As quickly as her hopes had lifted, they crashed down. “I am not marrying Freddy Herrington,” she shouted.
“You’ll do as you’re told,” Lord Malcolm said.
Before either Bianca or Jack could protest, Bianca’s mother raced on with, “Unless it’s too late already. How long as this been going on? How far advanced are you?” Without waiting for an answer, she rushed on to, “We could always send you to Scotland. Malcolm’s nephew, Gerald, is odious, but frankly, at this point, not only would he agree to marry you, he’s what you deserve.”
“Bianca is marrying me,” Jack said, pushing himself to his feet at last. He must have had enough time to gather himself in the face of such hostile enemies, because he stood his ground and glared right back when Lord Malcolm rounded on him. “I love her, and I will marry her.”
A prickling silence followed his declaration. Bianca bristled even as her heart swelled for him. Once again, he was being a bully and throwing around her life as if it were his toy. The fact that she still wanted to marry him was almost irrelevant to the high-handed way he was treating her.
“You did this on purpose, didn’t you,” Lord Malcolm seethed, stopping Bianca’s indignant thoughts in their tracks. “You knew the only way we would even consider allowing you to marry a lady who is so decidedly high above you was to disgrace her so thoroughly that she would be desperate.”
“No.” Jack shook his head, but he didn’t have a chance to go on.
“Dear God, it all makes perfect sense now,” Bianca’s mother gasped, staring at Jack in furious horror. “You’re even more of a villain than I supposed.”
“Jack, you didn’t,” Bianca whispered, doubt filling her to the point where she began to tremble.
“No, I didn’t,” he told her over his shoulder, then faced her mother and Lord Malcolm once more. “But if I had thought of it sooner, I might have considered it. I would have considered anything that would allow me to marry the woman I love more than my life in the face of such opposition from her narrow-minded, imperious family.”
“How dare you?” Bianca’s mother snapped.
“You unspeakable bastard,” Lord Malcolm growled at the same time.
Bianca thought she might be sick again. She sagged against the back of the settee, holding her stomach. The situation was wildly out of control, and she didn’t see any way to rectify things. Tears began to sting at her eyes once more, though she’d been convinced she was cried out.
To her surprise, Jack resumed his seat beside her, sliding an arm around her back. “We’ll be all right,” he promised her. “We’ll get through this.”
Bianca jerked away from him, brimming with sudden, irrational anger. “Don’t touch me, you bully. My life is the one that has been changed. I’m the one who will be punished for it forever.”
Jack pressed his lips together and frowned, frustration rippling from him, but he stayed right where he was, by Bianca’s side.
Lord Malcolm’s was the reaction that sent a chill through Bianca. He took a small step back as a sly grin spread across his weathered face.
“Oh, Lord,” Bianca’s mother said, her anger shifting to wariness as she watched her husband. “What?”
“Why should Bianca’s be the only life that’s ruined?” Lord Malcolm said with a sinister feeling that made Bianca’s skin crawl. She knew her step-father was dangerous, but she hadn’t really understood until that moment.
“What are you thinking?” her mother asked, turning to him with the spark of revenge in her expression.
“It had better be that there is no point in denying Bianca and I what we want,” Jack said.
“I’ll thank you not to speak for me when it comes to what I want,” Bianca hissed in reply.
“Are you saying you do not wish to marry me?” Jack stared at her as if daring her to say anything at all.
Bianca pressed her lips together and huffed out a breath through her nose. “I am saying that my mind is my own and I am tired of you insisting you know what’s best in every situation.”
“Not every situation,” Jack said. “Just this one.”
“Stop dominating me on every—”
“Silence,” Lord Malcolm shouted. His booming voice was enough to wither the words in Bianca’s mouth. She sank deeper into her seat, stomach roiling. “The two of you will marry,” he said, though the way he said it filled Bianca with foreboding instead of joy. “But much needs to be done before you reach the altar.”
“What are you proposing?” Jack asked, inching to face Lord Malcolm but remaining seated by Bianca’s side, his hand on the small of her back, whether she wanted it there or not.
“I’m saying that Alex Croydon owes me more than a few favors,” Lord Malcolm went on, his voice not much more than a menacing hiss.
“Alex Croydon?” Jack frowned. “He’s the Home Secretary now, isn’t he?”
“Oh, yes,” Lord Malcolm said, a little too much glee in his eyes. “He has the ear of the Queen as well. He can make things happen.”
“What kinds of things?” Bianca’s mother asked, her eyes sparkling with excitement and cunning.
“Suitable marriages, for one,” Lord Malcolm told her. “Marriages worthy of the daughter of an earl and step-daughter of a marquess.”
“I told you, Bianca is marrying no one but me,” Jack said, raising his voice by a hair.
Lord Malcolm stared at Bianca’s mother as if the two were conversing without words. When he arched an eyebrow and darted a sidelong look at Jack, her mother sucked in a breath and broke into a smile that chilled Bianca’s blood.
“Oh,” she said with delight. “I see.”
“I don’t,” Bianca said. “What sort of evil are the two of you plotting?”
They ignored her. Lord Malcolm turned to Jack with a grin that made Bianca squirm. “Say goodbye to your life as you know it, boy,” he said. “You’ve reached too far above yourself and now you’re going to pay the price.”
Jack remained silent where he was for a moment, his back straight, his glare unblinking. “I’m more of an adversary than you think,” he said.
Lord Malcolm merely laughed at him. “Just wait.” He turned to Bianca’s mother and said, “I’ll go to Alex and start the gears turning right away. There’s no time to waste where these two are concerned. The sooner we get them wed and positioned, the less damage we’ll all have to suffer.”
“Positioned?” Bianca asked with a frown.
She was ignored. Lord Malcolm strode for the door and out of the room. Bianca’s mother crossed her arms and stared at Bianca and Jack through narrowed eyes. She said nothing, though, and after shaking her head in disgust, she marched out of the room after him.
“I’ll just leave the two of you alone,” Cece said in a hushed voice, as though someone had died. She pushed herself to stand and scurried for the door. “It’s not as though you could get into any more trouble than you’re already in.”
As far as parting words went, Cece’s weren’t reassuring. Bianca sat where she was, shoulders hunched, hands shaking, terrified of what would happen if she moved too suddenly.
“That went well,” Jack said by her side.
She twisted to glare indignantly at him. “You have no idea what you’re talking about,” she snapped.
“I was being facetious,” he fired right back.
“You don’t know what Lord Malcolm is capable of,” she told him, her anger on the rise again.
“Actually, I do,” he said, shifting to face her and knocking their knees together. “I have access to files about him at Scotland Yard that would turn your hair white.”
“Then why did you talk back to him?” Bianca wanted to shout.
“I was defending you,” Jack said, obviously angry.
“Maybe I don’t need your defense.”
“Of course you need my defense,” he said. “We’re up against the combined might of your mother and Lord Malcolm. No one comes out of those situations unscathed.”
&
nbsp; “I know.” Bianca raised her voice. “I was raised by Mama and have lived with Lord Malcolm for five years now. I know what we’re up against. They’re going to punish us far worse than society ever could.”
Jack blew out a breath and rubbed a hand over his face. “At least they’re going to allow us to marry,” he said.
“That’s what terrifies me,” Bianca said through clenched teeth. When he frowned at her as though she’d spit in his face, she said, “It’s the how, not the if that worries me.”
“As long as we’re married, what could they possibly do to stand in our way?”
Bianca laughed humorlessly and stood. “You’re going to find out the answer to that question whether you want to or not.” He stood as well, but before he could say anything, she went on with, “Did you impregnate me so that you could marry me?” She crossed her arms and glared at him. “Did you purposely trap me into marriage so you could better your prospects?”
“For the last time, no,” he shouted, clearly offended. “Your whole family may be a bunch of conniving nobs, but I’m not. I was raised to deal honestly with people.”
“How dare you insult my family like that?” Bianca yelped.
“In case you didn’t notice, your family just insulted every last thing about me and vowed to ruin my life,” he said, leaning closer to her. “How do you propose to defend that?”
Bianca’s heart sank. She didn’t. She couldn’t. Whatever her mother and Lord Malcolm had in mind, there was a good chance it was going to have far worse consequences than if she were simply to walk out into the street and declare Jack Craig had gotten her with child out of wedlock.
“I’m exhausted,” she said at last, regretting the whine in her voice as she did. “I just want to go to bed. Go home and…and do whatever it is you do in that excuse for a flat of yours.”
“Are you sending me away?” Jack asked with a glower.
“No, I’m telling you to retreat, regroup, and rest,” she insisted. “Because, come tomorrow, whatever Lord Malcolm and my mother have planned, you’re going to need all of your energy to deal with it.”
Chapter 12
The sure and certain knowledge that Lord Malcolm Campbell was plotting against him was enough to make any man tremble in his boots and look over his shoulder every three seconds. Jack was no exception. After the telling off and the threats he and Bianca had received a few days before, he’d lived in a constant state of high alert. It was wearing on his nerves.
His presence had been demanded at the Campbell household for supper every night since that wretched day. He’d been introduced to a string of hard-faced noblemen and women of Lord Malcolm and Lady Katya’s acquaintance with titles like Lord Helm and Lord Gatwick, not to mention the Home Secretary, Mr. Alex Croydon, and his wife, that made his head spin. He’d even been dragged away from his desk at Scotland Yard in the middle of the afternoon to sit through an interminable tea party at Mrs. Croydon’s house where he was thoroughly scrutinized by what felt like half the matrons of the aristocracy. They’d clearly found him to be as distasteful as if Lady Katya had invited the urchin he’d been to soil their settees, but at least he’d been able to stand by Bianca’s side, holding her arm in support. Even though she was still spitting mad at him.
And she was furious with him. That much was clear from the way she hadn’t said more than two words together to him since their haphazard engagement. She blamed him for everything, he knew. He blamed himself. If he hadn’t been so hot to get her in bed, if he hadn’t been an animal once he had her there, he might have stopped to think, might have held her at arm’s length a little longer. Or at least he might have purchased a French letter or two to delay the inevitable.
But it was too late now. Bianca was carrying his child. Lady Katya had consented to their marriage. And Lord Malcolm was about to have him assassinated, as likely as not. But Jack still had work to do.
“Poole. I want you to make a list of all the warehouses along the Thames that we haven’t searched yet,” he said, voice booming more than usual in order to make up for the snakes in his gut, all of which bore Lord Malcolm’s head. “We’ll get permission for a raid if we have to, but I need to find out who—”
“We’ve got bigger problems than that,” Poole said, rushing toward Jack from the far end of the main office as Jack made his way across. Poole blocked him from continuing down the hall toward his private office. “I found out the date, sir,” he said, eyes bright with excitement.
“The date for what?” Poole’s excitement was contagious, and for the first time in days, Jack’s heart pounded over something other than the imminent loss of his balls at Lord Malcolm’s hands.
“The attack, sir,” Poole went on, lowering his voice and practically hopping up and down in excitement. “I uncovered credible information overnight that it is set to take place on the day the election results are announced.”
A rush of victory filled Jack. The election. He’d nearly forgotten about it. The blasted thing had already started in parts of England.
“Excellent,” he said, clapping Poole on the back and continuing on through the main office. “Do we have any sense of where the attack will take place yet? Is it the Palace of Westminster, a smaller, public venue, or a personal house?”
“That I don’t know, sir,” Poole said, pulling away from Jack and preventing him from going on at the same time. “There’s something else you should know, though.” He glanced anxiously past Jack to the hallway.
“There’s more?” Jack smiled. “Have you found the connection between Brickman and Denbigh where it comes to the attack on Lord O’Shea?”
“No,” Poole said slowly. He winced, rubbing the back of his neck. “I mean, I know it’s there.”
“We all know it’s there,” Jack said.
“But you’ve got other problems now.” Poole nodded past Jack’s shoulder.
The thrill of triumph Poole’s news about the date of the attack brought with it crashed hard when Sir Edmund’s curt call of, “Craig,” sounded from behind Jack.
Jack pivoted to find his superior striding into the main office, a white-faced Smiley shuffling along behind him, carrying a crate filled with…filled with Jack’s personal items from his office. Dread pooled in his stomach.
“Do I want to ask what this is about?” Jack’s voice was low and suspicious, but he faced Sir Edmund with shoulders squared and his chin up. He could practically hear Lord Malcolm chuckling and rubbing his hands together in revenge.
Thank God Sir Edmund was a man of few words. “You’ve been promoted,” he said, hesitating at the end of his sentence as though he wanted to add more but couldn’t push the words out of his mouth.
“Promoted?” Jack frowned. Under any other circumstances, he would have been elated to hear the news. He’d been aiming for a promotion for years. But Sir Edmund looked furious rather than proud.
“To Assistant Commissioner,” Sir Edmund said, practically growling the words.
Jack’s jaw dropped and his stomach with it. The clerks and minor officers in the room who had been pretending not to listen fell deadly silent. All activity in the office, all chatter and busywork, stopped dead. Someone dropped a pen and let it roll without picking it up.
“I beg your pardon, sir?” Jack shifted his weight, gaping at Sir Edmund. “Don’t you mean a promotion to Superintendent?” That was the rank above Chief Inspector, after all.
“Assistant Commissioner,” Sir Edmund repeated, the words even tighter than before.
Jack shook his head in disbelief. “There are already four Assistant Commissioners, sir.”
“Law dictates that a special dispensation to create a fifth Assistant Commissioner can be created under unusual circumstances,” Sir Edmund said.
“What special circumstances?” Jack argued, though it was fairly obvious when all was said and done.
“That is not for me to question,” Sir Edmund said, red-faced, his whiskers quivering. “Smiley here will take your belo
ngings to your new office on the second floor.”
“New office?” Jack glanced to Smiley, who stared back at him as though looking at the Queen.
“Your cases have been reassigned to Poole,” Sir Edmund went on.
It was like a fist in Jack’s gut. “With all due respect, sir, several of my cases are at a crucial moment of investigation. The attack on Lord O’Shea and reports of an imminent attack to take place as the results of the election are announced—”
“Your cases have been reassigned,” Sir Edmund said, his voice louder. “Poole can continue those investigations.”
“But what am I to do, then?” Jack asked, horror taking the place of mere dread in his gut.
“Your specific duties as Assistant Commissioner have not been revealed to me at this time.”
Sir Edmund’s words dripped with fury, and at last Jack realized why he was so furious. His hand must have been forced. He must have been ordered by a much higher power to promote Jack to a position of utter uselessness with a fancy title. The move meant Jack was the only non-military man in the upper echelons of Scotland Yard, promoted unfairly, and that Sir Edmund had been forced to lose one of his best investigators during the middle of sensitive investigations. Well done, Lord Malcolm.
“This is bullshit,” Jack growled, turning to storm out of the office.
“Yes, it is, my lord,” Sir Edmund hissed after him.
Jack froze in his tracks, a chill like nothing he’d ever felt before slithering down his back. He pivoted back to Sir Edmund, his eyes wide. He was far beyond speech, but the narrow-eyed way Sir Edmund stared at him and the slight, deferential bow he made confirmed that Jack hadn’t been imagining things. He’d heard the way Sir Edmund addressed him clear as day.
He pushed forward, propelling himself out of the office and down the stairs and out into the street. His lungs felt tight, and no matter how much he tried to breath, his head spun and his ears rang. So much for a dagger in the back. Lord Malcolm had found other ways to destroy him, and he couldn’t help but feel there was more to come.
It’s Only a Scandal if You’re Caught Page 13