Waiting For The Moon Part 27

She tried desperately to believe her own words, but fear was a cold, hard lump in her stomach.

She understood, finally, what a lie was.

Ian stood beside Andrew's bed. The boy lay motionless beneath the mound of gray-white bedding, his cheeks a pale chalky hue, his eyes open and unseeing.

Ian wished he'd been stronger with Selena, wished he'd turned and walked away from her pleading eyes.

But he couldn't do it, couldn't destroy her so completely, even though he knew it was the safest, most honest course.

He pulled up a chair and sat down beside Andrew. The dark window shade that Andrew insisted upon covered the window, blocked the bright sunlight and kept the room shrouded in shadows. Beside the bed, a candle flickered.

Ian understood more than he wanted to now. So much more.

218 Andrew's frequent bouts of depression and habitual suicide attempts were no longer a tragic character flaw or symptoms of madness. The boy had suffered horribly in his short life, the most degrading, painful, humiliating physical abuse imaginable. And Ian would bet money that the pain had come from a relative. Perhaps even Andrew's father. Ian felt sick at the thought. He remembered his own father, his own childhood, and suddenly the pain he'd suffered because of his mother's illness seemed immature and misplaced. What Andrew had suffered was so much worse. On the bed, Andrew moved. Ian leaned forward. "Andrew?" The boy whimpered softly. Tears squeezed from his closed eyes and streaked down his temples. "Go away ... not again ..." Instinctively Ian reached out, brushed the hair from Andrew's eyes. One casual touch was enough. The sickening images slammed into his brain. He winced, fought the pictures, held the horror at bay by sheer force of will. After a few moments, they softened, turned dim and out of focus. He let out a harsh breath of relief. He had to help this boy. But how? How could such memories be eradicated? Common sense told him that it was impossible, that Andrew would carry these images like a stone on his heart until the day he died. Until one of his feeble suicide attempts succeeded. So what could Ian do? Return to Selena and apologize, tell her that some heartbreaks were irreparable? Such surrender was inconceivable. All of his life he'd accepted challenges that other men walked away from. He thrived on insurmountable odds, on beating the whims of fate. He felt a stirring of ambition. The doctor he'd once been lifted his tired old head, peered through the dusty 219 jacket of Ian's soul, and smiled. He was a trained physician-once he'd been the best of the best-and he'd sworn to help people in pain. And Andrew was in more pain than any patient he'd ever treated. Ian went to his bedroom and pawed through his books, pulling down anything about diseases of the mind. When he had everything, he went back to Andrew's room and resumed his seat. One by one, he read the books, kept reading until the sun began its lingering descent into the silver sea. He closed the last volume at seven o'clock that night. He threw it across the room and stared dully at the pile of books and papers beneath the window. He'd never studied psychiatry before, certainly not with so specific an inquiry in mind, but he'd always thought of it as a fringe science, a loose collection of tricksters and misguided doctors trying to cure the incurable or watch the inevitable. Still, he'd thought they knew something, that they'd at least developed a theory for helping their patients. But they were dangerous men, ugly and frightening in their narrow-minded view of the world in general, and women in particular. He stared at the paper at his feet. Thomas Hawkes Tanner's "On Excision of the c.l.i.toris as a Cure for Hysteria." Hysteria. That's what they called it when a woman said she'd been raped as a child. "Hysteria." He shook his head, thinking of the articles and ideas he'd read. They left him feeling dirty and ashamed of his profession. Dr. Freud-supposedly one of the best alienists of the time-had been the only beam of hope in a dark, dirty, misogynistic profession. At first Freud had believed the women who reported that they'd been raped as children, and his theories excited Ian. Then, for no apparent reason, Freud had stopped believing. Suddenly these same women who years before

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had been victims were now suffering from "hysterical fantasies."

Ian had no source in his library that even allowed for the possibility of what had happened to Andrew.

The respected psychiatrists would clearly treat the boy as if he were hysterical-no doubt they'd use electrical shock treatments on his genitals to cure him of the unacceptable "fantasies" that lurked in his mind.

It was sickening.

Ian shoved a hand through his hair, wondering what to do. Unlike his "colleagues," Ian had access to the ultimate, unvarnished truth. He knew Andrew was neither hysterical nor fantasizing. The boy was a victim, pure and simple.

And so, it fell on Ian's shoulders to treat his patient.

Antic.i.p.ation nibbled at his consciousness again. He'd owned an insane asylum for ten years, and managed it for six; and now, finally, he was going to treat his first patient.

Andrew released a quiet moan.

Ian leaned forward and forced himself to touch the boy's shoulder. "Andrew? Can you hear me? It's Dr.

Carrick."

Andrew blinked groggily. Slowly his eyes opened.

Ian felt a rush of pure adrenaline. Just like the old days. "Andrew? I'm here."

Andrew turned his head. "Dr. Carrick?"

Ian stared down into the boy's pale gray eyes. "h.e.l.lo there, Andrew. You gave us quite a scare."

"You touched me," Andrew said softly.

"Yes."

Tears glazed Andrew's eyes. His lip trembled. "You shouldn't have done that, Dr. Carrick. I was always so careful around you."

"I'd like to help you, Andrew." .

He turned his face away. "No one can help me."

"Maybe if we just ... talked ..."

I.

221 "He Andrew pressed his face tighter into the pillow, said he'd kill me if I told anyone."

"He'd have to kill me first."

Very slowly, Andrew turned back toward Ian. "You'd protect me?"

Ian nodded.

Andrew started to cry quietly. It was a long time before he could stop.

Ian said nothing, just sat there, waiting. Finally Andrew wiped his face and looked up at Ian through eyes that were pathetically hopeful. "I need help, Dr. Carrick."

A lump formed in Ian's throat. "We all do, Andrew. We all do."

Chapter Eighteen.

The moon was bright and full and ringed by clouds. It cast a bluish white aura of magic across the dark night. Selena followed Ian from the house. He slipped through the garden's wrought-iron gates and went to the gazebo, sitting on the granite bench inside, leaving the gate open behind him. She followed slowly, careful not to step on a twig or branch or make any sound. At the gate she paused, allowing herself-just for an instant-to believe that he'd left it open on purpose. A silent invitation. But she couldn't lose herself in the fantasy. This morning she'd glimpsed another, darker side of Ian, and it had frightened and confused her. He had been cold and needlessly cruel. His selfishness made her feel frighteningly alone. As if some integral, necessary part of her soul had splintered. For hours she'd sat on the porch steps, trying to understand what had happened. There was no one she could ask. Johann would be sarcastic; she was certain of it. Edith wouldn't allow herself to speak of "the master" that way, and Maeve . . . Selena sighed. Poor Maeve had spent the day in the kitchen, making her long-dead husband a cherry tart. Selena had wandered through the silent house, time and again pa.s.sing in front of Andrew's closed door. She 222 223 waited patiently, and not so patiently, for Ian to leave the boy's room, but the door had stayed closed until a few moments ago. In her need to understand Ian, she'd consulted book after book, but none of them answered her question. Until finally, when she'd almost given up, she'd opened a book of poetry that Ian had once read to her. Almost magically, it had fallen open, and she'd found the words she needed so desperately. If thoust must love me, let it be for naught Except for love's sake only. Do not say I love her for her smile-her look-her way Of speaking gently-for a trick of thought That falls in well with mine, and certes brought A sense of pleasant ease on such a day- For these things in themselves, Beloved, may Be changed, or change for thee-and love, so wrought May be unwrought so. It had taken her a long time to understand the poem's true message, but finally she saw that Miss Browning was explaining the very nature of love. With the words, Selena began to understand the emotion she'd given so freely. Her first true memory was of Ian. It sounded trite and ridiculous, but for as long as she could remember, he'd been her sun, her moon, her world. Naively she'd thought she loved him; it was the only word that fit the enormity of her feeling. But now she saw her mistake. She'd been mesmerized by Ian, bewitched by his quicksilver moods, captivated by the most brilliant smile she'd ever seen. It had been an illusion, though, a young girl's whimsy. If she was to cross the yawning channel between infatuation and true love, she would have to do it now, with her eyes wide open and her heart too vulnerable to bear. She would have to accept his imperfections, his vices, 224.

his fallibility; just as he would have to accept hers. And it would only be a beginning, nothing more.

She took a single step forward, her fingers resting lightly on the chilly iron bars of the gate. The sweet fragrance of hyacinths, jonquils, and blossoming snowdrops hung in the crisp air, their white faces peering through the shadowy lattice sides of the gazebo. Ian sat on the granite bench, his back turned to her.

Moonlight caressed his hair, gave it the appearance of a golden halo against the stark, unrelieved black of his coat.

"h.e.l.lo, Selena," he said without turning around.

She gasped softly. "How did you know it was me?"

"No one else would dare follow me here."

She clasped her hands and walked toward him on the small granite path that wound through the beds of white flowers. Her heart was beating too quickly, and a strange moisture dampened her palms.

This could be an end for them, right now, in the magical quiet of this garden. Ian could turn away from her, return her to the cold darkness of her life before his smile.

She released a shaky breath and twisted her damp hands together. For the first time, she spoke a thought that was not truly on her mind. "Did you help Andrew?"

He didn't turn to her. "Not yet."

At the answer, so quietly spoken, Selena felt a rush of affection for him. He probably didn't even know what the words meant, the effort they implied. She knelt before him and looked up. Their gazes met, and in his eyes she saw a quiet, resigned suffering.

"I disappointed you today," he said in a crisp, matter-of-fact voice.

"Yes."

He gave a laugh, soft and bitter in the darkness. "I told you I would."

She heard the finality in his voice and it angered her. "You yield too quickly."

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He drew in a sharp breath and looked down at her. "I've always cut my losses fast."

"But love-"

"Love." He shot the word at her like a poison dart. "You know nothing of love and less of me."

"I know you as well as I know myself."

"So you do. Of course, you don't know your own name."

The caustic edge to his words saddened her. She didn't understand why he wanted so badly to believe the worst of himself. "Oh, Ian. You are so troubled with the unimportant. I know all I need to know of myself."

"And what's that? That you love me? Is that your defining characteristic?"

"No. I am like any other human. My opinions and emotions and beliefs define me-not some word I cannot recall."

He touched her then, and she saw the sadness in his eyes. "So you have found opinions at last. And what do you believe in, my G.o.ddess?"

For once, the words fell from her lips easily, forming themselves from the emotions in her heart.

"Goodness. Honesty. Beauty. Second chances. The feel of a raindrop on my lips. Laughter and tears and the healing power of each." She eased up on her knees and tilted her face to his. "I believe in you, Ian."

"Selena-"

She touched his lips to still the protest. "Shh. Listen to me. I may be brain-damaged, but I am not stupid.

I watch the world, Ian. Things that you long ago stopped seeing, stopped believing in, are still real for me.

Who is more wrong-the child who believes in fairy tales or the adult who does not?"

He stared down at her. Brushing a knuckle along her jawline, he tilted her face just a little. "What in the h.e.l.l do I do with you, Selena?"

Tears burned her eyes. She wished she had the intel

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ligence to tell him what it was she felt, but she was no poet. "Just love me, Ian. Make a beginning with me."

He gazed down at her, his flame blue eyes almost luminescent in the pale moonlight. "What if it's wrong, Selena?" His voice broke. "What if you belong to someone else?"

This question that bothered him so much meant nothing to her. All she cared about was the look in his eyes and the way he made her feel when he touched her. "How could it be wrong?"

He gave her a smile that was heartbreakingly sad and touched her face. "Ah, Selena ..."

She leaned forward, pressed her cheek into the heat of his hand and closed her eyes.

He made a soft, groaning sound and pulled her into his arms, holding her so fiercely she couldn't breathe.

Ian poured himself another huge gla.s.s of whiskey and tossed it down, tasting nothing, feeling only the false warmth in his gut.

Wobbling, laughing quietly to himself, he made his reeling way to his desk and sat down with a thud. The papers strewn across the mahogany surface blurred before his eyes.

For a split second, he saw the letters he'd filed at every post office between here and New York City.

He'd told hundreds of people about the mysterious woman in his care. h.e.l.l, he'd begged her family to come forward.

He crashed his fist to the desk and swept the offending whiteness away. Papers scattered to the floor.

What was he going to do? Sweet Jesus, what was he going to do?

It was the question that haunted him, drove him to his knees and kept him reaching for the booze. Every moment, every second, every breath, reminded him that Selena might someday be taken away from him, that he-ignorant, selfish b.a.s.t.a.r.d that he was-had alerted the world to her presence. Every time the wind 227.

tapped on the windowpane, he jumped; every time Fergus drove into town for the mail, Ian stood at his window, sweating, obsessing, waiting for a letter to arrive.

To whom it may concern: I'm coming to claim my wife.

My wife, my wife, my wife. The mother of my children ...

He grabbed the fragile lamp from the corner of his desk and threw it in frustration. It hit the paneled wall with a thwack and crashed to the floor in a spray of broken gla.s.s. Flames shot up from the pool of fuel on the wooden floor, licked the dark cherry paneling. The acrid scent of smoke wafted through the air.

He stared at the flames. In the reddish gold swirls, he saw her eyes, the color of maple syrup, eyes a man could lose himself in. And her hair, the wavy, untamed sweep of burnished brown. So soft and sweet-smelling; it slipped through his fingers like silk.

He squeezed his eyes shut, wishing he'd touched it more, wishing he'd kissed her more deeply, more often, wishing he'd peeled away her cheap gingham dress and stroked the petal softness of her skin.

Wishing, ah Jesus, wishing ...