Нора Робертс - Midnight Bayou

He watched a blue heron rise from the reeds like a ghost, beautiful, pure, perfect, to skim over the tea-colored water and glide into the trees. Away from him. Always away from him.

She was gone. His Abby had winged away from him, like the ghost bird. Everyone said it. His family, his friends. He'd heard the servants whispering about it. How Abigail Rouse had run off with some no-account and left her husband and bastard baby daughter behind.

Though he continued to look in New Orleans, in Baton Rouge, in Lafayette, though he continued to haunt the bayou like a ghost himself, in the loneliest hours of the night, he believed it.

She'd left him and the child.

Now he was leaving, in all but body. He walked through each day like a man in a trance. And God help him, he could not be a father to the child, that image of Abigail he secretly, shamefully doubted carried his blood. Just looking at her brought him unspeakable sorrow.

He no longer went up to the nursery. He hated himself for it, but even the act of climbing the stairs to the third floor was like drowning in a sea of despair.

They said the child wasn't his.

No. In the dimming light of dusk, with the night coming alive around him, Lucian covered his face with his hands. No, he could not, would not believe that of her. They had made the child together, in love, in trust, in desire.

If even that was a lie …

He lowered his hands, stepped toward the water. It would be warm, as her smile had been warm. Soft, as her skin had been soft. Even now the color was deepening and was almost the color of her eyes.

"Lucian!”

He froze, on the slippery edge.

Abby. She was rushing toward him, pushing through the fronds of a willow, with her hair spilling over her shoulders in midnight curls. His heart, deadened with grief, woke in one wild leap.

Then the last shimmer of sunlight fell over her face, and he died again.

Claudine gripped his hands. Fear made her fingers cold. She'd seen what had been in his eyes, and it had been his death.

"She would never want this. She would never want you to damn your soul by taking your life.”

"She left me.”

"No. No, that isn't true. They lie to you. They lie, Lucian. She loved you. She loved you and Marie Rose above all things.”

"Then where is she?" The rage that lived under the numbness of his grief leaped out. He gripped Claudine's arms, hauled her to her toes. Part of him, some dark, secret part, wanted to pound his fists into her face. Erase it for its connection to Abigail, and his own drowning despair. "Where is she?”

"Dead!" She shouted it, and her voice rang in the warm, sticky air. "They killed her. Death is the only way she would leave you and Rosie."

He shoved her aside, staggered away to lean against the trunk of a live oak. "That's just another madness.”

"I tell you I know it. I feel it. I've had dreams.”

"So did I." Tears stung his eyes, turned the light watery. "So did I have dreams.”

"Lucian, you must listen. I was there that night. She came to the nursery to tend the baby. I've known Abby since we were babies ourselves. There was nothing in her but love for you and Marie Rose. I should never have left the Hall that night." Claudine crossed her hands over her breast, as if to hold together the two halves of her broken heart. "The rest of my life I'll beg her forgiveness for not being there.”

"She took clothes, jewelry. My mother is right." He firmed his lips on what he believed was an act of strength, but was only his weakened faith. "I have to accept.”

"Your mama hated Abby. She kicked me out the next day. She's afraid to keep me in the house, afraid I might find out-was He whirled around, his face so contorted with fury, Claudine stepped away. "You want me to believe my mother somehow killed my wife, then disguised the crime, the sin, the horror, by making it appear Abby ran away?”

"I don't know what happened. But I know Abby didn't leave. Mama Rouse, she went to Evangeline.”

Lucian waved a hand, turned away again. "Voodoo nonsense.”

"Evangeline's got power. She said there was blood, and pain, and fear. And a dark, dark sin. Death, she said, and a watery grave. She said you got two halves, and one is black as a cave in Hell.”

"I killed her then? I came home in the night and murdered my wife?”

"Two halves, Lucian, that shared one womb. Look to your brother.”

The chill stabbed through him, bringing a raw sickness to the belly, a vile roaring in his head. "I won't listen to any more of this. Go home, Claudine. Keep away from the Hall.”

He dug into his pocket, took out the watch pin, pressed it into Claudine's hand. "Take this, keep it for the child." He could no longer call her by name. "She should have something that was her mother's.”

He stared down, grieving, at the symbol in her hand. Time had stopped for Abigail. "You kill her again by not believing in her.”

"Stay away from me." He staggered away, toward Manet Hall, toward his chosen hell. "Stay away.”

"You know!" Claudine shouted after him. "You know she was true.”

Clutching the watch to her breast, Claudine vowed to pass it, and the truth, along to Abigail's daughter.

From his gallery, Declan watched the day come to life. Dawn was a rosy blush on the eastern sky, with hints of mauve, like sleepy bruises, just beneath. The air was warming. He could feel the rise of it almost every day. It wasn't yet March, but winter was bowing out.

The gardens that a month before had been a sorrowful wreck, showed hints of their former grandeur. Strangling vines, invasive weeds, deadwood and broken bricks had been hauled away, revealing foot by foot the wandering paths, the shrubs, even the bulbs and plants that had been too stubborn to die away.

An old iron arbor was wild with what the Franks told him was wisteria, and there was an island of massive azaleas that showed the beginning of hopeful buds.

He had magnolia, crape myrtle, camellia, jasmine. He'd written down everything he could remember the Franks reeled off in their lazy voices. When he'd described the vine he imagined on the corner columns, they'd told him what he wanted was morning glory.

He liked the sound of it. Mornings here were full of glory.

He thought his body was adjusting to the five or six hours of disturbed sleep a night he was able to snatch. Or maybe it was just nervous energy that was fueling him.

Something was pushing him, driving him step by step through the transformation of the house that was his. Yet somehow, not only his.

If it was Abigail hovering, she was a damn fickle female. There were times he felt utterly comfortable, totally at peace. And others when cold fear prickled the back of his neck. Times when he felt in his gut he was being watched.

Stalked.

Well, that was a woman for you, he thought as he sipped his morning coffee. All smiles one minute, and slaps the next.

Even as he thought it, he saw Lena and the big black dog step out of the trees.

He didn't think twice, but set his coffee aside and started for the gallery steps.

She'd seen him long before he'd seen her. From the shelter of the trees and morning mists, she'd stood, idly rubbing Rufus's head, and had studied the house. Studied him.

What was it about the place and the man that pulled at her so? she wondered. There were any number of great old houses here, along the River Road, on toward Baton Rouge.

God knew there were any number of good-looking men, if a woman was in the market for one.

But it was this house that had always snagged her interest and imagination. Now it seemed it was this man, jogging down the thick stone stairs in a ratty shirt, rattier jeans, his face rough with the night's beard, who had managed to do the same.

She didn't like to want. It got in the way of things. And when that want involved a man, well, it was just bound to mess up your life.

She'd built her life brick by goddamn brick. And she liked it, just as it was. A man, no matter how amiable he was, would, at best, alter the design. At worst, he'd send those bricks tumbling down to ruin.

She'd kept away from him since the night she'd taken him into her bed. Just to prove she could.

But she had a smile ready for him now, a slow, cat-at-the-mouse-hole smile, and stood her ground as the dog raced over, tearing through the ground fog, to meet him.

Rufus leaped, slopped his tongue over Declan's face, then collapsed, belly up, for a rub.

It was, Lena knew, Rufus's way of showing unconditional love.

Charms dogs, too, she thought as Declan crouched down to rub and wrestle. The man had entirely too much appeal for anybody's good.

Especially hers.

"Rufus!" she called out, bringing the dog to his feet in a flurry of muscle and limbs that nearly put Declan on his ass. And laughing, she tossed the ball she carried high in the air, nipped it handily on its fall. Rufus charged her, a blur of black fur and enthusiasm. She hurled the ball over the pond. Rufus sailed up, over the water, and nabbed the ball with his teeth seconds before his massive splash.

"The Bo Sox could use you two." As the dog paddled his way to shore, Declan strode up, cupped his hands under Lena's elbows, and lifted her off her feet. He had an instant to see her blink in surprise before he covered her mouth with his, and took her under.

She gripped his shirt, not for balance, though her feet were dangling several inches off the ground. But because he was under it, all that muscle and heat and man.

She heard the dog bark, three deep throaty rumbles, then the water he shook off himself drenched her. She wouldn't have been surprised if it had steamed off her skin.

"Morning," Declan said and dropped her back on her feet. "Where y'at?”

"Woo." She had to give him credit for both greetings, and pushed a hand through her hair. "Where y'at?" she responded, then reached up and rubbed a hand over his rough cheek. "Need a shave, cher.”

"If I'd known you'd come walking my way this morning, I'd have taken care of that.”

"I wasn't walking your way." She picked up the ball Rufus had dropped at her feet and sent it, and the dog, flying again. "Just playing with my grandmama's dog.”

"Is she all right? You said you stayed over with her when she wasn't feeling well.”

"She gets the blues sometimes, is all." And damn it, damn it, his instant and genuine concern touched her. "Missing her Pete. She was seventeen when they got married, and fifty-eight when he died. More'n forty years is a long time to mesh lives.”

"Would she like it if I went by later?”

"She likes your company." Because Rufus was thumping his tail impatiently, she winged the ball again.

"You said she has a sister. Any other family?”

"Two sisters, a brother, all still living.”

"Children?”

Her face shut down. "I'm all she's got there. You been into town for any of the partying?”

Off limits, he decided. He let it go, for the moment. "Not yet. I figured I'd go in tonight. Are you working?”

"Nothing but work till Ash Wednesday. People do like to drink before Lent comes.”

"Late hours for you. You look a little tired.”

"I don't much care for being up this early, but Grandmama, she's an early bird. She's up, everybody's up." She lifted her arms high, stretched. "You're an early bird yourself, aren't you, cher?”

"These days. Why don't you come back to the house with me, have some coffee, see what I've been doing with my time since I haven't been able to spend any with you.”

"I've been busy.”

"So you said.”

Her brows knit, forming a long, shallow line of annoyance between them. "I say what I mean.”

"I didn't say different. But I'm making you edgy. I don't mind that, Lena." He reached out to tug on her hair, amused and delighted to see temper darken her face. "But I would mind if you think I'd settle for one night with you.”

"I sleep with you if I want, when I want.”

"And I'd mind," he continued mildly, though the hand that gripped her arm before she could spin away was very firm. "I'd mind a great deal if you think all I want is to get you in the sheets.”

"Men don't touch me unless I tell them they can touch me." She shoved at his hand.