The Lady's Guard (Sinful Brides Book 3)

by Christi Caldwell

  “You’ll tell her the truth,” Ryker said bluntly. “You’ll tell her there is reason to suspect someone might wish her harm, so that she is prepared.” It was a familiar lesson in the Dials. But one anathema to the fabricated existence manufactured by these nobles.

  The wrinkles around the duke’s eyes deepened, but then he gave a reluctant nod. “I will explain it to the girl. Shall we?” he asked, and then with his slower, methodical steps, he started for the doorway.

  Ryker set out behind him, and Niall kept a distance, trailing after the father and son. Eager to be on with this assignment, so he could prove the girl was seeing ghosts in shadows and be free of this stifled, stilted world.

  From where she stood at her easel, Diana squinted, trying to bring the numbers on the ormolu clock into focus.

  Ryker had not yet arrived.

  Just past nine o’clock, it was early by Polite Society’s standards. Men such as Ryker Black, and the scowling guard who’d pinned Diana against an alley wall, however, seemed to exist without sleep.

  She’d didn’t know what to expect of Ryker and Father’s meeting.

  Given her brother’s aura of strength and power, she’d convinced herself that Father would at last leave his rooms and step out into the living—and listen.

  She tightened her grip on her paintbrush. Men always invariably trusted other men. Where were women? Well, women like her were secreted away for their own good and doted on like cherished porcelain, not sturdy people capable of knowing their own minds.

  Giving her head a shake, she returned her attentions to her painting.

  Since her mother’s treachery had been revealed, Diana had existed in a peculiar state. She was disdained by the peerage and yet exalted by the servants in the Duke of Wilkinson’s employ. The members of her father’s household staff treated her with reverence, but never anything more.

  It was, at best, a lonely world.

  At worst, a miserable one.

  Even the flood of invitations and visits from the peerage had come to an abrupt stop.

  Only a handful of invitations had been issued for the once respected family. Beyond that, there was not a single friend, caller, or suitor.

  The irony was not lost on her. When her mother had been around, she’d scrutinized Diana’s every movement and decision with such intensity, Diana had secretly longed for privacy to simply exist without fear of reproach.

  Never before would she have been able to sneak out, hire a hack, and avoid detection. Not as long as her mother had been present.

  Now, with her mother gone, there wasn’t a single person to care about her painting, or embroidering, or . . . her. Her sister, Helena, spent more time in the country than she did in London. Her brother, Ryker, though he’d pledged to help her, hadn’t uttered a single word to her in the whole of her life before that.

  She scrunched up her mouth. Nor had her mother truly cared about Diana. She hadn’t. At all. If one wished to be truly specific. Diana had listened in at too many keyholes to know that she’d served only one purpose—to make a great, advantageous match that would grow their family’s wealth, power, and prestige.

  Then there was Diana’s father. The always smiling, benevolent papa, who since his wife’s sins had come to light looked through Diana but never at her. Instead, he closeted himself away in his rooms, rarely coming out but for meals. Her stomach muscles clenched. He’d been bereft since he’d discovered the hand Diana’s mother had played in getting rid of his beloved mistress and his illegitimate children. Mad . . . just like the duchess.

  Those whispered words she’d overheard between two serving maids reverberated around her mind.

  Her fingers curled reflexively around her brush, and she forced herself to ease that grip. Diana made another several strokes upon the canvas.

  A slow-simmering resentment boiled to the surface once more. There was surely a darkness in her soul that she should hate her father. She did not hate him for having loved a woman other than his wife and giving that woman two children. She did not hate him for publicly declaring those children his own, as he should have done years earlier. She did not even hate him for his collapse this past year.

  What she could never understand, or forgive, was the ease with which he’d sent his wife to Bedlam, a prison more than a hospital. As a duke he’d the power and influence to at least see her in an establishment where she was not abused.

  As such, she had no doubt that when she did indeed board a ship bound for St. George’s, he’d never give Diana another thought.

  Abandoning all futile efforts at creating anything of her own, Diana tossed the brush down onto the palette. It landed with a hard, satisfying thwack, splattering paint on the table. Loosening the strings of her apron, Diana pulled it off and rested it on a nearby shell-backed chair. Restless, she snagged the large leather book lying open.

  Some of the tension left her frame.

  Resting one palm on the table, with the other she flipped through William Gilpin’s collection of landscapes, her gaze skimming the pages. She stopped on a familiar, dog-eared page. Diana froze. A pair of men marching a path down a long road toward the impressive keep. She trailed her fingertips over the turbulent sky. The thick clouds, portending night’s approach. Had the artist captured his own desolate thoughts of home? Or did he, with the two figures shoulder to shoulder, hint at a closeness of two who would weather the darkness on the horizon? Darkness. Danger—

  Meredith stumbled into the room. “Murderers,” the girl panted, clutching at her side. “We were wrong for doubting you.”

  “I . . . what?” she blurted. They’d doubted her? It was a silly detail to fix on given the servant’s warnings. And yet . . .

  “My lady,” Meredith implored. “We have to hide. Please. Demanded to see His Grace and are in his office now.”

  Then Meredith’s earlier words slipped forward.

  Tall. Dark. Scarred. With weapons.

  “Did one of the men have a scar that ran from here”—she motioned to her lip—“down to here?” she asked breathlessly, dragging her fingertips from her jaw just under her neck. A man with the face and body of a battle-hardened warrior. How had he come by those vicious wounds? Sadness and curiosity pulled that thought around her mind.

  Meredith nodded frantically. “An ugly monster, my lady,” she whispered, clutching at her throat.

  Diana blinked. “Ugly?” Niall Marksman would never fit with society’s standards of beauty, but there was a rugged masculinity to him that made him real in ways gentlemen of the ton were not.

  “His eyes are black like Satan’s, and the man with him?” Meredith gulped. “Equally scarred. Evil.”

  Diana registered a thick, charged silence. Her stomach sank.

  Ryker, Father, and the very devil Meredith had come to warn her of all stared back.

  Bloody hell.

  By the harsh glint in Niall’s piercing blue eyes, he’d taken Diana for one of those gossiping sorts.

  Her lady’s maid shrieked and rushed behind Diana. So much for loyal servants, she thought dryly as the girl cowered at her back. “Meredith, my brother, Ryker, and . . .” What to call Niall Marksman? Nor have you felt a thing sisterly toward him since the day he folded you in his arms at the Hell and Sin. Cheeks warming, Diana cleared her throat. “Mr. Marksman and my brother are here to visit. Will you see to refreshments?”

  Meredith paled as the three men stepped inside. With a hasty curtsy, she rushed past the men at the front of the room.

  Her glassy-eyed father looked at Diana as though he puzzled through a familiar stranger’s identity. Not even a greeting was issued.

  Then, when was the last time her father had paid her a visit? Their exchanges were nonexistent since Mother had been moved to Bedlam and he into his chambers.

  Ryker sketched a bow, and she went through the motions of greeting her brother. Niall Marksman hung back, not joining the group.

  Her heart knocked wildly against her rib cage.

&
nbsp; Danger.

  Everything about him, from the soot-black lashes and glacial eyes to the tightly coiled muscles straining the fabric of his loud, splendidly tailored garments, exuded the very essence of that menacing word.

  She gave thanks as her father performed useless introductions, and took the opportunity to settle her racing heart. Surely this was not the man Ryker would assign to stand as guard?

  By the jeering glimmer in those near-obsidian eyes, Niall Marksman had neatly interpreted her very thoughts.

  “Please, please, let us sit,” her father said in vacant tones.

  Stealing an occasional sideways peek at Mr. Marksman, Diana took the curved, gilt wood bergère chair—farthest away from the menacing guard.

  While Ryker and her father settled into their respective seats, she set out to calm her panicky nerves.

  It was silly fearing Niall Marksman. Just because he’d had her pressed hard against the brick wall abutting his gaming hell. Just because he’d put his hands all over her, everywhere. Including her throat, when he’d nearly choked the life from her.

  Niall moved into position alongside Ryker’s chair, giving him the look of one of those ruthless warriors defending his liege. She swallowed hard. Yes, well, mayhap it was prudent to fear him. If even just a little. She’d not, however, dwell in a constant state of it—for him, or any person. It was why she’d see him as no one more than Niall, Ryker’s brother.

  Well, mayhap not his brother, per se. Not given the wicked ponderings she’d carried for the man a year earlier, when she’d been a pathetic, romantic miss. She—

  Registered the peculiar silence.

  Heat rushed to her cheeks, and she folded her hands primly on her lap in that demure acquiescence drilled into her by a stern-faced nursemaid and then equally stern-faced governess.

  “Ryker came to see us today,” her father supplied needlessly, grinning the first real expression of mirth, one that reached his eyes, for the first time in more than a year. The aging duke leaned over and patted his son on the knee.

  A pang struck her heart. Regret, guilt, and pain, all neatly rolled together. Of course, why shouldn’t her father be restored to the living? He had before him a son he loved, given him by a woman he’d also loved. A woman Diana’s mother had ultimately seen destroyed. “Ryker,” Diana greeted softly. How many times as a small girl had she yearned for a brother or sister to call friend? Only to end up with this aloof stranger who wanted nothing to do with her?

  He inclined his head, saying nothing, revealing even less.

  But regardless of how he felt, or didn’t feel, about her, he was here. And that said something about his honor and character.

  Their father rotated his gaze between his two children. By the emotion glittering in his eyes, they were assembled for an intimate family gathering and not a previously arranged meeting Diana had single-handedly orchestrated.

  “Shall we take refreshments?” their sire suggested.

  “I am not here on a social call.” Was Ryker’s reminder intended for Diana or their delusional sire?

  That statement, however, had little impact on the duke. “No,” he concurred, and then turned to Diana. “Your brother is here—”

  Niall snorted, and she favored him with a razor-sharp glare. “I’m sorry, Mr. Marksman. Are you unwell? Mayhap you require tea, after all, to clear whatever is in your throat?”

  His jaw dropped, and she delighted in that momentary lack of control. Good. Served him right. He might belittle Ryker’s relationship to a duke’s daughter, but their blood was the same.

  “Foine,” he said, touching the brim of an imagined hat.

  How easily he slipped in and out those throaty, guttural tones. Was it a bid to disconcert? Shock? Or was it simply what came from living between two worlds? Shoving aside her piqued curiosity, Diana returned her attention to her father.

  “As I was saying,” he went on. “Your brother is here because he cares about you.”

  It was Diana’s turn to choke, and her skin burned with the feel of Niall’s hard, mocking gaze turned on her.

  “I always knew the bond between my children would be strong, if he—”

  “Perhaps we might discuss the reasons for Ryker’s concern?” she suggested in a rush, in a desperate attempt to cut off that humiliating delusion he waxed on about.

  “—cared about you.”

  Feeling much like an owl startled from its perch, she blinked wildly at Niall Marksman.

  “Your father didn’t say Ryker was concerned but rather he cared about you.”

  A vast difference and also a noticeable slip on her part. One that Niall exploited, earning a glower from his brother from the street. Oh, blast. She was not made for this subterfuge business, but he did not need to needle and mock her. Diana adopted a serene expression her mother had insisted she master in front of a mirror at the age of eight. “I’m certain you did. Did you not, Papa?” She laced that question in feigned confusion, meant to distract. Of course, no one had truly listened to Diana all these years. Her father was content to see the surface and nothing more.

  He blinked his befuddlement. “Concern. Care for. All the same, is it not?”

  No, it was not. Caring came from a place of affection, if not love. Concern could come from a place of guilt or remorse. She, however, knew better than to debate her father’s point. “Indeed,” she murmured.

  Niall’s blue-black eyes nearly disappeared behind his thick, sooty eyelashes. She forced herself to remain still through his derisory study.

  Ryker took command of the discussion. “I have reason to believe there are men who might wish you harm.”

  Three pairs of eyes fixed on her. Why could she not have been one of those cleverly prevaricating ladies? And why had she not considered just how she’d let that surprise play out? Or was it terror? They expected something. Oh, drat. Which was it they expected?

  Ryker took heart. “I see you are shocked.”

  Belatedly, she let her mouth fall agape.

  And then wonder of all wonders, a grin, not at all mocking and very much real, curled Niall’s mouth in the corners, momentarily transforming his scarred, hardened visage into something wholly beautiful. Which was odd to think of a man as beautiful, and yet his square, noble jaw and chiseled cheeks were better suited to stone masterpieces than a mere mortal.

  He caught her regard, and all hint of softness dissolved behind the rugged exterior. Heat exploded in her cheeks at being caught staring. “Wh-who would wish me ill?” she blurted, embarrassment lending credence to that stammer. It was also a question that had dogged her sleepless nights and worry-filled days since that first broken axle.

  “I don’t know specifically who,” Ryker replied. “But I have enemies. Many of them. The same men who stabbed my wife on the street.” That reminder threw a somber blanket of silence over the room.

  It didn’t matter which station a person was born to. Either one lived on the streets and battled foes or one danced in a ballroom, the recipient of snide whispers and ruthless barbs.

  “I don’t know what to say.” And mayhap it was the very truth to that admission that allowed it to tumble forward so easily.

  “Ryker’s friend—”

  “Brother,” Ryker corrected the duke, a harsh edge to that single utterance.

  “Brother,” their father reiterated, bobbing his head. “Mr. Marksman will be a guest here. Looking after your . . . your . . .”

  “Safety,” Ryker supplied.

  “He’ll be keeping you company.” The duke dabbed at his eyes. “Like a friend. Until the threat has passed. It will be good for you to have a friend here.” Niall Marksman emitted a strangled, choking sound, and Diana shot him a sideways look. “With your lack of—”

  “Thank you,” she hurriedly interrupted, jerking her attention to her father. It was one thing to be friendless. It was another for two strangers to know that pathetic detail. Diana stood, and after her father and brother rose, she held her fingers out
to Ryker, and he hesitated a moment before taking them. “Thank you for your concern.” Not caring. She gave his hand a slight shake in a bold gesture that her mother would have lamented and then released his callused hand.

  She turned her attention to Niall and offered him her hand. “Thank you, Mr. Marksman, for offering your services on my behalf.” A muscle leapt at the corner of his eye.

  He did not wish to be here.

  Does that surprise you? Did you think he, the owner of a gaming hell and man responsible for that club’s security, would welcome living with you, in this household? Diana herself despised these stifling walls.

  Then, with all the enthusiasm of one grabbing the edge of a burning blade, he placed his gloveless hand in hers. The air lodged in her lungs as a searing charge radiated from his touch. It tingled a path up her arm and set her heart pounding.

  All from a touch. It’s because you’ve never felt a man’s naked hand on your own before. Even so . . . Diana swiftly yanked her hand back. She lowered her shaking fingers to her side and retreated a step. Taking care to avoid his gaze, she stood silent while her father and Ryker concluded their meeting.

  A short while later, Ryker departed and, in his wake, left behind his ruthless guard—Mr. Marksman.

  Diana glanced about for the maid, who’d already gone.

  “Scared, princess?” he taunted, earning a gasp.

  She pressed a hand to her chest. Niall Marksman wore that cool mockery with the same ease he owned his icy ruthlessness. This was the man Ryker had left behind to ensure her safety. “We’ve gotten off to a rather ignominious beginning.”

  “Ya like to use fancy words, do you, princess?”

  She’d not let him shake her. Not any more than he already had. “You’re not, you know,” she said softly.

  He nudged his chin, commanding her without words to finish that thought.

  “Ugly, evil, or d-dangerous.” She stumbled over that last word. “As my maid earlier suggested. You’re none of those things.”

  Mr. Marksman laughed, the sound as ragged as a graveled road. “You’re a bloody twit if ya believe that.”