Tainted by Temptation (25 page)

Her heart squeezing in her chest, Velvet slid on her stomach to the edge. With handfuls of grass, she lowered herself over the side.

Her hands shook, her legs shook, and her teeth chattered, not from cold, but from pure terror. The cold, she didn’t even feel. She inched slowly down the slope, grabbing brush and rocks. Her nails tore and broke, but Iris was in worse shape.

“Hurry!” the girl cried.

The ground crumbled away and Velvet couldn’t breathe. She slid, grabbing and clawing. The thud in her chest felt like she’d been hit by a cannonball. Oh God, she was going to fall all the way down to the dark ocean. Clouds obliterated the light of the moon, and only the dark, the restless rhythm of the ocean and Iris’s whimpers filled her senses.

Evans pulled on his smalls and hopped around him fastening buttons, in spite of Lucian’s inability to stand still.

“Sir, if you would just step in,” said Evans.

“Mrs. Bigsby, where the hell is everyone?”

“They’re searching, sir.” Mrs. Bigsby lit lamps and passed one to a maid who put her hand on the side of her face as she went by rather than look at him in his state of undress.

Mr. Bigsby sat in one of the chairs by the door, moaning and rocking back and forth. Lucian wanted to slap him and tell him to help, but the others had answered his call.

Lucian pulled open the billiard room door. Evans danced around him. A quick glance inside confirmed that Iris was not inside.

He tripped over his dresser and then decided Evans would be less of a nuisance if he allowed him to dress him. “Where the hell are the groomsmen? You should be looking for Iris,” he shouted at Evans.

“As soon as you are decent, sir. You scare the maids enough fully dressed.”

Lucian growled, threw off his dressing gown and held his hands out for Evans to slip his shirt over his head.

The house servants began to gather in the hall. He could see from the wide-eyed scared expressions that Iris hadn’t been found.

As he scanned the group, two faces were missing. “Where the hell is Nellie? She should be back from the stables by now.” Why hadn’t Velvet returned? Either way, if she’d located Iris or not, she should be back.

But then if Iris had fallen off the cliffs, Lucian doubted that Velvet would be able to find her in the predawn darkness. He didn’t want to even think that his daughter could have fallen. Her mother’s broken body on the rocks flashed in his thoughts.

His spine felt as if a knife were jabbing it, and a dull ache pounded in his head. No, this wasn’t happening.

Heedless of Evans’s efforts to tuck in his shirt, Lucian ran out the front door. Not a single light burned in the long, low stable buildings and no men were stirring. He swung through the first door and ran up the stairs to the quarters above.

Pounding on doors, he shouted for rope and lanterns. He’d thought it would save time to send Nellie, since she was already dressed. Clearly he’d been mistaken.

Without waiting, he raced outside and toward the cliffs.

“Velvet! Iris!” he shouted.

The restlessness of the ocean signified a storm moving in. The night was so black he couldn’t see. Almost by instinct he headed for the place where Lilith had fallen. The drop was straight down there.

Where the hell had Velvet gone? If he’d lost her or lost Iris, he wouldn’t have a reason to live.

“Iris!” He cupped his hands around his mouth. “Velvet, answer me.”

“We’re here,” he heard the faint call below, just as the first fat raindrop splattered him.

Lucian stumbled as the tension dropped out of his muscles. Thank God, they were alive. Moving to the edge, he dropped to his belly and leaned over. Far below, the unnatural white of a nightgown stood out against the granite and dirt. His breath caught.

A flash of lightning illuminated the two figures clinging to the side of the cliff. They were so far down, he feared if he tried to get to them, he’d send them plunging to the rocky sea. “Hold on! Help is coming!” he shouted.

The skies opened and let out a torrent. Dear God, would they be able to hang on as the dirt changed to mud and the granite turned slippery?

After what seemed like forever, Evans herded men toward him. Lanterns bobbed and many of the men gasped, seeing how far down Iris and Velvet were. One man came running from the stables with a coil of rope over his shoulder.

Lucian almost knocked him over in his haste to tie one end around his waist. “Lower me over the side,” he barked.

He plunged over the edge, and the mud slid underneath him.

Iris screamed.

“Hurry!” Velvet’s voice was high and reedy. “I cannot hold on much longer.”

The rope slid up under his arms, restricting his movements, but the men above slowly lowered him. When he was close enough, he grabbed a fistful of Iris’s nightgown. The rope sawed into his sides, but he ignored the chafing. He had to get to Velvet.

A second length of rope dropped over the cliff. “Send the girl up!” shouted Captain Darling.

Velvet’s face was strained and her eyes wild. She shook as she clung to a rock.

“Velvet.”

“Please, get Iris safe.”

“I have her.” With a strength he didn’t know he had, he pulled Iris to him. Straining, he reached down as Iris smothered him with her arms around his neck. “Velvet, take my hand.”

“I can’t let go,” she wailed.

Iris sobbed and threatened to strangle him, but still he reached for Velvet.

“Lower me!” he shouted. “Iris, it is all right. I have you. I will not let you fall,” he murmured into her golden curls while he watched Velvet cling to an outcropping of granite.

“Send the girl up,” repeated the captain.

Velvet’s fingers slipped.

He lunged as the rope lowered with a jerk.

“Papa!” screamed Iris.

Barely catching Velvet’s hand, he pulled. His shoulder strained. The rope slipped and for a second he thought all three of them would plunge into the sea. When the motion stopped, he coaxed Iris to reach for the second rope. “Wrap it around you. You have to be brave, Iris. I know you can do it. I can’t let Miss Campbell fall.”

He talked Iris through tying a bowline knot. “That is exceptional for a first time,” he told her as she completed the knot that would hold her securely. “Pull her up!”

The men above hauled Iris up quickly. Velvet’s trembling was so violent they both shook. With Iris on her way to safety, he used every last bit of strength he had to pull Velvet to him. He gathered her in, and unmindful of the wavering light of lanterns and the watchers above, held her tight against him and buried his face in her hair. “I thought I lost you.”

She made a sound somewhere between a sob and a laugh.

A few seconds later the looped end of the second rope landed beside them, and he helped Velvet into it. The men hauled them both to the top.

Velvet collapsed on the ground as Captain Darling pulled the rope over her head. Iris stood beside Velvet and patted her head.

Lucian knelt on the edge of the cliff and gathered them both to him.

“I lost the bracelet, Papa,” sniffed Iris. “It caught on a bush and stopped my fall, but then it snapped.”

“It doesn’t matter,” he said, kissing her forehead. “I should have died if I lost you.”

Velvet continued to shiver violently. She was muddy from head to toe. “You put on clothes.” Her voice was flat and disappointed.

“Forgive me. I thought if you found her, you’d come back for help. I had no idea you’d climb down the cliff.” Given Velvet’s fear of falling, he never would have expected her to go over the edge. He should have known she would be brave in her quest to save Iris.

“There wasn’t time.” The wind stole her faint words.

“She saved me, Papa. I was about to fall, and she saved me.”

“I fear I made us both fall farther,” said Velvet.

Evans wrapped Lucian’s Turkish robe around Velvet and a blanket around Iris. “If you like, sir, I could carry the girl inside. I’ve told the staff to light the fire in the library and bring tea.”

Rain streamed down and the men milled around, coiling the ropes and hesitatingly watching them.

Barely able to stand separating from Iris and Velvet, Lucian stood. He needed answers, but making them suffer the rain any longer was silly.

“Miss Iris, should you like a horseyback ride?” asked Evans.

Lucian stared at his normally fastidious dresser, kneeling down in front of the girl.

Iris nodded and climbed on. Evans rose and trotted toward the house.

Lucian picked up Velvet and followed. In the bubble of silence that enveloped them, he held her close. “How will I ever repay you?”

Velvet tucked her head into his shoulder. She moaned softly, “It is all my fault. I should have been in the room with her.”

“No, love, you saved her. If not for you, she might have fallen all the way down.” He shuddered. Losing Iris wouldn’t have been any less painful than losing one of his newborn babies had been. Perhaps it would have been worse, since he’d had longer to love Iris. “I thought you were the one in danger, when you tried to tell me it was Iris.”

Velvet’s cold hand twisted in his shirt. “I still cannot believe Nellie would . . .”

Nellie? Nellie was behind this? She was a lumbering awkward clod of a woman, and while he thought her strange, he’d never thought she posed a danger to anyone.

“The kitchen door is closest, sir,” Evans called back.

One of the men held open the garden gate.

They descended the steps to the kitchen and entered the warm room. Several of the kitchen staff scurried around. The smell of coffee belied the horror of the near fatal accident.

Lucian set Velvet on her feet. She was bedraggled, with her hair streaked with mud. Never had anyone looked more beautiful. Evans bent and let Iris down.

His arm around Velvet, Lucian reached to put a hand on Iris’s hair.

Mr. and Mrs. Bigsby sat flanking their daughter at the kitchen table. Bigsby looked sick and couldn’t meet his eyes, but Mrs. Bigsby stared back hard. Nellie watched the group with no more interest than she would watch a vegetable delivery.

Lucian beckoned to one of the grooms. “Don’t let Nellie go anywhere.”

Footsteps and murmurs indicated the kitchen was gathering a crowd. He heard the word pass out through the door to others that Iris was safe.

Lucian stared hard at the woman who had tried to kill his daughter. “What is wrong with you?”

Nellie turned blank eyes on him. Bigsby rocked back and forth and moaned.

Velvet put her arm around Lucian’s waist and pressed her palm against his chest.

“She didn’t mean nothing,” said Mrs. Bigsby. “She—She were sleepwalking, she were.”

“She threw my daughter off a cliff while she was sleepwalking.” Surely even Mrs. Bigsby didn’t believe that. No judge or jury would believe that.

“She wasn’t sleepwalking.” Iris pressed closer to his legs.

He dropped his hand to her shoulder, reassuring her.

Nellie’s face twisted and she half stood, pointing at Evans. “You, you . . .” Her face turned red.

Lucian swiveled to look at his valet. How was Evans involved in this?

Evans stepped closer. His placid face twisted into an angry caricature. “I what, you evil witch?”

“You said you were just burning fires in the mistress’s chamber to get rid of the damp before Mr. Pendar took a bride. You didn’t tell me
she
was staying in there. He was supposed to marry me.”

“What?”
Lucian recoiled. In what world did Nellie ever think he would marry her?

Bigsby looked up, and tears streamed down his face. “She’s mad. She killed the other two. I know she did. Can’t stand it when you look at another woman.”

“Hush your mouth,” hissed Mrs. Bigsby.

“Mrs. Pendar deserved to die like she did. All she ever did was make you miserable,” shouted Nellie.

Velvet clapped her hands over Iris’s ears. Her protective instincts touched Lucian in a way nothing else could. But for her, he likely would have lost Iris.

The groom shoved Nellie down. “Did you take a rock to that poor Myra girl’s head? What did she ever do to you?”

“That whore was carrying another man’s child. I know how much that hurt you,” Nellie said to Lucian. Her expression turned pleading. “You didn’t need no other woman foisting another man’s baby on you again.”

Myra’s pregnancy had been what made it safe for him to bed her. He’d never been in any doubt about the father, nor had she.

“Send for the sheriff, so I may swear out a warrant for all three of them.” Lucian picked up Iris and carried her out of the kitchen. He pulled Velvet along behind him.

The group parted, and not only were his servants hovering, but Bowman and a couple of his other guests. “Glad your girl is safe,” said Bowman.

Lucian just pushed past the man. He didn’t care about railroads or business dealings. He only cared that he hadn’t lost Iris or Velvet.

“What is she talking about?” Iris asked.

“She’s crazed,” muttered Lucian. “Don’t worry. She’ll never come anywhere near you again.”

“She killed my mama, didn’t she? She said if I wasn’t around, Miss Campbell would have to leave.”

“Miss Campbell is never leaving.”

Velvet squeaked.

As he entered the main hall, several of the female servants milled about. A few of his guests stood waiting for news. “We found her,” he told them. “You may return to bed. I’m sorry to have disturbed your rest.”

Evans came up behind them. He instructed two of the maids to take Iris up, get her into a warm nightgown and run bathwater for Velvet. “The library, sir. Miss Campbell, I will return when your bathwater is ready.”

Lucian pulled Iris to him and held her tight for a long minute before he let her go with the maids from the inn. “Don’t ever scare me like that again.”

“I did not mean to,” she said.

“I know, sweetheart. I know, but I can’t stand the idea that I might have lost you. I love you, Iris.” His eyes burned, as the fear he hadn’t allowed himself to feel earlier gripped him with icy claws.

“I love you, too, Papa.” Iris patted his shoulder. She whispered in his ear, “If you have to marry, could you make it Miss Campbell?”