Tempting the Scoundrel (Private Arrangements Book 2)

by Katrina Kendrick

  Nick followed her up the stairs. “Alex.”

  “Not yet. I’m still fuming.”

  “I know,” he said casually, shoving his hands into his pockets. They rounded into the private wing. “Listen. What Latimer said—”

  “Don’t repeat it.”

  “Wasn’t going to.” He looked askance at her. “You were magnificent.”

  “Nicholas.”

  “And I adore you.”

  She shook her head and let out a gusty laugh. “Enough flattery,” she said, jerking open the bedchamber door. “Inside, please. Take off the waistcoat and the shirt.”

  He smiled slowly as she shut the door behind her. “I like where this is going.”

  God, but he was beautiful like this. Fierce, sexual, confident. Desire made it so easy to forget everything he had done, but Alexandra could not allow it. She couldn’t let herself forget. “You’re bleeding through your clothes. Let me see your wound.”

  “Now I hate where this is going. Let’s try again. I take off my shirt, and you . . . ?”

  “I’m about to throw a vase at your head, Nicholas.”

  At her exasperated look, he chuckled. “Very well. Be my nurse, then.”

  He deftly removed his waistcoat, then lifted his shirt over his head and dropped it.

  How could Alexandra have forgotten Nick’s beauty? He was devastating enough in his clothes, but the long, lean lines of his body were the exquisite product of a man who saw no value in leisure. A part of her wished she’d had the opportunity to touch him more, explore him thoroughly. At the inn where he had taken her virginity, the candlelight had hidden so much from her. Then, on the train later, they had been covered by blankets as he’d taken her hard and fast on the slim bed in their private rail car.

  He’d made it seem like they had all the time in the world. And he’d smiled at Alexandra exactly like that. Exactly.

  The next day, she’d found out how many lies that smile hid.

  His eyes held hers in an unspoken challenge. Daring her to look away, perhaps. Or daring her to come closer. “Nothing you haven’t seen before,” he murmured, repeating her words from the other night.

  A pang went through her. Did he hurt at the reminder of what they shared? Had he thought of their journey to Stratfield Saye in the darkness of his bedroom? Did he touch himself at night and recall the swaying bed on the train where they’d spent so many hours? She did—and she hated herself for wanting him.

  But Alexandra would not look away. Admiring his beauty was not the same as approval. She had to remember he was not like a lion. Lions acted out of survival; this one had made the conscious choice to betray her.

  “Turning my words around on me?” she asked. “It’s not necessary. I remember.”

  A soft knock came from the door. Alexandra took the bowl of warm water, towels, and bandages from the waiting maid, then dismissed her.

  Nick settled in the wingback chair. When Alexandra came to him, he tilted his head back, and she saw the pulse at his throat. She wanted to touch it, press her lips to it. Perhaps his heartbeat held answers, depending on whether it raced or slowed at the closeness of her. That was real.

  “Do you wish you could forget?” She didn’t know if he was asking about their intimacy, or everything—meeting him at all.

  Yes, she almost said. But, then: No.

  Never.

  “Do you want the answer to that question?” she asked instead.

  Didn’t he understand that she couldn’t do this again? That she couldn’t give him another glimpse into her heart? The pieces had taken her so long to put back together; she had painstakingly placed them day after day, month after month, year after year. And like anything repaired after being shattered, it was more fragile than ever.

  Something flickered through his features, then he lowered his lashes. “Very well. Something easier. What did Latimer mean about Lady Elaine?”

  She examined the cut along his shoulder, sliding her hand under his arm to raise it. His skin was warm. Touching him under such pretense was easy. She could pretend her fingertips lingered to check over his injury rather than admit the truth: it had been four years, and she missed the feel of him. “He proposed to Lady Elaine Featherstone at the start of the season. Elaine came to me and asked me to . . . investigate him.”

  Nick’s eyebrows rose. “. . . Investigate?”

  “I have contacts in my work that I send inquiries regarding certain individuals of interest. Aristocratic men are easy.” She slid the cloth up his arm. “They are stupid, arrogant, and like to brag about even their most mediocre accomplishments.”

  Nick let out a laugh. “My god, you missed your calling as a spy for the Home Office.”

  Alexandra allowed herself a small smile. “Well, I discovered that aside from mistreating servants, Latimer’s gambling problem has nearly bankrupted his family. It’s all very quiet. He had enough to keep up appearances so Elaine wouldn’t know he was after her fortune. She broke things off after I told her. Did you really take everything he had?”

  “I left him the house,” he insisted.

  Alexandra rolled her eyes. “Perhaps we should consider Latimer as a nemesis on your list. He hates me enough to abduct me. He did try to stab you. I could see him vowing revenge.”

  “He’d be the first name I’d toss into the fire,” Nick said, wincing as she pressed the cloth to his cut and held it there. “It’s not him.”

  “No? First reason.”

  “He’s a fucking idiot who can’t even put his own trousers on.”

  “Good reason.” With her free hand, Alexandra reached for the bandage and put it in place of the cloth. “Back to an empty list, then.”

  Nick watched her slowly bandage his arm. “Have you investigated potential husbands before? For other women?”

  “A few,” she said lightly. “You might say I have some experience with husbands hiding things.”

  Nick fell quiet. Alex held her breath for what he’d say next, regretting that she had brought up their catastrophic marriage. But Nick only asked, “And where did you learn to defend yourself?”

  Alexandra bit her lip to keep from smiling. “Perhaps that secret ought to stay mine.”

  Nick looked up at her through his eyelashes. “What if I promised to keep it?”

  Oh, but when he looked at her like that, she wanted to tell him things. She wanted to float in Stratfield Lake with him by her side, and reveal every secret she’d kept over these years. But her secrets were all she had left to protect her heart.

  Alexandra forced a smile. “Maybe I’ll tell you another time.”

  They both knew she wasn’t going to. That after this was over, she wouldn’t be this close to him again. Alexandra comforted herself with thoughts of another continent, of the journey she’d take on the ship, and the ocean that would one day separate them. She thought of the guidebooks she read, the passages she memorized. She was going to explore parts of the world.

  The ones without him.

  Alexandra focused on Nick’s injuries. “The blood made it look worse,” she said, to fill the silence. “You should check it again in the morning, but I don’t think you’ll need stitches.”

  He made some noise. “Wouldn’t matter if I did.”

  Yes, she knew why. She could see the scars across his chest and back, old injuries that belied his upbringing. She had wondered, once, where a gentleman might obtain such injuries, but excused those thoughts away. Perhaps he had travelled to dangerous places. Perhaps he had obtained them in an accident. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.

  Excuses.

  These scars were part of his brutal past, one she never asked about. Swipes across his chest, star shaped marks, some ragged and thick. One along his chest . . .

  Her fingertips skated across it before she could stop herself.

  Nick’s hand caught hers. He held it there, waiting quietly. For her to say something? Or maybe he held her hand for other reasons, ones she couldn’t begin to contempla
te or didn’t want to. They stayed together like that for longer than Alexandra should have allowed.

  “You going to ask?” he said quietly.

  “Ask what?” But she already knew the answer.

  His eyes seemed to darken as he pressed her fingers to his scar. “You know what. You never demanded answers from me. Never asked about my past. Never even asked me why.”

  Alexandra didn’t wish to tell him that she had investigated him, too. That she kept her notes in the box with his articles, a reminder of her youthful folly. That understanding more of him never seemed to matter; it didn’t take the pain away.

  “Isn’t that the problem?” she said. “I shouldn’t have had to. I trusted you were telling me the truth. I married you because I trusted you.”

  His hand tightened around hers. “No secrets between us, Alex. Not this time. Don’t let me be like the men you’ve investigated, known for a liar.”

  “But you are,” she whispered.

  Nick’s eyes were bright, almost fevered. “Ask. Please, Alex. Ask.” At her hesitation, he continued, “You ought to know a thing or two about the man whose name you bear.”

  Say something, she told herself. It should have been so easy to reply that she didn’t intend to bear his name any longer. I want a divorce. Such a statement would have been so final, a period at the end of their tragic story. If she wanted to dig the blade deeper, she could mention the ship, the length of the ocean, and the miles of distance she would one day put between them.

  But these words would not come. This was the most vulnerable she had ever seen him, and something in her could not walk away without knowing who she was leaving behind.

  Alexandra’s gaze lowered to the scar. Just one of many. None of them made him any less beautiful. They were a map of his past, the things he’d kept hidden from her. “Tell me this one, then. Only this one.”

  Nick shut his eyes and loosed a breath. She wondered if it was in pain or relief. “When I was a kid in the Nichol, some toff took a liking to my ma. She worked the streets, did whatever she could to bring coin home and raise me as best she could. This toff treated her like shite but paid her better than most, so she kept him around.”

  Alexandra noticed the subtle thickening of his Irish accent, the lulling cadence of it. When she’d known him as Nicholas Spencer, his English accent had been lovely, but this? Oh, she loathed that he’d had to hide it from her. Nick’s voice was the most beautiful thing she had ever heard.

  “Anyway,” he said, running his fingertips along the back of her hand. “He showed up at our door one day looking for a quick fuck, so ma has to oblige him. He’d been paying our rent. Who was she to deny him? He roughed her up, of course. I heard it from the next room. When I went to defend her, he whacks me on my arse with his cane. I come to realize that thing has a blade hidden in it when he swipes me here. Told me it was something to remember, the next time I think of interfering.”

  Alexandra swallowed back the bile in her throat. She had known Nick’s past was full of cruelty. A man like him could not grow up to become King of the East End without knowing a thing or two about awful men. But the thought of someone deliberately hurting him made her feel sick.

  “How old were you?”

  He lifted a shoulder. “Seven, I think. Ma died not long after, anyway.”

  “I’m sorry, Nick,” she whispered.

  Nick looked at her. “I don’t want your pity. That’s not what this is for.”

  “What is it for, then?” she asked tiredly.

  He reached up and cupped her cheek. “Just truth, Alex. Nothing else.”

  No, that look was too intense. It said too much. Who was he to make her feel these things? He wasn’t her infatuation anymore. She wouldn’t be dazzled by a pretty face and a kind smile. He had lied to her, betrayed her, abandoned her, and insulted her.

  She moved out of his reach, the distance between them already as vast as an ocean. She didn’t need a ship to cross it. “You gave me that too late.”

  He didn’t look angry. Not frustrated, either. Only understanding. “I know it,” he told her. “But let me be clear: you still have the right to demand answers from me. Doesn’t matter how many years pass, you will always have that right.”

  She stared at him, at his scars bared to her. Tell me about that one on your wrist, she wanted to say. Then another, then another. All those missing pieces of his past accumulated like the notes in her box.

  Perhaps she needed them before she closed the lid on her folly for good.

  Before she could answer, an insistent knock came to the door. “Thorne?” It was O’Sullivan. “We’ve got a situation.”

  Thorne didn’t look away from Alexandra. “What is it?”

  “The lads found another body.”

  Chapter 13

  “Stay here,” Thorne said to Alex as he shoved on his coat. The movement made him wince, damn Latimer to hell.

  “Absolutely not,” Alex said, jerking open the connecting door to her bedchamber. She disappeared inside and he heard her rustling through her wardrobe. “I’m coming with you,” she called out, voice muffled from the depths of her closet.

  “It’s out of the question.”

  “Someone paid a man to abduct me from my own bedchamber,” Alex said as she stomped about her room. “He’s now responsible for the murder of three people. What am I supposed to do? Toil away in my bedchamber? Worry after you all night?”

  She’d worry? Thorne came to the connecting door. “You’d—” He sucked in a breath at the chaos within. “What happened in here?”

  Alexandra looked offended. “Happened? Nothing happened.” She gestured to the piles of paper all over the bloody place. “This is what work looks like.”

  “That’s not what my office looks like.”

  “This is what my work looks like.” She buttoned up her coat and pushed past him. “Don’t change the subject. I’m coming with you.”

  Thorne blocked her exit. “You don’t need to see this.”

  “Nicholas Thorne,” she said, tapping her foot, “you seem to be under the ludicrous impression that I’m asking for your permission. I assure you, I am not. Now step aside or I will bodily remove you.”

  With a muttered oath, Thorne yanked open the door. Alexandra swept past him and together, they hurried down the hall to the back stairs of the Brimstone.

  O’Sullivan eyed Alex as they approached. “I wasn’t aware her ladyship was coming.”

  “Is viewing a corpse some kind of masculine bonding activity? Does it have a sign over it saying No Women Allowed to See the Dead Body?”

  O’Sullivan seemed to mentally debate this. “Solid point.”

  “Mr. O’Sullivan, you”—she flashed her teeth—“are not an idiot. Congratulations.” She shoved past him out the door.

  O’Sullivan looked over at Thorne. “What just happened?”

  “You agreed with her, you fucking fool. Now she likes you.”

  “Oh,” O’Sullivan said. “Shit.”

  The Nichol brought back so many memories for Thorne. He recalled running through these winding alleyways, picking pockets, doing worse. The East End wasn’t easy; you had to have a bit of hardness to endure the life it gave you.

  It was strange, how a place could hold such joy and sorrow for him in equal measure. Some memories—like those of his ma bringing home sweets when she could spare the blunt—were lights in his otherwise dark past. Others still haunted him. Like the fear after his ma died. Or the stomach churning hunger that made him so desperate for food and shelter that he took it where he found it. He knew every labyrinthine turn, every nook, every cranny. He’d slept in them all, once or twice, when things got difficult.

  Back then, the East End had been in worse condition: filthier, the buildings unsafe and crowded. It still wasn’t a pretty place; the Nichol, though, got a sight better since he’d gained control over the vestry. Not by sitting on the board, of course, but in the way he knew best: bribery, intimidation, viol
ence—if necessary. They weren’t kind things, no, but Nicholas Thorne couldn’t afford to be kind to some men. So he put the fear in them.

  Thorne glanced at Alex, wondering about the thoughts behind her calm expression. Was she disgusted? Did she inhale the stink and wish she were back in St. James’s?

  But no. She didn’t seem fazed by the ramshackle buildings, by the filthy drunk who leered at her as she passed. Thorne couldn’t blame the bloke; she was beautiful, determined, her strides purposeful. She stood out like a rose in the gloom.

  “Ho there!” O’Sullivan called out as they neared the group of lads cloistered around a prone body hidden in the darkness. Flickering gaslights nearby cast long shadows down the wet, gleaming street.

  “Mr. O’Sullivan!” The littlest one ran over and tackled O’Sullivan’s legs.

  O’Sullivan clapped the boy on the shoulder. “Thomas? What are you doing out here, lad? You ought to be home with your ma.”

  “Tommy insisted on it, ‘e did,” came another voice. George, one of the older lads, walked over and touched his cap to greet Thorne. “Nasty bit o’ work ower there, Mr. Thorne.”

  Thorne put a restraining hand on Alex’s arm to keep her from investigating. “You see anyone around this way, George?”

  “Nah. Empty by th’ time I got ‘ere. That bloke were cold a while.” He eyed Alexandra in interest. George was, after all, sixteen. Just learning how ladies worked, and Alex was a hard one to miss. “Pretty piece. Heard you had a woman up at the Brimstone, but I thought Fi and Lottie were tellin’ tales again.”

  “Never say you saw her,” Thorne said. He pulled some coins from his pocket. “Take these. Get Thomas and the other lads some supper. And the rest to your ma. Don’t even be thinking of spending it on a woman, or I’ll have your hide if I hear of it.”

  George laughed, taking the coins. “Aye, sir.”