And then he winked at her.
Taken aback, Brynn glanced away, but when she returned her gaze, he was still staring at her with an odd, calculating look on his face. He had never paid much attention to her before. Had Hawksfield said something to him?
To her everlasting dismay, the duke excused himself and cut a path directly toward the refreshments table. Brynn looked around in desperation. Eloise was still in conversation with the dowager, her back to Brynn, and her mother seemed to have disappeared. She had no idea why she was in such a panic. She and her entire family had known the duke for years. But the look in his eyes now gave her pause. It seemed heavy and purposeful. As if he were a hunter and she were the prey…as if he were seeing something he suddenly coveted.
She had to be wrong. He was old enough to be her father! Older than her father, in fact. But as the duke neared, the admiring look in his eye was not to be imagined.
He took her numb hand in his and kissed it. “Lady Briannon, you are as beautiful as a new rose in spring.”
“Your Grace,” she murmured, curtsying and taking in a gulp of air as her mother materialized out of nowhere. Her mama had a bad habit of appearing in places where she wasn’t wanted, but for once, Brynn was exceedingly grateful.
The dowager turned, too, to converse with the duke, and so did his daughter. His mouth tightened, and his eyes grew frosty, and he did not deign to acknowledge Eloise, whose icy demeanor rivaled his for a brief second. Instead, he directed his attention to those who had accompanied Brynn’s mother. Eloise smiled and curtsied before allowing the Earl of Langlevit to escort her to the next set.
Bradburne engaged in polite conversation with her mother, but Brynn could feel his eyes fluttering to her décolletage, as if drawn there by the cursed rubies lying so blatantly on the bare expanse of her skin. Resisting the urge to claw the dastardly necklace from her throat, Brynn wished she still had her stole.
The strains of a waltz in the next set started to play, though the music seemed oddly distant. A buzzing in her ears was her first warning. And then she started to feel dizzy. Bradburne turned to her and extended his hand, the other still wrapped in a white winding cloth. The world began to spin, the floor beneath her feet tilting precariously.
“May I?” His stare was confident as though her answer was already a given. He was a duke, after all. No one would say no to a duke.
She licked dry lips. “I…”
Strong hands grasped her arms as the voices faded into an unrecognizable drone. A cool cloth was suddenly being pressed to her head and a glass to her lips. She sipped automatically, and the liquid burned a hot path to her stomach. Brynn coughed, opening dazed eyes that came into contact with a pair of laughing blue ones leaning over her.
“Your Grace,” she said. “Please, you do not need—”
The duke grinned. “She is awake!” he pronounced and a wave of cheering ensued. “It’s been quite some time since I have caused a young maiden to swoon simply by asking her to dance.”
“Still a rake,” someone shouted, and the crowd erupted into laughter again.
The duke helped Brynn to her feet, and she swayed unsteadily, managing a sliver of a smile. “If it pleases His Grace, I will retire now. Perhaps I may have the honor of claiming your dance another time.”
He bowed, his lips pressing against her hand once more. “I look forward to it with pleasure, Lady Briannon.”
Brynn curtsied, trying not to be sick all over the polished floor at his emphasis on the word pleasure, and rose to take her leave. Her mother’s face expressed astonishment, her father’s resignation, while Gray looked as if he’d swallowed an insect the size of a pomegranate. Brynn, however, felt like she needed a scalding bath.
She could feel the duke’s eyes on her all the way to the staircase and hear the laughter and raucous comments as he rejoined his friends. She held her head high, walking gracefully up the stairs. As for the rubies and the offending dress, she would chuck both the instant she got home.
“Not one word,” she warned Gray as they collected their coats. She wrapped the silver stole around her shoulders. Likely for his own safety, her brother remained quiet as they climbed into the waiting carriages.
If the duke offered for her, her father would be hard-pressed to refuse, and her mother…good Lord, the promise of a coronet would make the age difference between them disappear. Brynn sighed at the coil she had gotten herself into, all because she had dressed to unmask a marauder.
She relaxed into the rocking movement of the carriage and tried not to think about what her future held. Perhaps there was still hope that her mysterious highwayman would appear and whisk her away from it all.
Suddenly the carriage jolted to a stop. Brynn’s heart skipped a beat as Gray hopped from the conveyance with a look that said she should stay put. She did. For a moment. If it was indeed the masked man making yet another attack, she would never forgive herself for hiding in a carriage simply because her brother had wanted her to.
Brynn descended the steps. There was no Masked Marauder demanding no displays of heroism. Instead, another conveyance up ahead lay on its side. Brynn’s eyes widened, her hands clasped to her mouth. A man leaned against one upturned carriage wheel for support, while another sat upon the edge of the path, his head clasped between his hands. Gray stalled her with a raised hand, but Brynn wasn’t to be stopped. She approached the man who was standing, his hands clutching his head. Recognition was swift. It was Earl Maynard, one of her father’s oldest friends. “Lord Maynard, what happened here?”
The aging earl cleared his throat and blubbered the words Brynn was dreading…the ones she already knew he would say. “It was the Masked Marauder. He beat Berthold unconscious. Shot my horse! Nearly shot me, too.” He turned toward her, and in the light of her footman’s torch, Brynn almost vomited.
His face was covered in livid wounds, his eyes puffy, and his mouth split. Blood dampened the white of his cravat. Her gaze returned to the motionless horse in the road, and the strength drained from her body. It was just an animal, but she couldn’t stop the shuddering sobs from creeping up in her chest.
Brynn slumped down. The thief she had fantasized about had done this. She had imagined him kissing her, rescuing her. She had dreamed of his touch. Her skin crawled with revulsion and shame.
The rubies weighed unnaturally heavy around her neck as another thought occurred to her: when Hawksfield had left the masquerade he’d been angry. Had she been wrong to dismiss him? Could he be the Marauder? Was he capable of such cruelty?
Brynn recalled the chilling look on his face as he’d left, and shivered. But how? It was common knowledge that Hawksfield loved horses, prided them. He’d returned Apollo to Ferndale as promised, groomed, fed, and happy. She could not claim to know the enigmatic Marquess of Hawksfield well, but surely his integrity would never allow him to sink to such callous violence.
No. It was clear now that the masked bandit was nothing more than a lowbrow thief. Cold-blooded and vicious. And she had been a blind, overly romantic fool to ever consider otherwise.
Chapter Ten
Archer reigned in Morpheus as he came upon Pierce Cottage. The two-story stone and timber home and barn were quiet and sleepy in the early Sunday morning light. There was still a chill in the air. Morpheus’s hot breath clouded with every pant, but Archer didn’t feel the cold. His body had alternated between mild and sweltering heat since hearing the news a half hour before, when Archer’s valet had entered his bedroom.
“There has been an incident,” Porter had said, causing Archer to sit up and push the fog of sleep away.
His valet, ever efficient, had relayed the attack on Lord Maynard’s coach the night before in as few words as possible.
“It is being called the work of the Masked Marauder,” Porter had finished. However, Archer had already been up and pulling off his nightclothes to get dressed.
He was wrapping Morpheus’s traces around a post when Brandt opened the cottage’s
front door.
“You look like hell,” he greeted with his usual lopsided grin. “How’s the leg?”
“Fine,” he snapped. He’d been lucky, Archer supposed, that the shot had been so shallow. It was healing at a fast pace, though it still oozed from time to time, especially when he moved too briskly.
Archer stormed past his friend into the warm, familiar front room of Pierce Cottage. Aged oak floorboards, a large stone hearth with a fire in the grate. The long table surrounded by chairs and benches that had been in the same place for as long as Archer could recall. The cookstove sat in a far corner, and when Brandt’s mother was alive, it had emitted the finest scents Archer’s nose had ever traced. Warm yeasty rolls, butter cookies, roasted chicken, and savory puddings. He knew he was in trouble when his stomach didn’t so much as grumble with a single pang of hunger.
He felt ill.
And furious.
Brandt closed the front door and turned to him, his arms crossing over his chest. He was as tall as Archer and as thickly built, but Brandt had a gentleness about him that Archer lacked. It was a grace and tranquility that spoke to the horses in Worthington Abbey’s stables, that calmed them and made the animals feel safe and respected. It often calmed Archer as well, though not now.
“What is wrong?” Brandt said, frowning at his ill humor.
By the time Archer had finished relating all he knew thus far, Brandt’s arms had come down to his sides, and his hands were flexing in and out of fists.
“You have an apostle, it seems,” he said, heading toward the cookstove. He slid on a mitt and lifted a coffeepot.
“A zealot, more like,” Archer replied.
He pulled out one of the stick-back chairs at the table and sat, drumming his fingers on the worn wooden tabletop. It was here, at this table, where he’d always felt most welcome. Most at ease.
As a boy, Brandt had spent time at Archer’s table, too. The table in the children’s nursery, that was, where Archer’s tutors had been given the task of teaching the stable master’s boy. The duke had not known of this, of course. It had been the duchess to whom Archer had pleaded such a convincing case. She had relented, but had warned them to be quiet about the lessons; if the duke were to hear of them, Brandt would be sent away. Montgomery, Brandt’s father and stable master, would be as well.
So their lessons had been discreet, their compliant tutors completely and utterly under the charm of Archer’s mother. They likely assumed the second boy was yet another ward of the duke. Sharp-witted and quick-brained, Brandt was a fast learner, keeping pace with Archer and even outdistancing him in some subjects. Despite the social hierarchy separating them, Archer trusted Brandt more than anyone in his own set.
The most intelligent and educated stable master in all of England sat down in a chair across the table from Archer. Brandt sipped his coffee. He hadn’t offered any to Archer. Brandt knew if Archer wanted some, he’d have to get up off his privileged arse and get it himself.
Archer didn’t think his stomach could handle coffee right then anyhow. He hooked an ankle over his knee. “He killed the bloody horse. Shot it. He beat Maynard and his coachman severely, too.”
And Viscount Northridge and Lady Briannon had been the first to come across the unholy scene. He hated that she’d seen the carnage this so-called apostle had left behind. What must she have thought, believing the defenseless beast in the road had been killed by the same man who had waylaid her carriage last week?
“Whomever it was has an obvious taste for violence,” he went on, trying to stay focused. “And you can be certain he isn’t redistributing the vast wealth of the ton, either.”
Brandt sat back in his chair. “This is not the Masked Marauder, and people will know it. You’ve never beaten someone to a pulp, or fired your pistol. Hell, it isn’t even loaded with a shot.”
“They don’t know that,” Archer replied. “And though I may announce what I plan to do with their precious coin and gems, how many of them do you think actually believe me? When the news about this reaches London, they’ll think that this bloodthirsty thief and I are one and the same. This brigand was no doubt stealing for his own benefit.”
Heartless bastard.
Brandt sat forward again, a restless energy coming off him. “Perhaps we should cool our heels a bit. If our zealot is as bloodthirsty as you say, it won’t be long before a dead horse becomes a dead peer.”
It was a wise suggestion.
“There is something more,” Archer said, nodding at his friend and clearing his throat. “I received an anonymous note from someone claiming to know my secret.”
Brandt’s brows slammed together. “A note?”
“It arrived hidden in my newssheets,” Archer said. “It appears that someone is aware of my true identity.”
“Do you think they are connected?” Brandt asked, his expression darkening. “The note and the attack?”
“It’s possible.”
Archer considered the two occurrences—the note and the violent attack on Maynard—and couldn’t help but worry that the two were related in some way. It seemed entirely too coincidental to have a zealot marauder and an unknown blackmailer appear almost at the same time. There was no way to know, he supposed, yet the malevolence of this imposter rubbed at him. Unlike Archer, he was no gentleman bandit.
Archer sighed, rubbing his temples. He’d known this path would be risky, but there were many who needed him to take that risk. People with no one to turn to. As always, Eloise’s mother came to mind. Though the Duke of Bradburne had the means to care for her and their child, he had chosen not to. After he’d taken whatever pleasure he could from her body, she’d been beneath his notice. So had Eloise. Lady Bradburne’s feelings of guilt at the woman’s death had become Archer’s own and, in some small way, redistributing his father’s—and the ton’s—wealth brought with it some measure of retribution. For Eloise’s mother’s sake. But he had not expected his alter ego to be usurped by a real criminal…and one whose violence would be attributed to him.
After so much time spent funneling the wealth of his peers to hospitals and orphanages, these people needed him…depended on him, even. More precisely, they depended on the generous donations of Viscount Hathaway. Hathaway, one of Archer’s false identities, had become a silent benefactor to the poor. At first, small contributions had been made, pilfered from sleights of hand and sweeping wins in the gaming hell he’d started at Cambridge, and then later at other more established gentlemen’s clubs where the spoils became far larger.
Soon after that, however, Archer had seized upon the idea to waylay his first carriage. It had been carefully planned, following an obnoxious display at White’s led by the bejeweled and pompous Lord Bainley, who had needed to be taught a valuable lesson in humility and divested of some of his fortune. The thrill of the act was undeniable, but it was the subsequent satisfaction of Lord Hathaway’s ability to make such large donations that had kept Archer waylaying carriages. Only those deserving of his attentions, of course.
Hathaway had actually been one of his mother’s uncle’s titles, and not one that could be easily traced back to him. Archer gave as much as he could of his own wealth, but the needs of the poor far outweighed his means. His intentions were benevolent. Those of this follower were clearly not. Outrage fanned higher within him. How dare some overzealous criminal impersonate him?
“Who could it be?” Archer said in an agitated voice. “It has to be someone we know, someone we have used. What of the runner?”
He left that end of the business to Brandt. If the Marquess of Hawksfield approached commoners with a job of running trinkets and jewels to Scotland’s border for cash trade, his game would be up in a flash. Brandt, however, had the obscurity that was needed for such a task.
He shook his head firmly. “It’s my cousin. I trust him. And he doesn’t know about your involvement. If anything, the boy thinks a lower footman is raiding the jewelry boxes of the fine guests that flow in and out of y
our London and country estates.”
Good. That was the theory Archer had hoped the runners would form. Petty theft. Not highway robbery.
“He’s new, isn’t he? This isn’t our first dance. What of the other runners you’ve employed?” Archer asked.
Brandt’s frown deepened as he considered what Archer had asked. Earlier on, they had used less trustworthy people to run the stolen jewels up to Scotland. They had been paid handsomely, and hadn’t asked questions, but that didn’t mean that they wouldn’t get ideas of their own or want a larger piece of the proverbial pie.
“It’s possible one of them has started to develop a theory about where those jewels really came from,” Brandt said, then sat back in his chair. “Or perhaps that boy you keep talking about from the night before last?”
Archer scowled and waved off the suggestion. “He was half the size of Maynard. And if the lad was a cutthroat, he wouldn’t have tried to help me.”
“He wouldn’t have shot you in the first place.”
Archer sighed and nodded. “Fair point.”
“He could have been following you for weeks, shot you so you would be out of the way, but didn’t want to kill you. He could have accomplices. Perhaps he already knows who you are, which is why he did not remove the mask. And what if he’s the one who sent the note?”
Archer schooled his expression to not betray the sudden chaos of his thoughts. It was entirely possible, and it would certainly confirm his earlier suspicion that the anonymous note was linked somehow. “If you’re right, this could be a real problem. If it is ever traced back to you or me, and I am somehow blamed for this pretender’s actions…” He paused, studying his friend. “There is one thing, though, that we may need to resolve.”
“Which is?”
“Lady Briannon Findlay.”
Brandt shot him a perplexed look. “The poorly girl from the neighboring estate?”
Archer thought of the time he’d seen Briannon square off against an angry boar, her color high. She hadn’t looked so “poorly” then. Neither had she at the masquerade last night in that sin-inducing dress, but servants gossiped, and it would be expected that Brandt, too, would have heard the rumors of her lung ailments over the years.
My Rogue, My Ruin Page 14