AN Unexpected Gentleman

by Alissa Johnson

  “You?” Aghast, she looked from Mr. Birch to Connor. “The two of you?”

  “The three of us, lass,” Gregory corrected.

  Connor cleared his throat. “Gregory was the gentleman in the hall.”

  “The gentleman . . . I . . . You . . .” She glared at Connor, then Michael, then Gregory O’Malley with extra heat because she’d felt a little sorry for him a moment ago.

  The old goat wasn’t daft at all.

  Disappointment twisted in her chest as she realized she’d found yet one more string, one more deception. Until now, she’d retained the hope that some part of that night in the garden had been real. She’d known Connor had sought her out, of course, but she’d not realized just how much of their first meeting had been staged. Now she couldn’t help but wonder if every part of it had been an act, and if she would ever be more to Connor than a useful toy.

  To her eternal horror, she felt a lump form in her throat and the burning threat of tears. To cover it, she planted her hands on her hips and turned her anger on Michael and Gregory. “The nerve of you, sneaking about a lady’s home, uninvited. Conniving to compromise an unsuspecting woman. Grown men behaving like callous youths. You should be ashamed of yourselves. Both of you.”

  They didn’t look ashamed, particularly. Michael was grinning. Gregory was rubbing his hands together enthusiastically. “Aye. Spine.”

  “Aye.”

  Adelaide tossed her hands up. “Oh, for pity’s sake. You cannot—”

  “Have a seat, Adelaide,” Connor suggested softly.

  She shook her head without looking at him. She was reluctant to meet his eyes, afraid of what she might see there. Was he laughing at her? Was he feeling proud of himself for having maneuvered her so cleverly?

  “I prefer to stand,” she replied coolly. What she truly preferred was to concentrate on her anger. Also, she wanted to deliver a proper set-down to Gregory and Michael, which was fairly difficult to accomplish from a seated position.

  “We’ll discuss it later,” Connor murmured. “Privately. Have a seat, wren. Please.”

  Finally, she forced herself to look at him, and she noted with relief that he didn’t appear amused or proud of himself. Unfortunately, he didn’t appear especially ashamed of himself, either. His expression was guarded, his green eyes carefully shuttered, and she realized there were to be no answers or apologies while his men were present.

  She looked back at Gregory and Michael. They grinned in unison. Clearly, there was also nothing to be gained from them.

  “Very well,” she replied with as much dignity as she could muster.

  Defeated, she took a seat on the settee, and for the next half hour, she listened to Gregory and Michael talk and laugh, swap barbs and insults. It seemed bizarre to her that they should carry on so, as if they were all old friends sharing pints and conversation round a table at a tavern. And it was further distracting to have Connor seated next to her. His arm was draped over the back of the settee, and every so often, his fingers brushed along the nape of her neck, or toyed with a loose lock of hair. His touch sent warm chills along her skin, and she was torn between wanting to move away and wanting to lean into him like a purring cat.

  She stayed perfectly still and tried to focus on the conversation. Gregory, she learned, was the third son of a failed Irish jeweler. Michael had been born to parents in service to a prominent English family, and orphaned before the age of ten. They’d met as sailors aboard a merchant ship and, after a particular grueling voyage from London to the Americas, agreed to pool their savings and become Boston businessmen.

  “What sort of business?” Adelaide inquired.

  Michael gave her an odd smile. “We was what you might call . . . purveyors of fine art.”

  “You sold art?”

  “Aye,” Gregory said. “But we weren’t what you’d be calling successful. Not until we met our Connor.”

  “How did you meet?”

  Connor pulled his hand away from her neck. “I don’t think—”

  “Caught the boy trying to lift my purse,” Michael explained cheerfully.

  “What?” She turned on the settee. “You were a pickpocket?”

  “No, I worked on the docks . . .” Connor shifted in his seat. It was a small movement, but she saw it. “But I may have picked a pocket or two when an opportunity presented itself.”

  “Did opportunities often present themselves?”

  “Define often.”

  It seemed best to reply with silence.

  He shifted again. “Now and then. I hadn’t the training or practice to be confident in the game.”

  Michael laughed. “There’s the truth of it. I’ve known East End doxies what weren’t so grabby as you.”

  “Remember you’re speaking to a lady,” Connor said before looking to Adelaide. “They put me to work. I ran errands in exchange for food and lodging. Later, when I’d proven I could be trusted, they made me a partner.”

  “Selling art?” Somehow, that didn’t seem right. The savings of two sailors couldn’t possibly have been sufficient to enter into such a business, and Connor had made no mention of his interest in art when she’d spoken of Isobel’s painting. “What sort did you—?”

  Connor rose to his feet. “It’s growing late. We should get you home. Gentlemen, you’ll excuse us.”

  Michael leveraged his considerable girth out of his chair. “But we were just getting—”

  “Another time.”

  The men were slow to leave, mumbling their farewells and dragging their feet across the carpet. Michael turned around at the door and spoke in a tone that approached, but didn’t quite reach, apologetic.

  “For what it’s worth, miss, I never were inside the bird’s home.”

  It took Adelaide a moment to realize they’d gone back to the topic of Mrs. Cress. “Oh, for the love of . . . You were on her grounds, Mr. Birch. And Mrs. Cress is not a bird.” A silly, gossiping biddy, but not a bird. “She is—”

  “Good night, gentlemen.” Connor’s hard tone cut through the men’s amusement like a knife. Unfortunately, the effect proved temporary. Adelaide could hear them laughing seconds after they walked out the door.

  She ground her teeth a little at the sound. “You keep interesting company, Mr. Brice.”

  “They meant no offense, Adelaide.”

  “Was everything about that night a lie?” She cut in, uninterested in listening to a defense of his men. It was Connor’s behavior for which she wanted an explanation. It was his apology she’d been waiting to hear.

  “Not a lie, exactly,” Connor hedged. “A ruse. There is a difference.”

  By no stretch of imagination did that qualify as an explanation or an apology. “There certainly is. A ruse requires a multitude of lies.”

  “I had no other choice,” Connor replied patiently. “I’d only just gained my freedom, and you were all but engaged. I thought there wasn’t time for a traditional courtship.”

  “Well, we’ll never know now, will we?” She folded her arms over her chest. “I want to know what else has been kept from me. What else should I know—?”

  “Nothing. There is . . . Well . . .” He offered her a sheepish smile. “I might have had a hand in stalling your brother’s creditors in their attempts to seize your inheritance.”

  Her heart executed a quick and painful somersault. “There was an attempt to take my inheritance?”

  “Also, I might have had a hand in keeping that information from you.”

  She digested that disturbing news in silence.

  Connor lifted a shoulder. “It was just a bit of lost paperwork here and there. A way to stall things until I could gain my release. If you had lost the inheritance, you’d have put every effort into bringing Sir Robert up to scratch.”

  She would have, without question. His reasons for interfering made perfect sense—from the standpoint of a man intent on stealing his brother’s almost-fiancée. But there was no reason for him to have hidden the trou
ble from her. No reason at all . . . except to shield her from worry. It had been an act of thoughtfulness. A rather misguided and inexcusably high-handed act, but a thoughtful one all the same.

  “You should not have kept information related to me and my family to yourself. It was wrong of you, and I’ll not tolerate such overbearing behavior in the future.” She sniffed, made a show of brushing a few wrinkles from around her waist, and mumbled at the floor, “But I thank you for your assistance.”

  “You’re welcome.” He didn’t mumble at all.

  She dropped her hands and straightened to give him an exasperated look. “You are fundamentally incapable of issuing an apology, aren’t you?”

  “Not fundamentally, no.” A thoughtful furrow formed across his brow. It looked at odds with the spark of humor in his green eyes. “Deeply suspicious of the purported wisdom of admitting to fault, however—”

  “Oh, never mind.” A reluctant laugh escaped. “Is there anything else? Any other secrets I should be made aware of?”

  “No. There is nothing else you need to know.”

  “Are you certain?” she asked, her tone mocking. “You haven’t any other nasty siblings? You’re not married? You’re not wanted for murder in the Americas?”

  “No.” He ran his tongue along his teeth. “Not murder.”

  “Oh, my—”

  He laughed and stepped forward to sweep her into his arms. “Holy hell, you’re gullible.”

  “This is not—”

  He bent down and gave her a brief but heated kiss. “Be easy, wren. To the best of my knowledge, and much to my regret, I have only the one brother. I’ve never had a wife, and I am not wanted for a crime in any country. It was only a jest.”

  “It was in poor taste,” she grumbled. “I want your word there have been no other, and will be no other, deceptions.”

  He brushed the backs of his fingers across her jaw, a quizzical expression on his face. “Do you trust me to keep it?”

  “No, not entirely.” He’d given her reason to like him, even to be grateful, but she’d be a fool to forget where she, and her trust, fell on Connor’s list of priorities . . . Well below his plans for revenge. “But I should like it all the same.”

  He let her go suddenly, and a humorless smile pulled on his lips. “Very well. You have it.”

  Two days later, Connor took a seat behind his desk in the Ashbury Hall study and frowned at the pristine mahogany surface. The desk was new, just arrived from the cabinetmaker. The wood was waxed and polished to a glassy shine. Nearly every piece of furniture, every inch of the house, looked the same. He could practically see his reflection in the library shelves.

  Ashbury Hall was ready; the repairs were nearly complete. The servants’ quarters were full of Sir Robert’s former staff. All that was left was for Adelaide to arrive and decide what final decorative touches to put in place. Everything was as it should be. All was going according to plan.

  So why the blazes did he feel so dissatisfied? Why was he being plagued by thoughts of one little lie?

  There is nothing else you need to know.

  It wasn’t even a real lie. Adelaide did not need to know that Sir Robert had never cared for her, that the only reason he’d taken an interest in her at all was because . . .

  Connor swore ripely . . . Was because of him.

  That was the truth. He knew it, and had no intention of telling Adelaide. He was lying by omission.

  As a rule, lying in any form didn’t trouble him overmuch. Needs must, and all that. But this was different. It felt different. He’d made a mistake not keeping his interest in Adelaide secret. It was a carelessness that had cost Adelaide dearly, and for that she deserved an apology. Offering one, however, would only serve to ease his conscience, not give her peace of mind.

  Adelaide loathed Sir Robert and didn’t give a damn for his opinion of her, but no one, no one, wanted to hear they’d fallen prey to a false courtship, twice.

  Not exactly twice, Connor amended. However unconventional, however far removed from the ideal, his courtship was legitimate. Unlike Sir Robert, he wanted Adelaide. The fact that Sir Robert hadn’t was an insult that would never reach her ears.

  This was, at best estimate, the fourth time Connor had arrived at this conclusion. And still he remained dissatisfied, and still the lie niggled at him.

  Which was his fault entirely. Sometime in the past week or so, he’d let Adelaide get under his skin.

  After a moment’s reflection, he decided this assessment was not entirely accurate. Adelaide had gotten under his skin months ago. Somehow, she’d worked her way deeper. She was in his blood.

  And why the devil wouldn’t she be? Lord knew, she was everywhere else. She dominated his thoughts, invaded his dreams, and featured prominently in every one of his waking fantasies.

  Something had to be done about those fantasies. Visions of her and him engaged in the most delightful—and, admittedly, improbable—activities popped into his head at the most inconvenient times. Just that morning, he’d been going over the books with Michael one minute and envisioning Adelaide in the next . . .

  Connor tilted the chair back on two legs, propped his feet on the desk, and stared at the ceiling.

  She’d been in the walled garden at Ashbury Hall, if he recalled correctly, wearing her wren’s mask and not a stitch more. A blanket was spread on the ground, and her lips were parted in a seductive smile. She was waiting for him. Only him.

  Her thick chestnut locks fell loose around her bare shoulders. He brushed a strand aside and bent to taste the salt of her skin. The shiver that passed over her tickled his lips. The soft intake of her breath turned him to stone. When she lifted a hand to touch, he captured it and held it down.

  He wouldn’t let her take, not right away. He’d keep her still, standing just as she was, as he explored every luscious curve, every soft plane. When she trembled, when her knees buckled, he would lay her on the blanket and continue the sweet torture. When she moaned for him, he’d let her touch. And when she cried out his name, he’d slip between the soft cradle of her thighs and . . .

  The chair slammed to the floor with a crash.

  “Bloody, bloody hell.”

  It was damn distracting. And it made him feel like a randy teenage boy.

  How the devil was he to manage a proper revenge when every time he tried to plot, the lie he’d told Adelaide niggled at him and an image of her stripped bare and smiling at him filled his head.

  He could work around the guilty conscience. There was no plotting round a naked woman.

  “Begging your pardon, sir.”

  Connor looked up to find an elderly man with a baritone voice and more white hair than a footman’s wig standing in the open doorway. His new butler. Devil take it, what was the man’s name? Jenkins, Jones . . .

  “Jennings.” That was it.

  “Yes, sir.” Jennings held up a folded note. “A missive has arrived for you, sir.”

  Connor accepted the letter, read the contents, and grinned.

  Chapter 19

  Wolfgang Ward was returned to the bosom of his family with nothing but the clothes on his back and the hostility he’d wrapped around himself like a cloak.

  Adelaide stood with Isobel and George on the front steps of their home and watched her brother climb from Connor’s carriage.

  He looked terrible, far worse than he had the last time she’d seen him. Adelaide didn’t understand it. How could her brother have grown more gaunt and look even more haunted? Angry and indignant, she understood. Wolfgang had never responded well to having his wishes denied. But the family’s new circumstances, his new circumstances, ought to have provided him with some peace of mind. He was free of prison, debt, and Sir Robert.

  Why did he look like a man still caged?

  She scowled at him as he strode away from the carriage without a word to the driver. Angry and indignant or not, he should have passed on his thanks to the driver for the lend of Connor’s vehicle. Lo
rd knew, he’d not pay his thanks in person or think to send a note.

  Reaching the steps, he greeted Isobel with an embrace and George with a bright smile and his favorite game of tickle the infant. For Adelaide, he had only a perfunctory kiss on the cheek and the words, “I’ll speak with you in the parlor.”

  Hoping to get over and done with whatever unpleasant business he had in mind, Adelaide followed her brother inside and watched as he took in his home with a slow sweep of his eyes, before marching into the parlor, where he opened a cupboard in search of brandy. He made no comment on how much further the house had deteriorated during his absence. Not a single word was spoken about the missing furniture and decor.

  “If you are looking for Father’s decanter,” Adelaide said evenly, annoyed by his lack of interest in the family home, “it was sold two months ago.”

  Wolfgang swore lightly and tapped the cupboard shut with his finger. “Never mind, I’ll drink the swill at the tavern. We need to discuss what’s to be done next.”

  “About what?”

  “Your engagement.” He caught his hands behind his back. “I’ve given this some thought, and I have decided it would be best if you broke it by letter. No need to bring an ugly scene—”

  “Break it?” she interrupted. “Why ever would I do such a thing?”

  “Because you’ve no reason to keep it.” He spoke as if the answer were obvious and she a trifle dense for not having figured it out on her own. “Our debts are paid, Adelaide. We’ve the inheritance, and the money Mr. Brice—”

  “The inheritance is nearly gone. And that is quite beside the matter. I did not engage myself to Mr. Brice for his fortune.” She would marry him for his fortune, which was entirely different. The latter was a reasonably acceptable means of providing for one’s family. The former spoke of thievery and deceit. “What you are suggesting is wrong in every sense of the word. I’ll not do it.”

  “It’s done all the time. Ladies break engagements left and right these days—”

  “They don’t take money, Wolfgang. An engagement is not something one can let out for a fee and then insist on having back.”