He fell into silence, the endless gaze resting on her as he awaited her next statement.
Butterflies battled within her, knocking frantic wings against her ribs as she grasped for some measure of calm. The Guardian hadn’t twitched a muscle, yet he loomed over her, a spectral shadow.
“Yes, well...I would beg a favor of you.”
His casual stance didn’t change nor did her sense of being thoroughly scrutinized, but something new pervaded the air between them, that breathless hush before a storm. Lenore cleared her throat.
“The sextons have bricked my father’s grave, but I fear it won’t be enough to deter the resurrectionists. I’m told the Guardians protect the dead from such men. I can pay you…”
Long fingers briefly brushed her glove, halting her movements as she reached for her reticule. Enthralled by the contrast of wraith-white hand against black glove, Lenore found it difficult to look up when the Guardian spoke.
“Do not trouble yourself, miss.” He glanced at the grave near her father’s. “There will be no criminal disinterments in Highgate. I protect all who rest here. Your father and the others will remain undisturbed.”
The hollow voice, with its hints of eternity and long night, raised chills on her arms, though now it was from fascination instead of fear. She lifted her veil to better see him and bit back a gasp. Pale as the dead he guarded, his features held a peculiar beauty highlighted by sharp cheekbones spaced wide and high, a long haughty nose and solemn mouth. He was a combination of sinister and fragile, unearthly and eerie…and familiar.
Some invisible tether anchored her to him, drew tight until she was nearly leaning into him, peering hard into those pinpoint white pupils. Her better judgment warned such a notion was impossible, yet she asked the question anyway.
“Do I know you?”
Something bright and hot ignited in that desolate gaze before guttering. The Guardian cocked his head to one side in a puzzled gesture. “Do you?”
Lenore almost leapt away, her cheeks hot with embarrassment. She yanked the veil down. “Forgive my presumption. Of course we don’t know each other. For a moment, you just reminded of someone I once…” She almost choked on the words. Two deep breaths and she managed to find her voice again. “I won’t take up more of your time. On behalf of my family, I thank you for your vigilance, sir.”
She broke all rules of polite convention and proper decorum and held out her hand. Even through her glove, pleasant tingles cascaded from the tips of her fingers to her shoulder when the Guardian clasped her palm lightly and bowed. A thick lock of white hair brushed her knuckles. Lenore imagined she felt its softness.
“I assure you, the pleasure is mine, Miss Kenward.”
Her hand twitched in his grasp, and he released her. “How do you know my name?”
His lips curved a little. “I read your father’s monument when it was delivered to Highgate. I assume that as his daughter, your surname is the same as his.”
Lenore almost groaned at her foolishness, but a tenacious certainty that she once knew this Guardian goaded her to push a little more despite the fact she was making a cake of herself. “How do you know I’m not married?”
“Because a husband of any worth would never leave a wife to grieve her parent alone in the graveyard.”
The words, spoken in that sepulchral voice, brought greater heat to Lenore’s cheeks. She’d never been so thankful for the half-blinding safety of her mourning veil and the murk of London’s filthy air. “You are very observant.” Thank God she sounded so collected in this strange conversation she’d impulsively instigated.
“A useful skill in my line of work, Miss Kenward.”
Lenore nodded and backed away. “I thank you again, sir, and bid you good day.” She pivoted, her skirts snapping around her legs, and strode toward the cemetery gates where carriage and coachman waited just outside the grand entrance.
Eager to flee the cemetery and the guardian’s deathless presence, the coachman all but tossed her into the carriage before leaping onto the coachbox. The horses lurched forward in their traces, hard enough to jolt Lenore backward and knock her bonnet askew. She turned for a last look at the keeper of the dead. He’d followed her and lingered beneath the gates’ stone archway, a statue himself wreathed in fog. She raised a hand in farewell. He did not return her salutation, but she fancied she heard his voice over the creak of carriage wheels.
“Until next time. My Lenore.”
CHAPTER TWO
Nathaniel watched Lenore Kenward’s carriage until it disappeared behind a tree-lined esplanade. His Lenore. Despair knifed through him, as cutting and painful as that first moment of recognition when he saw her alone at her father’s graveside.
Her mourning veil hid her face, but he’d recognize that proud posture anywhere, the graceful curves of her body swathed in yards of black paramatta silk. He’d envied the mist that swirled over her skirts and caressed her back.
As a Guardian, he stayed hidden in the shadows of Highgate’s crypts and sprawling oaks. His role was not to terrify the living but to protect their dead. He’d broken an unwritten rule amongst his kind, manifesting in the midst of the fog and frightening the clutch of mourners gathered nearby, but he couldn’t stay away.
Unlike him, she had changed very little since he last saw her five years earlier. His appearance was the stuff of nightmares, his aspect warped by the twisted ambitions of a crazed and soulless man. Lenore did not run away; she blanched with fear, but she didn’t run.
He drew no closer, unsure if she might yet change her mind and flee. Instead, she approached him with single-minded purpose, hesitating as she came nearer. She might be frightened, but it didn’t stop her from seeking him out. He’d almost smiled. She was still as firm-minded as he remembered.
When she spoke, the cane on which he leaned nearly snapped beneath his tightening fingers. He might not have forgotten her stubbornness, but the cadence of her voice had dimmed in his memory. Soft and sure, it caressed him as surely as if she reached out and stroked him with her hand, bringing back breathless recollections of a lost time. When she raised her veil to better see him, he’d almost dropped to his knees.
