The creaking sound next door had them both standing to attention. ‘Gray?’ The soft voice beyond the door was filled with sleep, but she sensed him, just as he had her. The bed creaked again, the mattress shifting as if she had sat up. ‘Gray? Is that you?’
In seconds she would come to the door and check. He knew that with the same certainty that he knew she would likely never forgive him for what he was about to do. He gestured frantically for Hadleigh to leave, feeling sick to his stomach and riddled with guilt at the only option fate had left him with, then answered, ‘Yes, my love. It’s me. I crept in. I hope you don’t mind.’ What else could he do but lie? As the lawyer hid in the shadows he grasped the handle and opened the door at the exact same moment as she did. She was smiling. Beautifully rumpled in the moonlight. ‘You crept in?’
‘Don’t hate me.’ He hated himself enough. This was the worst sort of betrayal. One she would likely never forgive him for if she ever found out. Their goodbye. ‘But I missed you.’
‘I missed you, too.’ Feeling like the worst sort of chancer, ne’er-do-well and scoundrel, he opened his arms and she stepped into them, and in doing so he fell into the biggest, deepest pothole of his life.
* * *
Thea woke late and Gray was gone. She wasn’t surprised. He was a gentleman despite his impulsive ways and he would want to protect her modesty. She could still see the indent his head had made on the pillow, still smell the lingering scent of his spicy cologne, so she wrapped her arms around it and hugged it close. It was a poor substitute for the man. She smiled as she pictured him unable to sleep and then doing the outrageous and coming to her in the night. It was such a spontaneous, devil-may-care, live-in-the-moment, Gray-like thing to do and hopelessly romantic. She still couldn’t quite believe it.
Then he had climbed into the bed beside her and, at her instigation, made love to her with such aching, impassioned tenderness that it had brought poignant tears to her eyes. His final words before she had drifted blissfully back off to sleep in his arms had also been heartfelt.
‘Just remember I love you. Always. No matter what. No matter how dire things are or how bad they seem.’
They made her sigh just thinking about them.
With an undisguisable spring in her step, she dressed and allowed her maid to fix her wayward hair loosely. Gray loved all her mad curls, so she would forgo the usual plethora of pins for him. She practically floated into her uncle’s sitting room to find him sat on a chair striking a pose as Harriet stood behind her easel, measuring his angles with her outstretched paintbrush while Bertie stood by, looking highly amused at the ridiculous tableau.
‘You look lovely today.’ He eyed her up and down appreciatively. ‘You’ve changed your hair. It’s softer. Suits you.’
‘Thank you. I feel lovely.’ She did. Warm and ripe and thoroughly loved.
‘Tuesdays will do that to a person.’ Bertie’s face was deadpan, but his eyes were dancing as if he knew she’d been thoroughly ruined and was happy to have been so. ‘Tuesdays...and handsome gentlemen with soppy black dogs.’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’ But her cheeks were heating at the memory of exactly how splendid her Tuesday had started. Harriet had never mentioned that particular bit of bed sport in all her descriptions, but it had been most enlightening. Her man had a very talented mouth.
Her man.
She wanted to sigh again at how marvellous that sounded, but withheld it because Bertie was grinning at her. ‘How is the portrait going?’
‘It’s at a critical stage. Frankly, I think it’s beyond saving. Your uncle, though, is quite delighted with it.’
‘Good heavens, then it must be bad.’ She wandered behind the easel and looked over Harriet’s shoulder. It was a definite face—that was something—not her uncle’s, but at least it had discernible features.
‘What do you think, darling?’ Her friend stepped back to admire her work, too.
‘Fabulous colours.’ The bold striped waistcoat jumped off the page, making her uncle’s vivid choices seem tame, but part of Uncle Edward’s hair was also apparently blue. Prussian blue, to be exact. She met his eyes and watched him stifle a chuckle. He really did have the most warped sense of humour. ‘I think you’ve really captured his essence.’
‘I’ve already had some footmen clear space in the gallery opposite dear old Pater. I decided he’d be able to avert his eyes if I was hung next to him and there’s no fun in that. He can glare at me in disappointment for eternity now.’ The chuckle escaped then and soon turned into raucous laughter. ‘The old grouch will be spinning in his grave.’
‘Has Lord Gray been to check on Archimedes yet?’ Any hope that she had made the question sound casual died when she watched the three of them share a very unsubtle, but pointed look.
‘Not as yet, darling. I’m sure he’ll be here presently. He does seem rather devoted...to poor Archimedes, of course.’ Harriet studied her thoughtfully. ‘You look different.’
Thea drifted to the sideboard to fix herself some tea. ‘It’s the hair. I’ve decided to give my scalp a holiday and stop nailing my coiffure to my skull.’ Once she was out of view of both her uncle and Bertie she couldn’t resist beaming at her friend, then walked two fingers along the edge of the sideboard. Two fingers which hesitated at the ledge, then leapt off the end. ‘Today, I am a quite different Thea from the one I was yesterday.’
Harriet grinned back, instantly understanding. ‘How positively splendid. Did you sleep well?’
‘I am thoroughly rested.’ Although now that she thought about it, she wouldn’t mind a passionate kiss to start the morning properly. ‘I might wander down to the stables to check on Archimedes.’
But Gray wasn’t in the stables and nor had he been there, which might have been odd considering he was usually up with the lark like Thea was, but, seeing as they had both used the bedtime hours for pursuits other than sleep, she wouldn’t blame him for sleeping in. She had, after all, and she had worn him out. Alone, she made no attempt to stifle the grin of achievement and decided to saddle a horse to ride to Kirton House instead and be unapologetic about the reason. She wanted to see him. Wanted to kiss him. Wanted to drag him back to the brook for more shamelessly wanton lovemaking.
* * *
But as soon as Kirton House came into view through the trees she saw something wasn’t right. There were strange men everywhere and lots of horses. Several wore uniform—she recognised it as that of the Excise Men—but Gray was nowhere to be seen. That made her panic and, recalling the overheard conversation from Ipswich, set her old, suspicious mind whirring.
Instinctively, she tied her horse to a branch out of sight and quietly picked her way through the copse by the brook to come level to the house without being seen. It was then she saw the guns. Big ones. Shotguns and pistols. So many of them in a huge crate, all being loaded and passed around like port after dinner to the forty or so strange men in the stable yard who appeared very confident handling them.
‘Hurry up, you fools! We don’t want to alert the whole of Suffolk to your presence. Unload and get inside!’ She recognised Lord Fennimore’s impatient bark and tried to pick him out from the crowd to no avail. Beyond, within the confines of the stable, were more men. She was certain she recognised the back of Gray’s aged cousin as he quickly disappeared through the wide door frame, but she was too far away to be certain.
Sensing something was now very wrong, Thea crouched low, darting across the meadow from ragged bush to ragged bush, getting as close to the outbuildings as she dared without leaving the safety of the tall grass. When that proved fruitless, she darted towards the rear of the stable, sinking her bottom to the ground and pressing her back against the slatted wood to attempt to hear what was going on inside, while castigating herself for her suspicious nature. Gray was different. She felt it in her bones. He was good and kind and...
‘I e
xpressly warned him not to seduce the chit!’ Lord Fennimore again. Angry.
‘Well, if you don’t mind me saying—’ A new voice. Aristocratic. Deep. ‘—it’s a damned good job he did. Their passionate little romance saved our bacon. We’d have been done for last night without his quick thinking.’
‘Something that would not have been necessary if you had stayed put last night and not risked the entire mission with your carelessness!’
‘Do you think it’s a real romance?’
‘Hard to say...’ Two more strange males, their tones teasing. ‘But from the look of him, there’s something there. I’ve never seen him quite so angry.’
‘Angry! Why, he’s positively seething. He looks ready to punch one of us at any second.’
‘Back off!’ Gray’s voice, accompanied by the noise of reins and buckles jangling.
‘I think he’s a bit taken with Miss Cranford.’ Thea’s hand covered her mouth a second before the wounded cry burst forth. She was the chit he had seduced? ‘He called her my love...’
Bile rose in her throat as the world shifted on its axis. Last night had been a lie? It had all been lies! The two slices of toast a winking Harriet had forced her to eat to keep up her strength threatened to make an instant reappearance at the bitter aftertaste of forbidden fruit. She could hear fate laughing at her in the background. Realising Impetuous Thea had fallen for another vulture. A bounder. A ne’er-do-well. A scoundrel who would make calculated, premeditated love to her to cover up whatever it was he was really doing.
She stumbled, half-running, half-crawling, back to the trees blindly, silent, bitter tears streaming down her cheeks at the universe’s cruel punishment. Her heart ripped callously in two.
Chapter Twenty-One
Gray had just slammed Hadleigh against the wall when he sensed her, then bolted from the stables like a man possessed to try to fix the unfixable. He frantically scanned the yard and the meadow, knowing she was there and that she was in pain, then saw the unmistakable glimpse of fiery copper hurtling through the trees. He tore after her, oblivious of the odd looks he was getting from his men and his friends. Nothing else mattered but reaching her and trying to limit the damage of whatever she had potentially seen, or, God help him, overheard.
‘Thea! Wait!’ He plunged into the trees, ignoring the branches that caught and tore his clothes and skin. ‘Thea! Let me explain!’
She was fast. His lungs burned with the effort it took to come within touching distance. He reached out his hand, his fingers grazing the back of her dress. ‘Please let me explain!’
She skidded to a halt then and finally turned to face him, small fists clenched, her face leached of all colour, the awful evidence of his betrayal etched plainly on her lovely face. ‘Explain? What is there to explain? You are a liar! A barefaced, shameless, heartless liar!’
‘I’m not...’ Yet another lie when she deserved the truth. ‘All right—I’ve lied, yes... But I had to... But not about the important things. I didn’t lie about us.’
‘Really? Then last night wasn’t a lie. There wasn’t someone with you when you claimed you couldn’t bear to spend another second without me? When you climbed into my bed? Made yourself at home in my body?’
‘There was, but...’
‘How could you!’ Her face crumpled, but she held back the sob. ‘I trusted you! I gave myself to you believing you were genuine, yet you played me all along! Your own cousin forbade you from seducing me, because clearly you do this sort of thing a lot. How you must have laughed when I did your dirty work for you! Gave myself freely! What a stupid, ignorant fool I am!’
He reached out to touch her and the stinging slap across the face caught him unawares, although it wasn’t anywhere near as painful as he knew he deserved. ‘Don’t touch me, Gray! Never touch me again!’ She hugged her arms around her body and put six feet of distance between them. He couldn’t blame her for that either. If he could have left himself standing somewhere and marched off in disgust, he would have, too. ‘Why me? Was it sport? My fortune? The challenge?’
‘I work for the government.’ The least he could do was give the whole truth, no matter how unpalatable it was. ‘For a covert agency called the King’s Elite. Lord Fennimore is my superior, not my cousin. We created that story as a cover, to attempt to infiltrate a dangerous smuggling ring and bring the ringleader to justice. I wish I could have told you all that, I really do, but I couldn’t. My mission had to take precedence over everything else—except it didn’t. You kept pulling me away from it. I’ve always been drawn to you. That part wasn’t a lie. All my background, everything about Cecily, all that is the honest truth, too. I’ve never lied to you about any of that.’ His voice was desperate. ‘In fact, I doubt you’ll believe me in light of what you now know, but you are the only person on this earth who knows me that well. But I was tasked with befriending your uncle. Ingratiating myself into his circle.’ He was spilling state secrets, breaking the law, but she was worth it. They were worth it. If he could make her understand.
‘My uncle?’ There were tears on her cheeks. More silently spilling over her long lashes. Tears he had caused. Each one like a knife to the chest.
‘We have intelligence which leads us to believe he is the leader of that smuggling gang.’
She baulked, her face paling further. ‘The cut-throat who murdered those men in Newgate?’ She staggered backwards towards the brook, her head shaking with denial. ‘That’s preposterous!’
‘Yesterday the Excise Men intercepted a smuggling vessel at Leiston.’ The words felt like dust in his throat, but they now had a direct link to Gislingham Hall. The warrants had been issued. Her uncle’s arrest was imminent. Sooner, seeing as she had overhead things their planned midnight raid would have to be brought forward. ‘An express arrived at the hall within two hours of the raid. At roughly the same time, we were able to link the ship to a storehouse in Ipswich. It was heavily guarded. A few hours ago, we raided it and took every man within it prisoner. I am sorry to tell you that, as we suspected, it was filled with illegal French brandy.’ The pretty, trusting mouth he had kissed just hours ago hung slack, disbelieving. ‘But there was more. Guns, tea, tobacco...money. It hasn’t all been counted yet, but we estimate there is in excess of twenty thousand pounds in coin alone.’ There was no point sparing her from the most damning connection. The one he still struggled to come to terms with himself. ‘According to the landlord, the storehouse is rented by a Mr Walsham.’
‘Bertie?’
‘And he’s seen a carriage bearing the Gislingham crest there on more than one occasion in the last few weeks. Late at night. But while the witnesses cannot describe the passengers’ faces, they all clearly remember the two canes he needed to lean on as he was helped out of the coach.’
‘I don’t believe it. I won’t believe it! This is just more deception piled on your lies! Neither my uncle nor Bertie would ever do such things. They are not criminals!’
He rifled in his pocket for the charred piece of note, knowing she needed to see the proof with her own eyes. ‘Do you recognise this handwriting?’
She stared at it, then flinched, recoiling at the sight, circling around him warily. He held it out. ‘Look at it closely. It is a matter of national importance.’ She took it and stared, her features frozen but her eyes tragic. She knew it. It went no way to making him feel better. ‘Men have died. Too many of them. It’s my job to see that nobody else does. Please, Thea—tell me. Do you recognise this handwriting?’
‘No!’ Then he felt her palms flat against his chest as she lunged, sending him flying backwards into the water. By the time he hauled himself up the bank, he heard the horse’s hooves kick into a gallop and, sopping wet and utterly devastated, was forced to watch her ride like the wind towards her house, the precious, tiny, damning piece of evidence gone with her.
* * *
Thea had no memory of the sh
ort journey home. Not when her mind was reeling and the ground had been pulled from beneath her feet in more ways than one. But she miraculously made it in one piece and headed to the sitting room blindly.
‘How could you?’ Her temper so hot and bubbling above the surface, she swept her hand violently across the mantelpiece, sending all the tawdry silk arrangements flying.
Her aunt stared back at her blankly. ‘Is everything all right, dearest?’
Thea held out the damning charred fragment. The one covered in her aunt’s small, neat writing. Needing to piece together some sense out of the tempest of chaos swirling in her head. ‘I know! I know all about your warehouse and the smuggling.’
Caro gently grasped the toxic piece of paper and stared at it silently. ‘How did you get this?’
‘The Excise Men retrieved it from a ship they boarded yesterday.’ Her aunt sat up straighter. ‘They’ve impounded all your brandy!’
All those meaningless lunches, all those shopping trips. Just lies. So many lies and all from people she cared about.
‘But how did you come to have this?’
‘They asked me if I recognised the handwriting! They caught the Captain trying to burn it.’ Her aunt’s calmness was staggering. Thea was accusing her of hideous, criminal acts and she hadn’t even left her chair. Hadn’t looked outraged or denied any of it. ‘I snatched it and came here to confront you. I can’t believe it...’
‘Did you tell them it was mine?’
‘No. I ran. I didn’t want to believe it... But they can’t be far behind me. They have a small army.’ Good grief, this was all so surreal. Why didn’t her aunt deny it? ‘Is it true? Have you killed men?’
‘Not personally.’ Her aunt stood and began to pace, her eyes oddly blinking as she tapped the burned piece of paper against her other hand. ‘This is all very unfortunate, but not entirely unexpected.’ She sighed, as if it was of no matter rather than the most catastrophic and devastating news Thea had ever heard. For a woman who stressed about every wrinkle, her composure at the bombshell was staggering. ‘Are you certain you never told them whose writing this is?’
The Disgraceful Lord Gray Page 23