Earl of Darkness

by Alix Rickloff

  A knock at the front door drew the bustle of Mrs. Flanagan. A purr of muffled voices in the hall. Then louder. Shriller. And the drawing room door opened on the coifed and coutured figure of an elegant young woman Cat’s age, or a bit younger, with eyes of deep blue and hair like late summer wheat. She stood in company with Mrs. Flanagan and an older, nondescript lady whose features faded into the background next to the vitality of her companion.

  For a moment, panic clogged Cat’s throat, and she made a desperate wish for the carpet to swallow her whole. She speared Mrs. Flanagan with a look, but the housekeeper seemed immune to her silent plea. Or perhaps she was too flustered on her own account to worry over Cat’s anxieties. She certainly looked a bit gray around the gills.

  “Miss O’Connell, I—” she began in an almost apologetic tone.

  “You see?” the young woman spoke over Mrs. Flanagan’s attempt at an announcement. “I knew she’d be here, Stow.” She floated forward in a cloud of expensive scent and muslin, her curves undulating in a sultry writhe that in the right company must draw every eye.

  Cat was not the right company.

  She fell back on the tattered rags of her upbringing long enough to bob a curtsey and offer a chair, but Miss Osborne seemed in no hurry to take a seat. Instead she did much as Cat had just done. Took a slow turn about the drawing room, her eyes roaming every nook and cranny as if mentally categorizing the contents. Her shrewd gaze lingering for long minutes on the clutter of packages. A morning gown spilling from one. Another parcel’s tissue folded back to reveal pairs and pairs of stockings and three petticoats.

  Cat flushed with angry humiliation.

  “Such a well-appointed room,” Miss Osborne commented, stepping around a ribboned hatbox as if she were avoiding a pile of dog waste. “A bit dull, but nothing a woman’s touch couldn’t fix in a trice. Don’t you agree, Stow?”

  Stow simpered her agreement as she boggled at the wrapped bundles, less skilled than Miss Osborne at ignoring Aidan’s generosity.

  Her audit apparently complete, Miss Osborne’s attention fell back on Cat, who’d remained silent and waiting and sick to her stomach.

  Mrs. Flanagan tried once more. “I’m sorry, but His Lordship is not—”

  “At home to visitors?” Miss Osborne interrupted. “Oh, I know.” She turned to Cat. “Mr. O’Gara told me all about Lord Kilronan’s run-in with those horrid footpads. I would have rushed over here immediately, but I was asked to sing at a charity concert last evening. And then this morning I was due to meet with some of the committee members for the Magdalen Asylum.” Her pointed gaze narrowed. “Perhaps you’ve heard of it.”

  Cat’s hands curled to fists. “No, but it must be an admirable cause. I’m sure nothing less would have kept you from your betrothed’s side.”

  Miss Osborne frowned, her lips pursing in a quick moue of distaste, obviously unsure whether she was being ridiculed. “Just so. But really, I wouldn’t go so far as to label him my betrothed.” She tittered with false modesty. “I mean nothing’s official. Yet.”

  The woman couldn’t have been more obvious had she knocked Aidan over the head and dragged him back to her cave.

  “Normally, Miss O’Connell, I wouldn’t pay a call on a gentleman’s establishment. People will gossip, you understand. But I felt I must put aside the potential harm to my reputation in order to speak with you.” She offered Mrs. Flanagan a radiant smile. “Run and find us some tea, won’t you? That’s just the thing to accompany a good woman-to-woman chat. And take Stow with you. She can help butter the toast.”

  The authority behind the gentle suggestion had the housekeeper and Miss Osborne’s silent companion nipping to the kitchens, leaving Cat alone. A toy on which Miss Osborne could sharpen her dainty claws.

  “Please, don’t remain standing on my account, Miss O’Connell.”

  Cat all but collapsed in a chair, nerves battering her insides. “If you’re not here on His Lordship’s behalf, what brings you to Kilronan House this afternoon?”

  “When I heard rumors of Kilronan’s dear cousin being newly arrived in town, I knew I must make my introductions. And then when Mr. O’Gara explained about your poor mother’s unexpected illness, I felt it behooved me to come and offer my sincerest sympathies.” Her blue eyes widened in mock horror. “To think, coming down with plague on the eve of your departure. I do hope she’s out of danger.”

  Plague? Of all the illnesses in the world, Jack came up with plague? Why not just accuse her imaginary mother of flying to the moon? But Cat let none of her irritation show. Instead she offered a regretful lift of her lips and a heavenward raise of her eyes. “Yes, thank you. The doctors assure us it’s a mild case of . . . plague, so she should be up and about very soon. I’m only grateful my cousins”—she accentuated the word—“were able to house me as they’d originally planned.”

  “Yes, that was fortunate, wasn’t it?” Miss Osborne’s fluttery sweetness dissolved with every passing second, and Cat tensed for a hair-pulling, face-scratching brawl. Miss Osborne had weight and height on her side, but Cat had experience and a mean left hook.

  The woman settled herself upon a sofa, gloved hands resting in her lap, chin tilted at the perfect angle to showcase her elegant profile. Only her eyes glittered with a flinty stubbornness. “Can we stop pretending to each other, Miss O’Connell?”

  Cat’s knots doubled. “I don’t know. Can we?”

  Miss Osborne’s lips curved in another vixen smile. “I think so. You look like an intelligent woman. And of course, I’d expect no less from Aidan. When all is said and done, he does have standards.”

  Ah. There was the proprietary use of his first name. She was leaving no doubts as to her future plans. Cat wished her all the gods’ good fortune.

  “I understand a man’s animal nature.” Miss Osborne colored as she spoke, a beautiful blushing pink that made Cat’s teeth ache. “And as a bachelor, it’s only natural Aidan would seek the company of someone like you to sate his base needs.” Someone like Cat being, in Miss Osborne’s eyes, two or three steps below leper. “But once we’re married, any connection between the two of you must end. Do it. Or I will do it for you.” Spoken with all the cool assurance of one used to getting what she wanted.

  Cat defused her menace by laughing outright. “Let me reassure you, Miss Osborne, I wish you much joy of him. By that happy day, I can only hope I’m settled as far away from Lord Kilronan as Ireland will allow.”

  Clearly prepared for a fight and discomfited by Cat’s cheerful acquiescence, Miss Osborne seemed deflated by her quick success, but it lasted only a moment before she regained her earlier poise. Cleared her throat. Even that managing to sound melodious. “I don’t blame you. It’s easy to see how one in your position might fantasize. It would be only natural. Aidan’s shaky finances. His family’s odd reputation.” She dismissed them with an airy wave of her hand before resting her palm on her heart as if preparing for martyrdom. “Temporary obstacles to overcome. They mean little to me when placed against the venerable consequence of the earldom. That is truly forever.”

  In other words, she didn’t care if she wed Attila the Hun as long as she gained a title out of it.

  A serving maid took that moment to enter bearing a heavily laden tea tray. Stow following behind, a nervous smile on her waxen face.

  Cat waited through the girl’s clinking bustle and withdrawal, her jaw clenched against what Miss High-and-Mighty could do with her earldom. Instead, she merely smiled until her cheeks ached. “Kilronan is lucky to have gained such unwavering affection, but I can assure you I harbor no fantasies toward His Lordship. He and Mr. O’Gara are family. Nothing more.”

  Her warning imparted and the tea forgotten, Miss Osborne drifted toward the door. Stow a gremlin shadow dogging her heels. “I’m so glad we were able to come to a suitable arrangement, Miss O’Connell.” Pausing with a dramatic flourish, she offered Cat another piercing stare. “Do give your mother my best.”

  Cat wa
ited until the drawing room door closed behind them before falling into a seat on a furious exhale. “Gods above, Aidan. What the hell have you gotten me into?”

  Aidan found Cat in the library, muttering obscenities more at home on the tongue of a sailor.

  “Plague. Of all the harebrained, idiotic—what was he thinking? Why not just come out and say I’m the household’s communal trollop? It amounts to the same thing in the end.”

  “Flan told me about Barbara Osborne’s visit.”

  She spun around. Desperation and fear darkened her eyes, making empty pools within the chalky pallor of her face. “You’re out of bed.”

  “After two days, staring at my ceiling was growing a bit dull.” He reached for her hand, but she flinched out of his grip. Glared up at him. “Don’t. Just don’t touch me. That’s what she thinks. What they’ll all think once they discover me here.”

  A crack in the impenetrable mystery of Cat. He probed with a delicate touch. “They?”

  “It doesn’t matter. I have to leave. Now.”

  She stalked ahead of him. Back and forth. Back and forth. Her long stride hampered by the sweep of her new skirts.

  He’d been far off the mark with that one. Not even the primmest of gowns fully disguised the silky, seductive way she moved. A shame he’d wasted so much blunt to no purpose. But he could admire. And imagine. From a safe, celibate distance.

  He did just that. Remaining calm amid the human eye of the hurricane pacing in front of him. Letting her work off her angst until her frantic gyrations wound down and she sank onto a sofa, her head in her hands.

  “We had a bargain,” he began.

  “That was before. Don’t you see?” she mumbled.

  He leaned against the mantel as if patience was his middle name. “No, but you won’t let me.”

  “Let’s just say I’m painfully familiar with accusations of immorality.”

  He waited on a held breath for her to continue, but she clamped her mouth shut, any confession at an end.

  “If you want to leave, let’s get to work.”

  “And Miss Osborne? She did everything but plant her flag in you.”

  “Now there’s an image to get the blood moving faster.”

  “Don’t tease. It’s not funny,” she grumbled, but at least her earlier outrage seemed to be diminishing.

  “If you like, I’ll speak to her. Explain that if she’d only waited she would have met your very proper and very ugly chaperone, Miss Grimm, who locks you into your chastity belt every morning and guards your door with a brace of pistols every night. And if that doesn’t do the trick, I’ll reassure her of your close family connection and explain about your poor ill mother, bless her soul. The plague can be nasty this time of year.”

  She snickered. “You’re making fun of me.”

  “Would I make fun of someone whose mother lies deathly ill?”

  She chewed her lip, humor dancing in her eyes. “You’re ridiculous.”

  “The dear woman’s only wish as she lay suffering with pustules—to see her daughter safe in Dublin with her very proper and platonic cousins.”

  A full-fledged giggle escaped her. “She never thinks of herself, does she?”

  He smiled. “A martyr to her core, your sweet mother. I’ve often said so.” He drew her up from the sofa, her hand resting in his. Trust replacing her earlier desperation. That and something else. Fellowship? Camaraderie? Would he go so far as calling it friendship?

  “Leave it to me, Cat. Barbara Osborne’s no coldhearted ogre. I shall soothe her ruffled feathers, and your honor will be restored.”

  She stiffened. Withdrew her hand, stepping back. The moment of solidarity gone. “If only it were that easy.”

  Cat closed the book, stretching her arms over her head. Feeling the pop of unkinked muscles down her back.

  Daylight had become candlelight as heavier rain moved in, darkening the room. She closed her eyes, enjoying the sensation of being warm and comfortable inside while the booming echo of thunder rolled overhead. It had been long years since she’d been able to take luxuries like these for granted. Long years since she’d been driven from her stepfather’s house, the marks of his rage on her face, his pilfered coins wrapped in a knotted kerchief banging against her side. The first theft in a slippery slope that had landed her here.

  Her momentary contentment faded. She’d still had no word concerning Geordie’s fate, despite Aidan’s promise to investigate.

  Their lodgings had been ransacked and abandoned. None asked could say whether the dwarf had escaped or been taken. Not even the promise of a reward loosened tongues either too suspicious or too fearful. She’d had to settle for a message entrusted with the publican at the Red Lion on New Street. An especial haunt of Geordie’s and the one place where he might go in a pinch. If he lived, he’d know she hadn’t forgotten him. He’d know she was safe. He’d know she was sorry for making a complete mess of everything.

  Kilronan sat in a deep window embrasure. The effects of the ambush in the alley had slowly diminished. His black eye faded to a sort of sickly puce gray. The scratches on his face mostly healed. Unconscious of her scrutiny, he leaned his head back against the wall, eyes raised heavenward, muscles in his jaw jumping. Tension shivered off him. A coiled intensity barely contained.

  She’d witnessed the explosion that came upon the release of that taut spring. The effortless transformation from polished aristocrat to hardened fighter as the instinct to survive took hold. It had been beautiful and terrifying and thrilling to watch. And if she hadn’t been scared sick she would have lost herself completely to the fantasy that he’d been fighting to protect her.

  He stretched stiffly and rose. Like a sailor’s first tread upon dry ground, his steps came unsteady before his limbs loosened. Yet even then, his gait contained that slight half-halting stride she’d noticed earlier.

  Catching her eyes upon him as he rubbed his thigh, he quickly defended himself. “It’s an old injury, so you can stop looking at me as if you want to bundle me back to bed.”

  “Are you mad? I’d not even suggest it.”

  Grim features brightened to boyish mischief, and he laughed. “Then you’ve already won my eternal gratitude. Between Blake’s whining and Jack’s advice, I’m all suggested out.”

  He took a turn around the room, his gaze passing over the portrait above the mantel, an unreadable expression hardening his eyes. “You’d not know it to look at me, but in my day I had the women swooning over my favors. Their husbands gunning for my back.”

  He sounded like an octogenarian recalling a faded past, yet he couldn’t be more than thirty, the muscles moving beneath his skin still supple, the razor-keen edges hardening his features still glittering sharp.

  “Is that how—” She motioned toward his leg.

  “Aye. A lesson for you. A drunken cuckold and a loaded weapon are not a good mix. You should have heard my father. The surgeon’s digging for the ball was a jaunt compared to the haranguing I received from the old man.” Bitterness tinged the dark amusement. “I don’t know whether he was angrier at my dishonorable behavior or at my losing the duel to a mere baronet.” His gaze lengthened into memory. “Ahh, but she was worth it. A grand beauty with—” he caught her derisive look. Quickly changed the subject with a shamefaced smile that suddenly made him seem years younger and far more vulnerable. “And you, Cat? Were you the apple of your father’s eye? Your mother’s little helper?”

  Cat thought back to her mother’s convenient blindness when it came to her new husband. The blame. The cajoling. The jealousy. But that scene shifted to her stepfather’s short temper and acid tongue. His seeking hands. His smarmy threats. Jeremy had been as much about running away as running toward. She just hadn’t realized it at the time.

  “They weren’t anything special,” she mumbled.

  He leaned over her shoulder, examining her progress. She found herself staring as he turned each page. The strong, capable fingers, the heavy bones of his w
rists, the solid chunk of an emerald adorning his pinky. His breath came soft against her bare neck. His sleeve brushed her shoulder.

  Was it the cozy snap of the fire? The patter of rain against the windows? The effects of too much claret? Whatever sparked this bewildering fascination, it quickly grew until the smoky warmth of his body lit an unwelcome flame in the inches between them.

  She cursed her rotten luck. She couldn’t be marooned with a scrawny, horse-faced clod who picked his nose or wiped his mouth with the tablecloth. Oh no. She had to be trapped with every woman’s most sinful fantasy. A man who radiated enough sexual energy to fell a roomful of females.

  She tensed, hoping he didn’t notice the hitch in her breathing, the quiver of nerves trembling her limbs. She fought back with recollections of his disdain when she’d worried over his intentions. The dismissive way he scoured her with his eyes as if she were dirt to be scraped from his heel. Miss Osborne’s prior and very emphasized claims.

  It worked.

  Her body’s mutiny subsided, leaving behind a dull ache in her chest, pressing against her ribs, and a new realization that she needed to remain vigilant or she might forget the truth of her stay here. Be it within the comfort of Kilronan House or the misery of a Newgate cell, she remained a prisoner.

  Night hung thick in the room, cut only by the meager halo of candlelight surrounding his desk, the red gold glow of the fire. Cat had already done so much. Pages and pages in her tidy handwriting lay scattered across his desk. He scanned one as he paced, his hand nervously tapping his thigh, his brows raised in curiosity. “My sister doesn’t write half so legibly.”

  She looked up, startled, from where she hunkered in a chair, the diary propped against her knees. “Huh?” she grumbled.

  “I asked about your education. Where did you tell me you learned to write such a neat hand?”

  One shoulder dipped in a half shrug, half rebuff. “I didn’t.”

  Another nonanswer. He let it go.