Must Be Magic (18 page)

Uncertainly, Leila faced the boy opening the door of Dunstan's cottage later that morning. He was nearly as tall as she, with a shaggy head of dark hair and striking black eyes just like his father's. It was one thing to take a man as lover. It was quite another to face the reminder that he had a family and a life beyond the one they shared in their private moments.

Was she selfish in coming here to ask that he delay the trip to London just a little longer? She needed more time to experiment. He needed more time to learn how to behave in the city. She wanted him to take her with him, but she didn't know how to suggest it.

She'd never had to share her actions and decisions with anyone, or ask them to share theirs. Even when married, she had made her own choices. Uncertainty made her nervous.

Wrapped in her own concerns, she'd done her very best not to think about Dunstan's family, but something told her she'd better confront that reality now.

“Lady Leila?” the boy asked with the same uncertainty that was unsettling her.

“And you are Griffith.” He reeked of rebelliousness, but his age offered a better excuse for it than that of her grown nephew. “You are the perfect image of your father. Is he here?”

“Yes, m-my lady,” he stuttered, glancing back into the house.

“Griffith, who is it?” Dunstan called from the interior.

Pleasure shivered down Leila's spine at the sound of his voice. When he appeared in the room behind Griffith, her skin tingled with remembered joy. The loneliness inside her opened up and welcomed the man walking toward her with such masculine assurance. It was rather an intimidating experience not to restrain her feelings as she was accustomed to doing, yet she smiled in trust and relief at his approach, and a pleasurable warmth enveloped her at the appreciative look he offered in return.

“Let the lady in,” he ordered. Still in stockinged feet, he shrugged on his vest and dug at his disordered hair to straighten it, as if he'd just arisen from bed—as he probably had, given their late hours the night past.

Griffith stepped aside, and Leila brushed by him, unable to take her gaze from the man who had taught her so much already, the man from whom she could learn so much more. Anticipation spilled through her like that of a child at Christmas. “I have been thinking.”

A wry smile curled Dunstan's handsome mouth. “Always a dangerous proposition. Griffith, you had best run outside before the lady explodes.”

The boy looked from one to the other of them and didn't budge.

“I don't think warning him of an impending explosion is the correct incentive to send him away,” said Leila. Such silliness, yet she couldn't help tweaking his Ives nature. “Tell him nothing will explode, and he'll wander away in boredom.”

Griffith bit back a grin and edged toward the kitchen. His father chuckled and relaxed. “All right, so we know each other too well. It's probably not wise to teach him Malcolm tricks either, so perhaps we should go outside.”

“I'll hoe the turnips,” Griffith offered, skipping backward, still watching Leila. “You're prettier than Aunt Ninian,” he blurted.

“Out!” Dunstan roared, not turning to watch his son. “Or you'll haul water the rest of your born days.”

Reddening, the boy turned and ran.

“Shame on you,” Leila chided, sweeping past him to examine the sparse furniture of the parlor, suddenly nervous at being left alone with a man who knew her better than she knew herself. “He's a charming boy. You must teach him to speak properly, not bellow at him as if he were a beast in the field.”

“That's what we beasts do—bellow. You shouldn't come here unescorted. It doesn't take long for tongues to flap.”

She waved a dismissive hand. “Let them flap. There are things of far greater importance on my mind.”

He stood behind her but didn't touch her. She wished he would. She knew why he could not. The trust between them was still too fragile.

She stood here, in his house, knowing they could never share it. She shivered and crossed her arms to cup her elbows.

“I'm listening,” he informed her gravely.

“Thank you for that.” She lifted her chin and stared at the wall. “Before you go to London, you must teach me…” She hesitated, uncertain how to ask for what she wanted. “I wish to learn if there is any truth about what you said last night. About my ability to smell emotions.”

His fingers brushed her shoulder, briefly, reassuringly. “That might be easier done in London. You need people on whom to experiment.”

She took a deep breath of relief. He understood. She swung around and dared face him. She didn't read censure or disbelief or amusement in his eyes. He truly believed she had a gift, and he respected it. She could not describe the heady delight bubbling up inside her. Impulsively, she stroked his newly shaven jaw.

“I lived in London all my life and knew nothing of my gift. Perhaps I need to be isolated to fully realize it. Help me.”

“How can I possibly help you when merely being associated with me could ruin your reputation?” he asked. “I cannot stay here. I must take Griffith back to Drogo and do what I can to clear my name.”

“If you go to London, you will bellow and frighten people, then become angry and wring necks to achieve what you want,” she predicted. “And nothing will be resolved.”

He scowled and looked ferocious. “I know how to behave.”

“You crushed a cigar on Lord Townsend's foot,” she reminded him. “You lurked in the conservatory and steamed. What are the chances that you'll discover anything worthwhile talking to plants?”

He rubbed the back of his neck and stared at her with a look of growing incredulity. “I'll never hide from you, will I?”

“Did I read you correctly?” Leila asked in delight. “Am I right?”

“You want me to tell you yes and unleash another demon into my life?” he asked.

She beamed. “Teach me to experiment, and I shall teach you to behave.”

“You'll what?” he roared.

“Teach you to behave.” Demurely, she lifted her skirts and moved toward the door. “We can go to my laboratory. Perhaps you can teach me how to duplicate my vision. Ninian is arriving shortly. It would be rude of you to run away before she arrives. I've arranged a small dinner in her honor. You can come and learn social manners. We'll share our differences. It will work.”

“You've cast your wits to the wind!” he shouted after her. “I'd rather become a monk and take a vow of silence than be forced to sit through another of your dinners!”

She heard his irresolution through the bluster. He wanted to work with her but simply couldn't admit it. She threw him a dazzling smile over her shoulder and slipped out the cottage door. Maybe she would manipulate, just a wee bit.

The stubborn ass needed it occasionally.

***

“Lily, Lily, we're here, Lily!” Gay, childish voices called down the stone corridor leading to the dairy where Leila was experimenting with a scent for her maid. “Mama says you may have us until eternity or the end of summer, whichever comes first. What's eternity, Lily?”

Leila smiled at the question from her youngest cousin, then let the smile fade as she sensed another presence.

Setting her latest perfume on a shelf, she unfastened her apron strings and waited for the onslaught of laughing waifs racing toward her.

She lifted and hugged the little ones, crouched down and kissed the older ones, inhaled deeply of innocence and imagination and the fearlessness of inexperience. They chattered of horses and coaches and the puppies they'd seen at the inn, and Leila listened to them all while conscious of the woman waiting patiently in the doorway, her young son in her arms.

Ninian.

Short and fair as a Malcolm should be, Ninian had been raised in the far north of England, too far distant from the rest of the clan to ever be one of them.

Leila blinked at that realization, and glanced up at the serene young woman. She had always been envious of her younger cousin, but she saw their similarities now. Despite her powerful gifts, Ninian still stood outside the family circle, as alone as Leila felt.

Ninian raised a questioning eyebrow as Leila came forward. Apparently she had communicated her feelings in some manner that only Ninian could read. Lifting Ninian's young son into her arms, Leila gestured for the lot of them to precede her. “Tea and tarts for everyone,” she cried. “Off with you, ladies. Wash your hands, and tell Nurse to wipe the dirt from your faces.”

Chattering children raced ahead, leaving Ninian and Leila to saunter behind them. In Leila's arms, Ninian's one-year-old sucked his thumb and looked about with typical Ives curiosity.

“You should have children of your own,” Ninian said.

Remembering her panic of last night when Dunstan had forced her to think of such things, Leila attempted to stay calm. No one knew exactly how accurately Ninian could read emotions because she was usually discreet, but Leila would rather not take any chances. “Should, or will?” she asked, hiding her anxiety.

“It's much too early to tell of a certainty,” Ninian replied without any sign that Leila's question was unusual. “Grandmother was very vague about when babes have souls. Until they do, there is little to detect but their physical presence.”

“How soon did you know?” Leila tried not to hold her breath. It had been not quite a month since that first magical night in the faerie cave. Her courses were late.

“I passed through a faerie grove and felt Alan's soul enter me.” A smile teased the corner of Ninian's lips. “I think Grandmother sent me an Ives soul on purpose.”

“Then it probably entered kicking and screaming,” Leila replied, her mouth drying as she considered all the ramifications of an Ives growing inside her.

They'd reached the front foyer, where she must let Ninian go to her chamber and freshen up, but she couldn't bear to dismiss the subject yet. She needed to know if she could possibly be carrying a child after all these years of barrenness.

She rather thought that was why Ninian was here.

Ninian offered one of the dreamy smiles that made her Ives husband swear she departed from her head and visited other planets. Reaching for her son, she beamed benevolently at Leila. “The kicking and screaming will come for you when your big bad Ives learns he's sired a girl.”

She ascended the stairs, tickling the child in her arms, leaving Leila hanging on to the newel post with both hands.

At day's end, after assigning the responsibility of temporary stewardship to one of Leila's more promising tenants and reassuring the workers that all would continue as usual, Dunstan returned to the cottage with the intention of checking on his experimental crop. He hungered to return to Leila's bed tonight, but the risk of discovery was high now that Ninian had arrived. He was too damned tired to keep climbing vines. Besides, finding protectives out here wasn't easy. And no matter how Leila protested, he didn't dare risk a child while a hangman's noose hung over his head.

He needed the peace of growing things to settle his confusion.

Hurrying around the cottage, he stopped cold at the sight of Griffith sitting in the middle of his field, a pile of turnip tops in his fists.

Rage and panic roared in Dunstan's ears.
How
many
of
the
plants
had
the
boy
pulled
up?

He'd worked a lifetime developing that seed! The plants were irreplaceable.

Dunstan bit his tongue, stiffened his back, and marched into the field to investigate.

“Problem?” he asked without expression.

Griffith raised a blank countenance. “I'm weeding, as you told me to do.”

“I trusted you to know the difference between weeds and crop.” The boy wasn't dumb. Had he pulled up the plants in anger?

“And if I don't? Will you send me away?” Griffith demanded.

Dunstan had been planning to send him to Drogo when he left for London. Now he took a deep breath, capped his anger and impatience, and sat down in the middle of the field with his son. “I told you, I'm no good at being a father. You have to spell out what's bothering you in simple terms I can understand. You're my son. That doesn't change if you pull up a whole field of turnips. What's wrong?”

“You're planning on going to London without me. I heard you.”

“I'm planning on leaving you somewhere safe while I look for a murderer,” Dunstan explained.

“You never wanted me,” Griffith interrupted with a cry of protest. “I'm just an expense to you.”

Dunstan didn't welcome this irrationality when he already had more problems on his plate than he could handle. Children had damned bad timing. Dunstan propped his head in his hands and stared at the dirt. “
Celia
didn't want you. You know that. It's hard for women. And your mother didn't want to give you up. I tried to do what was best.”

Inexplicably, an image rose in Dunstan's memory, one of Griffith as a toddler falling down in his haste to greet him during one of his infrequent visits. Dunstan bit back a curse of regret. At the time he'd wanted to lift the boy and hug him, but he had felt too awkward to try. And now the boy was too big to hug and too old to give his trust easily.

He'd missed out on the simple love of those early years. He needed to find some way of making up for it now. “I was young and stupid, but I wanted you. I just didn't think I deserved you.”

“You wanted
her
more than me,” Griffith interpreted. “Just like you want these turnips more than anything else. And they'll die, just like your wife did.”

Out of the mouths of babes.

Reaching over, Dunstan grabbed his son's hair and tugged him closer. Griffith struggled, but that only served to hurt him. Dunstan waited until the boy quit resisting and leaned closer. “Crops aren't people. They're important, but not as important as you. And from now on, you come first. Is that what's bothering you?” Dunstan released the boy's hair, stood up, and pulled Griffith up with him.

“Lady Leila will come first,” his son answered flatly. “You'll send me off to school so you can have her.”

Ah, one more reason he needed to stay home and not see Leila.
Devil
take
it.

“I'll send you off to school, but not because of the lady.” He needed a drink. He needed food. He needed his son to believe in him. Dropping his arm around Griffith's shoulders, Dunstan steered him toward the house. “I hereby give you permission to punch my arm if I ignore you, all right? But sending you to school is for your own good; it's not ignoring you.”

“I'm a bastard. They'll laugh at me.”

“You're an Ives bastard. The school is well accustomed to us. Besides, I can't afford to send you just yet. You'll have to hoe turnips until I can. So, tell me why you pulled up the turnips.”

“They have grubs. I read that Michaelmas daisies prevent grubs.” Griffith still sounded wary, but he didn't move from Dunstan's loose embrace.

“Michaelmas daisies?” Dunstan imagined a healthy field of turnip greens surrounded by scented flowers come fall, and despite his exhaustion, he grinned. “I'll tell the lady you're on her side. Maybe she'll hire you instead of me. The two of you can plant rhododendrons in the wheat and lavender in the potatoes.”

“You don't believe me.” Sullenly, Griffith tried to jerk away.

Dunstan wrapped his arm around his son's neck and knuckled his hard head. “Did I say that? We'll grow great blooming bouquets out there if we must. Those turnips are our future, and I'm trusting you to help me with them.”

Griffith turned to him with a reluctant light in his eyes. “Me? You'll listen to me?”

“Why not? You're my son, aren't you? Who else would be smart enough?” With a smile, he shoved the boy toward the house and the tantalizing aroma of roasting beef.

The boy whooped and ran for the door.

The boy's excitement eased some of Dunstan's hurts, enough to keep him searching for the right thing for his son.

It would be a hell of a lot easier if someone would present a scholarly pamphlet on what the right thing was.

***

Following Griffith through the kitchen door, Dunstan let the boy run ahead as he halted to investigate the scented letter waiting on the washstand. Opening it, he scowled at the lavishly scripted invitation to tomorrow night's dinner. Leila might as well offer temptation on a silver platter. An entire evening watching her breasts pushed up for viewing but not touching—the damned woman knew how to drive a man to his knees. A week ago he would have resisted without a qualm. Now…

He threw the invitation down to follow the sound of voices. To Dunstan's surprise, Ewen, his younger brother, sat sprawled on the settle before the fire, the gears of the kitchen clock spread about his feet while Griffith watched him with absorption.

“What the devil are you doing?” Dunstan demanded, pouring a mug of ale before Martha could fetch one for him.

“Showing Griffith how to fix clocks.” Ewen cleaned a gear with an oily rag and, with intense focus, sharpened a prong.

“You rode all the way out here to show him how to fix clocks? Have the lot of you decided I can't survive on my own?”

Surprised, Ewen looked up from his task. “Why would we do that? You're more adept at surviving than all of us put together.”

Mollified, Dunstan threw his leg over a bench and sat down. “Damn right. So now tell me again why you're here.”

“To learn more about canal locks. I needed to see if the one in Northumberland could use the same kind of gears they use here, or if we need to design a new system.” Ewen handed Griffith a knife and let the boy screw one part to another. “I've invented a better method of opening the locks, but the gears I've found aren't strong enough.”

Since the nearest canal was fifty miles from here, Dunstan figured Drogo was behind the side trip, but he wouldn't argue the point. Ewen lived in a future world of his own imagining, when he wasn't charming women into bed, but he had a level head when he applied it. “Can't help you there. I can provide you with turnips and perfumes, but not gears.”

“Perfumes?” Ewen lifted a handsome black eyebrow, then a wicked grin spread across his face. “There's a girl at home who would enjoy perfume.”

“
Malcolm
perfume,” Dunstan warned. “And Leila would have to meet your lady friend before she could create one for her. She's experimenting and would consider it a favor if you asked for one for yourself.”

Ewen's eyes immediately narrowed. “Malcolm? I thought you were planting turnips, not consorting with the lady.”

Pretending he was busy working on the clock and not listening, Griffith earnestly applied his knife to the screw. Dunstan wasn't fooled. He tilted his head to indicate his son and didn't take up the argument. “You'd probably be better at helping her than I am. She's setting up a distillery to use once I have the gardens in place.”

“A distillery!” Ewen's eyes lit with interest. “For perfumes?”

“For scents. I think the perfumes are mixed later.” So, he wasn't being entirely truthful. He wasn't lying either. He just wanted Leila to have an opportunity to experiment on Ewen. His brother always appeared cheerful and carefree, but there was far more to Ewen than met the eye. Would Leila be able to discern that?

Did he really want to know? The idea of a woman who could uncover one's deepest, darkest secrets was altogether frightening.

“I could spare another day,” Ewen agreed. “Do you think the lady would let me take a look at her distillery? Perhaps I could make a few suggestions.”

Smack into the trap he fell. Trying not to show his satisfaction, Dunstan nodded. “I'll send a note. We'll see.”

To make Leila happy, he could wait one more day.

***

Leila smiled in pleasure as the three Ives males strode into her parlor. It was pure fate that had led Ewen here just in time for her dinner party. She desperately needed to speak with Dunstan, but she realized he might not have come without Ewen.

She'd hesitated about inviting Griffith, but this was a rural gathering. His social education shouldn't be neglected as his father's had been.

Heads swiveled as the men entered. Several of her male guests gravitated in her direction, some in her defense, others out of self-protection, she suspected. Looking over the company from his imposing height, Dunstan scowled at their antics, then offered a polite nod to Ninian. So, he wasn't totally hopeless. He only despised idiots.

Smiling at that realization, Leila turned her attention to the other two late arrivals. Ewen surprised her by beaming with good cheer at her appraisal. She rather thought a charming Ives a contradiction in terms.

The boy stood near his father's side, and Leila admired the way Dunstan squeezed his son's shoulder reassuringly. The obstinate man was as terrified in this setting as Griffith, but he refused to show it.

If she actually carried a child, it was comforting to know its father was a good man.

Taking the responsibility of social arbiter firmly in hand, she advanced on her new guests as if they were royalty. “How marvelous that you could come,” she trilled. “I've heard so much about you.” She offered her hand to Ewen and batted her lashes at Dunstan. “You must introduce me, sir. I've been all that's impatient to meet the brother who captures lightning.”

Dunstan scowled at her foolery, but he performed the introductions with the expertise he must have been taught at his mother's knee. The man wasn't untrained, just contrary, Leila reflected, offering him her best smile. She felt a heartbeat of triumph at his startled but softening demeanor.

“I must introduce this charming young man to a friend of mine.” With skill, she separated Griffith from his all-male family. Divide and conquer was a tried-and-true tactic.

She introduced him to one of her younger neighbors and left the two young people in easy conversation amid the adult whispers flying about their heads.

Turning back to the doorway, she noted Dunstan had already appropriated a glass of brandy from her butler, and Ewen had gravitated to the prettiest young woman in the room. Good, keep the one occupied while she took care of the other. Dunstan Ives was easily the most fascinating man here, and despite their wariness, not one of her female guests had failed to notice his impressive physique.

Although she preferred to pull him aside and keep him to herself, she had promised to train him in better social manners. All he really needed was to relax.

“He's shy,” she whispered into the ear of a baronet's sister, who was nearly gawking. “Talk to him about your horses.”

“I couldn't,” the girl whispered back, horrified. “He's terrifying.”

“He's
terrified
,” Leila corrected. “If you know anything at all of turnips, he would be forever grateful.” Firmly, she steered the girl in Dunstan's direction.

“Turnips?”

Leila didn't give her a chance to question more. “Miss Trimble, the Honorable Mr. Dunstan Ives. Miss Trimble has one of the finest stables in the area, sir. She knows all about horse breeding.” All right, so mentioning anything so indecent as breeding was inappropriate, but she couldn't help it. The man needed to be jolted out of his self-centeredness. The young lady's gasp of horror ought to bring out the protective Dunstan.

It did. He immediately looked sympathetic. “My brother is interested in developing his stable,” he said smoothly, giving Leila one final glare before turning his attention to the crimson-faced girl. “Perhaps you could give me some pointers.”

She'd known she could rely on him. The man had “responsibility” engraved on his forehead. Now, to other matters.

“He's a murderer,” Sir Bryan Trimble hissed as Leila drifted to his side. “You place us all in grave danger by dealing with the likes of him.”

On her scale of importance, the young baronet did not register higher than an ant, but he might make a good test subject. Fair hair thinning, jowls already forming, he had the air of a man who considered himself to be the height of rural society. He would be looking for a wife to add to his consequence. Leila smiled and patted his arm. “You are so kind to think of our welfare. With men like yourself about, I feel quite safe. I've been testing new scents from my flower garden. Would you care to try one?”