Undeniable Rogue (The Rogues Club Book One)

by Annette Blair

  That was when Sabrina knew that there would be no flight this time for her, because if she ran now, she would leave her heart, her very self behind.

  She was his and he was hers.

  She loved him. God help her, she did. With a love, the likes of which, she never imagined could be hers. Pray God, such a vulnerable love would not destroy them both.

  Sabrina rose from the bed, took the purse and threw it in the corner. Neither of them turned, even when the cloth bag split and coins scattered and rolled to every corner.

  He cared for her, Gideon thought.

  He cared for her, but all she cared about was that he should have enough money to keep her.

  That broke him. Always for the money with her. He had almost forgotten that everything she did was for money. He wanted to ask if she had finally taken his seed for the money as well. But he could not, for he could not bear her answer.

  It might destroy his last thread of hope.

  It almost did destroy his pride, because, God help him, in that moment, he did not even care. He wanted her any way he could have her, as he had from the first.

  He cared only that she was safe, and here, and his.

  His.

  He took in the picture of her then, almost defeated as she moved to the chiffonier, where he had left her hairpins. She bent to the side, to cascade her hair in that direction, her profile perfect. She took the fall of hair, twined it and set it atop her head, slipping hairpins into it, before turning to regard him.

  In the full glow of candlelight, her breasts were high and heavy, proud and free. Sabrina. His wife, the woman he loved, the most beautiful—

  The candle’s flame flickered and brightened in the breeze he stirred, as he moved toward her. Light danced off...a scar, clarifying it, bringing it into stark relief.

  The closer he got, the more such imperfections did he notice. Another and another, too many of a sudden. Scars slashed her shoulders, a breast.

  Gideon grasped those fine shoulders and turned her so he could examine each desecration marking her porcelain skin.

  Her scars, Gideon thought absurdly, were all on the outside.

  Other scars marked the nape of her neck, the back of an arm.

  Rage, and an abounding tenderness, filled him, to the point that he feared he must crush her in his embrace, beat on her tormentor, or smash something.

  Taking his hands from her, lest he leave bruises of his own, Gideon fingered one particularly thick white blemish along the back of a shoulder. “Tell me about this one.”

  “I...fell against a hot poker.”

  “He attacked you with a hot poker.”

  Sabrina regarded the floor.

  “And this one?” He kissed the circular scar at her nape.

  “A nail.”

  “A bloody, huge nail,” he snapped.

  “Sticking out of the wall, and I got...pushed...more than once, against it.”

  She had been pinned, literally, to the wall. Gideon’s stomach churned, his throat closed. Something constricted his chest. “I want to kill him.”

  “You cannot. Someone else already did.”

  “Would that I could end his despicable life a second time.”

  “You would have to wait your turn. He was much despised.” Sabrina wanted to tell Gideon then, that she feared she knew Brian’s murderer, and that Lowick must even now be looking for her. But she could not.

  “Why, Sabrina? Why did you marry him?”

  “I was seventeen when my father sold me to Brian. I believed Brian must be an improvement over my father. In such cases, one always assumes that the unknown must be better.”

  She shrugged. “As it turned out, they were two of a kind.”

  Dear God, Gideon thought. How many men had she been wronged by, passed to? Her father gave her to her first husband, whom she must have fled, to go to Hawksworth, who passed her to Gideon. Lord, this could end badly.

  Or had it already done so?

  “Did you kill your husband?”

  “No.”

  “More’s the pity.”

  “I am a coward.”

  “You have more strength than ten of the best men who fought Boney beside me.”

  “I endured.”

  “You survived.”

  “I did not remove my children soon enough from danger

  “You got your children to safety.”

  She had not. Oh she had not. “I got them to you, which is as close to safety as they can get.”

  “But not complete safety.”

  Long moments of silence passed during which time Gideon became more and more agitated. “I had thought that we were beyond secrets, you and I.”

  She shivered. “I am afraid.”

  He grabbed a blanket from the bed and wrapped it around her. “Of me?”

  “Not so much anymore.”

  “The day you become certain that I will not hurt you, is the day I pray for and will celebrate.”

  “Celebrate now. I am certain you will not hurt me.”

  “Then why are you afraid?”

  “I am not even certain why. Not quite.”

  “You do not think me strong enough, or enough yours, to stand with you?”

  “I think you the most wonderful man it has ever been my privilege to know. I thank God daily for your presence in our lives.”

  “But?”

  “You are human, and only a man, after all.”

  “After all.” Frustration ate at Gideon, fury, but over what, precisely, he did not know. “The danger you fear is from an outside source?”

  “Yes, and no.”

  “Damn it, Sabrina!” Gideon turned away in anger, and came back as fast. “Damn, damn. Damn! You must trust me enough to tell me.”

  “If I did, I would place you in danger.”

  “To hell with your lack of faith in me. Tell me, damn it!”

  She turned away from him, instead. “I cannot.”

  Crushed, almost broken, Gideon regarded her steadily. “Tell me, at least, if I must set the runners to watching the house day and night.”

  “You must.”

  “Can you give me a description of your enemy?”

  “Satan’s worst nightmare.”

  Gideon ran both hands through his hair. “Veronica must be one you see as your enemy?”

  “Yes, but not only her.”

  “A man, too, you see as dangerous?”

  Sabrina nodded.

  “He is tall with a beard. Confirm or deny.”

  “Short and clean-shaven.”

  “A skinny man.”

  “Sturdy, barrel-chested and thick-limbed.”

  Gideon saw that Sabrina was breaking under the weight of his questioning, but he needed to know more. “His eyes, they—”

  She sobbed. “No more, please.”

  Gideon lifted her into his arms and carried her to his bed.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Gideon had left Sabrina alone in his bed, almost as soon as she fell asleep.

  From the moment he extracted from her something of a description of her tormentor—though he still had no understanding of her torment, which worried the hell out of him,—and from the degree of her fear, he knew he must do something immediate to set her mind at rest and protect her and the children.

  He must act quickly.

  For his own peace of mind, he went first into Sabrina’s bedchamber to look in on Juliana in her cradle and assure himself that all was fine with her. She slept on her stomach, and he could not see much more of her than her tiny hand covering her pink little face, but she was there, safe, and sleeping well. Then he dressed and went up to check on the boys. He covered Damon’s shoulders and tucked one of Rafe’s feet beneath his blanket.

  Everyone in his world was tucked into their beds, safe.

  Drizzle gave a squeaky yip as Gideon was leaving, and he stooped down to scratch behind a small ear, and even the pup went back to sleep.

  On the second floor, Gideon woke Dogg
ett, then Waredraper. Doggett had not patrolled since his accident, but it was time again.

  After the men dressed, they met him in his study. “I need your help,” Gideon said. “Sabrina is afraid of someone, and though I do not have a name, I need you to begin patrolling again, both of you. Day and night. Keep an eye out for anyone who looks suspicious.”

  Gideon took to pacing. “You once said that you would do anything for Sabrina. Well do this. Prove to her that she and the children are safe at all times, beginning now.”

  “Can you give us a description of the fellow?” Waredraper asked.

  “Only that he is robust, thick-limbed and barrel-chested.”

  “That will have to do,” their seamstress said, rising.

  “Thank you.” Before he left, Gideon made for Sabrina’s sitting room to see if he could find something that might give him, or Bow Street, a clue as to her tormentor’s identity.

  She might not appreciate him going through her things, but he remembered her scars, and for that reason, felt justified in trying to help her, despite her reluctance to trust.

  Other than her writing things, he found a canister containing a hundred pounds sterling, a small fortune to someone for whom money has always been a problem, he supposed. What he did not understand was her reason for secreting it away from him, when he gave her a more-than-generous allowance.

  The canister was, as far as he could see, the only item of value in her desk. Before he left the house, he took the container of money to his study and locked it in the safe.

  After he did, Gideon went straight to the mews, behind the house, to saddle Deviltry, for it was unlikely that even the stable lad was awake at this early hour.

  Unfortunately, Grandmama would soon be, because Gideon was going to awaken her, himself, and persuade her to pack up her household and move back to Kent today. He wanted her to take Sabrina and the children with her, for he believed they would be safer away from London.

  On his way to Grandmama’s he would stop at Bow Street. If it was not too early, he would request ‘round the clock protection for his family. If it was too early, he would go back after he left Grandmama’s.

  Last would be a very quick stop at his solicitor’s, to have the man set up an account in Sabrina’s name with the eighty-five hundred pounds she had won at The St. Eustace Winter Fair. It was hers. She had earned it, every penny.

  Not only had she stayed when she thought he was poor, she had tried to help him by winning the race purse and giving it to him.

  Lord, if he had not already loved her— The realization stopped him in his tracks. Did he?

  Yes, he loved her. He had not even realized it. Perhaps it had only taken root sometime last night. Perhaps when she stood on his bed and ordered him not to come to her unless he was naked, if you please. Or when she helped him remove that second boot. Perhaps when he had seen her scars and wished they were his, wished he could claim all her pain.

  He supposed his love for her had been sneaking up on him for some time. Perhaps, since she threw flour in his face, or when she made a conquest of England’s Prince.

  When he loved her, mattered not; he only wished that she loved him in return. Though life would probably go easier on them both, if she simply trusted him.

  Ah, but he wanted her love.

  He needed her love.

  He needed her.

  * * *

  When Sabrina awoke alone, she realized that within the ultimate tenderness of their second loving, Gideon had made their first encounter, earlier in the night, seem almost brutal.

  She thought then, that he might have attempted that second time, to make love to her.

  If that was his intent, he had succeeded.

  He had cherished her into forgetting the ugliness that marked her. He had carried her all the way to heaven and promised her eternity.

  Then why, when she slept, did he leave her?

  Had he taken a disgust of her, when he awoke and realized the horror she had brought to their marriage?

  Like him, the scattered coins were gone, and Sabrina did not know whether to be pleased or saddened by the fact.

  Foolishly afraid that she would never see him again, Sabrina rose to a more-than-frantic wail from her daughter.

  * * *

  Not fifteen minutes after Gideon left by way of the mews behind the house, Damon woke and went to his favorite spot on the window-seat, with its view to the street out front. What he saw made him run for his brother.

  “Rafe, wake up.”

  Rafferty sat up and rubbed the sleep from his eyes. “What? What is wrong?”

  “He is there, across the street again. The man who watches us. Come.”

  Rafe fell backward in the bed, moaning. “It is still nighttime.”

  Damon pulled his twin’s covers off. “Wake up. Come and see.”

  “No.” Rafe pulled them back up. “Leave me be.”

  “But there is something about him. He reminds me of….” Damon tugged on Rafe’s arm. “Just come and look. Now.”

  “In a while,” Rafe said turning over. “I just need one more sleep.”

  “No. You will not sleep when I need you to see that man. Rafe, he reminds me of...of Uncle Bryceson.

  “That is not funny,” Rafe said, yawning, hugely and hugging his pillow tighter, fighting suddenly to stay asleep, though he opened one eye. “Uncle Bryceson died at Waterloo. Mama would scold you for your faradiddle.”

  “Suppose he is not dead, after all, and is watching over us? Suppose that, hunh?”

  Rafe sighed and sat up, allowing himself to be tugged from his bed, dragging his feet on principle, when he was curious enough to run to the window and see Damon’s ghost. He even threw in a complaint about sisters being quieter than brothers.

  “Look, there,” Damon said. “Does that man not look like uncle Bryceson, if he were not bent and used a cane and had scars and longish hair like a lion?”

  “I think you are having another bad dream, and what happened to your dragon?” Rafe picked up the purring Mincemeat, sliding against his leg. “All I see is a lonely, old man.”

  “Then why does he watch us all the time? Answer me that.”

  “All the time?” Rafe snorted. “Have you seen him more than twice, then? And what makes you think he can see us? It is almost still dark out, and he looks so old and broken, he might also be blind.”

  “He is not blind.”

  “Is.”

  “Is not.”

  “Wave at him, then. Go ahead. Wave.”

  Rafferty waved and laughed, until the watcher shrugged his shoulders, and waved back. But before Rafe could react, he turned to a scraping sound behind him, then something covered his face, making it difficult to breathe. Panic clawed at his middle. “Damon!” he shouted, kicking out with instinct. “Damon, you stop this right now.”

  “Help,” Damon yelled. “I am caught.”

  Mincemeat was torn from Rafe’s arms.

  Rafe screamed, heard his brother screaming, until a blow silenced him, as the next did for Damon.

  Below, in the hazy gray of awakening dawn, the watcher, straightened, despite the pain in the action. “Damon! Rafe!” he shouted.

  Neither boy returned to the window.

  The scarred man was not even certain what he had seen. Perhaps Demon and Rapscallion were only playing a trick on him, except that it was a bit early in the day, even for those two.

  Then the watcher saw, just down the road, two ruffians, each with a thick, rolled rug over his shoulder, emerging from the mews road, several houses down from Stanthorpe Place. Side by side, the rug-toting rotters made their scurrying way toward Henrietta Street and disappeared from sight.

  The watcher made to charge forward, as if he would run after them, but he was thwarted by his bad leg. He tripped and dropped his cane, cursed and glanced down the street, but he saw nothing save the smoky fog of London’s dawn. “Hello the watch!” he shouted, hoping to catch the attention of a retiring night-watc
hman. “Hello the watch!”

  “Damn.” The kidnappers were getting away, if they were kidnappers. Except that he had seen no one in the nursery window since that scuffle of a sort was played out before his eyes. One minute both boys were there, waving, then something cut his view of them, giving him the absurd notion that curtains, or bags, had gone down over them, as if the boys were butterflies caught in nets. Except that all had been darkness inside the nursery, making it difficult for him to discern much of anything beyond the window.

  As hobbled as he was, he would follow the route the men with the rugs had taken, he decided, until he came upon someone who would help. If only he could reach his cane, far below him on the ground, and get back up again, after he did.

  But before he could attempt that feat, a beefy arm hooked him ‘round the neck, and something hard—a knee, perhaps—wedged itself in the small of his back.

  “Never you mind shouting for your thieving cronies, Mate, you got Stanthorpe’s own guard dogs, at’cher service. We saw you watching the house.”

  Another man stepped before the watcher, wielding a kitchen knife in a parody of swordsmanship, for all the world as if he were stitching a sampler in the air. “Waredraper and Doggett, sentinels, guardians and protectors of the righteous,” said the knife-wielder.

  “Thank God,” the watcher said, tongue in cheek, wishing Doggy, or Dogwart—or whatever the devil the oaf behind him called himself—would loosen his bully hold. “Enough of your burlesque performance,” the watcher snapped. “The Whitcomb lads have been kidnapped.”

  The sham sentinels laughed. “Kidnapped? By who?” the prissy one facing him asked. “Those two would bruise an abductor bloody.”

  That was true, the watcher thought. “Look, if it is all the same to you, the men I believe to be their kidnappers scurried toward Henrietta Street, likely heading for Oxford Street. You had better go after them.”

  “Sure we will, just as soon as we get you settled, won’t we, mate?” Dogwart asked his prissy, grinning friend.

  “If you do not believe me,” the watcher tried. “Then take me to Sabr—to her grace. She will tell you who I am and she will listen to me, by God, which is what you should be doing. You will rue this morning’s work. Her boys are taken, I tell you.”