Forever and a Day (36 page)

The man continued to blankly stare up at his mother’s pale face and those soft gray eyes as if in a trance.

“No portrait did her justice.” Roderick’s voice echoed in the room, sounding a bit more nervous than he intended.

Atwood turned and fully faced him. The yellowing glow of the study’s candles illuminated a shaven, lean face framed against disheveled, shoulder-length black hair. Cool ice-blue eyes that bespoke of a hard life held Roderick’s gaze. His large gloved hand gripped the hilt of a dagger that was sheathed and attached to the leather belt resting on his hip.

“I’m your nephew,” Roderick offered to reassure the man that the blade was unnecessary. “Yardley.”

“I know who you are,” Atwood replied in a low but casual tone that was laced with an accent that appeared to be an odd combination of American and British. “We met. Back in New York.”

Roderick swallowed. “Forgive me for not being able to remember. I had an incident that—”

“I know. You needn’t worry. I’m not all that memorable, anyway.” Atwood eyed him. “Allow me to get to the point of my visit tonight, nephew of mine. One I have yet to convey to your father. After a less than constructive meeting with my father this morning, who refused to let my mother see me, I have decided to kill him. Tonight, actually. After he leaves this house and heads into his carriage. And I intend to have all of London witness it. Why am I telling you this? Because when you are brought before the jury, I don’t want there to be any doubt as to what my motives were. Tell them it wasn’t revenge but a savage need for peace.”

Roderick stared, not knowing what astonished him more. Those words or how casually he had said them. “Don’t do this. Killing him will only see you hanged.”

“Exactly. Peace.”

Oh, no. No, no, no. The man was not about to do this and drag him and his father into another nightmare. He edged toward him. “Killing him and then getting yourself hanged will change
nothing
.”

Atwood flexed his leather-gloved hands. “I know.”

Hell, the man was serious. Not to mention absolutely insane. “Uncle. If you do this, you will not only destroy yourself, but you will ruin my father, and me, as well. You’ll also be destroying the wife I hope to take and the children I hope to have. All we would ever know and hear and see would be the blood you rashly spilled and the mess you left for us to mop up.”

His uncle pointed a gloved finger to his own head. “I am
not
going to live inside this head a breath more.”

It was as if he were meeting a deranged version of himself prior to regaining his memory. “No one understands you more than I. Believe me. Living within a head you would rather step out of is a curse of the worst sort, but there are ways to allay the misery. But not like this. You will find it through the support and love of your family.”

Atwood’s face darkened. “The Sumners are not my family.”

“Right you are in that. The Sumners are not. But we are. I am. My father is. My father loves you given all that you represent. He loves you enough to unearth his own wife’s remains, which I know will kill him considering what she meant to him. Despite that, you mean to dirk him? You mean to dirk the last person who remains standing in your corner in order to entertain some morbid urge for revenge?”

Atwood searched his face. “He means to disturb my sister’s grave? I won’t have it.”

“’Tis the only means we have of proving your legitimacy. My father told me about my grandfather denying your legitimacy, but
this
would prove it. ’Tis the only known portrait of you in existence with a label of your name and it lies buried with my mother.”

Atwood momentarily closed his eyes. “She was buried with my portrait?”

“That she was. She carried you upon her lips and within her heart until her last breath was taken and spent her entire life wanting to find you. If you don’t mean to honor the living, Uncle, I ask that you at least honor the dead. My mother deserved as much.”

Atwood’s features twisted as he swung away. After a long moment of silence, he turned back and wordlessly unfastened the leather belt from around his hips. He folded the belt around the sheath of his dagger and held it out. “Take it before I use it.”

Roderick grabbed hold of the belt and dagger, a breath escaping his lips. He tightened his hold on the worn leather and slowly shook his head. “You need to find peace.”

Atwood set his shoulders and slowly rounded him. “I hear death is a nice long sleep. Sounds peaceful enough to me.”

Roderick drew in a ragged breath and let it out. “Take back the life that was so maliciously taken from you and create something worthier. Surround yourself with people who will love you and support you whilst taking your place back in our circle where you belong. That is how you will find and know peace. Give yourself a chance to know it. Consider starting a family and commencing anew.”

A gargled laugh escaped his uncle. “Taking an aristo for a wife, who’d never understand the chaos within me, would only beget children whose bedtime stories would involve my nightmares. I don’t think so.”

Turning toward him, Roderick offered in a sympathetic tone, “You underestimate a woman’s worth and her ability to redefine a man. A woman can give you hope in a world that has none. She can fight for you when you have ceased fighting for yourself and everything you believe in.”

Atwood glanced toward him. “Smitten, are you?”

“Beyond. You should be so lucky.”

Atwood smirked. “Distract me. What’s her name?”

Roderick bit back a smile. “Her real one? Or the one she is parading under? For I will confess I am about to marry two women for the price of one. She is divine intervention. I have never known anyone or anything so exquisite.”

“I could use a little divine intervention.” His uncle strode back toward him and leaned in. The smell of leather penetrated the air. “Would you be willing to share her with your uncle from time to time? When I’m feeling particularly lonely? Or are you the territorial sort?”

Roderick tossed aside the leather belt and blade with a resounding clatter, lest he use it himself, and stared his uncle down, fury streaking through his body and his mind. “Do I look amused?”

Atwood snorted and patted his cheek, the cool leather grazing his skin. “Now, now, you aristos are so easily ruffled. I was joking.”

“Were you?” Roderick reached out and purposefully gripped the man’s muscled shoulder hard, digging the tips of his fingers into the flesh beneath. “Don’t cross the only family you have left, Atwood. Don’t even
joke
about it.”

His uncle’s ice-blue eyes seemed to be taunting him. “You needn’t worry, nephew. I only cross those that cross me. And you haven’t crossed me…
yet
.” Flinging Roderick’s hand away, he started backward toward the doors of the study, still holding his gaze. “I think I’m going to like London. There are just so many civilized people crawling around my boots looking to lick them clean. Now if you’ll excuse me…I intend to find myself a dance partner and scare the shite out of people.”

Swinging away, he slid open the doors with a single sweep of his long arms and disappeared with the billowing movement of his long riding coat.

Roderick winced, knowing he was supposed to keep Atwood in the study, but had a feeling all of London was fecked either way. So he let him walk, thankful to no end that he had Georgia to see him through whatever mess lay ahead.

EPILOGUE

Òmnia vincit amor; et nos cedamus amori.

Love conquers all things: let us, too, surrender to Love.

—Virgil,
Eclogues:
Book X (70 BC–19 BC)

Seven years later, evening
The Tremayne household in London

T
HE
DOOR
TO
THEIR
BEDCHAMBER
creaked open inch…by inch…by inch…by inch.

Georgia sat up against the pillows, setting aside her needlework, and tapped at Roderick’s open book. “’Tis set to begin.”

Roderick slapped his book shut and tossed it with the flick of his wrist onto the linen before them, shifting toward the door. Adjusting his robe, he called out toward the now-open door, “The answer is still no. So I suggest you go back to the nursery and mope about it to your brothers, who have yet to care about anything beyond milk.”

Their daughter, Ballad Jane, padded into the room, twirling her dark braids, and eventually paused beside their bed, her large green eyes darting from Georgia to Roderick. “Uncle Atwood wouldn’t say no to me. Nor would Uncle Milton.”

Georgia glanced over at Roderick and drawled, “Now, how can you argue with that?”

Roderick threw back his dark head and huffed up at the ceiling, “The answer is still
no
.”

“But,
Papa
—” Ballad fell against the edge of the bed in exasperation, leaning toward him. Reaching up, she patted both hands against the mattress she barely reached, each pat emphasizing every word she insisted on saying. “I really, really want an elephant. Preferably a girl elephant. No, not preferably. Definitely. Definitely a girl elephant. It can sleep with me. I don’t mind. Really.
Please?
I only want one.”

Georgia burst into laughter. “That child is yours, Robinson. Not mine. You were the one to read her all of those stories about India. Now handle it.”

He sighed. “Come here, love.” His dark brows came together as he leaned toward the edge of the bed, reached down and yanked their daughter up and onto his lap.

Settling her into place and yanking her white nightdress down over her small stockinged feet, he lowered his head to hers, intently holding her gaze. “Where on earth are we going to keep an elephant in the middle of London? Animals of such size are only meant for the wilderness. Even Hyde Park would make the poor thing feel unwelcome. How about we get you a dog instead? The biggest one we can find? Or a pony? Would you prefer a pony?”

Ballad puckered her lips as if
he
were being ridiculous. “I don’t want a dog and I don’t want a pony. Everyone has dogs and ponies in London and I don’t want what everyone else has. I want an elephant. No one has any of those.”

A laugh rumbled out from Roderick’s lips. “There is a reason for it.”

“Papa,
pleeeeeease
.” Ballad clasped her six-year-old hands together and shook them up at him pleadingly. “I will never, ever,
ever
ask for anything again.”

He sighed. “The answer is still no and you are old enough to understand why I am saying no. Are we done?”

Ballad dropped her clasped hands into her lap. She glanced up at him and swept a finger out toward Georgia. “Mama said that if we take up Grandpapa’s offer of living at his estate in Surrey, there would be more than enough room for an elephant, given all the acreage he has. Can’t we call on Grandpapa and tell him we are moving in? That way, I get to see him every day
and
I get an elephant.”

Roderick turned to Georgia, glaring at her. “You didn’t actually promise her an elephant if we moved in with my father, did you?”

Georgia grinned and leaned toward him. “You wanted a
big
family, Robinson. It doesn’t get any bigger than that.” She jabbed his shoulder. “
But
…if the elephant is a bit much, and I’ll agree that it is, I suggest we take the child to India for a few months instead, lest we never know peace. I’ve always wanted to go. Wouldn’t it be fun?”

“Fun?”
Roderick eyed them both, even as his daughter’s eyes had lit up at Georgia’s suggestion. “Crawling into the mouth of a crouching tiger in the middle of a sweltering jungle is not what I call fun. How about we go to France?”

Ballad crossed her arms and huffed out a breath, grouching, “I never get anything. Not the pistol that I wanted. Not the sword that I wanted. Not even the monkey. And now this. What good is having money if we never use it for anything?”

Roderick elbowed Georgia hard. “We know where that tongue comes from.” He paused, shaking his head, and eventually blew out a breath. “Fine. We go to India. That at least would be educational and money well spent. Only, we’re leaving
all
of the elephants
there
. Is that understood?” He gently tapped at Ballad’s forehead. “I also don’t want any more of this talk about how I never give you anything. Money is a privilege, Ballad, not a right.”

“Yes, Papa.”

Ballad let out a joyful screech, throwing up both hands. She scrambled out of his lap and off the bed, landing on the floor with an echoing thud.
“India!”
Dashing out the door, with hands still waving, she disappeared into the corridor shouting, “I have the best Mama
ever!
”

Roderick paused and jerked toward Georgia. “That little brat forgot to thank the one person who is paying the goddamn bill.”

Georgia grabbed hold of his robe, dragging him down toward her onto the mattress. “All that really matters, Robinson, is that
I
know who is paying the bill. It could be worse. She could be wanting a cougar. Can you imagine?”

Roderick let out a growl, replicating one himself, and shoved his warm hand beneath her nightdress, causing her to squeak. “And what do
you
want, Lady Yardley?”

“Move your hand a little lower and to the left. And when we’re done, I want you to go fetch us some whiskey.”

“Yes and yes, madam. Anything else?”

“Yes. Close the door.”

* * * * *