It was beginning to rain before Gideon gave into the growing certainty that his bride was not coming. Again.
How in God’s name had she managed to thwart two strong ruffians who feared no one? It had to be the fault of the men. They must have done something incredibly stupid, tried to snatch her in front of her over-protective family. Or they really had taken his money and his bride for their own purposes.
Almost as annoyed about his wasted time as about the loss of his bride, he finally turned his horse’s head back toward Blackhaven. If there was no message for him at the barracks, he would have to go back to the wretched tavern to dig out his useless scoundrels and find out what had happened.
But as he rode through the worsening rain, an old coach rumbled toward him. Even huddled against the weather, surely the disreputable looking driver was familiar? Hope sprang once more, particularly when the coachman pulled up his horses. Eagerly, Heath urged his mount across the road, just as the window came down and another familiarly villainous head poked out. There was dried blood on the man’s face, so it looked like his little Maria’s newly grown claws had been unsheathed at his expense. Heath grinned in fierce pleasure at the prospect of breaking her to his will.
“Let me in then, man, I’m soaked out here,” Heath said impatiently. “You take my horse back to headquarters—” He broke off, belatedly aware of the rest of the man’s face. Bruises were forming over his eye and jaw. Far more damage than his little Maria, surely, could inflict, even in a tantrum. “Where is she?” he demanded.
“Ain’t here,” stated his dubious ally, who called himself Smith. “We got her all right and tight, easy as blinking. Then this fellow rides up, jumps onto the box, and throws poor Jimmy into the road! I tries to shoot the cove, and her ladyship shoves me out the coach and all!”
Heath gazed at him in growing rage. “Didn’t you even go after her?”
“’Course I did! Find her and her highwayman—”
“Highwayman?” Heath repeated, startled.
Smith grinned sourly. “Rode like one, looked like one, except he wore spectacles instead of a mask.” Gingerly, he touched his bruised face. “Fought like one, too. ’Course, I was dazed from landing on my face in the road, but he gave—”
“The nobody,” Heath interrupted with loathing, “Who the devil does he think he is?”
“He thinks he’s the man who took your bride back to her family,” Smith stated. “And I’ll tell you something else, she didn’t seem so willing to come to you.”
Heath swore at him, understanding it was a mere jibe. In fact, Smith cared little whether or not the girl was willing. Heath would have made her so. By now, probably, if the damned secretary didn’t keep interfering.
“There’s nothing can be done tonight,” Heath stated. “I’ll meet you tomorrow at six, with a new plan, and you’d better not mess that one up!”
*
For propriety’s sake, Lord and Lady Wickenden accompanied Maria and Michael back to the castle. They drove through the rain in the Wickendens’ closed carriage, and Lady Wickenden came in to the castle to return Maria to the bosom of her family. Several guests on the staircase and the gallery above witnessed the arrival. Frances flitted downstairs toward them.
“Aha, is that you, Gillie? Will you stay for dinner?”
“Sadly, I can’t. We are on our way to another engagement. I just stepped in to apologize for keeping Maria so long! We decided dropping her here on our way was simplest, so I hope her ladyship hasn’t been worried.”
“Oh no, Mama knew she was with you,” Frances said airily, though her anxious scan of Maria belied her easy manners. Serena, clearly, had told her what she’d seen. “Thank you for bringing her back.”
Dressed for dinner, the guests were all moving toward the drawing room, Lord Underwood and the Gayles among them. Her reputation, it seemed, was saved. Maria wondered briefly why she didn’t care more and put it down to the excessive excitement of the last couple of hours.
“Oh, dear, I shall have to rush up and change, or I’ll keep you all waiting,” she said, and bade a friendly and grateful farewell to Lady Wickenden before rushing to the stairs. Deliberately, she didn’t look over her shoulder for Michael until she was halfway up and glanced back as though to speak to Frances.
Michael had vanished. Clearly, he’d slipped away unnoticed to use the side stairs. Which was wonderfully discreet, as though his entrance only happened to coincide with hers. But it was the weak part of their story, for Lord Underwood, as well as several other people, had seen him borrow Mr. Grant’s horse and ride off in a hurry. She probably needed to discuss that more with Michael.
Truly, she simply wanted to see Michael again, alone, to find out if he would look at her once more as he had when he’d kissed her in the road…
She smiled as the maid quickly dressed her hair, reliving those moments riding back to Blackhaven almost in his arms…
Finding the maid smiling back at her in the mirror, she seized control of her expression. “Perfect!” she said, jumping to her feet. “I must hurry, or I shall be scolded for keeping everyone waiting for their dinner.”
In fact, she suspected it would be another ten minutes before they went into the dining room, but she hoped she might catch Michael in the library before that. She thought she could probably slip past the drawing room door.
When she rounded the corner from the landing into the long gallery, he was the first person she saw, striding toward her from the other end. Fortunately, the drawing room door was closed, and she slipped past Robert, the wooden-faced, young footman waiting there, and onward to meet Michael almost at the library door.
“There you are,” she said casually, for Robert’s benefit. “I just wanted to discuss with you…” She swept into the library and stopped in surprise as two young women rose to their feet.
Michael had come in behind her and now stood alarmingly still by her side.
The women might have been sisters, for they bore the same handsome features. However, one looked awed, nervous to the point of frightened and very feminine. The other, taller and much more forceful, seemed unimpressed to the point of contemptuous, for her discontented mouth turned into something close to a sneer as her gaze swept over Maria before landing, without much more warmth on the man beside her.
“Well, Michael?” she uttered.
Michael seemed to start breathing again. He held out his hand as he stepped forward. “Judith!”
Chapter Thirteen
A month ago, even a few days ago, Michael would have been thrilled that Judith had come to his place of work. For although she had been pacified by the size of his salary, she did not approve of him working for an earl, even one in parliamentary opposition who spoke up for many of the same causes she espoused. So, that she had got beyond her disapproval to travel here and enter the home of the privileged she so despised, undoubtedly meant a lot.
And yet, chiefly, he felt appalled.
Perhaps it was that he had no warning. He’d seen neither Lord Braithwaite, nor any servants since he’d entered the castle and slipped discreetly away to his own chamber to change. And of course, he was in Lady Maria’s company. Lady Maria whom he had kissed with sheer relief when she’d tumbled safe and sound from the coach.
Sheer relief? His brain laughed at him. Is that what you call it?
He had, in different ways, betrayed both of them in that one instinctive, glorious act. He owed both abject apologies at the very least. But all he could do at this moment was fall back on good manners and hope they separated very soon.
He kissed his betrothed’s gloved hand and her cool cheek. “How wonderful to see you. And you, Gillian.” He shook hands with Judith’s married sister.”
He turned back to Maria, who still stood in the same place, a smile on her lips but total bewilderment in her eyes. Shame and regret clawed at his insides.
He forced himself to smile. “Lady Maria, may I present to you my betrothed, Miss Judith Warren, and
her sister, Mrs. Derby. Judith, this is Lady Maria Conway, Lord Braithwaite’s sister.”
Maria advanced with her hand held out in her usual, friendly fashion. “Miss Warren, how lovely to meet you! I have heard so much about you.”
For an instant, Michael thought pride might prevent Judith from even taking the girl’s hand. He felt like cringing for her single-minded rudeness and for the quite deliberate offense she would cause Maria.
A fraught instant passed, and then Judith seized Maria’s hand and dropped it again almost immediately.
Still smiling—for she had exquisite manners—Maria gave her hand to Gillian. “Mrs. Derby, delighted to make your acquaintance.”
Gillian, the opposite to Judith in just about every way, curtsied low, murmuring “My lady,” in tones of such awe that Michael almost cringed for her, too.
“I hope you have not been waiting long for Mr. Hanson,” Maria said kindly. “Will you join us for dinner?”
Immediately, Judith looked affronted rather than grateful. Gillian looked merely terrified.
“Perhaps another time?” Michael interjected. “I can see you are not dressed for formal dinner. Where are you staying?”
“At the King’s Head,” Judith replied, for it would never have entered her head, for any number of reasons, to expect to stay here.
“I have heard it’s very comfortable,” Maria offered.
“It’s well enough,” Judith replied, “but full of children.”
“Ah.” Maria smiled again. “You would be very welcome to stay here, but I’m afraid the castle is full of children, too.”
“The inn is fine for us,” Judith said quellingly.
“Good,” Maria said. “Well, I shall leave you in Mr. Hanson’s capable hands. He will tell us if there is anything we can do for you. Good evening, Miss Warren, Mrs. Derby.”
As she walked gracefully from the room, Michael quashed the urge to watch her go, and instead smiled at his betrothed, trying to conjure up the pleasure he knew he should feel. “What a pleasant surprise! Did you really come just to see me?”
Judith blushed slightly, which she didn’t do often. “Not just. But I did not need to come in person.”
“I’m very glad you did.”
“Well, now we have seen you, we shall return to the King’s Head. You may accompany us if you wish.”
“I can’t,” Michael said gently. “Not tonight.”
Judith’s lips curled. “You are already so far under Braithwaite’s thumb that you must dine with him, too?”
“There is no must,” he said steadily. “But you will agree it would be rude to excuse myself with no notice. Tomorrow, if I am invited, I shall dine with you.”
“If you can spare the time,” Judith said, “from your gallivanting with the rich and fashionable.”
“Judith, it was my day off. I was merely given a seat in Lord Wickenden’s carriage to return.”
“Lord Wickenden!” Judith said scornfully. “The Wicked Baron—a mere dilettante and waste of your time.”
“Actually, he saved me time,” Michael said tartly. “It takes half an hour to walk up by foot.”
Perhaps Judith saw that she was being too critical or merely annoying him, for she forced a smile that didn’t quite touch her eyes. “I forgot how easy going you are. And yet it is one of the reasons I first liked you. You treat everyone alike, whether laborer or so-called great lord.” She put out her hand again. “Come tomorrow, Michael, when you can.”
“I will.” He took her hand, squeezing it warmly, for she was rarely demonstrative in her affection. “Unless the earl has thought of something new for me to do, my duties should be light until we return to London.”
“Good,” she said. “Perhaps we can work together on a new project I have become involved in. But I’ll tell you about it tomorrow. Go and dine with your master!”
At least there was a shade of awkward humor in her words now, which made him smile. “Let me send for a carriage to take you back. It was pouring when I came in.”
“Oh, it’s almost off now, and we’d rather walk.”
Gillian, who’d looked up, eagerly hopeful at the mention of the carriage, sighed. But she never objected to Judith’s plans and obediently followed him and Judith to the front door.
When they had gone, Michael ran up the stairs three at a time, and was in time to join Miss Harker at the tail end of the procession into the dining room. He felt unaccustomedly rattled by Judith’s presence in Blackhaven, or perhaps it was a simple reaction to the afternoon’s dramatic events. He needed time to adjust to her again.
So, after dinner, he should really have retired to his chamber and not allowed himself to be persuaded by Gayle, of all unlikely people, to join the drawing room party. Although he was avoiding thinking about his justification, he knew he should avoid Maria for any number of reasons, and so sat with Gayle.
Gayle, after a few too many glasses of port, seemed inclined to reminisce over school days. Michael recognized very few of his stories or the people involved, and was, mostly, amused by the fact he seemed to have forgotten he had done his best to bully Michael.
It was the countess who rescued him, sitting deliberately on his other side to ask after his visitors.
“They would not come to the drawing room or allow me to send in tea,” she told him. “So, I left them in the library to wait for you. I hope you found them!”
“Yes, I did. Thank you for looking after them. I saw them out on their way back to the inn.”
“I hope you assured Miss Warren that your betrothed is most welcome in the castle. She did not appear to believe me!”
“Miss Warren is shy,” he said awkwardly, “and perhaps a little overawed.” Neither was quite true. Nothing overawed Judith, and he was sure she had been more disapproving than shy.
However, the countess only smiled. “So was I when I first came here.”
He stayed only half an hour longer. When Maria sang and played at the pianoforte, at least he had an excuse to look at her. It seemed to him there was something brittle to her gaiety. She laughed too much, chattered too brightly, and yet she still sang so angelically that his throat closed up.
Worse, he wanted to punch Lord Underwood, who stood proprietarily by her side, turning the music for her. Michael suspected she wasn’t even reading the music but playing from memory.
She only glanced at him once, her gaze sliding off him again as though it were accidental.
He slipped away before her song was finished.
*
Maria did not sleep well that night. Although she had been aware almost from their first encounter that Michael was engaged, meeting the woman finally brought the reality home to her with a force similar to a slap on the face. What had she been thinking? Allowing herself to fall—to imagine she was falling—in love with Michael, knowing of his engagement. She had let him kiss her. If she was honest, she had kissed him back. And while that action might have been excusable as sheer relief and gratitude for her escape, the fantasies she had indulged in afterward were most definitely not.
Ashamed and confused, she had almost sent her older sisters away when they had come to her chamber at bedtime. In the end, she had let them in, since they were not so easy to be rid of, but had kept her story to a bare minimum.
“A man beckoned to me from the corner. I thought he was poor and needed something, so I went to speak to him. Before I knew what was happening, I was shoved into a coach and abducted. Fortunately, Mr. Hanson saw and gave chase.” She allowed herself to indulge in just a little awe. “Actually, he was wonderful, leapt from horseback onto the coach horses, and from there up to the box, where he pushed off the driver.”
“But what of the man in the carriage with you?”
“He tried to shoot Michael, so I pushed him out.”
Her sisters made no mention of her slip-up concerning Mr. Hanson’s Christian name. Instead, they gazed at her with some respect.
“Mr. Hanson stopped the c
arriage. He had to pause and fight one of the abductors, but then we disguised me as a man and rode to the Muirs’.”
“I have to say you’re taking all of this very well,” Frances observed, frowning.
“I don’t think I had time to be truly frightened. Everything happened so fast.”
“But who was it? Who abducted you?” Serena demanded.
She slid her gaze free, could not look at Frances, who knew all about Gideon and last year’s failed elopement. “I don’t know for sure. But please don’t tell Mama or Gervaise.”
“I think we need to tell Gervaise,” Frances said reasonably. “You have to be safe, Maria.”
“Oh, I will be,” Maria promised earnestly. “I will never wander away again, even to the end of the road. At least, not until this is…dealt with.”
“Maria, it’s not Michael Hanson’s business to deal with matters like this,” Frances pointed out.
Tears started to Maria’s eyes, though she made herself laugh. “I know that! Of course I know that. Look, the whole thing is to do with previous scrapes, so I want to sort it out myself. But I promise I will call on you, on Torridon and Tamar—and, yes, even Gervaise!—if I need help. I won’t endanger myself, I promise.”
Her sisters had exchanged glances and then reluctantly agreed, through reminding her of her promises.
When they had gone, she all but fell into bed, but despite her exhaustion, sleep eluded her. Her mind was too busy with Michael, with Judith, with the knowledge that she did not like the set of Judith’s hard mouth or the chill in her eyes.
Of course, perhaps the woman did not look so at everyone. After all, from what Michael had told her, she was a woman of compassion, fighting for the betterment of those less fortunate than herself. But she had no reason to love Maria. Perhaps she had sensed the closeness between her and Michael and was jealous.
Perhaps.
In the morning, there was a trickle of blood on the sheet, from where she had re-opened the wound in her palm, but she rose with a clearer head and the determination to make things right. Once washed and dressed, a glance in the mirror told her she did not look her best. Dark shadows ringed her eyes, the legacy of too little sleep. It hardly mattered.
The Wicked Sister Page 13
