Free Etiquette With The Devil by Rebecca Paula Page B

of green water feeling much the same. An object in motion that had suddenly come to rest. Since then, he had lost his brother and his sister-in-law to typhoid, and been charged with the livelihoods of three children and a small exotic menagerie. There was no time to rest.
    Besides, what did he know of family?
    Bly shared a heartless laugh with the lonely darkness of his makeshift office. He pushed away from the desk and staggered to his feet, drifting forward through the hall until he stood on the landing of the grand staircase in the foyer, gawking up at the ghost of the family portrait, long since removed and marked only by a box of vibrant wallpaper. He hadn’t looked upon it since he was a boy, but he felt it there all the same. His family’s eyes were still filled with condemnation toward him. There was still the uncomfortable distance his father kept from his mother in the painting. Those sad eyes of hers. That firm hand of his father he knew all too well wrapped tightly over his shoulder.
    To hell with that portrait and his godforsaken family.
    Burton Hall wasn’t haunted, but since returning, his spirit certainly was.
    He shook his head clear and clutched the railing, pulling himself up the stairs one laborious step at time, as if his boots had been weighted with concrete blocks. He was about to turn the corner once he reached the second floor for his quarters, until a faint glow at the end hallway caught his eye.
    Bly walked down the tiled hallway, noting the previous dullness of it had been polished to a gleam. Bent over a metal bucket, illuminated by flickering candles on either side of the hallway, was the sleeping figure of Clara. A wet rag had fallen from her hand onto the floor next to her dress, another ghastly frock.
    She was too stubborn for her own good.
    Earlier in the day, she insisted upon airing out the future schoolroom, even after he chased her through the house demanding that she take an afternoon off. She insisted that things be brought to order for the sake of the children as she stretched precariously on a ladder, washing down dusty walls. Routine was the word she chose to hiss at him when he pressed her on the point. It was not a new concept. He had been an army man, after all. Still, the word from her lips was more like a punch than a reprimand.
    “Dawson,” he whispered. Bly waited, but she didn’t stir. With a pointed jab, he shoved his finger into her bony shoulder. Her lips parted and issued a soft sigh, but she didn’t wake.
    “Dawson,” Bly said again, his voice a deep rumble. His hand hovered above her shoulder, scared that if he were to touch her again, he would break her. Judging by the stillness of her features, she was lost deep in sleep.
    With an irritated sigh, he pushed aside his foolish fear and placed his hand on her shoulder. She stirred slightly, making a sleepy murmur as lush as a pluck of a sitar. Her eyes fluttered open—piercing gray. It felt as if she ran him through with a blade to his chest. Clara moved her lips as if to speak, but sleep won once more.
    “I should leave you here,” he said. “You could use a night of sleeping on the tile floor for your stubbornness.” He thought of the way the late afternoon sun had danced around her as she stood on the ladder, wagging her finger and wet rag at him. The ice in her eyes while the world burned around her. “You probably wouldn’t even feel the cold, would you, you icy creature?”
    He imagined her indignant outrage if she were awake and he smiled, wishing that she were awake to challenge him.
    “Well,” he spoke aloud once more, rising to his feet. The hallway rocked beneath him, his knees threatening to give. If he didn’t bring her to bed, he would soon be passed out beside her. Bly extinguished the candles and bent down. “I hope you don’t wake and hit me, you impertinent woman.”
    He lifted her into his arms, stilling as her body’s heat seared his skin. It felt as if he were picking up a hot