She looked appropriate, damn it. The last thing she wanted for a visit with bloody Lord Kildaire.
“Where is Mr. Howard?”
“I’ve already spoken with the dear man. He will keep himself scarce, as proper. He is only an employee, after all, not family or a special guest.”
Her heart plummeted to her toes. The thought of George being nearby had been the only thing keeping her spirits up as she prepared for this most unwanted occasion. And he’d been banished? The loathing she felt toward her mother doubled. “I see.”
“Good. Now march!”
Far too soon they stood on the entrance steps of the manor house, watching a gleaming carriage pulled by two matched black stallions glide down the curved gravel drive.
“Well,” said Bertram Donovan as he came to join them, looking uncomfortable in a tightly knotted cravat. “Fine set of horseflesh there. Says a lot about a man, his horses.”
Louisa shot him a filthy look. “If he needs your money so badly, they are probably borrowed. Or he has a very large unpaid bill at Tattersall’s.”
“Now, now, my dear. Most of the ton have very large unpaid bills somewhere. It’s the way of society and perfectly acceptable.”
“Except to those starving and unable to pay their own bills.”
“Louisa!” hissed her mother, as the carriage came to a smooth halt in front of them. “Not another word, or you’ll be sorry.”
Her fingers twisting together, Louisa took a deep breath to quell her panic and tried to imagine George was here. He would rest a big, warm hand on her back. Or tell a terrible joke, just to ease the tension. Fighting, parrying some verbal sword thrusts, or simply resting her forehead on his chest were all things she could manage right now. Stoically awaiting her fate like a condemned man at Tyburn, she could not.
Lord Kildaire stepped out of the carriage and strolled toward the steps before halting and inclining his head. His ink-black hair was immaculately brushed, and he wore black trousers, black waistcoat and jacket. A snowy white cravat was the only relief in the outfit, and she barely repressed a shiver at the way he looked even more menacing than usual.
“My lord,” said her father genially. “You are most welcome to our home.”
“The pleasure is mine, Mr. Donovan,” said Kildaire with a cold smile. “Mrs. Donovan. And Miss Donovan…upon my word, how fetching you look in that gown. Almost like a lady born.”
“You have no need to worry, Lord Kildaire,” said her mother eagerly. “We hired a comportment tutor from London who has worked wonders with Louisa’s dancing and wardrobe. Even her conversation. I don’t know what we would have done without him.”
“Him?” said the marquess, his gaze narrowing.
“Oh yes,” said Louisa. “Mr. Howard is a most dashing fellow. So witty and warm and hand—”
“Hush, daughter,” snapped her mother, discreetly pinching her arm. “His lordship doesn’t want to hear about a servant.”
“On the contrary, madam,” drawled Kildaire. “He sounds rather interesting. Perhaps Miss Donovan might accompany me on a stroll around the grounds and tell me all about him. After being cooped up in a carriage, I am in need of some air.”
“Of course, of course,” said her mother. “Off you go, Louisa.”
“Where is Belinda?” said Louisa desperately. “Surely I’ll need a chaperone.”
Her father smiled indulgently. “I think we can all agree that a chaperone is unnecessary for a simple stroll. Lord Kildaire will behave with all propriety, I’m sure.”
“Quite,” said the marquess, smiling like a shark as he held out his arm. “Miss Donovan?”
Swallowing hard against a wave of nausea, Louisa took it reluctantly, and they made their way to the gardens being landscaped to the right of the manor house. Thankfully they were still in construction so weren’t too sprawling, and in full view of the parlor windows. “Did you have a pleasant journey here, my lord?”
Kildaire ignored the question, and his free hand came to rest on her arm in what from afar would have looked like a tender pat. In reality, his fingers were bruising her flesh with the brutal grip, and she stifled a whimper. “Has he fucked you?”
“Excuse me?”
“Do not play the wide-eyed ingénue with me, Miss Donovan. You understand the question, now answer it. Have you allowed this Mr. Howard into your bed? Has he stolen something that belonged to me?”
A lie sat on the tip of her tongue. She desperately wanted to scream yes, George had had her over and over and over, six times a day since he’d arrived, in fact she was certain she carried his child, so marriage to another man was quite out of the question.
But she couldn’t do it. “No.”
His grip tightened until she thought he might break her arm. “Do not lie to me, you little bitch. If I find out that this lowborn scum tutor has rutted between your thighs, I will destroy him.”
Louisa cried out in pain. “He hasn’t!”
“And I won’t only destroy him,” Kildaire spat. “But also his family. And his friends. I’ll see them all on the street with nothing and they can starve there like the gutter rats they all are.”
“You could try,” said a soft, achingly familiar voice behind them.
The marquess turned on his heel, dragging her with him. “Ah, the estimable Mr. Howard…well, I never! Mr. Howard is none other than George Edwards. And several mysteries are now solved.”
George smiled, but it was like no smile she’d ever seen on his face before, ice-cold, and frightening. “What mysteries might those be, my lord?”
“Never you mind. But I wish Percival had told me the full story, because this is all too delicious. And I know precisely why you have been forced to take on employment. Ha! Sheer perfection. Now, servant, run along. Miss Donovan and I are enjoying some private time. And private time is for two. Well, for now, at least.”
“I’ll leave when I wish to,” said George. “But at the moment, you are handling Miss Donovan in an objectionable manner. Not at all the behavior of a gentleman, is it.”
“Gentlemanly behavior is vastly overrated,” said Lord Kildaire, his grip remaining firm on her arm. “And Miss Donovan is not your concern. She is soon to be my wife. Although I believe I have you to thank for her improved wardrobe. Now she looks like someone who could almost pass for a lady rather than an ugly poor relation. I must say, a rich wife will be so very pleasant. Then I’ll have all I desire.”
“Not likely,” spat Louisa. “You are quite deluded to think I will ever marry you…ow…”
Pain flared up her arm, and she winced. George’s fists clenched and he stepped forward, but she stayed him with a tiny shake of her head.
“Oh dear, I do apologize,” said Lord Kildaire, a smirk on his face. “I forgot you might still be bruised and tender from the other day.”
Shocked to the core, she stared at him. “Excuse me?”
“Well, it can’t have been a pleasant landing, with all that wet grass and mud and animal excrement.”
Louisa gasped, and forced herself to meet the marquess’s mocking black gaze. “How do you know about that?”
“Oh, my dear. And here they said you possessed some sort of brain. How do you think?”
Chapter Ten
Any minute now, he was going to personally know what it felt like to commit murder.
Flexing his shoulders, George adjusted his stance. No matter what Kildaire said, no matter how evil or inflammatory, he just had to keep a cool head until Louisa was safely out of the way. Then he could pound the smaller man into the cold, churned-up ground.
He’d never thought it would be possible to hate anyone as much as Sir Malcolm, but Kildaire was rapidly ascending the list. Standish and Louisa were both correct in their assessment of this sack of shit.
“You were there?” said George, wanting to hear him admit it. “On that road?”
Kildaire smirked. “So many roads, dear boy. But there is nothing like a brisk ride, is there? I do enjoy
an afternoon gallop in the country.”
“Were. You. There.”
“Of course I wasn’t there. Anyone who witnesses a shocking curricle accident would go for help, obviously. You were helped?”
“Of course,” snapped Louisa, glaring at the marquess. The flush on her cheeks spoke of a rage only just held in check, although his gaoler hold on her probably helped.
“Thank heavens,” said Kildaire. “One would hate to think that a man dragged by unruly horses or a woman tipped over a fence were left to fend for themselves. I just wonder how the horses got into such a state. You must be a poor driver, Edwards, to put such a lovely lady at risk.”
“You,” snarled George. “You put the lady at risk.”
“Me? Put at risk the woman I’m going to wed? What a ridiculous notion. I wouldn’t harm a hair on her pretty head,” said the marquess, smiling widely as he cupped Louisa’s cheek, then slid his hand down to stroke the skin just above her bodice. “’Tis a pity there is nothing here right now, but that will change with pregnancy. We’ll be sure to invite you to the christening, Edwards. Every christening, for that matter. You can be sure I will keep her belly full.”
A feral growl escaped before he could swallow it down. “You aren’t even betrothed yet.”
Kildaire laughed. “A mere technicality, dear boy. And that expression on your face is pure delight. One might think you hated me. Hated me because I am going to fuck this fiery little cailin in all the ways you can think of, and many more you can’t. And there’s not a thing you can do about it, you wretched son of a whore…arrrgh! You little bitch…”
George nearly cheered as Louisa’s “clumsy” slipper-clad foot delicately rose from where it had embedded itself in Kildaire’s instep, but as the marquess dropped her arm and jerked away from her, it gave George the perfect opportunity to step forward and land his first blow—a powerful jab to the solar plexus. His opponent dropped to his knees with a pained gasp, one hand bracing on the ground as he looked up to shoot George a look of pure, burning hatred.
“Your mother’s common blood runs strong in your veins. But you will be very, very sorry for that.”
“Do not,” said George softly, “ever speak of my mother.”
“Ugh. I don’t know what the hell someone like your father was thinking, marrying her.”
George stilled, staring incredulously at the dark-haired man on his knees. “Exactly what do you mean by someone like my father?”
“Even for a third son, she was far too lowborn. A tailor’s daughter! Those are the women you fuck, you don’t ever marry them!”
A third son?
His vision blurred as the three words pummeled his brain, the most crucial and significant piece of information he’d ever received about his father. From an arrogant, son of a bitch stickler like Kildaire, it could only mean third son of an aristocratic family. The marquess would never concern himself with the lineage of anyone else. So it was true. What his mother had seemingly derided had actually been the truth.
He and Caro were the children of a somebody.
And for all the trouble they had gone to, to hide his past from him, an important family. A very important family. But who were they? Who the fuck were these people?
George leaned down and gripped Kildaire’s cravat. “Who?”
“Take your damned filthy hands off me,” snapped the marquess.
“I asked you a question. Who are they?”
“Tell him,” added Louisa fiercely, from her spot several feet away. “Immediately!”
Kildaire frowned, then his eyes widened as understanding dawned and he burst out laughing. “You don’t know. You honestly don’t know. Oh, that is exceptional, me knowing more about your family than you do.”
Fury exploded through George, and he lifted up the other man by his cravat, high enough so the fabric became a noose and he began to cough. “You have mere seconds to start talking, my lord. And then your face will suffer.”
“Try it. I dare you,” Kildaire replied, his dark eyes glittering like polished jet, and equally as cold.
George shrugged. Then he drew back his fist and smashed it into the man’s nose. Bright red blood spurted out, smearing across his cheek and dripping down onto his chin. “How about now? Is your damned memory improving?”
The marquess’s grin was an unholy bloody grimace. “No.”
“Fine,” said George, and hit him again, an uppercut that his old boxing tutor would have been proud of.
But in his rage he missed his opponent’s fists moving, and without warning, pain exploded in his thigh. Sent off balance by the blow, George stumbled backward, and the marquess managed to free himself and charge forward, landing two solid punches, one into George’s stomach, and another in the vicinity of his left eye socket.
“No!” shrieked Louisa, darting forward, but he swiftly waved her back.
“Not so pleasant on the other end of the fist, is it, Edwards? Ha! Edwards. Edwards. Edwards. The man without his own surname, because his family hated him that much—”
Pain had never felt so gratifying, and he reveled in the rawness of his knuckles when they connected with Kildaire’s jaw. The man’s head snapped back, more blood spraying from his mouth.
“Tell me,” George snarled, moving to wrap his hand around the marquess’s neck. “Right fucking now.”
The marquess shook his head. “You are a damned fool who has no idea who he is dealing with. Nobody trifles with this family. No one. And that includes me. They hold your secrets in trust, silent as the grave unless you cross them. If they have you in their sights, here is some free advice: leave England.”
“Fuck you.”
Kildaire began to laugh, almost the chortle of the mad, as blood oozed from his nose and mouth, and George’s heart plummeted. No matter what else he did, the man wasn’t going to say a word.
“Mr. HOWARD. What are you DOING?”
George froze, his already cooling bloodlust turning to ice at the horrified masculine voice behind him. Oh hell. His employer.
“Nothing Papa, just a little friendly fisticuffs,” said Louisa, moving as though she were trying to shield him from her father, which was about nigh-on impossible. “Lord Kildaire said some awful things, and—”
“Silence, Louisa,” said Bertram Donovan, as he walked around the battle site until he could meet George’s gaze head on. Christ. The normally amiable man’s expression was a mask of florid-cheeked, quivering chin anger. “I cannot believe what I have just witnessed.”
“He attacked me,” spat Kildaire. “Your damned comportment tutor attacked me—”
“You deserved it,” said George, rubbing his sore knuckles. “Any man who threatens a woman with sexual violence, who puts her life at risk, deserves everything he gets.”
Kildaire clutched at his chest. “Such lies! I will not stand for this. Attacked and slandered. Mr. Donovan, you retain excessively poor employees, he should be dismissed at once without a penny. As for your daughter, the wedding must happen with all haste. She needs to be properly guided and corrected at once.”
“Papa!” shouted Louisa, tugging on her father’s sleeve. “You cannot do that to Mr. Howard. You must…you have…you have a contract! It would be bad business. Very bad business.”
Donovan actually hesitated for a moment, as though weighing her words. But then he looked up again at George. “I have no choice, Mr. Howard. You are dismissed from your post. Because of your previous good service, and your connections, I will not throw you out into a winter night. Instead, first thing tomorrow morning a footman will escort you to Cheltenham and purchase you a return ticket to London. Now get out of my sight. Louisa, come with me this minute.”
Bowing his head as Donovan helped the marquess to his feet and led him back to the manor, Louisa trailing behind them, George stared helplessly at the ground. As if to reinforce the idiotic thing he’d just done, a chill wind whipped up, numbing him to the bone.
Now he had no job. No money apa
rt from the bank draft, which wouldn’t even begin to cover the gambling debt. Fucking Kildaire would marry Louisa, and he still didn’t know who his family really was.
Ten minutes of madness. And he’d lost everything.
~ * ~
Louisa paced her bedchamber, her nightgown swirling around her legs like a mini storm cloud. There was no chance of sleep tonight. Not after everything that had happened.
Once Kildaire had been escorted to the best guest chamber with as much care and concern as if he’d been injured fighting Napoleon himself, Louisa had sprinted after her father to beg him to reconsider dismissing George. But Bertram Donovan was adamant. Mr. Howard had undone all his sterling work with such disgraceful conduct toward his lordship, a man of courtesy and breeding. And indeed, the marquess’s suggestion of a swift wedding was an excellent one.
Her father’s words had made her want to cast up her accounts, but she’d bitten her tongue, as he’d convinced bloody Kildaire not to call for a constable or magistrate and press charges. Yet tomorrow, mere hours away, George would return to London. And she had a hideous feeling she might never see him again as an unmarried woman.
“No,” she said aloud. “It cannot end like this.”
Taking a deep breath, she squared her shoulders and walked to her bedchamber door. Opening it slowly and carefully to avoid any creaks, she stepped out into the hallway.
“Louisa,” said an achingly familiar voice to her left, and she barely stifled a gasp at the sight of George slumped outside her door.
“What…what are you doing here?” she whispered, crouching down, her heart thumping so hard with joy and anticipation and fear it might surely burst out of her chest. Moonlight shining through a large window revealed him looking weary and pale, apart from a darkening bruise under one eye.
“I…do not sleep very much. Not that I would sleep anyway, knowing Kildaire is under the same roof. Even with a beaten face, I wouldn’t put it past him to try and force you for an immediate wedding. And if he tried it, I was going to finish what I started. Nothing left to lose now.”
Rake to Riches (The London Lords Book 2) Page 14