Page 23 of Ondine

Dinner was a surprisingly pleasant affair, certainly not because of any effort on Warwick’s part, but because Justin was so good-humored.

He told her tales about the first Norman lord to lay claim to the Chatham land.

The Norman killed the old Saxon lord and consequently married the Saxon’s daughter—a wise political move, one that Henry VII would utilize centuries later upon marrying Elizabeth of York to put a final end to the War of the Roses.

“They say our Chatham ancestor was quite a wild man,” Justin told her, lavishly spreading thick roe upon a chunk of bread.

“Red-haired and red-tempered, his thirty-pound battle-axe—a relic from his Viking ancestors, no doubt—eternally at his side. From such a man, it seems but natural that our arms carry the legend of the beast.”

Ondine took a sip of wine, ignoring her husband’s silence to enjoy her brother-in-law. “’Tis quite an interesting history you Chathams have acquired.” The wine tonight was potent, and she felt brash. Heedless of a possible rising of Warwick’s wrath, Ondine determined to quiz his brother.

“The legend that intrigues me most, Justin, is that regarding your grandmother, the poor lady who lost her life upon the sealed stairway, the—uh—ghost the servants claim to haunt the manor.”

Warwick emitted an impatient oath beneath his breath, and Ondine felt his eyes upon her, hot with brooding annoyance.

Justin didn’t seem to notice. “Ah—that is tragic and recent history!” His eyes twinkled as he leaned toward Ondine.

“I never knew my grandfather or grandmother—it all occurred before my birth. Warwick was scarce born. It was in the days right before the old king’s execution, when the war was coming to an end.

The battle came to our very doorsteps, the Round-heads and the Cavaliers!

Our grandsire and father cut dashing figures, so we were told!

Battling the enemy . . . upon their own land!

Alas, grandfather fell, and the news was rushed to the house.

Father was of age then—and married, naturally, since my elder brother is quite legal!

—but Grandmama was nowhere near aged; she was a beauty rare, so they claim, and so her picture shows!

She would rush to her lord’s side, disbelieving that he could have been slain.

The staircase fell in, tragically. But, according to rumor—”

“Justin!” Warwick interrupted impatiently. “Must we further rumor amongst ourselves?”

Justin looked at his brother innocently. “Warwick, I air family linen only before the family! Your bride must be aware of the full story of our haunts, lest she should hear of them elsewhere!”

Warwick did not dispute him, but rose, his teeth set in a grate, and carried his wine to the mantel, as if he did not care to hear a recital of his family’s past.

“They say,” Justin told Ondine quietly, “that the lord’s mistress did murder his wife, casting her from the staircase!”

“His mistress! What was she doing in the house?”

“Well, she lived here, of course. She was the housekeeper.”

Ondine gasped. Justin chuckled.

“But you see, the mistress received her just reward, for she, too, stumbled from the stairway and died, her neck broken.”

Warwick groaned from the mantel. “Rotting wood—and we are endowed with two crying haunts!” He stalked back to the table, setting his goblet down upon it hard. “Ondine—”

“My brother is quite right,” Justin interrupted hastily, worried that he might have truly upset her. “You mustn’t let servants’ tales upset you, you know. Our parents lived out lovely lives; they’ve been gone but a few years now, succumbing to lung fever, rather than any curse or ghost upon us.”

“I’m not upset, Justin. Merely curious. And you’re quite right; I should have learned these things from my husband—or my dear new brother!—rather than the servants!”

Justin appeared a bit surprised by the low hostility in her voice, either that or the fact that Warwick had obviously told her nothing of his land or his family.

Warwick had his hands upon the back of her chair, and he pulled it out abruptly. “Milady, I believe you’ve heard quite enough for one evening. Bid Justin good night, my love, so that we might retire.”

“Retire? ’Tis so early!”

“We’re retiring,” Warwick informed her, an edge of steel to his voice.

Justin laughed delightedly. “Ah, newlyweds! What can I say, Ondine? The family abounds with hungry beasts!”

Ondine flushed. Justin rose, offering her a deep bow and her husband an encouraging grin. “Remember that second sons tend to be more courteous, should you find my brother’s temper too fierce to endure!”

He was gallantly teasing her, of course, yet Ondine felt Warwick’s body grow stiff behind her. He did not seem so angry at the words as he was speculative. He set an arm about her, pulling her to him with a groan for Justin. “’Tis a pity you may not yet return to court!”

Justin chuckled. “Alas, ’tis true. I am doomed to languish here, an unhappy voyeur to the lovers’ tension that steams betwixt the two of you. Good night! Leave me to wallow in my wine!”

“Do not wallow too far, Brother. I’d see you in my apartment in, say, an hour. I wish to discuss the building project.”

Justin sank back to his seat and raised his goblet to his brother. “An hour, then.”

Into the gallery and out of Justin’s sight, Ondine pursed her lips, shaking Warwick’s touch from her shoulder and stamping somewhat inelegantly ahead of him. She remained silent as he opened the outer door and shut it, then turned on him angrily.

“Why is it, Lord Chatham, that you refuse to alert me to that which it seems imperative to know? Then, when others would do so, you growl like a beast, thus adding fuel to your own legends! You wish me to play your wife, yet you order me about and lock me up at night like a possession, like one of your horses or hounds—”

He watched her silently, slipping from his jacket to toss it upon the spinet bench, then interrupting, “Madam, you are a possession, purchased upon the gallows. Well kept, I might add.”

Ondine fixed her hands upon her waist, too feverish with temper and wine to take heed of her words.

“You are the one, my lord, who took care to inform me that the gallows were not to be mentioned again.”

He moved over to the large desk, sat upon the chair behind it, and stretched his legs atop it, crossing his booted feet and wearily pressing his fingers to his temple.

“Perhaps, my love,” he said lightly, “I should return you to the gallows, since like the horse or hound, you seem prone to bite upon the hand that feeds you.”

“You cannot return me to the gallows, my lord. You chose to take me from there, to marry me. I no longer stand condemned.”

Dear God, Warwick mused, he was acquiring a racking headache.

Between this vixen and his brother, he was sorely vexed, irate, and burning with emotion both perplexing and annoying.

Damn her! Would she not let him be? Watching her at his table, smiling, laughing—no, flirting, rot her—with his brother.

Acting the grande dame with all finesse and graciousness, far too stunning and feminine in her elegant dress, her hair a soft flow of curling silk and chestnut.

It was a blaze of fire and glory about her, and her eyes, so deep a blue as to bewitch the beholder with their gaze . . .

“Perhaps I cannot return you to the gallows,” he snapped, then found control and continued negligently. “Perhaps I can return you to the mysterious past that brought you there—to those whom you fight in your dreams!”

“What?” The gasp came from her in a startled rush, and he frowned, his body tensing. He had really meant nothing by the words; they had just come to him. But at their utterance she turned pale, her eyes vast pools of indigo, and her slender hands, still set upon her hips, tensed with alarm.

And suddenly she appeared both very beautiful and proud and very vulnerable. Despite himself he wanted to assure her that he would do nothing to harm her; that he would never cast her to the pit of demons she so feared.

And yet . . . hadn’t he brought her here, hoping that her presence would bring his own demons to the fore?

He longed to go to her, touch her, hold her with all that was chivalrous in him—and all that was not.

He was reminded of her naked form that morning, so slim and yet so wondrously curved, the weight of her full young breast in his hand, the sensual beauty in the curve of her hip, the sweet taste of her lips, parting to his with surprise.

Desire shuddered through him, hot and potent.

He swung his feet from the desk and turned from her, closing his eyes, clenching his teeth, and lacing his fingers together with all his strength.

No! He would not think of her so; he had made her his wife, but—by God!

—He would spurn her for the lying, ungrateful horse thief she had proved herself to be.

Slowly, achingly, he began to ease and reminded himself that his behavior was that of the brooding tyrant.

And she was many things he admired, courageous and able to carry out his charade with far greater talent than he had ever imagined.

Nor did he wish her ill; he craved to give her freedom in the end, a life that might truly have been saved.

He had been irked beyond reason to find himself jealous of his own brother.

And he had to be as wary and suspicious of Justin as he was of anyone else; Justin stood to gain the most if Warwick gave Chatham no heir.

He turned back to the still ashen beauty who was his wife.

“My lady, my apologies,” he said wearily.

“I did not mean to touch upon a wound; I’d not leave you to any harm, be that harm hunger or one of human threat.

It is true—my grandmother died upon a stairway, and you are my second wife.

If I do not care for talk of either, it is because I grow vastly impatient with talk of ghosts. ”