Stubly alone made her skin crawl, but being encroached upon by six made her feel close to retching there in the grass.
“Pretty as ever, Miss Blake.” Stubly tipped his hat. “Bow to the lady, lads.”
A chorus of snickers erupted. “The last time we crossed paths your deuced brother and Lord Rigsby thought they could best me.”
“They did best you, Stubs, to my recollection,” one of the other men laughed.
“Shut up, Jolly!” Stubly snarled.
The laughter stopped. The circle around Henrietta tightened.
Instinct screamed at Henrietta to bolt for a hole in the circle, to run fast and hard and hope for the best. Instinct also told her to stay still. Stubly and his friends were not known for their brains. Perhaps she could outwit them. She stood her ground. “Good afternoon, gentlemen. Although I don’t know if men who use such language deserve that moniker.”
They laughed again.
She forced a smile. “Now, I bid you good day. I must be getting back to my grandmother. She’s waiting for me.” She strode forward with more confidence than she felt.
Stubly inched closer. “No, she ain’t. I’ve been watching you since you entered the park. You’re alone. And now you’re mine. I’ve waited long enough. Then the other gents can have you, too. You won’t mind.”
She ran. Meaty hands grabbed her waist.
“No!” Henrietta kicked out and was rewarded with a cry and a groan. Not Stubly’s though.
He twisted her arm behind her back and pulled her up against him, whispering in her ear, “I like a little fight.” His breath reeked of stale liquor, and he clearly hadn’t used his tooth powder in days. She gagged at the wretched smell. “Last year, the world thought you too good for the likes of me, didn’t they? But I knew better,” he sneered. “Now the truth is out.” His lips, wet and sticky, pressed against her ear. “I can do what I want with you, and no one would bat an eye.”
“Stubs.” A voice from the crowd she didn’t recognize. “Maybe we shouldn’t.”
“We have to,” another voice said.
“I don’t care what you think. She wants it. She gives it away, I hear. Though it wasn’t news to me. Besides, we’re doing the duchess a special favor.” He ground his hips against her back and bile rose in her throat.
“Please, no,” she whimpered.
“You mean ‘please, yes.’” He shoved her forward, sent her to her knees, then yanked her up again, pushing her forward until the rough bark of a tree scratched her cheek.
She fought panic. She could still control the situation. “You let go of me this instant!” Her voice sounded more confident than she felt.
“Let her go, Stubs. A little fun is fun, but she wants her dead.” The voice hissed the last word, scared of the single syllable.
“Yeah. Let’s go. It’s the middle of the afternoon.”
Henrietta swallowed the panic shooting through her. Dead? “Who wants me dead?” she choked out.
Stubly’s grip tightened. His breath heated her ear. “No use in knowing if you won’t be here long enough to enjoy the information.”
“No!” Henrietta stomped on his foot, flung her elbows wherever they might hit a vulnerable target.
His hand flew over her mouth and the other shoved her tight against a tree.
She bit his palm.
“You bitch!” he cursed, jerking his hand away.
“Stubs!” The voices behind them grew in urgency.
Stubly didn’t notice. “You’ll pay,” he said, shaking his hand.
“Stubly! Someone’s coming!”
Still, he seemed not to hear, piercing Henrietta with a rage-filled gaze.
“My lord.” A voice, deep and commanding rose above the others. “I ’ave a pistol trained on yer ’ead. If you don’t let Miss Blake go, I’ll use it.”
“Thomas!” Henrietta cried, sobbing thanks for her groom’s rescue.
Stubly’s grip loosened. Whether from fear or astonishment, she didn’t know and didn’t care. She wrenched from his grasp and stumbled toward Thomas, who shoved her behind him, keeping the pistol trained on Stubly the entire time.
“You think one man can stop all of us?” Stubly asked.
Henrietta caught a hint of grin slip into the thin line of Thomas’s mouth. “I ’eard you’re not particularly great with a pistol, my lord. Besides, what others are you talking about?”
It was true. Stubly stood alone, his cronies ambled, cloaks limp about their shoulders, back the way they’d come. Henrietta’s heartbeat slowed from triple- to double-time.
Stubly’s head jerked about as he gazed in dismay at his disappearing friends. “Fuck,” he muttered. He lifted his eyes to Thomas and squared his shoulders. “You won’t shoot me.”
“Won’t I? Personally, I feel Mr. Blake should ’ave shot you last year, but that’s me.” His brows drew together. “And a bunch of the others back at the ’ouse, of course.”
Stubly stood his ground, his jaw hardening. “I didn’t do anything wrong.”
Henrietta surged forward, fists at the ready. “Why you!”
Thomas yanked Henrietta back behind him.
“Yer a liar and a scoundrel and everyone will know it,” Thomas said, keeping the pistol trained on Stubly. “Already do know it, I’m sure. Just been too polite an’ all to say anything.”
“You dare speak to me with such impudence and disrespect?”
“I dare to shoot ya if ya don’t scram.”
Stubly looked as if he might barrel forward and tackle Thomas to the ground. But in the end, the light drained from his eyes, he pulled his hat low over his brow, and he stumbled after his friends.
Thomas watched him, then turned to Henrietta. “Are you okay, miss?”
“Yes, Thomas. Thank you.”
“Yer not okay,” he said, eyes grim.
“I am. I promise”
“Yer cryin’.”
She reached up to her cheeks. Oh, she was crying. The realization unleashed a torrent inside of her, and her tears shed faster, more violently, until she was sobbing, hiccupping.
“There, there.” Thomas patted her shoulder awkwardly, then placed her atop Lemon like she was a straw doll. “Chin up. We gotta walk through the gauntlet to get ye home. Don’t let ’em see ya shiver, miss.”
She pulled herself up tall and wiped her eyes. No, she’d not let them see her shiver, no matter what they did to her.
Chapter 25
The park was an intimidating crush of silks and satins, parasols and stovepipes, from Rotten Row to the Lady’s Mile, but Grayson pushed Trott into it anyway.
“I don’t see why we couldn’t have waited for Hen at home,” Tobias said, pushing into the crowd alongside Grayson. “Grandpapa has particularly good scotch.”
“Of which you’ve had enough today.”
“I’ve not had any scotch today. Brandy, yes, but not scotch.”
“Keep your eyes peeled, Tobias.” He wanted to tell Henrietta as soon as he could—it was all over except their future together.
“I think that’s Lemon.”
“Henrietta’s mare?”
“Right there.”
Grayson swung in the direction Tobias pointed. It did look like Lemon, but where was Henrietta?
Tobias cupped his hands over his eyes. “And, look, there’s her groom walking into the copse of trees.”
A bullet of dread lodged itself in Grayson’s gut. “But where’s Henrietta?”
“I don’t know.” Tobias nudged his horse toward the trees and Grayson followed, but a barouche rolled between them, impeding Grayson’s progress. He tipped his hat to the woman in the conveyance. “Good day, Lady Paddington.”
“Hello, Lord Rigsby, how is your father?”
“Fine,” he bit off, peering over her shoulder at Tobias.
“Are we to expect a happy announcement soon?” Lady Paddington clasped her hands together and sent him a knowing grin.
“Yes, actually.” Grayson steppe
d to the side to circle around her.
She clapped. “It will be the wedding of the century!”
“Grayson,” Tobias called, irritation, urgency, lacing his voice.
Lady Paddington turned her body to follow Grayson’s apparently unsuccessful evasive maneuvers. “To think, a duke’s son and a duke’s daughter. I’m sure even the Regent will attend!”
“Grayson,” Tobias barked.
Grayson felt a hairsbreadth from complete rudeness. “My lady, I—”
“Grayson.” Tobias’s voice cut through the air with an edge of panic. “She’s come out of the copse with the groom. Something is wrong.” He abandoned Grayson to Lady Paddington and urged his horse into a hard gallop.
“Don’t worry,” said Lady Paddington, unaware of the frustrated tension wafting toward her. “I’ll act surprised when I hear the official announcement.”
Grayson’s patience snapped. “I fear you will be authentically surprised.” He didn’t even tip his hat when he whipped Trott around the barouche and took off toward the copse. Henrietta sat atop Lemon, her spine stiff, her hair disarranged, a pistol tucked into her groom’s waistband. Tobias arrived before Grayson, but at the breakneck speed Grayson set, not by much. He vaulted out of the saddle as Tobias grabbed the pistol and charged for the copse of trees.
The groom raced after him and pulled him back. “Ain’t nothin’ you can do, sir.”
Tobias’s grip on the pistol tightened. “There sure as hell is.”
“Grayson?” Henrietta’s voice pulled him from the conflict erupting between Tobias and the groom.
She’d dismounted Lemon and stood like a shadow beside him.
He didn’t dare touch her—she seemed too fragile—and her pallid face offered no answers. “Henrietta, what’s happened?”
“Only what was promised.” Her voice trembled. She took in a racking breath. “Why didn’t you do as they asked, Grayson?”
He risked it, then. He grasped her shoulders, rubbing his palms up and down her chilled arms. She didn’t break, but her face looked shattered. “I don’t understand,” he said.
“Don’t you? The duchess’s gossip has done its work.”
“There’s to be no gossip. That’s why I came to find you, to tell you your grandfather and my father—they stopped her.”
She laughed, a harsh thing in the afternoon sun. “Then why did Stubly attack me? And right after I saw him speaking with the duchess. They stopped nothing.”
Now he understood why Tobias had grabbed the groom’s pistol. He kept his voice calm, the hands on her upper arms soft. “Are they still in the copse?”
Her lips pressed together. “I don’t know. Grayson—”
“Stay here.”
She cursed, called him back, but rage made him deaf to her pleas.
Once under the cover of trees, he saw the group in the distance, walking away from the copse.
Grayson stopped beside the groom, who stood watching Tobias.
Tobias ran toward the disappearing group, screaming. “You cowards! Get back here!”
In the distance, a figure stopped, turned slowly, and made its way toward them. The other figures continued walking away.
Grayson turned to the groom. “Miss Blake is alone. Go to her. I’ll take care of Mr. Blake. Get Miss Blake home.”
The groom was gone before he could finish his sentence, and Grayson strode closer to Tobias.
Tobias held the pistol at his side as if it were a book and not a deadly weapon. But his body tensed in a way Grayson knew meant murder. “Scum like you,” Tobias said to the approaching figure, “has no place in polite society.”
The figure spoke, taking shape, personality. Grayson recognized him from their first duel. Stubly. “You’re right, Mr. Blake. You should head back to Manchester and stay there.”
Tobias lifted the pistol and gave it a loving look. “Tell me, Stubs, old buddy, what the hell made you imagine you could touch my sister?”
“What poisoned gossip did you hear from the Duchess of Valingford?” Grayson demanded.
Tobias turned a surprised look toward Grayson. “The duchess? Interesting. Grandfather will be interested in this development.”
“No gossip,” Stubly said. “Saw the whore and thought, why not take her?”
Grayson lunged forward and Stubly crashed to the ground, screaming and holding his nose. “You hit me, you fucking lunatic!”
Tobias slid up beside Grayson. “He hit you, but I’ll shoot you.”
Grayson pinned Stubly to the ground with one boot to the other man’s chest. “You’re lying. We bested you in the duel. You wouldn’t be dumb enough to risk the end of Tobias’s pistol again.”
“I think he would be, Gray. He looks bloody daft to me.”
Stubly looked wildly around the copse, as if searching for aid.
“Your friends have scattered.” Tobias knelt down. “They’re not as stupid as you, it seems.” He pushed the barrel of the pistol against Stubly’s chest. “No one to see what comes next. My only real dilemma is whether or not to let my friend here beat you to a pulp before I put a bullet through your heart.”
Sweat broke out on Stubly’s forehead and he inched across the ground away from Grayson and Tobias.
Tobias stood. “What say you, Lord Rigsby? I’ve experienced what you can do with your fists.”
Grayson cracked his knuckles. “I think I’d like to be the one to take the shot, actually.”
Tobias flipped the pistol, offering its handle to Grayson. “Oh, well by all means.”
Stubly scrambled to his feet. “You can’t shoot me. You’ll hang!”
“Gladly if it’s for wiping you off the earth,” Grayson replied.
Stubly spit at their feet. “You think you’ve been the wronged parties? Ha! I’ve been assaulted! A peer of the realm, assaulted by a tradesman’s filthy son and a spare lucky enough to become the heir.”
“Do you hear this drivel?” Tobias asked Grayson.
“That’s it!” Stubly ran his fingers through disarrayed hair. “I challenge you to a duel.” He spit each word, spittle collecting at the corner of his mouth, his eyes wild.
Tobias blinked at him, then blinked at Grayson, then burst into laughter. “I wasn’t even trying to get him to do it this time! Did you see, Gray?”
“I saw, but I fail to see how any of this is supposed to be funny.”
Tobias wiped tears of mirth from his eyes and turned back to Stubly, whose shoulders seethed up and down.
“I accept. I hope you’ve been practicing in the last year.”
Gray placed a hand on Tobias’s shoulder. “No.”
“What, you don’t want me to put a bullet through this coward’s heart in a time-honored, gentlemanly tradition?”
Grayson took the pistol from Tobias’ grip. “No. I want to put a bullet through the coward’s heart.”
“Are you sure? Being a proper future duke and all, I assumed you wouldn’t want to get your hands dirty.”
“They can’t get dirty defending Henrietta.”
“Good answer.”
Both men turned cold eyes to Stubly, who shifted uncomfortably from side to side, looking for a way out. Grayson stepped toward him slowly, pistol aimed at the man’s crotch. “Tomorrow at dawn. Bring your second.” He turned, unable to stomach looking at the worm a moment longer, but then slowly swung around to face him once more. “Tell me the truth. You’ve left Henrietta alone for a year. Why now?”
Stubly sneered and walked away without a word.
When they emerged from the copse, Henrietta had not yet left, stubborn chit. She seemed to be locked in a standoff with her groom who tugged the horse’s reins in one direction while Henrietta tugged the saddle in another. Grayson sped up. He’d either crash her into a hug or lecture her soundly for not getting to safety. He’d decide when he got there.
Tobias grasped Grayson’s forearm. “Don’t tell her about the duel. She won’t like it.”
“I didn’t think
she would, but what were we supposed to do?”
“Exactly. She won’t see it that way. Do you remember last time?”
Of course, he did.
“Grayson! Tobias!” She’d spotted them and let go of the horse to fly after them. She skidded to a halt in front of them, her face drained of color. “You’re both all right. And I didn’t hear any gunshots.” She looked from one of them to the other and back again, as if unable to decide what to do first.
Grayson decided for her. He pulled her to him, crushing her soft body against his own. “Are you well? Did they hurt you?” he demanded.
She shook her head against his chest. “I’m so glad you didn’t hurt them.”
“What?” Grayson held her out at arm’s length. “They all deserve to be shot.”
“I was going to shoot them,” Tobias said. He pointed toward Grayson. “He punched Stubly.”
Henrietta wrapped her arms around Grayson’s waist and squeezed tight. “Thank you.” Then she pulled away, shaking her head and looking left and right. “Do you think anyone has seen anything?”
“Henrietta, it doesn’t matter. What matters—”
“It does matter,” Tobias bit off. “No one can treat you—or any woman—like that.”
“You can’t duel them all, Tobias,” Henrietta said.
Grayson grunted. “He can certainly try.”
“Grayson! Mercy!” Henrietta vented her frustration to the sky. “Listen, the both of you! Someone wants me dead.”
“What?” Grayson and Tobias shouted together.
“A ‘duchess’ according to one of Stubly’s cronies.”
“The Duchess of Valingford,” Grayson and Tobias said together.
Henrietta paced back and forth. “Surely not. She wanted to ruin me with gossip, not kill me.”
“But who else, Hen?” Grayson asked.
Tobias straightened his jacket and tamed his ruffled hair. “Some people are deeper than they appear.”
Grayson put an arm around Henrietta and guided her toward her horse. The thought that someone had hired Stubly to rape her and leave her for dead chilled him to the core. He’d gladly put a bullet in any of Stubly’s vital body parts tomorrow, but only after he learned exactly who the duchess was who wanted Henrietta dead. He had no doubt it was the Duchess of Valingford. Who else? But confirmation would be useful. He wrapped his hands around Henrietta’s waist and lifted her onto Trott. “I’ll escort you home.”
A Secret Desire Page 18