Wolfsgate (7 page)

It was quite warm today and now it was hours past midday. The only thing she wanted to do was have a quick swim in the creek. She wiped the perspiration from her brow with her arm and marched off through the stone archway which lead through the rose garden and onto the serpentine walk.

Much ahead of her time, Brandon’s mother, Lady Caroline had eschewed the organized linear gardens of her day in favor of a more natural and spontaneous landscape for Wolfsgate. She had created a unique, unstudied world beginning with the shady and intriguing serpentine walkway bursting with borders of luxurious rose blossoms, pale pink begonias, scarlet dahlias, dusky pink and purple riots of hydrangeas. During the summer, sweeps of lavender and large-leafed greenery ran into taller flowering shrubs and hanging trees. Even though this exuberant, impetuous garden had not seen a proper gardener’s care in quite some time, Justine did her best to prune and trim, but she liked the organized chaos. It had a kind of rough, sumptuous magic all its own. This lush, sheltered walk remained a sensual pleasure of a different kind of beauty—vivid and dramatic, wild and unsorted. Meandering on this walkway was a meditative release and a pleasure-filled restorative for Justine unlike any other.

The stone walkway led directly to Lady Caroline’s folly, but Justine took a well-worn path that forked from it leading towards the creek. Ten minutes later she reached the water with a loose smile on her face, her body relaxed. She unfastened her kerchief and released her hair, then removed her corset and soiled skirts, leaving on her thin chemise. She entered the cold water and sighed as it wrapped around her ankles, her calves and her thighs. She plunged in and quickly swam to the opposite shore.

Justine smiled to herself as she swam back and forth. She floated for a bit on the surface with her eyes closed, her hands paddling aimlessly through the cool water, soaking in the golden warmth of the sun on her skin. The breeze murmured through the leafy trees overhead. A forceful splash crashed through the water next to her, and Justine flinched. Brandon. His slick, wet hair, bare shoulders and contoured back gleamed in the golden light. She immediately submerged herself lower in the water.

“How are you feeling?” she asked.

“At this very moment, much better, however long that lasts.” He wiped the water from his face. “I was suffocating in the house. My head was aching. I was outside and saw you walking this way through the woods, and I figured it must be to come here. My head is so muddled, it’s no wonder I hadn’t thought of it myself.”

They paddled around each other in the water, his pale green eyes never leaving hers, his thick, black lashes glistening with water drops. Justine dipped lower under the surface of the water.

“Do you often work in the garden?” he asked.

A flutter went off in her belly at the thought that he had been watching her. “I enjoy it. I’ve managed to grow quite a few herbs and vegetables over the years, mostly by trial and error.”

“Did Richard and William appreciate your efforts?”

She scoffed. “I don’t think they even noticed. It served to keep me out of their way though, more than anything. Lady Caroline’s roses are still thriving.”

“Yes, I saw them.” A smile wafted across his lips at the mention of his mother, then faded just as quickly. Justine twisted away from his heavy gaze and dove under the water. When she came up she saw he was staring over at the rocks where her stepsister, Annie, only fourteen years old at the time, had met her death years ago. They were all so much younger then and under the umbrella of what they had considered to be a family.

“It seems like a hundred years ago, I swear,” his hoarse voice broke the eerie silence. A shadow crossed his features, his mouth downturned.

“Yes, it does,” she said softly. “Brandon, you did everything you could have possibly done to save her.”

He rubbed the sides of his face. “That is at the root of all of this, isn’t it? His sister’s death at my hands secured William’s anger towards me forever.”

“Annie was already dead when you got here. Stuck in the rocks, taken under in the floodwaters.” Justine chewed her lip. “And anyway, we all know I was to blame.”

“Justine!”

“It’s true, isn’t it? I knew she wanted to go see the frogs in the middle of the night, but she had sworn me to secrecy. We were to go together, but I had fallen asleep, so she went on her own. I woke up, her bed was empty, and I just knew. I was too terrified to go to Richard or to William.”

“You came to me,” Brandon said, his voice low.

“Yes, somehow I found the nerve to go to your chamber and wake you, tell you that she was missing and most likely at the creek. You took off immediately, we barely got your boots on you. I shall never forget standing in the pouring rain on the front steps watching you fly off down the muddy hill. I shall never forget it.”

“But I was too late.”

“If only I hadn’t fallen asleep or if I had woken up earlier, hadn’t tarried in coming to you.”

“Stop it, Justine,” he said, floating closer to her, his brow furrowed. “Annie was quite impetuous. She was a good girl, but so damned impulsive. Even if you had been awake, you couldn’t have stopped her. I warrant she would have had you out here in the floodwaters with her. We would have lost you too, but thank Providence you’re here,” he said, his voice low, his heavy gaze holding hers. “I couldn’t get her loose no matter what I did. Her foot had gotten stuck on that goddamned rock, her dress had twisted around her pulling her down like a lead weight.”

“Brandon…” She laid her hand on his bare arm.

“I will never forget finding her face down in the rushing water, bobbing like a lifeless object.” His hand quickly covered hers and gripped it tightly. “Our very own Ophelia.”

She released her hold on his arm. “Annie was no Ophelia. There was not a sullen or gloomy bone in her body. From the moment I entered their house when my mother married Richard, she never once showed me any resentment or wickedness. Ever,” Justine whispered. “From the very first, she treated me as a true sister. Annie was my best friend, and I will never forget her. Her death changed everything for me, even more so than my own mother’s passing.”

A twinge ached in the hollow of Brandon’s chest. After Annie’s death, everything had indeed changed once again in their house, just as it had when his mother had died a few years before that. It was as if a noose had tightened around them all over again. Justine, who had once been a smiling, affectionate young girl, had transformed into a shy and withdrawn creature who rarely laughed in the forthright way she always had.

Her mother had passed away after a short illness, just the year before Annie’s sudden death, and after that Justine spent most of her time with her governess rather than with Brandon and William. On occasion, Amanda’s younger brother Andrew would draw her out, but it was generally frowned upon. William had grown cold and churlish after the shocking loss of his beloved sister. He never had a kind word for Justine after that and wouldn’t allow her to play with their circle of friends. It was then that Richard began a slow degeneration into his own world.

Thereafter, Uncle Richard barely registered Justine’s presence and often left her on her own at Wolfsgate, relinquishing responsibility of her under the pretense of the country being a better place for her to grow up. Richard and William would spend many months at a time in London on their own enjoying society and its entertainments. They would return to the country whenever it pleased them, which was seldom, and Justine would accompany them to town on rare occasions.

Brandon winced at the memory. He had left England then and gone on his tour of Venice, Rome, and Florence with his good friend Charles while Justine had been left behind at Wolfsgate with only his father and her governess for company.

“Brandon, do you remember when Annie and I found you and William here swimming, and you wouldn’t let us swim with you?” Justine’s voice was light, her face upturned, her eyes relaxed. “It was so very hot that day, and we were desperate for a swim.”

“Yes, I do.” The edges of Brandon’s mouth curled up. “Annie got quite annoyed, and you both took our clothes. You saw us naked.” He let out a laugh. It felt good to remember a summer afternoon when children’s pranks and swimming in a cool creek were their only cares. “Ah, Justine, the look on both your faces!”

“I was frozen to the spot, I couldn’t move. William was so mad at us.” Justine’s unfettered laughter rang out over the surface of the water, and an unfamiliar warmth spiraled in his chest. “He was yelling, carrying on all the while completely forgetting he was standing there before us without a stitch on him!”

“Annie only made faces at him.”

“Yes, she did, then she threw all your clothes in the water, grabbed my hand, and we ran all the way home.”

“Such silly girls.” He splashed water at her.

“Oh!” Justine splashed him back. He splashed her again, moving closer towards her.

Justine let out a squeal and smashed her hand through the water in his direction. “Stop it!”

“You stop!” he shouted back at her laughing. “Or I will have to resort to extreme measures.”

She only laughed harder, and he launched towards her with his two hands ready to plunge her down below the surface. His hands gripped her shoulders, and she turned to twist out of his grasp, but ended up twisting deeper into him. She shoved at him, but her hands slipped against the wet skin of his bare chest. He held her fast.

She bit her lower lip, and his gaze fell on her mouth inches away from his own, then it dropped lower. Her wet bosom was plainly obvious through the sheer wet fabric of her chemise which now clung to her body. His nerve endings lit up like a flame, and he broke away from her diving under the cool water. Within moments, he came back up for air, but Justine was no longer in the water. She now stood on the shore by their pile of clothing.

“Justine? Are you leaving?”

She turned to answer him and instantly blushed, obviously realizing too late she was showing him her naked body under her soaked chemise. Softly cursing under her breath, she quickly turned, but in doing so, offered him a full view of her rear.

“I’m cold,” she said, gesturing in the air with her hand. She snatched up her skirts and got into them, then wrapped her corset around her torso, quickly fixing the stays. She tucked and smoothed the clingy, damp fabric around her fetching body.

Brandon floated on his back on the water and enjoyed the view of his wife. He took in her full breasts, her shapely bottom, the curve of her hips. Justine was no longer a girl. She had grown into a woman. A very desirable woman. His body tightened. It had been a long time since he had been aware of that particular reflex and was pleasantly surprised by it. In fact, that burn now flared through him. Maybe it was one of his body’s strange new reactions to having been finally drained of the opium. Maybe it was all this rejuvenation and fresh country air.

Maybe it was simply Justine.

Brandon got out of the water. She was hunched over on the ground buttoning her boots. He tossed his head and squeezed the excess water from his hair, knowing the cool drops would fall on her.

Justine blinked up at him. “I should go. Molly may need my help. I didn’t tell her I was coming here.” She got up and scrambled away from him.

“Wait for me. I’ll come with you.” His body quaked with silent laughter at his bride’s obvious discomposure over his nakedness. “Could you hand me my shirt, Justine?”

She darted to his pile of clothes and, averting her gaze, handed him his shirt. She was nervous, and he liked that. He could take advantage of it. He still didn’t trust her motives. Although he had known Justine since she was a child, the last time he had spent any time with her she had been a girl of maybe fifteen or sixteen years old. She was a woman of twenty now, having lived with William and Richard. Surely, a different person. How could he be certain of her true character or of her intentions in William and Richard’s plot that had entwined them both?

Justine peeked over her shoulder at him. “Um, I thought perhaps you might like to visit your father’s grave. May I take you there tomorrow morning?”

He pulled up his boots, his eyes remaining on her. “Yes.”

She smiled. “Good.”

He stood up, wobbling on his feet. His body swayed, and his one hand shot out to grab the tree trunk near him. Justine was next to him in seconds, her arm around his waist. His wet hair splattered her face and neck with water.

She placed one warm hand on his chest. “What is it?”

“Just dizzy, I don’t know. Too much bloody excitement, I suppose. And that knee again.” He grimaced. “Damn.”

“Do you want to sit?”

“No, no, I don’t think I’d be able to stand up again. Let’s walk slowly.” He tucked his free hand around her shoulder and pulled her closer into his torso. The warmth of her body seared him to her side. She waited as he took a few more deep breaths. Maybe his pulse would ease, and he could go back to feeling normal again.

No, normal was most certainly over.

“Better?” she asked. He didn’t answer. His muscles remained tense. “You don’t have to be embarrassed with me, Brandon.” Her voice had softened. “I saw you in that hospital. I know what you’ve been through, and I know the effort this is taking. It will be some time before you will be fully strong again.”

His gaze slid to her face. Her head was tilted back, there was a gleam in her velvety brown eyes. Was that hope? Confidence? Did this girl ever waver in her belief that all would be well?

“Ready?” she asked, her voice light.

He nodded and clasped his other hand over hers that she still had on his chest. He squeezed it, then let it go. They walked slowly, his breathing labored, his limp pronounced.

“When we get home, you will eat something, even if I have to feed you myself, do you hear?”

“Stop bothering me about bloody food,” he said through clenched teeth.

“You cannot heal completely without sustenance. All this time they were feeding you God knows what evil swill at that hospital, and you were wasting away. Now your current diet of spirits just will not do. It will only set you back.”