The Lady of Bolton Hill (24 page)

“I’m going to lift my hand and check if you are still bleeding,” Clyde said. Bane gasped as the doctor released the pressure from his throbbing wound. The stars tilted, grew dim, but then another rush of agony seized him as Clyde replaced his hand. “Still bleeding. Hold on there, son.”

Bane tried not to smile. Did this man have any idea whom he was talking to? Clyde’s look of concern would probably turn to horror if he knew he was up to his wrists in the blood of a vicious criminal.

But that wasn’t really true, was it? He was now walking a new path. He tried to remember how Clara had put it.
“You can begin building a life of valor,”
she had said. Bane fought against the wave of nausea that rolled through him. He was ready for his new life. He wanted that life of valor Clara spoke of. He wanted to slay dragons and climb mountains and do something noble with his life. The next few years would be consumed with simply trying to outwit the Professor’s army of assassins, but eventually he would gain a foothold and stop running. The world Clara was showing him was too enticing to let the Professor ruin.

N
ever in a million years could I be a nurse,
Clara thought as she watched Clyde draw a needle through the torn flesh in Bane’s torso. Her brother’s face was expressionless throughout the procedure, which was easier than watching Bane’s tense features as he gritted his teeth and clenched her hand with each pass of the needle.

The sun was rising by the time they had made it to Clara’s Bolton Hill home. She hoped Bane would be safe here from the Professor’s men for a day or two while his wound healed and he figured out where to go.

Manzetti had carried Bane into the guest bedroom right beside Clara’s room, and Clyde had removed the slug from Bane’s waist. Clara pulled a stool close to the mattress so she could hold Bane’s hand throughout the ordeal. Clyde had offered Bane a hit of morphine to ease the pain, but Bane had refused. “I’ll take it without the crutch,” he had said. “I suppose I deserve whatever I have coming.”

Even though Clyde assured her that Bane’s wounds were not life-threatening, Clara could not abandon Bane, not when they had come so far together.

And not when Daniel paced like a caged lion right outside the door. Clyde insisted on having only one person in the room to assist him with the surgery, and Clara was glad that Daniel had been banished from the room. If Daniel had the least inkling about who Bane was, she wouldn’t put it past him to tear the boy to pieces. Not four days ago Bane had ordered the fire that had destroyed Daniel’s home, then had proceeded to orchestrate her kidnapping. She wanted Bane patched up and gone before Daniel’s quick mind could put the pieces together.

“Hand me the scissors,” Clyde said as he tied off another of the tiny row of stitches that tracked across Bane’s waist. Clara pressed them into her brother’s hand, then cleared away the water bowl that was tinged dark with Bane’s blood. “That’s the last of the stitches,” he said. Clara could feel some of the tension drain from Bane when he heard the words. “I’ll need Daniel in here to hold Alex up while I bind everything tightly.”

She cracked open the door to ask Daniel to help. The moment the door opened, Daniel’s drawn face appeared in the doorway. The frantic look she’d seen in his eyes earlier was gone, but still he snapped to her side the moment she asked for help. His face looked haggard and exhausted and she ached to take him in her arms and stroke the dark hair back from his forehead. It would have to wait until Bane was safely out of the house.

“Clyde needs your help to hold Alex up while he bandages him.” She really didn’t want Daniel anywhere near Bane, but it could not be helped. She cleared the stool from the bedside and stepped aside. “Be careful with him,” she cautioned as Clyde and Daniel lifted Bane from the mattress. What little color was left in Bane’s face drained as he was lifted upright to be bandaged, and Clara thought he might faint. Hoped he would faint, actually, so at least he would be out of pain for a short while. Clyde moved quickly and efficiently, and Bane was gently lowered back against the mattress.

She picked up the torn and bloodied shirt from where Clyde had tossed it to the floor. “I’ll get you one of my father’s shirts,” she said. But she didn’t want to leave Daniel alone with Bane. There had been no time to fill Daniel in on what had been going on over the last few days, and he was chomping at the bit for information. Under no circumstances did she want him talking to Bane unless she was there to mediate.

She opened the door and called out to Manzetti, directing him to her father’s room to fetch a shirt.

“Try to get some rest,” Clyde said once Bane was lying down. “It will be at least two or three days before you can be up and about. It is going to hurt like the devil for another week or two, but in a month you’ll be good as new.”

“Not good enough,” Bane said tightly. “I’ll be heading out by nightfall.”

Clyde raised a brow. “Don’t be a fool. I just spent thirty minutes putting in a row of stitches that are sheer poetry in their perfection. I’m not going to tolerate you ripping them out.”

A smile hovered on Bane’s face, and with the barest hint of movement, he shrugged his shoulders. “Have it your way,” he said casually.

Clara knew he was lying. The moment no one was watching she was certain Bane would leave the house. Even now, there were probably dozens of people scouring Baltimore on a hunt for the most wanted man in the country. Clyde proceeded to outline how Bane’s injury should be cared for, how the dressing should be changed and an ointment applied to the wound. As her brother talked about how the patient’s movement should be limited and how much sleep he should be getting each day, her heart sank. Bane would not have the luxury of a soft bed or someone to help him change his bandages. Within a few hours he was going to be in a flight for his life.

A rap on the door was followed by Manzetti, who handed in a white cotton shirt. At least she could send the boy off with clean clothing. “Here’s a shirt for Bane,” Manzetti said as he handed the garment to Clara, then left the room.

Clara flinched at the rasp of indrawn breath.

“Bane?”
Daniel said in a disbelieving voice. His entire body had gone rigid and his eyes were ablaze with anger.

Clara raced to stand between Daniel and the bed. “Actually, his name is Alex. Alexander Banebridge.”

“Bane.” Daniel spat out the word. Clara glanced at the bed, where Alex calmly folded his hands across his chest, looking the epitome of serene relaxation.

“Yes, Bane,” the boy said. “Clara likes to call me Alex because she thinks it is more civilized, but I prefer Bane.”

Daniel shoved Clara aside and lunged toward the bed, hovering over Bane like an avenging angel. “I swear by all that is holy I’m going to rip you apart limb from limb.”

Bane’s smile was angelic. “Clara will never forgive you if you do.”

Daniel froze. After a moment he reared upward and swiveled his gaze toward her. “Clara, do you know who this man is? That he orchestrated your entire kidnapping?”

“I know exactly who he is, and what he has done.” She wondered if Daniel also knew that it was Bane who had reduced his home to a pile of ashes. She wasn’t about to bring up the matter. Once again she inserted herself between Daniel and the bed. “Bane is sorry for what he’s done, and I’ve already forgiven him. I expect you to do the same.”

“Never.”

“Bane has turned his life around. If the Lord can forgive him, we need to be able to do the same.”

“He’s a vicious, foul drug runner. He reeks of filth.”

“Which is why his transformation is all the more remarkable.”

Daniel’s eyes were glittering with anger and he looked ready to spit nails. “Clara, do you realize that every time you open your mouth, he is smirking behind your back?”

She whirled around just in time to catch a glimpse of Bane’s taunting smile before he wiped it clean. She turned back to Daniel. “Bane can be excessively annoying, I know. He’s still learning how to be a decent human being and he has got a long way to go, but he has
earned
his right to have a clean start. I’m not going to let you ruin that, Daniel.”

Daniel continued to glower at Bane. “He’s doing it again.” Clara did not even need to turn around to know that Bane was taunting Daniel with one of those smug grins.

“Stop it, Alex,” she said in frustration. “How am I to broker some sort of truce between the two of you when you both act like children?” It seemed foolish to worry about protecting Bane when he was recklessly taunting Daniel. She strode to the door. “I’m leaving. Bane, you can fend for yourself.”

Daniel did not even let the door close before he came charging after her. Of all the reckless, dangerous situations in which Clara had placed herself over the years, this was certain to be the most foolish. Bane was the person who had Eddie Maguire quaking in his boots, and Clara was fussing over the scorpion like a mother hen? He strode after her and followed her into her bedroom.

He forced his voice to remain calm. “Let me be explicitly clear,” he said. “Bane is the person who masterminded your kidnapping. He controls the entire drug trade along the East Coast. Did you know that?”

“Yes.” Clara opened her wardrobe and pulled out a simple muslin dress. “I’m changing now, so you’ll have to step outside.” She was still dressed in the pants, vest, and shirt she’d been wearing when she made a dash down the pier. The same pier Bane had blown up while she was standing on it.

“I’m not leaving you unprotected in this house. Not with that viper in it.”

Clara hugged the dress to her chest. “Fine. Guard me from the other side of the door.”

What he wanted to do was shake some sense into that lovely head of hers, but the sooner she was out of those pants, the better. He had a good suspicion about whom those clothes belonged to, and the sight of his dainty, delicate Clara wearing that snake’s clothing was revolting. He stepped outside her bedroom and leaned his forehead against the closed door. This had been the longest four days of his life. His home was destroyed, someone had tried to frame him and take away his freedom, and the woman he loved more than life itself had nearly been killed. But he had Clara back. He smiled, knowing that all his other problems faded into the ether so long as he could have Clara at his side. Never in his life had he seen such splendor as when she came racing down that pier, her golden hair blowing in the wind and her eyes ablaze with excitement.

“Leave your hair down,” he called through the closed door.

“That would hardly be proper.” Her voice was muffled, as though she was tugging the dress over her head even as she spoke. He laid his palm against the door.

“Clara, it would send me over the moon if you would consent to being a little improper just for this afternoon. Let me see you with your hair down.”

When she opened the door, his knees went weak at the sight of her. She was wearing a blue-and-white-flowered dress, her hair tumbling around her shoulders and a smile on her face as bright as the morning sun. He opened his mouth to tell her how beautiful she was to him, but it was as though he had been struck dumb.

“Let’s go downstairs where we can talk,” she said quietly. Her little hand slipped inside his as he walked down the staircase. The quiet elation of sharing this simple, domestic moment with her was astounding. All his riches, his renowned discoveries . . . all of it could crumble into the dust if that was what it took to simply share his life with Clara. He still needed to sort through the ugliness of what had caused her abduction and who was trying to frame him. And then he would ask Clara to marry him. If she wanted him to go to church, fine. If she wanted him to stand on his head and sing Handel’s
Messiah
, he would do that, too.

“I need you to forgive Bane,” she said, the moment the door was closed on the study.

Daniel closed his eyes as the weight of exhaustion sank through him to the marrow of his bones. It was hard to even keep standing, but if forgiving that holy terror was what Clara needed of him, he would find a way to do it. Daniel opened his eyes and looked at her, standing in the morning sunlight. Her expression was hopeful and her hands clasped together before her, as though in prayer. Her face looked luminous, and the delicate white skin of her arms . . . his eyes riveted to an ugly bruise on the inside of her elbow. He shot across the room and turned her wrist up to see the wound, mottled purple with a dark red spot in the middle.

Clara tugged her hand, but he kept her wrist in his hand like a manacle. “Who did this?” he rasped.

Clara did not meet his eyes when she whispered her reply. “Bane did it.”

“It looks like a needle mark.”

“It is.”

He dropped her arm and paced the room, fighting the urge to spring up the stairs and choke the life out of the wounded man resting above. He leaned over her father’s desk and curled his fingers around the edge to stop himself from bolting from the room. “What did he do? What
precisely
did he do to you?”

“It was opium,” she said, and Daniel squeezed his eyes shut as waves of anger rolled through him. His sweet Clara, held down and drugged by that monstrous brat. “I’m still not exactly sure what his plan entailed,” Clara continued, “but he was hired by someone to frame you and Manzetti for murdering me.”