Whereupon the bird turned into a lovely—and quite nude—woman….
—from Clever John
Mick watched as Silence ate the confection from his fingers. He felt a strange satisfaction in feeding her himself that wasn’t dulled even when she realized what she’d done and drew away, wrinkling her nose.
He was enjoying himself, he realized with something like surprise. He’d never chased a woman for more than a day or so—a week at most. They all fell at his feet, some within minutes. He knew, cynically, that his attraction couldn’t all be put down to his pretty face. His power, his money drew them just as much if not more.
But not Silence.
Mick smiled to himself and sat back to select a sweetmeat. Silence disliked him, disobeyed him, argued with him, and was all but starting a rebellion amongst his people, and still he indulged her.
“I must be getting back to my rooms,” Silence said and stood.
Mick frowned with displeasure. “Why?”
“Because of Mary Darling.”
He shrugged. “One o’ the maids is watchin’ her.”
“But if Mary wakes she’ll want me.”
“Why?” he asked again, biting into a sweetmeat. This discussion wasn’t to his fancy, but sparring with her was.
“Because,” she said slowly, looking at him as if he were lack-witted, “she’s only a baby and she loves me.”
“Babies,” Mick pronounced, “are a great trouble.”
She shook her head, not bothering to reply this time, and started marching to the door.
Mick sighed. “Have the rest o’ the sweetmeats brought to me rooms,” he told Tris and rose to follow her. Lad, who’d been lying beside his chair, got up as well, padding quietly behind him out into the hallway.
Silence didn’t seem surprised when he caught up with her in the hall. “You should come to see Mary more often yourself. She is your daughter after all. Perhaps then she might learn to call you something else besides Bad.”
She quickened her pace.
He shrugged, keeping up with her shorter strides easily. “Happens I’ve other things to do, and as I say, babies are a bother.”
“Humph. You say that as if you’ve made a great discovery.”
He didn’t answer, just to irritate her, and she quickened her step again. They were nearly running through the halls now.
“Whyever did you bother acknowledging her in the first place, then?” she asked. “Surely it would’ve been easy simply to turn her away. Unscrupulous men do it all the time.”
She glanced over her shoulder at him as if she’d scored a hit with that “unscrupulous,” but he’d been called worse in his time.
Much worse.
Still, it wouldn’t do to let her think he was going soft on her. Mick stepped in front of her and slammed his hand against the hallway wall, putting the length of his arm in her path.
She squeaked and bumped into him, soft breasts pushing for just an instant against his muscles. Lad sat down in the hall, looking back and forth alertly between them.
Silence straightened and glared at Mick.
He leaned down close—close enough to catch the scent of lavender in her hair.
“What’s mine is mine, m’love,” he whispered, “and I won’t be lettin’ go o’ anything that belongs to me.”
She scowled at him. “Mary is not a ‘thing.’ ”
“Aye.” He smiled. “But the principle’s the same.”
“That’s not how a father should treat a daughter,” she said, her voice softening.
He narrowed his eyes at her—that tone might creep under his skin if he let it.
Her beautiful eyes widened pleadingly. “Didn’t you have a father?”
He refused to let the memories surface. For a moment he was still, making sure they were properly stowed away, and then smiled. “Why, darlin’ did ye think mine was a virgin birth?”
She blushed as he knew she would. “No, of course not, but surely—”
She might have said more, but he straightened away from her. Her questions were hitting too close to home.
She blinked and looked around.
“Ye were hurryin’ to see the child, were ye not?” he asked and opened the door to her room.
“Her name is Mary Darling,” she said as she sailed into the room. She halted suddenly and turned. “But it should be Mary O’Connor, shouldn’t it? She’s your daughter after all.”
He stopped and blinked. Mary O’Connor. It was a good name. A proper name.
He shook his head to dispel the thought. “Off with ye now,” he said to the maid, hovering near the door.
She bobbed a curtsy and left without a word.
Lad padded around the room, sniffing at corners, before going to settle by the fireplace.
Mick turned to look at Silence who was bending over the baby’s cot. “Happen she mightn’t want to be known far and wide as me daughter.”
“Shh,” Silence hissed, then glanced at him and whispered, “She’s just a baby. Whyever wouldn’t she want to be your daughter?”
He shrugged and came to stare broodingly down at the lass. “I’ve many an enemy.”
The child’s cheeks were flushed deep pink, her black locks plastered with sweat to her forehead. One chubby fist was flung over her head. She was a pretty little thing, there was no doubt.
Mick frowned. “Does she often breathe so loud?”
“No,” Silence whispered worriedly. She laid the back of her hand against the child’s forehead and something deep inside him twisted.
Her palms had been rough, but the back of her hand was soft and cool as she laid it on his forehead and smiled wearily into his eyes. “Have ye a fever then, Mickey, me love?”
Mick felt sweat start on his back. Those memories were buried deep—he’d made damned sure of it, but letting Silence in was resurrecting them. He had the sudden urge to order her from his rooms, from his palace. But he couldn’t do that now. It was far too late. She was already in his palace, in his life. He couldn’t go back—and wouldn’t even if he could. She was so close to him now that it was as if he held her in his palm like a glowing ember—and gave thanks for the pain even as he inhaled the smoke from his burning flesh.
Mick’s chest expanded. He breathed in Silence’s scent, breathed in both pain and comfort. “Is she ill, then?”
“I don’t know.” Silence bit her bottom lip. “She’s hot.”
Mick nodded. “I’ll send for a doctor.”
She looked up, her eyes wide, the gray swirling with the green and the brown, her hand laid so tenderly on the baby’s head. “If you think that’s—”
He didn’t stay to hear the rest of her sentence. The baby needed a doctor… and the room was haunted by memories.
SILENCE’S HANDS TREMBLED as she wrung out a cloth and patted Mary Darling’s little cheeks. The toddler was so hot that Silence could feel the burning of her skin even through the cloth.
The heat worried Silence, but it was Mary’s awful listlessness that struck terror in her heart. Mary’d had chills and fevers before. She’d once whimpered all night long, tugging on her ear fretfully, until in the morning a clear liquid had drained from the ear and she’d slept calmly. Silence had stayed up many nights rocking and walking Mary Darling when she wasn’t feeling well. And in all those times Mary had been grumpy and sad and fretful, but she’d never been listless.
“Himself has sent for the doctor,” Fionnula said as she came in with a fresh bowl of water.
“She’s just so hot,” Silence murmured as she wrung out the cloth and applied it again. “I’ve taken her out of her frock and stays, but she’s still on fire.”
“Me mam used to say as the fever was to burn away the illness inside,” Fionnula offered.
“Perhaps so, but I’ve seen fever kill, as well,” Silence murmured.
There had been a little boy, new to the home and rather sickly. Winter had suspected he’d not had enough to eat in his short life. The child
had caught a fever and within two days had simply faded away. Silence had wept quietly in bed that night, holding Mary close to her chest. Winter had said with awful pragmatism that some children didn’t live and one just had to face that fact. But even he had worn a drawn expression when he’d said it and he was especially nice to the small boys in the home for weeks afterward.
Silence shuddered. Mary couldn’t fade away. She couldn’t imagine living if the little girl died.
There was a murmur of voices in the hall and then the door opened to reveal Mickey O’Connor ushering in a rotund little man.
“What have we here?” the doctor asked in a bass voice that seemed too large for his body.
“She’s burning with fever,” Silence said. She had to fight to keep a quaver out of her voice.
The doctor placed a hand on the baby’s chest and stilled.
Silence started to ask something, but the man held up his other hand.
After another moment he took his hand off Mary’s chest and turned to Silence. “Pardon my rudeness, ma’am, but I was feeling for the wee one’s heartbeat.”
“I understand.” Silence grasped her hands together at her waist to still their trembling. “Can you help her?”
“Of course I can,” the doctor said briskly. “Never you fear.”
He opened a black case, revealing a half dozen sharp lancets in different sizes. Silence rubbed her palms together nervously. She knew that the doctor meant to cut Mary.
Mr. O’Connor had been lounging by the fireplace, but he stirred at the sight of the lancets in their fitted pockets. “D’ye have to cut her?”
The doctor’s face was serious. “It’s the only way, sir, to let the evil drain from her body.”
Mickey O’Connor’s mouth tightened, but he nodded once before turning his face to the fireplace.
The doctor chose a delicately wicked looking tool and then fished out a little tin dish. He looked at Silence, his face grave. “Perhaps you can hold her upright upon your lap. If you can keep her from moving in any way, it’ll be for the best.”
Silence picked up Mary gently. She’d always hated bloodletting, ever since she was a little girl and had had to be bled three times for some childhood illness. If she could save Mary’s tender skin the sharp scalpel, she’d offer her own arm, but this must be done. She knew that.
The doctor had been watching her and now he nodded at her approvingly. “Can you hold the cup for me?” he asked Fionnula.
The maid stepped forward and took the cup.
“Easy,” the doctor murmured, and with quick efficiency, lifted Mary’s chemise and made a cut high on her thigh.
Mary flinched but made no sound.
Bright red blood flowed from the wound.
It seemed to take forever before the doctor murmured, “I think that will do it.”
He pressed a clean cloth to the wound and wound a strip of linen around Mary’s leg, tying it off neatly.
“Now then,” the doctor said as he wiped and put away his lancet. “A little broth will help enormously, I believe. Take a small piece of chicken and boil it with a sprig of parsley and two of thyme. Strain the broth and add a spoonful of white wine, the finest you can find. Serve this broth to the child thrice daily, making sure she drinks a full teacup if possible.” He glanced at Silence sharply. “Do you understand?”
“Yes,” she said, stroking Mary’s hair.
“Good. Good. I also have this elixir.” He produced a small blue glass bottle. “My own concoction and I fancy a very effective one. A spoonful in a small cup of water before bedtime. Now”—he picked up his bag and stared severely at Silence and Fionnula—“should she come out in spots or vomit up bile, you are to call for me at once, yes?”
Silence nodded again, her lips trembling. “I will.”
The doctor laid his hand on Mary’s head and turned toward the door without another word. Mickey O’Connor turned and silently followed him, pausing before he exited. “Do ye have all that ye’ll be needing for her?”
Silence bit her lip to stop it trembling. “I believe so.”
His hesitated and for a moment she thought he was about to say something, but in the end he left without a word.
“WE’LL STORM HIS cursed palace and take her out by force if need be!” Concord Makepeace declared ferociously the next day. “Bad enough that she’s ruined her own reputation, but to sully the good name of the home is too much!”
Concord’s graying hair was coming down from his queue and he looked rather like an aging Samson.
A hotheaded, aging Samson who’d not fully thought through the consequences of an attack on an armed pirate stronghold.
Winter sighed to himself. He’d known the drawbacks to informing his brothers of Silence’s plight, but he couldn’t in all conscious let them remain in the dark.
Even if Concord’s undirected anger and worry were giving Winter a headache.
“The palace is a fortress,” Winter pointed out calmly. “And we are only two. If we—”
“Three,” came a voice in the doorway of the home’s kitchen.
Winter met the green eyes of his brother Asa, his own eyebrow slowly raising. Although he’d sent word to Asa’s rented rooms, he hadn’t expected him to actually show up. Asa hadn’t been heard from in nearly a year. For all Winter had known, his middle brother had sailed overseas.
Yet here he was, as brawny as ever. Asa had the shoulders of a bull and a mane of tawny hair like a young lion. The last year had given him a few differences, however. His scarlet coat was intricately embroidered at the cuffs and skirts, and his shirt, while plain, was of fine linen. Winter’s eyes narrowed. Interesting. However his brother made his living, he was apparently doing quite well for himself.
“What are you doing here?” Concord, never tactful, asked aggressively. “You don’t respond to letters, you don’t bother to make an appearance at Temperance’s wedding or the christening of my new daughter, or when Silence lost her husband at sea, and yet you think you can simply trot back home?”
Winter winced and murmured quietly, “We do need his help, Concord.”
“Ha!” Concord folded bulging arms across his chest. Like Winter, he dressed plainly in black and brown, his hat round and uncocked. “We’ve done just fine without him for the last year.”
“That was before Silence went to live in a pirate’s house,” Winter pointed out drily.
Asa, who’d propped one massive shoulder against the door frame, straightened now. “What pirate? You said in your letter to me that Silence was in dire danger. You never mentioned a pirate.”
Concord snorted.
“Mickey O’Connor,” Winter said quietly before Concord could go off on another tirade.
“Charming Mickey O’Connor?” Asa asked incredulously. “What is Silence doing with him? Did he kidnap her?”
“No.”
Asa pulled out a kitchen chair and sat, planting his elbows on the table. “Then why?”
“Last year a baby was left on Silence’s doorstep,” Winter explained. “Silence named the child Mary Darling and brought her here to the home. This was after Temperance married Lord Caire and was no longer managing the home with me. Silence took her position. She cared for all the children, of course, but she made Mary Darling her special pet.”
Concord stirred. “The baby was like her own. When William died, I think the child gave her comfort.”
Winter nodded. “I returned home from a trip to Oxford several days ago to find Silence gone. When I confronted her at O’Connor’s palace—”
“You went to Mickey O’Connor’s house by yourself?” Asa interrupted.
Winter met his eyes. “Yes.”
For a moment a startled look crossed Asa’s face, and then he slowly nodded. “Go on.”
Winter inclined his head. “She seemed quite as usual. She was dressed in her own clothes and frankly did not appear to be overly happy that I’d come to her rescue. She said that Mickey O’Connor was Mary Darling
’s father—”
Asa swore and Concord glared at him.
“—and that O’Connor had brought her and the child to his home to protect them from his enemies. I could not persuade her to leave so I came away again. Now, however, there are questions being asked about where exactly Silence is. If the truth that she’s living with a notorious pirate becomes known…”
Winter shrugged. He didn’t need to tell his brothers what such information would do to the home’s good standing—and the money it needed from its patrons and donors. One whiff of impropriety and the fickle aristocrats would find some other charity to amuse themselves with.
“You should have picked her up and dragged her out bodily,” Concord growled.
Winter arched an eyebrow. “Past O’Connor and a half dozen of his men?”
Concord grimaced.
Asa rolled his eyes. “Trust you to advocate a near-suicidal action based on moral outrage.”
Concord half rose from his chair, bellowing incoherently. Asa rose as well and for the next several minutes the kitchen was filled with loud masculine rage.
Winter sighed and closed his eyes, raising one hand to gently rub his temple. He’d had a lifetime to observe the strained relations between his elder brothers. There were times when they could almost make it through a family meal without resorting to shouts, but those occasions were rare and becoming rarer. Concord dealt with the tension by assuming an unyielding line: He was entirely correct and by contrast everything Asa espoused was entirely incorrect. Winter had once overheard Temperance muttering under her breath that their brother should’ve better been christened Discord.
Asa’s response to this ceaseless state of friction was to disappear. It was a constant worry for their eldest sister, Verity. She feared—and Winter privately concurred—that someday their brother would go away and simply not come back.
His brothers’ voices died.