by Gaelen Foley
They laughed, but Jacinda stared, frozen, her heart in her throat. God’s teeth, what is he doing here?
CHAPTER SIX
Jacinda couldn’t take her eyes off him. Bracing one hand on the railing, Billy Blade vaulted lightly over it and into the mad traffic of the lane, his rookery-honed reflexes barely fast enough to save his neck as he crossed Rotten Row on foot, amid the dust cloud of zooming chariots and thundering hoofs. Several people cursed at him, but he ignored them, advancing with an alarming air of determination.
“Ten quid says he gets crushed before he gets to the other side,” Acer said.
“Done,” George answered.
Jacinda watched in mingled astonishment and dread until Blade had safely reached the other side of the lane. He ducked under the railing and walked out onto the peaceful green, brushing the dust off his jacket.
“Well, hell, there goes our wager.”
“Pay up, Loring. By Jove, I daresay the ruffian is coming straight for us.”
“I—I’m sure you’re wrong,” she interjected, suddenly realizing that disaster was coming if she didn’t retreat at once.
“Don’t be alarmed, my lady. We will protect you,” Acer said drolly.
Wide-eyed, Jacinda looked from the leading dandy to the leader of the gang. It was not her protection but Blade’s that concerned her. Her hot-tempered, aristocratic male friends would all but spit on him if he dared approach her, and the violent row that was bound to result would end not only in bloodshed, she realized, but would also summon one of the policemen who patrolled the park. Blade was outnumbered and outclassed. He could not possibly win. She had to think of something or he would end up arrested, and with his long list of crimes, hanged. Her heart pounding, she racked her brain for some way either to head him off or distract her suitors.
“What the deuce does he want?”
“No doubt he’ll either beg for a shilling or murder us.”
“What an interesting ensemble,” Acer observed, his haughty gaze raking over Blade’s dusty black jacket; tough, tan-colored drill trousers; and scuffed boots. In place of a cravat, he wore the faded blue neckerchief, loosely knotted. “I wonder if he’ll tell us who his tailor is. Captain Blue Beard, perhaps?”
“Oh, be quiet, Acer,” Jacinda retorted sharply. “He is obviously poor. Let’s go. I’m bored.”
“Where do you want to go?”
“I hardly care! This day is monstrous dull.”
The dandies agreed but loitered, and still Blade advanced, as though he thoroughly believed himself the equal of any of the highborn young men surrounding her. He was almost upon them, his fearless stare fixed on her. In seconds, he might call out her name, and that would mean catastrophe for them both.
What was the blackguard thinking? Surely he ought to know better! He was a fool to try to talk to her here. Then she saw something sparkly wrapped around his hand and realized it was her diamond necklace. So, he had discovered her gift, she thought, realizing that nothing was going to deter him. She looked at him, at a loss. He left her no choice. She stared through him coolly, as though she did not know him—indeed, as if he did not exist—then looked away, dealing him a rapierlike snub.
The cut direct stopped him in his tracks.
Her chest constricted at the hurt surprise she saw in his face, but she refused to feel guilt. It was the least he deserved for the way he had trampled her will last night; but from the corner of her eye, she saw the astonishing speed with which his expression of wounded bewilderment turned into cold disgust.
A little piece of her heart died in that moment. She could not bear to look at him. Though he came no closer, she saw it was already too late. Acer was staring at him through narrowed eyes, as though Blade were the first fox of the hunting season.
“That scoundrel is armed,” he murmured slowly. “And I don’t like the way he is looking at you.”
“Come, Acer. I’m bored,” she repeated nervously, but Acer ignored her.
Without warning, he clucked to his horse, starting toward Blade.
“Acer!” she said furiously.
“What is it?” He turned to her in the saddle.
“You are supposed to be paying attention to me! Am I not your best asset for making Daphne jealous?”
He scowled.
Her forced, merry laugh rang somewhat hollowly. “Race you to the Long Water!” Switching her gelding’s flank lightly with her riding crop, she set off at a blazing gallop.
Blade stared after her with a firestorm of humiliated fury erupting from his heart, searing its way through every vein and artery. His pulse pounded out a primal drumbeat as he watched her riding her fine white horse off across the park with expert grace, a ruthlessly beautiful huntress in dove-gray skirts, the bright pink scarf tied around her hat blowing in the wind. The dandyish fops with whom she was holding court followed her with high-spirited cheer. All but one.
His gaze locked with that of the arrogant man in the bottle-green coat.
Blade wanted to kill him.
After having been obsessed with the girl for the past sixteen hours, he had been taken aback to find her surrounded by suitors, but had managed to keep his temper in check. He had seen her warning look clearly signaling him back, but still he had approached. He had not known if she had been trying to discourage him because she was ashamed of him or if she had been merely trying to protect him from what she feared would be a thrashing at the hands of her pretty gentlemen. As either possibility was intolerable to his pride, he had ignored her warning. After all, he had real business with her, in the matter of returning her diamonds. But now she had made her feelings crystal clear so that even a clod like him could understand.
Oh, he had gotten the message, all right. The lady was done with him. Her icy slight had brought him back rudely to his senses, a cutting reminder of the impossibility of any further association between them. God, what a fool he was. She had been nothing but a rich girl looking for a thrill. He felt used. And to think, he had held himself back like a tender lovelorn swain when he ought to have taken his pleasure of her—and her brothers be damned. He wasn’t afraid of them.
He wanted to hit something very, very hard.
Perhaps the pampered, polished dandy somehow sensed the murderous anger behind his stare, for he reeled his chestnut horse around after taking only a few steps forward. Sending Blade one last scornful glance over his shoulder, the dandy rode off after Jacinda. Blade was left wondering if he had created a monster in the girl. Now that he had taught her how pleasurable such dalliance could be, would she sample those other men, too? Well, she had warned him that her mother the duchess had been a thoroughgoing hussy. A man would have to be mad to love such a woman.
“You, there!”
Blade looked over with a dark, dangerous glance and saw a policeman watching him from some distance away.
“Move along!”
Belatedly remembering self-preservation and the numerous bounties on his head, he pivoted and walked away with a black scowl on his face.
Within a few minutes, he had hailed a dilapidated hackney and was speeding back to St. Giles. Yet another place where he did not belong, he thought bitterly. He rested his elbow on the window ledge, bringing his knuckles up against the grim line of his mouth. He closed his eyes briefly in roiling anger and persistent shame of himself, of the low, crude ruffian he had become. Had chosen to become.
Forget her.
It would be easy. To hell with her and her sweet, wanton body, her fine friends and her brilliant marriage. He didn’t need her. He didn’t need anyone.
If things were different, he could’ve had her. He could’ve made her crawl for him, but he had chosen his path fifteen years ago. There was no going back. He refused to—not for her, not for anyone.
His old man did not deserve to get off the hook that easily. With his elder brother Percy dead now and no other heirs to be found, the extinction of his line was, Blade thought, a most fitting punishment for Truro th
e Terrible.
Aye, like the poet said, better to reign in hell than serve in heaven. He was Blade of the Fire Hawks now. In for a penny, in for a pound. As the shabby, creaking coach plodded back into the shadowed, winding streets of the rookery, he thought of the humble folk who had become his new family. They depended on him and counted on his protection in this rough place.
He looked out the window at the ragged children playing in the gutter as the hackney rolled by, and with a silent vow, rededicated himself with twice his former effort to his life of crime.
Having barely staved off disaster in the park, Jacinda rode through the tall, black, wrought-iron gates of Knight House, still shaken by the hurt, angry look in Blade’s eyes when she had cut him. But he gave me no choice! She dismounted lightly on legs that shook beneath her and left her horse with the groom.
Striding up to the white porticoed entrance of Knight House, she braced herself to hear her sentence from Robert, but now the more pressing matter in her heart was to confide in Lizzie about Blade. With uncanny timing, the butler, Mr. Walsh, opened the door for her as she swept into the house.
“Good day, Mr. Walsh. Is Lord Griffith still here?” she whispered.
“No, my lady,” he answered discreetly.
“Thank goodness. Where is Miss Carlisle, please?”
“In the drawing room.”
“Thank you.” She looped the long train of her riding skirts over her forearm and hurried up the curved marble staircase, drawing off her gloves.
Dear, wise, motherly Lizzie was a tower of strength and always had an ear to listen, a shoulder to cry on. Lizzie would know what was to be done.
Having been raised together from the nursery, she was Jacinda’s most trusted friend and had long been like a second sister to the family. Lizzie’s father had served as Robert’s trusted estate manager at Hawkscliffe Hall, just as his father had, and his father before him. Mr. Carlisle had died, however, when Lizzie was only four years old, whereupon the small orphan had become the ward of the duke. It was decided that she should become the companion to the then three-year-old Lady Jacinda, and especially welcome playmate for the lonely little aristocratic girl, also an orphan, who had only her caretakers and, of course, her much older brothers to amuse her. As Jacinda neared the top of the staircase, she heard a commotion from upstairs.
At first she thought that the argument over her “stunt” of the previous evening was still going on. Amazed and angered at the thought, she ran the rest of the way up the curving marble staircase, only to find, to her relief, that her misadventure was not the cause of the ruckus.
It was Alec.
Lord Alec Knight, the youngest of the formidable five, was a golden-haired Adonis and a rake who could charm his way out of anything, especially when it came to the fair sex. Women adored Alec. They couldn’t seem to help themselves. She had seen little girls of five ask him to marry them when they grew up and titled dowagers of advanced age discreetly pinch his bottom when he walked past the whist table.
Everyone, especially Lizzie, was fussing around him in distress as he sat, princelike, in the middle of the room with his stockinged foot propped up on a footstool. One of the better local surgeons was poking cautiously at the limb.
“Ow! Damn your eyes, you impudent fellow,” Alec said haughtily. “I told you, the dammed thing hurts!”
“Alec, darling! What’s happened? Are you all right?” With a worried frown, Jacinda rushed to his side. She was relieved to note that marital harmony had been restored among the two pairs of spouses; little Morley sat smiling in his nurse’s arms; and Miss Hood was knitting in a chair by the wall, looking sour as ever, but mollified.
“Hullo, Jas.” Alec gave her a sheepish smile, then winced with pain and scowled at the surgeon. “My good man, I am warning you….”
The surgeon looked up at Robert, who was standing nearby, his arms folded wearily over his chest. “Your Grace, the ankle is broken.”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you,” Alec retorted.
“Fix it,” Robert ordered.
“Yes, Your Grace.”
“Oh, Alec, you chuckle-head! What have you done to yourself?” Jacinda leaned down and gave him a doting kiss on his cheek. “What mischief have you been up to?”
“Nothing as bad as yours, I warrant,” he muttered, sliding her a knowing look askance. “Another stupid wager, I’m afraid.” He shifted uncomfortably in his armchair.
“You’ll have to tell me all about it—”
“I think not,” Robert interrupted. “Don’t go giving her any ideas. Mr. Walsh, see to it that Lord Alec has everything that he needs from his rooms at the Albany, please.”
“Very good, Your Grace,” the butler said with a bow.
“Capital idea!” Alec chased off his grimace of pain, brightening at the suggestion of a recuperation at home where the loyal family servants and his womenfolk could look after him. No doubt their care would be much more solicitous than that of the busy staff at the fashionable hotel in nearby Curzon Street where he had his bachelor lodgings.
Lizzie was hovering nearby looking distraught over his injury when Alec captured her hand, pressed a kiss to it in his carelessly flirtatious way, then held it to his heart. “Bits, be an angel and fetch me some wine?”
“Of course, dearest,” Lizzie murmured, smiling fondly at him when he called her by his favorite pet name for her.
“Oh, Alec, ask one of the servants to do it,” Jacinda protested.
“It tastes better when Bitsy gets it,” he said, flashing Lizzie one of his dazzling grins.
“It’s all right—I don’t mind—it’ll only take a moment.” Blushing profusely, Lizzie extricated her hand from Alec’s light but possessive hold and hurried off to do his bidding.
Jacinda folded her arms across her chest, suddenly disliking the idea of Alec and Lizzie under the same roof together, but she said nothing. Lizzie had been in love with the scoundrel since she was nine years old, though she claimed to have long since outgrown her infatuation. Jacinda hoped so, for as much as she loved her rakish brother, everyone knew that Alec collected ladies’ hearts the way Lord Petersham collected snuffboxes. As much as she would have loved for Lizzie to become her true sister through marriage, she knew that Alec would only smash Lizzie’s gentle heart into smithereens.
“Jacinda, I would speak with you privately,” Robert ordered.
“Of course,” she murmured, then followed him out into the hallway.
He closed the door and turned to her. “Bel has persuaded Miss Hood not to resign—though I am tempted to dismiss her for failing to detect and prevent your foolish attempt to leave us. In the meanwhile, I have settled matters with Lord Griffith. The wedding’s off.”
“Is he angry at me?”
“No.”
“Are you, Robert?”
He just sighed and shook his head at her.
“I’m sorry. I truly am.”
“I know.” He gathered her into a fatherly embrace. “It’s just that you worry me so, little one. The way you enslave your admirers…How can I help but fear disaster? It’s like the time I came out into the hallway and saw Morley teetering atop the staircase. I never moved so fast in my life—”
“I am not a two-year-old.”
“Forgive me if a part of me wishes you still were. It was a good deal easier keeping track of you then. In any case, to answer your question, no, I’m not angry at you, but I am terribly concerned.” He grasped her shoulders gently and held her at arm’s length, staring soberly into her eyes. “I am sending you down to the country—”
“Robert, but the Season’s just started!”
“Ah, ah, you’ve brought it on yourself,” he chided. “You will spend the rest of April at Hawkscliffe Hall, where you will use the peace and quiet of the country to contemplate the error of your ways.”
She groaned.
“You may return to Town for the Devonshire ball on the night of Princess Charlotte’s weddi
ng. I know how much you have been looking forward to that.”
“May I bring Lizzie with me, at least?” she asked in despondency as he shepherded her back into the drawing room.
“Yes, if she wishes to go.”
But when Jacinda asked her friend a few minutes later to accompany her to the country, Alec interrupted before Lizzie could reply. “Oh, no, you don’t. I need Lizzie here to take care of me.”
Jacinda scoffed at him, taking her friend by the arm. “Alec, I am sure Lizzie has got better things to do than play nursemaid to you.”
“No, she hasn’t,” Alec said jauntily. “Do you, Bits?”
Lizzie turned to her in dismay, as though the suggestion of coddling Alec for the next few weeks sounded perfectly acceptable to her.
“Lizzie!” Jacinda cried, seeing her friend’s hesitation. “I shall perish of boredom up there by myself!”
“Nonsense. You’ll have Miss Hood,” Alec said slyly. “It is a punishment, after all, Jas, not a holiday. Besides, don’t you think you’re being a wee bit selfish? Why must Bits miss out on the Season when it was your own stupid stunt?”
“Lizzie doesn’t care about the Season and as for my ‘stupid stunt,’ at least I didn’t break my ankle on some addlepated wager. You just want her here to fetch and carry for you, as if she were a spaniel—”
“You little diva! You only want her to follow you around like your own personal audience—”
“Please, stop it, both of you!” Lizzie exclaimed, looking from one to the other. “I do not wish to go to the country right now. I really should stay here to help Alec—”
“You’re choosing him over me?” Jacinda demanded.
“Don’t you remember how dreadful my hay fever is in spring? The last thing I want is to go traipsing through the fields after you and your hunting dogs, sneezing my head off.”
“You tell her, lass!” Alec said, gloating in his chair behind her.
“Besides,” Lizzie added, a rare tinge of anger pinking her cheeks. “He is right. It is your punishment. I don’t see why I should go just to make it pleasant for you. After all, you didn’t trouble yourself about leaving me behind when you set out for France. Besides, Lord Alec needs me.” She laid her hand on his shoulder. “Her Grace and the servants cannot look after him all by themselves.”