by Anne Gracie
Her grandfather turned and regarded the newcomer with outrage. “You’ll what? How dare you bluster in here, making threats against me. Who the devil do you think you are?” The lash flickered out, like a striking snake.
Gideon stepped closer. “I am Carradice and I will not stand for violence against any woman, let alone this one.”
“This woman has naught to do with you. She is evil and I—”
“She is my wife-to—”
Chapter Twenty
“One word frees us of all the weight and pain of life:
That word is love.”
SOPHOCLES
“WIFE?” LORD DEREHAM’S EYES ALMOST STARTED FROM THEIR SOCK- ets. His face paled, then flushed suddenly with rage. He shook Prudence like a dog shakes a rat. “You foul little slut, I’ll—” He raised the whip again.
“Let her go!” Gideon grabbed Lord Dereham’s wrist, squeezing it like a vise, harder and harder until the bones threatened to crack. Her grandfather swore, and suddenly Prudence was free. She staggered.
“Stand away, sweetheart,” Gideon said gently, steadying her on her feet with careful hands. All his attention was on her.
She tried to warn him, but could only make a muffled sound through the gag. Her grandfather’s whip whistled though the air and lashed Gideon across the back of the head. He barely flinched, just pushed her gently toward the corner of the room.
“Get him!” her grandfather roared, and the two burly henchman leaped at Gideon. He ducked and swung a punch that landed with a crunch on the shorter man. Blood spurted from the man’s nose, and he staggered back.
His partner struck Gideon a two-handed blow on the back of the neck, and Prudence watched, horrified, as her beloved staggered under the impact, then without turning, rammed his elbow backward. It connected audibly with the man’s ribs. The man tried to grab his ear. Gideon responded with a mighty punch to the stomach. The man grunted and kicked out. Gideon slammed another punch to the head, then a third to the jaw.
Prudence yelled helplessly through the gag as the second man came rushing across the room, an iron poker raised. She kicked a stool into his path, and the man went sprawling on the flagstones. The poker clattered to the ground. She darted forward and kicked it out of his reach. The man scrambled to his feet just as Gideon felled his partner with one last, frightful punch.
“Come on then, my bucko,” Gideon beckoned him, his fists raised. A faint smile lingered on his lips, and his eyes were lit with a devilish glint. It looked almost as if he enjoyed this appalling brawl, she thought incredulously.
The man took one step forward, then hesitated.
“Go on, you filthy coward—get him!” roared Lord Dereham, spittle and rage dripping from his lips. He lashed at the man with his whip.
The man stepped back, out of range. He glanced at Lord Dereham, then at Gideon, then at his partner, sprawled bloody and insensible on the taproom floor. He shook his head. “Get ’im yerself, m’lord,” he said. “I’ve ’ad enough o’ this business.” And he left, ignoring Lord Dereham’s shouts of outrage.
Gideon, his chest heaving and blood welling from a cut above his eye, stared across the room at Lord Dereham. Slowly, the light of battle faded from his eyes. He lowered his fists reluctantly.
“I cannot in all decency fight a man of your age, sir,” he said. “Let us agree that there has been enough violence tonight. Admit defeat, and you may leave here unmolested, though I would gladly see you hanged for what you have done to Prudence.” His fists clenched again, and he took several deep breaths before he continued. “But I am young and in my prime, and you are more than sixty and but recently recovered from injury.” He glanced at Prudence and added in a softer voice, “She has suffered enough distress this night. You are her grandfather, after all. We will be related.”
Prudence felt unbearably moved by his gallantry. Oh, what a beautiful man he was!
“Will be related? You’re not wed yet?”
“No, but we shall be as soon as possible. So, pax, Dereham?”
Prudence felt her eyes flood.
Lord Dereham shrugged and gave a grunt that seemed to indicate assent. He stumped toward the door, scowling but silent. Gideon watched for a moment, then reached for Prudence’s gag. “I’m sorry I took so long, love. Are you all—”
Slash!
The whip cut across his hands, narrowly missing Prudence’s face.
Gideon pushed her behind him and advanced on the old man, a murderous light in his eyes. He was pale, his mouth hard and unsmiling. His dark eyes glittered with a fierce and implacable rage. Prudence had never seen him like this. She wanted to call out to him, but the gag was still in place. She wanted to help, but her hands were still tied. She watched helplessly as her grandfather limped across the room in an insane rage, whip lashing furiously at the man she loved.
Crack! “Admit defeat, would I?”
Gideon ducked as the lash swung above his head but did not stop his advance.
Slash! “Give in to an insolent puppy?”
The lash cut his ear. Gideon moved forward.
Smash! The whip missed Gideon and sent a tankard of ale spinning across the room. Slash! At his face again. The old man was trying to blind him, he realized.
Nothing could blind him now, Gideon thought savagely. The old man had had his chance.
“Too old for a fight, am I?”
With a hiss, the lash snaked out at him again, and this time Gideon lifted his arm to receive the full brunt of it. He heard Prudence whimper as the lash slashed into him, but Gideon made not a sound. He bared his teeth in a grim smile, lowered his arm, and yanked hard. The whip flew out of the old man’s hand. Behind him Prudence made a small, muffled sound.
Gideon calmly unwrapped the lash from his forearm and took the handle in his hand. “Fond of the whip, aren’t you, Dereham? You’re very skilled with it, we’ve all seen that.” He cracked the whip an inch in front of the old man’s nose. Lord Dereham stumbled backward.
“I admit, I haven’t had the practice you have.” Snick! A button flew off Lord Dereham’s coat. “But then I haven’t been practicing on women and little girls.” Snick! Another button went rolling across the flagstones. The occupants of the room watched in silence.
Gideon’s face hardened. He repeated, “Women. And. Little. Girls.” He slashed at Lord Dereham with each word. By the end of the sentence, not a button remained on the coat.
“They are harlots, one and all!” shouted Lord Dereham, taking courage from the fact that so far he hadn’t been touched by the lash. “The whip is all they understand! And as for you—I’ll have you hanged for this!” Lord Dereham shook his fist at Gideon. The whip lashed, and a thin red line blossomed on the fist.
“How old was she when you first used your whip on her, eh? Eleven? Twelve? And what about Grace?” Gideon punctuated each word with the whip. “You are an obscenity! You should never have been allowed to rear young girls. It is a miracle they have emerged so sweet and pure.”
“Pure?” Lord Dereham snorted. “What drivel has she been telling you? She is about as pure as—”
With a single enraged punch, Gideon knocked him out cold.
Ignoring the prone body on the floor, Gideon flung the whip into a corner and went instantly to Prudence. He took her into his arms, crooning and murmuring tender reassurances. He untied the gag, flung it in the fire, and called for a knife. It made short work of the ropes around her wrists. He swore when he saw how raw and chafed they were, and he hugged her gently to him, smoothing her hair, her cheek, checking to see if she was whole and unharmed.
Prudence kept saying, “It’s all right, it’s all right,” over and over, as if he needed reassurance more than she did, and indeed, he blamed himself sorely.
“I’m sorry, love. I should have been there with you. I should have walked you home. I’ll never—”
“Hush.” She smoothed his hair back tenderly. “It was my choice, and they took us by surprise from behind. And I
am all right. Grandpapa has done worse than this to me. But, you—your brow is bleeding. He nearly blinded you. And your injured shoulder, how is that?” she asked distressfully, and tried to examine his hurts.
“Faugh, makes me sick to my stomach!” Lord Dereham had come to and struggled to his feet. He observed them sourly.
“Get out, old man, if you value your life,” Gideon said in a hard voice.
“She’ll betray you. They all do. No concept of honor. She is already another man’s leavings! Did you know that, hah?”
Gideon glared at him, but said calmly enough, “What do I care for that? Virginity can be given away, or lost, or wrested from a girl by force. It matters not to me. What matters is honor and a loving heart. My Prudence is the most honorable woman I’ve ever known. And she has the truest, most loving heart in all the world.”
Prudence could not see for tears.
“Pah! Her fancy man! Wants you to marry her, does she? Is she carrying your bastard in her belly, eh? She did that once before, you know, but I beat it out of her.”
“You beat it out—” Gideon could not finish the sentence. He felt sick with fury. “Her baby?”
The old man snorted righteously. “Thrashed her until she dropped the mongrel pup. There are no bastards in my family.”
“I beg to differ,” Gideon said coldly. He was gripped by a rage he had never before experienced. To have this evil old man boasting that he’d thrashed a young girl until she miscarried. He’d never heard of anything so barbaric. And it was Prudence, his sweet, loving Prudence who’d had this vile thing done to her.
“For that, you evil old man, I’m going to kill you.” Gideon advanced, murder in his heart.
Crash! Lord Dereham sank slowly back to the floor in a welter of pottery shards, stale crusts, and vegetable peelings. Gideon blinked.
“Ahh, now that makes me feel a lot better!” The landlady stood over the prone body, grinning with satisfaction. “Call me a fat old trollop, would he? Try to blind my Alfred, the horrible old baskit!” She poked at the old man with her foot. He did not stir. She faced Gideon. “Now don’t be angry with me, sir. I know you had every reason to want to kill him—the black-hearted old goat.”
She glanced at Prudence and added in a lower voice, “I never heard anything so wicked and heartless in my life as what he done to miss here. But if you’da killed him you’d have to flee the country, and where would that leave your lady, eh?” She nodded. “Better I bash him over the noggin with the pigs’ dinner.” She glanced around the room and grinned. “And I can’t say I didn’t enjoy it! Fat old trollop, indeed!”
She was right, Gideon realized. In his rage he probably would have throttled the old man, and it would have been murder. He stared at the landlady, shaken, then collected himself.
“Madam,” he said, “you have saved me from myself, and for that I humbly thank you.” He bent and with all the grace he could muster, kissed her hand as if she were the grandest duchess in the land. “And as for his insults, I wouldn’t let them rankle. The man obviously feared and hated women. There would be nothing so threatening to him as a magnificent woman in her prime.” He kissed her hand again, this time as a man kisses the hand of a beauty and added mischievously, “With or without a bowl of pigs’ slops in her hand.”
She giggled and blushed, then bustled off to fetch them all a drink to settle their nerves.
“Hah! What’s all this?” said a voice from the doorway. “Good God! Is that m’brother Theodore lyin’ there on the floor? Why is he covered with vegetable peelin’s and onion skins? Prudence, m’dear gel, there you are. Are you all right?” Great-uncle Oswald rushed across the room and embraced her heartily.
Prudence burst into tears. She tried to stop herself, but she couldn’t. They just seemed to flow out of her. Though why she should turn into a watering pot now was a mystery to her. She hadn’t cried when Phillip betrayed her. She refused utterly to cry when Grandpapa beat her, or when those men were fighting Gideon. So why she should cry when it was all over and a dear old man rushed up and hugged her, she could not say. She could only sob helplessly.
Great-uncle Oswald dabbed ineffectually on her shoulder murmuring such things as “There, there,” and “Tut, tut,” and after a few moments she heard him say, “Here, Carradice, this is more in your line than mine,” and she was transferred to a much stronger, warmer embrace as Gideon wrapped her to him. The sobs came harder then. He swung her into his arms and carried her upstairs.
He found the inn’s private sitting room, pushed the door open with his foot, and carried her to the settee, where he sat with Prudence cradled in his lap, held tenderly against his heart as she sobbed.
He held her in silence, stroking her hair as each sob reverberated through her body and his. There was little passion in the embrace, just warm, comforting strength and slowly the storm of weeping passed. A wood fire crackled in the grate. She lay against his chest, listening to the beat of his heart and the gentle hiss and pop of the flames, wishing the moment could last forever.
He shifted his arm slightly, awkwardly, and recollection flooded back to her. She sat up. “Your injured arm—did you hurt it again in the fight? Should you be holding me?”
He ignored her question, just hugged her tighter. “I’m sorry. I should have come with you, should have insisted on walking you home—”
“Hush.” She laid a hand over his lips. “It’s over now. Truly over.”
“Yes. It is.” Gently he tipped her face to his and possessed her in a long, tender kiss.
She must have made some small sound, for he instantly loosened his embrace. “Am I hurting you?”
“No,” she murmured, winding her arms around his neck and pulling his mouth back down to hers. It was bliss being held like this, holding him. She’d wondered if it would even happen to her again, and now she just wanted to lie in his arms and kiss him, savoring the moment, planning nothing, thinking about nothing. Except Gideon. Reveling in his warmth and strength and tender protectiveness. And kisses.
“I should have protected you. I promised to keep you safe but—”
“Hush. It doesn’t matter.”
His face remained guilt-ridden, troubled. He stared at her left arm. “That old swine has bruised you.”
“A hot bath will help, but truly it looks worse than they feel. I can scarcely feel any pain now that you are here.”
“I’ve ordered a brandy to be brought up to you. It will help you sleep on the way home. Oh, I know how exhausted you are, with all that has happened this night, but a brandy will help you relax.” His eyes were dark with concern. “For this to happen is bad enough, but on top of…I’m sorry about Otterbury, Prue.”
“I’m not,” she told him. “I’d already severed the betrothal.”
He stared, uncomprehending.
“That day you called on me…and I said Phillip was coming at two o’clock. I was short with you, distracted because I was nerving myself to break the betrothal in a few moments’ time.”
“You broke the betrothal that day?”
“Yes. I told him I could not marry him. I cannot understand why I ever imagined I loved such a man. He didn’t even care about the baby, Gideon.” A quiver passed over her expressive features.
“Oh, love.” He stroked her cheek. “To discover he had a wife who was increasing, too; it was a monstrous way to break the news to you.”
“It was a shock, and yes, I cannot deny that for a moment I was hurt. I don’t understand why Phillip didn’t tell me straightaway.” She shrugged. “I’d already told him I wouldn’t marry him. I think he was worried his wife would find out about me.” She sighed. “You were right. I imagined I was in love…but I was not yet seventeen, and so lonely. And I did not then know what love felt like, not truly.”
“And you do now?”
She gave him a glowing look that took his breath away. “Oh, yes.”
Gideon suddenly could not breathe.
“You told me you wanted
me,” she reminded him softly.
He nodded.
“Well, I have wanted you almost from the moment we first met,” she said. “I did my best to resist you for the sake of my promise to Phillip, but I could not. My will, no matter how much I tried to bolster it, could not override my heart. I think I was yours from that very first day.”
He said nothing. Was frozen.
“You once asked me to come live with you and be your love. Is the offer still open?”
The obstruction in his throat moved. “You know it is,” he croaked. “Prudence, you are my heart, my soul. I, too, never knew it could be like this.” And he kissed her, kissed her as if she was rare and precious. Kissed her, mouth to mouth, man and woman, elemental, offering her his taste and his mouth and his body and his heart.
“A bad business! A very bad business!” Great-uncle Oswald entered the room. “I’ve brought you a possett.”
Gideon and Prudence leaped apart. Then Gideon deliberately drew her back to his arms. “You are mine. We have nothing to hide.” Prudence smiled and leaned against him. No, she could not hide how she felt if she tried.
Great-uncle Oswald set down the steaming possett and hurried across to the fire. “Cold to my bones, never mind it’s a warm night. Whoever would have believed it? My own brother kidnappin’ little Prue, here! And the way he’s treated you m’dear, well, it’s shocked me to my bones, I can tell you!”
The old man looked very worn and tired. “What did he think he was doin’, I wonder? Did he think we wouldn’t hunt him down and fetch you back?”
Prudence was silent. There was nothing to say.
He spread his hands to the fire and shook his head in bewilderment. “Must have bats in his belfry. As if we wouldn’t stop scourin’ the countryside till we found her, eh, Carradice? We love this little lass, don’t we?” His voice broke, and he pulled out a large yellow handkerchief and blew his nose forcefully.
Gideon held Prudence tightly in wordless assent. Prudence could say not a word. Her heart was too full. No one in her life had stood up to Grandpapa for her, and now she had two champions, defending and protecting her. And saying they loved her. It was more than she’d ever dreamed of. Her eyes filled again. Truly, she was becoming the veriest watering pot.