Lord Savage

by Mia Gabriel

  “Yes,” he said. “Take them.”

  I did, aligning their edges into a neat stack in my fingers while my thoughts ran wild. I knew what I had to ask, even as I dreaded his answer.

  “Why didn’t you give them to me when they were delivered?” My voice was small and uncertain. “That wasn’t part of the Game. It couldn’t have been. Oh, Savage, why did you keep them from me?”

  “Why,” he repeated. He tried to smile, and failed, his eyes filled with bitterness. “It’s obvious enough, isn’t it? I didn’t want to share you.”

  I shook my head, confused. “I didn’t wish to be shared, either,” I began. “But that has nothing to do with—”

  “I must go,” he said, already moving toward the door. “There is someone I must see directly.”

  “No, Savage, wait!” I cried, following him. “I need to know why—”

  “Read what Laura wrote to you, Eve.” He paused, his hand on the doorknob, and looked at me as if he might never see me again. “Then, if you still wish it, we will talk further.”

  Before I could answer, he closed the door and was gone. I could have followed; for once he hadn’t forbidden it. But he’d made it clear enough that he wished to be alone, and the way my head was spinning from all he’d told me, so did I.

  It wasn’t a good solitude, either. I hurt because he had walked out like that. How could I not? His scent was all over me, reminding me keenly with every breath of the hot, urgent sex we’d just shared in the gallery. I stared down at the envelopes in my hand, wondering—or was I dreading?—what messages they contained.

  “May I bring you tea, Mrs. Hart?” Barry asked, appearing from nowhere as he always did.

  “No, Barry, thank you,” I murmured. “I believe I will wait for his lordship in the bedroom.”

  “Very well, ma’am,” the servant said. “I do expect him to return shortly.”

  “You do?” I asked, my voice trembling with fragile hope.

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said confidently. “His lordship is wearing his dressing gown. He has not been shaven yet this day. He cannot go far in such a state.”

  “Ah,” I said, feeling foolish for expecting more. “No, he cannot. Thank you, Barry, that will be all.”

  Barry hesitated, lingering longer than was proper. “Forgive me for speaking out of turn, ma’am, but I also believe his lordship will return because of you.”

  I smiled. Barry had been with Savage most of his life, and would be intimately acquainted with all his master’s humors and habits, and his past as well. If Barry said that Savage would return because of me, then he would. He would.

  “Thank you, Barry,” I said softly. “Thank you very much.”

  He nodded, and quickly withdrew. With Lady Carleigh’s notes in my hand, I retreated to the bedroom. I wanted Savage to find me there, the one place that had become so special to us that it was almost impossible to imagine us together anywhere else.

  Sitting in the chair beside the window, I frowned down at the sealed notes. Part of me wished I could simply burn them, sealed and unread, and be spared their contents. But Savage had specifically told me to read them, and so with a sigh I began to open the notes, one after the other, and arrange them by date on my knee.

  Each was only a sentence or two long, the kind of little note that every good hostess sends to her guests to make them feel welcome at a house party—except that Lady Carleigh was referring not to a standard dinner or hunt but to the Game.

  The first must have been written and delivered soon after Savage had won me in the auction. Less than a week had passed, and yet it already seemed a lifetime ago.

  My dear Mrs. Hart,

  Didn’t I promise you that all would fall into place as planned? I trust at this moment you are enjoying the most rapturous kisses & caresses from your delectable MASTER!

  Fondly,

  Lady C.

  The next must have been the following morning.

  Dear Mrs. H.,

  How disappointing not to see you & Lord S. at breakfast, but I can only assume you are finding such rapture in each other’s arms that you cannot be parted as yet. You must tell me all when we dine this evening.

  Lady C.

  But there hadn’t been any time for confidential little conversations at that dinner—not after Savage had flown at Mr. Henery. Lady Carleigh herself hadn’t witnessed that—she’d been in the kitchen at the time, being bedecked with strawberries and cream—but clearly she’d heard from her husband and others what had happened.

  My dear Mrs. H.,

  How dismayed I was to learn of the disturbance, le désaccord, if you will, between Lord S. & Mr. Henery this evening! To be sure, it is flattering to have so chivalrous a champion to defend one’s virtue, as he did yours, but the degree of the defense was très outré for our little company.

  Lord S. has been known to let his temper run wild before—truly he can be the beau sauvage!—but I had believed that such outbursts were well in his past. If you can, & in the sweetest way possible, urge him towards sobriety & genial behavior for the remainder of our time together. Pleasure is our only goal, yes?

  You’re a lamb,

  Lady C.

  This note worried me. Not the part about Savage’s temper—all men had tempers if they were crossed—but the French phrases that were sprinkled throughout. English-speaking ladies resorted to French only when they were especially upset, as if using the other language softened things they’d rather not be saying at all. Lady Carleigh was not happy with Savage, and her unhappiness grew with the next note.

  Mrs. H., my dear,

  It seems that Lord S. has made quite the hermits of you two. Please dine with us this evening, or at the very least join us for the later entertainments. If he is the reason you are staying away, please do your best to persuade him otherwise, & tell him he must answer to me. You are sorely missed, ma chère.

  À plasir,

  Lady C.

  But evidently Simpson had gone to her mistress after she’d seen my bruises in the bath, and in Lady Carleigh’s next note both the playfulness and the French were gone.

  Dear Mrs. Hart,

  I have just now spoken with Simpson, who is much concerned on your behalf, as am I. Simpson suspects that things are not as they should be between you & Lord S. Please come to me in my rooms at once, or at the very least send word to me that you are well & unharmed.

  Lady C.

  I sighed impatiently. What real reason did they have for their concern? I preferred Savage’s company to the licentious goings-on among the others, and he preferred mine. We’d been invited here to play the Game, and this was how we’d chosen to play it, that was all. I was hardly his prisoner, or whatever else they were imagining. I could have left him at any time. I’d simply chosen not to.

  As for what we did together, that was no one’s business but our own. These last days with Savage had been happier and more exciting than any I could recall in my entire life. That was all that mattered, wasn’t it?

  Certainly there was nothing in Lady Carleigh’s notes for Savage to dread, and nothing that would turn me against him. Wishing he would return, I cracked the seal on the final envelope.

  Dear Mrs. Hart,

  I beg you not to ignore these words as you have ignored all my others. Lord Savage may be an old & dear friend, but I fear that he has influenced you in an unfortunate & desperate manner. I do not wish to alarm you, but I worry that he may have lapsed into past habits of unpredictable violence. There, I have spelled it out plainly. I fear for your safety, my dear. At the time of poor Lady Savage’s death, there were many questions asked about his role in her demise, & none answered. Thus I urge you to take care of his temper, & guard yourself against any further outbursts.

  If I do not receive a reply, I shall be forced to come seek you out, to reassure myself of your well-being.

  In perfect sincerity,

  Lady C.

  I read the note over twice, then slowly refolded it to set asi
de with the others. At least I now knew why Lady Carleigh had appeared so suddenly in the gallery, and why she’d brought the tall footman with her, too. And I was thankful that Savage had explained to me about his wife; if he hadn’t, I might indeed have wondered what dark things Lady Carleigh was hinting at.

  Instead, it was all sadly easy to decipher. These mysteries around Lady Savage’s death would be due to his desire to keep her last illness private. What the world perceived as his uncontrollable temper, I realized, was his way of protecting me in the same way he’d tried—and failed—to protect his poor wife.

  It was so unfair of the Carleighs to suspect him of worse. He’d never turned against me, nor had I ever feared for my safety in his company. Instead, with him I’d always felt safe, secure, even cherished. We had played the Game of Protector and Innocent, but behind it was an unspoken understanding, an empathy, between us that went much deeper.

  It would be difficult to describe in words, because words had often been secondary to our deepening trust. Lady Carleigh might claim a long friendship with Savage, but after only a week, I felt sure I was the one he trusted more, the one who knew him better.

  I glanced up at the ormolu clock on the mantel, surprised to see that he’d been gone only fifteen minutes; it seemed like much longer. As far as I was concerned, we would have little to discuss when he returned. There were no great revelations in the viscountess’s notes, and nothing that merited his uneasiness. All I wished now was to reassure him, and make our last hours together as memorable as possible.

  I thought back to the gallery and how he’d wanted to see me draped in pearls. I could do that for him. In my room were the long, costly ropes of pearls I’d worn the first night; the pearls, like the rest of my jewels, were kept in a special strongbox built into the base of one of my trunks, and only Hamlin and I knew its precise location as well as the combination to the lock. I didn’t trust Simpson enough to send for her to bring them back, nor was there time.

  But if I was quick, I could run to my room and get the pearls myself. Then, when Savage returned, he’d find me in his bed, waiting for him in pearls and nothing else.

  I tossed aside the notes and headed for the door, wrapping my dressing gown more modestly about my body. I managed to avoid Barry, and swiftly hurried down the long hallways to my own rooms. My bare feet made no sound on the polished floors, and I saw no one beyond a few servants. It was strange to return to my rooms, and to see all my belongings neatly arranged exactly as I’d left them last week. I’d grown so accustomed to my insular time with Savage that I felt as if I were somehow looking back a great distance over time, with my clothes and other things representing an Evelyn Hart that no longer existed.

  I was glad there was no sign of Simpson, and I quickly found the necklaces, taking the long ropes of pearls from their silk-lined cases and tucking them into the pocket of my dressing gown. The pearls clinked softly against the gold ben wah balls that I’d forgotten were in my pocket, too, and I smiled wryly. What better symbols could there be of the old Evelyn bumping against the new version?

  I closed the door gently and began back to Savage’s rooms. Down this hall, turn left, and to the end of the next. A pair of parlor maids with trays curtseyed, and I bowed my head, not wishing to make eye contact with them any more than they did with me. I quickened my step, turned the last corner, and nearly ran directly into Baron Blackledge.

  “My lord!” I gasped with surprise and dismay, and stumbled backward, barely saving myself from falling. “Forgive me, Baron, but I did not see you.”

  “Not at all, Mrs. Hart.” He caught my arm to steady me, and kept hold of it. “We don’t want you to take a tumble, do we?”

  He was dressed for an afternoon in the country, in a tweed suit with a Norfolk jacket and a gaudy argyle-patterned vest beneath, and if I had sensed I was underdressed earlier in comparison with Lady Carleigh, I now felt as good—or as bad—as naked before Lord Blackledge. His gaze raked over me as if he could see straight through my dressing gown and my costume. I remembered that look from the auction, the raw hunger in his eyes, and it took all my will not to shrink away from him.

  “Thank you, my lord, but I am quite recovered,” I said, trying to pull my arm free. “Where is your own Innocent, the blond girl? Why is she not with you?”

  “We parted. She was far too … obliging, shall we say? No challenge. Not as you would be, Mrs. Hart.”

  He held fast to my arm, clearly delighting in my discomfort.

  “If you please, my lord,” I began again. “Please let me—”

  “Hah, how I love to hear a lady beg!” he said, leering as he cut me off. He glanced past me, down the hallway. “Where’s Savage? He’s kept you locked up so tight this week that I can’t believe he’d let you out of his sight, not like this.”

  “I’m hardly Lord Savage’s prisoner, my lord,” I said, wishing now there was a footman or two to summon for help. “Now if you’ll excuse me—”

  “You should thank your stars you’re not, Mrs. Hart,” he said, his fingers tightening around my arm. “He did that to his wife, you know, locked her away until she went mad. Some say he even pushed her to her death, from the window of their bedroom.”

  I gasped, shocked. Savage himself had told me his wife had died from her illness, but nothing of a fatal fall. Was it too painful to mention, so painful that Savage had purposefully omitted her death from his telling, or was Lord Blackledge simply repeating more audacious, unfounded gossip?

  Pleased to see the effect his story had had, Lord Blackledge nodded, his eyes glittering.

  “You understand now why you’d be much better off with me, Mrs. Hart,” he said. “I’d show you how a real Englishman treats a woman, and you’d thank me for it.”

  “Thank—thank you, no,” I stammered. “Now if you’ll please excuse me, I must return to his lordship’s rooms.”

  “Not yet.” With a little jerk, he pulled me closer, his broad face red with excitement. “Tomorrow night, I mean to claim you, Mrs. Hart. You’ll be mine for next time, and Savage won’t be able to stop me.”

  He pushed me to one side to throw me off-balance as he bent over me, determined to kiss me. I twisted sharply in his grasp and fought to break free, and turned my face away to avoid his mouth.

  “Let me go, Baron,” I ordered, fighting my panic to sound as stern as I could. I didn’t want to cause even more of a scandal and scream for help, but I decided that if he persisted, I would. Surely there must be someone else in earshot, even in this cavernous house. “Let me go at once!”

  “Release her.”

  Savage’s voice was deceptively calm, but I recognized the steely tension coiled in every word. He had come up behind us, silent and barefoot, and he stood with his feet slightly apart and his hands knotted into fists at his sides.

  One wrong word from Blackledge, and he’d strike. It was as simple, and as obvious, as that.

  I didn’t want them to fight over me. Blackledge wasn’t like Henery. He was broad-chested, stronger, and with a bully’s bravado. But that wasn’t all. If Savage gave in to his temper again, I feared that Lord Carleigh might actually summon the local constable to have him arrested. Both men must have realized it as well—how could they not?—yet still Blackledge didn’t release my arm.

  “She’s tired of you, Savage,” he jeered. “Look at her! Why else would she be trolling the halls dressed like this, eager for a man who could satisfy her the way you can’t?”

  “That’s a wicked lie, my lord!” I cried furiously. “You know I was returning to Lord Savage’s rooms, and yet you trapped me!”

  Savage’s pale eyes flicked from Blackledge to me, revealing nothing. He couldn’t believe Lord Blackledge, could he? Didn’t he trust my word against the baron’s?

  “She’s always wanted me,” Lord Blackledge continued, goading Savage. “She never wanted you. You paid for her, but she wanted me more.”

  “No!” I shook my head, desperate to defend myself against s
uch an outrageous lie. “I have never wanted you, not even for a second!”

  “Then why were you coming to my bedroom?” he taunted. “Why had you left Savage for me, and—”

  “Let her go, Blackledge,” Savage interrupted curtly. “See which of us she chooses.”

  “Why should I leave the decision up to a slut like this?” Blackledge said, but after a moment’s hesitation he released my arm, adding a shove for good measure. “Go on, decide.”

  I fled to Savage, darting to safety behind him. “You’re an evil, manipulative man,” I called back to Blackledge. “I would never choose you, not under any circumstances.”

  But Blackledge only laughed, and wagged a fat finger.

  “You say that now,” he said, “but you’ll change your tune fast enough when you finally get a taste of my cock. Tomorrow, Mrs. Hart, tomorrow and you’ll be mine.”

  To my relief, I felt Savage’s arm circle my shoulders, drawing me close. Yet, the gesture seemed more possessive than protective, and definitely not affectionate, which tinged my relief with uneasiness.

  “Come with me, Eve,” he said, his voice still curt as he led me away, his fingers locked with mine. “You—we—have no place here.”

  If I’d expected a fiery outburst from him, none came. Instead, as soon as we’d returned to his bedroom, he dropped my hand and retreated to stand alone beside the window. He pretended to stare out at the lawn; I knew he saw nothing.

  “When I returned,” he said finally, “you were gone.”

  “But only for a few minutes,” I protested, joining him at the window. “I intended to be back here to greet you.”

  He was so skilled at making his face blank, hiding everything deep inside.

  “But you weren’t,” he said. “Did you read what viscountess wrote of me? Was that what made you run away?”

  I retrieved the notes from where I’d left them earlier, handing them to him with the most recent one open on top.