Another sound like a shot, and now she was starting to wake up properly.
Rowena reached out a hand to his chest, as though for comfort. “Do you think we are in danger?” She whispered desperately. “Because of your friend – because of the spy?”
James’ heart was racing, and not just because of the potential danger that seemed to be waiting for them downstairs: there were certain parts of his anatomy standing to attention at the mere touch of her hand on his body.
Opening his mouth to say that it was incredibly unlikely that the noise below had anything to do with them at all, but of course it was not impossible, when a man and a woman burst into their room.
Screaming, Rowena scrabbled to find the blanket and cover herself completely with it. James was startled, but not recognising either of them and unwilling to show fear at this early stage in the proceedings, he merely sat upright in the bed, and stared at them.
It was difficult not to laugh. How ridiculous this all was, James thought. He could not have dreamt this up if he had tried!
“Rowena!” The woman cried, and rushed towards her.
James’ heart went cold. They knew Rowena – and that made it very possible that they could make public what they had discovered here. What a fool he was: they should have been up and out of this bedchamber as soon as possible. Now they were found and discovered – but by whom?
Before he could even consider enquiring, the man stepped forward.
“Sir, I challenge you to a duel,” he said in magnificent tones, “for Miss Rowena Kerr’s honour.”
Something fell to the ground, and James peered down to look at it. “Sir, I think you have dropped something.”
The man stared at him angrily. “That is my glove, you fool – I demand satisfaction!”
James stared at him, utterly bewildered, and then down at Rowena who was attempting to hide herself completely. “Is this some jest, Rowena?”
“No jest, sir!” The man stared at him with an expression of disgust that James was frankly unaccustomed to being on the receiving end of – more often than not, it was he giving such a look.
Just as confused, James murmured to Rowena, “Is this the man with whom you eloped?”
A bitter laugh escaped her lips as Rowena gave up the fight to be completely hidden, and emerged to sit up next to him, still pulling up the blanket to cover her breasts.
She shook her head. “I have no idea who that gentleman is, but that lady there is Miss Adena Garland.”
James’ eyes darted over to the woman who had now seated herself on the bed on Rowena’s side, and saw her flush with pleasure.
“Actually,” she said in a lilting voice heavy with pride, “I am Adena, Marchioness of Dewsbury now.”
It was clear that Rowena had no idea her friend had been so married, and the excited mutterings between them was clouding James’ brain. Marchioness of Dewsbury – so this gentleman must be…
“I know that title,” he said slowly, his gaze returning to the man who was still looking daggers at him. “My lord, I have not had the pleasure of meeting you before. I am – ”
“I have no wish for pleasantries,” the Marquis of Dewsbury snapped.
Adena raised a placating hand towards her husband, and murmured, “Luke…”
“Sir, after eloping and not marrying Miss Rowena Kerr, I have no choice but to call your honour into question,” breathed the Marquis of Dewsbury heavily. “I may not be a relative of hers, but with no brother and a father still in London, I am here to defend her.”
And James could see the fierceness of his words, how desperately he believed it. What a confusion – but surely, one easy to put right.
“No, Adena, you do not understand,” Rowena was saying, “this is not – ”
“Luke, turn away to the wall, please,” Adena said over her friend, nodding at her husband. “I need to get Rowena dressed and ready to depart.”
James stared in confusion as her husband immediately obeyed, turning to face away from the bed to stare at the wall. Utterly bewildered, he muttered, “I have no understanding of what is happening here.”
Rowena had been pulled out of bed by her friend, blushing at her utter nakedness, and was being hurriedly dressed by her friend.
This was intolerable, thought James. This misunderstanding had to be corrected.
“Marquis, there has been a mistake,” he began. “How did you find us? I mean – ”
“You have besmirched my wife’s friend,” the Marquis snapped angrily to the wall. “I will challenge you on her honour with a duel, and if you are too cowardly to meet the challenge then I will know you for what you already are, you cur!”
James felt the anger rising in his chest and into his head, but in part it was directed at himself. He knew that he was technically in the wrong here: as ill-informed as the Marquis was, his instincts were good. He had certainly taken the virtue and innocence of Rowena, though they had both enjoyed it greatly, and he would probably do the same thing if a man had done such a thing to his sister, if he had one to protect.
For only the second time in his life, a feeling of great impulsiveness crept over him. Well, why not reclaim his honour and Rowena’s at the same stroke?
“I accept your duel,” he replied quietly to the back of the Marquis’ head.
“No!” Rowena cried out as she forced her arm through her gown. “No, James, you must not – ”
“James?” Adena said quickly. “But that was not the name on the note you left your parents. What – ”
“No time like the present,” snarled the Marquis, who took a step to his left and wrenched open the door.
James rose swiftly from the bed and grasped at his clothes. He was a relatively good man with a blade, he thought as he pulled on his shirt – the best fencer at his club. Surely a duel was very similar to that, without much difference save the potential fate at the event.
He swallowed as he pulled on his boots. Perhaps he had been hasty in accepting this duel; for all he knew, this Marquis could be a champion at his own club. They had certainly not moved in the same circles before, and he had no knowledge of his skill with a sword. What if –
“Are you coming, man, or no?” The Marquis’ irritated voice rose from the stairs.
“Now,” James managed, almost out of breath at the speed at which he had dressed.
Adena was still speaking. “But Rowena, he is not the man – ”
“James, do not be so foolish!” Rowena cut across her, and as James strode purposefully out of the room he had two pairs of footsteps following him.
“This is no sight for a lady.” The Marquis was standing at the bottom of the stairs, and James saw him shake his head at his wife. “Adena, please – ”
“Do you think I am likely to stay here while you risk your life?” She shot back.
James smiled, despite his racing heart, as he reached the Marquis. “I can see why Rowena and your wife are friends.”
But there was no answering smile in the Marquis’ face. “Outside. I demand satisfaction.”
And so here we are, thought James with an almost bitter smile. A short journey by coach was all I intended, and here I stand outside the King’s Head Inn, of all places, with the memories of a night filled with overwhelming pleasure just disappearing as I fight for the honour of a woman who had already lost it when I encountered her.
I wanted excitement, he thought ruefully. And now more than anything, I want a second who knows his way around a pistol. Never before has the phrase ‘be careful what you wish for’ been more true.
“Here you go, sir.”
The last word was uttered with such contempt that James almost blanched, and he opened up his hand willingly without seeing properly what was being handed to him.
It was a pistol. James swallowed. He had assumed swords; although most duels were fought with pistols these days, it was more common across the high nobility to favour the old ways. Swords were preferable. He knew where he was with a
sword. But a pistol…
“Do you…ah, ‘tis no matter.” James could see immediately that any request would be ignored by this man who looked at him as though he was nothing, as though he were dirt on his shoes. “But do you not wish to know the name of the man whom you have accused?”
He saw the battle on the Marquis’ face: to say yes was to admit interest, but to say no would be churlish. His breath rose in the cold as the four of them stood in the cool morning air.
Good manners eventually won out. “To whom am I speaking, sir?”
There was little grace in his words, and James saw Rowena glower at him which only made his heart beat faster.
“I am James, Viscount of Paendly,” James said in the strongest voice he could muster.
He saw the surprise in the Marquis’ face. Evidently, he had not expected a titled man to stand before him, and it looked as though there was a moment’s hesitation in his eyes.
“Luke, I must speak with you,” Adena came rushing towards him. “I think we have made a – ”
“I had never expected a voyage with a viscount to end with the dishonouring of an innocent woman,” the Marquis said brusquely, ignoring his wife and indicating that the two men should move forward with his outstretched arm.
James’ heart was beating even faster now, and the voice of Rowena calling “No!” seemed to be moving further and further away from him. Or perhaps it was because he was moving: the blood pounding in his ears was enough to distract him entirely, so it was almost impossible to tell.
He had hoped for something exciting, but surely even Rowena herself could not have guessed that his impulsive decision to offer her passage closer to home could have led to this!
“Twenty paces? To first blood?”
James nodded, and the Marquis stared at him for a moment, as though unsure exactly whether to say anything more – but he decided against it. Turning away from him, the Marquis took a stride forward and counted, “One.”
James hurried to do the same. One, two, three: each step took him closer to his fate, and his heart seemed to know it, pumping faster and faster as though it was attempting to use up all its strength, make up for any time that would be lost.
Out of the corner of his eye, James could see Rowena standing there, her gaze fixed on him, turning as he moved like a sunflower followed the sun.
An overwhelming feeling of love poured over him. She was worth this, Rowena Kerr was: she was worth almost everything. There was no woman like her, no one at all, and to just spend that night in her arms was almost enough.
And then he remembered the feel of her breasts in his hands, and the way her hair flowed over him, and the twist of the smile and look in her eyes as he took her to ecstasy, and James knew that he would never allow any man to touch her again.
She belonged to him, and he belonged to her – and this duel would seal it.
He stopped, and turned on the spot to face the Marquis.
“Ready?”
James nodded, not trusting his voice to speak lest it shake and reveal his fear. The pistol was heavy in his hand. How long had it been since he had last fired a pistol? He was a little rusty, but as long as his eye was still in…and there he had been, not three days hence, laughing at Giselle for suggesting a little target practice. By God, that he had taken her up on her offer!
Adena bit her lip and took a step forward, a white handkerchief in her hands. The beating of his heart pounded ever harder in James’ ears.
This was it.
As the white material fluttered down to the ground, James raised the heavy pistol and fired – and felt a terrible pain flare in his other arm.
8
“Careful, man!” James winched as another bandage was tightened around his left arm.
Rowena could not help but smile at the outraged indignity on his face as her friend Adena glared back at him.
“If you would just hold still for five minutes, then this ordeal would already be over,” she snapped back. “For both of us!”
Rowena’s smile widened as she watched James open his mouth to retaliate, and then immediately wince as Adena twitched the bandage once more. To know that he was not in danger relieved her heart of so much concern. It was enough to know that he was well. It was enough to know that he was safe.
“Do not be such an infant,” retorted Luke, and Rowena was forced to hide her smile as the Marquis of Dewsbury – her friend’s husband, she had to remind herself, for it was as much of a shock to her to discover the Marquis standing in their bedchamber as it was for James – grimaced as Adena poked his leg to keep him quiet.
“Will both of you hush and be still?” Adena muttered, carefully tying a small knot in the bandage around James’ arm, as the two gentlemen sat side by side on the bed. “It may be early, but you will wake up the entire place with your yammering if you cannot stay quiet.”
She looked up at Rowena as she handed her friend another clean strip of linen – donated by the fearful innkeeper, who looked as though he would rather not know that an illegal duel had taken place at his inn – and the two friends exchanged a glance: half mirth, half relief.
“If you had not been so rash to jump to a fight,” Adena continued, turning to face her own husband now, who had the good grace to look a little sheepish, “then you would not have to put up with the pain now, then would you? All that running about in the carriage from inn to inn, searching for Rowena, and you both leapt to attack each other!”
The two men murmured something incomprehensible, and quelled as Adena glared at them.
James looked up at Rowena, and smiled gently, holding out his hand, which she immediately took. No words were needed between them: she could not help but be impressed with him, and it would not do to say such a thing before others.
Watching, as she had been, from the side lines, it had been immediately clear that James had found his mark but had no wish to kill. The cut that Adena was so fastidiously seeing to on Luke’s leg was but a scratch: the bullet had barely touched him, and but for the heat of the moment, there would barely by a mark on him.
Unwilling to kill, but able. Ready to protect her honour, defend it, risk his own life for it, but determined not to take a life himself.
She stared into his sparkling eyes, and wondered whether she would ever meet a man that she could love more than he – for she did love him. How could she not? He was everything that she wanted from a man, everything that Oscar Bentley was not: brave, thoughtful, insightful, caring.
As Adena clucked around her charges, Rowena tried to ignore the growing pressure on her hand from his that matched the growing pressure on her lungs. His eyes did not waver from hers, and she felt herself falling into them, unable to breathe for love of him.
There was something between them, she knew it. She could feel it and surely he could too. But there was no agreement between them. Marriage had not been spoken of, a proposal was not necessary. She had taken him to her bedchamber, that was true, knowing what would happen – but there had seemed no other alternative. She had wanted him, and her honour was lost, and what else could she lose but her heart?
“There.” Adena’s voice cut through her thoughts and jerked her to the present. James dropped her hand, and it fell empty and cold to her side. “The best thing you can do now is rest, and put as little weight on that leg,” looking pointedly at her husband, “and that arm,” turning to glare at James, “as possible.”
“Yes ma’am,” said Luke with a lazy grin, which quickly vanished as she gave him what Rowena had always called, ‘Adena’s look’.
“Let me help you take these downstairs,” Rowena said hastily, lest James say a single word as that was likely to set her friend off when she was in such a temper.
She gathered up the excess linen strips, and tugged at Adena’s arm. “Come on.”
Leaving the two men to sit together in silence – a far greater punishment, thought Rowena with a smile, then any duel – she stepped towards the door as her friend
followed her.
“Men,” Adena muttered under her breath as they moved down the stairs. “Such babies.”
Rowena shivered. The thought that one, or both of them could have died over her rash decision to take pleasure with another: it was enough to make anyone stop and consider their actions.
“You are cold – and mayhaps in shock a little, too,” Adena stopped on the stairs, and took the linens from her. “Run back upstairs and get your shawl, and you and I can break our fasts downstairs by the fire.”
“I am quite well,” protested Rowena, but one look from her friend was enough. “I will go and retrieve my shawl,” she said meekly.
The door to her chamber was slightly ajar when she reached it, and just as she reached out her hand to push it open, Rowena heard something that made her stop and pause.
“…still not want to marry her?”
Heart racing, heart horrified, Luke’s words echoed around the room for several seconds before she heard James’ answer.
“My good man, I never intended to marry her in the first place!” James voice was exasperated, a little irritated, but clear through the gap in the door. “May I remind you that I am not the one that she actually eloped with?”
Rowena’s cheeks crimsoned, but there was no one to see them. Stood as she was inches away from the door, she was unable to see anything but a chink of light, but the words spoken were easy to hear.
“Nonetheless,” came Luke’s reply, “after taking her innocence, what else did you think you were going to do?”
Her fingers were still outstretched, and as though unable to stop herself, Rowena pushed it forward just an inch, her heart pounding and her blood boiling.
A glimpse of James appeared in the gap. He was smiling, and he shrugged with a wince as he replied, “I never had any intention of marrying her, and that was never promised. Understand, man, she wanted me to make love to her, and I was not strong enough to say no.”
Shock and pain ricocheted through Rowena’s body as her mouth fell open in silent dismay. She had had no expectations, certainly, but it was devastating to hear that James had no feelings for her at all.
Ravishing Regencies: The Complete Series: A Steamy Regency Romance Boxset Page 41