“Bale.”
“So I’m glad you left. You had things to learn about yourself, and I had things to learn about myself.”
“What did you learn?” She could barely get the question out.
Dark brown eyes flared yellow as they bored into hers. “I learned that I want you even more now than I did two years ago.”
If she’d had her wings out, they would have shivered with pleasure. “I was afraid you’d be angry, angry enough to refuse me. We are grudge-holders, you know.”
“I’ve no grudge against you.” He reached out, lacing their fingers together. “I think we’ve already proved that we’re not like other banaranjans.”
“We’re most definitely not.” She smiled.
Bale returned her smile. “Then why don’t we start over? Have a little breakfast here at the Majestic and talk about your ideas, and where we go from here?”
“I’d like that, but I don’t think we have to start over completely. For instance, I really enjoyed that night-flying manoeuvre.”
“Good.” Heat crept into his gaze. “Because I plan on doing a lot of night-flying with you.”
“Sam!” Rinna called. “We need to order. Something tells me I’m going to need some energy!”
Kim Lenox
Answer The Wicked
Late afternoon, London, 1883
“I shall have a visitor today,” Mr Rathburn quietly announced.
Malise Bristol turned from the upper drawer of the walnut clothes press, where she arranged her elderly patient’s nightshirts. One of the hospital’s perpetually out-of-breath, red-faced laundresses had delivered them only moments before. The linen was still warm to the touch.
Mr Rathburn’s quietly spoken words had startled her — startled her because in the nearly two years she had been assigned as his personal nurse at Winterview, he had never once received a visitor. The other residential patients of the exclusive, elegantly appointed home for the aged often had visitors, even if only barristers with papers to be signed or family members with stylish hats in hand, begging for an increase in their allowances.
“A visitor, sir?” she enquired, closing the drawer.
He sat in his wheelchair peering out the window, which was framed by vertical swathes of burgundy silk. In the dim afternoon light, the silk appeared almost black in contrast to the grey sky on the other side of the pane. He appeared gaunt today. Frailer than in days before, and nearly swallowed by his green silk dressing robe.
“Indeed,” he answered, offering nothing more in the way of explanation.
“A member of your family?” she enquired hopefully. Though neither of them was an excessive conversationalist by nature, she had grown very fond of Mr Rathburn and wanted him to have a loving family. Only why wouldn’t they have made an appearance before now? Because, her mind supplied, they were obviously a terrible, useless lot.
“No, not family,” he answered evenly, sounding not the least bit disappointed.
“Business?”
“Thank God, no.”
“A friend then,” she prodded gently.
He was quiet for a long moment. “I suppose.”
Malise’s heart warmed with a vision of two elderly gentlemen, whiling away the remainder of the afternoon reminiscing about younger days. A visit from a friend would do Mr Rathburn good. She should not be his only companion in his final days.
Even from her perspective, as his nurse, a visitor would be a welcome distraction. Their days together followed a rather monotonous pattern, each day nearly identical to one before.
First, there was breakfast, then she would push Mr Rathburn in his chair for a walk about the grounds. If weather did not allow for such an excursion, they walked the halls instead. Next, the elderly gentleman would spend a few quiet hours squinting through his brass-rimmed spectacles at one of his many old books. Sometimes he would ask her, ever so politely, to read to him. Then it was time for luncheon and another walk. Afterwards, she would tidy his suite or draw in the sketchbook he had given her for Christmas while he wrote in silent concentration in one of his many leather-bound journals. Then, after a light repast of tea and whatever staid culinary selection the kitchen sent up, the male attendants would come and assist him into bed and she would retire to her tiny room in the hospital attic — except for Saturday evenings when she took the train into Chelsea. Sundays were her day off.
She made no complaints about the quiet predictability of their time spent together. Her life before coming to Winterview had been more eventful than she cared to remember.
Still, admittedly, she was more than a little curious about her elderly patient’s visitor. Anson Rathburn was an elegant, dapper old gentleman. His belongings — an exotic mélange of carved masks, primitive weaponry and foreign texts — suggested a life of adventure. There were also a few tintypes, some showing a smiling, handsome and young Anson Rathburn. But strangely, he had never spoken of his life before Winterview. She, as his hired nurse, had never presumed to press too invasively for details.
A sudden question occurred. How did Mr Rathburn know to expect a visitor? He had received no letter. No telegraph.
It was then she realized he did not simply look out the window now, at nothing in particular. His gaze was fixed on something there.
She crossed the room to stand beside him. Drops tapped against and drizzled down the panes, offering a distorted view of the grounds. The early spring rain had cleared the rolling, green lawn of patients, staff and guests, save for—
Stone benches lined Winterview’s central drive, and upon the furthest of these, nearly concealed by a thick canopy of trees, sat a dark-clad figure. The man wore a long raincoat and a wide-brimmed Western style hat that concealed most of his face, everything but a stalwart jaw and pursed lips. One leg was bent at the knee, its foot planted against the ground, while the other leg jutted straight on to the path before him. His hands rested against his thighs, completing a pose of pensive reluctance. Though difficult to tell much more from such a distance, she perceived a broad, well-turned pair of shoulders and fitted trousers over long, athletic legs.
“Is that your visitor, sir?” she asked, a bit breathlessly.
“It is.”
Excitement shot through her. Why? She couldn’t exactly say, other than that the “old friend” she’d imagined in her mind was very different than the apparently much younger man sitting in the rain outside.
“Would you like me to go down and invite him inside?”
Mr Rathburn smiled. “Not just yet.”
His answer relieved Malise. She supposed he was correct, and that his friend would come inside from the rain whenever he decided to do so.
And yet a half hour later, Mr Rathburn’s visitor had still not seen fit to call. He had, however, over time, moved from one bench to the next so that he narrowed the distance between himself and the front steps. Malise knew this to be so because she had passed by the window to steal a peek at least a half dozen times. Astoundingly, Mr Rathburn appeared to have forgotten all about him. He sat in his wheelchair at his desk, quietly reading. Another quarter of an hour passed before he lifted his blue-eyed gaze from the page. His eyes sparkled with humour.
“I do believe he must be soaked through by now. What do you say, Nurse Bristol?”
“That must certainly be true, Mr Rathburn.”
“Please do invite him up.”
“Yes, sir.”