Windswept (37 page)

Harrison shook his head slowly. “How can you speak to me this way? Dylan has quite gone over the edge. Our worst fears have been realized today. He took an innocent woman to the cliff where he pushed his own mother to her grave. Only by the grace of God did you arrive to save her…”

Jacob laughed, a low feral sound that came from deep in his throat. “Yes, God sharpened my instincts and led me to Nora today, but He also gave me you for a father, so I don’t know whether to thank the Divine Being or curse Him for playing loose with my life.”

“Blasphemy now, too, Jacob? To what depths of depravity has this family sunk?”

“Enough so that you must look up to see the rest of us sinners.”
In one swift motion, Jacob shoved the chair away from him, sending it scudding into a wall of his father’s priceless leather bound books. Harrison winced in what was no doubt real pain this time, but he shook off its effects.

Jacob was through toying with him. He was through dancing around the issues they both knew must be faced. “This isn’t a family,” he said with measured calm. “It’s a monarchy, and its depraved condition begins with the self proclaimed king.”

Harrison’s gaze flitted to the pistol and Jacob positioned himself between the desk and the wheelchair. He crossed his arms over his chest and looked down at the man who had never shown any signs of weakness but whose eyes now reflected the first hint of panic.

“What manner of human being are you,
Father
, to believe yourself justified in ruling people’s lives? To map out their futures to fit your own desires? To lie and deceive the very ones you profess to care for?”

Jacob’s hands clenched over his chest, and it was only with great willpower that he kept his fists buried against his shirt. It frightened him to think where his anger might lead. “You called yourself
Father
. You called yourself
Husband
. You have no idea what it means to be either! What about the sons you have lied to for years? What about Anne Hempstead,
Father
?”

The wheelchair rattled with the force of Harrison’s trembling. His face became an image of fear. “Jacob, you must listen to me,” he beseeched. “That woman, Nora, she lied to you. She took things that didn’t belong to her and tried to turn you against your family.”

An uneasy calm, which was in a way more dangerous than unbridled anger, suddenly settled over Jacob. With almost a smile on his face, he said. “Yes, she took things that didn’t belong to her. But they did belong to
me
. They were about
me
, about who I am. And she gave them to their rightful owner, something you would never have done, you self-serving bastard!”

Bright scarlet infused Harrison’s cheeks, and he sat forward, no longer cowed by his son’s fury. “Everything I did, I did to protect this family. I am not ashamed of what I’ve done for Dylan, to keep him safe. And you have had a good life. You’ve amassed wealth and power. And still you have the gall to look upon me as one who connived against you.” He pounded his fist on the arm of his chair. “How dare you, Jacob?”

“A good life?” Jacob was incredulous. The demented man truly believed what he was saying. “I’ve been a prisoner of nightmarish visions of what I would become. I’ve been locked in a self-imposed cell of guilt and restraint for fear of the horrors I could unleash upon the world.”

He pressed his father’s hands to the arms of the chair and covered them with his own vise-like grip. “But that’s not truly what is important. I know that. What matters,
Father
, is what’s right, what’s decent. And you have no idea what you’ve done to violate all that is moral and decent and good about a man’s life. And you nearly had a woman killed today. In short, you have played God, and no man can do that, not even one whose own misfortunes confined him to a wheelchair.”

An oppressive silence filled the room. For moments neither man spoke. Jacob’s gaze never left his father’s face. Before his eyes, the great Harrison Proctor, master of his island, lover of fine horse flesh and finer brandy, began to shrink in size and stature. He seemed to shrivel until his chair virtually surrounded him in an overbearing presence of wood and cane. The man who had always dwarfed the sad conveyance he lived in was now made a small man in its shadow.

When he spoke, Harrison Proctor’s voice quivered with weakness. “What are you going to do?”

“If it were just you, I would walk away from Belle Isle and never return. I wouldn’t care if you choked on the vines and weeds that would one day invade the walls and wrap their tendrils around your throat. But you’re lucky,
Lord Proctor.
You have another son, and ironically it is he who will ultimately prove to be your savior.”

“Wh…what do you mean?”

“I will take care of Dylan as I always have. He cannot be faulted for what he is. And as long as Dylan lives, I suppose you will also. If you have a prayer left in your shrunken heart, I suggest you pray for Dylan to reach a ripe old age.

“But there will be changes. You will no longer live in the luxury to which you have accustomed yourself. What is not necessary to the survival of this estate will be sold to pay Dylan’s medical expenses. What is not essential to your own survival will be turned into profits for Proctor House. Do you understand?”

“You wound me deeply, Jacob,” his father muttered. “I never thought you would turn on your own flesh and blood.” Then, as though an afterthought, he asked, “Are you going to marry her?”

Jacob allowed himself a smile of victory. “So now you are interested in my life, are you,
Father
? Well, now you have no right to answers. But know this, you will never bounce any grandchildren upon your knee.”

He sat on the edge of the desk and slid the pistol to the far side. “We have no need of weapons, do we? I think we have a clear picture of who the enemy is, and he is only one defenseless old man. But I am going to give you one chance to redeem a small portion of the nobility you’ve lost.”

“What more can you ask of me?”

“Only this. Tell me about my mother. Tell me about Anne Hempstead.”

The old man’s eyes filled with tears, and he bent his head. Jacob sensed a memory had truly weighed upon what was left of his heart.

“She was a good woman, Jacob,” Harrison said. “And a proud one. Very much like you. If she were still with me…If only…”

Jacob swallowed a catch in his breath, and listened to the story of his mother.

Later, Jacob washed the grime and dirt of Sophie’s mountain from his body and wished he could erase the refuse of the past years from his life as easily. He ate his evening meal in his room and thought about everything his father had told him and how the extraordinary details of his past would now merge with his future.

His mother had languished for several days after giving birth to him. She suffered from the hardship of the delivery and pining for a husband who was as good as lost to her. Harrison Proctor’s voice had broken into sobs when he told Jacob of his indiscretions with Sophie Farrington while his wife, Anne, was expecting their first child. His wild infatuation with the exotic Sophie had become public knowledge, consequently breaking his wife’s heart and her will to live.

He told Jacob that Sophie had enchanted him. She’d cast a spell from which he couldn’t escape. She was vibrant and shimmering, and her laughter was like a thousand tinkling crystals. She was different from other young ladies of means. She tossed convention to the winds and wore the spirit of individuality like a dazzling cloak. Once Harrison had had a taste of her, he only wanted more. Even knowing he was married, Sophie’s parents encouraged the romance. It was as if they suspected what their daughter’s future held and were unburdening themselves of a scandalous disaster.

And that is what Sophie became. Shortly after Anne died, Harrison took Sophie for his wife. She insisted vehemently that the infant Jacob call her Mama, not so much from affection, Harrison thought now, as from a need to possess everything that had been Anne’s. In time she became pregnant and delivered her own child. She lavished excesses upon “her two boys,” parading them around London as though they were royal princes. When young Jacob balked at the attention and the fineries, she took Dylan under her flamboyant wing, and molded him in her image.

At first Harrison thought his wife merely craved the attention she got from owning expensive things. But he soon realized that Sophie’s problems were much greater. An imbalance in her brain, the doctors called it. A dementia that upon studying her family history might very well pass to her own offspring.

Her public behavior was an embarrassment to Harrison and his parents. She would not listen to reason and threatened retribution against the entire family if she were not allowed to continue her extravagant lifestyle. She was indiscreet in her affairs with other men. She was garish and outspoken at public gatherings.

And then the worst happened. Harrison’s parents threatened to take nine-year-old Jacob out of the household and tell him the truth of his birth. When Sophie got wind of the plan, she bellowed with rage, claiming that no one would take what was hers. Then a carriage accident took Charles’ and Lydia’s lives. Harrison never proved that Sophie somehow caused the demise of his parents, but in the library at Proctor House he told Jacob of his suspicions.

“I felt I had no choice,” he told his son. “I brought my family here to the island. I thought Sophie might get better.” He laughed bitterly at the thought. “I might have told you the truth some day,” he said, “but Dylan began acting strangely, and then Sophie attacked me with the dagger. I was desperate…an old, desperate, feeble man whose only pleasures in life were the ones he could buy and indulge in on Belle Isle. I couldn’t take the chance that you would forsake us.”

Jacob had left the library with the knowledge his father had finally given him, the sad, shocking knowledge of his past and his father’s true character. He had hardly said a word as his father railed on about his miserable life. If Harrison expected absolution from the son he’d wronged, he discovered he was never to get it.

Jacob would honor his commitment and allow his father to live out his days on the island, but forgive him? Never. Understand why he made the decisions he did? No. Harrison Proctor had chosen greed and deceit over honor. And if Nora hadn’t uncovered the truth, he would have persisted in his ignoble ways. This was something Jacob could never understand.

Having eaten very little, Jacob chose clean garments from his wardrobe. He put on his shirt by the open window that looked over the garden. Dusk was settling over the island, bathing the candlebush and fire vines in a rosy glow that was suddenly beautiful in Jacob’s eyes. He was done with wretchedness and lies and depravity. Thank God he now knew what goodness was, and that a man was blessed to find it. And he knew, too, that he had been less than honorable in his dealings with it.

Jacob walked into the hallway of the quiet house, shutting his door behind him. Then he went toward Nora’s room.

Chapter Twenty-three

Jacob knocked on Nora’s door with just the knuckle of his forefinger. Her reply was barely above a whisper. “Come in.”

She was wearing a simple white cotton nightdress, probably borrowed from a servant, and she was seated at a mirrored vanity. Her hair streamed over her shoulder in a damp mass of vibrant ebony. A towel was on her lap. The scent of lilacs drifted from soapy water in an oak tub.

Lace curtains at the window billowed into the room with a twilight breeze. A pale glow from the sun sinking below distant hills outlined the tallest trees and bathed the room in soft pink hues. A single flickering lantern illuminated Nora’s face in the mirror.

Jacob had to tell himself to breathe, something he’d never had to do before. But then, he’d never seen a sight as lovely as Nora at this moment. The sharp, almost painful catch of air filling his lungs matched the one in his step, and for a moment prevented him from going where his heart tried to lead.

She pivoted on the vanity stool and looked at him. “Jacob, are you all right?”

Her words calmed him, brought him back to himself. “I’m fine.” He went to her, laid his hand on the crown of her hair, then trailed his palm down the silky wetness. Her hair was cool and slick and patterned with fine ridges like a grosgrain ribbon. He picked up the towel from her lap and pressed raven strands into its folds, drying her hair slowly, a section at a time. He savored the simple task after the complications of the day. “I did what I had to do,” he said finally.

She covered his hand with hers, stilling his chore for a moment. “Do you want to talk about it?” she asked.

“Yes, that and a lot more. But not now.”

She turned back to the glass and he watched her reflection. Her feelings were mirrored in the gentle cobalt of her eyes gazing back at him. He saw caring and understanding in their depths, and reveled in the notion that they were for him.

She raised her hand to her chest where ivory skin showed above the worn cotton. Perhaps some day she would allow him to gift her with gowns of the finest silk and satin. She would indeed be lovely in them, but he would always remember her as she looked now, with her hair unadorned and her beauty all the more enchanting because of its simplicity.