For the Love of Lilah Read online

  "No. I'm afraid I'm the woman without them."

  "What a story. I read about it down in Raleigh a month or two ago, and then...well, I have to confess, I'm just addicted to those supermarket tabloids. Comes from living alone and reading too many es­says." He gave her a sheepish smile that would have charmed her if her senses hadn't been working over­time.

  "I guess the Calhouns have been lining a lot of bird cages lately."

  He rocked back on his heels and laughed. "Pays to keep a sense of humor. I guess it's a hassle, but it gives people like me a lot of vicarious excitement. Missing emeralds, jewel thieves."

  "Treasure maps."

  "There's a map?" His voice sharpened and he worked hard at easing it again. "I hadn't heard."

  "Sure, you can pick them up in the village." She reached in her pocket and drew the latest one out. "I've been collecting them. A lot of people are spend­ing hard-earned money only to find out too late that x doesn't mark the spot."

  "Ah." He had to fight against clenching his jaw. "Capitalism."

  "You bet. Here, a souvenir." She handed it to him, careful for reasons she couldn't quite place not to brush his fingers. "Your students might get a kick out of it."

  "I'm sure they will." To give himself time, he folded it and slipped it into his pocket. "I really am fascinated by the whole thing. Maybe we can have that sandwich soon and you can give me a firsthand account of what it's like to look for buried treasure." "Mostly, it's tedious. Enjoy your stay in the park." Knowing there was no safe way to detain her, he watched her go. She had a long, graceful body, he noted. He certainly hoped he wouldn't have to dam­age it

  "You're late." Max met her on the trail when she was still twenty yards from the parking area.

  "It seems to be my day for teachers." She leaned into the kiss, pleased with how warm and solid it was. "I was detained by a Southern gentleman who wanted information on flora for his geography class."

  "I hope he was bald and fat."

  She didn't quite manage the laugh and rubbed the chill from her arms instead. "No, actually, he was quite trim and had an abundance of hair. But I turned down his request that I become the mother of his children."

  "Did he make a pass at you?"

  "No." She held a hand up before he could rush by her. And did laugh. "Max, I'm kidding—and if I wasn't, I can dodge passes all by myself."

  He didn't feel as foolish as he might have even a day before. "You haven't been dodging mine."

  "I can intercept them, too. Now what's behind your back?"

  "My hands."

  She laughed again and gave him a delighted kiss. "What else?"

  He held out a clutch of painted daisies. "I didn't pick them," he said, knowing her feelings. "I bought them from Suzanna. She said you had a weakness for them."

  "They're so cheerful," she murmured, absurdly touched. She buried her face in them, then lifted it to his. "Thanks."

  As they began to walk, he draped an arm around her shoulders. "I bought the car from C.C. this after­noon."

  "Professor, you're full of surprises."

  "I thought you might like to hear about the prog­ress Amanda and I are making on those lists. We couid drive down the coast, have some dinner. Be alone."

  "It sounds wonderful, but my flowers'll wilt."

  He grinned down at her. "I bought a vase. It's in the car."

  When the sun was setting behind the hills to the west, they walked along a cobble beach that formed a natural seawall on the southern point of the island. The water was calm, barely murmuring over the mounds of smooth stones. With the approach of dusk, the line between the sky and sea blurred until all was a soft, deep blue. A single gull, heading home, soared overhead with one long, defiant cry.

  "This is a special place," Lilah told him. With her hand in his, she walked down the slope of cobbles to stand close to the verge of water. "A magic one. Even the air's different here." She closed her eyes to take a deep breath of it. "Full of stored energy."

  "It's beautiful." Idly he bent to pick up a rock, just to feel the texture. In the near distance an island melted into the twilight.

  "I often drive down here, just to stand and feel. I think I must have been here before."

  "You just said you'd been here before."

  Her eyes were soft and dreamy as she smiled. "I mean a hundred years ago, or five hundred. Don't you believe in reincarnation, Professor?"

  "Actually, I do. I did a paper on it in college and after completing the research, I found it was a very viable theory. When you apply it to history—"

  "Max." She framed his face with her hands. "I'm crazy about you." Her lips were curved when they met his, curved still when she drew away.

  "What was that for?"

  "Because I can see you, waist deep in thick books and cramped notes, your hair falling into your face and your eyebrows all drawn together the way they get when you're concentrating, doggedly pursuing truth."

  Frowning, he tossed the cobble from hand to hand. "That's a pretty boring image."

  "No, it's not." She tilted her head, studying him. "It's a true one, an admirable one. Even coura­geous."

  He gave a short laugh. "Boxing yourself into a library doesn't take courage. When I was a kid, it was a handy escape. I never had an asthma attack reading a book. I used to hide there, in books," he continued. "It was fun imagining myself sailing with Magellan, or exploring with Lewis and Clark, dying at the Al­amo or marching across a field at Antietam. Then my father would..."

  "Would what?"

  Uncomfortable, he shrugged. "He'd hoped for something different. He was a high school football star. Wide receiver. Played semipro for a while. The kind of man who's never been sick a day in his life. Likes to toss back a few beers on Saturday night and hunt on weekends during the season. I'd start wheez­ing as soon as he put a thirty-thirty in my hands." He tossed the cobble aside. "He wanted to make a man out of me, and never quite managed it."

  "You made yourself." She took his hands, feeling a trembling anger for the man who hadn't appreciated or understood the gift he'd been given. "If he isn't proud of you, the lack is in him, not in you."

  "That's a nice thought." He was more than a little embarrassed that he'd pulled those old, raw feelings out. "In any case, I went my own way. I was a lot more comfortable in a classroom than I was on a foot­ball field. And the way I figure it, if I hadn't hidden in the library all those years, I wouldn't be standing here with you right now. This is exactly where I want to be."

  "Now that's a nice thought."

  "If I tell you you're beautiful, are you going to hit me?"

  "Not this time."

  He pulled her against him, just to hold her as night fell. "I need to go to Bangor for a couple of days."

  "What for?"

  "I located a woman who worked as a maid at The Towers the year Bianca died. She's living in a nursing home in Bangor, and I made arrangements to inter­view her." He tilted Lilah's face to his. "Come with me."

  "Just give me time to rearrange my schedule."

  When the children were asleep, I told Nanny of my plans. I knew she was shocked that I would speak of leaving my husband. She tried to soothe. How could I explain that it wasn't poor Fred who had caused my decision. The incident had made me realize how futile it was to remain in an unhappy and stifling mar­riage. Had I convinced myself that it was for the chil­dren? Their father didn't see them as children who needed to be loved and coddled, but as pawns. Ethan and Sean he would strive to mold in his image, eras­ing every part of them he considered weak. Colleen, my sweet little girl, he would ignore until such time as he could marry her for profit or status.

  I would not have it. Fergus, I knew, would soon wrench control from me. His pride would demand it. A governess of his choosing would follow his instruc­tions and ignore mine. The children would be trapped in the middle of the mistake I had made.

  For myself, he would see that I became no more than an ornament at his table. If I defied h
im, I would pay the price. I have no doubt that he meant to punish me for questioning his authority in front of our chil­dren. Whether it would be physical or emotional, I didn't know, but I was sure the damage would be severe. Discontent I might hide from the children, open animosity I could not.

  I would take them and go, find somewhere we could disappear. But first I went to Christian.

  The night was moon washed and breezy. I kept my cloak pulled tight, the hood over my hair. The puppy was snuggled at my breast. I had the carriage take me to the village, then walked to his cottage through the quiet streets with the smell of water and flowers all around. My heart was pounding in my ears as I knocked. This was the first step, and once taken, I could never go back.

  But it wasn't fear, no, it wasn't fear that trembled through me when he opened the door. It was relief. The moment I saw him I knew the choice had already been made.

  “Bianca,'' he said. '' What are you thinking of?''

  "I must talk to you." He was already pulling me inside. I saw that he 'd been reading in the lamplight. Its warm glow and the scent of his paints soothed me more than words. I set the pup down and he imme­diately began to explore, sniffing into comers and making himself at home.

  Christian made me sit, and no doubt sensing my nerves, brought me a brandy. As I sipped, I told him of the scene with Fergus. Though I struggled to re­main calm, I could see his face, the violence in it, as his hands had closed over my throat.

  “My God!'' With this, Christian was crouching be­side my chair, his fingers skimming up my throat. I hadn 't known there were bruises there where Fer­gus's thumbs had pressed.

  Christian's eyes went black. His hands gripped the arms of the chair before he lunged to his feet. "I'll kill him for this."

  I jumped up to stop him from storming out of the cottage. My fear was such I'm not sure what I said, though I know I told him that Fergus had left for Boston, that I couldn 't bear more violence. In the end it was my tears that stopped him. He held me as though I was a child, rocking and comforting while I poured out my heart and my desperation.

  Perhaps I should have been ashamed to have begged him to take me and the children away, to have thrust that kind of burden and responsibility on him. If he had refused, I know I would have gone on alone, taken my three babies to some quiet village in Ireland or England. But Christian wiped away my tears.

  “Of course we’ll go. I'll not see you or the children spend another night under the same roof with him. He'll never lay a hand on any of you again. It will be difficult, Bianca. You and the children won't have the kind of life you're used to. And the scandal—"

  “I don't care about the scandal. The children need to feel loved and safe.'' I rose then, to pace. “I can't be sure what's right. Night after night I've lain in bed asking myself if I have the right to love you, to want you. I took vows, made promises, and was given three children." I covered my face with my hands. "A part of me will always suffer for breaking those vows, but I must do something. I think I'll go mad if I don't. God may never forgive me, but I can't face a lifetime of unhappiness."

  He took my hands to pull them away from my face. "We were meant to be together. We knew it, both of us, the first time we saw each other. I was content with those few hours as long as I knew you were safe. But I'll not stand by and see you give your life to a man who'll abuse you. From tonight, you're mine, and will be mine forever. Nothing and no one will change that.''

  I believed him. With his face close to mine, his fine gray eyes so clear and sure, I believed And I needed.

  "Then tonight, make me yours."

  I felt like a bride. The moment he touched me, I knew I had never been touched before. His eyes were on mine as he took the pins from my hair. His fingers trembled. Nothing, nothing has ever moved me more than knowing I had the power to weaken him. His lips were gentle against mine even as I felt the tension vibrating through his body. There in the lamplight he unfastened my dress, and I his shirt. And a bird began to sing in the brush.

  I could see by the way he looked at me that I pleased him. Slowly, almost torturously he drew off my petticoats, my corset. Then he touched my hair, running his hands through it, and looking his fill.

  "I'll paint you like this one day," he murmured. "For myself."

  He lifted me into his arms, and I could feel his heart pounding in his chest as he carried me to the bed­room.

  The light was silver, the air like wine. This was no hurried coupling in the dark, but a dance as graceful as a waltz, and as exhilarating. No matter how im­possible it seems, it was as though we had loved countless times before, as though I had felt that hard, firm body against mine night after night.

  This was a world I had never experienced, yet it was achingly, beautifully familiar. Each movement, each sigh, each need was as natural as breath. Even when the urgency stunned me, the beauty didn't lessen. As he made me his, I knew I had found some­thing every soul searches for. Simple love.

  Leaving him was the most difficult thing I have ever done. Though we told each other it would be the last time we were separated, we lingered and loved again. It was nearly dawn before I returned to The Towers. When I looked at the house, walked through it, I knew I would miss it desperately. This, more than any place in my life, had been home. Christian and I, with the children, would make our own, but I would always hold The Towers in my heart.

  There was little I would take with me. In the quiet before sunrise, I packed a small case. Nanny would help me put together what the children would need, but this I wanted to do alone. Perhaps it was a symbol of independence. And perhaps that is why I thought of the emeralds. They were the only things Fergus had given me that I considered mine. There were times I had detested them, knowing they had been given to me as a prize for producing a proper heir.

  Yet they were mine, as my children were mine.

  I didn 't think of their monetary value as I took them out, held them in my hands and watched them gleam in the light of the lamp. They would be a legacy for my children, and their children, a symbol of freedom, and of hope. And with Christian, of love.

  As dawn broke, I decided to put them, together with this journal, in a safe place until I joined Christian again.

  Chapter Ten

  The woman seemed ancient. She sat, looking as frail and brittle as old glass, in the shade of a gnarled elm. Close by, pert young pansies basked in a square of sunlight and flirted with droning bees. Residents made use of the winding stone paths through the lawns of the Madison House. Some were wheeled by family or attendants; others walked, in pairs or alone, with the careful hesitance of age.

  There were birds trilling. The woman listened, nod­ding to herself as she plied a crochet hook and thread with fingers that refused to surrender to arthritis. She wore bright pink slacks and a cotton blouse that had been a gift from one of her great-grandchildren. She had always loved vivid colors. Some things don't fade with age.

  Her skin was nut-brown, as creased and lined as an old map. Until two years before, she had lived on her own, tending her own garden, cooking her own meals. But a fall, a bad one that had left her helpless with pain on her kitchen floor for nearly twelve hours, had convinced her it was time to change.

  Stubborn and set in her ways, she had refused of­fers by several members of her large family to live with them. If she couldn't have her own place, she'd be damned if she would be a burden. She'd been com­fortably off, well able to afford a good home and good medical care. At the Madison House, she had her own room. And if the days of puttering in her garden were past, at least she could enjoy the flowers here.

  She had company if she wanted it, privacy if she didn't. Millie Tobias figured that at ninety-eight and counting, she'd earned the right to choose.

  She was pleased that she was having visitors. Yes, she thought as she worked her needle, she was right pleased. The day had already started off well. She'd awakened that morning with no more than the usual sundry aches. Her hip was twitching a bit, which
meant rain on the way. No matter, she mused. It was good for the flowers.

  Her hands worked, but she rarely glanced at them. They knew what to do with needle and thread. In­stead, she watched the path, her eyes aided by thick, tinted lenses. She saw the young couple, the lanky young man with shaggy dark hair; the willowy girl in a thin summer dress, her hair the color of October leaves. They walked close, hand in hand. Millie had a soft spot for young lovers and decided they looked pretty as a picture.

  Her fingers kept moving as they walked off the path to join her in the shade.

  "Mrs. Tobias?"

  She studied Max, saw earnest blue eyes and a shy smile. "Ayah," she said. "And you'd be Dr. Quar-termain." Her voice was a crackle, heavy with down-east. "Making doctors young these days."

  "Yes, ma'am. This is Lilah Calhoun."

  Not a shy bone in this one, Millie decided, and wasn't displeased when Lilah sat on the grass at her feet to admire the crocheting.

  "This is beautiful." Lilah touched a fingertip to the gossamer blue thread. "What will it be?"

  "What it wants to. You're from the island."

  "Yes, I was born there."

  Millie let out a little sigh. "Haven't been back in thirty years. Couldn't bear to live there after I lost my Tom, but I still miss the sound of the sea."

  "You were married a long time?"

  "Fifty years. We had a good life. We made eight children, and saw all of them grown. Now I've got twenty-three grandchildren, fifteen great-grand­children and seven great-great-grandchildren." She let out a wheezy laugh. "Sometimes I feel like I've propagated this old world all on my own. Take your hands out of your pockets, boy," she said to Max. "And come on down here so's I don't have to crane my neck." She waited until he was settled. "This here your sweetheart?" she asked him.

  "Ah...well..."

  "Well, is she or isn't she?" Millie demanded, and flashed her dentures in a grin.

  "Yes, Max." Lilah sent him an amused and lazy smile. "Is she or isn't she?"

  Cornered, Max let out a little huff of breath. "I suppose you could say so."

  "Slow to make up his mind, is he?" she said to Lilah and winked. "Nothing wrong with that. You've got the look of her," she said abruptly.

  "Of whom?"

  "Bianca Calhoun. Isn't that what you came to talk to me about?"

  Lilah laid a hand on Millie's arm. The flesh was thin as paper. "You remember her."

  "Ayah. She was a great lady. Beautiful with a good and kind heart. Doted on her children. A lot of the wealthy ladies who came summering on the island were happy to leave their children to nursemaids and nannies, but Mrs. Calhoun liked to see to them her­self. She was always taking them for walks, or spend­ing time in the nursery. Saw them off to bed herself, every night, unless her husband made plans that would take her out before their bedtime. A good mother she was, and nothing better can be said of a woman than that."

  She gave a decisive nod and perked up when she saw that Max was taking notes. "I worked there three summers, 1912, '13 and '14." And with the odd trick of old age, she could remember them with perfect clarity.

  "Do you mind?" Max took out a small tape re­corder. "It would help us remember everything you tell us."

  "Don't mind a bit." In fact, it pleased her enor­mously. She thought it was just like being on a TV talk show. Her fingers worked away as she settled more comfortably in the chair. "You live in The Towers still?" she asked Lilah.

  "Yes, my family and I."

  "How many times I climbed up and down those stairs. The master, he didn't like us using the main staircase, but when he wasn't about, I used to come down that way and fancy myself a lady. Aswishing my skirts and holding my nose in the air. Oh, I was a pistol in those days, and not hard to look at either. Used to flirt with one of the gardeners. Joseph was his name. But that was just to make my Tom jealous, and hurry him along a bit."

  She sighed, looking back. "Never seen a house like it, before or since. The furniture, the paintings, the crystal. Once a week we'd wash every window with vinegar so they'd sparkle like diamonds. And the mis­tress, she'd like fresh flowers everywhere. She'd cut roses and peonies out of the garden, or pick the' wild orchids and lady's slippers."

  "What can you tell us about the summer she died?" Max prompted.

  "She spent a lot of time in her tower room that summer, looking out the window at the cliffs, or writ­ing in her book."