“Your grace.”
He met Anne in the courtyard between Cyrwthorn and the mews. “What are you doing out here?” Anyone could have snatched her where she stood, and he’d have been none the wiser.
“Looking for you.” She sat on a stone bench overlooking the small plot used for the kitchen garden and pointed to a spot where someone had planted some pansies. “Not as pretty now as later in the season. It reminds me of home. Look there. Lavender.”
Ruan frowned. “You’ve never seen Fargate Castle, have you?”
“I meant Bartley Green.”
He gave her a sharp look. “Cyrwthorn is your home now.”
“Today, I called on Mrs. Forrest.”
His insides seized up.
“She remembers the scent of ambergris. It was her impression that rape was never intended, but the men got to drinking and then one of them—”
“Anne.”
“Her husband was not kind to her afterward.”
“No.”
She touched his shoulder. “You say you think you’re dead inside, and I say that’s a lie.” Her hand moved from his shoulder to his mouth, gently touching his lips.
“I adore you, Anne.” But she wasn’t pleased by the declaration. Damn it all, why not? Every other damn woman he’d known would have been. Which answered his question well enough.
“Why?”
“Why.” He wrapped his arms around her. “It’s everything about you. It’s the way I feel when I’m inside you. How you move with me, the feel of your skin, the sweet inside of your thighs, the shape of your mouth. How you moan when I thrust just so. Your bright eyes. Your arms. Your spectacles send me mad with desire. But more, in some strange fashion I fail to understand, I need to give you pleasure. I want you crashing over the edge even more desperately than I want to fall myself. Anything, so long as you understand you are mine. So long as I drive the thought of any other man right out of your head.”
“There aren’t any other men.” She leaned against him, soft and warm.
“I know.” He tightened his arms around her, wanting to claim her as forever his. “Will you kiss me?”
The kiss soon flamed out of control. He wanted to get her where he could undress her and reveal more perfection than he had ever dreamed of finding in one woman. She answered his greed, her arms circled his shoulders. “We need to get inside,” he said into her mouth.
“I know.”
They did not make it off the bench, let alone inside. By the time she was helping him with the buttons of his trousers he was painfully aroused and in a state of wretched longing for her. He dipped his head to take her mouth in a kiss of searing heat, being very free with his hands, too.
“The hell with it,” he growled. “Here. Right here.” He gathered her into his arms and sank to the ground with her nipping his ear. Instead of laying her down, he sat her on his lap, spreading her gown so it billowed around her thighs while he unhooked her gown.
No other woman could do this to him, make him want to worship her like some fool boy. He unbuttoned his trousers and was just about to delve into her when she pushed him onto his back. Right into the middle of Merchant’s lavender. Her hands slid up his arms, bringing them above his head and holding them there on his sufferance because although she was tall, she was not tall enough to truly pin him. Nor heavy enough, either. He outweighed her by a substantial amount.
“Now,” she said, mock serious. “For once, you are at my mercy.”
For once? Hadn’t he always been? “Do what you will, minx.” He drew in a breath of lavender pungent with the bruising they’d given it. Her gown was loose enough at the back that he had a thumping good view of shadowed breasts.
She bent her head to his and kissed him, taking control of his mouth. When he started to bring his arms down so he could hold her and put himself inside her as he longed to do, she tightened her grip on him. Her mouth hovered inches over his.
“I want to touch you,” he said, thinking of his mouth on the peak of her breast and him inside her. She straddled him so he could feel her heat but not touch its source.
“Why?”
“Because I’ll go up in flames if I can’t. Because I adore your body. All your sweet curves and that heat inside that’s ready for me. Because I love you.”
“Love.” In the dark, he could just make out the dim gleam of her spectacles. “I cannot stop thinking of all the times you’ve said that before. To so many other women. Did you mean it before? When you said it to the others? Did you mean it when you said it to Katie?” She laughed sadly. “Is it possible you believed it then and only think you believe it now?”
“I knew I didn’t love the others.” He worked one hand free and wriggled it under her skirt. He covered her backside, sliding a finger between until he found her core. He could fight dirty, too, when he had to. She gasped but cut off the sound. “I love you, Anne. You’re the only one.”
“Tell me—Oh, Cynssyr.”
“Show me your breasts, Anne. Yes, that’s it,” he said when she began to pull aside her gown. The two of them were a tangle of clothes and arms and legs. His knees were bent so she could lean her weight against him, his erection, for the moment, conveniently behind her. “There is just no question,” he said when she’d managed to bare herself for him. “No question at all that I would have married you on account of these alone.” Her arousal and the cool air puckered her nipples. He managed a kiss right there.
“Oh, Cynssyr,” she moaned. “Ruan.”
“I do love you, Anne. I am your slave, if you would but have me.”
She groaned on an intake of breath as his fingers stroked. She wasn’t holding herself off him to deny him anymore, but to give him access. “Tell me,” she said with some effort, “why I should believe Lord Ruin when he says he loves me.”
His other hand was free now, and he put that under her skirt, too, gripping her behind. “Lord Ruin never said he loved you.” She moaned again. “It is your husband who loves you. Madly. Truly.” She didn’t believe him yet. Not entirely. Her head went back, she arched into his hand and came. Hard.
He raised her hips and brought her down on him. “I am home,” he said.
Afterward, picking a bit of lavender from her hair, he said, “Forgive me, Anne.”
She lifted her head from his chest. “For what?”
“All of this.” He raised his hands in a helpless gesture, then helped her put her clothes to rights. “I am sorry you had to marry me. I am sorry for everything I’ve done since then. I’m sorry you cannot believe I love you.”
“Cynssyr,” she mournfully whispered.
“You want to know why I love you. You brought light into my formerly gray existence.” He touched her cheek. “Until you, I never knew a woman could be both friend and lover. You saved me from the dark. I love you for what you are; strong and brave and kind. When I walk into a room and you are there, my heart lifts. When I’m away, just thinking of you makes me smile. Being with you makes me happy. No one else has ever done that. When I am with you, I am whole. Better than whole, for on my own, I’m a worthless fool.”
Reverently, she touched his chest. “If I let myself believe you, I would be on air. Transformed. Delirious with joy. And if ever it ended, I could not survive. Do you even know how many woman you have destroyed this way?” She shook her head. “No, I could not bear it.” She curved herself to fit into his arm around her. “I could not.”
She wasn’t dressed for a cold morning and when a shiver took her, he shrugged out of his coat and slipped it over her shoulders. Already, the sky was turning from black to muted gray. He tucked her against his side. “We were very wild after the war, Devon and I,” he said softly. “Our nights were spent in pursuits of no credit to our character. Cards. Drink. Opera dancers, actresses, women of easy virtue. Anything and everything to remind myself I was still alive. That I had cheated death.” Her arm crept around his waist, giving rather than seeking support. “After a night of carousing
and whoring, I’d come here to watch the sun rise.”
She shifted enough to look into his face. “Do you feel alive now?”
He smiled warmly, touching the tip of her nose with the pad of his index finger. “At this moment, I have no doubt I am alive. I never do with you.”
The hard edge to her sadness softened. “We are friends, aren’t we, Cynssyr?”
“Yes.” He nodded. “We are.”
“Do you think that’s enough? It must be.”
Not for him. Not enough for him. In the distance, he heard a wagon rumbling by.
“Ruan?”
“Mm.”
“Mrs. Forrest told me she thinks someone’s been following her, and I think she’s right.”
His blood chilled. “Why?”
“From her sitting room, I saw a carriage on the street.”
“Nothing alarming about that.”
“A gig, actually. Rather shabby. And it was there the entire time. We left together. I told Henry to follow us and we drove in her carriage nearly to Bond Street.”
“The gig?”
“Followed us.”
Cold fear rippled through him. “The man in the gig. Did he see you get into the carriage?”
“He must have. I’m sure he did.”
Ruan sat in perfect silence with his wife, watching dawn turn to morning. The sky softened from gray to silver. Birds began to sing, first just one or two, then more, then a riot of them. Another day begun. And he was utterly without hope.
“Tomorrow,” he said, “you must go to Cornwall.”
CHAPTER 32
Ruan crumpled a letter from some ninny who claimed to have invented a method for turning brass to gold. He tossed it to the floor.
“Bad news?” Hickenson asked from the desk where he’d been taking Ruan’s dictation.
“If I had a shilling for everyone who hopes I am a fool, I’d own the bloody world.”
“I imagine so. Shall we continue?”
“Finish that last, and we’ve done for the day,” Ruan said even though there remained a dozen letters yet requiring a reply.
Hickenson bowed his head. “Your grace.”
Ruan left Whitehall for home and found the silence there unsettling. The void of Anne’s absence lay heavier yet on his rooms. With Dobkin absorbed in selecting a fresh cravat, Ruan pulled out his watch, feigning concern with the hour, then threw himself onto a chair and stared at the toes of his boots. Ten past five. Hours now since Anne left. By his reckoning she must be some thirty or forty miles distant from London. He had no desire to go anywhere tonight, though he was expected at half a dozen places. The gaping emptiness of Cyrwthorn, of, indeed, the whole of London, without Anne was a small enough price for her safety.
“Your grace?”
He turned his head and saw Merchant at the door. “Yes?”
“An urchin, sir.”
“An urchin?”
“A grubby child who claims my Lord Bracebridge sent him.”
“Is he still here or have you chased him off?”
“No, your grace. He delivered a message and vanished.”
“Which would be?”
“That my lord the earl of Bracebridge requires you to meet him posthaste at the Three Swans.”
He shot to his feet, thrilled at the prospect of having something useful to do. “Dobkin!” he shouted. “My coat.” He didn’t wait for Dobkin’s help when the valet appeared. He just grabbed his coat, thrust an arm through the sleeve and was on his way.
A stocky fellow dressed in a ragged black cloak and hat waited outside the Hell. He thought he recognized him as one of Devon’s men. From his rough dress and scarred face, a companion from the days when Devon had made his living by the expedient of force and wit. “Where’s Bracebridge?”
The man performed an awkward bow, sweeping his hat off his head and scraping it inches from the filthy street. “This cove you’re after, he had another cove with him who dashed not the quarter hour before you was aware, your grace. A gentleman. Like yourself. A banging dimber, he was. His lordship followed him. You and me can take care of this one, no worries there, he says.”
“I say we end this business now and go after him.”
“No, no!” The man threw up a palm. “He’ll be fly then, and slip out the back for sure. You’re not the man to likely blend to the crowd here. There’s a fence there, easy enough to climb if a man’s in a desperate alarm.”
“I’ll cover the rear then. You go inside.”
“Afraid he’s seen my face, sir. Besides, his lordship wants us to bide our time and follow when he leaves. See where he goes to ground.”
Devon was probably right about that. “Likely take us straight to the fellow he’s working with.”
“Aye, your grace. That’s as may be.”
Ruan settled down to wait, along with his unnamed companion slinking into a dark corner. Three quarters of an hour passed. Tavern downstairs, gaming upstairs, whores up another floor. A steady stream of gentlemen and riff-raff patronized the tavern. They came in cold and left drunk. The gamblers stayed longer, but those who left were just as drunk as the others. “Here’s something,” said his companion when the door opened to let out another staggering customer. “There he is, by God.”
The man who came out had his hat pulled low and a grayish muffler wrapped several times around his throat. Bundled up against the cold, Ruan couldn’t be sure who it was. Perhaps Thrale. Perhaps not. “Let’s go.”
“Right behind you, your grace. Hup! Hup! Watch your step. He’s slipping away.”
He knew he’d been duped when he looked back after turning several corners onto increasingly dank streets. Expecting to see Devon’s man, instead, he saw nothing but swirling fog.
“Damn it to hell.” Ahead, the street was only briefly empty. From the noisome mist, a dark shape emerged, coming toward him. The shadow firmed then divided into two shapes. Two men bent on murder, Ruan guessed. He spread his fingers, tensing then releasing them. He drew in a breath and was ready.
The skirmish didn’t last long, for, thinking themselves undetected and with the advantage of surprise and number, the men attacked with more enthusiasm than precision. Though Ruan suffered a hard blow to the midsection, he drove the heel of his palm hard into a face. That one staggered back, clutching his nose. He whirled and lashed out with an elbow to the cheek. The other flailed madly, screeching when he saw his companion flee. Ruan got a handful of canvas, but the man jerked free and escaped into the dark, leaving Ruan holding only a tattered coat.
Quickly, knowing he risked another attack by staying, he rifled the pockets. He found a knife. Several, actually. He took the sharpest and slid another into his boot. The pound note in another pocket likely represented the man’s fee for murder. And, Ruan decided, a fair one for the night’s work. Off in the distant, he heard shouts. Whether they came from his attackers screwing up choler enough for another go at the price on his head, he did not stay to discover.
As he walked, he held the larger knife like a man who would know what to do with it. Which he did. He moved as rapidly as the filthy streets permitted. Mayfair was a lifetime away on foot, and he didn’t expect he had a prayer of finding his carriage and horses nor any transportation but his boots. No hack who valued his gig would look for a fare in these streets, it’d be an invitation to robbery.
A whore who could think of only one reason for a man of quality to be walking alone fell into step with him just long enough to discover her mistake. He brooded while he walked. He’d been tricked on more than one level. Flat out tricked. As for the man responsible for duping him, who but Thrale would even know of his progress in discovering the culprits? He wondered if tonight another woman would pay for his stupidity.
When he stalked into Cyrwthorn, he hardly looked at Merchant. “Has Bracebridge called?” With a flick of the wrist, he tossed Merchant the knife.
“No.” He caught the knife handily.
“Aldreth?”
; “No, your grace.” With equal ease, he snatched Ruan’s hat and gloves from the air.
“Any letters?” He refused to think of what might have happened to some young innocent. Not until he had word to the contrary. “Has anyone called? Anyone at all?”
“No, your grace.”
“Send three or four men to the Three Swans.” Ruan flew up the stairs with an energy borne of pure frustration. Merchant valiantly kept pace. “They’re to find my phaeton and my horses. Have them fetch the constable if necessary.”
Merchant spoke between gasps. “Your—grace.”
“Close up the house.”
“Sir?”
“I’m going to Fargate Castle—” Three rapid-fire blows on the front door stopped Ruan in his tracks.
“Are you at home?”
“Find out who it is.”
Merchant drew a deep breath and went downstairs. Ruan waited where he’d stopped, nearly to the first landing. He heard voices, recognized Merchant’s calm tones. The other he couldn’t make out except that it was a man’s voice. Another husband or father beside himself with worry?
Merchant returned. “The Marquess of Thrale.”
“Indeed?” He said the word in a voice so arid desert sands would have seemed moist. As cautious as the Marquess had been so far, he would have expected a letter or another boy culled off the street. He wondered what sort of game Thrale thought he played.
Merchant inclined his head toward the front door. “He says he has your carriage.”
“Indeed.”
“Furthermore, he is under the impression you have been injured, though I assured him you are in perfect health.”
“Thank you, Merchant. I’ll see him in the Red Salon.”
“Shall I bring coffee, your grace?”
“Please.” Ruan went to his rooms. When he was dressed in buff trousers—just the sort of daring attire Lord Ruin would adopt—shining boots, white cravat, striped waistcoat, but without the cutaway frac for now, he went to the Red Salon, a man, to all appearances, just in from a night of festivity.
Lord Ruin Page 26