Alexandra thought of his hands on her. Of the strange sensations they elicited.
“The Terror of Torcliff,” she whispered. A devil best left alone.
CHAPTER THREE
Piers dragged a towel across his hair and down the ruined side of his face, wiping away chilling rivulets of rain as he leaned against the stable door. All the while, his thoughts lingered on the feminine curves his hands had negotiated only an hour or so prior. On the most arresting figure of an extraordinary woman.
He’d wrested the blasted stallion into his stall and made certain the animal was given hot mash and a dry blanket.
Not that the blighter deserved it.
Alexandra Lane. He grunted out a steaming breath, testing the syllables in his mind as he had a hundred times in the last hundred minutes.
Alexandra Lane. Sounded more like an address than a bedeviling female.
One would think, when searching for bone breaks or wounds, that the curve of a hip or the length of a thigh beneath all those skirts wouldn’t make any sort of lasting impression. Especially not to a man so familiar with the female form as he.
And yet.
His hand twitched each time he recalled the weight of her own palm against his. He could exactly recollect the flare of her waist. The quirk of her lip. The delicate structure of her, not at all shaped by a corset.
Just sensible tweed and womanly flesh.
Alexandra Lane. A confounding dichotomy of iniquity and innocence.
She’d conversed with camel keepers and successfully acquired a doctorate at the Sorbonne.
One touch from him, though, and the lady threatened conniptions.
Not a lady, he corrected himself.
A doctor.
The bloody woman had gone to war with his new stallion and won. She’d possibly saved several lives, and had nearly been crushed to death. The moment she’d caught her breath, she’d forgotten to be upset about any of it.
Fearless.
But she’d snatched her hand from his as though he’d burned her. She’d been unable to even look at him until he’d rankled her.
Because he’d terrified her.
To be fair, he alarmed and disgusted everyone he met, especially before they accustomed themselves to his fairly new and startlingly dreadful appearance. And yet, something about his interaction with the doctor struck an unfamiliar note. A note that lodged in his head like a song that, when finished, would simply start again until it drove one mad.
He’d frightened her. But …
She’d shrunk from him, obviously. Evaded his touch. His gaze. But when goaded, she’d met him head-on with clear eyes and condemnation. Going so far as to engage him in conversation.
He’d spoken more words to Alexandra Lane than he had to anyone in more than a year.
In their moments together, he’d not detected a trace of true disgust. Fear, but not revulsion.
In fact, he’d imagined for a brief moment that he’d read admiration in her whisky eyes. The kind of feminine appreciation his looks had entitled him to his entire life before the incident.
Which made absolutely no fucking sense.
In his experience, people often reviled what they feared, or vice versa. So, if she wasn’t repulsed by him, why fear him?
Had he been mistaken? Had he read admiration where none existed?
Perhaps his physical reaction to her had somehow interfered with his powers of observation, and his speculation was nothing but fanciful tripe.
A latent yearning for a captivating woman to return his desire.
Because it had been ages. Or, at least, what seemed like ages.
Glancing up toward the turrets of Castle Redmayne with frank detestation, he tossed the cloth aside with undue violence.
It would be ages more. Possibly never.
Tugging his damp shirt from his trousers, he whipped it down his shoulders, away from the chill bumps blooming on his skin. God’s blood, it was cold. Cold as gray stone and the merciless sea.
This place. This fucking castle had always been thus, he imagined. Cold. Empty. Miserable. From the moment the Viking, Magnus Redmayne, had mercilessly claimed Torcliff and the surrounding land, up until the current fucking useless lord, it seemed that nothing at all could make this place hospitable.
Piers glared out into the unrelenting storm across the vast castle estates and down to the treacherous red cliffs. Maynemouth Moor, where fifes and fishermen had once lived, had lately been renovated into charming cottages and even boasted a seaside resort.
Where is Dr. Lane resting her head tonight? he idly wondered. In some cozy stone bungalow with an equally erudite man, no doubt. Cecil, did she mention his name was?
Lucky bugger.
They probably pored over maps together, speaking animatedly about curious dig sites, and cursed tombs.
Cecil. He spat on the ground. What a name. Probably wore spectacles and a smart mustache. Likely had a hunchback from bending over texts, soft, scholarly hands and—Piers stroked his beard—and a weak chin. At least he hoped the punter was possessed of a weak chin. Or weak arms, at least.
Piers pictured them in one of the little homes on the moor hunkered over a well-worn desk using bloody, damned—he didn’t know what—magnifying glasses and cartographer tools or some such.
Cecil would make a terrible pun. She’d lift her delicate chin and laugh with her entire body, her eyes sparkling with tears of merriment. They’d take dinner. And drinks. Sherry or brandy.
Piers’s lip curled at the thought, tightening his scar. A painful reminder why a woman like that would rather have academic Cecil over a hard-hearted huntsman like him.
He kept all the beasts at the accursed Castle Redmayne.
So, what was it about this storm that made him envisage another destiny? What if he’d been born another man?
Suddenly that cottage on the cliffs became something else. The man at the table wasn’t good old Cecil.
Dr. Lane greeted Piers, instead, with enthusiastic kisses and a lively story about a runaway horse. Before unpacking the maps and magnifying glasses, he’d light the golden lanterns and check her properly for bruises. Peel away her soiled kit and bathe the chill from her bones. He’d stretch her out upon a rickety brass bed that made unholy noises and proceed to welcome her home properly.
After, he’d feed her from his hands and watch her features beam with enthusiasm as she discussed fucking Borneo or wherever she’d returned from.
Maybe, in this pleasant fiction, they’d take their restless spirits and find meaning and fulfillment reading the bones of the dead.
And why not? Let Cecil keep the beasts at Castle Redmayne.
A sheet of brilliant lightning blanketed the sky, reflecting off the turbulent ocean below the cliffs and wiping away the image he’d so preposterously invoked of a life he could never have.
Christ. When did he develop a penchant for revolting sentimentality?
Piers stared into the dark storm long enough for his entire torso to go numb, watching as one by one the cottages at Maynemouth Moor tucked in for the night.
Best he never saw Alexandra Lane again. The strange longings she evoked were both unsettling and bloody dispiriting. He’d a long and terrible retribution to attend to, and then there were the beasts to consider.
Both within and without the castle.
Though maybe he’d keep her in that cottage on the cliff, locked in his mind.
And when he had a moment to himself, he’d visit her there.