A Scent of Magic Page 16

  She passed the gates by again. But her car slowed when she reached the small lane she recognized as leading to the cottage. She looked at her watch. Seven-forty-five. Probably late enough that the landscape crew had gone home. And hopefully, their employer as well. With this much daylight left, she could see what work had taken place and perhaps decide if Nick had unearthed anything, if he was actually searching for something like Mary Rose’s Book of Shadows. Of course, she would have no way of knowing what he might have found, but a hole in the ground would be telling.

  There was no car in the drive, no horse tethered to a tree, and Simone guessed she had the place to herself. Remembering Clyde Covington and the dog Heathcliff, however, she parked Esther’s car facing the lane, just in case she might need to get out of there in a hurry. Her pulse pounded as she stepped onto the gravel, and she wished she’d worn more sensible shoes instead of the trendy but slippery sandals that were on her feet.

  She made her way down the stepping stones she’d followed in the moonlight the night she’d been apprehended here for trespassing, and wondered if Nick’s too-efficient watchman was lurking nearby. By the light of day, or rather early evening, the place looked totally different, innocuous, non-threatening. Just the typical picture post card charm of a restored fifteenth century dwelling. Briefly, she regretted that she had been unable to stay here for a few days.

  Behind the house, the brambles and briars had been cleared away, some ripped from the earth by their roots, others sawed at their gnarly bases. It looked like a miniature layout of a new subdivision raked of growth by an aggressive developer. Still, sometimes to make room for new beauty one had to destroy old chaos, and in her mind’s eye she could see planted here a garden as lush and lovely as Esther’s.

  She came to the gate and saw that the scene behind the garden wall was much the same, only here, many of the brambles remained in a huge pile in one corner, ready to be carried off or burned, she supposed. Slipping past the intricately designed, rusting iron barrier, she entered the sheltered area. The circular outline of the central garden was now naked and clearly visible. Simone walked slowly to the outer edge and knelt and felt of the soil. It was rich, fertile, but had been uncultivated for a long, long time.

  What plant had Mary Rose grown here that had provided the oil she’d used in her magical essence?

  Obviously, nothing Simone was familiar with. Could John Rutledge have sent her something from India, some exotic plant from the Far East? Or perhaps seeds or bulbs?

  Simone allowed her gaze to scan the enclosure, wondering if anything sent from India could survive an English winter. Only if it were properly protected from storm and cold, she was certain, but she didn’t know if a place like this would have had a greenhouse or solarium in those days. She doubted it.

  Suddenly, her eye came to rest on a fresh scar on the face of the north wall. What appeared to be recently-scraped white mortar gleamed like a beacon even in the last of the sunlight, framing the dark hole it surrounded.

  With a lurch of her stomach, Simone knew that if Mary Rose Hatcher had hidden her Book of Shadows in that niche, Nick had beat her to it.

  Damn him!

  She made her way across the soft earth of the garden to the hole in the wall and hesitated before feeling inside with her bare hand. Simone had never trusted dark places not to be inhabited by spiders and other creepy things. She stood on tiptoe and strained her eyes to see what, if anything, the cache might hold, but as she’d expected, it was empty.

  “You seem unreasonably fond of this place.” A deep voice filled with undisguised sarcasm sounded behind her, and Simone nearly collapsed in alarm. She turned, expecting to see the watchman leering at her, ready at any moment to unleash his ugly dog. But the source of the comment was far worse. Leaning against the garden gate, looking sexier than hell in tight jeans and an open-necked shirt, Nick Rutledge studied her speculatively. “Want to explain what keeps bringing you to my property?”

  At that moment, Simone hated him more than ever. His face was like a stone, with just a hint of a sneer on his lips. His arms were crossed, his intense stare calculated to intimidate. His stance was arrogantly casual, with one knee bent, his foot resting on a lower bar of the iron gate.

  She hated him, and yet, something inside of her stirred instantly, a fire she’d fought to extinguish over the long years since their days together in France. To her dismay, she felt a familiar sexual hunger, an appetite she’d been able to satisfy only in her dreams.

  She desired him still. How could it be?

  Damn him again.

  Simone hated herself as well in that instant. Hated her weakness. Her vulnerability. She’d found him attractive when she’d seen him earlier, but her feelings had not been this blatant, this naked, not even when he’d kissed her that night at Brierley Hall. What had happened since then that caused her defenses to crumble so suddenly and easily at the mere sight of him?

  A clip from a remembered dream, like a film short in a movie, rolled into her consciousness, filling her with impressions of a sweet sensual union beneath the gentle flow of a tropical waterfall. A sense of being loved totally. Of being able to trust her lover implicitly.

  It was the perfume, she thought, panic-stricken. Or at least the after-effects of the perfume, playing tricks with her mind and her body. Now, instead of its control over her impulses being limited to her dreams, its powers appeared to have taken over in the real world. She cringed against the wall, her skin suddenly ice cold. “No,” she hissed in a low groan. “No!”

  The dark-haired woman with her back to the garden wall stared at him like a cornered animal, a mixture of fear and hatred in her dark eyes. Nick’s gut wrenched. In spite of her expression, she was exquisitely beautiful, dressed all in white, like some mystical enchantress on this midsummer’s eve. She was a modern day sorceress, however, clad in a stylish white sleeveless linen blouse tucked at her slender waist into white slacks that hugged her body possessively. Her feet tantalized him from within high-heeled sandals. Against his reason, Nick’s body responded to her appeal with alarming fervor.

  The lengthening rays of the sun pierced the leafy protection of the ancient trees overhead and shone upon her, as if spotlighting her beauty with pre-twilight shades of misty blue and silver. The image was reminiscent of the dreams he’d experienced recently. Dreams in which he had been with this woman, known her intimately, loved her fully. He ached for her, longed for this to be the dream world where time—past, present, and future—did not exist.

  But this was not the dream world, no matter how he wished it so. And Simone was here, trespassing again, and this time, Nick knew why.

  Somehow, incredibly, Simone knew about the essence he’d discovered in the old trunk, the potion which he’d read more about this very afternoon in Mary Rose’s strange and enchanting journal. It was the only rational explanation for her repeat appearance here in this garden. She must have somehow come into possession of the fragrance. Had she found some remnant of it in her brief stay at the cottage?

  No. It was why she had come here in the first place.

  Intrigued, and knowing how much of his own future might be was riding in the balance, he decided to press her for an answer.

  “Relax,” he said, forcing a calm he did not feel. He wanted to assure her, get her to talk to him in a rational manner. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  She took a step away from the wall, defiance replacing her irrational fear. “I’m not afraid of you. You are despicable, but I doubt that you would murder me right here and now.”

  Her words stung, their impact eroding his careful emotional control. He laughed bitterly. “Are you quite sure?” he baited her, irritated that she would not be at least civil toward him. “I could do away with you, bury you here in the garden, and set fire to those brambles over your grave. No one would ever suspect…”

  Nick was surprised to see her eyes widen at his diabolical joke. She believed him! “But then, I’m only despicable,
as you say, not a murderer.” God, but he was making a bloody botch of this. He needed her cooperation, not her antipathy, if he was going to learn anything from her.

  He moved away from the gate, going to the far side of the circular garden, enabling Simone to escape if she wished. “You may leave at any time, Simone. But I do believe you owe me an explanation. What is going on? What’s brought you here again?” He knew he was pushing it, doubted if she would bother responding.

  To his surprise, she did not run. He saw her shoulders relax slightly beneath the open-throated blouse. She looked down at her hands, as if examining her manicure.

  “I suppose I do owe you that,” she said after a long moment, her tone unreadable. Then she raised her head suddenly, and her eyes were cold and hard. “But I will not give it to you until you explain to me why…”

  Nick’s heart sank and his stomach knotted. “Stop it, Simone,” he interrupted her roughly, striding still further around the circle until its full diameter lay between them. He shoved his hands deep into his pockets. “What happened in France is history. And it’s best left buried in the past.”

  “Why? Do you think I am still a foolish, naive child, that you can wave me off so easily? Don’t you think you owe me an explanation? An apology?”

  Nick turned to face her fury. She had every right to an explanation. An apology. If he could only come up with something that made sense. For a decade he had avoided facing the truth of what he had done, tried to justify his actions in terms of having had no choice.

  But he knew better. Everyone has choices. He could have chosen to fail in his mission to obtain those formulas from Jean René. He could have opted to try to convince Dupuis of another strategy for the recovery of the House of Rutledge. He could have chosen…Simone.

  Instead, he’d allowed his obsession with overcoming the shame of his father’s suicide, with reclaiming his family’s heritage and good name, to distort his thoughts and drive his actions. It was not something of which he was proud, but at the time, it had seemed indeed as if that had been his only choice.

  He wanted desperately to make it all go away. Wanted time to spiral backwards to when they’d been friends. Lovers. He wanted worse than life itself to take her in his arms and say he was sorry.

  But too many years, too many lies prevented that from ever happening.

  His heart bled as he stared into Simone’s face, which was nearly as white as her clothing. Only her full lips retained a hint of color. Her lips, and her dark, demanding eyes.

  Yes, he owed her.

  But it was a debt he could never repay. In his dreams, perhaps. But only there.

  His dreams reminded him of the perfume, of all that he must protect if he was to survive and emerge successfully once again. “What,” he made himself ask again, “are you doing here?”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Simone was shaking from the unleashed emotions that raged through her. She hadn’t meant to confront Nick about all of this. It did not serve her purposes. She should have been subtle, used his own device of seduction rather than raving at him like a madwoman. But his arrogance, the sneer that had greeted her when she turned to face him, summoned in an instant all the anger against him that she had stored inside. If she’d had a gun at that moment, perhaps she would have become a murderer.

  “You are unbelievable,” she said, finding her voice again at last and shaking her head at his refusal to give her even so much as a verbal apology. The man was without remorse. He was hard. Selfish. Devious. Criminal. And if she wanted answers concerning the perfume, she’d better gain control over her emotions and start playing hardball. Perhaps her best offense was the defense he was seeking.

  “Very well,” she said, straightening, preparing her strike. “It’s no secret I’ve taken your place at the House of Rutledge.” She thrust her verbal dagger and was gratified to see a flicker of chagrin flash in his steel blue eyes. “But to perform at my best, I must know all about the materials available to me. As you well know, I have every fragrant substance known to man beneath my fingertips in the perfumery. But I am not like other perfumers.” She brushed her long hair away from the heated perspiration on her neck, wondering if her improvised “explanation” would end up making sense to Nick. Wondering why she cared. Why she didn’t just get the hell out of here.

  But she seemed compelled to continue. She raised her chin slightly, looked directly into his eyes. “I am my father’s daughter,” she told him, taking a step toward him across the perimeter of garden, daring him to look away, wanting him to know she was out to avenge his wrong against her family. “I do not wish to use synthetics unless there are no other options. Truly great perfumers go to the source, the flowers and plants and animals who give us of their essences. Being new to English soil, I came to this area because I’ve heard the English gardens here are second to none. I came to smell the earth and the flowers and the plants so that I will understand their nature, for I plan to use them to create my own grands parfums, just as my father once did.”

  As the last words escaped her, she wanted to bite off her tongue. She’d agreed with Dupuis not to let anyone know of the new direction in which she planned to take the House of Rutledge until they had worked out a corporate marketing strategy and cut their deals with the manufacturers of the containers. Now, in a fit of pride and passion, she had just spilled their plans to their prime competitor.

  The expression on his face told her that he understood clearly the implications of what she’d just revealed. But his cold, hard reply ignored it, demanding again instead that she answer his original question…why was she here? “There are no flowers in this garden, Simone.”

  “I did not come here to see flowers,” she said, groping for an alternative explanation that would stand to reason. Her eye caught the gleam of the last of the sunlight on the circular rock formation outlining the garden and the wedge-shaped beds it contained. “I came to see the mandala, the circular layout of the garden.”

  Nick’s expression shifted from angry to surprised, and his gaze dropped reflexively toward the garden. When he looked back at her, grim suspicion was etched into his features.

  “How did you know this…mandala as you call it, was here?”

  “Esther Brown told me, the woman I stayed with in Redford after I left here. By the way, I can assure you,” she added with dry cynicism, “that my reservation of your vacation rental cottage was made in total ignorance that you owned it.”

  Nick said nothing, regarding her for a long moment. Then he stepped toward the circle and kicked at one of the rocks absently. “Why did you come back here, then, after you knew I owned the place?”

  Same question, different format. The man was nothing if not tenacious. But his quiet tone of voice caught her off guard. It was devoid of its earlier cold, caustic suspicion, revealing just a hint of self-deprecation. Why would you want to be anywhere near me? it seemed to ask. It was the closest she’d seen him come to behaving as if he gave a damn about anyone but himself, and it stirred an odd sympathy within her.

  But she blinked and clenched her fists. She could have no sympathy for Nicholas Rutledge. Reaching into her imagination, she continued her made-up tale. “I…I wanted to see it by moonlight. That’s why I was here when your bag man caught me. I study gardens, you see,” she went on, liking the direction her story was taking. It was the truth. She did study gardens. “Gardens should be enjoyable by night as well as by the light of day, and I was intrigued when Esther told me about the luminescence of the rocks that form this mandala.”

  “Odd that you should refer to it as a mandala.”

  The suspicion was back in his voice, and Simone wondered why he would concern himself with semantics. “Why so?”

  “A mandala infers that it is some sort of ritualistic symbol.”

  Simone considered that for a moment. Esther had described the garden as a mandala, not a circle. She’d also said she believed it had been used at one time by her “craft ancestors” as a
sacred place for casting spells. Maybe it was once used in some sort of ritual, but Simone wasn’t inclined to share this foolish folklore with Nick. “I’m sure Esther was just being descriptive.”

  Nick raised his gaze to her face again. “Yes, likely.” He questioned her no more, but his piercing gaze searched her own. Silence stretched between them, and with it, a tension so palpable Simone’s heart began to beat in apprehension. He wanted something more of her, she was certain of it. But he remained silent, still, like a leopard just before the strike.

  The sun had slipped over the horizon, giving way at last to the encroaching night, leaving the garden enshrouded in the indigo of twilight. Fireflies illuminated the shadows with brief, tiny glints of light, and Simone caught the redolent scent of roses and honeysuckle.

  Time seemed to become suspended in the gloaming. There was no yesterday. No tomorrow. Only the moment.

  The cooling air misted and played upon a light breeze, swirling around them. Simone’s skin prickled, from more than just the damp and the changing temperature. It was as if they were no longer in the garden, but had shifted to some other reality. A surreal, ethereal world…like that in her dreams.

  Nick’s expression changed. Instead of the demanding questions, in his eyes she now saw desire, an aching need mixed with incredible pain. His was a sorrow the depth of which she’d never seen before. Despite her determination to hold onto her fury against Nick, his expression filled her with a strange despair. She wanted to look away, to deny the feelings of sympathy and compassion she that welled unbidden from her heart, but she could not tear her gaze from his. She heard him calling to her, an unspoken appeal, but powerful and real nonetheless, and as if in a trance, she answered his silent summons. She moved toward him from across the far side of the circle, and he stepped inside its ring, meeting her in the center.