had broken away from the group and was toddling across the sward, lugging a basket almost as big as she was. "Miss Letty, lookit!" A big grin split her face as she raised the wicker lid, revealing an earthenware plate piled with lardy cakes, a battered teapot, and two tin cups.

"Me mam said ee would be needin' vittles to keep up yer strength." From the pocket of her pinafore, she produced a mashed lump wrapped in newspaper that turned out to be a smoked pilchard sandwiched between chunks of black bread. "This un's mine, but ee can have it, too."

Jessalyn's fear had churned her stomach into a permanent state of nausea, but she took the sandwich and even managed a smile. "That is very kind of you, spud."

"I can pour. Lemme pour." Little Jessie squatted beside them, knees spread wide, her lips pouched in concentration as she filled the cups. Steam wreathed her fey, pointed face. The tea was hot and black, smelling strongly of jasmine.

Jessalyn took the tea, warming her fingers on the hot tin. "Have you seen your grandfather again since the opening, Little Jessie?"

The child shook her head so hard her braids whipped her chest. "No'm. Mam said I musta been mistooken. He scampered off, did Grandda, on 'count of the runners bein' after him. Went to America. Should I be leavin' the basket, Miss Letty?"

"Yes, please. Thank your mam for me."

Emily watched the little girl run off with a flash of white pantalets. "Little Jessie. Was she named after you?"

Jessalyn breathed a shaky laugh. "Yes, the poor little thing." She broke off a piece of the lardy cake and flung it into the sea for the shorebirds. "What a namesake to have to live down—the scrapes I got into when I was her age..."

"She is the baby you and Caerhays found in the mine," Emily stated. Jessalyn kept her gaze on the lardy cake, breaking off another piece. "He spoke to me once of that time," Emily said. "He said they were the happiest days of his life."

Jessalyn swung around in surprise. "But it was only one summer."

"A summer that changed his life. I believe he thought that if he ever married anyone, it would be you."

Jessalyn stared out at a sea that was still and black, as if it, too, existed only to wait. "I asked him to marry me that summer. I as much as begged him. He wanted nothing to do with me, and he told me so in most unflattering terms."

"I think men must be different from women in how they love," Emily said, "in how they show their love. For us being in love is a haven. For some men it can be a most tormenting kind of hell."

In the dark all Jessalyn could see was the purity of Emily's profile and her cropped hair faintly tinseled by starlight. Her chest felt sore with a grief unspent. She wondered if this was a punishment from God, for clinging to her love even after he had married. It was sinful to covet what was Emily's. And she could not begrudge the man she loved another's love and care simply because it did not come from her. He was already out of her life. She made
a
silent vow to God that if He would let McCady live, she would banish him from her heart as well.

She started to reach out, to take Emily's hand, but in the end she pulled back. "You are his wife, and I am nothing to him now," she said, her throat full. "He might not know it yet, but Caerhays is blessed to have found you."

Emily's head lifted, and for a moment Jessalyn thought she would smile, but then she tensed, her face seeming to shatter like ice under a mallet. She grabbed Jessalyn's arm, her nails digging deep. "They're bringing somebody up."

Jessalyn jerked around, jolting to her feet. Lanterns bobbed and dipped before the enginehouse. Men were climbing the cliff path, carrying a body on a piece of canvas stretched between two poles.

Emily tried to run and stumbled, falling with a rattling jar onto her hands and knees. Jessalyn stopped to pick her up, and they waited, arms wrapped around each other, for the rescue party to crest the bluff.

Because he was taller than the others, Duncan's golden head topped the rise first. He walked beside the litter, holding aloft a pitch torch, and in the sudden flare of light Jessalyn could see that the body had hair that was the washed yellow color of an old saddle. And the hand that dangled lifeless was spotted with age. The men laid the litter on the ground, covering it with a blanket. One of the tinners' women started to wail.

Jessalyn felt Emily's spine stiffen as she drew in a deep breath. She stepped forward, her head high, and in that moment Jessalyn thought she had never looked more the earl's wife. "Have you found my husband?"

Duncan shook his head, his gaze on his boots. "We'll keep digging, m'lady." He paused, as if undecided whether to say more. "There's still hope, m'lady." But he hadn't been able to keep the lie out of his voice.

"Yes, of course," Emily said. "Thank you, Duncan. And thank the others for me as well, please. For all that they are doing."

Duncan and the men returned to the mine. McCady's women stood on the bluff together and watched them go. After a while Emily slipped her arm around Jessalyn's waist, leaning her head on Jessalyn's shoulder... waiting.

They brought him up an hour later.

They carried him up in a litter like the others. But unlike the others, he lived.

At the sight of him Jessalyn swallowed back a sob in a throat skinned raw from fear and worry. He might be alive, but he looked near death, with his eyes shut and sunk deep into the sockets, the flesh pared from the bones of his face and white as whalebone. His chest heaved, drawing thinly at the air, and blood oozed from a gash in his head.

Emily made a little chirping noise of pain and grabbed Jessalyn's hand. McCady opened his eyes.

His gaze flickered over the faces surrounding him, fastening on to one. "Jessalyn..." He sucked in an agonized breath. She thought he looked bruised. Deep inside him, where he would never heal. But then, incredibly, he smiled. "I got a... trifle lost..."

Tears spilled from Jessalyn's eyes. "You silly goose. No one can be a trifle lost."

Emily squeezed her hand tightly in silent comfort. But after a moment Jessalyn pulled free and dropped back, leaving Emily to walk alone beside the litter that carried her husband.

They had gone only ten more feet when Emily jerked and spun around, collapsing onto her knees. She stretched out her arm, her fingers curling into a rigid claw, and Jessalyn felt a scream building in her chest.
He's dead,
she thought.
Oh, God, he's dead.

But it was Emily who screamed.

Rain dripped off the roof of the lych-gate, rattling on the shiny, lacquered wood of the coffins, soaking into the ebony velvet bunting of the hearse. The horses' black plumes drooped, soggy with the damp. It was fitting weather for a funeral.

The whole countryside had gathered at St. Genny's cemetery. Some were drawn as always by the enactment of a tragedy, but most were there out of respect for the earl. Hadn't he brought work to these parts? said Salome Stout to her mistress, the Reverend Mrs. Troutbeck. And he one of the scapegrace Trelawnys, them as never cared a tuppence for Cornwall before. Well, the mining venture had ended badly to be sure, but give the man his due, he had tried.

The pallbearers carried the caskets one at a time to where the freshly turned earth lay black in the spring grass among the leaning salt-pitted gravestones. It did not take as many hands to lift the second one, small as it was. 'Twas no bigger than a lobster basket, Little Jessie Stout said, earning a shush from her mam. If the babe had lived, so Dr. Humphrey said, it would have been a boy.

They spoke in reverent whispers of how Lady Caerhays had miscarried her babe on the bluff above Wheal Patience that terrible night of the fall and of how she had died, bleeding and feverish, two days later. The earl had not even been in his right head himself when the poor thing had slipped away.

Miss Jessalyn had been with her at the end, though, and there was another tragedy. Burned out of house and home she and old Lady Letty had been, and this hardly a week gone by. Left with scarcely a rag to stand up in. Still, she had trimmed her hat with black mourning ribbons this day, out of proper respect for the dead, so Mrs. Troutbeck pointed out to Mrs. Childrens, the baker's wife. She had grown up a proper lady, had Miss Jessalyn, for all her earlier harum-scarum ways.

The Reverend Troutbeck fumbled through the service, twice losing his place. Not many noticed, though, for they were too intent on studying the earl. The women thought he looked romantic, like a hero out of a blue book, what with the way the white bandage around his head set off his dark good looks. And such a torment burning in his eyes, they whispered. How he must have loved his pretty young wife. The men—those who knew that he was burying all hope at thirty thousand pounds—thought how well he might be grieved to the point of madness.

Jessalyn stood beside him, looking up at him out of gritty, pain-darkened eyes. She saw a face that was all sharp bones and hollow shadows. He was still and drawn deep into himself, his eyes utterly empty and seeing nothing but the coffins... and another failure.

He is flagellating himself with it,
Jessalyn thought,
like a monk heating his own hack with a knotted rope, until he bleeds and does penance for his sins.
She wanted to lean her body against his, to press his head to her breast. To take the whip from his hand and kiss his scarred and bruised fingers one by one. And she was afraid that if she so much as touched his arm in sympathy, he would turn away.

The Reverend Troutbeck spoke of dust returning unto dust, and ashes unto ashes. The rain came down harder now, beating a tattoo on the caskets. Jessalyn's gaze was drawn to the lych-gate, where the hearse waited, where she and Emily had stopped to speak that windy Sunday, the day the primroses had first bloomed. Emily had been so happy that day, laughing, blossoming herself in her pregnancy, and with her newly discovered love for Cornwall.
I don't think I shall ever want to leave....

A great sadness swelled within Jessalyn's breast. She swallowed hard, trying to keep it down, but a gulping little cry escaped her. McCady flinched, as if she'd touched him after all.

The pale linen of his shirt shone stark against the tin gray sky. The sea rolled in heavy black waves, tumbling over his boots, breaking into foam.

She sloughed toward him through the wet sand. The rain slashed at the beach, making a rough, purring sound as it stippled and pocked the water. He faced the sea. He had discarded his coat somewhere; his shirt clung to his back, so wet she could see the darkness of his skin underneath. She licked her lips, tasting salt and fear, and spoke his name.

She didn't think he heard, for he stood unmoving still. She shivered, wet and cold in the pouring rain, for she was wrapped only in a delicate cashmere shawl that Emily had given her after the fire. She thought she would leave and instead took another step toward him.

His voice lashed at her, hard and biting, above the sea's raucous, gasping breaths. "You can no longer place any dependence on my playing the part of the honorable gentleman, Miss Letty. From now on, if you know what is good for you, you will stay the bloody hell away from me."

She took another step and laid her cheek against his back.

He whirled, almost stumbling as he took all his weight on his bad leg. He flung out his arm, pointing down the beach. "Go, damn you!"

Tiny tremors shook her legs, and tears burned her eyes. She felt suffocated with yearning. She would not leave him.

His dark hair hung plastered to his head, dripping over the white bandage. Rain ran over the sharp bones of his face. Haunted and slightly wild, his eyes glowed at her. His hand curled into a tight fist, and he drew it back against his chest. "Oh, Christ, Jessa. Please..."

"I love you."

He seized her in a grip that hurt, hauling her up against his hard chest with such force it knocked the breath from her. He lowered his head, smothering her mouth, and the sea slammed and broke around them. The rain poured.

His kiss was rough, frantic... hot. She clung to his shoulders, her fingers digging into his rigid flesh, while he devoured her lips. He yanked off her poke bonnet, then jerked off her shawl and hurled them onto the rocks. He thrust his fingers through her hair, pulling her chignon loose from its netting and pins. He held her head fast with one hand, while he kneaded her breasts with the other. His fingers tugged and pulled at her nipples through the thin, rain-slick material of her muslin bodice and cotton shift.

He was being too rough and fierce, hurting her, but she didn't care. She had wanted this for so long. She was afraid to move, afraid to make a sound, for fear that he would stop.

He tore his mouth from hers and dragged her down with him onto the wet, foam-laced sand.

He loomed above her. The gold ring in his ear caught a flash of some ethereal light, so that it shimmered like a star caught fast in the dark night of his hair. His eyes were dark and sun-faceted in a world of gray rain. There was no tenderness in them, no mercy in the hard and hungry mouth that seized her lips. Only a deep and terrible need.

She surrendered to his kiss. Not even the crashing roar of rain and sea could drown out the tumult of her heart. Her hands roamed over him, seeking, yet she already knew the shape of him, the taste of him. She had always known these things, even before she knew of him.

A wave broke hard against the beach, dousing them with salty spray. He said something fast and harsh that she didn't understand, as he pushed up her skirt and shift. He gripped her thighs, spreading them. He knelt between her legs, rising above her. His face was so hard, so intent, he looked cruel. He cursed as he wrenched at the flap of his pantaloons, and then his breath left him in a soft, keening sigh. His sex sprang free from the concealing shadows of hair and cloth. Her glazed, unfocused eyes caught but a glimpse before he lowered himself over her again. His fingers probed for the slit in her drawers, and when he found it, he hooked his fingers in the opening and ripped.

She gasped with shock and then arched, gasping again, as he slid his finger deep inside her. He went utterly still, and she seemed to hang suspended with him, in a universe of wondrous feeling, connected only to his hard, burning finger. A wet heat spread in a growing pool from that part of her, as if she were melting down there.

He shuddered, and a harsh, tearing sound erupted from his throat. "God, I have to... Jessa, sweetling, I can't. I'm sorry, but I can't..."

She didn't know what he meant; she was afraid he was going to stop, to pull away from her. The thought was unbearable. She wrapped her arms around his back, her nails gripping at the wet thin linen, holding him tight to her. "Please," she whispered.

He pushed another finger inside her, opening her. She felt a searing pain, and she stiffened against him. Something smooth and hard and hot pushed between her legs, probing her woman's flesh, stretching her impossibly wide.

She knew a moment's fear, and then he drove into her. And she pressed her mouth into his shoulder to smother a cry.

He thrust again, burying himself deeper. She felt the fullness of him; he was thick and hard and throbbing inside her. It hurt, yet there was something else there—a hot, spiraling pressure that went beyond the pain into pleasure. It felt right for him to be so deep within her, to be a part of her.

He moved, pulling almost out of her, then pushing in again, a rough thrust and drag that struck a fire deep within her, like a spark off flint. She clung to him, straining upward, as the pressure within her grew, burning hotter. He pumped his hips, and the breath came from him in harsh, tearing gasps. "Please..." she said again, wanting something more, not knowing what it was.

His head flung back, his eyes clenching shut, his face contorted. He gave one last mighty thrust that seemed to pierce her heart as he shuddered violently, surging long and deep within her.

He collapsed heavily on top of her. She could feel the thudding of his heart and tiny tremors quivering across his chest. She reveled in the crush of him against her, the feel of his weight. Love for him squeezed at her heart, bringing tears to her eyes.

Slowly his breathing quieted. He drew out of her and rolled onto his back in the sand, leaving her feeling empty.

The rain poured over her face, into her parted, panting mouth. The sea spilled over her legs, pounding and sucking, in and out, pulsing to the heavy beat of her heart. She sat up. Her skirts were rucked up around her waist, and she pulled them down, suddenly embarrassed.

She dared a glance at him. He sat with one leg bent, his elbow resting on his knee, his face buried in his hand, and his fingers clenching and clenching in his rain-black hair. The words
I
love you
swelled up from within her, pushing against her lips, but she held them back.

He raised his head, and his hand fell, hanging limp. He looked at the tumultuous sea, and she could see his throat move as he swallowed. He turned, searching her face. The only light in the whole world seemed to come from his eyes. "I want you again."

A sigh stretched across her chest, easing out of her. She leaned into him. "Oh, take me again, McCady. Take me again."

His arms came around her, crushing her to him, and his mouth closed over hers in a long, deep kiss that stole her breath.

After an eternity he tore his mouth from hers and buried his face in the curve of her neck. He planted soft, sighing kisses along her throat, his lips trailing over her chilled, wet skin, and she trembled. He lifted his head. His mouth tightened as he rubbed his thumb over her red and swollen lips. "I was a bloody rutting beast. I hurt you."

He had, but she didn't care. She loved the thought of him being inside her, the intimacy of it. And they said it hurt only the first time.

She smiled, tilting her face up to his, asking without thought or words for another kiss. He traced the shape of her mouth with his tongue, parting her lips. He tasted of the rain and the sea, and of wanting—hot and spicy. Their mouths mated, then parted, only to come back together, again and again, as if each breath must begin and end with the other's lips.

His fingers tangled in her hair, dragging her head back, exposing her neck to his hot, wet mouth. He rubbed his partially open lips against her throbbing pulse. "Ah, God, Jessa, Jessa... you taste like sin. Once started, a man cannot stop." He raised his head, pulling back a little. His eyes burned bright and hot.

It was dim and damp inside the gatehouse.

He lit a lantern, hooking its handle over a wall peg. The room held little furniture: a scarred and ring-marked table, two ladder-back chairs, and an old wooden bed made up with a brown army blanket and rough huckaback sheets that looked worn but clean. A stack of dry faggots lay next to the swept hearth. The place was freshly scrubbed and smelled faintly of fried bacon and tobacco.

She felt shy and nervous, being alone here with him, knowing what was coming, knowing that he was thinking of it, as she was. "Does someone live here?" she asked.

He was crouched on one knee, laying the fire. His doeskin pantaloons pulled tautly across his hard thighs; his wet shirt clung to the powerful muscles of his back. "No one now," he said. "Duncan slept here at first, until we could fix a place for him up in the hall."