More or Less a Temptress

by Anna Bradley

  “Foolish!” Hyacinth leapt to her feet, angry color rising in her cheeks. “In case you’ve forgotten, that reckless, foolish plan of mine happened to work!”

  “Dumb luck, and nothing more. If a single thing had gone wrong, what do you suppose would have happened, Hyacinth?” The anger and fear Lachlan had been struggling to control rushed back to the surface, making his voice harsh. “What if Isla and Lord Sydney hadn’t reached you in time? What if Dixon discovered what you were about? Damn you, he could have hurt you! Do you think I ever could have forgiven myself if he had, Hyacinth? When I first saw you, standing there in that damn library with your torn gown, I thought—” Lachlan dragged a hand down his face, bleak despair chasing the anger from his voice. “Jesus, I’ve never been more terrified in my life.”

  Silence descended on the room. Lady Chase’s weeping came to an abrupt halt. No one moved or even seemed to draw a breath, until at last Lady Huntington’s delicate cough broke the silence. Lachlan came back to himself to find everyone in the room staring at him. Both Ciaran and Isla wore identical knowing grins on their lips, but Lady Chase’s mouth had gone slack with shock, and Finn was gaping at Lachlan and Hyacinth in astonishment.

  “My goodness,” Lady Chase croaked at last, raising a bony hand and pointing at Lachlan. “Mr. Ramsey is…why, I don’t know how I didn’t see it before, but I believe Mr. Ramsey is in lo—”

  “I still don’t understand this.” Finn shot Lady Chase a warning look, then cleared his throat, and fixed a stern look on Lachlan. “Before I left London, you swore to me you’d protect Hyacinth, but from what I’ve heard so far, it sounds as if you failed to keep your promise.”

  Hyacinth had resumed her seat, but now she shot to her feet again. “No, he didn’t! Indeed, you’re wrong, Finn! He—”

  “I did fail.” Lachlan met Finn’s gaze without flinching. “I never trusted Lord Dixon. I thought he was a scoundrel from the start, but I didn’t act quickly enough. By the time I did, Hyacinth had already put herself at risk. I should have stopped it long before then. It’s a miracle it didn’t turn out worse.”

  Isla made an impatient noise at that, and every head in the room turned toward her. “I’m tired of you taking blame upon yourself you don’t deserve, Lachlan. How could you have stopped Lord Dixon, when only Hyacinth and I knew about his threats? As for his being a card cheat—”

  “Threats? Card cheat?” Lady Chase fanned herself with her handkerchief. “Oh, my goodness. Someone fetch my smelling salts!”

  Lady Huntington and Hyacinth both hurried to tend to Lady Chase. Ciaran turned to Isla with a sardonic, “Well done,” and Finn, pushed to the last degree of his patience, thundered over the tumult, “For God’s sake, will someone please tell me what the devil happened in Lady Entwhistle’s bloody library?”

  Lady Huntington was waving smelling salts under Lady Chase’s nose with one hand, and patting Hyacinth’s hand with the other. “I’m certain there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for all of it.”

  “At this point, I’d settle for any explanation.” Finn turned his glower on Lachlan. “Well?”

  “There is an explanation, but you won’t find it reasonable. It begins with a lie I told you when we arrived in London.”

  It was a bald, abrupt confession, but Lachlan was no longer under any illusions about the damage a secret could cause, both to those who kept it, and those it was kept from. He wanted it out.

  Finn reacted much as one might expect when he discovers he’s been deceived. His eyes narrowed, and his face hardened. “Very well. What did you lie about?”

  “It wasn’t a lie!” Isla broke in. “It was, well, we didn’t tell you the entire truth about why we left Scotland, but we didn’t lie about it, precisely.”

  “We hid the truth. Same damn thing as a lie, I’m afraid.” Ciaran glanced at Lachlan. “But it wasn’t just Lachlan who did it. We all did.”

  “If Ciaran’s defending me,” Lachlan said, “This must be worse than I thought.”

  Ciaran shrugged. “We’re in it together, Lach. We have been from the start. I believe you’ve mentioned that a few times since we left Scotland.”

  “I have. I didn’t think you were listening.”

  Another shrug. “I wasn’t. Until now.”

  A long, silent look passed between them, then Lachlan gave his brother a half-smile, and turned to face Finn again. “My father, Niall Ramsey—” He broke off abruptly, shook his head, and began again. “Niall Ramsey, Ciaran and Isla’s father, died last year. Our mother,” he included Finn in his glance, “Was never the same afterwards. Looking back, I think we all knew she wouldn’t live long after he passed, and she didn’t. We buried her less than a year later, but it wasn’t just grief over his death than sent her into an early grave.”

  Finn remained silent, his arms folded over his chest, waiting.

  A corner of Lachlan’s lip turned up, but his smile was bitter. “Since the night we arrived in London, I’ve marveled over the irony of it, but in the end it’s a simple enough thing. One way or another, our crimes catch up to us.”

  Finn stared at Lachlan, his face expressionless. “Indeed. What crimes would those be?”

  Lachlan wasn’t looking at Finn anymore. He was looking at Hyacinth, and his voice dropped to a hoarse whisper. “That first night, you accused me of being a murderer. You were right all along, leannan. I am a murderer. Before we left Scotland, I killed a man.”

  Both Lady Chase and Lady Huntington gasped, and their faces went white, but Finn, oddly enough, didn’t even twitch. He was watching Hyacinth, assessing her reaction, his eyes narrowed in thought. After a moment, he turned back to Lachlan, an eyebrow raised in question. “It’s not as simple as that. Let’s have the rest of it.”

  “Why should you think there’s more? Is it so hard to believe I’m a killer?”

  “Yes,” Finn answered at once. “It is.”

  Lachlan stared at him, at the brother he hadn’t trusted, the brother he’d lied to, the brother he might never have known had circumstances been different, and something cracked open in his chest.

  “You’re right, Lord Huntington. There is more. Much more.” Isla got to her feet to stand beside Lachlan. “It wasn’t a murder, but an accident. A terrible accident. Lachlan was protecting me from…well, from someone we thought we had every reason to trust. It’s a long story, but for now you only need to understand this man, he…he tried to hurt me. He attacked me. Lachlan heard me screaming, came running, and pulled him off me, but my attacker—he stumbled and fell, and struck his head on a heavy wooden beam on the way down. He died instantly.”

  For a long moment, the only sound in the room then was the hiss and crackle of the fire, but then Lady Huntington rose to her feet, crossed the room, and put an arm around Isla’s shoulders. “Oh, my dear,” she murmured, gathering Isla into her arms. “Oh, Isla.”

  “If you ask me, the scoundrel got what he deserved,” Ciaran said. “But the rest of the townspeople didn’t share that opinion. Lochinver is a small village. Too small for us, after James Baird’s untimely demise. If we hadn’t left on our own, I have no doubt they would have run us out, or worse.”

  “We never would have known any of you then,” Isla added softly. “At the time, leaving Lochinver felt like the worst thing that could ever happen to us, but now, well, it’s strange, isn’t it, the way hope so often lies at the heart of a tragedy?”

  Finn had been listening to Isla with a pensive expression, but now his gaze swung to Lachlan. “You mean…”

  Lachlan nodded. “It was only after Baird’s death that my mother revealed the truth about my parentage. She knew she wouldn’t live much longer, and she was desperate for us to leave Lochinver, and start a new life far away from Scotland. What better chance than as the second son of a marquess? If none of it had happened—if Baird hadn’t died—I don’t think she ever would have told
me the truth.”

  “Jesus,” Finn muttered, shaking his head.

  “I loved my—our—mother, but when I found out the truth, I was angry. To discover the man I’d believed to be my father wasn’t my father at all, that Ciaran and Isla weren’t my full sister and brother, and I had another brother, one I never knew existed…those lies seemed the worst sort of betrayal to me.” Lachlan ran a hand down his face. “Christ, I’m not even Scottish.”

  “No, you’re a bloody Englishman. What could be worse than that?” Ciaran glanced at Finn. “No offense, my lord.”

  Finn’s lip curled in a reluctant grin. “And our mother?”

  “Buried in Lochinver, beside Niall Ramsey. I don’t suppose we’ll ever see their graves again. None of us will ever go back there.”

  “She made us swear we’d leave the past in Scotland, that we’d never tell anyone the secret about what happened.” Isla turned a pleading look on Finn. “She believed it would ruin us wherever we went, that we’d become outcasts, and after what happened there, we believed her. Our friends in Lochinver—we’d known them our entire lives. They were like our family, but after James died…” Isla wiped a tear from her cheek. “They turned their backs on us. We couldn’t risk it happening again, not even when we met you all, and found out how kind you are.”

  “It was a mistake. I thought I was protecting Isla and Ciaran by keeping our secret, but I was wrong, and I…” Lachlan swallowed, but he met Finn’s eyes. “I beg your pardon for it. We thought that secret would stay buried, but as I said, our crimes catch us in the end.”

  Ciaran snorted. “It wasn’t our crimes; it was Lord Dixon’s bloody cousin in Achiltibuie. As it happened, this cousin had heard the whole story, related it to Dixon in a letter, and Dixon, being the blackguard he is—”

  “Saw his chance, and took it. He threatened to expose us unless Hyacinth accepted his courtship. Our secret made her vulnerable—put her at the mercy of an unscrupulous scoundrel like Dixon.” Lachlan’s tone was grim. “I’ve no doubt he would have tried to force her into marriage, as well.”

  “Except he didn’t, because Hyacinth wouldn’t have it.” Lady Huntington was staring at Hyacinth with a wondering look on her face, as if she’d never quite seen her sister until this moment.

  “Ah, now we come to it. How, exactly, did you do that, Hyacinth?” Finn fixed Hyacinth with a penetrating stare. “Something about Lord Dixon being a card cheat?”

  Hyacinth looked around the room, flushing when she noticed every eye fixed on her. “Yes. He, ah…well, I discovered he was cheating at cards, and so I…arranged to expose him.”

  Hyacinth said this with the air of one who’s done discussing the matter, but Finn was far from satisfied with this explanation. “But how the devil—that is, how could you have discovered he was cheating at cards? Did you see him do it?”

  Hyacinth bit her lip. “Um, no. I…oh, very well. I found a bit of paraffin wax in his waistcoat pocket. The tip of it was fashioned into a point, like a pencil, and so I suspected he was—”

  “Marking cards.” Now it was Finn’s turn to stare at Hyacinth as if he didn’t recognize her. “But how in the world did you know a card cheat would use wax to mark cards?”

  “I heard about it from a young lady I met in Brighton. Do you remember Miss Harrington, Grandmother? Her elder brother was a card cheat.”

  “Indeed?” Lady Chase looked dazed, and she was still clutching at her smelling salts.

  “Well, I’ll be damned.” Finn grinned. “Those trips to Brighton weren’t an utter waste, after all.”

  Lady Huntington wasn’t as amused as her husband. “How in the world did you get your hand in Lord Dixon’s waistcoat pocket? And what do you mean, you ‘arranged to expose him’? I don’t like the sound of this, Hyacinth.”

  “You’ll like the truth even less, Lady Huntington.” Lachlan curled his hands into fists, his fingernails cutting into his skin. Damn it, he should have killed Dixon while he had the chance. “She lured him into the library—”

  “I didn’t lure him! I don’t even know how to lure a gentleman. I simply invited him to accompany me to the library, and—”

  “Then she tempted him into removing his coat and waistcoat, and—”

  “Tempted?” Hyacinth crossed her arms over her chest and glared at Lachlan. “I’m no temptress, Lachlan. You exaggerate!”

  But Lachlan, who was wildly jealous and growing more so with every word, only glared at her. “She tempted him into removing his waistcoat, but first she made sure to put the bit of wax in his pocket—”

  “I didn’t put it there! That is, I put it back where I’d found it the night before. For pity’s sake, Lachlan, you make me sound a very villainess—”

  “I’ll leave it to you all to imagine what a man like Dixon might have done if he’d caught her.” Lachlan’s voice was rising. “But if that weren’t dangerous enough, she then proceeded to divert him until Isla could arrive with Lord Sydney.”

  Ciaran interrupted then, a look of unmistakable pride on his face. “Very clever, really. Sydney had lost thousands to Dixon, you see, so he was an ideal choice to discover the thing. Indeed, it was rather ingenious, if you ask me—”

  “No one asked you!” Lachlan stepped closer to Hyacinth and caught her shoulders in his hands. “Damn it, why did you risk yourself like that? He put his hands on you! He touched you, ripped the sleeve of your gown—”

  “Ripped her gown! Oh, Hyacinth! Oh, my goodness.” Lady Chase collapsed back against the settee, quite overwhelmed.

  “I don’t deny it was risky, but Hyacinth was just magnificent, Lord Huntington!” Isla plucked at the sleeve of Finn’s coat to get his attention. “Perhaps we shouldn’t have done it. I can’t deny we didn’t escape unscathed, what with the scandal it’s caused, but, oh, Lord Huntington! Hyacinth truly has such a sweet, tender heart, and once she saw how things were for us, nothing would dissuade her.”

  “No one doubts the tenderness of Hyacinth’s heart.” Without realizing he did it, Lachlan drew Hyacinth closer to him, until he was cradling her against his chest. “She’s the sweetest lass in London.”

  Hyacinth said nothing, but she gripped Lachlan’s forearms in her hands, as if to keep him there with her.

  “Hyacinth.” Finn took Hyacinth’s arm and drew her gently away from Lachlan. “Why did you take such an enormous risk? Lachlan’s right. This could have gone terribly wrong. Why didn’t you simply tell Lachlan, or Ciaran or Lady Chase Lord Dixon was threatening you?”

  Hyacinth stared up at him with wide eyes. “Because I was afraid if you found out they’d kept something from you, you might…”

  “Yes? It’s all right. Just tell me.”

  Hyacinth glanced at Lady Huntington, who gave her an encouraging nod. “I-I…oh, do forgive me for saying this, Finn, but you’ve only been married to Iris for a short time, and I don’t know you all that well yet, and you’re…well, you’re quite stern, and I was afraid...I was afraid if you found out the truth, you’d send Lachlan—that is, you’d send all the Ramseys away, and I couldn’t bear to…well, I’m very sorry, Finn.”

  Finn’s face softened. “It’s all right. There’s nothing to be sorry for.” He turned to Lachlan, and laid a hand on his shoulder. “You should have told me the truth at once, but we don’t withhold forgiveness in this family—not from those who sincerely ask for it, as you’ve done today. You’re my brother, Lachlan, and Ciaran as well, and Isla my sister.” For a long moment, Finn stared hard at them. “Do you suppose I couldn’t find it in my heart to forgive my own family?”

  They’d been offered little forgiveness from those they had a right to expect it from. To have Finn offer it so freely now, even after they’d lied to him, humbled Lachlan. “We were wrong, and we’re…” Lachlan cleared his throat. “We’re truly grateful for your forgiveness.”

  “You’re a good
sort, Finn,” Ciaran said. “For an Englishman, that is.”

  Finn shook his head, a grin playing about his mouth. “Lured Dixon into a library, eh? I’ll be damned. That took some courage. Our little Hyacinth—”

  “Finn!” Lady Huntington shot him a warning look.

  Finn straightened, and cleared his throat. “Oh, right. I mean, that was a very foolish thing to do, Hyacinth. It could have gone terribly wrong. I hope you’ll never do something so dangerous again.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Hyacinth was never in as much danger as Dixon was. Lachlan almost killed him. He hauled him off his feet by his cravat, and dangled him there like a ragdoll until Dixon nearly wet himself. That was a good bit of business, Lach,” Ciaran added, nodding approvingly at Lachlan.

  “Did he, indeed? That is a good bit of…” Finn trailed off with a glance at Iris, and once again cleared his throat. “I mean, that was a very foolish thing to do, Lachlan. It could have gone terribly wrong. I hope you’ll never do something so—”

  “Oh, for pity’s sake, Finn. Do you suppose my memory is that short?” Iris crossed her arms over her chest. “I recall you doing something similar to Lord Claire last summer. It must run in the family—squeezing a man’s neck, I mean.”

  “What, you mean to say you thrashed Lady Joanna’s brother?” Ciaran shot Finn an admiring look. “Oh, that’s very good, that is. How did you—”

  “This is all very well,” Lady Chase interrupted, putting aside her hysterics for long enough to fix them all with an irritated scowl. “But what’s to become of Hyacinth? Are her heroics to be rewarded with a lifetime of spinsterhood?”

  “No. Hyacinth won’t become a spinster, Lady Chase.”

  “Humph. You don’t know the ton as well as I do, Mr. Ramsey. I can assure you, they aren’t likely to forgive a scandalous library assignation.”

  “The ton can do as they please, and so will I. I’m marrying Hyacinth.”