He’d forgotten how differently the Scottish raise their lassies. There was no falseness in Rhiannon. One got the notion that she saw every deceit a man perpetuated on others … and on himself. It was a compelling sensation and an unsettling one. He knew better than to rhapsodize over the past.
But in Rhiannon Russell he saw the best of Scotland. He looked at her and recalled brae heirs and valiant sons, killed or imprisoned or sent off to rot in England’s penal colonies. Aye, looking at Rhiannon Russell was a bittersweet endeavor but one he could not deny himself.
A week ago he’d discovered that she woke early and moved about the castle freely while the rest of Carr’s guests slept. Since he seldom found peace in slumber and even less here at Wanton’s Blush, he’d made it a habit to seek her company.
She didn’t seem to mind. Over the course of those short hours he’d discovered Rhiannon had other traits besides beauty and honesty. Each day she seemed to gain more of a singular strength, the sort of strength that comes from abandoning oneself to fate, of moving past fear. It was a characteristic with which he was well acquainted. He and Rhiannon Russell had much in common.
He leaned back against the newel and scanned the thinning company. Beneath their piled wigs, their faces were slack with witless hunger and numb desire. If he had a jot of red blood in his veins, he would take Rhiannon out of here this very night. No one would miss her until dawn. During the evenings she kept to herself and Carr never asked after her … Carr. Aye. That was the danger and the enigma.
Donne was not the only one who thought so. Several times, when the revelries had wound to a temporary end, Ash Merrick had sobered up and sought Donne out. Ash belabored Donne on every point he’d discovered about the Russell family and Rhiannon’s hypothetical brother. Despite his penchant for debauchery—and just lately his wholehearted pursuit of it—Merrick still owned a subtle intelligence.
The reminder killed Donne’s urge to chivalry. No one would notice if he took Rhiannon Russell—no one except Ash Merrick. A ruthless sort of gentleman, one a wise man would not lightly cross.
And Thomas Donne was a most wise man.
“Do you still pine for your bucolic home?” Fia looked over Rhiannon’s shoulder and met her reflected gaze in the mirror.
“Yes,” Rhiannon replied. “I miss Fair Badden very much.”
Fia’s heavy eyelids sank over her dark eyes. “Well, darling, you don’t seem to be wasting away from the effects. You’re in blooming good looks.”
Rhiannon finished twisting her hair into a knot atop her head and pushed herself away from the dressing table. “Thank you. I think.”
“Why is that, do you suppose?” Fia asked silkily. “Do you suppose you were not as happy at Fair Badden as you claim? Or perhaps your heart was never as fully engaged as you thought?”
The little witch, Rhiannon thought with a sharp glance at the girl. Her expression softened when she saw that her glare had disconcerted the girl. That was the trouble with Fia; innocence and jaded knowledge inexorably twined together to form her character.
Most of the time Rhiannon couldn’t decide whether Fia’s questions were deliberately provocative and biting or astoundingly innocent and honest. And perhaps she was angered with Fia because Fia was in some small way right.
“I do not doubt, Miss Fia, that I loved well Mrs. Fraiser. Every day I think of her and miss her very much and hope that she does not grieve for me or worry.” Fia was watching her fiercely, her brows puckered uncharacteristically in concentration.
“But, perhaps,” Rhiannon went on, “Fair Badden does not hold the place in my heart I thought it did. Perhaps no place is anything more than what memory and experience make it.”
The girl held Rhiannon’s gaze for one long moment before Fia nodded shortly. “You should write a letter to your Mrs. Fraiser.”
“I can do that?” Rhiannon asked in surprise.
“Of course,” Fia said coolly. “This isn’t Bedlam, Miss Russell, it’s a castle. We do have servants for that sort of thing. Write her a letter—she can read? Good, and I’ll have it delivered.”
Nonplussed by Fia’s detached magnanimity, Rhiannon rose to her feet and smiled tentatively. “Thank you … I will. Your kindness—”
“You really should let Gunna fit you with a wig. With your eye color a pale silver would be astonishing.” Rhiannon quelled the impulse to smile. Fia was as disconcerted by having made the offer as Rhiannon had been on hearing it and she was seeking to cover her awkwardness. The least Rhiannon could do was to help her out.
“I dislike wigs,” Rhiannon said. “Nits.”
“I don’t have lice!” Fia cried.
Rhiannon raised her brows. “Of course not.”
Fia frowned. “We’d best be going. Have you finished? No powder, either? No beauty mark?”
“No.” Rhiannon swept past the girl and through the door, smiling when she heard the trip of Fia’s feet hastening to catch up. She was a tiny thing.
“Carr won’t like your dress,” Fia warned breathlessly on making Rhiannon’s side. She eyed Rhiannon’s gown as they began descending the stairs. “Too jeune fille.”
Rhiannon was unconcerned with Carr’s sartorial approval. Ash Merrick and Fia’s curiosity about her family in Fair Badden occupied her thoughts. “You have another brother, do you not?”
“Yes. Raine. He’s a few years younger than Ash. Big, rough-looking fellow.”
“I don’t believe I’ve met him.”
“Well, darling, you wouldn’t lest you’d been loitering about French prison yards,” Fia said complacently.
Rhiannon halted. “Prison?”
Fia sighed and stopped also. “Yes. I thought you knew. I thought everyone knew. Ash was imprisoned, too. Until Carr ransomed him almost a year ago.”
Prison bracelets. The scars he wore were from manacles. “What— But why—”
Fia tched gently. “Carr does not tolerate stuttering.”
“Why were your brothers imprisoned in France?”
Fia shrugged with elegant unconcern. “My mother was Scottish, you know. She was quite the little Jacobite loyalist, I’m told. She sought to involve Carr in her dramas. Carr played along with her.”
Did it not occur to the girl that she was Scottish, too? Rhiannon wondered.
“Her relatives eventually proved valuable during the rebellion of forty-five. Carr furnished the Duke of Cumberland with information he’d acquired through them. In return, Wanton’s Blush was given to Carr.”
Rhiannon barely heard the last part. Cumberland. The Butcher of Culloden. The floor dipped beneath her feet. She looked up, light-headed, and found Fia’s lovely gaze fastened on her in puzzlement.
“Go on,” Rhiannon said faintly.
“After Culloden, those of my mother’s relatives still living discovered Carr’s true allegiance.”
His treachery, thought Rhiannon.
“They plotted to ambush and kill him. Only they caught my brothers instead.” Fia’s slight, childish shoulders lifted in a dismissive shrug. “Their captors didn’t know what to do with them. For probably the only time in their lives my brothers had cause to bless their Scottish blood.
“For valueless as my mother had been to her relatives, they were a loyal lot. They disliked the thought of killing her sons. So, they handed them over to their French allies to be used as hostages, thinking they would break Carr’s back financially. Within days of their capture Ash and Raine were in a French gaol. The conspirators were, by the way, soon after rounded up and dispatched.”
“Why is Raine still in prison?” Rhiannon asked in bewilderment. “Your clothes, the jewels, the food, this place … surely Carr can afford to ransom him?”
“He didn’t try.” Fia’s elegant chin rose. “To give in to such demands would only encourage further tactics of that sort. He explained it to me.”
Dear God, Rhiannon thought numbly, what manner of wasps’ nest was this? A father who would not ransom his own sons long after the
hostilities that had resulted in their captivity had ended? A cold, emotionless girl who supported such monstrous disloyalty?
“But Ash is free,” Rhiannon said.
“Yes …” Fia’s brow lined in perplexity. “Carr ransomed Ash. I must own, he never explained that to me …” She glanced at Rhiannon and her brow once more smoothed. “Not that it matters. I’m sure Carr had excellent reasons. It’s imperative that one see each situation for what it is without allowing sentiment to cloud one’s judgment.”
“Is that what paternal affection is, a clouding sentiment?”
“You don’t understand.”
“Don’t you miss your brother?”
Color simmered beneath the smooth powdered surface covering Fia’s face. “I don’t know him. I don’t know either of them. Carr said they had been too much under the influence of my mother as children and it has irrevocably marked them. He says they are unfit companions for me. Besides, Ash and Raine have never demonstrated any concern for me.” A sliver of bitterness disturbed her usually suave voice.
“But still, they are your brothers,” Rhiannon insisted. “Don’t you wonder how Raine is? If he suffers? If he hopes for release and is doubly tormented in captivity by knowing his father refuses to pay for his freedom … perhaps even his life?”
“I don’t wonder at all. What could such conjecture possibly accomplish?” Fia slowed her steps, as though she wished to draw away. “You are too emotional. An unfortunate characteristic Carr says is endemic in the Highland Scot.
“Besides, Ash will see that Raine is eventually freed. He’s obsessed with the idea. Why do you think he agreed to waste all that time fetching you?”
Rhiannon could not answer. Her thoughts spun in a chaotic whirl.
“Money. To be used for Raine’s ransom,” Fia said in disgust.
Rhiannon stared at her unseeingly. “Are you sure?”
Fia lifted her shoulders indifferently. “I conjecture. What else is he spending his money on? Certainly not clothes!” She sniffed.
“Miss Russell!” A deep, masculine burr drew Rhiannon’s stricken gaze from Fia’s inimical one.
Thomas Donne strode up the stairs two at a time, his hard face softening at the sight of Rhiannon. Beside her Fia’s expression grew guarded.
The girl drew back on Donne’s approach, as though she could not bear for him to see her with her eyes bright and her skin flushed. Donne did not spare her a glance.
“You’re not going to the fight, are you, Miss Russell?” he said to Rhiannon.
“I’m afraid I don’t know what you mean,” Rhiannon mumbled, the implications of what Fia had told her wheeling through her mind. “Lord Carr insisted that I attend some sort of entertainment. He said nothing about a fight. Not a cockfight? Or bear baiting. I can’t abide either.”
Donne glanced sharply at Fia. “No, Miss Russell. This is men fighting, bare-knuckled street savagery. Nothing a lady should witness.”
“Carr specifically asked for her,” Fia said calmly. “And many other ladies will be present, have been present all this week. It’s not as abhorrent as you make out, Lord Donne. I doubt Miss Russell is so much more sensitive than the rest of us.”
“Other ladies will be present?” Rhiannon asked doubtfully. She had no desire to see two men beat each other but if it provided the chance to press Carr about leaving here and, perhaps, discovering more about Ash and Raine, she would take that opportunity.
“Other women will be there,” Donne allowed flatly. “But I would not place Miss Russell amongst their ilk. Refuse, Miss Russell,” Donne urged. “Your attendance can only cause you distress. It’s scandalous even for Carr. Even for this crowd.”
“You’ve become a prude, Lord Donne,” Fia said haughtily. “ ’Tis nothing more than an interesting demonstration. Personally, I agree with you that the thing should be called off, but only because it makes him so unprepossessing to face over the dining table. But why should Miss Russell care? If she really was kidnapped, as ’tis rumored, she might even enjoy seeing him receive a good thrashing.”
Donne swung on Fia, his mouth smiling politely but his eyes flat with scorn. “Don’t measure another’s capacity for decency by what little you … see in others. Whatever Miss Russell has suffered at your family’s hands, I cannot think she wishes to witness Merrick’s crippling.”
“Merrick?” Rhiannon echoed in unwilling alarm. “How is that?”
Donne stared at her. “But … didn’t Fia or Carr tell you?”
“What?” Rhiannon asked.
“Ash Merrick is one of the combatants.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Ladies and gentlemen clad in last night’s stained, rumpled silks, whey-faced and flabby-skinned in the unforgiving morning light, hung from the windows overlooking the stable courtyard and milled four deep around its border. A carnival mood infected them. By pitting an aristocrat against a commoner in a bareknuckle fight, Carr had orchestrated a delicious scandal. And not just any aristocrat but Carr’s own son, Merrick, and not a single fight but fisticuffs for three days running now.
They wouldn’t have missed being part of this no matter how much it cost—and it had cost them plenty. London hadn’t offered anything so infamous in a decade. And though they panted to be away to London to spread the tattle, they dare not leave lest something even more outrageous occur.
Their murmurs quieted as Baron Paughville’s groom entered the stable yard. He was stripped to the waist and oiled, his shorn head likewise greased to frustrate an opponent’s handhold. Rumor had it he’d wrestled on the Continent. More telling, he was Scottish. The chance to break English bone and pound English flesh would have been enticement enough without the fat purse Carr offered for winning.
Ash Merrick stood chatting with the crowd at the rail with all the appearance of amiability. Surreptitiously, he noted the groom’s long, thick arms and short, bowed legs and the forward tilt of his crouching gait. The Scot would be hard to get off his feet and onto the ground, where street brawls—and prison brawls—were won or lost.
Three days ago Ash would have been certain of his victory. If nothing else, he’d had the element of surprise to aid him. His opponents, all culled from the stables and fields hereabouts, were laborers. They did not imagine an aristocrat would deal violence so brutally or so expeditiously. Three days had taught them differently.
But it wasn’t surprise alone that gave him an advantage. He’d learned to fight not only unscrupulously but also fearlessly. He could block out every external distraction including pain, narrowing his focus down until only he and his adversary existed.
What set today apart was simply his body. He was no longer physically up to the task. Though his spirit had risen to do battle through sheer instinct, spirit alone could no longer compensate for three days of brutal pummeling. The preceding victories had come at a price.
He suspected one rib was cracked. For a certainty two fingers of his left hand had been broken. His left eye was swollen as a result of having become intimately acquainted yesterday with a combatant’s boot heel, and purple welts tattooed his torso. Today would be his last fight, no matter what his father “urged.”
The thought of Carr made Ash smile.
His father had lost a great deal of money betting against his son, while Ash had made a nice profit. His smile faded. Today, though … today Ash simply wanted to survive and have an end to it.
“What do we do now?” The Scots groom demanded of the crowd in general. He approached the cleared center of the stable yard and eyed Ash expectantly. “Is there anyone to make a beginning or end to it?”
Ash glanced about, looking for Donne. The elegant Scotsman had held Ash’s bets for the past days. Not finding him, Ash tapped a nearby exquisite on the arm. The startled young man backed up. Ash grinned.
“Don’t worry— Begad if it ain’t Hurley!” Ash exclaimed. “Hurley, m’dear, be a fellow and make me a small wager, will you? Fifty pounds says I win.” He seized Hurley’s glov
ed hand and pried open the stiff lavender-sheathed fingers, slapping a fat purse into his palm and curling the fingers back over it. “There’s a lad. And since you’ve been such an accommodating fellow, let me give you a tip. I wouldn’t follow suit. My bet is only by way of incentive, don’tcha know.”
“N-n-no,” Hurley stammered. “I mean … y-y-y-yes. I mean, I am sure you’ll win, Mr. Merrick.”
“I did warn you.” The small diversion palled and Ash dismissed Hurley without another thought. Best get on with it.
In a single motion he stripped off his jacket and then pulled the cambric shirt over his head. Whispers of female gratification sizzled beneath roars of masculine approval. Ash faced the Scotsman still standing awkward and self-conscious in the center of a ring of beautifully clad ladies and gentleman.
“No one starts and no one finishes it,” Ash explained, approaching the other man, “save we two. There are no rules. There is only one manner in which to win and that is to leave here upright.” He stopped just out of arm’s reach of the other man. “Exquisitely simple, n’est-ce pas?”
“I gets it,” the groom growled and launched himself forward.
Ash had been right; the man had experience. He came in low and aimed for the knees, seeking to take Ash to the ground rather than battering haphazardly—and ineffectually—at the head. Ash locked his fists together and swung down, chopping across the back of the groom’s oncoming neck.
Pain jolted through the broken fingers and thundered through his hand. The Scot tumbled and sprawled flat under the blow. Ash wheeled back, cursing and shaking his injured hand even as he felt arms grapple him about his calves. Damn the man, he was still conscious.
Ash kicked out and twisted sideways but the arms about his legs tightened relentlessly. With a thick grunt, the Scot heaved upward, pitching Ash into the air.
The ground slammed into Ash’s back like a smithy’s hammer. Pain drilled through his side with red-hot intensity, driving the air from his lungs, blackening the edges of his vision. He gasped, rolling to his side and curling up, protecting the injured ribs. The Scotsman recognized his agony and paused, his eye glinting with anticipation. It was only a second’s gloating, but it was a second too much.
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