Since the window in question was several floors above street level and the marquess commenced to counting the seconds, Reardon squirmed uneasily in his grip.
Michael picked up two of the black books and juggled them. “We know where she was seen last. Put your energy to something more useful.”
Reardon sent Michael a look of gratitude as Gavin dropped his coat and swung his attention to his brother, who now had two books and an ink pot circling.
“Where?” he demanded with such force the ink pot should have shattered.
Slipping the books and pot back to the desk one by one, Michael eyed Gavin skeptically. “What do you intend to do if we tell you?”
“It’s a matter of what I intend to do if you don’t.” The quiet fury of Gavin’s voice spoke louder than his earlier bellows. “You know what to do with these books when I leave here. I’ve a man following Winfrey. You two take care of the others. I’m going after Dillian.”
Reardon still looked ready to launch another protest. Michael averted the confrontation with a shrug. “Your messenger saw her on the road to Arinmede late last evening.”
Cursing low and long, Gavin grabbed his hat and cloak and swept out without so much as a by-your-leave to the men remaining behind.
Taking full advantage of his cousin-in-law’s extensive stable, Gavin had his mount galloping full speed toward the roads of Hertfordshire within the hour. He calculated Dillian had been gone well over twenty-four hours now. Anything could happen in twenty-four hours. His heart rode in his throat as he imagined what a gang of ruffians could do to a woman in just a few short hours.
But she was alive. The messenger had seen her alive and riding toward Arinmede. He thought he just might murder her when he found her. Why in hell had she gone to Arinmede?
Knowing Dillian, any of a thousand and one answers came to mind. He had no intention of fretting his brain to discover which one. He just needed to see that she was safe, and then he would murder her.
Not until he reached the sight of the overgrown pines lining the drive to his ruin of a home did Gavin think to wonder why he concerned himself at all with the wayward brat. He could have stayed in London, caught the thief and arsonist, and allowed Dillian to molder here until he had time to come back and pin her hide to the wall. No wonder Michael and Reardon had looked at him oddly. He was losing his mind.
Or some other more vital part of his anatomy, like his heart. He would consider that later. Right now he must figure out how to trap Dillian all over again, because he’d already figured out her main reason for coming to Arinmede. She could hide in there forever, and no one would ever find her. Except him.
The crumbling stable hardly seemed fit for his valiant horse, but Gavin brushed the horse down, and gave him what oats he could find before slipping back through the midnight darkness. He glanced over the house, finding no lamp burning but the one Matilda kept in the servants’ hall.
Dillian was in there. She had to be. He didn’t stop to decipher the various emotions rampaging through him. First, he would get his hands on Dillian.
He must do this methodically or she would know he was here and deliberately hide. He’d not find her for a week that way. No, he had to think like Dillian. Where would she hide if she didn’t know her enemy or when he would arrive?
Not downstairs. The servants might find her there. The secret passage seemed a better bet. He just prayed she hadn’t found a passage that he hadn’t discovered yet.
Gavin slipped up the back stairs and down the short hall to the master bedroom and the nearest entrance to the passage. Without a candle guiding his way, he could fall over her. He’d left candles aplenty in the master chamber. Just remembering that night Dillian had given herself to him made him ache in more places than the one easily aroused.
He’d been a cad, but she’d been more beautiful than any woman he’d ever known. He wouldn’t allow anyone else to hurt her, not even himself.
He found a candlestick in the holder just inside the bedchamber door, along with the tinderbox. Trying to make no noise, he lit the wick and cupped his hand around the flame until it steadied. Then holding it high, he stepped into the chamber, aiming for the wardrobe and the hidden door.
Gavin didn’t have to go that far. He found Dillian sleeping in the middle of his bed, her dark curls tumbled artlessly over her face, her lavender gown in tatters, and one of his old coats clutched snugly against her breasts.
He wanted to scream at her carelessness. Instead, the sight destroyed some barrier inside him, leaving him wide open and vulnerable to this impish sprite who had stolen his bed and his heart and, apparently, anything resembling his mind.
All thoughts of murder dissipated as he approached the bed and her eyes fluttered open.
“Gavin,” Dillian whispered. She could see the elegant gleam of his white cravat against his bronzed skin, and she smiled sleepily. “You only need an eye patch to make a lovely pirate.”
“I died a thousand deaths on the way out here,” he informed her, sitting down to discard his shoes. “I think I ought to make you suffer a few of them. Would you at least tell me truly what the hell you’re doing here?”
She grimace in disgust. “I was stupid enough to let someone abduct me. It was quite unpleasant, and I thought I might starve.” She looked at him curiously as he stripped off his coat. “It seemed rather odd that they took me on the road to Hertfordshire.”
“Or Bedford,” he reminded her. “Or York for all that matters. Where is Anglesey?”
“Bedford,” she admitted sleepily, her caution now diverted to another area. “What do you think you’re doing?” she asked as he pulled off his shirt.
“Going to bed. I haven’t had a wink of sleep in two days. Move over.”
She moved over. And when the Marquess of Effingham lay sprawled, half-naked beside her, Dillian curled up next to the heat of him and promptly returned to the soundest sleep she’d known in weeks.
In the early hours of dawn, she woke with her tattered dress around her waist. She lay spoon fashion within the curve of Gavin’s long body, with his big hand proprietarily resting on her nearly bare hip. She held her breath, uncertain what to do, not wanting to wake him but not wanting to let him think her wanton if he should wake.
She knew she should break away when he began caressing her, but she couldn’t quite find it in herself to do so. His hand drifted higher to cup the mound of her breast, and the muscles in her womb clenched with desire.
“Gavin?” she whispered a trifle breathlessly.
“I want to love you properly,” he murmured, his voice reflecting a hint of perplexity, “but I don’t know how to go about it. If I let you up from here, you’ll run, and I may never have another chance.”
Dillian turned on her back to discover Gavin’s scarred face hovering over her. She’d never seen him uncertain. Gavin was a man who rode out into the world with clear purpose and a course of action.
She traced the scar along his upper lip. “I need you,” she whispered, disbelieving her own ears but knowing deep inside her that she spoke the truth. “Hold me?”
He bent and kissed her nose, the corner of her mouth, and her ear. “I’ll hold you forever, if I can. I warn you now.”
She ignored the warning. Words meant nothing. The heat of his kiss meant everything.
She felt safe here. For the first time in her life, she’d found a place where she belonged. Dillian wrapped her arms around his neck and knew the security of his greater strength. She wouldn’t question the wrongness of what she did, or the possible results. She just needed the reassurance of his strong arms holding her, his hard body sheltering her, just for the moment. Just until she knew what to do next.
Gavin’s tongue swirled inside her mouth, and every ounce of her yearned for more. Dillian arched into him. He brushed aside her gown and chemise to find purchase around her breast. She moaned in pure pleasure when his fingers sought the aching crest.
“I want all of you,” Gavin
said harshly, burying his face against her throat and nibbling tender flesh. “I can’t pretend I’m a gentleman any longer. I’ll not play the gallant, Dillian. I mean to take you and keep you.”
She knew his words should alarm her, but his roaming hands had aroused her to a plane beyond fear.
She still believed that minutes later when the remains of her clothes disappeared over the side of the bed. Gavin still wore his tight breeches, but his arousal strained so hard against the buttons that she couldn’t bear letting him suffer longer. She couldn’t believe her boldness when she reached to unfasten him, but she worked faster at his deep groan of approval.
When, between them, they had the buttons undone, Gavin murmured his ecstasies to her breasts as he pushed them together and devoted his attention to each in turn. Dillian quivered in delight as he suckled and stroked, then she nearly melted when he slid his hand down between her legs to stroke her there.
She had no understanding of the hold this ungentlemanly marquess had over her. A scarred beast, a military American, a man who scorned all she knew and loved, he ought to send her fleeing into the countryside. Instead, she opened her arms and heart and herself to him and took him inside her.
He drove deep, possessing her as he never had before. She tilted her hips to take him even deeper, and he held her there, not allowing her to twist away when their rhythm grew more forceful. Waves of sensation washed away all conscious thought. She rose to meet him as surely as the ocean met the sand. When the breakers finally crashed against the shore, she cried out at the rush of his seed.
Only then did she realize what his warning meant. He had meant to claim her, and he had.
He’d planted his seed deep within her, where it could take root and grow. She might leave this bed carrying his child. In this, he had not protected her. Not this time.
Chapter Thirty-six
“Where do you think you’re going?” Breathless from running down the front stairs, Dillian grabbed the belt she’d made of Gavin’s cravat to keep her loose boy’s breeches from falling. She’d stolen one of his shirts from the wardrobe, and the huge billowing sleeves apparently enhanced her ghostly image. The maid dusting the front hall fainted dead away at the sight of her. Dillian didn’t stop. She refused to let Gavin get away without her.
Even seeing her flying from the house didn’t keep the dratted man from mounting his stallion. He scowled in disapproval as she grabbed his reins.
“I left Michael with those damned journals,” he explained. “It’s time I found out who most needs them destroyed. You know how to hide yourself here. You should be safe until I return.”
Direct and to the point. He didn’t even raise an eyebrow at her ungainly attire. Dillian thought she could love a man like that, but right now she wanted to clobber him. “Those are my journals! I have every right to know what’s in them. and I want to see the villain thrown in the darkest dungeon we can find. You go nowhere without me, Gavin Lawrence!”
He leaned over and pried her fingers loose of the reins. “I risked your life the other day. I don’t intend risking it again.”
She tangled her fist more forcefully in the leather. “You have stones for brains, Mr. Lawrence! You risked nothing then, and you risk nothing now. I take full responsibility for my own actions. Let me go with you.”
“Dillian, if you don’t take your hands off those reins now, I’ll pry them off, and you won’t like it if I do!” he threatened, catching her wrist in a powerful grip.
“You may spew pebbles from that stony brain as you will. Lord Effingham, but you won’t scare me. Take me up with you at once, or I shall follow on my own.” She’d thought he’d know that by now, but it seemed he needed reminding.
He glared, and before Dillian realized what he intended, Gavin swung down from the horse and gathered her up in his arms, holding her so close against him she feared to breathe.
“I’m not your father, Dillian,” he growled against her ear. “I protect what is mine. Someone dared harm you. I will teach them and anyone else with similar thoughts that they can’t get away with that. Don’t stand in my way, Dillian.”
“I hate military men!” She tried screaming at him, but the words emerged as a whimper. “Can’t you see that if you must fight, I must fight beside you?”
She didn’t know where her anger had gone, but tears threatened to take its place. He would ride off as her father had and never return. She couldn’t allow it.
Her hot tears scorched through the cambric of Gavin’s shirt. Her words confused him. No one had ever offered to fight beside him before. He had just assumed it was his responsibility to defend those weaker than himself. Michael had found ways of working around him. No one else had ever tried.
“Dillian, I can do this better if I’m not worrying about you,” he said, caressing her disheveled curls. Her tears crumbled his defenses, but he couldn’t let her know that.
“You won’t come back,” she accused. “You won’t! I want to go with you.”
Gavin recognized that feeling of desertion all too well. He’d learned to overcome it, he’d thought. But he saw now that he’d merely isolated himself from everyone so they couldn’t desert him, so no one could hurt him again.
“Dillian, I’ll come back,” he promised, lifting her teary face from his shirt. “This is my home, and I won’t abandon it, or you. I’m asking you to trust me. Will you do that?”
The shimmering tear drops in violet eyes nearly undid him. She seemed so horribly vulnerable. At the same time he saw her intelligence, knew her trust rested not on blind instinct but her experience and wisdom.
“Is Blanche safe?” she demanded.
“I should imagine she’s on one of the Earl of Mellon’s estates right now, surrounded by armed guards and my indomitable cousin and her husband. She’s safe. You’re not. You’re the one they really want, Dillian.”
She nodded reluctant agreement. Her fingers traced Gavin’s scars, loving them with her touch. “I trust you,” she finally admitted. “I just don’t trust your brand of heroics. I want you back alive and in one piece, not on a stretcher or in a casket.”
He smiled grimly. “I assure you, madam, that a weak-kneed politician and a duke or two are no match for someone who took on the British navy with little more than a leaky rowboat. If I know you’re safe, I can concentrate on bringing the culprits to justice.”
She released the reins and stepped away. “All right. I’ll trust you,” she agreed. “But you had best keep messengers on the road night and day so I know you’re alive. If I don’t hear from you by tomorrow evening, I’m coming after you.”
Tilting her chin, Gavin kissed her quickly, and swung back in the saddle before she tempted him to more. “With any luck at all, Miss Whitnell, I shall return here personally by then. Keep the sheets warm.”
* * * *
“If she hadn’t had that blamed pistol with her, there’s no telling what could have happened,” Gavin raged as he stalked up and down the library in the Earl of Mellon’s town house.
“We made sure she knew how to defend herself,” Reardon claimed in his own defense.
Gavin swung around and glared at him. “She shouldn’t have to defend herself,” he shouted. “She should have friends and family looking after her. If His Majesty’s bloody damned soldiers can’t do it, then I will!”
“I’m not her bloody damned father!” Reardon yelled back. “I thought she was provided for. I didn’t know the journals meant anything. Devil take it, I was in a hospital for a year! What did you want me to do?”
Michael flipped through a book tracing the genealogy of English nobility, adding more scratchings to the mounds of paper collecting on the desk. “The British are so predictable,” he murmured.
Reardon ignored him, but Gavin swung around to point an accusing finger at his brother. “Don’t you dare leave here until I’m done with you. Every time I want to talk to you, you disappear. If you’ve broken the code, what did you find in those journals?”
Michael tipped his chair back, and tickling his nose with the quill of his pen, stared at the elaborate moldings on the ceiling. “I learned Colonel Whitnell thought very highly of himself and not nearly so much of his superiors, except Wellington, of course. He and Lady Blanche’s father, whom he calls Perceval regardless of which title he held at the time, enjoyed wine, women and song, not necessarily in that order.”
Reardon scowled, but held his tongue. Gavin reached over the desk and appropriated the stack of papers, shuffling through them, stopping occasionally to examine one more closely. “Go on,” he said as he read. ‘Don’t make me read the whole blamed thing.”
“Whitnell was thorough. You have to give him credit for that,” Michael continued, idly separating the quill’s feathers. “He was in charge of munitions for a while. He kept records of what he ordered, what he received, and their disbursements. I don’t particularly know what set him off, but he started writing friends back in England, inquiring into the manufactories of certain armaments. He had Perceval write friends in government concerning the actual expenditures to different companies. He apparently had lists and inventories comparing costs, invoices, and such. He hid those. They’re not in the books.”
Gavin had stopped reading, and Reardon stopped scowling. Both men watched Michael expectantly.
Michael shrugged. “He concluded the arms from certain manufactories were substandard for the actual items invoiced, that someone billed the government for two and three times the value of what actually was shipped, and that major amounts of government funds were siphoned into someone’s pocket at the expense of Wellington’s army. He speculated more than greed lay behind the plot, but he didn’t succeed in proving it before he died.”
Gavin’s fist crumpled around the sheets he held. “Who? Damn you, Michael, who?”
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