A Scandalous Lady

by Rachelle Morgan

  He’d vowed to himself that he would not visit the village today, not spy on Faith. He had too many other duties to attend to let himself become distracted by the gel’s crazy delusions. He and Chadwick were planning on finishing the repairs on the windmill and rechink the ovens in the bakehouse, both of which would take most of the day.

  But in spite of his resolve, he found his duties carrying him farther away from the manor and closer to her. With an ax in the scabbard, he guided his horse through the forests north of the village boundaries. He told himself that Millie would need wood once the bake ovens were completed, and that the best oaks grew near this stream. But when he saw Faith in the distance, he knew he was only lying to himself. The house had felt empty since she’d begun her project, the days twice as long. He’d secretly been hoping for a glimpse of her, just to assure himself that all was right, that she’d come to no harm.

  His heart beat faster, his blood flowed hotter. She’d donned a ragged pair of trousers no doubt borrowed from one of the village boys, and an oversize shirt that swallowed her frame. And still, she was so pretty she took his breath away. Using a tined garden tool to rake at the weeds that had overtaken a patch of earth beside the old counselor’s office, she attacked the ground with an obsessive zeal, without a soul in sight helping her.

  What drove a woman to such mad—and futile—extremes?

  He shook his head in bafflement, purely amazed that she who had nothing would give so much of herself. And to the most ungrateful lot of souses he’d had the misfortune to meet.

  Let her. She’d learn. She’d tire of her wasted efforts soon enough.

  But she didn’t.

  Each day for the next week she returned to the village again and again. After her morning chores at the manor house were completed, she would make the two-mile hike along the shoreline for the village, toil until near dark, then return to the manor house to assist with supper and sleep.

  And each day for the next week, Troyce grew more and more concerned. If anything, she looked worse now than the day he’d brought her to Westborough. Her hands were chapped from harsh soaps, her face drawn, her features thinner, and the shadows under her eyes stark against her tanned skin. Was she even eating? Troyce didn’t think so, and he blamed himself. He never should have consented to this scheme. He above all knew how fruitless it was. At the same time, he couldn’t find it in his heart to deny her something that was so obviously important to her.

  But neither could he allow her to continue working herself into an early grave.

  With a sigh of surrender, he returned to the manor. After a quick trip to the boathouse, he once again mounted his horse and wheeled him in the direction they’d just traveled. But instead of guiding his horse toward the outskirts, he headed straight for the bloody village.

  Troyce didn’t think it was possible, but the place looked even more dismal now than when he’d first set eyes upon it nearly four months earlier. Though signs of Faith’s labors were everywhere—rubbish piled neatly on the side of the road, carts overloaded with broken furniture, trails of water leading in and out of buildings from where she’d been hauling buckets—his own failures were more apparent. The barren fields, paupers’ huts, the dearth of activity . . .

  Wasn’t that just the rub? Away for eight years learning to rebuild things, and he couldn’t rebuild his own life.

  Unable to bear the sight, he looked away and clicked the horse forward. His heart thudded against his ribs as he closed the distance between the outlying farmlands and the village itself. A festering stench rose from the corral, making Troyce wonder when it had last been cleaned. No wonder she thought him such a monster.

  The stillness alerted him that his presence had been noted. Troyce braced himself, knowing what would come even before the first stone caught him between the shoulder blades. The second hit him in the back of the head. Soon, he was being pelted from both sides by hand-sized pieces of his own land.

  Still, he kept his posture straight and his gaze trained ahead. He was no stranger to the villagers’ welcome; he’d endured it several times in his initial efforts to meet with them and discuss how they could work together to save Westborough.

  Then, as now, the situation seemed to have surpassed discussion, but he refused to let them run him off his own lands. And so, steeling himself against the pain of rocks nicking his flesh and the shouts of disdain searing his soul, Troyce continued down the center roadway, his thoughts focused on finding Faith.

  He never saw the one that dropped him to his knees.

  Faith was pushing a wheelbarrow overloaded with debris from what had once been the baker’s shop when the shouts of the crowd gathering at the end of the village drew her notice.

  She glanced up and spotted a rider. She recognized his broad-shouldered frame at once, and her heart gave a traitorous leap at the sight of the baron heading in her direction. What was he doing here?

  And what were those things flying in the air around him? Her eyes narrowed as she tried to make them out when suddenly, the baron jerked in the saddle and keeled sideways.

  The grips of the wheelbarrow slipped from her hands and the load toppled. “Baron!” Grabbing her skirts in both hands, she tore down the street. The crowd began to converge, and terror surged through her veins like frozen fire.

  “Get away from him! Get away!” She shoved herself between foul-smelling bodies until she reached the center of the mass. There her baron lay facedown in the mud and muck. Faith dropped to her knees, heedless of the shouts around her. She rolled him over. Blood seeping from a cut above his eyes made her stomach roll, and a haze of anger blurred her vision. “What the bloody hell ’ave ye done to ’im, ye sorry sons of Satan!”

  She ripped a portion of her underskirt and wiped away the mud and blood. “Baron? Can ye hear me? Open yer eyes.”

  Thick sooty lashes fluttered, then lifted. Faith wilted, never so relieved to see those silvery gems in her life. “There ye are . . .”

  She smiled, and the darkness that had been Troyce’s world suddenly brightened. “Faith . . .” He smiled back, a weak effort. With the sun shining behind her, her curls looked like a halo. Her brown eyes shone with a suspicion luster, as if she were fighting tears.

  She brushed something soft across his brow. “Are ye all right?”

  “Not so highborn now, am I?” he whispered.

  “Oh, ye bloody fool.” She laughed. But it was sad laugh, not the kind he’d often hoped to hear coming from her. “What are you doing here?”

  I missed you. The thought slapped him like a fierce wind on the open sea, stealing his breath. Troyce closed his eyes lest she read the emotion in them, and struggled to sit. His world spun like a child’s toy. His head pounded with the fierceness of a warrior’s drum. He clutched the side of his head as if that would dull the pain and pointed toward his horse. “I brought canvass. For the windows.”

  “Where did you get—” Her face snapped around to the bundle tied to the back of his saddle. “You took them from your ship, didn’t you?”

  “They weren’t being used.”

  “Oh, Baron . . .” She started to caress his cheek, then drew back as if remembering where they were.

  And who surrounded them.

  Troyce didn’t need to look into their faces to know what he would find; they’d made it perfectly clear when he’d ridden through town. Condemnation. Disdain. Utter and absolute hatred.

  “Someone help me get him on his horse,” Faith ordered.

  Not a person moved.

  “He brought coverings for your windows to keep out the rain.”

  Still, no one moved. In fact, the tension in the air only seemed to intensify, and a sliver of apprehension embedded itself at the back of Troyce’s neck.

  “He’s trying to help you, can’t you see that?”

  “Faith, let it go,” Troyce said, gathering his strength and his bearings. “I can manage on my own.”

  “Where was his lordship when the crops failed two
seasons in a row?” Someone called out from the crowd. “Where was he when we needed timber for the fences?”

  “Too busy slippin’ his hands up some muck-a-muck’s skirts, I’ll wager,” someone else cried.

  “Off hobnobbin’ with the hoity-toities, that’s where he was,” another chimed in. “Forgettin’ all about the little folks what put supper on his table.”

  “We don’t want his bloody help,” a bear of a man spat.

  “Then you are fools, every one of you,” Faith hissed in his defense. “He alone has the means to give all of you a fresh chance. Though why he’d do it, I can’t imagine. You’ve certainly done nothing to deserve it.”

  “He abandoned us!”

  She looked them up and down with undisguised loathing. “You abandoned yourselves.”

  Faith had no idea how she managed to get him on the horse. He was swaying so badly on his feet that she feared he would lose consciousness. Somehow, he put his foot in the stirrup and with her shoving his backside, swung his leg over. No sooner was he in the saddle than he slumped forward.

  She’d never ridden a horse before and didn’t think now was the best time to learn. Instead, she took the reins and walked beside the animal, hoping it wouldn’t give her any trouble. If the baron fell off, she had no idea how she would get him back in the saddle.

  It took nearly thirty minutes to reach the manor, and in all that time, the baron didn’t stir again until the horse came to a stop at the front gate. “Stay here and don’t move. I’ll be right back.”

  Faith was afraid to leave him, but there was no possible way she’d be able to get him into the house without help. Several minutes later, Lady Brayton was following her outside. Against Faith’s orders, the baron had dismounted, and stood leaning heavily against the animal’s flanks, his hand cradling the right side of his head above his temple.

  “What happened?” Lady Brayton cried, rushing to his side. “Good heavens, you’re bleeding.”

  He pushed himself upright, and though he was steadier on his feet than he’d been before, his face was an alarming shade of gray. But Faith was so grateful to see him alert that her legs went weak.

  “I fell from my horse, Devon. Don’t concern yourself.” The look he cast Faith’s way warned her not to gainsay him.

  “I’ll get some water and rags,” Millie said, then rushed toward the kitchen.

  With Faith on one side, Lady Brayton on the other, they supported his weight into the house and led him up the stairs to his room.

  Faith had never been in the master’s chambers before, since the task of cleaning the lord’s and lady’s rooms had been delegated to Lucy. The room was large and airy, decorated in shades of rich burgundy and gray the same shade as his eyes, with a heavy, masculine wardrobe, two trunks, two thick-cushioned chairs, and a massive four-poster bed fit for a king.

  Or a prince.

  He sank onto the mattress and ordered Lady Brayton to leave him, which she, of course, ignored. Faith stayed back near the door, out of the way, wringing her hands and fighting the instinct to comfort him. But she knew it would not be allowed. Lady Brayton would strangle her before letting her near the baron, and Faith was in no position to challenge her.

  But as she watched the duchess fuss over him like a mother hen, the realization struck her of how dearly Her Grace cared for his lordship. The two might grouse and disagree, but the bond between brother and sister could not be mistaken. Seeing it, feeling it, made her remember a time when she’d shared the same sort of bond with her own sister. Faith’s throat tightened, and the hollow ache she tried to ignore whenever she thought of Aniste—or Honesty as she’d dubbed her during their childhood—settled in her breast. They’d been so little, alike in so many ways and close as peas in a pod, but Honesty had always been the more vibrant of the two.

  No wonder their father had chosen her sister over her.

  Spotting her lingering in the doorway, Lady Brayton frowned, then shut the door, banning her from the baron. She was not allowed near him for the rest of the day, and worry for him was driving her mad. Finally, near dusk, Lady Brayton left his room.

  “How is he, Your Grace?” Faith asked, rising from the hallway floor just as the duchess shut his door.

  “What are you doing here? Haven’t you caused enough damage?”

  “Me?”

  “I don’t care what my brother said happened, his horse didn’t throw him. West learned to ride before he could walk. I know that he went to the village, and I also know that he wouldn’t have gone there if hadn’t been for you.”

  Every word seemed to take nicks out of her flesh. “I’m sorry.” She could hardly get the words passed the lump of anguish lodged in her throat.

  “Sorry? You could have gotten him killed!”

  Faith didn’t know what to say. How could she deny what she knew to be true?

  “If you want to waste your time and risk your life on that bloody village, then so be it, but do not jeopardize my brother’s. Until he is in a better position to provide what they need, he will not be returning. In the meantime, you just . . . stay away from him, do you hear me?”

  As if to drive the edict home, Lady Brayton locked the baron’s door and pocketed the key, then marched past Faith down the hall.

  Faith stared at the door for several long moments, before turning away. Back in her own room, she paced the floor. The duchess was right. It was her fault the baron had been hurt. If she hadn’t been so damned insistent on fixing the problems of the lands, he never would have gone to the village, and they never would have stoned him.

  Why had he gone there?

  Why had he decided to bring the canvasses, knowing what sort of welcome he would receive?

  She managed to obey Lady Brayton’s order for all of an hour before digging out a familiar leather case from her rucksack, which she’d confiscated while loading the carriages for the journey to Westborough. Even though she hadn’t thought she’d have need of her tools again, it still belonged to her.

  Returning to the baron’s room, she knocked softly on the door. “Baron?”

  No answer. She knocked again. “Lord Westborough?”

  Still no answer.

  Her blood beginning to run cold, she extracted a set of false keys from her kit and wedged them, one after another, into the keyhole. On the fourth try, she heard the familiar click of the lock releasing. Absently tucking the case into her apron pocket, Faith let herself inside.

  He stood by the window, the moonlight casting his face in half shadows, so much like the first time she’d seen him under the lamplight in front of a London tavern that her heart skipped several beats. Then she’d thought him her prince of dreams.

  Now, she knew he was only a man.

  A remarkable, foolish man.

  “Troyce?”

  He turned, saw her, and looked back out the window.

  She took a bold step forward. “I thought you were resting.” Another step. “How are you feeling?”

  With a brief and slanted glance over his shoulder acknowledging her presence, he answered, “My head hurts like hell, but I’ll live.”

  “This is not the first time they’ve turned on you, is it?”

  His silence said it all.

  Anger rose inside Faith, swift and blazing. At him for being so foolhardy. At the villagers for being so cruel. At herself for causing it in the first place. “Why do you allow it?”

  “Because they’re right. I did abandon them. Like father like son.” He laughed a humorless laugh that ended on a groan.

  Instantly, Faith was at his side. The swelling above his temple seemed to have abated, but the cut had been deep, and he’d no doubt carry a scar. “Oh, Baron, I’m sorry,” she said, reaching up to touch the knot, then drawing back at the last moment lest she cause him pain. “Can you forgive me?”

  “For what? You had nothing to do with this.”

  “I feel like I did.”

  “Oh, Faith.” He brushed a damp curl from her ch
eek with his finger. “Their contention has been an issue long before you arrived, and it will be dealt with, I promise you that.”

  She could hardly think when he touched her. Her heart jumped. Her mouth went dry. “What will you do?”

  “I will finish what you began. I refuse to let them drive me away any longer.”

  A flash of fear mingled with the pride in her expression, and Troyce’s heart soared. Unlike Devon, she didn’t scold him for his decision. Instead, she understood his inability to give up. To let them win.

  “Lady Brayton will not be pleased if you go back to the village.”

  “Lady Brayton is my sister, Faith, not my mother.”

  “She worries over you.”

  “I’ll admit that it’s nice to know that someone worries over me, but I’m a grown man. I make my own decisions.”

  “Even at the risk of your own life?”

  “Are you worried for me, too, Faith?”

  Slowly she looked up at him, and he lost himself in her eyes. Every emotion she felt was reflected there. Fear. Hope.

  Desire.

  “Yes,” she whispered. “I couldn’t bear it if something happened to you.”

  His resistance slipped. God, to hear her say that he meant something to her was like receiving a gift. He took a step toward her. She watched him closely, but she didn’t move. Her lids grew heavy. Her lashes fell, dark crescents against her cheekbones. Then she licked her lips, and the ache he’d been nursing in his head all afternoon took a downward shift. The top of her head came just below his chin. Faith was not exactly petite, nor was she overly tall. But next to him, she seemed so small. So fragile. So defenseless. It could have been her being pelted with stones. It could have been her on the ground.

  Aware that he was flirting with danger, he traced the edge of her jaw with his fingertip. “God, you are so beautiful.” A man could drown in those eyes of hers, and her skin . . . it wasn’t pallid like so many women, but fresh and healthy and natural. His fingers traced their way to her mouth. He should leave her alone. But he couldn’t. She’d haunted his thoughts, tormented his dreams . . . he could hardly sleep at night for wanting her.