“She has no one now.” No one but them. But Aidan. Shite. “She’s on her way here.” To marry Aidan.
The lump within Eamon’s throat grew thicker. He thought he had more time.
Aidan nodded, a wooden and stilted gesture, his jaw firming up as though facing a firing squad. “Well,” he said, “we knew this day would come. I’d always planned to marry the girl.”
Girl. As if she were still that silly little chit who sent her first letter at sixteen. As if it were a chore. For one, blinding moment, he hated Aidan. It was all he could do not to punch his arse of a brother in the face.
Eamon swallowed the anger down. Aidan wasn’t the arse here.
“You don’t have to—” Eamon snapped his mouth shut. Of course Aidan had to marry her. Lu had nowhere else to go. Besides, it had been decided on long ago.
“I do,” Aidan said, and they both knew the truth of it. He sighed, running a hand through his golden hair. “I do, and there’s nothing for it.” He looked at Eamon and paused as if considering. Eamon said nothing, for there was nothing to say. Aidan frowned. “Well then. I’ll have the staff prepare.”
Perfect. Bloody. Perfect.
* * *
Two Weeks Later
She stood on the front drive, halfway up from the gate and halfway to the house. A light mist swirled through the air, beading on her cheeks and dampening her hair. But she did not open her umbrella. No, that she leaned upon until it wobbled under her weight. She couldn’t seem to let go of the death grip she had on its handle long enough to raise the bloody thing and open it up.
Between the mist and the setting sun, the sky had turned a soft violet color, darkening to deep plum where storm clouds threatened.
“Dither out here any longer, old girl,” she muttered to herself, “and you’ll soon be swamped by the storm.”
Sadly, the prospect of being swept away was a shade too tempting. Beneath her skirts, her knees locked, refusing to allow her limbs to move. Ahead lay the edifice of Evernight Hall. The large manor house, done in a classic Greek revival style, shone ivory white against the crepuscular sky, as if even the impending weather would not dare mar its beauty.
And behind those walls lay Aidan Evernight. Aidan. Just thinking his name sent flutters of anxiety and excitement quivering through her belly. Four long years she’d ached to meet him, tried to imagine the way he smelled, the precise shade of his fair hair, the exact timber of his voice. She’d fancied it would be deep now, rolling over her like a wave from the sea. A shudder of longing went down her back as she imagined all of Aidan crashing over her.
He was so very close. It might has well have been a hundred miles.
Here she stood, bedraggled, her pelisse ripped on one shoulder and the hems of her skirts covered in muck and mud. She ought to be arriving in a proper coach. With proper servants to attend to her. Another shudder rippled through her flesh. This one so violent that she almost lost hold of her umbrella. The coach was at the bottom of the sea. And everyone else gone with it.
Bile surged up her throat at the memory. The screams, both of horses and of people. The sight of the carriage dashed upon the rocks, and in an instant, of the sea sweeping all sign of it away. Grief and fear threatened to crush her just then. She ought to be dead as well. Only she’d gotten out before the horses spooked. Having an indelicate yet undeniable need to relieve her bladder had saved her. And her bloody umbrella. The one she had insisted upon taking with her to use as a privacy shield.
A mad laugh escaped her. Not at all a bad omen, this. She swallowed hard. She’d seen too much death of late. As if it haunted her.
Perhaps it did. She ought to have died of cholera too. No. She wouldn’t think about it. Later she could cry for those lost. Ahead lay her future. All she had to do was claim it. To claim Aidan.
All she had to do was move. In the direction of the house. And yet she remained riveted to this bit of halfway earth. When really, she needed to be all in.
He was waiting for his bride. To be his bride was a notion that had, at first, struck fear into her heart and then become the only thing to keep her going. Years, she’d written to him. Fallen in love with him over parchment, ink, and quill. Horribly, the reality of actually meeting him was not the stuff of rainbows and chirping birds. But one of terror. She wanted this so badly it made her teeth hurt and her bones thrum.
Yet what right had she to pursue happiness when she lived a life of smoke and mirrors? Her family had died, a coach lay at the bottom of the sea, and she only here by providence.
Blinking up at the swirling clouds, she thought of old Irena the cook’s saying, fate throws fortune, but not everyone catches it. Was it really this simple? Could she do it and not feel guilt with every passing day?
Put the past behind her. And embrace her future. What could go wrong?
Chapter Three
Eamon hadn’t imagined that his temper could grow any fouler, but it had. He fair ached to smash his fist to the wall and feel the welcome bite of pain. For here Lu stood. At last. Battered and nearly swaying on her feet. And prettier than he’d imagined. Her fine, sherry-sweet voice was soft as she explained her harrowing journey, of how the coach horses had spooked from the sudden flash of lightning, and how the bloody stupid driver hadn’t been able to control them. The coach had gone over the cliff and into the sea, killing her lady’s maid, the driver, and two outriders.
Jaysus, but she could have been killed as well. The mere thought had his insides pitching and icing over. Lu. At last. And his eyes ate up the sight of her like a man starved. By God, but she was lovely. Delicate features, large, wide eyes the color of midnight, and a determined little chin with a cleft in it. A sign of stubbornness, Nan used to say. Not that anyone need tell him that Lu was stubborn. He adored that aspect of her.
Her hair was darker than he’d expected. A pure, raven black so glossy it shone gold where the lamplight hit it. Rainwater dripped from the ends of the limp tendrils falling about her face. She ought to be tended to, carried up to her room and set before the fire, not standing here swaying upon her feet.
Eamon was of a mind to suggest it when his brother spoke.
“How did you manage to get here from the cliffs, Lady Luella?” Aidan asked quietly.
His brother sat close to Lu, his body tense and his countenance pallid. As unhappy as Eamon. If only they could trade places.
“Well, I walked, didn’t I?”
Eamon almost smiled at her not-so-subtle dig at Aidan’s inane question. She had every right to be annoyed.
Mud streaked down like tears along the fine curve of her alabaster white cheek. “It wasn’t far.” Even so, she visibly trembled, and Eamon had to clench his fists to keep from reaching out for her.
“That you had to walk at all is a travesty,” Aidan said shortly, then reached for the bell. “We ought not have kept you here.”
At Aidan’s use of “we,” Luella ’s gaze flicked to Eamon. As fleeting and disinterested as her inspection of him was, he felt the look down to his marrow, and his breath caught short. But her attention had already returned to Aidan with a greedy appraisal that had Eamon’s tender heart squeezing in pain. God, he was nothing to her now.
“Let us get you settled,” Aidan said.
Lu frowned slightly at Aidan’s impersonal tone but nodded. “Thank you.”
Everything was wrong. The thick, awkward tension in the air, the way Lu’s glittering gaze soaked up the sight of his brother instead of him, and the way Aidan all but recoiled from his intended. All of it wrong. Eamon wanted to shout the truth, throw Lu over his shoulder and claim her. But years of being ordered to be silent, hold his tongue, and blend into the walls were difficult to overcome.
So he obeyed those long-ago edicts and said nothing as Aidan guided Lu out and introduced her to Nan, their housekeeper and general pest as far as Eamon was concerned.
The parlor fell to blessed silence, and he took a slow breath to ease the tightness in his shoulders. He could do this. He could keep quiet and watch Aidan and Lu—
“Fuck.” His fist smashed through the plaster, and the portrait of Great-Aunt Tilly swayed.
“Nan will have your head for that,” said their butler, George, as he entered the room.
Eamon shook his aching hand, scattering plaster dust. “She’s welcome to it. I’d rather not have it upon my shoulders at the moment.” He sucked on a split knuckle before eyeing George. “Why are you looking at me in that manner?”
Reproach Eamon would have understood, but George hovered in the middle of the room and stared at Eamon as though he’d soon wail upon him as well. Laughable, as Eamon had never raised a fist to anyone in his life. And George well knew it.
“There’s talk in town today.”
“There’s talk in town every day.” Eamon said it lightly but dread began to curl tight in his gut. “Talk” usually revolved around him, the dreaded fear rua who had the nerve to hide away in Evernight Hall. He almost snorted. As if being redheaded was a curse. Ah, well, perhaps it was. His father certainly considered him a curse, and no lady had looked upon his flame red hair with anything other than distaste.
Eamon clenched his hand to refrain from running his fingers through his hair.
“This talk,” said George, “is a mite distressing. Last night Seamus O’Neil ran off a man who’d been wheeling his cart through the town square at midnight.” George peered at Eamon as he continued. “Seems O’Neil didn’t like the look of the gall.”
“Every self-respecting Irishman views foreigners as a threat, George.” Damn, but Eamon knew where this was going. His day was officially ruined.
“An’ for good reason. That cart was filled with bodies.” His weathered face wrinkled further. “And parts of them.”
Eamon held his gaze without blinking. Even as his heart beat harder. “What did they do with the man?”
“He got away.”
Relief swept through Eamon, but he didn’t let it show. “It’s a good thing O’Neil was on guard. I’m certain the town was grateful for his diligence.”
“It’s a good thing O’Neil was drunk off his nut and tripped over his own feet before he could catch the bastard.” George raised a knobby finger and pointed it at Eamon. “I don’t know what you’re doing in that smithy, and I don’t want to know. None of us do. There are whispers enough in town over you. Takes naught but one bit of proof to have them come demanding answers. Mind yourself, boyo. We’ve got a new mistress in this house now.”
As if that wasn’t Eamon’s every waking and dreaming thought.
“I suggest you maintain your self-imposed ignorance, George, and let me worry about the rest.” Eamon didn’t wait for a retort but walked out of the room and headed for the smithy. The town could go to hell; he wasn’t about to let their fear keep him from the one pleasure he had left.
* * *
“What you need to understand,” said the housekeeper named Nan as they marched down a long corridor, “is that Eamon and Aidan are the lights that keep Evernight alive.”
Lu peered at the wiry woman, whose grey hair glowed silver in the dimly lit upper hall. “A strange thing to say.” She picked up her pace to catch up with Nan’s brisk stride. “What do you mean by ‘light’?”
Nan stopped by a door and looked her over. It was a very thorough assessment, one that left Lu feeling as though her flesh had been picked clean to the bone. “Every one of us at Evernight Hall loves those boys. It is our devotion to them that kept us going.”
Her use of “boys” made Lu smile. Aidan had quite a boyish quality about his features. It had surprised her to discover that about him. For some odd reason, she’d pictured him as more manly. His voice deeper instead of the soft, steady modulation he favored. Her smile fled. She’d also pictured him welcoming her with open arms, perhaps a passionate kiss. He’d simply treated her like a guest. A favored one, to be sure, but a stranger nonetheless. Perhaps it was due to the presence of his younger brother, Eamon.
Lu hadn’t taken a good look at Eamon. She’d been too distracted by seeing Aidan for the first time. But she recalled his hulking size as he clung to the shadows. Had he said a word? She couldn’t recall.
“I don’t like speaking ill of the dead,” the housekeeper said, “but the old Master Evernight was a hard taskmaster. Hard on everyone.”
Nan opened the door and led Lu into a lovely, well-appointed room done in shades of royal blue and white. “Your room. Feel free to request any changes.” Nan bustled over to the hearth and tended the flames before turning round. “They are as different as brothers can be. They are also as close as brothers can be,” Nan went on. Her gaze grew sharp on Lu. “They’d do anything for the other.”
“Then I shall have to get to know Eamon as well as I know Aidan,” Lu said.
If anything, Nan’s eyes narrowed further. “That you do. Though I suggest you get to know Aidan anew. Letters take time to compose,” she said quietly. “A person can hide in the written word in a way one cannot hide in life.”
Lu’s heart stilled, and it took all she had not to fidget under the woman’s piercing stare. She couldn’t possibly know.
“Are you saying that Aidan hid his true nature in our correspondence?” Desperation and the need to understand more of her now-distant fiancé made her ask. In truth, Lu barely refrained from asking how Nan knew of the letters.
Nan looked at her with genuine surprise. “Aidan hide his nature in correspondence? Never fear that, child. If there is one truth in this world, it’s that Aidan has never, and will never, lie through the written word.”