The Marquess' Angel_Hart and Arrow_A Regency Romance Book

by Julia Sinclair

  To Thomas’ shock, she'd rapped hard on the roof of the coach, and when the coachman pulled the team to a stop, she leaned out the window. “Turn east and south, as soon as you can. We need to get to Westbury, near Helmsley. That's where they'll be.”

  “What the hell are you doing, Georgiana?”

  She glared at him. “I am getting you to Tristan and Blythe. I believe that was the entire point of this exercise.”

  “But how do you know where they are? What the hell is Marrowly Grange? I've never heard of it.”

  Georgiana paused, and Thomas could tell that she was still deciding what she was going to tell him. “Marrowly Grange is an old property on the moors. Its disposition has always been on the complicated side. It belongs to a Carrow cousin these days, an old man who lives in Canada of all places. It's a place that Carrows and Martins have quarreled over in the past, which I find wonderfully apt on today of all days.”

  “Georgiana, why do you know all of this?”

  “The important thing is that I do.”

  That was all she would say, and though Thomas had tried several gambits to get her to talk, she evaded, snapped, or simply ignored him. He finally quit because it seemed to distress Honey when they argued.

  Honey's position with Georgiana was at least one thing he could be proud of. The slender girl had bloomed like a flower under Georgiana's direction, and Georgiana was delighted to find in Honey a natural eye for beauty and design. She was Georgiana's sole lady's maid at the moment.

  Georgiana had insisted on bringing her along. “At the very least, it may be a comfort to Blythe to see another familiar face, won't it?”

  Thomas had to agree, but now as the coach lumbered up the long road to the mysterious Marrowly Grange, all thoughts of anything but Blythe flew out of his mind.

  Blythe, I'm coming for you. I will not let Tristan harm you.

  As they turned into the estate's drive, a man on horseback galloped past them. Thomas thought nothing of it until they gained the door, and a knock revealed a butler with a slightly crazed look in his eye.

  “The duke is in the study ready to hear any reports. Vickerly will escort you.”

  A smartly-dressed but no less harried footman appeared to lead them, and bemused, Thomas, Georgiana, and Honey followed him to the study. On the way there, they passed the young man they had seen riding past the cart. He had a sorrowful look on his face and a guinea in his hand, and Thomas wondered all over again what the hell was going on.

  The footman opened the door for them and standing behind his desk, his hands braced on the edge as if he were a man at the end of his rope, was Tristan Carrow.

  “Well?” he asked without looking up.

  “Well, why don't you start with what the hell is going on here and finish with where you put poor Blythe.”

  Thomas supposed he was angling to get some sort of reaction out of Tristan, but he was not expecting what he got. With a roar, the Duke of Parrington leaped over his desk—that was actually quite impressive, said a small voice in the back of Thomas’ head—and charged at him.

  Thomas barely managed to dodge Tristan's charge, leaning back from a blow that looked as if it wanted to take off his head.

  Tristan's growl was nearly bestial. “You! What the hell have you done with her? I know it was you, stinking dog of a Martin!”

  “Keep your tongue inside your head unless you want me to break your teeth.” Thomas had had enough, and right then and there, he was more than pleased to beat Tristan to a pulp until he got his answers. He would have done just that, but Georgiana stepped between them as casually as if she were crossing the parlor at home.

  To Thomas’ surprise, instead of brushing her aside or simply going through her, Tristan came to a complete stop, and for a moment, the rage dropped from the duke's face entirely. “Georgiana, what are you doing here?”

  “I'm here to help my brother get some answers. Now, will you two please, please for the love of Heaven, stop and talk to one another? There is obviously something going on, and no one has all the pieces right now.”

  “I have everything I need to know. Last night, Blythe disappeared from Marrowly Grange. I have sent riders to all the places to the south, but damn it, nothing's come back yet. I have riders going east and west, but that will be slower. She may actually make it to a ship before we can find her.”

  Thomas could see the fear and exhaustion on Tristan's face. It was almost enough to make him pity the man if Tristan hadn't put him and Blythe through hell.

  “She ran away? But there's nothing out there.”

  Tristan shrugged. “It's Blythe. She has the most disconcerting habit of making her own way no matter what I try to do.”

  Thomas could at least agree with that. “I'm willing to forget the feud for a little while until we get her back... Why, Honey, what's the matter?”

  Through all of this, Honey had pressed herself against the far wall, as far away from the men fighting as she could get. Now, though, she was staring at a wool coat that had been tossed carelessly over one of the chairs close by.

  Now, Honey approached the coat and lifted it with shaking hands. She looked at something underneath the collar, and with a sharp cry, she dropped it. She backed away from the coat as if it were some kind of cursed thing, moving so quickly she almost tripped over the rug behind her.

  In a flash, Georgiana was by her side, throwing her arms around the smaller girl. “Why, my love, whatever is the matter?”

  “It's his coat! It's his coat, it's John's coat!”

  Thomas stared. “You must be mistaken.”

  “No! I am not. Look at the collar. There's a little embroidery there on the patch. I did that...”

  Thomas picked up the coat, and sure enough, there were small patches sewn in to help reinforce the shoulder seams. On one of them was a small feather design, now recognizable to Thomas as Honey's work. “John... the man who abused you?”

  Honey nodded jerkily. “He was here; he was really here.”

  Tristan scowled. “That coat belongs to Lord Cottering. If he hurt you, he shall be brought up on charges.”

  Thomas was shaking his head, feeling a deep well of panic open up inside him. “No, no, this is bad. Blythe was the one who took Honey from him. She helped Honey escape from him. What the hell was he doing here?”

  “He came to press his suit for Blythe's hand even after I told him no. He was... You're not saying that Blythe went off with him? She barely knows the man.”

  “I know her well enough to know she'd be furious with you and looking for any way out. I know she doesn't know Lord Cottering is Honey's John. And if Lord Cottering is the vengeful type, she might have walked right into his arms.”

  The sudden panic in Tristan's face made Thomas feel a little better. He nodded grimly.

  “All right then, your grace, it's time for you to decide. Do you love your cousin well enough to work with the Martins to get her back?”

  * * *

  29

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  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-NINE

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  Blythe knew she should be comforted by Lord Cottering's solicitous invitations to rest her head on his rolled-up jacket or to feel free to stretch out on the bench, but for some reason, she could not quite see her way to doing so. Instead, she sat upright on the bench opposite his, smiling politely at his attempts to be kind to her.

  “Truly, my lord, I am quite well, and when I have returned to London, I will be better yet.”

  “Please, Blythe. I feel as if we know each other quite well already, and I would be grateful if you were to call me Gerald.”

  It seemed like such a little thing, but something about the request made Blythe bridle at the thought. “I'm sure I couldn't. It is a great honor to be familiar with a peer, and I am afraid it is not an honor that I have quite earned.”
>
  “But you could. Believe me, I have long craved an avenue to get to know you better, and though I know your fleeing of Marrowly Grange to be tragic, I am so glad to be able to help you.”

  She smiled at him and let him think what he liked of that smile. There was something about Lord Cottering she liked less and less in close quarters. She reminded herself that she only needed to last until London, or barring that, if she were truly uncomfortable, she could depart his company at the first stop they made to rest the horses at the inn.

  The coach moved briskly along the packed dirt road, and it wasn't until they pulled into the village where they were supposed to be resting the team that her feeling of unease bloomed into something resembling panic.

  “I'm afraid we will need to stay here for the night. We can proceed to London in the morning. I shall check us into the inn as brother and sister, and that should quell any wagging tongues about our reputation.”

  He winked at her, and Blythe nodded uneasily. He was entirely right about her reputation, but still, she could not calm herself. She had encountered strange and dangerous situations in London, but she knew that on the moors and the quiet towns scattered throughout them, she was completely out of her element.

  Well, I shall keep my cards close to my chest, and I will simply stay alert. He has not actually done anything wrong yet.

  The girl who waited the tables and tapped the kegs at the inn also seemed to serve as the chambermaid, and she led Blythe up to the room set aside for her. The room was cozy with the fire already banked and a quilt thrown on the bed, but Blythe could not shake a feeling of distress.

  “Is everything all right, Mrs. Worthington?”

  “I... I beg your pardon?”

  “I said, is everything all right? Your husband said you were of a delicate disposition, and that you might be feeling poorly. I can have Cook make you up a hot bowl of broth and some toasted bread. That usually sets me to rights.”

  Blythe's brain was working furiously. Husband and wife, not brother and sister. It could be something Lord Cottering made up for sheer expedience, but the idea of it sat poorly with her. She came to a fast decision. “Perhaps I am not feeling well after all. Would you please escort me to the garde-robe?”

  As it turned out, there was only a drafty outhouse for those matters, but Blythe's sensibilities were robust enough to deal with the shoddy building with only a shudder.

  “Are you all right, Mrs. Worthington?”

  “Oh, just fine. Do you know, I was asleep on the coach all this way, and I really am not sure how far south we have come. How far are we from London?”

  The girl gave her a look, and then to Blythe's surprise, she winked at her. “Oh, and now you are not going to pretend you were heading north all the time? You are two days from London by Royal Mail coach, but what you are truly asking is how far you are from the border. That'll be another four days.”

  “The border... what... oh, my god. Gretna Green.”

  Blythe's blood froze in her veins. They hadn't been going south toward London at all. They were going north to Gretna Green, across the border into Scotland where a marriage could be made instantly legal with none of the niceties of king or church. She didn't need to know what Lord Cottering's plans were to know she wanted no part of them.

  The inn girl looked at her mystified.

  Blythe seized her hands. “The man who is here with me, I do not know him. He has lied about us being husband and wife—”

  “Well, everyone knew that.”

  “He has brought me here against my will. I have no interest in going to Gretna Green with him. I cannot stay in that room with—”

  “Ah, there you are, my beloved.”

  In the dim open area behind the inn, Lord Cottering had quickly appeared behind them. Blythe realized this was the first time she had seen him without his civilizing disguise, and in the flickering light from the inn, there was something monstrous about him.

  “Keep your distance.”

  “That's no way for a wife to talk, present or future. If you keep it up, Blythe, I will be forced to discipline you.”

  Blythe snarled at him. “Don't come any closer. Reputation or not, I shall not spend another moment with you.”

  “Oh, but you will, you little bitch. I had hoped to keep you stupid until we crossed the border, but this is almost better. You sound afraid, and that's what you should be. “

  To Blythe's shock, the inn girl stepped between them. “Here now. Clear out. We won't have with no kidnappings here. This is a good place.”

  Lord Cottering moved so fast that he was almost a blur. He struck the girl on the side of the head, and she dropped like a rock. “Mouthy little whore. Now, Blythe...”

  Blythe knew that she could not stay and help the girl, not if she were Lord Cottering's prisoner, and she refused to allow Cottering to use the helpless girl against her as blackmail. That meant, much as it rankled, that she had to run, and she darted into the deeper night beyond the courtyard. The shadows around the inn and lapping up to the edge of the unknown town were deep and dark, and soon she was into the thick grass of the moor.

  She heard Cottering's feet hit the ground as he ran after her, and she pushed herself hard, tearing into the night and knowing there was no one in the world she could depend on for help.

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  The moon had risen, and Blythe could not decide if that was a mark in her favor or against it. She had escaped Cottering's first lunge for her, making her escape onto the moors, but she had no idea how long she could stay hidden, curled in the tall grass. The moon was coming up, giving the moors an eerie silvery gleam, and if she were doing anything besides being hunted by a madman, she would have been enthralled.

  Instead, every cracking branch was his step, and every rustle in the grass was his approach. Blythe forced her breath slow and steady, and if she could have slowed her heartbeat, she would have. It thundered in her chest, calling him, she was sure, right to her position.

  He had shouted after her at first, calling her names, trying saccharine promises of truce that she didn't believe for a moment, and finally dissolving into furious rants.

  “You were the one who took Honey from me. You had no right to do that, Blythe, you must know that. She was just a whore, and she belonged to me. What kind of life can you give her after what she did?”

  As bait went, it was very nearly effective. She wanted to scream at him that Honey was her own person, free and more than capable of making her way in the world, but that would have been suicide. She held her tongue, and after some small eternity, Cottering fell silent too. Now she couldn't tell if he was close by or far away, if he had given up the hunt for her or if he was walking through the grass so softly she couldn't hear him.

  When she was a girl, Tristan and Ned's father had taken them hunting at the actual Parrington estate and been more than a little disappointed when she showed no aptitude for it. She could still remember his words as he lectured the boys at the dinner table.

  “Every creature on God's earth has its method for survival. The fox knows a thousand tricks to evade those who would hunt it. A rabbit only knows one. If you are going to be a great hunter, you must know which tricks your prey will use for which situation.”

  Blythe had always been a fighter, but now she reminded herself that her best trick was hiding. If she could stay still until she was certain that Cottering had given up, she could circle back to the village, try to find some help, and make her way to London. All she had to do was stay hidden.

  A loud scream rent the air. It sent chills up her spine, and her mind flashed back to a terrible night in Seven Dials, where a drunk woman had cut herself on a long piece of glass. The scream came again, piercing and with a feminine sound to it.

  The bastard. Somehow, he's brought that poor maid out here. He's torturing her!

  She scrabbled briefly in the dirt in front of her, but when the scream came again, Blythe could not stand to be still. She sprang up, ready to th
row herself at Cottering. Less than a dozen yards away, the man himself, alone and standing like a stone ogre in the bright moonlight, grinned at her.

  “A fox, bitch. They scream like women, don't they?”

  He rushed her, and Blythe's breath caught in her chest.

  * * *

  30

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  CHAPTER

  THIRTY

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  Thomas’ horse, a fine bay gelding from Tristan's own stable, tossed his head as Thomas drew him up. He reached down to stroke the horse's lathered neck, letting the horse fall back into a brisk trot.

  Tristan drew his horse up to Thomas’, frowning at him. “We will run the horses into the ground if we are not careful.”

  Thomas instinctively growled at Tristan. “If you are concerned about cost—”

  “I am concerned about running the only horses as fast as these two in the entire county down to their knees and then not being able to continue.”

  Thomas shook his head, chagrined as his own snappishness. “I'm sorry. But we cannot slow down. Every moment, they are pulling farther away.”

  Once they had realized Blythe was with Cottering, it had been distressingly easy to discern his motive.

  “He won't take her to London, where she has friends, and he won't take her to sea either, because what could he want on foreign shores?” Georgiana's voice was grave and level, like a doctor delivering a fatal diagnosis. “He is going north, to the border. To Gretna Green.”

  Tristan and Thomas had looked at her appalled.

  Honey had nodded, her face set into grim lines. “He wants control. That's what he always wants. He pulls you away from anyone who could help you, and then he forces you along his way. He could control me because I was all alone in London with no friends. But someone like Blythe, I suppose that will take a marriage.”