Chained: Reckless Desires (Dragon's Heart Book 1) (9 page)

“Can you ride?” he asked.

“A bicycle?”

“A horse.”

“You have horses here?” Bella was surprised. Maybe she shouldn’t have been, but she was.

“Yes. Your father takes care of them. It’s one of his more pressing duties. Didn’t he tell you?”

“Generally he tells me nothing. Ever. At least not since my mom died, and honestly not before either.”

Dorian regarded her as if seeing her anew. “It’s so odd, the way he talks about you—it’s as if you talk all the time. He and my father used to go on these long walks on Sundays, to survey the remote edges of the property and look for signs of trouble or spots that needed extra attention. They dreamed up all sorts of uses for the property you know, but my father never got around to any of them. Your father has told me about some of the more outlandish ideas, but also he gushed about you.”

Questions leapt to mind, but Bella didn’t know which to ask first. She didn’t want to think about her father. She hadn’t forgiven him for the way he’d scolded her. “Exactly how many structures are there on this estate? My dad told me about the hunting lodge where—I mean—the place where your father had his accident. And there’s the main house, and the library. How much more is there?”

Dorian led her around the maze, across the grounds, to the garage. He squinched his eyes shut as he thought about it. “There are quite a few. There’s the stables, the boathouse, the private dock. The footman’s home. The carriage house. The dining common. The old schoolhouse. The vault. The zeppelin dock. The submarine mooring.” He counted on his fingers as he listed all of them. “And at least a dozen buildings down by where the mountain’s edge meets Bearfield. We have renters in them now.”

“A zeppelin dock?”

“I may have made a few of those up,” Dorian grinned. “Honestly, I don’t really know how many there are. The entire mountain belongs to the family and there are buildings that were constructed a hundred years ago that are now forgotten.”

“What a problem to have,” Bella quipped. “Too many houses to count.”

“Well, it’s not like I grew up here. My mother raised me on the east coast, near Boston. We only visited here on holidays and for our family Augusts.”

Dorian opened the garage doors. There was a four-wheeler inside, half-caked with mud. “If horses are out of the question, we can take this. Technically it belongs to my brother Leon, but he won’t care if we drive it down to the meadows for lunch.”

“Leon,” Bella said. “That’s Napoleon.”

“He hates that name.”

“What’s with the names? Hannibal? Xerxes? I know the rich are different, but some of these names border on child abuse.”

“Well, they’d be perfect for my family then,” Dorian said darkly. Then, shaking away the gloom, “My father named us all after conquerors. Men who straddled the world, he said. It’s what he wanted for us all. It’s why he was so upset when I changed my name.”

Dorian strapped the picnic basket to the back of the four-wheeler and then mounted it in one smooth motion. He was still wearing a suit—a handsome and slim-cut slate gray summer weight—but it didn’t matter to him. He patted the back of the vehicle and Bella clambered on behind him, slipping and thunking her head off his back in the process. He turned the key and the squat beast roared to life.

Speaking was impossible while the engine was running, so Bella contented herself with wrapping her arms around his firm waist and holding on tighter than was necessary. His body felt good in her hands, solid and hot, almost fevered.

They drove down the mountain road a half mile before turning down a hidden path that was little more than a space where trees didn’t grow. There was a network of old walkways and roads on Winter’s Mountain that dated back to when the Ohlone people settled there three thousand years ago. Later, an army of gardeners and craftsmen had used them to build the estate, but now they were used by no one, save the occasional bear or rabbit.

What was going on between her and Dorian? There was a thing there, she could feel it. She could see it in his eyes. But it didn’t make any sense at all. She was a curvy girl who’d set her life on fire, and he was a half-mad rich kid chained to his father’s sinking legacy. They couldn’t possibly have anything together, could they? And yet there was something in the way he looked at her that felt right. She could feel it between them like electricity. At least when he wasn’t threatening to murder her or trying to remodel the house with his fists.

No, it was impossible. He couldn’t be trusted. The sunshine Dorian—he was a man she could love. There, she said it. But it was true. He was wry. He was handsome. He had compassion and kindness in his blood. But the midnight Dorian—he was an utter bastard. Maybe she should call that side of him Valdemar out of respect and fear of old Octavian?

Dorian drove them down the mountain on narrow switchback roads peppered with gravel, through arching canopies of oak and eucalyptus, past thirteen enormous sequoias all in a line, until they ended at a rolling meadow full of flowers.

“Your father made this. It was sort of his audition. He called it the
Bella Garden
but I’ll admit the significance was lost on everyone at the time.”

The field faced the sea, with the mountain at its back. The ground was almost too steep to walk on, except for a cobblestone path that led to a picnic table built on a vertiginous deck. The field was so full of flowers that the ground was invisible. It was like a giant red wound in the earth, like the mountain’s heart had been exposed here, in secret. She recognized some of the flowers, but many of the blooms were unknown to her. Flowers had never really been her thing. She liked them well enough, but their names never seemed to stay with her. These flowers were different though. They seemed magical.

“It’s incredible. This is gorgeous. Thank you for showing it to me.”

Dorian smiled at her sadly. “If I’m going to lose this place, I wanted a chance to share the most beautiful part of it with someone.”

The field of flowers dipped out of view at the edges, it was so large. How would it look from the sea? Or from the air?

“What was this spot before my father transformed it?” Bella stood near the four-wheeler, vaguely afraid to walk the path to the table. How long had it been since the deck had been used? Pages from her product liability textbook in law school flitted through her head. How many of those tragedies began with the words, “Well, we thought it was safe”?

“I don’t know. Not really. It was a giant burn mark that came close to circling the entire mountain. Like a very odd forest fire or arson maybe.” He shrugged. “My father was pathologically unable to answer direct questions, so I never knew. I’ve always suspected he was responsible, but he denied it.”

Dorian untied the picnic basket and led the way out to the table. He walked with sure steps on the slick stones, but Bella knew that if she took one wrong step she’d tip into the sea. No matter that there were stones and walls and a thousand flowering plants to break her fall. She could feel herself circling oblivion.

“How does she do it?” Dorian asked. “She knows my appetites better than I do.” He unpacked a bottle of white wine—a Zinfandel from a Napa winery—a cloth basket of fresh strawberries, a ceramic jar of freshly whipped cream, a loaf of bread dotted with chunks of chocolate and cherry, and a wheel of cheese lashed to its own private cutting board with a shining knife wrapped in paper stuffed between the cheese and the board.

Dorian sat facing the sea, and Bella across from him. But he saw on her face how disturbed she was by the abyss behind her, so they switched.

Bella broke off a hunk of the bread—still warm from the oven—and bit into it. The cherries were tart and the chocolate was sweet and it was heavenly in her mouth. “This is incredible,” she said. “You can’t have any.”

Dorian laughed loudly. “You’d deny your lord his just desserts?” he said with a spark in his golden eyes.

“I’d deny him nothing,” Bella said, meaning it lightly, but the words hung in the air between them, full of portent.

“The buyer is coming tomorrow,” Dorian said. “If his offer is satisfying and he demands it, we might need to leave by tomorrow night.”

“What?” Bella said around the strawberry sticking out of her mouth. She pulled it out and pointed it at Dorian. “Of course, it’s common with these sorts of contracts. I hadn’t been thinking about it from this side of the table. There’s a fear that given a month’s time the owner would spirit away anything of value in the house.”

“I wouldn’t take everything of value, but some of it I wouldn’t be able to resist.” He sighed and glanced over to regard the massive field of red flowers. “This could be our last night together.”

“Hence, the picnic?”

“Just so.” Dorian smiled at her kindly. “I’ve been meaning to do this ever since you started working for me, but the timing has never been right. There’s always been too much to do. Another hopeless stab at a cure to try. I owe you an explanation. You’ve seen me at my worst and you deserve to know why, but telling you would bring on—” a tremor shook his body, “—the curse.”

“I’d love to say no, no, don’t tell me if it hurts you so, but honestly I’m dying to know. Just promise me you won’t hulk out and leave me stranded here,” Bella said. “Or hurl me into the sea.”

“I promise,” Dorian smiled sadly.

“There are parts I know and parts I’ve guessed,” Bella said. “But I want to hear it from you.”

The gold in his eyes was dimming. “I’m cursed. I’m sure you’ve heard that. I am forbidden from discussing the particulars. Or offering any information at all, but if you were to question me . . .”

Bella nodded. Deposition. She knew this game. The wind was still and the air was hot. The scent of the flowers was subtle and heady and made her limbs feel liquid. But for a moment she could pretend she was back in her office in San Francisco, deposing someone on tape.

“State your name,” she said.

“Lord Dorian Valdemar Winterborn, Baron of Letheshire.”

“Baron?” she arched an eyebrow at him.

“Letheshire is basically a muddy field in Scotland these days, but it’s been in the family for a thousand years. All of three people live there now and technically I am their baron.”

“What is your occupation?” she asked.

“Formerly, I was executive of a nonprofit fund that directed contributions towards a variety of worthy goals, focusing especially on animal rescue, homelessness, and food scarcity. That became impossible with the curse, so currently I am the penniless administrator of the Winter’s Breath estate, located on Winter’s Mountain.”

“Why is it called Winter? We’re in California. There’s no winter here.”

Dorian shrugged. “It was my father’s nickname, they said. He was a cold man, a serious man. He had a bite to him, and teeth that sank into your bones. The nickname makes sense to me. Also, winter sucks, and so did he.”

Bella took a deep breath and prepared for the real questions. If the monster inside Dorian came out, she’d have nowhere to run or hide. But neither would he. One good kick and he’d tumble into the sea.

“Was it your father who cursed you?”

“Yes,” Dorian said, scratching his wrist.

“Did he curse you recently?”

“Just before he died. A month before?”

Did she believe this? Were curses real? If Chloe could talk to spirits, maybe fathers could curse their sons.

“Was he a witch?”

“No,” Dorian said quickly. “Next question. Please hurry.”

Bella had an idea. “What do you think of your brothers?”

Dorian blinked and sat straighter. “I hate them all. They’re cruel and wicked men, like my father. Complete bastards.”

Perhaps if she alternated between questions about the curse and questions about other things, she could hold off his curse longer.

“How did he curse you? Does it have something to do with that rusted chain?”

“Next question,” he replied, but he nodded first. The curse was in the chain.

“Why do you hate your brothers?”

“They did terrible things and lied about them to my father, on a near daily basis. They are selfish and awful men, but he couldn’t see that. He stood behind them blindly, no matter what. And when I was honest with him, I was punished for it. He thought that I didn’t love him because I told the truth, whereas I know my brothers didn’t love him, because they lied.” Dorian grabbed the picnic table in his hands. The wood groaned as he squeezed it.

“You love him, even though he was a monster?”

“Monster or not, he was my dad.” Dorian closed his eyes and breathed deeply.

“What are you really looking for in the house?”

“I’ve hired witches, many witches, to examine the curse. They had no answers for me until recently. They said that my father’s forgiveness was supposed to free me, but he died before he could give it. And now they all say the same thing, the key to freeing me is in the house. But I’ve found nothing. I don’t even know what it would look like.”

“Is it killing you?” she asked, her voice choking.

Dorian looked at her, his eyes swimming with gold and black. He nodded. “I don’t have a lot of time left. Though no one is sure how long. This sort of thing isn’t supposed to happen. The last expert who examined me said I should already have succumbed, but that something is keeping me alive and holding the curse back.”

Bella’s heart ached. “What is it?”

“You, Bella. It’s you. I know you feel it, too. Being near you I feel more like myself than I have in months.” There it was. He’d said it. Confirmed it. It wasn’t her imagination, he felt it too.

“Have you ever been in love?” Bella asked. Why did she ask that? She wanted to change the topic abruptly, but the question leapt out of her mouth before she could stop it.

“Perhaps.”

“Perhaps? What do you mean,
perhaps
?”

“It means I’m still trying to figure it out, this thing I feel. Do you forgive me? Can you forgive me? I’ve been such a monster and said so many horrible things. I basically enslaved you and the thought of it torments me at night. The idea that you could hate me—could justly hate me for the things I’ve done—is poison in my veins worse even than the madness the curse brings. Please tell me you can forgive me.”