The Scottish Companion (26 page)

“I would have thought you’d extend your visit somewhat longer,” he said, “especially in view of what recently occurred.”

“I believe that what recently occurred,” Lorenzo said with a small smile, “only concurs with Grant’s diagnosis. I doubt, Dr. Fenton, that he is dying of a blood disease. I do, however, suspected someone is trying to do him harm.”

“I would have thought that a friend would remain at his side,” Arabella said.

Lorenzo turned his head to regard her.

“You disapprove of my departure?”

“If Grant truly believes his life is in danger, it seems to me you would remain close to him.”

“It is Grant who has insisted I leave, Miss Fenton. He holds great store for loyalty. And family.”

She gently removed the glass from his hand and refilled it, giving it back to him with a delightful smile, one of the most genuine expressions he’d ever seen from her during the extent of his stay at Rosemoor.

Arabella stood, bent to kiss her father on the cheek, and then left the room.

“Miss Fenton?”

She turned at the door.

Lorenzo retrieved the book from where she’d left it beside her chair. “Your book,” he said. He glanced at the title. “A very heavy tome.”

“My journal,” she said, taking the book from him. Her smile had disappeared, but not so the brightness of her eyes. They sparkled at him, as if she were laughing and yet restrained her humor.

He watched her leave, and hoped that Grant had the good sense to get out of this marriage before it occurred.

G
rant lay beside Gillian in the darkness, thinking that what had begun in morning had ended at midnight. His body felt like a separate entity, a very satisfied and exhausted entity. His mind, however, was wide awake and racing with thought.

Gillian was unlike anyone he’d ever known—courageous and stubborn, opinionated, and fiercely herself. She was no more an angel than he was, but there was something about her that spoke of true innocence despite her experiences and her past. She did not have the nature to do evil or be unkind. Candor was part of her nature. While her words might sting a little, she directed them only to him, and he was more than able to withstand their occasional scorch.

To maids and footmen she was unfailingly polite. Even to Arabella, who occasionally strained the limits of his temper, Gillian was patient.

Was that why he felt so acutely protective of her? Did he perceive her as one of the innocent, and he had tried during the whole of his life to shelter the innocent?

Or was it something else entirely?

Whatever this interlude might bring was uncertain. One thing was abundantly clear, however. He could not marry Arabella Fenton.

“If you loosen your arm,” she said softly, “I promise not to run away.”

He realized his embrace was too tight, and moved his arm from around her waist, moving back a little on the bed. She brushed the hair out of her eyes as she looked over at him.

“What did you say to me?” she asked.

“When?” he asked, even though he knew quite well what she meant.

She shook her head from side to side, gently chiding him. “Was it Latin?”

“In a way. Italian.”

She held his hand with one of hers and then reached over and kissed him full on the lips. A gentle, soft, and tender kiss as if she would waken him from a dream.

“What did you say?” she asked against his lips.

He smiled. He couldn’t remember everything. Some of his words had been impassioned, surprising even him with their emotion.

“
Siete la mia speranza, il mio futuro
.”

“What does it mean?”

He rose up on one elbow, facing her. “The Italians are very inventive when it comes to love.
Siete bei quanto l’alba
. You are as beautiful as the dawn.
Rendete me il tatto potente
. You make me feel powerful.”

“And the other? You won’t say?”

It would be wiser if he didn’t.
Rimanga con me
. Remain with me.
Non desidero vivere senza voi
. I don’t want to live without you. And the most telling of his
remarks:
siete la mia speranza ed il mi futuro.
You are my hope and my future.

“Should I ask how you became so expert at what the Italians know of love? Or should I simply pretend that you did not make that remark?”

“I confess to nothing,” he said, bending to kiss her. “I’m sending you to Italy,” he said abruptly.

“Italy?”

The idea had just come to him, and the more he thought about it, the more appealing it became. He would send her there, and after he’d made arrangements for Arabella, he’d send for her.

Life was suddenly a great deal brighter than it had been a month ago. Or even a moment ago.

Would she marry him?

It wasn’t honor that kept him silent, but instead a curious reluctance. She couldn’t refuse.

“I have a villa there,” he said instead. “Where I lived before I returned to Scotland. It would be safe for you. Lorenzo will escort you, of course.”

She placed her hand on his bare chest as if to restrain his thoughts.

“I don’t want to leave,” she said.

“And I want you to do so, in order to remain safe. Which of us will win, I wonder?”

“So says the lover?”

“No,” he said, reaching for her. “So says the earl.”

Rosemoor was too large. Despite the fact he’d been here for weeks, Lorenzo found himself lost twice before finally finding his assigned chamber. The first time he didn’t mind being directed by a young, comely
maid. The second time, a tall and rather supercilious footman haughtily announced the directions, managing to annoy Lorenzo greatly.

All in all, he preferred Italy, his comfortable home with the sound of children and not all these trappings of wealth.

His stomach burned, and Lorenzo grabbed at it, thinking himself constitutionally ill-equipped for Scottish food. But at least it had been spicier than the pap he’d been forced to eat in London. Perhaps because Grant employed a French cook.

He probably had eaten too much of the bouillabaisse, but it had been exceptionally good. Or perhaps he shouldn’t have had the last glass of wine. Elise would have fussed at him about the lateness of the hour and his consumption of spirits.

Elise. How he missed his wife.

Once in his chamber, he sat down on the edge of the bed and pressed a hand to his stomach, letting out a small groan of discomfort.

He belched, but there was no attendant release of discomfort. His stomach felt like it was on fire, and so, too, did the base of his throat.

Uncomfortable still, he stood, poured himself a glass of water, and drank it down. Instead of helping with the pain, it seemed to make it worse.

He was never ill.

His scientist’s mind began to piece together what was happening to him. An ulceration of the stomach? He would have experienced signs before tonight. He’d always been able to eat anything he chose without any kind of ramifications. No, tonight’s pain was different, something altogether unique.

How very odd that he’d gotten sick after drinking bitter wine.

His stomach spasmed and he doubled over, falling to his knees at the end of the bed. He grabbed on to the curved footboard and pulled himself up, only to be felled by another paroxysm of pain. It felt as if a dozen spears had pierced his body, and he was bleeding. He even tasted blood as he wiped his mouth.

He doubled over again, and this time nearly lost consciousness. He would have shouted for help, but he found himself curiously unable to speak. He staggered backward, holding on to the bedpost.

Realization came to him then, and the horror of it nearly felled him. Lorenzo reached for his case, for the brown bottle he’d taken to the palace. His vision was blurry; so much so that the rug only inches from his eyes seemed so very far away.

He thought of Elise, but then the pain came again and he could only concentrate on the agony.

Dorothea, Countess of Straithern, stared in horror at Dr. Fenton.

It had been twenty years, but she felt just as she had the night she’d discovered the truth about her husband.

The evil was back. The evil that had once permeated Rosemoor and had been banished for the last two decades because of her fervent prayers and a benevolent God had returned.

“Tell me,” she said. When the only answer she received from the doctor was a sympathetic glance, she spoke again. “Tell me the entire story, Ezra.”

The man wouldn’t look her in the face. But a few moments later, he began to speak.

She felt her eyes widen and a sound almost like a groan emerge from her before she cut it off with a handkerchief and her fist. It would not do to become hysterical at this moment. An excess of emotion never accomplished anything.

“Dear God,” she said. “Why did you never say anything?”

“My wife and I decided that it would be wiser if no one knew. Until you asked, Your Ladyship, I thought the past well and truly buried.”

It was a very good thing that she knew this parlor intimately. She took a series of steps backward, hoping that the chair was where it normally was kept, beside the marble table at the left of the fireplace. She felt the seat against the backs of her legs and subsided gracefully into the chair, placing both hands on the wooden arms and waiting for the light-headedness to subside.

She wanted, very much, for Dr. Fenton to leave, but good manners was the habit of a lifetime. An ability to retain one’s aplomb is what separated the upper classes from the lower. She leaned back and focused on her breathing, wishing she hadn’t instructed her maid to lace her quite so tightly this morning. She looked quite well in her black, but appearance didn’t matter if she disgraced herself by fainting at Dr. Fenton’s feet.

Perhaps she should adopt the fashion of an eccentric older woman and simply walk around her home attired in nothing more confining than a loose, sack-like dress. Perhaps she might ask Grant to build her a
small house on the estate, someplace where she would be content to be odd and deranged.

“Did you not think that bringing her back to Rosemoor might awaken some memories for her?”

“She has lived not an hour away from Rosemoor all her life, Your Ladyship.”

“How delighted you must have been when Grant proposed the match.”

“Not delighted,” he admitted. “Although a part of me thought that being the mistress of Rosemoor would be a fitting reward for what she’d had to endure.”

“We have seen a great deal over the years, have we not, Ezra?”

“Your Ladyship,” he said, bowing. “You know you only have to call upon me and I will be at your side.”

How very odd that it seemed almost like a romantic declaration.

Perhaps it was the light-headedness that brought about the thought. Strange, she had never thought of Ezra in that way. She had never thought of any man in that way ever since her husband died. How very curious to feel the rapid beating of her heart. No doubt it was the effect of the shock she’d received.

“I, too, had thought the past well buried, Ezra,” she said softly. “But I do not think it is.”

His glance was troubled. “Nor do I, Your Ladyship.”

She smiled, and bless the man, he understood it was a gesture of dismissal and bowed once more, nearly backing out of the room as if she were a royal personage. A queen, perhaps.

The queen of disaster.

Sometime later, Gillian rolled over to face him. He lit the lamp so he could see her more clearly.

“There are not that many people who would wish me harm,” she said. She looked at him for a moment as if she were considering something. Then she turned and reached for the lamp on the table. She fumbled for something in the bottom drawer, and then handed it to him.

“My list,” she said.

“I beg your pardon?”

“I had to consider that I might well have been poisoned on purpose, Grant.”

“So you made a list?”

She nodded.

He held out his hand. For a moment, he didn’t think she was going to surrender the paper to him. Would they argue about it? He hadn’t had a quarrel with a girl since he was in short pants. Normally his title and his charm prevented the necessity of one, but he and one of the village girls had tossed clods of dirt at each other, until she’d been reprimanded by her mother, a woman who’d spoiled Grant’s fun by appearing terrified that he would tell his father. He had agreed to remain silent, not telling the woman that he rarely even spoke to his father, let alone confided in him.

How odd that he would think about that now as he waited patiently for Gillian’s cooperation.

Perhaps he thought of her as that long-ago girl, the only person in his childhood besides his brothers who had been unimpressed with his consequence.

She finally surrendered the paper, and he looked at the list.

“It’s not very long,” he said. “I believe you’re right. I have more enemies than you.”

“That’s because you’re older than I am,” she said blithely. “Much, much older.”

“Do not try to pass yourself off as having just escaped the schoolroom, Miss Cameron. I put your age as substantially past that.”

She looked a little affronted. “I’m an ancient crone,” she said finally, evidently deciding not to take offense. “I’m old as water.” She squinted at him. “And you, Your Lordship? How old are you?”

“Old as knowledge, and as wise as experience,” he teased.

“Perhaps you only look old because you’ve had a very full life. A great deal of wine, a great many women, a great many experiences, all in all.” She sat back against the headboard and regarded him.

He wasn’t about to respond to that goad. Instead he turned his attention back to her list. He knew only one name on the list, and it surprised him. The remaining two names were strangers.

He knew who Robert McAdams was—the man she’d loved, the father of her child. When he did speak, it was to ask a question about the next name on the list. “Mary McAdams?”

“Robert’s sister. She believed that I was trying to trap Robert into marriage. I don’t believe she liked me very much.”

“Do you actually think they would do you harm?”

“No,” she said. “I didn’t begin my list that way. I didn’t ask myself who would wish me dead. Instead, I thought of the people who would be relieved if I were dead.”

“Arabella is on the list,” he said, and turned to look at her.

“Yes.” It was the only comment she made.

“Have you no names on your own list?” she asked in the silence. “No enemies or would-be enemies?”

“On the contrary,” he said, glancing over at her, “my list would take pages, I’m afraid. Competitors, people I knew in Italy, perhaps even a relative or two.”

“Any women on that list?’

“One or two. Perhaps we might as well add Arabella to my list.”

She truly didn’t want to hear about other women he’d loved and left behind in Italy. But she asked anyway, because she was curious, because he was looking at her expectantly, and because asking about the Italian women meant she didn’t have to think about Arabella.

“Have there been very many? More than two?”

“Three,” he answered. “I was in Italy for five years.”

“One must evidently replace a lover periodically. Do they wear out?”

He laughed long and heartily, but she noticed that he didn’t answer her question.

The knock on the door subdued them both. They looked at each other like naughty children caught in the act of stealing biscuits from the kitchen.

“Stay here,” he whispered.

She gathered up the sheet, refraining from mentioning that she was effectively trapped in the bed since her clothing was either still in the laboratory or across the room in the armoire.