Wicked Exile (An Exile Novel Book 2)

by K. J. Jackson

  “Wait.” Jasper looked to Juliet with his eyebrows raised. “Juliet?”

  Pulling her shoulders back, Juliet stifled a sigh and her gaze centered on the enormous Scot filling the hallway. He swallowed up any space he was in. “You would like to leave now, today? And the journey north will be made in haste?”

  Lord Hedrun’s left eyebrow cocked at her words and he looked to Jasper. “Bad idea, Jasper. The lass is going to be there for one purpose, and I don’t trust this one. We go back to the Den and find another one.”

  Jasper threw his palm up. “Except Juliet is the best. She is exactly what you want in front of the Earl. I am well versed with all the women and believe me—Juliet is the perfect person for the job. A proper English lady, through and through, you won’t find better than her.”

  Lord Hedrun eyed her. “You can be docile?”

  Good heavens, what did he think she was? An ogre? “I can be docile in front of your grandfather, if that is what you are asking. That is what you are asking for, are you not? A proper, docile, charming lady for your grandfather to approve of?”

  “Aye.”

  “Then I am the best.”

  “Humble, too.”

  She set a placid smile on her face. “Honest, Lord Hedrun.”

  “It’s Evan.” He looked to Jasper, then looked to her, his grey eyes searching her face for a long breath, judging her soul. “Fine. You be the one.”

  { Chapter 2 }

  “How long will the journey north to your home take?”

  Evan glanced across the carriage at Juliet. She’d said very little to him in the last six hours beyond “thank you” as he’d helped her up and into the carriage at the Willows and after the short stop they’d made midday to change out horses. Her mind was clearly elsewhere.

  Fine with him, as long as she wasn’t this quiet when they arrived at Whetland Castle—at least in front of his grandfather.

  His eyes ran upward from the brush of her dark blue skirts between his outstretched legs. She looked different than she had at the Den of Diablo. Still beautiful, but she sat with an air of innocence about her. Odd.

  Quite impossible for the business she dealt in. It had to be the lack of rouge and that her dark blue eyes weren’t lined with charcoal. Her hair was smoother as well—not coiffed with elaborate curls—her auburn locks now swept away from her face in a simple, loose chignon.

  That had to be it.

  Her sweet angel face had been obscured by the markings common in a brothel. Take her out of the brothel into the light of the day and the air about her reeked of purity.

  Jasper had been right to push this one upon him.

  He cleared his throat. “The journey to Whetland Castle will take a week and a half, as long as the roads hold well,” he said. “You’ve been quiet. You said you would see this through, are you rethinking that promise?”

  She met his gaze. “No. I am planning.”

  “Planning what?”

  The carriage hit a rut and she absorbed the blow, her posture remaining impeccable, even on the rough of this road and the coach jostling. She looked small sitting across from him. Of course, almost all women looked small to him.

  “How long I will be away,” she said. “Everything I will need to do once I return to London. I like my days scheduled.”

  “Why bother? You won’t be back in London for near a month.”

  Her lips pursed for a quick second. “As I am currently at the mercy of you and whatever schedule you intend to keep, I have no plans to set into place today or the next few days, so I am planning my schedule for the future.”

  “You like to plan things?”

  “I am conditioned for it. I am accustomed to handling much of the activities at the Den. Food, drink, which women are available when, their schedules, who the incoming patrons are.”

  “It sounds like a lot.”

  “It is.”

  His hand flicked toward the carriage window that he’d cracked for fresh, crisp air. “Or you could look out the window at the clouds in the sky, relax and not plan anything.”

  She gave him a withering look.

  Point taken, she didn’t like to relax.

  His hand dropped down onto the cushion next to him. “Jasper told me what happened to Mr. Hoppler and his woman being shot. That must have put a kink in your schedule.”

  She shook her head, looking out the window with her mouth clamped closed.

  “You are in love with Mr. Hoppler?”

  Her gaze whipped to him, her blue eyes pinpricks on his face. “Why would you say that?”

  His forefinger lifted to point to her. “Your eyes, they clouded over at his name.”

  She shifted her backside on the carriage cushion and set her kidskin-gloved hands, one on top of the other, in her lap. “I most assuredly do not love Hoppler. I do not love. But I do respect and care for him, as I do also for Pen’s well-being. What you saw in my eyes was worry over my friend. Hoppler has saved me more than once and I will be forever in his debt.”

  “So, you’re just bed partners, then?”

  Her jaw dropped slightly as her look skewered him. “You think just because I work in a brothel I have sex with everyone I know?”

  “No…”

  She leaned forward, her words prickly. “Don’t presume to know—or worse—guess anything about my life.”

  “I thought ye said you could be docile.”

  A short, terse laugh cut from her mouth. “I said I can be docile in front of your grandfather. I didn’t say anything about the rest of our time together.”

  Evan heaved a breath. She was right. What did he know of her brothel? Of her activities? Of the actual thoughts of women in general? He’d never had to pay for a woman to warm his bed. And at that, he liked the women gone as quickly as they’d appeared.

  Both of his hands flew up, warding off her ire. “My apologies. I was just trying to work out what business you had at the Willows. Jasper said you were almost always at the Den of Diablo.”

  “Yes, well, Jasper likes to talk where he shouldn’t.” She settled back, relaxing ever so slightly at his apology. At least she knew how to move onward from the rude comment he’d made. “I was at the Willows to help Hoppler with Pen. That was all.”

  “You are a good friend.”

  Her tiny shoulders lifted. “I try to be. People depend on me.”

  “Do you like that?”

  “I cultivate it.” Her gaze moved off of him to the field they passed as raindrops started to splotch onto the glass. “If I am depended upon, then my life has worth.”

  He nodded, studying her eyes as she said the words. Honest. More honest than most people were with themselves. But so many currents ran under her eyes at the words. Her life had no worth if she wasn’t depended upon? And how exactly had she become a fallen lady?

  For as little as he knew about women, he knew he couldn’t ask her that question outright. Certainly not on the first day they met.

  He settled for a neutral inquiry. “What makes you happy, Juliet?”

  Her look snapped to him, genuine surprise in her eyes. “What makes me happy?”

  “Yes? Is it such a hard question?”

  Her mouth opened slightly, but no words came forth. She shook her head. “I’ve just never been asked it before.”

  Several seconds went by in silence. His eyebrows lifted. “You have no answer?”

  Her bottom lip jutted upward as her brow crinkled. Then a sudden smile lifted her cheeks. “When a woman new to the brothel learns how to shine.” The smile cracked wider, the edges of her eyes crinkling. This was not the smile she gave him in the study at the Willows. This was a smile that made the air around her light up, crackle. Would make any man crawl just to be in her realm.

  And it damn well stopped his breath in his lungs.

  “The moment she realizes her own power.” She shifted on the bench, her right hand lifting, animated. “Sometimes we’ll get a new woman—timid, shy, beaten down by this
world and just searching desperately for a shred of a better life. I teach her how to talk, how to smile, how to pander—everything she needs to know for how to get the brothel to work for her, instead of her working for it. And she gains that shred of a decent life, and then years go by and she’s saved enough to last her the rest of her days away from the life. She’s secure and she’s strong and she can move onward. That…that makes me happy. To be a part of that.”

  “Does it happen a lot?”

  “Not often enough.” The smile on her face softened, tempered, but it still held on her lips. “But when it does…when it does, it’s magic.”

  She’d relaxed, ever so slightly, and it exacerbated the fact that Evan had been trying to deny since he’d helped her up into the carriage.

  The woman was bloody well beautiful—not just her face and her body—but her soul. Despite the hard edge she’d initially put forth, her heart was made to love, to care.

  No wonder his instinctual reaction in the study at the Willows was to get away from her—fast. He was out of his depth here, and he knew it. There were lines that wouldn’t—couldn’t be crossed.

  And a woman like Juliet begged for those lines to be crossed.

  A bloody ill-advised idea, the whole of this farce of a betrothal to set before his grandfather. But here it was.

  He was too deep into it now to turn back.

  Present the woman. Make his grandfather happy.

  It’d been an easy plan when he’d concocted it three weeks ago.

  He just had to keep it so.

  { Chapter 3 }

  Juliet sat atop the horse, watching the water stream down from the brim of her poke bonnet in front of her nose. Flashes of light flew through the streaming water, the flickering flames in the lanterns on the side of the coaching inn reflecting oddly through the rain and scattering sparkles.

  The blasted man could be quicker about this.

  She shifted her stare to the inn’s front door, willing it to open. Rain had started in the afternoon. Hard rain. So much that the carriage had soon gotten stuck in a swath of deep mud six miles back. Hours were lost attempting to free the wheels, to no avail. With nightfall approaching, Evan had taken her on one of the horses to the closest village. A veer from the straight route north, but they needed somewhere to sleep that night.

  Juliet stifled the shiver that was determined to make her entire body quake. Her carriage dress and pelisse were not meant for the chill of this fall rain.

  He said he would be quick. This wasn’t quick.

  Just as she was about to slide off the horse and poke her nose into the coaching inn, Evan opened the door and stormed toward the horse. “We cannot stay here.”

  “What? Why not?”

  He grabbed the reins from the hitching post. “There’s only one tiny room available.”

  She looked out along the main lane through the village. The rest of the buildings along the road were small—a few shops, small homes. “Where is the next inn?”

  He sighed, looking up at her with no regard to the steady rain hitting his face. “The next village.”

  Her gaze whipped toward the road they had yet to travel. “How far?”

  “Another six miles.”

  She heaved a peckish breath. “But it is almost nightfall.” Leaning forward, her hand went to the neck of the mare, stroking it. “We cannot make this horse move on. She was already slowed by the muddied road and she’ll not make it very fast. Not to mention this rain has blocked any last light from the sky.”

  Evan’s stare stayed fixed on her. “There isn’t another option in this village.”

  She looked down at him. “Don’t be silly. One tiny room is fine. The horse needs a break and I can manage to share the room if you can.” She waved her hand toward the front door. “Go, hurry, before another beleaguered traveler takes it and we are sleeping in the stables.”

  His eyebrows lifted at her sharp order, but his mouth stayed closed. Under the patter of the rain a grunt reached her ears as he turned and disappeared into the inn.

  Juliet slid down the side of the horse, landing with a squish in the mud. She lifted her right foot, the ground sucking at her boot, then yanked her left boot from the muck. Stroking the side of the horse’s neck, she looked at its eye. “You did a good job getting us here. I’m sure there’s room in the stables for you.”

  A stable boy ran around the side of the building, grabbing the reins of the horse at the same moment that Evan reappeared.

  “We have the room—and it is tiny, but it will work.”

  Evan ushered her into the building and led her directly up to the fourth level of the inn. Along the hallway, he had to duck under the exposed rafters with every other step. Servants’ quarters, but it was better than sleeping in the damp stables.

  He stopped at the end of the corridor and opened the last door.

  Juliet moved past him into the room. It was tiny. A skinny bed, one small chair and a table. A fireplace with a weak blaze already lit meant that someone had just vacated the room. She hoped it wasn’t a servant that was going to be forced to sleep in the stables.

  “I apologize.” The thick rumble of Evan’s voice so close behind her rattled her chest. “I know ’tis not the luxury ye are accustomed to and I promised you would not do for anything on the journey.”

  She looked over her shoulder at him. “You promised that?”

  His shoulders lifted. “I implied it. Maybe I promised it in my own mind once I saw you.”

  “When you saw me?”

  His head inclined to her. “I recognized you were a lady, and therefore accustomed to the finer things in life. This is not that.” He pointed to the small patch of floorboards at her feet. “I will sleep on the floor, of course.”

  She was impressed he could tell the difference between the finer things and base necessities. Different from every Scot she’d ever come across.

  She turned fully to him. “This will do, truly. We’re not sleeping in the coach or the stables so I am grateful.”

  The slightest twitch flashed across his grey eyes—relief?

  “I will go and collect the food I ordered for us.” His torso angled to the side to duck under the rafters and he set the leather satchel that held her reticule in it onto the chair, then moved to the table, picked it up and set it near the fire. “I imagined with your sopping dress you wouldn’t want to sit in the chill in the public dining room. The fire should catch hotter in a few minutes.”

  She nodded to him and moved to stand beside the table in front of the fire. “That is kind of you.” She peeled off her gloves, draping them off the front of the table toward the heat and she stretched her fingers toward the flames. She needed to warm her hands before she could tackle the buttons on her pelisse.

  Dipping his head below the doorframe, he disappeared into the hallway.

  She exhaled the breath she’d been holding in her lungs most of the day. They were now far enough away from the Willows and London that the uneasy pit in her stomach had started to fade. Even if Lord Vontmour did appear at the Willows, he’d be easy to send away. She wasn’t there. She wasn’t at the Den. Lord Vontmour would slink back to his dreary townhouse in Mayfair, drink himself into oblivion, and with any luck, forget all about her in the ensuing weeks.

  Infatuations were tiresome.

  Not that she should judge. She’d developed a slight infatuation with the Scot that had sat across from her most of the day. She’d had a hard time not sneaking in glances at him, again and again, attempting to figure him out.

  Not a traditionally handsome man, he held such juxtaposition in his face. A slight scruff peppered his lower jaw, his bone structure was strong, proud—angles that could cut steel. A nose that had been broken once, maybe twice for the slight hiccups in the line of it. The whole of his face harsh—brutal. But then there were his eyes. Eyes that kept drawing her gaze back to them again and again. His irises were a unique grey, with flecks of blue swirling about like the deepest wat
ers were peeking out of a frothy sea. She’d stared at his eyes at length several times, attempting to determine what exactly it was—the angle of his eyebrows, how his lashes curled, or the tilt—that made them convey one overriding trait.

  Kindness.

  She’d never seen kinder eyes than his—on man or woman.

  Of course, that didn’t mean he was kind. And the rest of his face and body was all hard angles that looked like they could survive a horse trampling. Or take down the devil himself. But his eyes. Kindness.

  She stared at the flames.

  A shame he wasn’t inclined toward women.

  She really should put some effort into talking with the man. Not only was she supposed to pretend to be his betrothed, she was going to be stuck with him for the next several weeks. Weeks that with any luck could progress with a modicum of pleasantness, or in stony silence if she didn’t soon put forth a question or two and some concentrated interest in his answers.

  Her fingers curled, soaking in the heat from the fire, and she realized she could finally move them enough to strip out of her heavy wet clothes.

  She untied her dark blue poke bonnet and set it on the table, then unstrapped her leather sheath holding a small dagger from around her right calf. After untying her boots, she peeled off her soaked stockings and set her toes onto the marble hearth in front of the fire. Heaven.

  Her fingers went to work on the brass buttons lining the front of her pelisse. The wool weave of the dark indigo blue cloth had expanded and her fingers struggled to pop each button free. A shame that she’d chosen this pelisse, as half of the buttons were purely decorative, not really needed to clasp the front of the coat closed.

  Just as she pulled one sopping arm free from the sleeve, a quick knock rapped on the door and it opened without her response.

  Evan poked his head into the room, glancing about before entering. Balanced on his wide hand was a large silver platter with a cloche atop. Nudging her hat to the side, he set it onto the table by her gloves and then stepped back out into the corridor, retrieving a bottle of wine and two glasses from the floor.