The Duchess And The Dragon Part 18

He shook his head, putting on slippers. "I'm all right. I will be back shortly." He wasn't sure that was true, but he had to be alone.

His steps led him into the library, his sanctuary and place to think. The window hangings were drawn and the fire almost dead, lending an eerie darkness to the room that normally wouldn't have bothered him. Setting down the candle he carried, he stirred up the embers and added a log, trying to dissipate the chill in the room-and the chill clinging to his mind.

He poured a gla.s.s of amber liquor, then sat in the armchair behind his desk and let his breath out in a rush. As his eyes closed, the memory of the dream rushed back over him.

His father, again, trying to pull him down into the flames. It was so real, always so real, but this time there had been more. Other souls were there, in the distant blackness, screaming for him to help them. Their cries were like nothing he had heard on earth-guttural sounds more animal than human. Gone was any trace of dignity or self-possession. He could just make out their arms reaching, their hands clawing, wanting either to pull him in or secure his help in getting out. He didn't know which. He knew only that it terrified him.

He inhaled sharply as he remembered being able to smell them. Even now, the stench of brimstone and burning flesh clung to the insides of his nostrils. He'd seen his father in that darkness-a darkness so dense and alive that it seemed to crawl over him. Ivor had watched Drake, eyes glittering, hate and pain twisting his face. He clawed into the air, trying to reach Drake, trying to drag him into the torment of that dark nothingness.

s.h.i.+vering, Drake opened his eyes and rubbed a hand over his face. The liquor was a long, slow burn down his throat, making his stomach warm and bringing a small measure of comfort. But the dream remained, so vivid that he felt his heart thudding loudly in his chest.

This was Serena's fault. His fingers gripped his gla.s.s as he felt the first real anger at her since their marriage. All those questions at dinner . . . about his parents and their relations.h.i.+p. And then she had brought up his Uncle Richard, as if she knew something and was trying to validate it. He didn't like it. Why couldn't she let the past stay where it belonged?

Buried.

His head dropped back onto the high back of the chair, his eyes closed. The notion that the dream meant something, that his father was telling him something from the grave, wouldn't leave. Was his father in h.e.l.l? Was he truly trying to pull him down into some ghoulish, eternal nightmare with him? All he knew for certain was that the old man was still haunting him, still trying to ruin his life. "Why?" Drake gritted out into the dark room. "What do you want?"

A log fell, sending a shower of sparks and a sudden spurt of flame shooting up the chimney. Drake swung around, staring at the dancing blaze. "Go ahead. Tell me! What do you want?" He was shouting now, but he didn't care. He wanted answers. "Why won't you leave me alone?"

Empty silence was his only answer. The abyss mocked him, for he had no control over it. It could haunt him at will, especially in the vulnerability of sleep.

Drake's face twisted. "Whatever it is, you won't get it. We shall see who has the last laugh when my son inherits everything. Then we shall see who wins." His words sounded powerless compared with the horror of the nightmare-a little boy's bravado in the face of a monster.

Impotent fury filled him. Drake stood, ready to fling the gla.s.s in his hand at the fireplace, but he stopped. Carefully, quietly, he set it down on the desk. He could not let a cold body in a grave have such control over his emotions ever again. But as he stared down at his shaking hands, he suddenly felt helpless to fight it. He was cold and hot at the same time. Terror and stark panic sent him to his knees on the thick rug.

"If there is a h.e.l.l, there must be a heaven!"

His body quivered, sweat glistening on the skin beneath his dressing gown. Taking a deep, spasmodic breath he dropped his head, suddenly longing for peace-so thick he could almost touch it-the peace he had found in the Quaker meetinghouse.

Serena. She always brought him peace. Standing, he stumbled from the library and went in search of his wife, his safe harbor, his reason. He would bury himself in her serenity and there, as always, find his haven and his hope.

Chapter Twenty-Two.

Lady Chamberlain paced the marble floors of the entrance, her red heels clicking out her impatience. She would not leave until she got to the bottom of the mysterious d.u.c.h.ess of Northumberland. There was something disturbing in the way Drake looked at his stepmother. If she knew anything, she knew a man in love when she saw one! What she didn't know was how far their little farce had gone, but she wasn't leaving here today until she found out.

All these years, waiting for Drake to notice her. And now, just as the bloom was fading from her face and form, he chose someone else? A woman married to his father! Her gloved hands balled into fists at her side as she remembered when, years ago, she had been the most sought-after woman of the ton. Drake had insinuated a relations.h.i.+p then, but not the one she'd wanted, so she played hard to get.

When Drake's interest cooled toward her, others had taken note and dropped back as well. Now at thirty, she was practically on the shelf. When she thought of the offers she had turned down . . . it made her want to stamp her feet and scream. Now those eligibles were married with babies, and the younger bloods coming behind them did not want her. She would be forced to marry an old widower with children not her own to raise.

Her eyes narrowed. Someone was going to pay for that.

She may not have any power over Drake, but she certainly could get her claws into a backwater provincial who didn't know her way around a London puddle, much less the sea of Lady Maria Louisa Chamberlain's world. Serena Weston was hiding something, and Maria Louisa was determined to find out what it was and use it to maximum advantage.

She would have Drake yet.

Finally the butler came back and intoned that her grace would see her in the blue drawing room. She had never been inside any of Drake's homes. Her eyes devoured the elegance, and she felt her temper flare once more into her cheeks. Taking a calming breath, she stepped through the doorway, nodded dismissively at the butler, and studied the seating arrangements.

She entered the room and took a seat with her back to the wide windows. Facing the entrance, she sat on the edge of her chair, carefully arranging her skirts. The chit had better not keep her waiting! Maria Louisa doubted the d.u.c.h.ess even understood the nuances of a well-timed entry or exit, so she couldn't credit Serena with duplicity and yet, she knew better than to underestimate one's opponent.

It wasn't long before the d.u.c.h.ess entered, a little breathless and very pretty with those pure eyes and rosy cheeks. Maria Louisa had to admit the child was attractive. Stifling a curled lip, she pasted on a gracious smile and purred, "Why, your grace, you look as if you have been running. I do hope you did not hurry on my account."

Serena's smile broadened. "Oh no," she laughed. "Drake and I were riding early this morning and only just returned. We ride every morning, before the crowds begin." Her sigh was positively dreamy. "'Tis one of the best parts of the day." She pulled her hat off as she spoke and with it some of her pins. Long, golden-red curls cascaded around her shoulders. What man wouldn't long to bury his face in that resplendent hair?

Maria Louisa dug the nails of one hand into the flesh of the palm of the other. How could anyone be so happy? It was preposterous. And it was time to wipe away the innocent's grin. "Drake . . . hmmm . . . you are close, the two of you, yes?"

Serena blushed, that dreamy look on her tilted face. Aha! There it was. They were having an affair. It wasn't the first time she'd heard of a man doing so with his stepmother, and it would not, she was sure, be the last.

"Shall I ring for tea?"

Clearly this young woman had never held court at a morning calling session. Another mystery. Why was it that no one ever called on the young and mysterious d.u.c.h.ess? She should have been a delectable diversion to many of the ton.

"Of course, one should always provide refreshments for callers." Maria Louisa stated it with upraised brows, as if reprimanding a child.

Serena only agreed with a smile, going to the door to nod at the waiting footman. She seated herself across from Maria Louisa and laughed. "I have callers so seldom, I suppose my manners are a bit rusty." Then, looking Maria Louisa directly in the eyes, she asked with humble sincerity. "It was so nice of thee to come. Art thou well, Lady Chamberlain?"

She looked as if she really wanted to know, really cared and liked her. Maria Louisa scrambled for a moment, trying to gain a foothold. Hmmm, mayhap she had underestimated this woman.

Recovering, she smiled, c.o.c.king her bright-blond head to one side. "I am wonderful . . . but concerned, your grace."

"Concerned?"

The d.u.c.h.ess was all innocence, and Maria Louisa wondered if she was being played the fool. "Yes," she plunged forward with her plan. "There have been . . . rumors." She let the word fall heavy into the room.

Serena's brow puckered. "I am sorry, Lady Chamberlain, but I do not understand. Rumors about what?"

Maria Louisa fidgeted with her gloves in her lap, feigning reluctance. Finally she looked up with sad knowing in her eyes. "About you and Drake, your grace."

Serena laughed. "Please, Lady Chamberlain, let us dispense with this melodrama and be frank with one another. What, exactly, art thou trying to say?"

Maria Louisa ground her teeth. This woman's head must be made of stone. Changing tactics, she glared at her. "Your grace, scandalous rumors are flying that-" she fanned herself, showing the impact of such news on a true lady-"with the duke in the colonies, you and the earl are having an affair!"

SERENA LOOKED AT this beautiful woman, a woman obviously mad with jealousy, and felt pity for her. "As difficult as it may seem to understand, my lady, the duke married me. We have no need to have an affair."

Lady Chamberlain looked ready to burst a vein. Her blue eyes widened and then she sputtered, "You dolt. Of course the duke married you. I am not referring to the duke, but to Drake-the earl."

Serena shook her head. "Drake is the duke."

Lady Chamberlain looked confused for a long moment, then stood and pulled on her gloves. "I cannot fathom why the duke married such an addle-brained, unt.i.tled colonist. A mere child who can't even keep track of the difference in names and t.i.tles of her own husband. Let me put it simply for you. Ivan Weston, your husband, is the duke." She was nearly shouting now. "Drake is the Earl of Warwick and heir to the dukedom . . . and he is going to be my husband, so you may kindly take your hands off him and keep them off!"

The woman stormed out the door, almost running over the butler, who was loaded down with a one-of-a-kind mandarin-blue Chelsea tea service.

Serena stood in numb shock. Her brain couldn't seem to function.

The butler came into the room and set down the tea service. "Is anything amiss, your grace?"

Serena turned toward him but hadn't heard him enter. "No . . . no. Please go . . . and shut the door behind thee."

When he had left, Serena sank down on the settee, her hands limp in her lap. Lady Chamberlain thought she was married to Drake's father. The words pounded into her brain but made no sense. Everyone thought she was married to Drake's father.

Everyone thought she was married to Drake's father!

Oh G.o.d! G.o.d, please . . .

Trembling she slid to the floor, her head in her hands. Why had he lied? Why would he tell them such a thing?

Random thoughts flitted through her mind, trying to connect themselves, trying to make sense of it all. Drake wasn't Ivor's son. Drake had nearly killed a man and ran to America. Ivor was dead. Or was he? Could he be in the colonies as Lady Chamberlain said? If so, why would Drake lie about his father? Drake said he was the duke. Wasn't he? If not, who was her husband? So many questions. And only Drake, gone to his fencing practice, could give her the answers.

Was there ever a greater fool than she? She stared at the beautiful room. Christopher's image rose in her mind. She could have had a life with him. He would still be alive had she chosen him and their simple Quaker life. She could have chosen safety, but she had not. She had chosen this world. She had chosen the lies, the deceit . . .

She had chosen Drake.

Chapter Twenty-Three.

The coach ride from London to Bristol was making Serena sick. She lay back against the thin seat and fought for breath in the stagnant summer air. The swaying was dizzying. The man across from her devoured a meat pie with dripping enjoyment, making her avert her eyes and press the back of her hand to her mouth.

Combine these discomforts with the smells of the hot, cramped bodies of her fellow pa.s.sengers and it was all she could do not to retch-again. Every few hours, she had had to beg the coachman to stop so that she could throw up on the side of the road. It was a condition her fellow pa.s.sengers found increasingly annoying, but not so annoying, Serena reasoned, as vomiting into their laps.

She wondered vaguely and not for the first time if she was coming down with something. But she had felt so much better at the small inn they had stopped at last night that she didn't think so. It must be a traveling sickness of some sort. She had never been on such a long journey in a coach before.

Dressed again in her Quaker gray, with a dainty white lace cap atop her hair, she had adopted her maiden name of Serena Winter and was traveling as a widow. In truth, she didn't know what she was. Mayhap a widow. Had she married a duke, a dead duke, an actor? She flushed with anger and shame every time she thought of it.

After picking herself up from the floor of that elegant drawing room that she no longer felt she had any right to be in, Serena had packed her bags. Taking only the most simple gowns and belongings brought from her childhood home, she had decided to set out for some answers. Aside from Drake, there was only one man in all of England who could give them to her. The man of the letter. The man who might be Drake's real father. Richard Weston.

Exactly where he lived and how she would find him was still something of a mystery to her, but she supposed she would figure that out in Bristol. This wretched sickness had not been in her plans though, and she wondered in what condition she would arrive in the coastal town.

Some hours later Serena jerked awake to the sudden stopping of the carriage. In the darkness there were sounds of a river. Her stomach, thankfully quiet for the moment, surprised her with ravenous hunger. She climbed out of the tight s.p.a.ce of the coach with her fellow pa.s.sengers to find herself in Bristol on King Street, standing next to an inn whose sign read Llandoger Trow. With its white stone and rich, yellow light pouring from the many four-paned gla.s.s windows, the place looked warm and welcoming. Serena breathed a sigh of relief.

Inside, she ordered her supper and a room, using a portion of the small stash of coins she had taken from Drake's dressing table. She was told she would share her bed with three other women. After being treated like a queen for the last few months, she was amazed at the difference in the way people were treating her now, all because she wore different clothes and acted like someone of middle cla.s.s. People were mostly friendly, though, and with tired resignation she ate her meal and finally dropped into an exhausted sleep.

The next morning brought more nausea, but not as bad as on the coach. The aftereffects of traveling, she supposed. Finding Richard Weston turned out to be easy, as he seemed to be very well liked and respected. Serena was heartened by this, reminding herself that she had had no other choice. She certainly would not have been able to question Drake and believe a word he might say to her.

She walked the short distance, paying a boy of about twelve to carry her trunk for her. The town reminded her of home. A s.h.i.+pping port, Bristol was situated on the River Avon, just as Philadelphia faced the Delaware. The docks in the distance were busy, crews loading and unloading the tall, masted s.h.i.+ps. Black-headed gulls soared with quiet grace overhead and the air smelled of damp moss and fish, causing her to feel the first real pangs of homesickness since her arrival in England.

She looked up into the sky as she walked along, pretending for a moment she was on a Philadelphia street and walking home after a day of painting by the sh.o.r.e. The sky reflected the blue-gray waters with filaments of scattered clouds, providing a pretty setting for the many spires and towers of tall churches and cathedrals. Bristol was a town of churches, she thought, with a sudden, intense longing for her brushes and canvas.

She stopped in front of a white stone house on Queen Square, located just where the innkeeper had directed her. It was a handsome house, rising three stories, with arched, fancy stonework around the door and windows. Serena had expected something grander after the lifestyle of the n.o.bles Drake had shown her, but she supposed this was not London.

Mustering her flagging courage, she lifted her hand to knock. It wasn't very long before an elderly gentleman opened the door.

"Yes?" He squinted at her.

Serena gave him her most sunny, confident smile. "Good day, sir. I am Serena Weston, wife to Drake Weston, and I have come to call upon Lord Richard."

His wiry white eyebrows wiggled up and down as he considered her ident.i.ty. He bowed awkwardly and motioned her in with one arm. "You're the new d.u.c.h.ess, then? Drake's finally gone and gotten himself a wife?"

Serena nodded, entering the hall. "Is his lords.h.i.+p at home?"

"Yes, yes," the unconventional butler stated, but not before he moved closer and studied her face. "You're a young one!" he barked out and then seemed to remember that he shouldn't have said such a thing. He backed up into the hall. "Sit down, your grace, whilst I fetch him." He cackled when he said the last, shaking his head and smiling at his own thoughts as he left her alone in the small entry.

Serena saw the low, wooden bench the butler had pointed out but preferred to remain standing. The entry was small and poorly lit, making it hard to see where the butler had gone. Looking about, her eyes caught a painting through the open door of a drawing room just off the entry. Curiosity drew her into the room. She moved toward the stone fireplace where the portrait hung. It was lovely. She was lovely. A tall, willowy woman with long dark hair. She stood in front of a long-legged, brown thoroughbred, its mane decorated with red braided ribbons, as proud and pleased as his mistress. The woman wore a blue riding habit, white ruffles frothing at her neck. A matching blue hat with long, black feathers dangled from one outstretched hand. The artist had so superbly captured the mood that Serena could imagine the plumes of feathers swaying in the breeze and the woman laughing at something being said. In the distance looked to be pinkish-purple fields . . . of heather? Serena wondered if it was painted in Northumberland and had a sudden overwhelming desire to see the place.

"She loved to ride."

The deep voice startled her, so engrossed was she in the painting she had forgotten where she was and why she had come. Turning, she faced a man who must be Richard Weston.

He was shorter than Drake and a bit stocky in his middle age, but in the face, and especially the eyes, she could see the family resemblance. Serena turned back to the painting. "She is lovely. Who is she?"

The man's smile held deep sorrow. He walked into the room, came up alongside Serena, and pondered the painting with her. "Well, your grace, if you are who my addle-brained butler claims you are, that woman, had she lived, would have been your mother-in-law."

Drake's mother. Of course. Drake had her smile. Serena turned to this man, whose voice held the pain of lost love, and held out her gloved hand. "And thou art my uncle?" She smiled, wanting to cheer him and not knowing why exactly.

Richard took her hand and bowed over it. "As you say." There was a twinkle in his eyes that made Serena immediately like him. She had made the right decision in coming here.

"Please sit down and I'll ring for some tea or-" he grinned at her again- "attempt to do so."

Serena sat on a striped settee and laughed. "I do see what thou meanest, my lord. Thy butler seems a bit . . . aged?"

"Call me Richard, please. And yes, the poor chap has been in my employ for so long it would feel as if I were letting my own father go. I have, mind you, tried to bribe him into retirement with a substantial pension, but he would have none of it." He laughed and inclined his head toward her, the epitome of a conspirator. "Truthfully, he was so offended when I hinted he could no longer perform his duties that he didn't talk to me for three weeks. As he answers the door, it was a rather long three weeks."

Serena laughed and then hurriedly closed her mouth as the object of their conversation entered the room.

After the butler left, having to repeat the request for refreshments to himself several times, Richard took a seat across from her. "So you are Drake's wife. Did you travel alone, my dear? Tell me, how did all this come about?"

He seemed so genuinely interested and caring, so reminiscent of her father, that she felt a sheen of tears threaten her vision. Blast these emotions that rose up so suddenly, so overwhelming these days! She blinked and looked away for a moment, struggling to compose herself. "'Tis a long story. Dost thou want the whole of it now?"

Richard nodded, understanding in his eyes. "Is that not why you've come?"

She supposed it was. And it did seem right. But he was a stranger, and she felt little trust for anyone at the moment.

It took a few false starts, but by the time the tea and cakes arrived, Serena had done her best to tell the story of her meeting and marriage to Drake. She told it from her own perspective and from what she had believed true at the time. Now it was time to ask if any of her beliefs were true.

Blus.h.i.+ng, she described the letter she had found in Helena's desk, then went on to tell of Lady Chamberlain's visit and the strange inaccuracies between what the ton seemed to believe and all she had been told.