After this latest revelation of Jo being subjected to the indignity of a medical examination in the presence of her cousin, Daniel knew there was only one course open to him.
He straightened to his full and imposing height to look down the length of his nose at Cheshire. “There will be no doctor’s examination. No announcement of a betrothal to Pendleton. No—”
“You cannot come here and tell me what to do in my own home,” Cheshire blustered.
“Oh, I believe you will find I can do exactly as I wish.” Daniel’s voice was silky soft, a dangerous occurrence Cheshire would be wise to take note of. “Not only that, but I am also removing Lady Josephine from you and this house, immediately. If you doubt my ability to do so, then I advise you do not. I also suggest you consider who my friends are.”
“The Prince Regent and your other cronies do not frighten me,” the other man sneered.
“No?”
Cheshire’s face flushed with anger. “The law is on my side. Josephine is my cousin and ward, and as such, you do not have the right to take her anywhere.”
“I am giving myself that right. Unless you care for all in Society to know of your less than familial intentions toward your own cousin?”
“I have debts,” the duke began to bluster. “Pendleton has only held off this long because I promised he could marry Josephine.”
Daniel’s mouth tightened. “Then you will have to un-promise him.”
“He will kill me.”
“And by doing so, he will rid the world of yet another sewer rat.” Daniel kept the coldness of his gaze fixed on Cheshire as he spoke to Jo. “If there is anything here you wish to take with you, I suggest you go and collect it now. You will not be returning,” he added grimly.
“There is nothing here that I want,” she assured him softly.
“Josephine is not going anywhere but upstairs to her bedchamber where the physician awaits her.” Cheshire unwisely decided to accompany his words by grasping Jo’s arm.
“Do not say I didn’t warn you,” Daniel grated as he stepped forward and punched Cheshire on his sneering mouth.
As the man released Jo to reel back, Daniel punched him again. And again. Once started, Daniel could not seem to stop.
All the pent-up emotion of the past few days, worry and anger, seemed to have coalesced into one pinprick of light in which only Cheshire existed. Daniel followed the other man down onto the floor to rain blow after blow on the now-cringing man.
“Daniel, please, you have to stop.”
It was the sound of Jo’s voice, along with the softness of her hand on his shoulder that brought Daniel to his senses.
The face of the man beneath him was bloody, his nose probably broken.
Daniel glanced up at Jo, his heart a lead weight in his chest as he saw the look of horror and fear on her face.
Chapter 12
“I am sorry if my lack of control frightened you just now.”
Jo glanced across the Latham carriage at Daniel seated opposite her, the two of them having left Cheshire House several minutes ago. Several minutes in which they had traveled in silence. Jo didn’t know quite what to say, and Daniel… She was unsure of the reason for Daniel’s silence as he sat with his head leaning back against the upholstery and his eyes closed.
They had left her cousin, bloodied and groaning, lying on the floor of the salon and ignored Farrell as he leaned against the wall in the entrance hall, his face a pasty shade of gray. After all, they had a physician upstairs whose talents would not go to waste.
“Very little frightens me anymore,” she assured him dully.
“Perhaps that is as well.” Daniel roused himself enough to sit up and open his eyes to look at her. “Cheshire slapped you.”
“Yes.”
“As did Bates.”
Her bruised mouth twisted. “He punched me, to be exact.”
“For a second time.” Daniel’s eyes narrowed. “I believe I need to pay that young man another visit and teach him the proper manner in which to treat a lady.”
“Not at all,” Jo assured ruefully. “I was kicking him in the shins at the time.”
Daniel gave a slight smile at her admission. “That is still no excuse for punching you.”
“Daniel, I— I am responsible for starting the fire in the stables that night.” The words came out in a rush in Jo’s haste to make her confession. “Not on purpose,” she hastened to add as Daniel looked at her without speaking. “It was an accident. I had decided I must leave and thought to take one of the horses. I would have returned it to you as soon as I reached my great-aunt’s.” Guilty color warmed her cheeks as Daniel’s face remained expressionless. “Before I could saddle the horse, Mickey startled me, and I dropped the lamp. It smashed on the floor, the straw caught fire, and Mickey—he would not let me put it out. Tell me.” She sat forward anxiously. “Oh, please tell me I did not kill any of the horses or harm anyone that night.”
“You did not kill any of the horses or harm anyone that night.”
A frown furrowed her brow. “Is that the truth, or are you merely repeating my words?”
“It is the truth,” Daniel assured her. “We did not manage to save the stables, but all the horses were got out and only a few minor burns inflicted on their rescuers.”
“Oh thank God.” Jo sat back in the seat, her hands clutched to her chest in her relief.
“I already knew you started the fire.”
Her eyes widened. “How?”
He shrugged. “We searched through what was left of the stables the following morning. I wished to make sure there was no one inside when it burned down.” He frowned darkly.
“You thought I might have been in there…”
“It was a possibility.” Daniel still found it painful to recall his frantic search through the debris of the fire once they had doused the flames. Searching, and so very much afraid he would find a small skeleton that was all that remained of Jo. “What we did find was what was left of a broken lamp in the stall belonging to Rex. A lamp that should not have been there. It seemed certain that it was what started the fire.”
“I could still have started it on purpose.”
“One of the lads recalled hearing someone shouting the word fire as he roused. He seemed certain it was your voice he heard. Even if you had started the fire deliberately, it was obvious you had thought better of it by crying out a warning.”
Jo gave a shake of her head. “I would never have put the horses in danger in such a way.”
“So Mickey Bates confirmed yesterday.”
“Voluntarily?”
He gave a half smile. “Not particularly, no.”
Jo did not feel in the least sympathetic to Mickey, not after he had delivered her so callously back to the cousin he knew she despised and feared. “But the horses and grooms and everyone else really are all well?”
“As I said, a few minor burns, nothing more.”
“I have been so worried about Lady Midnight and her foal. About Rex and all the other horses.”
“And me?” Daniel drawled. “Did you spare a thought for how I might feel in any of your worrying?”
“I have thought of nothing but you,” she defended. “How upset you would be if anything happened to Lady Midnight and her darling foal. How you would think I had started the fire on purpose as a diversion to my leaving. How…how angry with me you must be.”
“And yet here I am.”
Yes, here he was, and Jo was none the wiser as to why he was if she was only guilty of burning down his stables. She accepted it was a serious enough offence, but surely not enough of one for Daniel to have gone to so much trouble to find her. Unless it was his intention to see she paid for her crime.
She swallowed. “Am I going to prison?”
He snorted. “I hope you will not think of it as such.”
“I do not understand.”
No, Daniel could see she did not. “I have taken you from your cousin’s home aga
inst his wishes. I am carrying you off in my carriage. There is only one solution to such a problem.”
“You are taking me to my great-aunt’s?”
“I am sorry to inform you Lady Anthea died six months ago.”
She winced, sorry to hear the elderly lady had died, but not having known her, she could not feel genuine grief. “So my flight from my grandfather’s home, from marriage to a man I despised, those weeks of hiding my identity by working as a boy in the stables, they were all for nothing.”
Daniel scowled. “From what I have seen of your cousin’s behavior and intentions today, he left you with little choice in the matter.”
She laid her head back against the upholstery. “But where am I to go now? What will become of me?”
“First, I should like to know why you decided you had to leave Latham Park that night?”
Her lashes lowered. “Surely it is obvious?”
“Not to me.” Daniel frowned. “I had thought we had…a friendship, at the very least.” He sat forward on the seat. “That last morning we had been…intimate, and then you spent the rest of the day in your bedchamber. Did what we had done so disgust you that you felt you had no choice but to leave me too?”
“No!” she instantly protested. “No. A thousand times no.” Tears stung her eyes. “I did not wish to leave you. I thought you wished me to leave you, and thought only of ridding you of a nuisance.”
“Why would you think that?”
She smiled sadly. “Perhaps the abrupt manner in which you left me sprawled across your desk without speaking so much as a single word? I later learned from Mickey the reason you had was because you saw him watching us through the window.” She sighed. “But that should not have stopped you from returning to me once you had dealt with him.”
“You had retired to your bedchamber by the time I returned to the house. I assumed you had done so because you regretted our intimacy and could not bear the sight of me.” Daniel grimaced. “I did come to your bedchamber later that afternoon, and you were sleeping. I came back again during the evening. When I found you still sleeping, I arranged for a candle to be lit in your room and a drink of lemonade for when you woke up.”
Jo realized it had been Daniel who had seen to her needs that night after all. It did not mean that he cared for her, she instantly chastised herself. Only that he had, as was Daniel’s way, acted out of concern for her. As he would have done with anyone else whom he thought in need of it.
She glanced across at him warily. “I obviously cannot go to my great-aunt’s. You said you do not intend sending me to prison for burning down your stables. So what is your one solution to my dilemma?”
“You will live with me, of course.”
“What?” she gasped.
“You will live with me,” Daniel repeated patiently, realizing he had surprised her with his announcement.
“I am to become your ward?”
“If that is what you wish to be to me, yes.”
The tip of her tongue licked nervously across her lips. “You made that sound as if there is an alternative.”
Daniel stared across the carriage at her, his throat suddenly too dry for him to be able to speak.
He had searched for Jo relentlessly these past four days, his mood alternating in that now-familiar state between anxiety for her welfare and anger at her for having left him in the first place.
He had not, in all that time, allowed himself to dwell on what he would do or say when or if he found her.
His relief had been immense when he saw her again today, so pale and fragilely beautiful, but still with that indomitable spirit shining through as she withstood her cousin’s threats with ones of her own.
“There are two alternatives,” he answered her question. “One of which I will not even consider.”
She still eyed him warily. “Which is?”
“You could become my mistress.”
“And the other?”
“You could marry me.”
Jo’s heart stuttered and then started again, faster than before. A heart filling with joy at the thought of—
Daniel had not said he loved her, or even that he cared for her. Only that he would marry her.
As a way of offering her his protection, not because he was in love with her as she was with him. Jo knew, perhaps better than most, how much Daniel despised the very thought of remarrying. She could not and would not take any more advantage of the many kindnesses he had already shown her.
“Thank you, but no,” she refused graciously, proud of herself for not getting down on her knees and begging Daniel to marry her. Now. This very minute.
A nerve pulsed in his tightly clenched jaw. “Then you will become my ward.”
“If that is acceptable to you?”
If it was acceptable to Daniel? No, it bloody well was not acceptable to him. It would be sheer purgatory to live in the same house as Jo and not lay so much as a finger on her. To be a father figure to her. But if that was all Jo wished from him, then Daniel had no choice but to agree.
He nodded. “I will have my lawyer visit Cheshire tomorrow and deal with the legalities.”
She winced. “Do you think Edgar will be agreeable?”
Daniel’s mouth thinned. “He will not be given a choice. I meant my threat earlier to ruin him socially if he comes near you again. He will either agree to this new arrangement, or I will see that threat carried out.”
Jo did not doubt for a moment that Daniel meant what he said. She only hoped that Edgar knew it too; otherwise, she feared he would receive another unsolicited visit from Daniel.
In the meantime, she was to live with Daniel. Not as his wife, certainly, but to be so close to him on a daily basis, to see him, be with him, and know that he would protect her no matter what, would be sheer heaven for her after the uncertainties of this past month. To be allowed to stay with him at all was more than she could ever have hoped for.
“May I look at your hands?” She prompted once the two of them had arrived at Latham House. “I am sure they must be in need of attention.” The cotton gloves Daniel wore were stained with blood.
“The blood is not mine,” Daniel assured her as he removed the gloves, along with his hat, and handed them to the butler. “Well mostly not mine,” he conceded as he saw his knuckles were also red, grazed, and bleeding in several places. “See that the gloves are disposed of, Bedford.”
“Please let me see…” Jo’s breath caught in her throat after she grasped Daniel’s hand in both of hers and felt that familiar tingle of arousal coursing through her body. She as quickly released his hand and turned to the butler. “Could you please bring hot water and some clean cloths I might use as bandages to the earl’s study? And perhaps a salve of some kind?”
“Certainly, my lady.” That stately gentleman disappeared toward the back of the house, the bloodied gloves held away from his body as he did so.
Daniel was sure he had not imagined the slight trembling of Jo’s hands as she held and inspected the damage to his knuckles.
Because it was a reminder of the violence of earlier?
Or perhaps because she still feared Cheshire and Daniel’s ability to ensure she was never be returned to her cousin’s home.
Or was it for another reason entirely?
Sitting behind his desk while Jo stood beside him allowed Daniel to focus all his attention on her while she concentrated on cleansing his knuckles.
Her cheeks were no longer pale but flushed. Her breasts were quickly rising and falling against the bodice of her gown, her breathing shallow and uneven. All signs of… What? What were Jo’s feelings right now?
“Tell me,” he spoke softly. “Did you refuse my offer of marriage earlier because you do not care for me in that way or because you believed my offer to be insincere?”
Her eyes flashed up to his and then down again. “I do not believe you to have ever been insincere in your life.”
“Then you do not care for me,” he accept
ed heavily.
“I am merely…acquainted with your opinion of marriage.”
Because Daniel had told her that opinion, quite succinctly, as he recalled. “And if that opinion has changed?”
“Then I would be happy for you.” Jo still refused to look at him, those long lashes hiding the expression in her eyes as she now applied bandages to his knuckles. “It is unhealthy to harbor such feelings of bitterness inside you for so many years.”
She would be happy for him? Damn it, Daniel did not want her to be happy for him but with him. “I do believe this desk is larger than the one at Latham Park,” he remarked conversationally.
She eyed him warily rather than the desk. “It is a very fine desk, yes.”
“Sturdy enough to take the weight of both of us.”
“Daniel—”
“Jo,” he spoke just as firmly as she. “Why do you imagine I asked you to marry me earlier?”
“You did not ask. You offered it as the alternative to my becoming your ward or your mistress.” She stepped away now that her ministrations to his hands were over.
“And if I were to ask you again now?”
Jo glared her frustration. “Now, if I am to become your ward, it would be inappropriate—”
“Possibly because I do not want you to be my bloody ward. I want you to be my wife!” Daniel’s voice rose in his agitation, and he rose with it, towering over Jo’s more diminutive height as she looked at him with wide, startled eyes. He sighed. “I apologize for shouting. It is just— Jo, in order to be your guardian, I would need to have familial feelings toward you, and my feelings for you could not be further removed from that.”
She chewed on her bottom lip. That endearing habit guaranteed to cause Daniel’s heart to pound, his cock to rise, and his breath to catch in his throat.
“I am not making myself plain,” he muttered self-disgustedly. “Josephine Mary Elizabeth Kendall.” He moved down on one knee in front of her before taking one of her hands in his. “I have fallen deeply in love with you and would consider it the greatest honor if you would consent to become my wife.”
Tamed by the Earl Page 12