Alexandra didn’t breathe. Hooves clopped away. Disappeared. Boots stomped their own thunder into the planks beneath her ear.
Faint strings of rapid, angry conversation permeated the fog.
“Find me the sod … secure him in the railcar … painful execution.” That voice.
“Impossible … grace … was back in London…” Another voice. Harried. Afraid.
“What fucking imbecile … whistle in the middle of such a crisis…”
“… the conductor cooling … couldn’t see her … the storm … terrible … grace.”
Impossible grace. Terrible grace? Consciousness threatened to desert Alexandra as she tried to make sense of the broken conversation.
Grace was often both impossible or terrible.
But it wasn’t meant to be, was it?
Grace was salvation. Divine forgiveness. Would she be granted either?
Likely not.
“Someone will hang for this!” the now familiar voice bellowed, much closer than before.
“Y-yes, you’re—”
“Where is she?” Fury scalded every word with brimstone heat.
I’m here on the ground, she thought. Or am I lost?
Better to remain beneath the notice of his fury. Better for everyone. Perhaps if she just gave herself to the mist, if she disappeared, all the scandal and sorrow would follow her into the darkness. It wouldn’t touch her loyal friends, nor would it besmirch what little was left of her family name.
Perhaps this was the solution she’d been searching for.
A heroic death.
As she entertained the terrible thought, black boots appeared from the mist, just before tremendous knees landed beside her.
It was the weight of two strong, careful hands roaming her person that finally sent a full breath screaming into her lungs.
“No!” she shrieked.
Or, rather, croaked inaudibly.
“Don’t move.” Rough palms snagged the shoulders and bodice of her herringbone tweed traveling kit as she helplessly drew greedy breaths into her chest. “Not until I know if anything’s been broken.” He exerted gentle pressure on her ribs and, though it was tender, no pain greeted his touch.
Only terror.
And … something else.
Alexandra couldn’t struggle. Her limbs didn’t seem to understand their purpose.
It was her nightmare come to life.
How many times had she battled the dark? A faceless man holding her down, his hands roving her body as her limbs refused to obey her.
Electric shivers coursed through disobedient nerves, returning her strength as unexpectedly as the lightning. She tried to shrink from him, to roll over, and to lash out all at once. The resulting spasm more resembled a seizure than a retreat.
“Someone get a doctor!” he barked, muttering beneath his breath, “And a bloody undertaker.”
“No need.” Her words came more easily now, lent sound by her slowly returning breath. “I’ll live.”
She jerked her ankle from his grip, but he caught it and pressed it back to the ground. “The undertaker is for the conductor after I murder him—I thought I told you not to move.”
“Nothing’s broken.” She kicked her leg as though his hand were a bug she intended to shake off her skirts. “I don’t need a doctor. Kindly unhand my ankle.”
To her astonishment, he complied, returning to bend over her. Loom over her, more like, a swarthy, sinister shock of a man rising from the mists.
The rain had soaked through his shirtsleeves—which must have been white at one time or another—rendering it iridescent, if not obsolete.
Beneath, he’d the chiseled-marble build of a Greek hero, and the features of a Greek tragedy. Shoulders and arms to impress Atlas. A torso to rival the statue of Ares she’d once admired in Hadrian’s Villa.
And all the unhallowed malice Hades could summon.
Such scars.
It would be easy to imagine the gods, ever unduly punitive to a mortal who dare challenge their strength or beauty, had sent a creature to rake demonic claws across features so flawless.
“Can you breathe normally?” he demanded. “How do you feel?” The questions might have been gentle if they’d hailed from a chest with a less barbaric depth.
“I feel … erm…” How did she feel? What did she feel? “I feel as though I’ve been crushed by a horse.” She wheezed a vague attempt at levity. “But I can breathe fine and am more bruised than broken.”
“You are lucky,” he clipped, grasping her hand. “I think you shaved twenty years off my life in twenty seconds.”
“What do you think you are doing?” She tried to snatch her hand away, but he held fast, relieving her of her traveling gloves.
“Searching for rope burns.” He spread her fingers wide with rough thumbs, examining her upturned palms. “Your gloves were but scraps of nothing.”
“I am unharmed,” she protested, trying to ignore how warm his skin felt against hers, despite the rain. How small and pale her hands appeared when cupped in his rough, square paws.
How fiendishly strong his fingers were. How helpless she’d be against that strength.
She yanked on his grip with unnecessary violence, tightening her hands into fists and hiding them in her skirts. “As—as I stated before, I’ll live.”
“So it would seem.” A wet chill replaced the warmth his hands had provided, matching the frigid note in his voice.
Alexandra forced herself to look into eyes as electric blue as the lightning, a crystalline clearness almost void of color, and no less sinister for the features into which they’d been set. The scars had something to do with that, certainly.
The shortest of the wounds branched from the dark hairline at his temple and interrupted his eyebrow. Had his dark hair, slicked back by rain, not concealed the wound, she wagered she could follow it high into his scalp. The longest fissure blazed across a sharp cheekbone into a well-kept beard, appearing again as a merciless gash through his lush lips.
Lush? Great Caesar and his glory, had she struck her head?
Alexandra blinked once. And again. Unsuccessfully attempting to tear her gaze from his mouth. Lips so soft simply didn’t belong on a face so brutish as his. The incongruity both perplexed and compelled her.
“Are you able to stand?” His tone turned as wintry as the storm.
He’d caught her staring.
Alexandra snapped her eyes shut in mortification. He probably assumed she’d been gawking rather than admiring.
Not that she had been admiring.
She hadn’t—wasn’t—wouldn’t dream of—
His hands manacled her arms, but before she could draw a breath of protest they were both on their feet. He released her the moment they were upright.
Alexandra reeled, her world pitching as much from the brief physical contact as the abrupt change of posture. She reached for the post to steady herself, and instead found a disc of hot muscle stretched beneath cool, wet linen. His chest twitched beneath her palm, as if the touch had surprised him as mightily as it did her.
She snatched her hand back into the cradle of her own chest. The warmth of his flesh again lingered, she noted with no little alarm.
“F-forgive me, I’m a little unsteady.”
“Are you certain you don’t need a doctor?” He stepped forward, concern etching his scars deeper as his arms reached out to provide a buffer should she fall.
Alexandra shifted out of his reach most ungracefully. “No!” She put up a hand to stop him, fully aware how useless it was to try. No world existed in which her feeble strength could be pitted against his in her favor. “No, I—I am quite unharmed. See? No need to concern yourself further.”
Lord, she couldn’t look at him again. He was simply too big. Too—male. Despite his cultured accent, he didn’t appear at all civilized. Indeed, he could have belonged to the scores of rowdy and robust men her professors had hired to protect them in unknown countries.
Men she’d spent a decade doing her best to avoid.
A silent and solemn stare made most anyone uncomfortable enough to flee her presence. It’d worked on everyone from desert marauders to determined matrons with notions of a convenient marriage for their sons. She’d wielded it with some expertise for years now.
So, why couldn’t she make herself lift her eyes from the mist? Why did the warmth of his skin linger in such a strange fashion? Why did her lungs still refuse to fully inflate?
Perhaps she did need a doctor.
“I’m trying to decide if you’re incredibly brave or exceptionally stupid.” His imperious tone broke her stupor.
Her eyes snapped to his, her fears shoved behind indignation. “I beg your pardon?”
“What were you thinking trying to control a beast of Mercury’s proportions? You saw what he did to that idiot porter and the lad is half again your size!” His frown deepened the interruption of the scar on his lip.
“I was thinking poor Smythe might be killed if someone didn’t do something.” Remembering the boy, she turned to where a few men helped him limp away. Smythe’s thin face was one heart-squeezing grimace of pain as he cradled his arm to his chest. Half of his penciled mustache had washed off in the mud, leaving his aching youth exposed.
“Is he going to be all right?” She took an unconscious step toward the procession.
“There’s a sawbones not a stone’s throw from the railyard. He’ll set the boy’s shoulder and send him home with morphine. Do you know him?”
She shook her head, disconcerted to discover the notice she and her companion had garnered from the remaining passengers, workmen, and railway employees. “We’d only just met when he carried my bags, but what does that matter? I still didn’t want to see him hurt … or worse.”
The man gave her his back, bending to retrieve both her gloves and his. Alexandra resolutely averted her gaze from the trousers stretching across his backside. Had she ever in her life noticed such a thing? Forcing a swallow, she took the opportunity to investigate the condition of her own suit. Mud and whatever other unmentionable slicks of dark grime now soiled her smart white blouse and beige jacket beyond repair. Her skirt had fared better, but only just.
“Better him than you.”
His low words froze her hand midair, leaving her coiffure uninvestigated. “I’m sorry?”
He said nothing, extending his hand to offer the soiled corpses of her gloves. A muscle tic appeared at his hard jaw, causing his third scar, mostly concealed by the black beard, to pulse in time to his ire.
“Thank you, sir.”
Azure beams of inquisition roamed her from beneath satirical brows. “Though your actions were unduly reckless, that was well done of you. Where did you learn to handle horses?”
The admiration warming his words prickled irritating awareness across her skin. “A camel herder on the Arabian Peninsula once demonstrated to me that very trick on his own beast. I hadn’t any idea it worked on horses before today.”
He blinked several times before echoing, “A camel herder…”
She nodded, the memory animating her. “His tribe could often pack their entire household on a camel’s back. Imagine how devastating such a display of beastly temper would have been in his case.”
“Devastating.” He repeated slower this time, intently regarding her for a pregnant moment.
“Of course, his animals were much more properly trained.” She shot a pointed glance to the horse cart, where the beast, Mercury, was now blinded and hobbled between the four mares.
The man’s lips—why couldn’t she stop glancing at them?—did the opposite of what she’d expected. He wasn’t smiling. But he wasn’t not smiling, either.
Those lips parted, then paused.
She likewise hesitated, sensing an as yet unidentified awareness hovering over them like a curious bee. The buzz of silence grew louder the more still they stood.
Should she make some sort of introduction? They’d already broken the rules of civility by exchanging so many words without a presentation by a third party. However, judging by his broadcloth trousers and mud-stained shirtsleeves, he wasn’t a man who lived by civil rule. Nor by that of nobility. Indeed, he was indolent about his attire. As though he couldn’t be bothered to have dressed properly to go into town.
He finally broke the silence. “It is … fortunate you’re unharmed, Miss…”
“Lane. Alexandra Lane.” Her first inclination was to curtsy, but she ultimately decided to do what she’d done with most men of his social standing from students and factory workers in America, to stone masons and professors in Cairo. She offered her sullied hand for a congenial shake. The working class tended to like that sort of greeting nowadays.
He regarded it as though she’d shoved a rank fish beneath his nose.
Alexandra faltered. Just who was he to put on airs? No gentleman, certainly. For what gentleman would wear his hair longer than his collar? Or work in public without a vest? Or grow anything more unruly than a trim mustache, scars or no scars?
Right as she’d decided to retract her offer, she found her hand once again enveloped in warm solid steel.
He shook twice, the calluses on his palms catching on her skin as his hand slid away. Little shocks rasped at her, as though every insubstantial ridge on his fingertip was electrified with sensation.
“May I inquire as to your destination, Miss Lane? Or is it Mrs.?” Something smoothed the gravel from his voice, as though he’d poured honey over the shards of stone.
“D-doctor,” she blurted.
The muscles about his neck tensed, as he went instantly alert. “I thought you said you didn’t need a doctor.”
“No, it’s Doctor Lane.”
His chin rose a few notches. “Women aren’t allowed to practice as physicians in England.”
As if she weren’t aware. “I earned my degree some time ago at the Sorbonne, if you must know.”
“Some time ago?” The words seemed to amuse him. “How many ages have passed, I wonder?”
“That’s of little consequence,” she said crisply, painfully aware her freckles and pert nose still made her appear a few years younger than twenty and eight. “But if you must know, I am a doctor of history. An archeologist, all told, my field of expertise being that of ancient civilizations.”
“Thus … the camels.” He reached out, trailing a finger down the collar of her traveling suit. “And the tweed.”
She jerked away. “You are too familiar, sir.”
His hand remained suspended midair for the briefest of moments before returning to his side.
“My apologies.” He seemed neither impressed nor censorious. Nor did his apology contain much in the way of penitence. But she had the sense she’d surprised him just as readily as he had shocked her. “As recompense for your troubles on behalf of my beast, I’d be delighted to conduct you to your destination in my coach-and-four. Or are you waiting on someone, Doctor Lane?”
The undue emphasis on the word grated at her. She glanced again toward the dusty work cart to which the four new equine arrivals were tied. Its shoddy if sturdy construction so incongruous with the handsome and stately coaches awaiting or conducting well-bred wedding guests.
Coach-and-four? Oh please. Of all the cheek.
She lifted her chin. “Cecil is tardy but will be along shortly.”
That’s right, she thought. Best you move along. The last thing she needed was to be alone with a man so drenched he might as well have been half naked and dripping with as much virility as he did rainwater.
She had a feeling even the little pistol she kept in her handbag wouldn’t stop a man of his size should he take it into his head to—
“Just as well.” He jerked his gloves back over his hands, turning the scarred side of his face away from her. “I need to take this beast to Castle Redmayne, where he’ll be taught to behave like a gentleman.”
Not by this lout, surely.
“Castle Redmayne? You look after the beasts there?”
His lip twitched once more, and Alexandra had the errant suspicion a dimple lurked beneath his beard.
“That I do. I’ve a great many responsibilities there.”
“Well, don’t let me keep you from them.” Alexandra turned to the road, making a great show of scanning for her conveyance. Her gaze kept blinking back to him, though, just to make sure he’d not surreptitiously moved closer.
At her dismissal, his eyes went flat, and she thought he might have readied himself to deliver a flippant retort before a little body thrust herself between them.
Alexandra found herself the prisoner of a five-year-old’s exuberant gratitude.
“Mummy says to thank you,” she crowed, clutching at Alexandra’s knees through soiled skirts. “You saved us.”
“Oh, yes, miss!” huffed the woman as she hurried over, her baby clutched to her breast. “I’ve never seen the like in me life. You’re so brave, miss. I can’t thank you enough.” The infant was unexpectedly shoved into Alexandra’s arms. A soft, familiar ache settled with the little bundle against Alexandra’s chest just beneath where the baby rested.
After the mother’s interruption, more bystanders and railway agents rushed forward with hearty exclamations, showering her with praise and expressions of concern.
Alexandra caught the sight of his retreating shoulders as he sauntered toward the cart. As though sensing her gaze upon him, he paused, and glanced over his shoulder.
Even from a distance, the blue of his eyes was striking. Preternaturally so. From so far away, they could almost be white.
He nodded, and so did she, realizing that she still didn’t know his name.
“You’ve been saved by the devil, miss.” The mother regarded him from behind wary eyes. “The Terror of Torcliff.”
“The whom?”
“Oh, aye.” The woman leaned in conspiratorially. “They say he’s been slashed by a werewolf.”
Alexandra had to work very hard not to wrinkle her nose. “That sounds rather…” Preposterous. Absurd. Unbelievable. “Rather unlikely, doesn’t it?”
The woman gave a shrug, stroking the cheek of the baby in Alexandra’s arms. How well it fit there. How tiny and lovely it was. “All’s I know is, since he came back to Castle Redmayne, the mists have been strange.”
That seized Alexandra’s attention away from the gurgling infant. “Strange how?”
“Just like this here!” She expanded her arms to encompass the station, only just showing signs of recovery from the ordeal. “An animal knows when a devil is about, me Gran always said. No wonder the horse spooked. Danger lives in these vapors. Devils and demons and the like.”
“Surely you don’t believe he’s a demon.” Alexandra wasn’t a superstitious woman, but a chill snaked its way through her, lifting every hair on her body.
The woman shrugged. “Misfortune haunts every black soul who lives in Castle Redmayne. Drives them to all manner of lunacy.” She jerked her chin toward where Alexandra’s savior had disappeared. “And the Terror of Torcliff has known more than his share. The devil’s touched him twice, they say.”
Alexandra thought of his hands on her. Of the strange sensations they elicited.
“The Terror of Torcliff,” she whispered. A devil best left alone.