The ruthless Lord Rule

by Kasey Michaels

  “Yes, well, Kitty,” Mary said now, lowering her eyelashes a bit as she found it hard to lie directly into such an innocent, trusting face. “About Tristan—it seems I have this…er…problem.”

  Kitty leaned forward eagerly, glad to be considered worthy of Mary’s confidences.

  DEXTER, STILL CLAD in his travel dirt, ran Tristan to earth late that same afternoon just as the man was stepping out of Gentleman Jackson’s Boxing Saloon, and rushed up to take his arm. “Tris, I have to talk to you!” Dexter imparted with uncharacteristic seriousness.

  “My goodness, Dex, what nettle has gotten into your breeches?” Tristan teased, feeling much better now that he had bashed at least one of Jackson’s underlings in his effort to work out the frustrations caused by yet another long, sleepless night. “Don’t tell me you and your little Incomparable are having troubles—and don’t think you are about to recommence being my shadow if you are no longer to be playing the lovebird. People were beginning to talk, you know, and I have enough on my plate right now without that!”

  Dexter pokered up stiffly at this double insult. “Miss Toland and I are enjoying our customary felicitous relationship, sir,” he intoned heavily, “and I would consider it a kindness if you would leave off poking fun at the woman I love.”

  Tristan stopped in his tracks. “Good God, did I do that?” he asked wonderingly. “And here I thought I was complimenting her good judgment—for casting such a looby as you aside could only be applauded as the action of a discerning female. There,” he ended, clapping Dexter bracingly on the back, “have I succeeded in vindicating myself regarding the merits of your Miss Toland?”

  “Yes, blister it, Tris, you have,” Dexter countered, confusion written all over his face, “but now I do believe I’ll have to call you out for your insult to me! Yet if I do that, I really would be guilty of being the stupidest person in nature.”

  Rule threw back his head and laughed aloud, feeling better and better as each moment passed. He really enjoyed Dexter’s company, for the younger man’s clear, if rather limited, outlook on life was a delight to witness.

  The pair walked on until they espied a small tavern and Tristan suggested they step inside to share a bird and a bottle, which suited Dexter to a cow’s thumb, as he had pressing business with Rule that he had momentarily forgotten—business that would surely serve to remove that genial smile from the man’s lips.

  Once they had been served, Dexter leaned forward in his chair, ready to impart his new-found knowledge, but then, realizing that he was in the most direct line of fire if Tristan decided to explode, he leaned back again and nervously cleared his throat a time or two before speaking. “Tristan…um…Tris, I happened to stop by Sir Henry’s this afternoon to pay a call on Miss Toland and…um…I say, man, that’s a devilish fine cravat! Do you think you could have your man instruct mine in the way of it?”

  Tristan, who had tied the thing haphazardly himself after his stint in the boxing ring and knew himself to be looking casual, to put it politely, narrowed his dark eyes and measured the man sitting across from him. “Spit it out, Dex. There’s something sticking in your craw and I’d say it’s about to choke you.”

  Dexter was all admiration. “How’d you do that, Tris? Julian does it too—always did—reads me like an open book. It’s a good thing I don’t need to be devious, as I sure don’t seem to have the head for it, do I?”

  “Nor the face,” Rule supplied with a grin. “Now out with it—are you in need of someone to bail you out of the River Tick? I thought you had given up gaming in those hells.”

  “Haven’t touched the dice more than twice since I met Miss Toland,” Dexter swore earnestly. “Besides, it doesn’t have to do with me at all. It’s Miss Lawrence.”

  Suddenly Tristan, who had been listening with only half an ear, was all attention. “Mar—Miss Lawrence? Is she all right? Was there an accident? You took your bloody sweet time telling me—” Rule was already out of his chair and heading for the door.

  “She’s fine!” Dexter called out, stopping Rule in his tracks. “At least she is now. It’s later on tonight that worries me.”

  “Tonight?” Tristan repeated, numbly slipping back into his chair. “She’s promised to Lady Jersey’s this evening.” At the sight of Dexter’s raised eyebrows, he continued rather sheepishly: “Sir Henry keeps me informed of her whereabouts—in all innocence, I assure you.”

  “Of course he does. Of course it is,” Dexter agreed, grinning widely. “Nothing at all out of the way about a thing like that.”

  “Julian should have strangled you in your cot,” Tristan said, not pleased to have been found out. “Now tell me why Miss Lawrence could be in trouble tonight before I do Julian’s job for him. I assure you, I have experience enough to make the procedure relatively swift and painless.”

  Running a nervous finger inside the front of his cravat, as if to reassure himself his valet had left him adequate breathing space, Dexter made short work out of his explanation.

  It seemed that Kitty had confided in him—in deepest confidence, Tristan was to understand—that Mary had a secret assignation shortly after midnight in Green Park. The only reason Mary had confided in Kitty was so that she would agree to accompany her home early from Lady Jersey’s when Mary pleaded the headache. That way Mary would be able to sneak out of the house in time to meet “her tormentor” in the park.

  “Her ‘tormentor’?” Tristan questioned, his agile mind already deciding that Mary was indeed the victim of some sort of blackmail.

  Dexter was nodding his head vigorously, happy to be done with his end of the mission, and grateful that Tristan hadn’t taken it into his head to slay the messenger who had brought him the bad news. If Rule wished to believe that pack of nonsense, it wasn’t up to him to convince him otherwise—even if Dexter did believe that Mary’s appointment was in reality a romantic assignation. After all, what sort of deep intrigue could involve anyone like Mary Lawrence?

  “You weren’t to know,” Dexter then volunteered, as he had never learned to leave well enough alone. “Kitty specifically told me that when she confided her fears in me. Not that I paid her any attention—after giving my solemn word that I’d breathe not a syllable about it to you—seeing as how you work for Sir Henry, sort of, don’t you, and should be most concerned lest any scandal come to his ward over some fortune-hunting Romeo.”

  Dexter later told his friend, Bertie Sandover, that it was then that he first swore he could see smoke rising out of Ruthless Rule’s ears. “You think she’s eloping with some other man?” Tristan had accused, his strong, lean fingers clutching the table edge in a death grip. “You think that’s why Mary was so adamant that I above anyone else was not to know about her plans for the evening?”

  “Kitty told me I had been chosen to waylay you in the card room or somewhere until Miss Lawrence could effect her departure from Lady Jersey’s,” Dexter squeaked in his own defense. “Plain as the nose on your face that she don’t want you poking about in her business. Now, Tris—” he warned feebly as Rule gave a low growl.

  “You’re a few bricks shy of a load, Dex, do you know that?” Tristan gritted through clenched teeth, not knowing what had made him the angrier: Mary’s assignation that evening or Dexter’s assumption that she was meeting another man. “And stop sliding down in that chair; you’ll soon be on the floor! Pull yourself together, man, or you’ll be no help to me at all.”

  “You want me to help you?” Dexter asked, swallowing hard on a gulp. “I thought you wanted to kill me.”

  Tristan called out to the serving wench to bring another bottle to the table. “No, no,” he assured the younger man, trying his best to remain calm and make his plans carefully. “After all, if I kill you now, you won’t be able to corner me in the card room this evening, will you?”

  MARY HAD BEEN CORRECT in her reading of Kitty’s character. When it came to keeping other people’s secrets, Kitty Toland showed a lamentable lack of dependability. This worked
very much to Mary’s advantage when it came to having Tristan informed of her plans for the evening.

  It did not, however, work in quite the same way when it came to having Jerome Toland gifted with the same information.

  “Did I do right to tell you, Jerry?” Kitty asked her brother fearfully as she watched him pace back and forth across Sir Henry’s morning-room carpet. “You said I must keep my eyes and ears open and tell you anything that seemed the least important, although, oh, Gemini, I can’t see how Mary’s little indiscretion can serve to help you. Surely you don’t plan to break into her rooms tonight while she is gone and steal her jewelry, like you did that time in—”

  “I told you to blank that memory from your mind, you ridiculous chit!” Jerome interrupted, still gnawing on the side of his thumb as he turned the information he had just learned over in his mind. Actually, he had hoped to insinuate Kitty into some peer’s household with just such thievery in mind, but once he learned of Sir Henry’s important role in the government, he had revised his plans to include the selling of information to certain persons he knew who were still championing Napoleon’s cause. Now he had this new kettle of fish handed to him.

  “Will you promise now not to interfere with Dexter’s and my plans?” Kitty, emboldened by the deathless love she bore her Dex, dared to ask. “You said if I helped you this one last time, you would agree to the match.”

  Jerome headed for the door, clearly preoccupied. “We’ll see, puss, we’ll see,” he promised vaguely before quitting the room. “Just do your part tonight like the lady asked you, and remember—you’re just as guilty as I am, so keep your mouth shut about my past!”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  IT HAD ALL BEEN SO EASY—so ridiculously easy. She knew she was right to have counted on Kitty to spill the soup. Mary was convinced Kitty and Dexter had all but drawn Lord Rule a diagram of her plans for the evening. Dexter’s maneuvering of Tristan into the card room had certainly lacked for subtlety, but then Tristan’s transparent willingness to be led away from his customary pillar-bracing stance at the edge of the ballroom had caused Mary to wonder how he had ever gotten such a reputation for spying—an occupation that she assumed must take a certain talent for subterfuge.

  But no matter. It was just striking midnight and she was going to be late if she didn’t soon succeed in sticking her unruly mass of hair up inside the oversized toque Ben had supplied her with that afternoon. Really, she thought ruefully as she shrugged herself into the long, shapeless black coat he had told her was part of the customary dress of young apprentices in the city. Ben may have many talents, but an eye for fashion certainly isn’t one of them.

  After looking at herself one more time in the mirror—seeing a slim, out-at-the-elbows youth dressed in straight loose trousers that went halfway down to her ankles (now shapeless in thick woolen socks and heavy black shoes) and a loose, open-necked blouse whose limp ruffle somewhat hid her bosom—Mary headed for the servants’ stairs, her bedside candle held high to light the way.

  Ben met her just outside the kitchen door, startling her as he appeared out of the darkness without a sound to whisper in her ear, “Git yer dew beaters travelin’, missy, whilst Oi go tickle up yer shadows fer yer. Oi’ll be ’ere waitin’ on yer when yers git back, mindin’ the store, like.”

  “Huh?” Mary asked inelegantly, still trying to figure out what “dew beaters” were.

  Ben shook his head sadly, wondering just how he, once a first-rate kencracker, had been brought so low. “Please yer to start walkin now, Miss, whilst Oi goes to tell Tiny and Goliath yer’re on her way.”

  Mary gifted him with a grateful smile. “Oh, of course. Thank you, Ben. I’ll start moving my dew beaters on the instant.”

  “Bless yer, missy,” Ben whispered gratefully before disappearing once more into the shadows, leaving Mary alone again in the foggy yellow moonlight.

  She had already plotted out the shortest way to Green Park, carefully planning her route along the best illuminated streets, but that did not keep her from jumping half out of her skin when a noise from a nearby alleyway reached her just as she had finished congratulating herself for having completed half the journey without incident. “Mad as Bedlam,” she told herself aloud. “That’s what you are, Mary Lawrence, traveling about the city with only a dwarf and a gentle giant as guardians.”

  She smiled then as she remembered her first sight of Jennie’s two grooms that afternoon at Lucy’s. Tiny, the benevolent giant, resembled nothing more than a huge, black mountain with muscular arms the size of cottage beams, while Goliath, clearly the senior partner in their friendship, stood only as high as her waist. In only a few moments Mary was convinced that, between Tiny’s brawn and Goliath’s brain, she had nothing to fear during her midnight foray in Green Park.

  Besides, she told herself yet again, Tristan is bound to be out here somewhere, skulking behind trees and playing bo-peep in dark doorways, watching every move I make. The thought of Tristan seeing her dressed in such an outlandish costume caused Mary to pause a moment beneath a streetlamp to inspect her appearance in a nearby shop window.

  NOW WHAT’S SHE DOING? Lord Rule asked himself as he flattened his body against the side of a building. Poking his head around the corner, he espied her adjusting her toque in a rather rakish tilt, “Plaguey queer time to be primping!” he muttered, wondering yet again (rather like Ben) how he had ever been brought to this pass.

  Chancing a quick look behind him, he saw that Tiny and Goliath were still in sight. “Lord,” he hissed, “that man is big!” Not that Rule didn’t believe himself capable of handling any problems, but Kit had offered his services, and Rule had decided not to take any chances with Mary’s welfare. Between the two of them, Tris and Tiny could hold off an army of cutthroats while Goliath led Mary to safety.

  Safety. Tristan snorted, disbelief at Mary’s naiveté making him shake his head sadly. You’d think she was out strolling the park with her maid at high noon, the way she’s just walking along without once looking to see if she’s about to be attacked from behind. Lord, if she were to turn around and see Tiny’s hulking figure coming up on her out of the fog—that would serve to put a period to her shenanigans!

  Rule waited until Mary had crossed the street and entered the park before darting across himself to run from tree to tree as she cut deeper into the park, his tall figure bent nearly in half. At last she stopped, looked around her a time or two—all without seeing either Rule or the two servants, who stood not twenty paces away from her in the shrubbery—before removing a folded sheet of paper and placing it carefully in a knothole of the largest tree in the area.

  Rule motioned to the servants with a toss of his head, sending Tiny and Goliath back the way they had come as Mary turned for home, while he counted slowly to twenty before crossing to the tree and removing the message Mary had hidden there before he too quit the park.

  Standing under the same streetlamp Mary had used to check on her appearance, Rule unfolded the note and held it up toward the light. “‘Iz-js duy-typ-zfe jy—’ What the bloody hell? It’s in code!” He lifted his head just in time to see yet another dark-clad figure disappear into the fog. The man the message was intended for? He asked himself, even as he stuffed the paper into his coat and started off at a dead run to capture Mary’s “tormentor.”

  “NEARLY TWO,” Mary said aloud, listening for the chiming of the hall clock and wondering what on earth could be keeping Rule. She had returned home and run up the servants’ stairs just as fast as her heavy black shoes could carry her, to stand in the window and wave her candle slowly back and forth across the window three times—signaling to Ben that she was safe in her room, but hoping Rule would take it as more proof of her clandestine activities.

  She had then hastily ripped off her clothes and dived into her nightgown, expecting Sir Henry to be calling her downstairs at any moment for a confrontation with her accuser. She had even, as the moments dragged into minutes, sat herself down at her dress
ing table to arrange her hair becomingly and dab on just a hint of that lovely lip pomade Lucy had loaned her.

  So where was Tristan? Mary had counted on him not waiting to decipher her note, had relied on his reputation for action before thought. It just wasn’t like him to retire to his rooms and patiently work out the code.

  “Oh why, oh why hasn’t he come crashing through the front door bellowing like a bull?” she asked herself, pouting. “How like him to be so contrary as to spoil all my fun!”

  “WHAT IN THUNDER ARE you about?” Sir Henry demanded, lowering the pistol he had aimed at the intruder’s heart.

  Lord Rule, one foot on the floor, the other still hovering on the sill, halted in his progress through Sir Henry’s bedchamber window. “I should have remembered, shouldn’t I?” Tris answered, pulling himself entirely into the room. “Many’s the tale I’ve heard about you in your younger days.” Drawing himself up to his full height, he then bowed. “Sir, your most obedient—”

  “Yes, yes, get on with it,” Sir Henry prodded, “and spare me any recital of my foolish salad days in the field. I’m just on the sunny side of fifty now, even if my ears and instincts remain good. What brings you here in the middle of the night? More plots to free Napoleon?”

  “If only it were, sir,” Tristan said, lowering himself into a chair to rest a moment before—his hot blood denying him more than a momentary respite—he sprang to his feet once more. “I can deal with the mundane,” he began in a rush, consigning an entire network of dangerous spies and conspirators to the everyday, “but I swear to you, this is beyond me!”

  “Prinny?” Ruffton prodded. “A plot to kill him? It’d be the third this month.”

  Rule shook his head and reached into his pocket to pull out the incriminating paper and hand it to his mentor. “I found this stuck in a tree in Green Park. Your ‘ward’ put it there this evening, just after midnight.”