My Fair Temptress

by Christina Dodd

  “The duke of Nevett wishes to see you, Miss Ritter,” Phillips said, and the glint in his eyes, the small smile on his face told the tale. Phillips had done something wicked. “The duke wishes to see you immediately.”

  Jude pounded up the stairs behind her, picked up her hand, and showed Phillips. “That’s not possible. She’s been wounded.”

  “Yes.” Phillips sniffed. “So I see. She does look quite disreputable. But you, Lord Huntington, have some wounds, also.” For Jude, Phillips played the concerned elderly retainer. “Shall I call a physician?”

  “Yes,” Jude said. “Miss Ritter is probably going to need stitches.”

  “I’ll see Nevett now.” Gently, Caroline disengaged her fingers from Jude’s grip and went to Nevett’s study.

  Jude followed her.

  Nicolette sat in a chair beside Nevett, talking steadily, urgently, but when Jude and Caroline walked in, she shook her head at them and sat back. Her whole attitude was one of resignation.

  For Nevett held a green leather journal in his hands.

  Caroline’s planning journal.

  She sank into a chair, her knees weak. She remembered very well every word she’d written on those pages, and they were, all of them, incriminating, revealing…embarrassing.

  Jude knew his father well, and clearly Nevett was in a royal rage. “Miss Ritter, I gave you a task to do. A simple task, really—that you get my son, the earl of Huntington, the heir to a dukedom, married by the end of the Season. With that goal in mind, I gave you clothing. I’ve been informed I gave you shelter. Most important, I gave you respectability and my full trust.” His voice rose with each word. “Perhaps you will tell me how it’s possible to accomplish this simple task by sleeping with my son!”

  Jude looked at her journal as if he’d like to rip it out of Nevett’s hands and read every passage. “Father—”

  Caroline gave him a look that reduced him to silence. She would handle this. “That’s my planning journal, and in it I recorded my private thoughts about Lord Huntington’s progress.” Thoughts which she sincerely hoped Jude never saw. “I keep it in my bedside drawer. Perhaps, Your Grace, you’ll tell me how you have it now.”

  “It fell into Phillips’s hands,” Nevett said, “and he very properly gave it to me.”

  Every head in the room swiveled toward the doorway. Phillips stood there, a pretentious smile stretching his lips. He thought he had won, and probably he had.

  “It fell into his hands? Out of my drawer?” Caroline pulled a disbelieving face. “I would discuss Phillips’s character with you, Your Grace, but I don’t use that kind of language—”

  That wiped the smile from Phillips’s face.

  “—And it’s not his character in which you’re interested.” Caroline bowed her head in sincere contrition. She supposed she deserved this whole, horrible day. She should never have tried to snatch at that happiness she thought she’d had with Jude. It was a lie, a chimera, and now she reaped the results. “You’re right, Your Grace. I do beg your pardon. I’ve violated your trust in every way.”

  “You violated my son!” Nevett snapped.

  “Don’t be ridiculous, Father,” Jude said.

  At the same time as Nicolette said, “Don’t be ridiculous, Nevett.”

  “I didn’t abuse your hospitality by deliberately enticing your son.” Caroline looked Nevett in the eyes. “Our actions seemed to be an offshoot of the flirting that we practiced endlessly. But I don’t want you to think I’m making an excuse for myself. There’s no excuse good enough.”

  “We don’t think you’re making an excuse.” Nicolette’s smile warmed the cold that had crept into Caroline’s heart. “You’re simply a very good teacher.”

  “Nicolette, have you lost your mind?” Nevett pointed to Jude, then to Caroline. “We were trying to get our son married and breeding.”

  “We were not doing that. You were, and if you’ll recall, I told you it was a plan fraught with peril.” Nicolette shook her head. “Perhaps in the future, you’ll consult me before you put one of your harebrained ideas into practice.”

  “Are you on her side?” Nevett indicated Caroline.

  “Absolutely,” Nicolette said categorically. “Caroline’s a dear girl, and if you couldn’t see the two of them falling in love, you weren’t looking.”

  “Nicolette!” Nevett came to his feet. “You mean you knew improprieties were occurring, and you didn’t warn me?”

  Jude had kept quiet long enough. It was time to intervene. “That’s because what occurred between Miss Ritter and me is none of your business, sir, and I’d thank you to keep a civil tongue in your head when you speak to her or about her.” Jude glowered at Phillips. “And perhaps you should tell your butler to keep his filthy nose away from my affairs and to mind his own manners.”

  Phillips quivered with offended dignity. The silly old sod, did he think Jude would thank him for bringing this disaster down on them?

  It was time to tell his father the truth. “I never intended to marry on your command. I don’t know what megrim made you imagine I would.”

  “Wha…what?” Nevett’s eyes bulged. “Has Miss Ritter made you lose all sense, too?”

  Caroline made a restless motion and tried to stand up.

  Jude restrained her with his hand on her arm. “Miss Ritter’s going to become the toast of London, Father. She saved my worthless life and helped me eliminate the two men who tried to assassinate Queen Victoria. She was wounded in the service of the crown.” Jude lifted her red-stained hand. “And if she would damned well marry me, I’d be the luckiest man in the world—but she won’t.”

  Nevett turned an apoplexic red. “She refused you? You, the earl of Huntington?” To Caroline, he asked, “Who do you think you are? He’s going to be the duke!”

  “I don’t want an earl. I don’t want a duke.” Caroline wrenched away from Jude, her cheeks red with chagrin. “I want to take my sister to France and live quietly for the rest of my days.”

  While he sputtered in indignation, Nicolette told Caroline, “Genevieve is in your bedchamber waiting for you.”

  “Then I’ll go to see her.” This time Jude couldn’t restrain Caroline. She rose and fled.

  Nevett eyed Jude across his desk. “You, son, have some explaining to do.”

  “But first,” Mum said, “Phillips, come in here.”

  The butler strode in, looking so proud of himself Jude clenched his fist and stepped forward, ready to forget their age difference and punch the old man.

  Mum grabbed the back of Jude’s jacket and pulled him to a stop. “Come here, Phillips.” She pointed to the place on the rug before her chair. “Right here.”

  If Phillips had been smart, he would have recognized the danger signs. That was exactly what Mum had always done when she prepared to rake her sons over the coals. But Phillips strutted forward as if he’d done something grand, and stood before her with such a smug expression Jude’s fists clenched again.

  “Phillips, you’ve been with the duke for many years. In fact, more years than I have,” Mum said. “So it’s with a heavy heart that I must let you go.”

  “Your Grace!” Phillips’s astonishment was satisfying to see. When he saw no yielding in Mum’s expression, he turned to the duke. “Your Grace!”

  Nevett stared at his young wife as if he didn’t quite believe what he was hearing. “Now, Nicolette…”

  She turned on him in a fury. “Husband, am I not in charge of your household?”

  “Yes. Yes, of course.”

  “Then I regret to tell you we must seek a new butler. This one has proved to have a regrettable tendency to undermine my efforts and the efforts of your staff.” To Phillips, she said, “You may go now and pack.”

  Phillips started to speak.

  “You may go,” Mum repeated.

  He was the portrait of the offended dignity as he stalked to the door.

  “Do you think that’s wise, Nicolette?” Nevett asked. “Good
butlers are hard to find, and at least we know he doesn’t steal the silver.”

  “There are more important things than the silver.” Mum must have really been furious, for she turned on Nevett. “Like the impropriety of reading others’ journals.”

  “Miss Ritter was in my employ!” Nevett said unwisely.

  “Yes, which makes my congress with her all the more despicable.” Jude placed his fists on his father’s desk, leaned over, and spoke right into Nevett’s face. “It was me you should have been shouting at, not Caroline! I’ve behaved abominably.”

  “Son, you’d better tell me the whole story from the beginning.” Nevett rubbed his forehead as if it ached. “Don’t leave anything out.”

  So Jude started with Michael’s murder in Moricadia, his participation in the pursuit of Michael’s killers, and his unethical use of Caroline as a distraction.

  Halfway through, Nevett poured himself a brandy, one for Jude, and at a glare from his duchess, one for her.

  Jude gave his father to understand that Caroline had been untouched when Jude seduced her—and he did tell them he seduced her, for to admit that she’d tied him to the bed would lead to much guffawing at his expense—and he explained her part, and his, in the capture and killing of the Moricadians.

  “That explains the blood on your shoulder and the cut on your face,” Nevett said gruffly. “You might want to have them tended.”

  “I did tell Phillips to summon a physician.” Jude’s various wounds were starting to ache and throb, and the blood was drying and sticking to his skin.

  “I’ll go see that it’s done.” Mum rose and walked to the door, then backed away. “Caroline and her sister are leaving.”

  Jude came to his feet and stared as Caroline swept past wearing a worn gown and gripping her ragged old bag. Of course. She took nothing but what she’d brought, and she didn’t spare him a glance.

  Jude sank back down. He’d made a hell of a mess of things.

  “Where does she think she’s going now?” Nevett demanded.

  “To an inn I would guess.” Jude needed to make sure she got to a decent place, and safely.

  “She’s going to take her inheritance and her sister and move to France,” Mum answered.

  “How the hell does she think she’s going to do that? Her father’s not going to let her sister go. That old man’s mean as hell. If he can’t have Miss Ritter’s money, he’s not going to let her go away and be happy.” Nevett stated the facts as he saw them.

  “He’s going to let her go with her sister because you’re going to tell him to.” Jude rose.

  “Why would I do that? She was supposed to teach my son and heir to flirt, and she vowed she would get you married by the end of the Season”—Nevett pointed at Jude—“and I don’t see a chance of that happening. Not even to her.”

  Mum sighed and looked at Nevett.

  “Well!” He glared at her. “Why should I do her a favor like telling her father to let his daughters go off to France where the damned heathens live?”

  “Because I ask you to.” Jude locked eyes with his father.

  “Nevett will be glad to speak to Mr. Ritter about his daughters,” Nicolette gently interposed. “Now, dear boy, you should hurry and follow Caroline, or I won’t know if she’s safe, and I’ll worry.”

  “Yes, Mum.” That was exactly what Jude planned to do.

  It was one of the things that women want.

  Less than a week later, Jude stood on the dock and watched as the ship to France weighed anchor.

  Caroline was on the deck with her sister, but even from a distance Jude could see Caroline wore none of the gifts he’d sent her. Not the necklace, not the lace shawl, not the warm mantle to wrap around herself during the sea voyage. Not even a single flower from his bouquet decorated her fichu. He might know what most women wanted, but he did not know what Caroline wanted.

  Time, his stepmother told him.

  But he thought that was too simple. Caroline wanted something more. All Jude had to do was figure out what.

  As the ship moved away from the dock, Genevieve ran to the stern to look back at the city of London. Jude waved at her, and she wildly waved back. She had met Jude on his visits to the inn, and she had confided she liked him. It’s too bad Caroline doesn’t like you, too, but maybe in France she’ll find someone who’s just as nice.

  And that haunted Jude. He wanted to give Caroline time to miss him…but what if she didn’t? What if she fell in love with a heathen Frenchman and married him, leaving Jude to spend his days in misery and loneliness?

  He got drunk one night and told his stepmother his woeful scenario and she had, without any sympathy at all, told him that he should have thought of that before he used Caroline so ruthlessly.

  Obviously, Mum had been talking to Caroline.

  The ship moved farther away, and Jude kept waving, hoping that Caroline would at least lift her hand.

  She did not. Her gaze went past him. Grasping Genevieve’s arm, she dragged her toward the prow of the ship as if she couldn’t wait to see the last of London.

  Looking around, he spotted the trouble.

  Freshie watched her from the shore, his stance menacing.

  With the first feeling of real happiness he’d experienced for a week, Jude took off his coat and threw it on the ground. He walked toward Freshie, rolling up his sleeves.

  When Freshie saw Jude’s scowl, he started backing away, then with many a backward glance, he broke into a run.

  Jude didn’t give a damn about dignity, clothing, or a gentleman’s rules. He sprinted after Freshie. He downed him with a flying tackle. With his hand on Freshie’s collar, Jude dragged him to his feet. Smiling into Freshie’s face, Jude said, “I really feel I must cure you of your regrettable tendency of stalking Miss Ritter.”

  And with a few well-chosen punches, he did.

  Chapter 28

  Seldom in a woman’s life did reality match her dreams. Only twice had Caroline had that experience. Once when she arrived in sunny Aquitaine and met her loving family…and in the dark of night in Jude’s arms.

  She sat on a sun-warmed boulder not far from her family’s chateau and watched as Genevieve romped up and down hills and around trees with two fat golden-haired puppies. Her sister and the puppies were very much alike with their gamboling grace, and Caroline thanked God for the haven her family provided for her and her sister.

  In the three months they’d lived there, Genevieve had blossomed. She’d shot up two inches; she was now taller than Caroline. She’d filled out and showed the promise of beauty. Already the neighbor lad showed interest in her and watched her with worshipping adolescent eyes. But as she told Caroline, “I’m not interested in a man. They just make you unhappy. Right?”

  Caroline had been forced to agree, for here she was, living the dream she’d dreamed for more years than she could remember, and all she wanted was Jude. Jude, with his intense blue eyes, his rawboned hands, the wounds he had suffered for his brother, for justice, and for her. Jude with his talented kisses and the passion he shared so brilliantly. As time went on, she forgot about the way he used her—dreadful man!—and instead recalled the way he looked at her, as if she were his one true love.

  She tried to remind herself that he’d used her, but honesty forced her to admit; he wasn’t like her father or Lord Freshfield. Yes, Jude had used her, but it had been in a—she hated to acknowledge it—a good cause. And he couldn’t have told her what he was doing, for that would have compromised the venture and perhaps destroyed his chance for revenge against his brother’s killers. She’d heard his explanations, but she hadn’t known it in her heart. Now she did, and she wondered what would have happened if she’d stayed in England and accepted his proposal.

  Caroline laughed aloud when one of the puppies went romping up the hill, tripped on his feet and came tumbling down. Genevieve chased him, picked him up, and kissed his slobbery face. “Ohh, Genevieve.” Caroline shook her head, but she didn’t r
emonstrate. Genevieve would tell her that a dog kiss was better than a boy kiss any day, and Caroline would be forced to agree—for Genevieve.

  Pushing back her bonnet, Caroline lifted her face to the sun and closed her eyes. For her, only a Jude kiss would do.

  Yet he would forget about her. He was the earl of Huntington, with a hundred debutantes from whom to choose. Caroline had tortured herself imagining him in love with a simpering young lady who was like…like she’d been four years ago during her Season.

  Childish little twit.

  “Hey, Caroline!” At the top of the hill, Genevieve bounced back and forth while the dogs frolicked around her. She pointed down at the winding path. “Somebody’s coming!”

  “Who?” Caroline stood. Whoever it was hadn’t yet rounded the curve.

  “This man. He’s really handsome! He’s coming around the path! He’s carrying flowers!”

  Caroline had the feeling Genevieve was shouting at him rather than at her. Carefully, Caroline pulled up her bonnet and brushed the wrinkles out of her simple blue skirt.

  “He’s glaring at me! He’s changed direction. He’s walking toward me!” Genevieve started giggling so hard Caroline thought she would burst. “I’m running away…!” She leaped like a goat down the other side of the hill and out of sight.

  Caroline found herself standing stiff and straight, breathless and staring down at the spot where the path emerged from behind the copse of leafy trees and wondering if by some chance…“Jude,” she breathed.

  He looked better than she remembered, which was almost impossible because she remembered a fabulous man stuffed with every perfection. He was tall. He was powerfully built. Each strand of his brown hair shone. Most amazing, he was impeccably dressed.

  He stopped when he saw her, and he stared as if he needed to fill himself with the sight of her.

  She liked that sensation very much. She didn’t like the irresistible urge to move toward him, to wrap herself around him, to melt into him and be one with him. The air between them heated, grew rich and stormy, and it seemed that lightning sparked on this sunny day.