Vixen

Chapter 8

Chloe took her usual seat on the rain barrel and sat numbly, staring into space. Vaguely, she wondered why she wasn't crying, but the wound was too deep for something as simple as tears. She wanted to run from this place, from the man who could cut so deeply, but she had nowhere to go, no one to turn to. Except Jasper. She disliked her half brother, but he was the only kin she had. Her mother had feared him, Chloe knew, just as she knew what was said about him in the district, that he was a hard man to cross. But he'd never really taken much notice of his little half sister and she couldn't remember receiving any overt unkindness from him. She'd had much more contact with Crispin.

The sound of hooves on the driveway beyond the courtyard penetrated her bitter musing, and she looked up incuriously toward the archway. As if in response to her reflections, Crispin Belmont rode into the courtyard. He was alone and astride a black gelding of impeccable pedigree. He looked around, saw Chloe on her rain barrel, and raised his curly-brimmed beaver. He offered her a small bow that seemed to invite a shared joke at this formality.

Chloe stood up slowly. "Good day, Crispin. What brings you here?"

"That's not much of a welcome," her visitor said with a jovial heartiness that struck a slightly false note to Chloe's ears. "I come with all goodwill and friendship, Chloe." His gaze flickered over her and a spark of inter-

est enlivened his features as he took in the rippling mass of shining hair, the slender waist accentuated by the sash of her flowing muslins, the rounded bosom, and the gentle flare of her hips. This Chloe was very different from the grubby, brown-serge schoolgirl eating bread and ham the other morning.

He dismounted, looping the reins over his forearm, and smiled at her. "Do you always walk around barefoot'"

Chloe glanced down at her feet and shrugged. "I felt like it." She stood waiting for him to reveal the purpose of his errand.

Crispin struggled to overcome his annoyance at this cool reception. He had a task to perform and was in all things obedient to his stepfather's commands. The new plan, hatched over the breakfast table, was to be initially conducted single-handedly by the intended bridegroom. He now swallowed his anger, reminding himself that eighty thousand pounds compensated for many an insult. Besides, such disrespect wouldn't survive under Jasper's roof.

He smiled again and held out a parcel. "My mother sent you some gingerbread. She was remembering how much you loved it when you used to come up to the big house as a little girl. I think there's something else in there too. Ribbons or some such frippery." He laughed in self-deprecation. "Ladies' trifles, my dear."

"Oh." Chloe took the parcel, looking rather nonplussed. "Well, please thank Lady Gresham for her kindness." She half turned away.

Crispin was searching for some way to hold her attention, when Samuel appeared on the steps of the house. Samuel had been watching from an upstairs window and, mindful of the need to keep Sir Hugo's ward under constant surveillance, hastened downstairs. "A word wi' ye, miss," he called.

"Excuse me," Chloe said with offhand politeness, and went over to Samuel.

"Who's 'e?" Samuel wasted no words.

"Crispin, my brother's stepson. Why?"

Samuel scratched his head. He could see no harm in a conversation in the courtyard with a relative, and the sharpness of her tone was belied by the sadness in her eyes.

"Where's that dog of your'n?" he asked. "Sir 'Ugo said you was to keep 'im out of trouble."

"He's shut up in my room. I forgot to let him out." The defiant sharpness faded from her voice. She had had very good reasons for thinking Dante might be an unnecessary addition to the scene she had planned in the library.

"I'll let 'im out." Samuel turned back to the house. "But don't you go leavin' the courtyard."

Chloe walked back to Crispin, still standing beside his horse.

"Rather peremptory for a servant, isn't he?" Crispin frowned.

Chloe shrugged. "He's not an ordinary servant, more a kind of confidant."

Dante came bounding down the steps, barking joyfully. He stood on his hind legs and put his front feet on her shoulders, licking her face. "Would you believe someone tried to steal this silly animal?" Chloe said, laughing as she pushed him away, forgetting her dismal mood for a minute. "He's such a commoner, surely no one could imagine he'd be worth anything."

"He's unusual," Crispin said noncommittally, trying to ignore Dante, who sniffed at his boots and pushed his nose into his crotch in a most embarrassing fashion. "And there are so many poachers in the area. There's no knowing but that one of them saw him and took a fancy to him. He might make a good rabbiter."

"Oh, I'm sure he would," Chloe agreed. "He's extremely intelligent… Dante, stop that." She toed him away from Crispin.

"Where's your guardian?" Crispin glanced casually around the disheveled yard.

Drinking himself into a drunken stupor. Chloe bit her lip hard, keeping both the words and the tears at bay. "In the house somewhere," she said. "I have to go in now. Things to do…" She gestured vaguely. "Thank you for calling, and please thank your mother for the gingerbread." She turned and ran lightly up the steps without waiting for Crispin's responding farewell.

The young man remounted and trotted out of the courtyard, perfectly satisfied with his progress so far. If Sir Hugo believed the dog to be the object of the attack, then he was more of a fool than Jasper thought him, but whatever he believed, he had no proof. And Chloe, at least, was not suspicious. And he'd made a small step toward disarming her. Jasper would be pleased.

Chloe wandered into the kitchen, averting her eyes from the closed library door as she passed it. She put the gingerbread on the table and began to unwrap it. "Fancy Lady Gresham remembering how I used to like this," she said, selecting a piece.

"Now, don't you go eatin' that before nuncheon; it'll spoil your appetite," Samuel said sharply, scooping up the parcel.

Chloe frowned. "I don't suppose it would, but I don't really want it anyway." She broke off a comer of the piece she had in her hand and held it out to Dante.

"Samuel!" Hugo spoke suddenly from the kitchen door. Chloe, unthinking, spun around toward him, then turned away, flushing. "I'm going into Manchester," Hugo said, his "eyes unfocused, his voice heavy. "I don't know when I'll be back."

"Runnin' out of brandy, are we?" Samuel said.

"Damn your insolence, Samuel!" The door slammed on his departure.

"Why's he going to Manchester?" Chloe asked.

"Always does when the devils is bad," Samuel observed.

"But what does he do?"

"Drinkin' and whorin," Samuel said flatly. "E'U be gone for days, I shouldn't wonder." He put a round of cheese on the table. "Sir 'Ugo's fightin' some powerful demons, miss. Has been ever since I've known 'im, since 'e was nobbut a lad of twenty summers."

"And you don't know what tfiey are?"

"No." Samuel shook his head. "E's never said a word, not even when the drink's on 'im. Most men babble like a Bedlamite in the drink, but not 'im. Close-mouthed 'e is. like a oyster." He cut into the cheese. "How d'ye fancy a morsel of toasted cheese?"

Chloe shook her head. "No, thank you. I think I'll go upstairs and lie down. I feel rather tired."

When Crispin Belmont appeared in the courtyard the following morning, Samuel called Chloe down from her room. "Ye've a visitor, miss."

"Oh? Who?" The question was lethargic and Samuel silently cursed his employer, who had to bear the responsibility for the girl's heavy-eyed pallor. She'd also returned to the brown serge, which didn't improve matters. A diversion of some kind would do her a world of good.

"That relative of your'n." He gestured with his head to the open door.

"I'm not sure I want to see him," she said, turning back to the stairs.

"Don't be foolish," he said roughly. "It'll do ye good. Can't mope around up there all the livelong day."

"I don't see why not."

"Oh, don't you?" Samuel abruptly decided that his

role as watchdog needed expansion. "Now, you get along out there, miss, an' talk to your relative. Downright rude it is to refuse to see a visitor. I don't know what Sir 'Ugo would say."

"And we're not likely to find out," Chloe muttered, but she went out to the courtyard.

Crispin had already dismounted and held a large bouquet of wildflowers. He offered them with a smile as she came up to him.

Not accidentally, he'd hit upon a happy choice. Cultivated flowers found no favor with Chloe, but the natural melange of color in the bunch of foxgloves, pimpernel, bindweed, and bugloss drew a cry of delight from her. "Oh, they're lovely. Did you pick them yourself?" "On the way here," he said. "Do you remember making daisy chains? You once made me a crown and collar."

Chloe frowned. She didn't remember-in fact, from what she did remember of Crispin, it seemed rather unlikely. However, she was prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt and said, "Vaguely."

She felt sufficiently in charity with him to consider inviting him into the kitchen, and then remembered Hugo's voice telling Jasper he wasn't welcome in his house. Presumably, the prohibition applied to Crispin also.

"Would you like a cup of water?" she offered, gesturing to the pump. "It must have been a hot ride." It was the only hospitality available to her, but Crispin looked as neat and cool as if he hadn't ridden the seven miles from Shipton.

"Thank you no," he said. "But I'd like to walk with you. How aboutwe take the dog across the field?"

Dante heard the magic word and emitted a short, excited bark, his tail waving.

Chloe frowned. "I'll have to ask Samuel."

"The servant? For permission?" Crispin sounded genuinely shocked.

"He runs the household," she said. "While Sir Hugo is… is away."

"Oh. Where's he gone?" Crispin asked casually, bending to pat Dante.

"Into Manchester," Chloe said.

"How long will he be away?"

Chloe realized she was not prepared to admit she didn't know. "Just a day," she said. "I'll go and talk to Samuel."

Crispin watched her run into the house and wondered why she'd reverted to the hideous serge and the clumpy boots. He didn't much fancy a walk through the fields with quite such a dowdy companion. But his instructions were clear, so he waited for her return with an eager smile pinned to his lips.

Samuel's negative had been unequivocal and Chloe returned disconsolate. "He has to obey Sir Hugo," she explained. "It wouldn't be fair to press him to do otherwise."

Crispin put a good face on it. "Let's sit in the sun, then." He led his horse over to Chloe's rain barrel and hitched himself boyishly onto the low wall beside it.

Crispin kept up a cheerful flow of friendly conversation for half an hour before taking his leave. Chloe was thoughtful as she returned to the house. There was something about him that jarred on her-a false note somewhere-but she couldn't put her finger on it, and it seemed ungenerous to look for faults when he was going to so much trouble to entertain her. And if anyone needed entertainment and something to divert her thoughts, she did.

rlugo stirred heavily in the deep featherbed. He drew in the stale reek of beer and bodies as he rolled onto his back. Groaning, he flung his arm over the soft mound of flesh beside him. Betsy snuffled and turned her plump body sideways, burrowing deeper into the feathers. Still only half conscious, Hugo smiled in vague warmth and gave her a couple of friendly pats before making more purposefully suggestive movements.

Betsy moaned in halfhearted protest but lent herself as she always did. It was her job, and this customer was gentler and more regular than most, and paid with a generous hand.

Afterward, Hugo lapsed once more into unconsciousness, coming to an hour later with a horrid jerk into heavy-limbed, aching wakefulness. Betsy had left the bed and was lighting the candles. 'Time to go, luv," she said.

Her petticoat was grubby, barely covering her ample breasts and riding high on her chunky calves, but her smile was friendly. "Got other customers. Can't make a livin' lyin' 'ere with you 'til mornin', now, can P"

Hugo closed his eyes, filled with a terrifying emptiness. If he was alone, the void would swallow him.

"Come back to bed," he said. "I'll pay you for the rest of the night."

"Can't," Betsy said firmly. "The bed's promised to Sal now. We takes it in turns, and now it's my turn for the street corners. It's not so bad in summer, but it gets right parky on a winter night." She chuckled expansively and bent to the tarnished copper plate that served as a mirror, pulling a comb through her tangles. "Fair do's, luv. Sal an' me 'ave worked it like this for a year now."

Hugo struggled up. His hands shook and the iron band around his head tightened ominously. He looked around the room with a flash of desperation.

" 'Ere." Betsy handed him a brandy bottle in instant

comprehension. "There's a drop in there. It'll keep the crawlers at bay."

Hugo downed the contents and his hands steadied, the incipient pain died. "Come home with me." There was a pleading note in his voice. "I can't be alone, Betsy. I'll pay you for the night and it'll be a lot more comfortable than street corners." He attempted a cajoling smile, but all his facial muscles were stiff.

"And 'ow'U I get back then?" Betsy frowned at him.

"I'll make sure you do," he promised. "Please, Betsy. I promise you won't lose on it."

She shrugged plump shoulders. "Well, why not. But I'll want a guinea for die 'ole night. And some extra for the inconvenience, mind."

"Whatever you say." He stood up slowly, ready for the violent swinging of the room around him. It steadied and he picked up his coat, hanging over a chair, feeling through the pockets. "Here, be a good girl and buy another bottle of that gut rot from your friend downstairs while I get dressed."

Betsy took the coin and went out in her petticoat. It wasn't her business if a customer chose to drink himself into an early grave.

Hugo pulled on his britches, concentrating hard on every little movement. If he didn't allow his mind to wander from the minute details of the present, the void wouldn't swallow him.

Betsy came back with the brandy and he took another deep swallow. He felt stronger immediately and a happy tingle of warmth spread through him, sending the demons back where they came from.

He escorted Betsy, his arm around her shoulders, down the stairs and to the mews where his horse was stabled. "You don't mind riding pillion, do you, Betsy, my love?" he said with a chuckle, slapping her ample rear in friendly punctuation.

"I don't, but the 'orse might," Betsy responded with an answering chuckle. " 'Elp me up, then."

Hugo heaved her upward and then mounted in front of her. The horse was well rested and stood firm beneath the combined weight. Hugo pulled the bottle from inside his coat and took a long pull, then clicked his tongue and nudged his mount's flanks. He couldn't remember how long he'd been away from Denholm. Several days, he guessed. But it hardly mattered.

It was a brilliant night, the air mild and soft, the white road to Denholm winding ahead of them. Betsy began to hum a ribald taproom song and Hugo joined in, taking occasional pulls from the bottle. The void no longer threatened. There was emptiness, but it was a comforting emptiness. No demons lurked; he could remember nothing in the past and couldn't care less about the future. He existed only in the capsule of the present with Betsy's warm, welcoming body against his back, the horse moving between his thighs, the brandy curling in his belly. Hugo Lattimer was happy.

Samuel heard the horse's hooves on the cobbles beneath his open window. He heard Hugo's deep chuckle and a feminine giggle. With a resigned sigh he rolled over and composed himself for sleep. At least Sir Hugo was back and in one piece. There was always the fear that during one of these orgies in the stews when Hugo forgot who he was and what he was, he'd fall victim to some assailant intent on robbery and murder. Somehow, though, he always came through unscathed. Probably because even when he was drunk he didn't lose the power and stature of a man who'd commanded one of His Majesty's ships of the line. There was an indefinable authority about the man that transcended even the uncoordinated merriness of a drunkard.

Hugo managed to put his horse in the stable, fumbling with saddle and bridle and stirrup leathers as he

unsaddled him. But he got the job done and turned to Betsy, standing in the doorway, still humming her ribald song. As he turned, his eye fell on an unfamiliar shape in a neighboring stall. He frowned, shaking his head, wondering how a strange beast had found its way into his stables. The shadow of the answer seemed to be there, but it wouldn't take shape. It was supremely irrelevant; everything was supremely irrelevant at the moment. Flinging his arm around Betsy, he hustled her into the house and into the library.

Chloe hadn't heard Hugo's arrival in the courtyard, since her chamber was at the other end of the house, but Dante, stretched out across the end of the bed, pricked up his ears as the master entered the house. He listened for a minute, then, satisfied that nothing out of the ordinary was happening, dropped his head back onto Chloe's feet with a heavy sigh.

The sound of the piano drifting up through her open window woke Chloe. She lay listening as the music filled the darkness. It was a cheerful, rollicking tune unlike any she'd heard Hugo play before. Together with her relief that he'd returned safely came a flicker of hope that if the demons had left him, he'd revert to the man he'd been before his cruel rejection of her.

The music stopped after a while, and she tried to go back to sleep. But gradually, as the possibility of an end to her wretched loneliness and confusion grew, she began to feel a return of her usual strength of purpose. Her life was still hers to manage. And there were fences to mend before her future could be arranged.

She was out of bed before she realized she'd made any decision. Dante jumped down and shook himself, going to the door.

"No, stay here," she said. "I won't be long." She slipped out into the corridor, closing the door quietly behind her. The dog whined.

It was only when she was halfway down the stairs that Chloe realized she was again running around the house in her nightgown. But there was no one to see and she wasn't going outside. At the library door she paused with a flicker of uncertainty. He'd told her she wasn't to approach him unless he summoned her… but that had been when the demons had been with him, when he'd been a different person. The man who'd been playing that merry tune couldn't possibly be the same man who'd thrust her from him with such rough unkindness.

She lifted the latch and pushed the door open. A silvery thread of moonlight lay across the worn Turkey carpet. There were soft sounds in the room, puzzling sounds that stirred her with a strange mixture of apprehension and curiosity. She stepped into the room.

The entwined figures lay in the moonlight, rustling with muffled whispers and heavy breathing. Chloe stared in shock, seeing plump white thighs gleaming in the moonlight, enclosing the long, hard body of Hugo Lattimer. His chestnut hair flopped over his forehead as he gazed down at his partner, moving himself rhythmically within the generous welcoming maw of her body. With a small chuckle of pleasure he threw his head back, tossing the long lock of hair away from his brow. His eyes opened.

The sight of the girl standing in open-mouthed shock in the doorway hit Hugo like an icy waterfall. He'd forgotten about her. He'd forgotten about everything that had driven him into the brandy lake of amnesia and into the hospitable arms of an amiable whore. And as he took in the slight figure outlined by the candlelight from the hall behind her, the gleaming hair tumbling about her shoulders, bitter bile burned in his throat and the brandy in his stomach turned sour. He tried to tell her to

go away, to avert her eyes from this shameful sight, but he couldn't form the words.

And then she'd gone, the door closing quietly behind her.

"Eh, what was that?" Betsy demanded. "What's 'ap-pened to you, then?" It was very clear her partner was no longer either interested in or capable of completing their coition.

Hugo disengaged and stood up. He felt queasy and horror-struck. He looked down at Betsy sprawling on the rug at his feet and saw only the degrading vulgarity of her position, the white slabs of flesh beneath the rucked-up grimy petticoat. With a muttered curse he turned from her.

"Get dressed and go."

"Eh, now, what's all this?" Betsy sat up, shaking down her petticoat. "All night, you said. You're not turnin' me out of 'ere like that!"

"It's almost dawn," he said, pulling up his britches. "The carrier's wagon passes the bottom of the drive at six o'clock. He'll give you a ride into Manchester." He went over to the desk in the corner, pulled open a drawer, and took out a strongbox. "Here, take this."

Betsy stared at the three gold sovereigns winking in the fading moonlight. It was as much as she could ex-pea to earn in two months, and it had been earned without much effort and no discomfort. "You're a rum 'un, you are," she said, taking the money with an easy shrug. "I'll be off, then."

Hugo made no response. He went to the window and stared out into the graying night, waiting while Betsy hooked herself into her dress, pulled on her cheap cotton stockings, and thrust her feet into her wooden clogs.

"All right, then," she said, hesitating at the door. "I'm

off." The rigid figure didn't move a muscle. With another

shrug she went into the hall, closing the door behind her.

"Who are you?"

Betsy jumped at the soft question. She turned to look at the small figure sitting on the bottom stair. "Bless my soul! And what's it to you, might I ask?" She approached and examined the white-faced girl curiously. "Was it you just came in there, then?"

"I didn't know," Chloe said in a flat voice. "Are you a friend of Hugo's?"

Betsy laughed, a rich chuckle from her belly. "Bless you, no, dearie, not what you'd call a friend exactly. It's my business to cheer gentlemen up and I does what I can." The coins chinked in her skirt pocket. "But what's a kiddie like you doin', prowlin' around in the middle o' the night, seein' things you shouldn't?"

"I'm not a child," Chloe said. "And I wasn't prowling."

Betsy peered closer. "Reckon as 'ow you're not such a babby after all," she agreed with a note of sympathy. " 'Ad a bit of a shock, did you, dearie?"

The library door opened before Chloe could respond. Hugo stepped into the hall. "Go up to your room, Chloe," he directed, his voice without expression.

Chloe stood up slowly. "I'm sorry I interrupted you," she said with an ironic courtesy. "Please forgive me. I didn't realize you had a visitor." She turned and ran up the stairs without a backward glance.

"That's a pickle, an' no mistake," Betsy observed wisely as Hugo opened the front door for her. "You'd do best to keep your little entertainments out of the 'ouse, if you wants my advice."

Hugo said nothing, simply closed the door on her. He went back to the library and steadily gathered up all the bottles scattered around the room, the full, the half full, and the empty. He took them into the kitchen, then went upstairs and woke Samuel.

Samuel listened to his instructions in complete silence. When his employer had finished, he said, "Reckon you can do it'"

"I must," Hugo said simply, but there was quiet desperation in his voice and eyes. "Keep Chloe away from the library at all costs." As he left the room, he added with a tinge of humor that surprised them both, "She has the devil's own facility for appearing in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"Mebbe so, but then, mebbe not," Samuel mused as he got out of bed. Maybe this time she'd appeared in the right place at the right time.

Hugo went back to the library and closed the door. He sat down in the cracked leather wing chair beside the empty grate and stared sightlessly into the graying light of the room as he waited for the long, slow descent into hell to begin.