A Rebel Without a Rogue

by Bliss Bennet

  He waited, his body tensed.

  Until at last her fingers gave a wordless squeeze of consent.

  Kit Pennington was not living in his family’s London home; the knocker had not been on the door at Saybrook House when she’d gone there in search of Major Pennington the day she’d arrived in London. No, Kit’s lodgings lay only a few streets away from Ingestrie’s. Yet they might have been a world apart, so different did they seem. And not only because Kit’s lay in Mayfair, and Ingestrie’s in less fashionable Marylebone. In fact, the furnished rooms the viscount hired had a decided air of style about them, with their rich red walls and gilt-embellished picture frames, a style the forgiving shadows of lamp and candlelight only enhanced. But in the bright glare of day, the cracking paint and worn upholstery, the stains from spilled wine and burns from countless careless cigars, were harder to hide. Ingestrie’s penchant for leaving his soiled clothing and other belongings scattered about only added to the dilapidated air. Fianna had been glad to wander London’s streets each day in search of Major Christopher Pennington, if only to escape the dispiriting pall that fell on her whenever she found herself alone in those rooms.

  But as soon as she stepped inside Kit’s chambers, an unfamiliar serenity settled about her. The woodwork in the two main rooms, painted in a dark green that might have been oppressive, instead warmed. During the day, the room would likely be awash in sunlight, given its tall windows topped only by the smallest of swags. Green-and-white striped upholstery, and a lighter green stripe on the papered walls, contributed to the open, airy feel. Though she stumbled over a footstool—covered with fabric of the same color and pattern as the carpet below it, masking it from her eyes—the room still made her feel as if she were walking amidst a stand of springtime trees, drinking in the promise of new life, new growth.

  How ironic, that he would bring a harbinger of death to such a vitally alive retreat.

  “My brother’s doing, not mine.”

  She frowned at Kit as he walked into the room and set her valise on the edge of the carpet.

  “Benedict, not Theo,” he answered, gesturing to the room around them. “My middle brother, the artist of the family. Though of late he’s been pouring his energies into portraits, he’s not above raising a brush to a wall if the color of a room’s not to his liking.”

  “You share chambers with him?” she asked, careful to keep her distance. How foolish she’d been, throwing herself at Kit that way, with no clear aim in mind. And to allow it to go on so! With the exception of Ingestrie, her rule had been to allow the men she cozened only a taste of her favors, enough to entice but not satisfy, so that they would grant her whatever she wished in the vain hope of winning more. That it had been Kit, not she, who had been the one to break their embrace had disconcerted her more than she cared to admit.

  Only the memory of Grandfather McCracken, his bent finger tracing over and over the letters that inscribed his lost son’s name in the family Bible, could persuade her to accompany the far-too-self-possessed Kit Pennington to his rooms.

  “No, these are Benedict’s rooms, not mine. He urged me to exchange with him after the shooting, so that my attacker would not be able to find me so easily.”

  Her back stiffened. But when her eyes darted to his, nothing in his face suggested any hidden meaning lay behind his declaration. No, he still did not suspect her.

  He moved toward a window, pulling the curtain shut against the darkening evening. “And when he discovered the light for painting was even better in the attics at Pennington House than it is here, he vowed he’d never return. You’ve no cause to worry; he’ll not bother us.”

  It was not Benedict Pennington who caused her hand to stroke over and over her sleeve, chasing wrinkles that even she could not see. Why had all the boldness with which she’d kissed Kit earlier suddenly abandoned her? Fianna removed her gloves and set them on a side table.

  “Are you the youngest Pennington, then?” she asked, perching on the edge of a sofa. She’d not be the one this time to make the first move.

  But he remained standing, his hands clasped behind his back. “No. In addition to my two brothers, I have a younger sister, Sibilla. Aunt Allyne will soon be traveling into Lincolnshire to bring her up to town.”

  “For her debut? Your mother is unable to oversee it?”

  “We lost our mother some years past.”

  “And your father, too, as your brother now holds the title?”

  He gave a short, sharp nod.

  She tamped down the unwelcome stab of sympathy. “You rely on Mrs. Allyne, then, for counsel and support? Have you no other elder relations upon whom you may call?” An uncle, perhaps?

  “Oh, the stray distant cousin or two,” he replied, turning back to her with a shrug. Sitting down in the chair opposite, he leaned forward, elbows perched on his knees. “What of yourself? Is your father still living?”

  A vision of a much younger Sean, holding her small body high above the crowds so she might bear witness, shot through her mind. Her own father, leader of the Antrim rebels, standing tall and calm by the gallows. Nodding to Major Pennington, who had overseen his imprisonment and trial. Ascending the scaffold, attempting to address the people who had gathered not just for the spectacle, but in tribute to his leadership, his courage, his friendship. Smiling as the rope was put around his neck.

  And behind him on the Market Hall spikes, the heads of four other rebels, sightless eyes staring out over the crowds, flies lazily buzzing about the festering flesh. . .

  Máire—no, Fianna, your name is Fianna—jerked to her feet. May the cat eat her, and the devil eat the cat, if she were fool enough to share such a memory with the likes of Kit Pennington.

  Ever the gentleman, Kit stood as well. But something stronger than mere civility had him taking a step toward her. “Is there something wrong, Fianna?”

  “I find I am rather tired this evening,” she said, folding her hands tight below her breasts.

  “Then perhaps we should retire early. May I show you where you’ll sleep?”

  Somehow she nodded, even as her mouth grew dry. Would he remain with her the entire night? Or take himself off to other pursuits, as Ingestrie often had after taking his pleasure of her?

  Taking up her valise, Kit guided her down the passageway. Opening a door at its end, he gestured her inside a simply furnished room. As she stepped inside, her eyes went straight to the plain white dimity curtains hanging from the half-tester bed. A bed only large enough for one.

  “If you find yourself in need of anything during the night, my room is just across the hall,” Kit said. With a stiff bow, he retreated into the passageway, closing the door gently behind him.

  CHAPTER NINE

  “My sincerest apologies, sir. I can find no record of a Major John Pembroke in any of this year’s muster rolls.” Ensign Farmer bobbed his head with red-faced deference not in Kit’s direction, but in Fianna’s. “Have you asked the Clerk for Widow’s Pensions? Or examined the Army List?”

  Pressing folded hands into the small of his back, Kit suppressed a grimace. The ensign was the fourth clerk at the War Office to whom they’d been shunted off, all in search of a man whose existence might, if his suspicions were true, be only a figment of Fianna Cameron’s cunning imagination.

  Given said suspicions, he should be pleased, not chagrined, at the continued inability of the War Office’s clerks to uncover any sign of the man whom the Irishwoman continued to imply was her natural father. Yet some soft part of him clearly wished the assumptions he’d initially made about her search to be true, wished her a righteous innocent rather than the creature of guile he feared she must be.

  It hadn’t been his aristocratic connections that had persuaded anyone at the War Office to aid them in their search, as he’d assumed, but rather the power of Fianna Cameron’s strangely compelling countenance. At the sight of disappointment on her narrow, fey face, each War Office clerk had moved a little closer, as if he would gladly offer hi
mself as sacrifice if he could but lift the burden of dashed hopes from her dainty, fragile shoulders. That tiny moue turning down the corners of her mouth even affected Kit, though he’d watched her don it, then remove it now several times in a row.

  And yes, there went Ensign Farmer, right on cue, leaning over the wooden counter like a fish ensnared on a line. Kit held his own body still, refusing to give in to the same compulsion. Damn them both for fools.

  “Please don’t apologize, Ensign. Of course a man as busy as yourself hasn’t the time to examine all the lists.” Miss Cameron laid a gloved hand atop Farmer’s ink-stained fingers. Would the familiar squeeze she gave them leave the boy as addlepated as the last clerk she’d enthralled?

  “If I might just look at the older records myself? I’ve come so far, you see, and my poor mother is so very distraught. . .”

  Ensign Farmer bit his lip. “I truly wish I could help, ma’am. But I’m not allowed to bring members of the public behind the counter.”

  Fianna’s lowered lashes, so dark against her pale cheeks, hardly fluttered; her quiet sigh raised her small but enticing bosom only the slightest bit. But her subtle machinations proved quite enough to entice the hapless ensign.

  “I suppose—I might bring the ledgers here? If you wouldn’t mind standing while you examine them?” he asked, as if she, not he, had the right to grant such an indulgence.

  “What a wonderful idea, sir. How clever of you to think of it!”

  The clerk slowly backed away from the counter, unable to tear his eyes away from the demure look of adoration with which Fianna gifted him. Only after his backside caught the edge of a desk and sent a pile of papers flying did he turn to search for the ledgers in question.

  Kit could not stop himself from smiling a little at the poor man’s discomposure. When he turned to Fianna to share the joke, though, all he saw was a frown. Why would a woman so skilled in manipulation not show some triumph, not even the least bit of pleasure, at her success?

  “Here are the ones from the 1790s, ma’am, one for each regiment,” Ensign Farmer said as he returned with an armful of dusty books. “Are you certain you don’t know his regiment?”

  “Unfortunately I do not,” Fianna said as she examined the words scrawled on each cover. “Only that it was stationed in Ireland in 1798.”

  Ensign Farmer frowned. “In Ireland? Oh, I do wish you’d said so earlier. Ireland’s an entirely different matter, indeed.”

  “Different in what regard, sir?” Kit asked.

  “Why, before the Act of Union in 1800, troops stationed in Ireland were paid for not by the English Parliament, but by the Irish one.”

  “And the significance of the distinction?” Kit asked.

  “I’m afraid, sir, those muster rolls are not kept here, at the War Office, but at Dublin Castle.”

  Fianna’s face fell. “Do you mean I’ve come all this way, only to discover the information I need is right there, in my own country?”

  “Oh, I hope not, ma’am! Surely the records must have been transferred here after the Union. Perhaps Ensign Timms will know where they’ve been stored.” Farmer gazed toward the back of the office, where another man sat scribbling.

  Kit snatched up a piece of foolscap and scribbled down his direction. “Perhaps you might send a note, informing us if you come across them, Ensign?” Tossing the pencil on the counter, he took Fianna’s elbow. He’d not spend another hour kicking his heels in this drafty, dusty place, watching yet another young clerk succumb to Fianna’s far-too-compelling charms.

  The sound of the ensign’s sighs dogged them until Kit yanked the door closed behind him. How long would they have to prolong this wild goose chase before he could catch her in a falsehood? And how many more smitten clerks would she leave in her wake?

  As they left Horse Guards and made their way toward St. James’ Park, Miss Cameron pulled her hand free of his arm, presumably to retie her bonnet ribbons. But she did not retake it as she fell back into step beside him. “If the War Office is to be of no aid, perhaps the regimental agents should be my next line of inquiry. Do you know if there is a place where such men typically congregate?”

  Her tone held none of the honey she’d poured out so freely to the clerks at the War Office. Why was her tone far more brusque, her words more direct, when she spoke to him, a man whom she’d agreed to bed? Did she guess he was growing suspicious? Or did she simply believe him already so in her thrall that no further effort on her part was required?

  “I’ve not the least idea,” Kit bit out, taking her hand and placing it back upon his arm. Ah yes, petulance was always so very charming.

  They walked in silence for some minutes, Kit taking care to keep his gaze straight on the pavement before him. Even if he turned his head, the deep poke of her bonnet would likely hide most of her face. But he’d rather not give her any more hints of just how easily she might beguile him.

  They’d come to a stop at Charing Cross, waiting for the crush of traffic to lessen. After a few minutes, he spied an opening and stepped forward. But she pulled heavily against his grip, her slight weight still enough to jerk him back from the road.

  “Fianna?”

  She made no answer, just stared at a raucous circle of red-coated soldiers blocking the walk before them. One of the men laughed as he held a bag over his head, just out of reach of two small, grimy, barefoot creatures clambering before him. As one of the urchins jumped and swore, the soldier tossed the sack to one of his fellows, over the child’s head.

  With the boy’s attention on his prize, he must not have seen the boot the first soldier intruded into his path. The redcoat holding the bag laughed even louder than the first as the boy tripped and fell heavily to the pavement. His smaller companion raced to his side, throwing a protective arm about him.

  But the first boy would have none of it. Popping up quick as a jack-in-the-box despite the trail of blood flowing from the scrape on his forehead, he raced to confront his new tormenter. “A thabhairt ar ais, car ar oineach!” he cried, his skinny arms flailing to little avail.

  Fianna jerked at the words, her hands fisting in her skirts. What, did she mean to launch herself into the midst of a street brawl? Kit reached out an arm and pulled her behind him.

  At her cry of protest, he stepped forward himself, jerking the contested bundle from the second soldier’s grasp. He’d not stand by idle and watch children be tormented. Especially not by a soldier. Uncle Christopher had drilled it into him that it was a soldier’s duty to protect, not to harm, the innocent, something he’d taken for granted until Peterloo.

  The soldier whirled, his grin changing to a snarl as he realized the sack had been taken not by a fellow redcoat, but by a stranger. Kit dropped it and held out a placating hand, offering peace but ready to curl fingers into a fist if the man proved belligerent.

  Before the soldier could utter a protest, though, Fianna Cameron had slid between them. She raised her hand and whipped a biting slap across the man’s beefy cheek.

  “How dare you bedevil a poor child so!”

  The soldier raised a slow hand to his face. Dazzled by the pain of her blow? Or by the beauty of the woman before him? The tussle had knocked the bonnet down her back, revealing her dark curling hair, cheeks ablaze with ire, eyes wide with scorn.

  Kit’s gut tightened. He had thought this woman cold, without passion?

  The soldier who had tripped the boy—an officer, much to Kit’s disgust—stepped to their side of the circle and laid a quelling hand on his subordinate’s shoulder. “My apologies, ma’am. We’d no wish for our little joke to upset a lady’s sensibilities.”

  The lieutenant’s self-assured smile faded as Fianna turned her disdain on him. “And what of the child’s sensibilities?”

  “Sensibilities? A lowly sweep? Surely, ma’am, you jest.”

  “Besides, he’s an Irisher,” offered the soldier she’d slapped. “Everyone knows they don’t feel as deep as we do.”

  “Do they,
now?” she muttered, pushing her way between the two men to crouch beside the unkempt children.

  The boys’ eyes darted between her and the soldiers, each narrow chest heaving from their exertions. Defiance and fear warred over their sharp features. Would he have to protect her not only from a troop of soldiers, but from these feral children, too?

  Fianna, though, seemed undaunted by the boys’ sullen glares. Holding a handkerchief in one outstretched hand to the injured one, she tossed her head in the direction of the soldiers. “Car ar oineach, indeed.”

  Startlingly white teeth flashed in the midst of that grimy face before a small hand reached up to cover it. But the hand could not hide the laughter that sparked in the boy’s eyes.

  “Shit on honor,” she translated, before reaching out to dab at the blood on the boy’s brow. “As everyone knows His Majesty’s soldiers are all too wont to do. Every Irisher, that is.”

  “See here, now, ma’am,” the officer began, belligerence edging his voice. “There’s no call to besmirch—”

  “No call for arguing with a lady, Lieutenant,” Kit said, using his body to block the man from stepping any closer. “Or harassing hardworking children. You’d do better to gather your men and return to your duties.”

  The man glared, but took a step back, clearly reading the implicit threat in Kit’s crossed arms and narrowed eyes. “Your servant, sir,” he offered, with the briefest of bows.

  Kit kept his eyes on him as he gathered his fellows and hustled them back in the direction of Horse Guards. Only after the entire troop had turned the corner did he pick up the sack he’d dropped by the side of the street.

  “Me soot,” the boy clutching Fianna Cameron’s white handkerchief against his begrimed forehead cried. He abandoned the scrap of linen to grab the heavy bag from Kit. “Master ’ud whip me sore if I’d lost it.”