Bella shuddered, not wanting to think about that, and about how Cora had begged for justice. But what had he said? “Mr. Hunter was your commanding officer?”
Lord Humphries blinked. “He outranked us, and someone had to keep order in the midst of the chaos. Even someone who was completely crazed.” He literally shook off his pensiveness. “But let us not speak of such unpleasantness. I’d much rather think of you, m’dear. Of us.”
“M-Mr. Hunter was crazed?”
“Why, yes. Looking back on it, I suppose we all were. It was not easy to hold a gut-shot friend as he died, or to look down your rifle sight, stare the enemy in the face and pull the trigger. But it got easier as the days drifted on. One eventually loses one’s humanity. Once the lust for blood takes over…Hunter, I suppose, was the worst because he also carried the burden for the rest of us. A pity, really, because now he is capable of…anything.”
Andrew was capable of anything? Anything? She shivered, wondering if she could have misjudged him.
Lord Humphries noted her shiver and took her hand. “Ah, and here I was hoping to steal a kiss, and instead I have upset you. I am sorry, my dear. I warned you we should not speak of war, did I not? Now drink your punch and I shall fetch you another.”
“Yes, but I did not realize—that is, I have not seen that side of Mr. Hunter. He seems so gentle, despite his gruffness.”
He laughed. “Aye, ’tis why we call him Lord Libertine. One moment all moroseness and remorse, the next all mischief and mayhem. One can never predict what he will do next.”
She had seen that side of him, and the thought that he might, under certain circumstances, be capable of mayhem troubled her. His anger was never very far from the surface, and she had provoked it in a way she doubted his friends had, and yet he had never done her harm. Well, not physical harm. And nothing she hadn’t participated in.
“And I see we have chatted just long enough for your would-be swain to arrive. I want that kiss, Bella. Will you meet me here tomorrow night?”
She glanced toward the foyer, where Andrew had emerged and spotted them. Almost desperate, knowing he would stop her, she leaned toward her companion. “Kiss me now, Lord Humphries.”
“And irritate him? I think not. ’Tis one thing to kiss you, and quite another to do it in front of Hunter. I do not relish that prodigious temper of his. I already had a taste of that this afternoon. Say you will meet me here at nine o’clock tomorrow. Oh, and it would be best if you did not mention this to Hunter. He would likely find a way to foil us.”
Chapter Seventeen
Bella remained seated when Lord Humphries stood and intercepted Andrew. They exchanged a few words, then Lord Humphries went on to the foyer and Andrew came her way. She finished the remainder of her punch and prepared herself for his usual challenge.
Instead he sat next to her and tilted her chin to look into her eyes. “Dash tells me you were expecting me?”
“Is that not what you meant when you whispered “Tonight” in my parlor this afternoon?”
“I had hoped to find you at home.”
She gasped. “You did not disturb Nancy or Mama, did you?”
He laughed. “After meeting the venerable woman, I concluded that she was the last person you would want to know that you were not at home. No, Bella, I met your sister on the street. Miss Eugenia. She told me you had already left for the evening.”
“Gina was out?” A cold knot of suspicion began to twist in her stomach. Had Gina lied to her?
“Aye. She said she was on her way to sit with a sick neighbor.”
Oh, the minx! Where had she really gone? How would Bella find her?
“That disturbs you?” he asked, reading her agitation.
“Only because it is a lie. We haven’t any sick neighbors. She has got it into her mind that I need help. She wants to assist me in finding Cora’s killer.”
Andrew’s expression turned to one of concern. “Do you know where she’s gone?”
“No. She has only done this once before, but all she said was that she’d fallen in with a group outside a theater.”
“Then there is not much you can do, Bella. Go home and wait. Come, I will take you.”
“I am not ready. I haven’t…”
“Kissed anyone?” he finished. “I am relieved to hear that, my dear. In fact, I would be quite out of sorts to hear anything else. Did we not decide that you were to cease that particular aspect of your investigation?”
“No, I do not believe we decided anything of the sort.”
He surprised her by bringing her to her feet and escorting her toward the foyer. “This really is not open to argument, Bella. I told you that I will not tolerate you kissing men—strangers for the most part—and most especially, Bella, not my friends. Never my friends.”
“What possible difference could that make?” she asked as he took her wrap from Biddle and draped it over her shoulders.
“Because I won’t have them comparing their experience and lying to best the others. I won’t have them talk about you as if you were some sort of…of…”
“Doxy?” she finished as he led her outside, where a gentle rain had begun to fall. He lifted the hood of her cloak and arranged it over her hair. His knuckles brushed her cheek, and she drew in a sharp breath. Odd, how that gentle sensation could affect her more deeply than if he’d struck her.
“No, Bella. We both know you are not a common doxy.”
“An uncommon one, then,” she snapped.
He hailed a hackney, handed her up and gave her address before joining her. “You are not any sort of doxy,” he said as he settled beside her.
“How many times must I remind you that you swore not to interfere with me?”
“As many times as I must remind you that I changed my mind. Surely you must see that I can never honor such an oath. You are asking me to sit on my hands whilst you put yourself in danger and deliver yourself over to any man for the price of a kiss.”
“Must you put it that way?”
“Prithee, what other way is there?”
He had a point. In fact, he’d been more delicate in his wording than she would have been. “But Gina—”
“Is not a child, despite your posture as her mother. You cannot control her any more than I, evidently, can control you.”
“She could be in danger.”
“As are you.”
“I never should have told you about my sister’s death.”
“Too late for that lament now, Bella.”
The coach lurched as the driver veered to avoid a pedestrian and Bella was thrown against Andrew. He winced and gripped his upper right arm.
“Did I hurt you?”
He shook his head. “No, Bella. ’Twas just a fencing accident from this afternoon. ’Tis nothing.”
She placed a hand on his knee to balance herself and regain her seating and heard him make a sound that was almost a groan. He covered her hand with his own and moved it slowly back to her own lap. When she looked back at him, the heat in his eyes nearly set her afire.
Struggling to regain her composure, she looked away again. “I…I must do something, Mr. Hunter.”
“Andrew. And there is nothing you can do. If you do not know where she is, you would likely spend the whole night traversing London and never finding her. The only thing you can do, Bella, is to go home and wait.”
She said nothing, but she settled back against the leather seat and sighed. “I am painfully aware of the dangers awaiting an innocent female in London.”
“Bella, please be reasonable. There is nothing you can do.”
“There has to be something. My honor, my loyalty to my family, demands that I do more than sit at home while one sister is missing and another sister’s killer walks free.”
He turned her toward him and cupped her face. Then slowly, giving her more than ample time to protest, he lowered his lips to hers. She closed her eyes as she surrendered. Oh, thank heavens he had kissed her. This was
the only thing that made sense in this wasted night.
The hackney pulled up to her house. Andrew opened the window and gave the driver a new address.
Damn! Andrew had to go. He had to meet with Farrell and pray the man had found news of where and when the next Blood Wyvern ritual would be held. That, and that alone, was his best chance of keeping Bella and her sister from harm.
But when, in the dim light of the hackney, he watched the stubborn jut of her chin, he knew she would leave the moment he was out of sight. If only Wycliffe had not sworn him to secrecy, and if he could be certain the knowledge would not make her reckless, he would tell her that no one had forgotten Cora O’Rourke. And that others were actively searching for the killer.
The moment they’d drawn up in front of Bella’s house, he knew he couldn’t leave her. He’d have to take her somewhere and keep her until morning and she was safe for another day. He’d wend his way through the rookeries then, roust Farrell from his bed, if necessary. He’d catch a few hours’ sleep in the afternoon and then return to the hells and rookeries until he found the demented men who had killed Bella’s sister and so many more.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked.
“Where you cannot get into trouble.” He answered more gruffly than he’d intended and she tightened her jaw, a sure sign that she was angry. Too bad. Better angry at him than dead on some sacrificial altar.
She sulked until the coach drew into the courtyard of an inn on the outskirts of London. He paid the driver extra to wait, handed her down and led her into a deserted public room. Henderson, the proprietor, peeked out from a back room and then came forward with a wide grin.
“Ah, Mr. Hunter, sir. ’Tis been awhile since we’ve seen ye. A room, sir? And the usual?”
He ignored Bella’s sharp intake of breath. “Yes, Henderson. Thank you.”
“A pleasure, sir.” He took a key from a peg on the wall behind the counter and brought it to Andrew. “I’ll bring the rest in a moment, sir. ’Tis quiet tonight. You’ll not be disturbed. If you’ve need of anything, just ring.”
Andrew nodded, took the key and guided Bella down a narrow passageway. He could feel her tension through her stiffened elbow. She was not going to make this easy.
The moment she entered the room, she whirled on him, hands on her hips and eyes narrowed. “Is this where you bring all your doxies, Lord Libertine?”
Where the hell had she heard that nickname? He held his tongue until, a moment later, Mr. Henderson brought a tray with a bottle of excellent wine, a bowl of fruit and a plate of bread and cheese. He placed it on a low table between two chairs facing an unlit fireplace, then went to the wide mullion windows, unfastened the latch and swung them open.
“’Tis a lovely night, sir. The rain has cleared and the garden smells especially sweet.”
“Thank you, Henderson. That will be all. We shall be leaving early, so no need to wake us.”
“Aye, sir.” He backed out the door and Andrew locked it behind him.
Finally alone, he turned to Bella. “Never doxies, Bella. I only bring women of quality here. Women who have need of discretion.”
Her cheeks burned livid pink, whether with anger or indignation, he could not tell. “Married women, you mean? And women you do not pay for sex?”
“Precisely. And if you expect me to apologize for that, you will have a long wait, my dear. What I did and who I saw before I met you is none of your affair. And if you expect an explanation for all of them, we’ll be here long past next week.”
“I…I did not mean to suggest that you owed me an explanation. Just that I do not intend to be one in a long line of…of…”
“Lovers?” he supplied as he poured two glasses of wine. “I did not imagine you would. Nor would I subject you to such a dire fate. You are correct in believing you deserve better.”
“That is not what I meant.”
He handed her a glass and lifted his in a toast to her. “To better days, Bella.”
“Goodness, yes!” She lifted her glass and drank deeply.
A soft breeze stirred the draperies framing the window and the rain-washed air filled the room with the scent of roses and honeysuckle. He watched her as she leaned on the sill to gaze at the moonlit garden.
The simple act of observing her was sheer torture, and he was mystified by the bittersweet irony. He had longed to feel again. Now he felt. He loved. And he ached because of it. Yet he would not change it. Loving Bella was all that gave his life meaning now. She might not love him in return, she might not even want him in her life, but her mere existence had lifted him from his mire of self-indulgence and desolation.
She turned from the window and sighed, a look of resignation on her face. “Then if you do not intend to seduce me, Lord Libertine, why have you brought me here?”
“To keep you safe, though you may not believe that. Your flirtations could eventually cost you more than a kiss.”
She shrugged. “It would appear, Lord Libertine, that it already has.”
“Stop calling me that, Bella. What happened between us the other night was regrettable, but it would never have happened if I’d known the truth. I doubt there is a single man at Belmonde’s or Thackery’s who would have believed that you were virgin. Of course, that does not excuse my behavior, but you might have spoken out at some point during my dastardly seduction.”
“Would you have believed me?”
“No.” Of course he wouldn’t have. He would have thought it was a laughable ploy to stop him. The real question was, would he have stopped? He sighed. Probably not. He would simply have used his knowledge of lovemaking, of what makes a woman pliant and malleable, to persuade her. As unconscionable as that was, it was also a testament to how badly he had wanted her. And how few scruples he had when it came to her.
She accepted his denial without comment and changed the subject. “At least this place is clean.” She glanced toward the bed—an imposing four-poster with a deep down mattress and crisp linens—and sighed. “How long do you intend to keep me here?”
“Until it is too late for you to traipse about London kissing men.”
“Dawn.”
“Or very close to it.”
“And do you intend to do this every night?”
“If I must.”
She shook her head. “I do not understand. Why do you care?”
“Perhaps it is me that I care about. I would likely go to gaol or hang for killing the men you kissed. I would prefer to avoid that.”
She gave him a smile, her first of the night. “That is a hollow threat, Mr. Hunter.”
“Try me.”
“I’ve told you everything. I’ve been as honest as I know how. Why can you not do the same for me?”
Would that he could—damn Wycliffe, anyway! “I am afraid for you, Isabella O’Rourke, and I do not want anything bad to happen to you. And that is God’s own truth.”
For the first time that night, she looked completely disconcerted and at a loss for words. He went to her and lifted her light cloak from her shoulders. She shivered in another breeze from the open window. “Shall I close the window, Bella?”
“I rather like the smell of flowers and rain. It reminds me of home.”
“Do you miss it so much?”
“I wish we had never left.”
“I can imagine,” he answered a little wistfully. Cora, of course, and his seduction. He had no doubt she’d turn back time if she could.
He turned his attention to slicing an apple and cheese into wedges and placing them on a flowered dish, then poured a bit more wine in her glass.
“If you’d like to get some sleep, Bella, go ahead. I will sit here.” He indicated one of the chairs.
She glanced at him over her shoulder, cocking a suspicious eyebrow. He laughed. “It would be better if you could trust me. I swear I will not ravish you in your sleep.”
“I have lost my trust since coming to London, Mr. Hunter.”
“Damn!
Can you not call me Andrew? At least when we are in private?”
She looked down, and the delicate fringe of her dark lashes lying against her flushed cheeks awoke a need in him. He was ashamed of that. Bella, it seemed, had to do little more than sigh and he was aroused. For all that he’d indulged his passions before, he’d never been governed by them until now.
“Andrew,” she said, barely above a whisper, “how did you come to be in possession of Cora’s handkerchief?”
“Cora’s?”
“The hankie you gave me in the parlor this afternoon.”
“You dropped it the night you left Marlborough House. I retrieved it.”
She sighed and tension drained from her shoulders. She had not quite trusted him, but at least she had asked the question. He finished his wine, shrugged out of his jacket and laid it over the back of the chair. He didn’t know how much longer he could act the platonic protector when she smelled like lilacs and fresh rain and just stood there, looking lost and lonely.
She came closer and took a wedge of apple from the plate. “Mr. Henderson seems to know your tastes quite well.”
“He is a most attentive host.”
“And are all your women the same? Do they have the same tastes, as well?”
There was something veiled in Bella’s voice. Was she wondering if she was like all the rest? “I think Henderson is safe enough with wine, fruit and cheese. Actually, I think he believes you are a cut above the others. You are the first he has brought fruit.”
“How would he know what sort of person I am?”
“He is a quick judge of character.”
“But I am not actually one of your women.”
More than she knew. “No doubt he thinks you are too good for me.”
She smiled. “Ah, but we know better, do we not?”
He took her hand and turned her toward him. “Do not do that, Bella. Do not belittle or diminish yourself. You are the only person I know who is working without self-interest here. You have nothing to gain in finding your sister’s killer, and everything to lose.”
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