Page 10 of A Touch for All Time (For All Time #3)

A ria closed her eyes and clung to the marquess. Did his red coat smell like pine, or was it the forest all around her? She couldn’t think straight with his arms around her while he rode them bareback on his horse. If death had a color, it would be the color of his horse. But the thunderous pounding of her heart convinced her that she was very much alive. Perhaps more alive than she’d been since her accident.

Sitting between his hard thighs was bad enough; thrusting his hips forward to get his mount moving nearly melted her all over him. He hadn’t apologized. He’d promised, once again, not to let her fall. Was he so quick and agile that he could stop her from bouncing right out of his lap, or so strong that he could catch her in a grand jeté?

“Miss Darling?”

And the husky tone of his voice when he called her Miss Darling made her belly flip.

“You were about to tell me about the woman who gave you the key.”

“Was I?” she challenged. How much should she tell him? His reaction the first time he’d heard of Mrs. B. wasn’t a good one.

“After my mother left,” he told her, leaning over her to speak close to her ear so she could hear him over the wind and his running horse, “my grandmother took over raising me. Sometimes when I looked deep into her eyes, she seemed infinitely older than a grandmother should be. She left when I was almost ten. Before she left, she gave me the key you now have in your possession.”

Aria turned to give him a disappointed stare. Really? “It’s the key you want.”

“What?”

“Is the key what this is all about?” When he continued to gaze at her, not understanding what she meant, she clarified, “It’s one of a kind, solid gold, and it can transport someone through time. Who wouldn’t want it?”

“Me,” he answered dully. “I had it in my possession and I never once tried to use it or even take it from its place to look at it.”

“Ha!” she mocked. “So, you’re telling me you had the key all this time and you were never curious about the door it belonged to? And that your grandmother is who—? Mrs. B?”

“You can be perceptive when it’s spelled out exhaustively for you, lady,” he drawled out, moving away from her.

Aria cursed him for taking the warmth from her. “Forget it. I’m not giving it up.”

“You’re not curious about how we have so much in common?” he asked her. “About why you were sent here—to me?”

“Who says I was sent for you? You weren’t even the first person I met. It was Will. Maybe I was sent here for him and not you! Or…or maybe I was sent here for me! You didn’t think of that, did you?”

“Miss Darling?” Will Gable called out beyond the early evening mist. “Is that you?”

“Will!” she exclaimed, sounding more excited than she felt. She waited until the horse stopped before she practically leaped from its back and into Will’s arms.

“I was beside myself with worry,” Will said without letting her go. “I wanted to go to the castle today to check on you, but my mother was afraid of inciting—”

He looked up at the marquess, who was staring at him from his mount’s back, waiting for him to finish.

“—your wrath, my lord.”

Aria watched the marquess’ smile curl his lips and then spread into a dark grin.

“Your mother knows, then, how easily her son rakes on one’s last nerve.”

“Will,” Aria said nervously. She shouldn’t have asked the marquess to bring her here knowing the animosity between them. “I think your mother, and perhaps even you, are wrong about the kind of person the marquess is. He’s been nothing but ki—”

“He’s not wrong,” the marquess interjected. “His family knows well enough that my wrath is not to be trifled with.”

“Why?” she challenged, glaring at him with her hands on her hips. “Will you get your horse after him? Wouldn’t you have already done that to his brother if it was possible? His coming to the castle to inquire after me would not incite your wrath. You’re not that kind of man.”

His smile shone in his eyes. It didn’t matter if he used his lips or his eyes to show his pleasure. No matter what else she told herself, she liked that she brought out a little bit of him. He angled his head at her as if he wanted to ask her how she knew what kind of man he was.

“You’re not wrathful,” she told him. “Detached maybe, but not wrathful. You hardly blink an eye when I insult or challenge you. You didn’t even get angry when I kicked your sword out of your hand.”

His gaze flicked beyond her head, to Will. He shot out a feigned laugh and shook his head. “It’s very different, Gable. I don’t dislike her.” His eyes widened for a second and he coughed softly.

He didn’t dislike her. Did that mean he liked her? What if he did? She didn’t like him. More importantly, she wasn’t staying.

“Okay, enough,” she admonished, holding her hands up. “Will, I just wanted you to know that I was alright. He isn’t a mad ogre.” She smiled, knowing the marquess heard.

“Mayhap just to you, little lion.”

She heard him, but she pretended not to. There weren’t any men in her past. Her past, like her future, was dedicated to dancing and then to helping her parents. She worked. She had no time for play. Conn needed tuition for an online college or something to help him live. Her mother needed help putting food on the table. How were they eating without her? She felt a sudden rush of panic flood her senses. She had to find a way home and stop thinking of the beautifully expressive dancer trapped behind walls he’d built to keep others out.

“I assume none of the doors in the castle was the one you needed,” Will said. Perhaps he hadn’t heard the marquess’ confession.

“I haven’t checked any others yet,” she told him.

“Why not?” the marquess asked. “I would have thought that was the first thing you did when you woke up this morning.”

“I didn’t want to do it alone. If I walked in on someone without you there with me—”

He held up his hand, silencing her from explaining further. But he didn’t say another word.

“If you find the door, I will not see you again,” Will said in a cracked voice.

Aria didn’t know what to say. She hadn’t wanted him to get any false hope about them. What should she say to him?

“Ghost is cold.”

She and Will both blinked and looked up at the marquess when he spoke. Aria eyed his horse. Ghost. Right. Figures. The beast did look cold though.

“We should go,” the marquess said.

“My lord,” Will tried, “I can bring her back to the castle after supper. I know my mother would be happy to see and feed her.”

“Another time,” the marquess said without giving her a chance to reply. “We have many doors to check, and I’d like to get started.”

He reached his arm down to Aria and waited for her to take his hand. When she did, he pulled her up.

He didn’t ride right off, denying Will another word, but waited for at least five breaths, giving her a chance to bid her friend a possibly permanent farewell. And then he moved around her, encompassing her and tightening his thighs around his horse until the animal bolted away.

“You should use a saddle,” she said when the horse slowed to a trot.

“Ghost doesn’t like them,” he told her, his voice vibrating against her back. She closed her eyes to fight off the dizzying effect he had on her. “She wore one for a long time and would prefer to be free.”

Aria wondered if he was speaking of his horse, or himself?

I’m a puppet.

His words and the heavy voice in which he spoke them were still fresh in her mind. She had wondered who pulled his strings, but it didn’t really matter who. How could he heal from his childhood? That’s what mattered. But surely, it couldn’t be up to her to heal him. She had a family who needed her! She wanted to shout it—especially so Mrs. B.—wherever or whenever she was—could hear it. Instead, she remained quiet on the way back to Dartmouth—doing her best to ignore the low flying raven above them.

When they arrived at the castle, the marquess dismounted, then instead of helping her down, he leaned in closer to his horse’s head and scratched the mare’s nose.

Finally, as if what he had to do next was the most unsavory task, he moved closer to Aria and held his arms up to her.

Was she to fall into them? She looked around the stable but didn’t see the stool. With her face burning up and her jaw clenched tight, she closed her eyes and let herself tip over.

And would have landed hard on her rump if he hadn’t caught her in the cradle of his arms at the last second.

“My apologies,” he said, staring down at her. “I wasn’t expecting you to collapse as if dead.”

He sounded cool and detached. He looked unfazed and uninterested, but he didn’t put her down until she insisted he do so before they reached the castle entrance.

He set her on her feet, letting his sea-colored gaze linger on hers before he glanced up at the raven, then moved away.

“Wash up,” he said, taking his first few steps away backward. “I’ll see you in the dining hall.”

“My lord—” Would she ever get used to calling him that? “I don’t know—”

“Sarah will help you.”

Was that the hint of a smile she just saw on his lips? What did he find humorous about her not being familiar with how things were run in a castle? He’d almost smiled. That’s what was important.

Why? Why did she feel glad that he’d smiled? She wasn’t there for him. There had to be a mistake. Didn’t she have enough on her plate? She couldn’t be responsible for his healing.

Before she could stop him, he went inside and bounded up the stairs.

Aria found Sarah tidying her rooms. Will’s sister seemed sullen while she dusted a table in the small sitting room. She barely looked up when Aria entered.

“Diedre told me you were out with the marquess,” she complained gently when Aria pressed her to tell her what the matter was.

“Yes, he took me to see Will at your house.”

Sarah gave her a hopeful grin. “My brother?” She sighed with relief when Aria nodded. “Will must have been pleased.”

Aria smiled but said nothing. What was there to say? She and Will had no future.

“I need to wash up and go to dinner,” she told Sarah. “Will you help me? I don’t know what I should wear or where I should go.”

Sarah seemed to forget the marquess and tended to Aria with great care. Aria guessed Will’s sister wouldn’t be happy about her and the marquess disappearing after they ate in order to try fitting an odd key into the keyholes of the castle’s many doors.

“You know a lot about the marquess,” she mentioned to Sarah as the girl tied her hair up with over a dozen pins.

“I admit I’ve liked him my whole life,” Sarah whispered with a giggle. “I felt sorry for him…and for myself because I knew who I was, the daughter of a carpenter. He was nobility, the son of a duke. He would never be allowed to…that’s why the other boys hated him, because he was so far above them.”

“What happened that day your father died? Do you believe the stories that he can communicate with animals?” She wouldn’t tell Sarah about the raven that seemed to follow him all the time. Or about how Ghost didn’t like being saddled. “And…just leave the back of my hair down. I don’t like all those pins.”

“I was young when it happened,” Sarah said and plucked two pins from Aria’s hair. “Six to be exact, but Harry cried about it every night for almost two months. He and the other boys were shooting arrows to see who had the best aim. Harry’s arrow hit Abigail the goose.” She pulled more pins and let Aria’s long, chestnut tresses spill down her back. “They ran away but Harry returned later to see if she lived or died. Her body was gone. He said he followed a trail of droplets of blood and found the duke’s son burying the goose in the forest. Lord Dartmouth knew Harry was the one who struck his friend. How would he know unless Abigail told him? He and Harry fought but then the forest animals began to come out of their hiding places to bite Harry. He said Lord Dartmouth was smiling. A wolf entered the glade and attacked Harry, but our father appeared and shot it. Harry says the boy called out for help and a large raven came and…” She stopped, unable to go on.

Aria took her hand in both of hers. “I’m sorry for bringing it up.”

“Oh, Aria, you’re shivering. I’m quite alright, really. I wouldn’t say the same for Harry.”

“Of course,” Aria said. She had the intention of speaking to Harry. According to the marquess, and now his own sister, Harry was a terrible bully toward the duke’s motherless son. She wanted to ask the marquess about that day and hear his side of it, not just Harry’s.

“Word of the incident traveled throughout all the villages, and soon almost everyone came against the young lord, Grayson Barrington. People wanted to stone him when they heard Harry’s sickbed tale. Thankfully, they were too afraid of the duke to lay a finger on his son. None of us were allowed to play with him. He didn’t have a single friend, not a soul to cry to—even his grandmother had left. Thank the good Lord for Harper Black. She stepped in and dealt with all the hostility Lord Dartmouth could muster. She finally reached him. She used to take him beyond the wall to the forest against his father’s wishes and let him practice his dancing to the music she played on her violin. We knew what she was doing, and we knew the trouble she would get into if the duke found out. He never did. We kept it secret from everyone else.”

“We?”

“Will and I,” Sarah told her.

“Why would Will care about what happened to the boy who supposedly got his father killed?”

“At the time, Will didn’t believe the stories about communicating with animals. He liked Lord Dartmouth, but Harry’s rantings finally got to him.”

“But not you?” Aria asked her.

Sarah shook her pretty head. “I worked here. I used to sneak off and watch him dance in the woods. I believed that he could speak to animals, and they understood him. Mayhap I should hate him too, but I had seen him with Abigail the goose when it was alive. Every memory I have of him before that day is him with that goose. That’s why I believed the stories. I had heard him speaking with Abigail, and many other animals. He would laugh for no reason at all—no reason the rest of us knew. They were his friends. If he was beaten up by my brother, the animals would have gotten involved. It’s the only reason so many animals attacked Harry and my father.”

“But if he had that kind of power, wouldn’t he have used it on your brother when everyone turned against him?”

Sarah shook her head. “After the incident, the village men were permitted to go out and hunt the animals responsible for what happened. They killed everything that moved in the forest. After that, I never saw the marquess smile or talk to an animal again.”

Aria wiped her eyes. The punishment was harsh for the animals and for the little boy who loved them.

She had had enough of being pampered and rose up from her seat so fast she nearly knocked Sarah over. She helped the youngest Gable to her feet, then hurried out the door.

When she heard Sarah behind her, she slowed a bit, getting a hold of herself. “I’m so hungry.” She laughed when her stomach rumbled to prove it and picked up her steps again. The delicious smells coming from the last set of double doors in the hall weren’t the reason her slippered feet hurried to get there faster. She wanted to see the marquess. She shouldn’t have asked Sarah so many questions. The more she learned about him, the more she wanted to see him comforted.

For the first time she didn’t think about getting home.

Sarah stopped her from pulling open the doors herself and plunging into the dining hall. Instead, she waited while a male servant opened the doors for her.

She entered first, then turned to look over her shoulder for Sarah when the girl fell back.

As if he’d been waiting for her, the marquess appeared at her side and escorted her to his table. There was no one else sitting at it. “Do you sit alone every night?”

“I don’t usually dine here,” he told her, looking ruthlessly handsome with his naturally raven hair combed back away from his face, his lithe body dressed for dinner in claret velvet and lace. “And when I do, Harper used to sit here.”

“She doesn’t anymore?” Aria asked him as she sat in the empty chair near his.

“No.”

“Why not? I understood her to be very important to you.”

He didn’t answer but sat down and looked at her, into her eyes as if he were searching for the meaning of life. Her instinct was to look away from such careful examination, but Aria fought it and stared back at him. She felt the risk of it almost immediately when he tore away her layers. What would he do if he discovered the passionate woman buried deep beneath piles of responsibility? She didn’t want that part of herself to be exposed.

She almost breathed out loud when he slid his gaze away first. She didn’t say anything else while dinner was served. What was she even doing here? Had Mrs. B. really sent her? Why? Lord Grayson Barrington was too dangerous to her. Could he tempt her to forget the doors?

“If we don’t find what you’re looking for tonight, I’ll take you out in the morning to search the forest.”

“Thank you,” she said with her two-pronged forkful of venison paused at her lips.

She was thankful for sure, but he sounded eager to be rid of her. The thought stung a little.

Then it occurred to her, and she leaned in closer to him. His indefinable, musky scent washed over her and through her, making her dizzy. “You’re not thinking of coming with me, are you?”

He blinked at her, then the slightest hint of a smile curled his lips. “It has crossed my mind, but I won’t leave Dartmouth in the hands of Cavendish.”

She looked across the hall to where his stepbrother sat with a buxom female and a group of other men. Timothy Cavendish was one of the bullies in young Grayson Barrington’s life. Now, he stood to inherit everything. Aria scowled at him.

Watching her, the marquess drew her gaze to his widening smile. “You hate those who hate me,” he said, sounding almost stunned to Aria’s ears.

“Yes,” she said without hesitation, then immediately blushed.

“Your reputation might be tarnished if you don’t revile me and leave my side. We will meet on the—”

“I’m not going to revile you or leave your side. At least not until I find my door.” She offered him her sincerest smile and watched him swallow and look away. “Where did you want to meet? Let’s go there now.”

“To the next door,” he answered hesitantly, then stood and led the way.

He surprised her. She thought, maybe, secretly hoped, that he might try to spend more time with her. He looked and sounded like he wanted to. She wasn’t disappointed that he denied himself. It was a commendable trait in a man.

“Do you have the key?”

She reached into a hidden pocket in the folds of her gown and pulled out the golden key. He brought her to the first door on the second landing. It was the door to Lord and Lady Albenum’s room while they were visiting. They were in the dining hall, so trying the key in their door wasn’t a problem.

By the tenth door Aria noticed her fingers were beginning to shake and her heart rate accelerated with each new door they tried. Would this be the one? Would she just walk through it and enter the future without him? Why wouldn’t she? She didn’t owe him anything. She wasn’t in love with him. She hardly knew him! Why was she having an anxiety attack every time she tried another door?

“My lord,” she said after the twenty-third door, “my family can’t make it without my help.”

“Then you must not tarry, Lady,” he said, sounding terribly tender to her ears.

She must not tarry. She followed him to the next door and slipped the key into the keyhole.

“Thank you for helping me,” she told him, pausing until she pushed the door open.

He said nothing so she opened the door and looked inside. It wasn’t the future. Her heartbeat slowed as she closed the door.

“Why are you helping me, by the way?”

“If you find your door and disappear behind it, I will be free of what they have planned for me.”

So, that was the reason he was so eager to see her go, so he could break free.

“You think I was sent purposely for you?” she asked him.

“You were given my key by who I’m certain is…was…my grandmother Tessa Blagden—over two centuries in the future. So, yes, it would seem so.” Tessa aka Hester Blagden. Mrs. B. The same person she had blamed when the key sent her here. Was this all Mrs. B.’s plan, as impossible as it was? “It would seem so,” she repeated, agreeing. “But why? Mrs. B. knew how much my family needed me. She helped us through so much after the accident. She made my dreams of dancing come true. And now I’m supposed to believe that she’s some witch with evil intent.”

“I’m told that in a future I may possibly spend with you, we will have sons.”

“No, that’s impossible,” she whispered, horrified. “I can’t abandon my family. I’ll never abandon them.”

Were her eyes deceiving her? Was that a genuine smile forming on his face, in his eyes and on his lips.

“Then let’s keep checking.”