It was Tarquin who spoke. Tarquin who turned his back but held the lantern out still. “Outside already. Marcus is with them. They’re fine.”
Darius had already pulled his trousers on but Eliza couldn’t seem to find her gown, her attention suddenly on her husband’s back as he tightened his laces. Scars crisscrossed the expanse of skin from the top of his neck to reach below the band of his trousers. How had she not felt it against her fingertips?
He hadn’t noticed her staring when he came to her shoulders with the robe he’d worn earlier, wrapping it about her while he snapped questions. “Accident?”
“Not likely,” Tarquin snorted. “The window was wide open.”
“What alerted you?” Darius asked as he took her hand, guiding her bare feet around the glass from the broken bottle and then through the door and down the stairs. She couldn’t seem to tear her eyes away from the puckered skin over his ribs, some marks raised and still looking angry, some older, glistening white and flatter and smoother than the others.
“I was on watch in the house and Morphett outside. He noticed the window open and came in to report when we heard glass shatter.”
“How much damage is there?” Eliza asked, slightly out of breath and mentally shaking herself free of the images of Darius’s scarred back, the skin broken and bleeding at some point in his pirate’s life.
“Hard to say. The boys were dousing the flames when I ran to wake the house. Went for the children and men higher up first.”
“Well done,” Darius said as he practically threw Eliza at Tarquin and then barged past them towards the study without a backwards word.
Eliza let Tarquin guide her outside, the smoke thick in the entryway despite the front doors being wide open. She coughed a little but then they were out in the cold night, the air clean but freezing rain falling steadily. A warm coat was draped over her shoulders and head as the two headed for the well-lit barn.
Nathanial stood by the double doors pulled almost all the way shut, the pistol in his hand raised when he heard them coming.
“Put that gun down,” Eliza called to him, fearing her own brother would accidentally shoot her.
She could have wept when she saw Grace, Gabriella and Ethan huddled together in one of the empty stalls. “You’re all well?” she asked as she fell to her knees and wrapped the two younger children in her arms, kissing them both on the head. She shrugged the coat off and handed it to Gabriella who shivered in her nightgown.
Ethan spoke first, his voice sure and strong but a slight tremor giving away his fear. “I thought you weren’t going to get out of there.”
“I was perfectly safe,” she assured the boy but in her mind she knew how badly this night could have turned for all of them. Had Darius not set a watch, the house would have burned and them with it.
“Where is Darius?” Nathanial asked from his stance by the door, Tarquin having gone back to the house to help.
“With his men,” she told him.
“What do you suppose happened?” This from Grace.
“I honestly don’t know.”
“One of Papa’s enemies?” Gabriella suggested.
Eliza certainly hoped not. She shook her head. “It was most likely an accident. A candle blown over in the wind, falling too close to a curtain perhaps.”
“We were supposed to be safe,” Nathanial muttered beneath his breath but Eliza heard the words and hoped her siblings had not.
Darius entered the barn then, ash up his arms and dusting his hair, his trousers wet from the knees down. “Nothing to worry about,” he said with more joviality than she could have mustered this night or any other where they could have all died in their sleep.
“What happened?” Ethan asked.
Darius kneeled in front of the boy and was almost knocked over when Ethan jumped against him, his little arms around Darius’s scarred neck. “A stupid accident. I must have left a lantern burning when I went up to bed. The window was open and the wind must have knocked it over.”
Nathanial’s intake of breath was audible and Eliza turned to silence him with a glare. Only the younger children would believe the lie but believe it they needed to. She would not have her brother too scared to go to sleep. Not again.
“Did the house burn down?” Ethan asked.
Darius chuckled and lifted him in his arms. “Not this night.”
“You shall have to be more careful in the future,” the little boy admonished with a yawn.
“Yes I shall,” Darius replied with a grin over his head. “Is everyone all right?”
“You’re naked,” Grace said with a giggle.
Eliza smothered a chuckle of her own with a cough. “It’s not polite to point out the state of a man’s undress, Grace. Neither is it polite to stare.”
“But he’s naked. Isn’t that impolite? Or is it just improper? Besides, you were also staring.”
“I think it’s time to go back to bed,” came Eliza’s reply. It was incredibly inappropriate for the girls to see Darius only wearing his trousers but there hadn’t been time to dress properly. She was just grateful that their attention was on him and not the fact that apart from a man’s robe, she was also naked.
Not trusting the task to anyone else, Eliza tucked the two youngest children into bed, then made sure Gabriella had everything she needed. It was decided that Nathanial would watch over them all despite Tarquin already vowing to do the same. When Darius pulled gently on her hand to draw her away, both man and boy had taken up chairs in the hall, a little table between them with cards being shuffled quietly.
She pulled back. “I should stay with them tonight. They’ll be scared.”
“My men won’t sleep tonight, Eliza. Nothing else will happen.”
“Good night,” Eliza called over her shoulder. She was too exhausted to argue.
Instead of going back to their room, Darius led Eliza back down the stairs once more but
