Lizzie Tempest Ruins A Viscount (Felmont Brides Series Book 1)

by Maggie Jagger

Chapter 8

  Dace found his friend in the library at Felmont’s Folly as the clock struck eleven.

  Rax looked up from his study of the fire in the hearth as he entered. “The errant husband returns. Dinner was delightful. Your wife invited Bertram Felmont, the vicar and his wife, and some strange gabbling fellow who is your estate steward. Remind me never to accept another invitation from you.”

  Dace warmed himself in front of the hearth. He had walked back from the Priory deep in thought, not that it helped him decide what to do. “How is dear Lizzie?”

  “Delightful. Gave me a tour of the house. Heavens! Never seen anything like it. Cross between a gothic monastery and a brothel.” Rax gave a few disapproving tuts. “James dogged my steps. I could scarcely enjoy Lady Felmont’s company for him breathing down my neck.”

  Jim Thwaite entered the library to glower at Rax.

  “Speak of the devil.” Rax sank deeper in his chair.

  “Come and join us, Jim.” Dace knew Jim would wait up for him to return. Lizzie’s fear of the bedding seemed to have infected her sainted James. Dace had been tempted to give his foster brother a dose of laudanum to make him calm down after Lizzie’s screams had rent the air the night before. “How fares my bride?”

  “Something is brewing. Been mulling something all day has Lady Felmont. Giddy with it, she is.” Jim eyed Rax and twitched his head meaning he wanted to speak to Dace privately.

  Rax said, “I can only agree, Dace. Your bride has a delightful laugh.”

  “As far as I can recall, dear Lizzie has always stewed over something. Perhaps if I expire at her feet, she’ll laugh for me.” Dace ignored Jim. He wanted no warnings or condemnations for what he must do next. At least some of her fears would soon be over. He put a hand on Rax’s shoulder. “I must ask you to go to London to see how Angel does. Explain why I left in such a hurry and find out if he has picked a day. Try not to tell him any details.”

  A mournful sigh and a nod sufficed for an answer from Rax, until he suddenly addressed the flames in the hearth. “Wants me to go put my head in the lion’s mouth! Not give any details. Just explain why he raced up to Felmont’s Folly to refuse to marry the woman who ruined him, to whom he is now married. Then find out if the date is chosen. Easy tasks he sets for me!”

  Dace saw Jim shoot Rax a baleful glance, wishing him out the room.

  His foster brother started off with a rush of words, “You’re going to have to stay with Lady Felmont during the day, our Dace. I mean, my lord. You can’t go haring off on your own after marrying her. Not yet, anyways. Don’t act stupid, your lordship.” Jim gave a guilty twitch and gestured at Rax. “Now look what you made me say in front of him! Lady Felmont needs courting. You must do it, my lord, or I swear I’ll knacker you.”

  Exasperation at having to my lord him in front of Rax and fear for his idol, dearest Lizzie, showed in Jim’s loss of control.

  Dace appealed to Rax, “You hear how he calls me names and my lords me in the same breath. Can’t give him the drubbing he deserves because my wife needs him to feel safe. I return from saving England and his arse, to find him up to his ears in clover at the Folly with Lizzie hanging on his every word. Did you know she smiles at him?”

  Jim went to poke at the fire.

  Rax tsked and tutted before he answered, “I’ve seen it myself. She gave me a lovely smile, too. Must agree with him on the courting business. Said so myself, if you’d recall.”

  “Hellfire! Tell me the secret to her smiles and her laughter, and I swear she shall do both tonight. Do I whisper sweet nothings in her ear?”

  Rax gave a moan that spoke volumes about Dace’s idiocy where women were concerned. “It doesn’t matter what you say, it’s how you say it. Surely you don’t intend to go to her again, not after what your wife suffered last night? I saw her nightdress.”

  Poor Rax, he must be the only person in the county who didn’t know the truth.

  Jim put the poker down. He lost his worried look and gave a hoot of scornful laughter. “The viscount had a nose bleed, that’s all it was.”

  Dace said apologetically, “Forgot to tell you. Molly spread the tale, the whole house knows. Didn’t you hear the family toast my nose at breakfast? Ma had heard all about it. By now the entire county is laughing at me, but I’d rather be thought a clumsy fool than a brutal rapist.”

  He paced back and forth on the Turkey carpet in front of the empty library shelves. “The worst is what I must do to her now. Hellfire! Why did she stay? You see before you a man about to....” He aped one of Rax’s lugubrious sighs. “I don’t even know how to talk to her.”

  “You need a brandy, Dace,” said Rax, ever the hopeful romantic. “Seduce your lady. There is no need for force, surely? How can you charm my sisters and not know how to talk to your wife?”

  Dace shrugged with one shoulder, not wanting to risk moving the other. “All I can think is that Lizzie is safer with me, even if I am merely the lesser of two evils.”

  “Then don’t go to her,” soothed Rax. “Don’t rush her. In a few days—”

  Dace interrupted, “If you had ever waited for battle to commence, you’d not ask it of me. Waiting is worse than fighting. I joined my regiment just after a battle. There were bodies everywhere. I’ll never forget the smell, nor the sight of the pit full of amputated limbs. Waiting is hell on earth and it won’t help her. Lizzie knows too much. She heard every lurid detail from a madman who confessed every sin in his repertoire. What she fears is much worse than what is going to happen.”

  He went to stand next to Jim, in front of the hearth. “What do you think?”

  Jim shivered, despite the warmth from the fire. “Don’t keep Lady Felmont waiting, our Dace. Get it over with. You’ll gain nothing by putting it off.”

  “There is only one hope, my friends.” Dace had been thinking about it all the way back to the Folly. “Lizzie will have to be shown I am harmless. Just can’t think of how to achieve that, do either of you have any suggestions?”

  Neither of them made a sound.

  Rax spoke up, “The loveliest lady awaits you. Surely you have only to please her, not an impossible task for a man of your amatory skills or were you lying?”

  “Yes, I lied in my youth. Didn’t we all? Perhaps not you, Jim. You enjoyed your share of female company, and had only to lie to Ma about your activities. But I had family dying right and left from syphilis. And, if you’d both recall, I’ve just spent six years with the angelic Anston watching over me, avenging sword in hand. How much practice do you think I’ve had?”

  “Tsk. Go and pleasure your wife,” said Rax. “Lucky man.”

  “There you go thinking inflaming thoughts again, Rax. Really, you must not. If I pleasure Lizzie, she will think me a whoremaster and she the whore.” Dace shook his head. “No. Calmly, with dignity. No pain, or as little as I can manage. The task must not take long. She will see I am not her brutal master. Hellfire! She hates me.” He gave weary sigh. “Gentlemen, I go to do my duty.” Easier said than done, he lingered by the fire reluctant to leave. “Damn! Jim have a brandy with Rax, you have more in common than you think.”

  Dace made for the door. “If Angel Anston could see me now, he’d run me through. Rather face the Angel of Death than my wife.” The door swung closed behind him.