The Elusive Earl (Saints & Scoundrels)

by Michaels, Maddison

  “My mother had to have been referring to that mountain!” she enthused. “That is where we have to start our search for Travis and the treasure.”

  “There are many snow-capped mountains that weep as summer approaches,” he reminded her.

  “Yes, but this is the only one is in the region with such a nickname.” She tossed her hair over her shoulder as she quickly relayed the tragic tale. “So, you see? It must be it.”

  Bree stalked back inside and headed straight over to the wardrobe. Daniel followed her in, wondering what she was up to as she tugged the doors open and peered into the extraordinarily large armoire, an expression of intense concentration on her face.

  His mouth turned up into a smile of its own volition. She looked utterly charming as she bit her lip, contemplating the choices within.

  “Ah, this will do,” she declared, pulling out a deep maroon riding habit.

  “Do for what?” he asked.

  She glanced back over at him. “To travel in, of course. We have to get to the mountain as soon as possible, and it will be cold tonight, so I shall need a warm riding habit.”

  “We are not going haring up a mountainside this late in the day.”

  “I cannot idly lie around while Travis is out there in the cold and wilderness, all alone. Ah!” she proclaimed pulling out a pair of black leather boots. “These shall do nicely.”

  Daniel took in a deep breath and counted to ten. He found it was a technique that sometimes worked to calm him down when dealing with Brianna and her illogical ideas. And although he did understand the concern motivating her, it would be safer to wait until morning. “We are not climbing a mountain tonight. The sun has all but set, and we shall be without any light.”

  “We shall take lanterns with us.”

  He counted to ten again. “And how do you propose we get past the Prince’s guards?” Daniel dragged a hand through his hair. “They’re not simply going to let us traipse out of here unaccompanied.”

  “They’re not even going to know we’re gone.” She grinned, waltzing behind the dressing screen.

  “What are you doing?” he all but choked out.

  “Changing, of course,” she sang out, her voice slightly muffled from behind the screen.

  Daniel muttered several curses under his breath as he pulled at his shirt collar, which suddenly felt horribly constricting around his neck.

  “There are clothes for you, too. In the other armoire,” she mentioned.

  Daniel stood staring transfixed at the outline of her silhouette as she peeled the dress from her body. Every single inch of material she dragged off her skin was pure torture.

  His breath hitched when the material of her dress was flung over the screen. The woman was naked right at this moment and only a few feet from him, concealed by a thin silk screen.

  God help him. He was going to go mad. He dragged his eyes away from the all-too-tempting sight and looked out the balcony doors. Shaking his head, he tried to rid himself of the distracting images of a naked Bree.

  With a growl, he strode over to the other wardrobe and wrenched open the cupboard door, the force of which pulled the door completely off its hinges. He cursed.

  “What is going on?” she called out from behind the screen.

  “Nothing!” he barked at her. Daniel counted to ten again. It didn’t bloody work; all he could see in his mind’s eye was her, naked. He tossed the broken door aside and rifled through the hanging clothes. All looked to be his exact size. The Prince, or more likely his man of affairs, Lord Mondesta, certainly had excellent resources to arrange clothing in his size on such short notice, too.

  He pulled out some black pants and a matching jacket, along with a cream shirt and a black cravat. Daniel had a feeling he was going to be needing to wear black for whatever it was Bree had planned.

  “Um, Daniel? I think I may need some help with the laces at the back of my dress.”

  Daniel groaned but, nonetheless, marched over to the screen. He pulled up short upon seeing Bree facing away from him, the delicate column of her neck and upper back exposed to his gaze. The back of her dress gapped open as far as her chemise, with the laces hanging loosely beside the creamy smoothness of her skin.

  He felt his jaw hang open, but he seemed unable to do anything except stare at her flesh. It looked so delicate. So soft. So tempting. Was the woman trying to entice him beyond repair?

  Shaking his head, he stomped over to her. He grabbed ahold of the laces and began pulling them tightly together. “What did you mean when you said they wouldn’t even know we are gone?” he barked out, caring little if she chaffed at his tone. He needed something to distract him.

  “Exactly that,” she informed him.

  As more of her flesh was covered by the fabric, he seemed to regain more of his equilibrium. “How could they not know we were leaving? There are hundreds of guards surrounding the outside of the palace.”

  “Exactly!” Her voice was triumphant. “They are mostly all outside, with very few of them inside.”

  “Which helps us how?”

  “We simply have to find the secret passage my mother used to use to sneak out of the palace, and then none will be the wiser that we have gone.”

  “How do you even know she used a secret passage?”

  “It was in her journal. She mentioned the entrance leading to the caves of Mendicino being behind a statue of a lion, and I happened to see one beside her portrait in the great hall.”

  Daniel groaned. “You really don’t like using front doors, do you?” He finished lacing up the back of her dress and tied a bow. “There. Done.” He took a step back. “You do realize there could be several lion statues in the palace?”

  She turned around and smiled at him. “Yes, there could. But at least we have a place to start.”

  He found himself lost in her eyes, and suddenly, all sense of logic left him as a sharp hunger for her engulfed him. He wanted her with an intensity that left him aching.

  A sharp knock sounded, jerking Daniel back to reality with a thud.

  “Bree!” Milly’s voice yelled in a stage whisper from behind the oak. “It’s me.”

  Daniel shook his head and strode over to unlatch the door.

  Milly looked surprised as she pushed past him and into the room. “What are you still doing here, Lord Thornton?”

  “This is my bedchamber, too,” he slowly told her, closing the door and latching the bolt behind her. Clearly, the girl had trouble understanding things. A Penderley trait, no doubt.

  Milly narrowed her eyes, looking rather like an angry Brianna when she did so. “It is not your bedchamber. This whole marriage between my cousin and yourself is a lie, and I will not have you compromising Brianna by pretending it is real.”

  “It is real, Miss Penderley.” Daniel sighed.

  “Have you consummated the marriage, then?” Milly asked.

  “Milly!” Bree chastised as she walked over to her. “Stop being so crass.”

  “It is not crass,” Milly militantly maintained. “It is asking about a fact. A fact which could mean the difference between you living the rest of your life in a loveless marriage or being able to annul said marriage and actually find a man who will make you happy and love you as you deserve to be.”

  Daniel felt as if he’d been punched in the gut. Whether it was from Milly’s censure or the thought of Bree with another man, he couldn’t say.

  “Milly, though I appreciate your concern,” Brianna said, blithely unaware of Daniel’s inner turmoil, “I’m certain you didn’t simply knock on my door to discuss my marriage.”

  “Well, no,” Milly agreed. “I came to see what you were actually up to. For I know you too well, Bree,” her voice was smug. “I didn’t actually believe you had a headache. It was obviously a ruse to escape from everyone and find Travis. Seeing you dressed in a riding habit confirms my suspicions.”

  “You’re not going to tell Aunt Edith, are you?” Bree asked.

  “
Good gracious, no,” Milly exclaimed. “Do you think Travis has gone to find the treasure then?”

  “Don’t you?” Bree replied.

  “Yes. Unless whatever he’s supposed to have taken from the Garendetta holds more interest.” Milly looked between them both. “When are you going though? It will be too dark to travel tonight.”

  “Hah! A sensible Penderley for once,” Daniel mumbled as he walked over and sat on one of the armchairs.

  “I don’t know if I should take that as a compliment or an insult?” Milly said.

  “Oh, it is a compliment for certain,” Bree answered before striding over and standing in front of Daniel. “But we must leave now, for it is going to take a good few hours to walk from here to the mountainside.”

  “But how do you expect to just walk out of the palace?” Milly asked. “I don’t think Mother or your grandfather will be too happy about that.”

  “According to my mother’s journal, there is a secret passage that leads from the castle all the way to the foot of the Mendicino Mountains,” Bree said. “We just have to find it, and then we can be on our way, without being detected.”

  “But the household is still awake Bree,” Milly calmly informed her. “Someone will see you searching.”

  “Which is why we shall leave at dawn.” Daniel replied. “That way, we can find the passage and have light to guide us. And we will be well rested from having had a good few hours’ sleep.” Not that he particularly thought he’d sleep well, being in the same room once again with Brianna, knowing she was but a few feet away but completely off limits, even if he was married to her.

  Bree narrowed her eyes and placed her hands on her hips, but then she sighed. “Oh very well, you are probably right.”

  “Excuse me?” he questioned. “You are actually agreeing with me and saying I’m right? Did I hear what she said correctly, Miss Amelia?”

  Milly laughed while Brianna scowled.

  “You heard correctly, you cad,” Bree admonished him.

  “Will wonders never cease?” Daniel mumbled.

  “Lord Thornton, you do like to poke the bear, do you not?” Milly grinned. “I had best be getting back to my own bed chamber.” She looked over at Bree. “What do I tell the others in the morning when it is discovered you are gone?”

  “Tell them nothing,” Bree said, walking over and hugging her cousin briefly. “If we are correct and Travis has gone in search of the treasure, hopefully we should be able to find him and be back at the palace by nightfall. And if we are not, then you can send the cavalry.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Bree slowly became aware of a pair of hands gently shaking her as the edges of a rather wickedly thrilling dream involving Daniel and his lips drifted out of reach from her consciousness.

  She tried to bat away the insistent hands, but to no avail.

  “Are you always this hard to wake up?” Daniel’s deep voice rumbled in her ear.

  She smiled sleepily upon hearing him, and instead of knocking his hands away, she reached up and pulled him on top of her. The warm hardness of his body against hers, pressing her into the mattress, felt delicious.

  Blinking, she gazed dreamily up into his green eyes. She smiled and brought her hand up to caress the stubble covering his face. It was surprisingly soft, particularly as it made him look like a dashing pirate.

  Abruptly, Bree realized where she was and exactly what she was doing. She gasped. Oh good Lord. Could she be anymore wanton?

  “Good morning,” he said calmly but with a decided hint of amusement in his voice, his lips mere inches from her own. “Good dream?”

  “Oh heaven help me,” she lamented, pushing against him.

  He laughed as he rolled off her and jumped to his feet. His eyes held hers. “By goodness, you are difficult to wake.”

  She dragged herself from the bed, her maroon riding habit a mess of wrinkles from her slumber. She’d decided to wear it to bed, instead of having to go through the delectable torture of feeling Daniel’s fingers fiddling with the laces of it once again. She knew she wouldn’t have been able to avoid throwing herself into his arms if he’d done so.

  “It’s time to go, then?” she asked him.

  “It is.” He stalked over and grabbed the two satchels by the door, along with two unlit glass lanterns.

  “Where did you get those from?” she asked as she put her leather boots on and laced them up.

  “I went for a little wander a short time ago.” He handed her one of the bags, followed by a lantern. “Everyone is abed, though the guards are patrolling along the outside of the palace. We should be able to get to the statue with ease.”

  “Hopefully the passage is behind it.”

  “It is. There’s a latch behind the lion’s head, which opens a panel in the wall.” He grinned at her. “Like I said, I took a wander.”

  A few minutes later, Bree followed him down the stairs and along the large hallway. A few wall sconces were still burning low to light their way. They came to a stop when they got to where her mother’s portrait hung in the great hall.

  Bree glanced up at it, though she couldn’t see much of her mother’s beautiful face in the pre-dawn gloom.

  Daniel silently strode over to the lion statute and reached around its back. There was a small click as the stone wall to the right of it opened inwards, revealing the secret passage her mother had written of in her journal.

  Daniel motioned her to follow him through. She stepped into the tunnel, and when she was a few feet in, she could hear the sizzle of a match coming to life. Daniel lit his lantern before taking Bree’s and doing the same.

  He handed it back to her and then pulled down a lever she hadn’t even noticed was sticking out from the wall. The door closed back into place, and they were left standing in the cold and damp tunnel.

  Bree sighed. At least, her fear of narrow passages in the earth didn’t seem to extend to secret passageways in palaces. Though that would probably change when the tunnel did as her mother’s journal stated and led underground to the Mendicino Mountain caves.

  “Come on.” Daniel nodded his head toward where the tunnel led. “We’ll probably be walking for a while. Are you going to be all right?”

  Straight away, she knew he was talking of her fear. She hated that he knew of her weakness. Hated that she had that weakness in the first place. “I shall be fine.” And she really hoped that, this time, she would be.

  She followed him down the passage until they came to some steps which wound deep down into the heart of the palace. By the time they got to the bottom, Bree was fighting hard to push past the horrid swirling sensation in the pit of her stomach. But she had to do so. Darn it, if her mother used to walk through this very passage by herself, then Bree could, too.

  She squared her shoulders and traipsed after Daniel down the long and winding tunnel. The passage itself seemed to go on and on, and after nearly two hours of walking and desperately imagining wide open spaces, Bree was beginning to suspect that it would go on forever.

  But finally, Bree saw a small opening ahead with a narrow path of steps leading upwards. With any luck, they would surface directly at the foot of the mountains of Mendicino.

  Gritting her teeth together tightly, Bree fought to clamp down on the feeling of claustrophobia that had been threatening at the edges of her sanity since they’d entered the tunnel. She gripped the handle of the lantern until the knuckles in her hands turned white.

  “You’ve done exceptionally well.” Daniel paused and looked over his shoulder at her. “Only a little longer and we will be out in the open air.”

  Not daring to look back at the yawning space of the dark passage, she carefully placed one foot on the first step and then followed with the other. Nearly there, she chanted to herself as she ascended up the narrow stairway. She breathed in a sigh of relief when she finally saw a shaft of light up ahead.

  She nearly stumbled up the last step in her rush to escape the confining space. She cau
ght her balance and stepped out of the opening into a clearing. Bree spun around to see the exit of the tunnel had been etched into a grassy mound at the base of a mountain.

  “So, what now?” Daniel asked, pulling out his canteen of water and walking over to the small river that was coursing down from the hillside.

  He filled up the bottle and then offered it to her, but she shook her head, instead scrutinizing the mountains and their surrounds. “Now, we find the trail that leads up the mountain, and then we climb.”

  Daniel took a sip, then twisted the lid back on before replacing the canteen into his satchel. He turned the flame of his lantern off and hooked it onto his belt. “Climb to where exactly?”

  “I don’t know,” Bree said as she did likewise with her own lantern, though she had to hook it onto the strap of her satchel, as she wore no belt. “But hopefully, we shall stumble upon something that resembles the mountain’s tears, which is the next clue in the poem.”

  The look on Daniel’s face was laced with skepticism. “Come on then,” he said, leading the way across the grass and beginning to follow along the ridge of the mountain.

  Suddenly, the ground itself seemed to shake. It only lasted a few seconds and was rather tame, enough so that Bree wondered if she’d imagined it or if it was she herself that had been shaking.

  “Are you all right?” Daniel asked her.

  “So, you felt it, too?” Some birds took flight from some trees, squawking their annoyance.

  “Of course I did,” he replied.

  “What was it then?”

  “A very minor earthquake, I would guess.” His eyes scanned the mountain. “That, or some underground explosion of some sort.”

  Bree followed his gaze. “Is it safe to continue?”

  “Hopefully.”

  “Oh the confidence that fills me with,” she mumbled as she began trudging after him.

  A few minutes later, they stumbled upon a small dirt track that wound its way up the mountain side. They looked at each other and nodded, then began to follow the path upwards.