Bloody Good Read online

  “Right you are, lad. Oh, by the way, I’m spending the evening in the Pig, will be there until closing. If you decide to skip the film and want somewhere to sit, feel free, Peter. That way you won’t disturb Mrs. Burrows; she likes to turn in early.”

  “Yes, er, thanks!”

  Crikey! Wasn’t this exactly what he wanted, the chance of private, undisturbed time with Alice? But he could hardly tell her the coast was clear and they could have more than coffee blissfully undisturbed in the Pendragon parlor. And what if they did? Someone would surely see her car, or notice her leaving late. Or would they? They were up a lane, well off the main village street, the only other cottage up here was unoccupied.

  Maybe, just maybe, it might work.

  God bless Sergeant Pendragon.

  Peter went up to change his shirt and put on his suit and it hit him: he’d just been having a conversation with a Dragon and was about to take a Pixie out to dinner.

  He certainly wasn’t in Devon anymore. Or was Devon full of Dragons as well as Pixies and he’d been too self-absorbed to notice?

  Better get ready for his particular Pixie.

  Alice sat by the window watching. She hadn’t done this since she was fifteen and one of Simon’s friends had taken pity on her and invited her to the Tennis Club dance.

  Today she’d rushed home, praying there’d be no emergencies, and spent the better part of two hours gussying herself up. She’d changed her dress three times, wanting to look smart, not wanting to look too dressed up, and definitely not wanting to look as if she’d spend half the afternoon wavering over what to wear.

  Gran had been worse, if possible. She’d passed the afternoon baking custard tarts. “He really liked them that afternoon you first met him,” she’d said. “I’ll just make a small batch and leave them out, in case you ask him in for a cup of coffee.”

  “Gran, I’m not being that obvious.”

  What was Gran suggesting?

  “Don’t be silly, Alice. No one ever got what they wanted by being shy. That was always your trouble. Your brothers overshadowed everything so you never got in the habit of getting what you wanted.”

  Hardly fair. “I was the one who got the medical training, Gran.”

  “Only after they both made it clear they weren’t interested. My love, now’s the time to think of what you want and go out and get it. Life’s too uncertain these days to put anything off.” She paused. “You do want him, don’t you, dear?”

  “Yes.” Why try to deny it? Gran always found out everything in the end. “But I barely know him.”

  “What’s that got to do with it? Your instincts won’t let you down, girl. You’re Pixie. You know good from bad and right from wrong by instinct. And if you love him…”

  Did she? He was on her mind constantly. Even to the point of distracting her from her patients. She’d been on edge all day, knowing she was seeing him tonight.

  Gran came downstairs. Slowly, Alice noticed. More slowly than she used to. “All set, my love?”

  “Yes, Gran.” Alice stood, crossed the hall, and kissed her. “I’m set, only thing delaying me is the non-appearance of a certain young man.”

  “He’ll be here, my love. Just you wait and see. You enjoy yourself and when you come in, be quiet, please. I’m going to bed early.”

  Gran had clearly made her point. So it was now up to her, Alice, to set the pace for the evening. Should she be sensible, or throw caution to the winds and follow Gran’s not exactly subtle suggestion?

  If she did, she might just scare him off for good. If she didn’t, he might think she was indifferent to him. After their wild lovemaking the other day? No, indifferent would never describe what happened between them. Ever.

  She looked in the mirror again, smoothed her hair, and decided she hadn’t chewed off her lipstick. Yet. She checked her bag for keys, purse, and clean handkerchief, and heard footsteps coming up the front path.

  Damn caution! She threw open the front door.

  “Peter!” He was handsome, beautiful, smiling, and hers. At least for this evening.

  “Hello,” he said. “Ready?”

  “Oh, yes.” But ready for what?

  Chapter 30

  “Gabriel?” Jeff Williams called as he entered his cottage. He knew his new friend, if he could call him that, much preferred being addressed as “Mr. Oak,” but damn it all. He was getting board and lodgings all found, so he’d get called by his Christian name.

  And on top of that, Williams had brought back ointment and gauze to dress his burns. That smarmy little CO had been downright stingy and unwilling to part with as much as a sticking plaster, but Williams had grabbed a few extra tubes when his back was turned. Serve him right!

  The burns had looked a lot better this morning than they had last night; they’d looked hideous then, but the last thing Williams wanted was his guest ending up with some sort of skin infection. By rights he should have gone to hospital, but the suggestion last night had been met with outright refusal and this morning, when Jeff left for work, his guest had been fast asleep.

  Alright for some.

  And come to that, what was he doing hanging around Brytewood? Since his damn aunt was arrested, you’d think he’d scarper off home. Mind you, he was generous at the Pig, always buying the first round and most of the later ones, too.

  A few tubes of Aquaflavine and a roll of gauze wasn’t a lot when all’s said and done.

  But where was he?

  Tossing his coat and hat on the sofa, Williams went up the narrow stairway and pushed open the bedroom door.

  The bedclothes lay in a heap in the floor. Oak never made the flipping bed. They’d had more than one argument over it, dammit, and Oak was the one sleeping in it but no matter what was said or agreed or demanded, Williams always ended up making it. Well, he wasn’t this time.

  Gabriel Oak stood looking out of the dormer window, intent on something outside and totally oblivious to Jeff, who’d raced up with the medicine.

  “Hey, Gabriel!”

  He turned. He was only wearing trousers. How he wasn’t freezing to death up here without a shirt or sweater beat Williams, but that passing thought went in a flash as he stared at the man’s arm and shoulder and then up at his face and neck. This morning they’d been red and blistered.

  Now not a trace of injury remained. Unbelieving his eyes, Williams stepped closer. “Your burns?” he asked.

  “What burns?” Oak asked, a note of cold amusement in his voice.

  “The ones you came home with last night, you arse!” He had the sense to be scared as he looked up at his so-called friend. “Hell! I even brought back ointment for them.”

  Oak looked at the tubes and the roll of gauze. He slapped them out of Williams’s hand. “Unnecessary.”

  “Hey! Look here…” Williams began.

  He never got any further.

  Eiche lifted him by the shoulders so they were eye to eye, and the mortal wilted under vampire will. As the man went limp between his hands, Eiche said, “I never had burns. You never saw them.”

  Williams blinked, struggled as his mind was compelled to accept something contrary to his belief, then nodded, his face slack.

  Really, he was so easy to compel, it was no fun. Now the stringy old Miss Waite, she’d resisted. It had almost been fun, but this specimen was good only for fodder. Eiche let out a sharp, dry laugh that had Williams wincing, bent his head, and bit into the mortal’s neck.

  He didn’t take much. No point in depleting him completely. Not yet. But he needed more blood; healing had sapped his strength. Tonight he’d go hunting. Under cover of dark, he’d be discreet enough to even keep Weiss happy.

  Eiche tossed the unconscious Williams over his shoulder, carried him downstairs, and dropped him in one of the shabby chairs by the cold stove. As the mortal stirred, Eiche compelled him once again. “If anyone asks, I was here with you all evening. I never left the house. Understood?”

  Williams looked up; his eyes r
olled in his head. “Understood?” Eiche repeated. “I’m in the house with you, and was all evening. I never left!”

  Williams gave a weak nod. “You never left the house. Stayed in tonight.”

  He was barely conscious as Eiche slung a heavy satchel over his shoulder, opened the back door, and slipped out. It wouldn’t be dark for an hour or so, but he could move fast enough to pass unseen and he had work to do. And dinner to find.

  “So,” Alice asked, “do we get the bus in the village and advertise instantly to the entire population that we’re off somewhere together, or walk down to the corner of Bell Lane and get the bus there so the news will have to wait until all the other riders get home to pass it on?

  “It’s really that bad, isn’t it?”

  “Yes.” Her grin suggested it wasn’t too much of a concern.

  “Which is closer?” He was still getting the hang of village geography.

  “Bell Lane, but it’s uphill.”

  They headed for Bell Lane and waited a good twenty-five minutes. “Darn it,” Alice said. “Maybe I should have driven, but I’d have a sticky time claiming a trip to the flicks was ‘travel essential to the medical practice.’”

  “I don’t mind waiting with you.” And dash it all, they were alone in a fading an autumn evening. Not a soul for miles and the only sign of life the crows heading home overhead.

  Why waste the moment? He touched her neck. She smiled, angling her head to rub her face against his shoulder. It would be insufferably churlish to refuse her invitation. And stupid to boot.

  He stroked her check, then took her face between his hands, wondering what magic had happened that this wonderful woman wanted him. “Alice,” he whispered, and brushed her mouth with his. She was all sweetness and warmth and glorious woman and, for this wonderful moment in time, all his.

  And had her hands on his neck pulling him closer as her lips parted and her tongue found his. Dear heaven!

  She let out a little sexy sigh and deepened the kiss and he felt her desire in every fiber of his body. He was halfway tempted to let dinner and the flicks go hang and take the good sergeant up on his oblique offer of privacy. Her touch was sheer magic and her lips like potent wine.

  She pulled away. “The bus is coming.” Her eyes were gleaming with desire, and yes, she was right. He heard the engine change gears as it came up the hill. By the time it rounded the bend they were standing decorously side by side, and he was trying his damnedest to wipe the satisfied grin off his face.

  “Evening, Doctor,” the driver said as they got on. Any pretense that they were chance passengers neatly destroyed as Peter paid for two tickets. “Just visiting are you then?” he asked Peter.

  “Bert, this is my new assistant,” Alice explained.

  “Well then, welcome to the big city of Brytewood. Where did you come from?”

  Even greeted with such friendliness one hesitated to say, “Pentonville Prison.” He didn’t have to.

  “This here is the lad who saved all those children in the vicarage,” a voice called from the back of the bus. “You got a flippin’ hero on your bus, Bert Sharp!”

  Peter couldn’t see the helpful informant, but seemed half the population of the village was on the bus, and most of them added endorsements.

  “Good to meet you,” Bert said with a nod as he handed back change for a half crown. “Time to get going and I’ll have you in Leatherhead in record time.”

  “Would help if we left on time,” a woman with a large basket on her lap said.

  “Give the man a break, Mildred,” a man across the aisle from her said. “There’s a war on, you know.”

  Alice got a seat at the back after a tall man stood and offered her his; Peter settled for standing near the front. No one took too much notice of the Only Five Standing Passengers sign.

  Amazing really, the chatter and banter that went back and forth. It was more like a crowded bus in Spain or Italy than England. Not for the first time, Peter realized how the war seemed to break down reserve between strangers. Heck, he ended up talking about badger hunting with his two neighbors and he didn’t know the first thing about identifying an occupied sett.

  Not that he was fooled—he was only too aware that every single passenger was formulating wild and wonderful opinions as to what Dr. Doyle and her new assistant were doing going into Leatherhead on a Friday night. He was tempted to announce to the entire bus that he was in love with Alice Doyle.

  But that might be a bit much even in these not quite usual times.

  Bert Sharp did his best, taking a few bends at a speed that belonged on Brooklands Race Track, but they arrived safely and got off the bus to good wishes for the evening.

  So much for discretion.

  Still, Alice didn’t seem too worried, so why was he?

  “Any idea where you want to eat?” she asked as the bus moved on and most of the alighting passengers headed up High Street toward the Ace theater.

  “Since this is the first time in my life I’ve been here, I was rather hoping you’d have an idea.” At first glance the town looked half dead and the great gap, like a missing giant tooth between two buildings on the other side of the road, showed only too clearly that Jerry left his calling card here as well as Brytewood.

  “Would you go for good food in a not frightfully fashionable establishment?”

  If she was with him, he’d happily eat at a soup kitchen. “You know somewhere?”

  “Run by an old friend. Her husband got called up but she keeps it going. I like to stop by when I can.”

  She was right about the unfashionable bit. The Blue Parrot was a narrow restaurant at the bottom of the town but the food was good: great servings of steak and kidney pie and masses of potatoes and carrots. Nothing elegant, but delicious. Of course he was subjected to the scrutiny of Alice’s friend, Beryl, her mother, and sister, but he seemed to pass muster.

  “Let’s skip pudding,” Alice said as they were finishing.

  “They’re not good?” He’d rather liked the look of the apple crumble and custard a man at a nearby table was wolfing down.

  “They’re marvelous, but will still be just as good next time we come and it just occurred to me, we’re late for the cinema anyway, and if we leave now, we can walk down to the bus station and get the bus that leaves on the hour.

  “We could always have pudding at my house,” she added.

  “Would that be alright?” What about her grandmother?

  Alice nodded, the light of promise in her eyes.

  They got the bus, although it was closer to a quarter past the hour when it set off. Seemed they were beating most of the population of Brytewood home, which may well have been part of her idea.

  It was close to pitch dark when the bus dropped them off, but they both had torches in their pockets and it was an easy walk downhill. They didn’t talk much, just strolled hand in hand. Somewhere in the distance a vixen cried out, there was a smell of cut grass in the air, and the odd waft of manure.

  Country smells.

  A wondrously peaceful evening stroll with the woman he loved. He tightened his grasp on her hand, drew her close, and kissed her.

  “Be home soon,” she said.

  “Yes!”

  As they rounded the bend a dark shape swooped down on them. Damn! It was the thing! The…

  Peter was shaking as sheer terror washed over him, setting his teeth on edge as his skin itched and tightened around his face.

  He reached out to Alice, who’d stumbled, intending to put her behind him, but she’d regained her feet and stepped away. Toward the thing, the it, and was standing tall, facing it, and in the beam of his torch he caught her face pale in the shadows and her arms high, her finger pointing at it.

  “Go away, you have no place here! Go! Take your turmoil with you!”

  She was unbelievably brave, utterly courageous, and totally insane. “Go!” she repeated. “Go back to where you came from!”

  Amazingly, against all logic,
odds, or possibilities, the dark shape reared up and stumbled.

  “Begone!” she called, sounding like a wild woman or an ancient goddess. The shape disappeared.

  Peter caught her as she stumbled. “Alice, are you…”

  “I’m alright, honest, but let’s get home. Fast.”

  They ran as if the wild hunt pursued them.

  Perhaps it did.

  Chapter 31

  They covered the couple of hundred yards to the house at record-breaking speed, running hand in hand, and Alice slamming the door behind them and bolting it before collapsing into his arms.

  She was shaking. So, come to that, was he.

  Talk about terrifying! What had been frightening walking home with Joe Arckle was a soul-freezing horror with Alice. What if that hideous presence had harmed her?

  Not, he reflected, a real worry. “What did you do back there?” Was this Pixie magic? Was everything his grandmother and his old nanny said true after all?

  Alice looked up at him, not moving one inch from his tight embrace. “Honestly, Peter, I don’t know. I felt the malevolence and the sheer ill will in that…thing, and knew I wasn’t going to let it hang around here. My home. Brytewood.”

  A couple of days ago he’d have thought that statement fanciful. Not anymore. “But what did you do?”

  “I could feel it in my mind and told it to take a running jump. It did.”

  She was so wobbly he took her over to one of the easy chairs by the fireplace and led her gently into the chair. “You’re upset.” What a pointless statement. Surely he could do better than that.

  She shook her head and smiled. A weak smile that seemed to take a lot of effort, but it was a smile. And directed at him. “I feel as though I were run over by a steamroller.”

  “What happened, child?”

  Alice jumped and Peter turned around in surprise. Mrs. Burrows stood in the doorway, a shawl around her shoulders and oddly incongruous bright purple slippers on her feet. “Alice?” She came into the room. “Were you hurt?”