Aubrey nodded, and held out his hand to the man, falling back on his instinctual good manners to cover his disappointment. Though why he should feel so, he didn’t know. Violette had made no secret of her intention to find the marquess, and had shown herself more than single minded and determined, disregarding the very real possibility of ruining herself in the process. He wondered what it would feel like, to be the object of such unswerving devotion. He’d heard her stammered apology to Falmouth, too, astonished to think such a lady had been driven to steal from her host in order to find the man she loved.
Aubrey suddenly found himself in possession of a violent dislike for Lord Edward Winterbourne. The sooner they found the fellow and he and Violette went off to live happily ever after, or whatever they were planning ... well, the better off Aubrey would be.
Mr Davis was looking at Aubrey with an expectant air; as it appeared, so were Violette, Falmouth, and everybody else. But Aubrey felt unequal to the task of posing questions or answering them and stepped to one side, casting a look at his cousin. Falmouth, albeit with a look of surprise, stepped forward and all of them squeezed into the room.
“Look, Peter, ‘ere’s that nice Mr Russell, come ta see you,” Jenny crooned, beaming at him.
“Hello, Jenny,” he said, forcing a smile to his face and trying hard to tamp down on an inexplicable surge of anger. He could hear Falmouth quizzing the fellow about everything he knew of Edward Grey, but the growing rage in his head and his heart seemed to drown everything else out. He had hoped, he realised, to find this Cheerful Charlie fellow for himself, to present him to Violette and thus earn her undying gratitude. Somewhere in the depths of his wild imaginings he’d seen her casting off her feelings for the dashing marquess and falling into his arms instead.
What a bloody fool.
Instead, because of her, he was well on the way to ruining his good name, he lived in daily dread of being summoned before his father who would demand an explanation for that fact and probably cut him off without a penny, and he had spent more hours than he cared to contemplate with his heart in a vice and searching the Seven Dials. No. The sooner she was out of his life, the better.
He swallowed down a hollow feeling in his chest that seemed to gape open at the thought and tried to return to the conversations around him. Violette was quiet now, though he could feel her eyes on him, perhaps wondering at his silence. No doubt she’d expected him to fall at her feet with relief upon finding her safe. He pushed that bitter thought away. That was unfair. She couldn’t help loving someone else after all. In fact, he admired her devotion; if only he wasn’t so damned jealous of it, he’d be proud of her.
“Blue Cross Street,” Falmouth said, nodding. “Shouldn’t be too hard to extricate him. What time?”
“‘Bout eight, by my reckoning,” Charlie said, rubbing the back of his neck. “Fight oughta start round nine, but ‘e’ll be there early, ‘course.”
“Be a good thing to get hold of one or two of the fellows in Gabriel Greyston’s employ, too,” his cousin mused, posing this suggestion to Mousy, who looked like all his Christmases had come at once. “See what information we can get from them before we bring a case against the fellow.”
Charlie held out his hand to Falmouth and gave it a hearty shake. “I can’t thank you enough, my lord,” he said, sounding really rather emotional. “I was at my wit’s end, I don’t mind tellin’ ye.”
“Don’t thank me,” Falmouth said, his tone mild. “It was my cousin there who brought me.”
Aubrey shifted under the obvious gratitude in the man’s eyes. He felt claustrophobic and wanted more than anything to get out of the filthy room.
“And you must be Jenny?” Falmouth continued, turning his attention to the woman and the mercifully silent child who was chewing on his small fist with a determined expression. “Mr Russell asked me if I might not be able to find somewhere rather more appropriate for you to raise this young man,” he said, smiling at her. “And I think I might have just the thing.”
Jenny turned her big eyes from Alex to him, her expression so full of gratitude that Aubrey felt quite ill. What had he done after all? He’d gone to Falmouth. Falmouth had done all of this. Not him. He’d simply expressed a desire to help. Falmouth had made it happen.
“Excuse me,” he said, his tone abrupt as he headed for the door.
He strode past Tommy who had been waiting outside on the landing, ignoring his demand to know what was happening and ran down the stairs.
He had just set foot outside when a different voice called his name, and despite his intentions, he ground to a halt.
“Mr Russell?”
He turned to see Violette framed in the doorway. She was clutching her cloak around her, but the hood was down and he could just make out her lovely face in the sparse moonlight that filtered down.
“Please forgive me, Mr Russell,” she said, her voice soft and full of a demand for understanding. “I know you must be angry with me for my behaviour. It was a horrid and shocking thing for me to steal from Lord Falmouth, especially when you’ve all been so very kind. But ... I had to find him, you do see?”
“Think nothing of it,” he said, wishing his voice sounded a little more genuine, instead of the flat, deadened tone that seemed even more stark in the murk of their appalling surroundings. “I quite understand, I assure you.”
She was silent then, standing and twisting the folds of her cloak in her hands in clear agitation.
“I didn’t want you to get involved in this,” she whispered, sounding so sorrowful that he cursed himself for a brute and sighed, taking a step back towards her. “Lord Gabriel Greyston, he’s ... he’s a bad, bad man. I didn’t want to see you get involved. I ... I was just doing what I thought right, but I realise stealing from ...”
“What?” Aubrey demanded, the burst of rage that had assailed him earlier only too ready to resurface. “You mean to say, you ran into the night alone, to the worst slum in whole of the country, in order to protect me?” He glared at her in utter fury. “My God, you must think me a feeble creature to need to hide behind your skirts!”
“No! I ... I never meant ...” she exclaimed, her eyes wide with dismay, but his pride had been pricked.
It was too much. Perhaps she was right though. He’d done nothing but run to Falmouth the moment things got difficult, and his friends clearly had no high opinion of his moral fibre. How should she view him after all when set against the noble and heroic figure of the marquess?
Jealousy raged and he knew if he stayed a moment longer, he’d say something he’d regret.
“Violette, I’m very glad you’re safe and well on your way to finding Lord Winterbourne. Falmouth will escort you home of course. If you’ll excuse me, I have things to attend to. Goodnight.” He hoped he did his best to leave her with a courteous bow, but he saw well enough the distress in her eyes. He was sorry for it. Sorry that he’d hurt her feelings, but his own felt all in a jumble. All his old insecurities about his own abilities and courage seemed to have reared their heads at one and the same moment and he just couldn’t breathe. He needed to get away. From all of them.
But especially from her.
Ten minutes later, he found himself in a bar with a bottle of blue ruin in his hand and a determination to finish it as quickly as possible.
He wasn’t sure how long it had taken in the end, but he had stumbled out of the bar sometime later with a desperate need for fresh air. Well, perhaps the air in this particular section of London wasn’t fresh, but it was cold, at least. He began to walk with no real idea of where he was heading and didn’t even realise where he was until he’d been wandering aimlessly for an hour or more. Looking up, he found himself once more on King’s Street and remembered Mrs Dashton’s invitation, that he should call upon her if he was lonely.
Well, he was lonely, dammit, and more miserable than he’d ever been in his life. Besides, the worst she could do was have the brute of a butler throw him out, and in his curren
t mood, that would simply round off a perfectly awful night.
Chapter 10
“Wherein a fellow’s pride hurts more than his head.”
Alex cursed his blasted cousin and wondered what the devil to do about the perfectly miserable young woman sitting across the carriage to him. She was trying hard not to cry, that much was obvious - and not entirely succeeding, as the occasional lift of her gloved hand to her eyes would seem to demonstrate.
He didn’t know what had passed between the two of them, but it was only too obvious that Aubrey was halfway in love with the girl already. Falmouth suppressed a sigh.
It would never do, of course, and poor Aubrey was setting himself up for a fall.
Alex had wondered from the outset if the girl was a close relation to the fellow she was hunting for and had discovered just that afternoon she was almost certainly the marquess’ sister. He had been about to apprise Aubrey of that fact when Celeste had come to speak to him about the missing money and all hell had broken loose.
But Miss Violette Greyston was not only a beauty, but heiress to a considerable fortune, and, whether or not her brother ever regained his senses, she was way out of Aubrey’s league. He didn’t wonder that Gabriel Greyston had kept her secreted away instead of giving her a season. Alex had a healthy suspicion of his fellow man and a cynical mind. His imagination could clearly devise the kind of nefarious plan Gabriel Greyston had no doubt been putting into action to force the girl to marry him. In the light of it, he didn’t entirely wonder at the girl’s decision to flee, ill-advised as it was. It must have seemed, at the time, to be the lesser of two evils. He wasn’t altogether sure that she wasn’t right.
He had no intimate knowledge of Gabriel Greyston, no one did, but the rumours of his insanity were legion, and there was no doubt whatsoever that he was a wicked bastard.
With a sigh of relief, Alex noted that the carriage had finally brought them home, and handed the unhappy female down with the anxious desire to place her in his wife’s capable hands. He spared a thought for Aubrey and wondered what on earth the poor devil was up to before heading through the doors of his home.
***
Aubrey blinked in confusion, staring up a ceiling that was so unfamiliar; the surprise of it momentarily distracted him from the pounding behind his eyes.
But only momentarily.
With a groan, he clutched at his head and then looked around in despair, only to cast his eyes with relief upon a large china bowl, clearly left for the purpose he now put it to use. Retching and vomiting until he saw stars he lay back in bed, utterly exhausted, and then started in alarm as the bedroom door opened.
To his shock and dismay, he was confronted with the vast and intimidating presence of Mrs Dashton’s butler, and braced himself for his inevitable ejection from the house, no doubt from the nearest window. More startling than ever was the almost paternal expression on the brute’s face as he placed a foul looking brew on the bedside table.
“Dasher,” he began and then gave a dignified cough. “That’s to say, Mrs Dashton, hopes you will feel better soon, Sah, but begs that you will not stir until you feels able to do so. She will be at home all day if you have need of her. I also took the liberty of bringing you a little something of my own devising that I take when I’m feeling a trifle malty.” This impressive speech was delivered with a mixture of a strong east end accent gilded with an attempt at something rather more refined. Aubrey found himself staring at the fellow with a mixture of incredulity and wonder at his kindness.
“Well, that’s ... that’s awfully good of you Mr ...”
“Lugger, Sah.”
“Mr Lugger,” Aubrey repeated, feeling at something of a disadvantage with a pounding hangover and laying in a stranger’s bed.
“You’re welcome, Sah,” the fellow said with a nod, before covering the rancid bowl with a cloth and carrying it discreetly away, leaving Aubrey to nurse his woes in private.
Aubrey lay back on the pillows and closed his eyes and tried to recollect the events of last night with little success. Sadly, the scene with Violette was only too sharp in his memory, but everything after that was hazy, to say the least. He remembered the gin - with a shudder - and presenting himself at the door here on King Street, but with a flush of shame he couldn’t think of a thing that happened after that. He hoped to God he hadn’t embarrassed himself. His pride really couldn’t take much more; it had been a fragile enough thing in the first place. Though how it could ever have been otherwise with his bloody father chipping away at it his whole life?
He grimaced and rubbed his eyes with his fingers, groaning at the pain. Aubrey supposed he was lucky. He knew some fellows whose fathers had beaten them black and blue. But he couldn’t help but wonder if he might have preferred that, instead of the mild contempt which his father seemed to reserve especially for him. At least they provoked a reaction, some outpouring of strong emotion. Aubrey had always felt his father didn’t consider him worth the bother.
Well, whatever had happened, he was going to have to face Dasher at some point today. The thought made him hope that dear old Lugger would bring the blasted bowl back quick-sharp. He was going to need it.
With a revolted sniff, he picked up the devilish looking mixture that the equitable butler had gifted him with and wondered if the blighter had been feeling kindly towards him after all as he gagged at the stench. Deciding he’d best take the fellow at face value, as he had little choice, he held his nose and hoped for the best.
***
It was late in the afternoon before Aubrey felt sufficiently able to muster both the courage and the ability to leave the sanctuary of the bed Mrs Dashton had kindly given him. Seeing as how she really ought to have thrown him out on his ear, it was with some trepidation he sought her out in her study.
She looked up as he entered, and he started in surprise at the picture of her sitting behind a great oak desk. It perhaps ought to look odd, a beautiful woman sat in the surroundings of an obviously masculine domain. Somehow Mrs Dashton seemed perfectly at home, her right to the power that was quite obviously at her fingertips glinting in her amused eyes.
“Mrs Dashton,” he began, wishing to get his apology over with as soon as he could. Though he was still a trifle hazy on exactly what he was apologising for, which only made it all the more excruciating.
The lovely creature at the desk got to her feet, her eyes full of warmth as she held her hands out to him. “Oh, dear, Mr Russell, please, won’t you call me Dolly? I can’t help but feel we are old friends now, after all.”
Aubrey swallowed and damned himself and his blasted memory. “Dolly,” he murmured, trying to force his unwilling lips into the semblance of a smile.
“How are you feeling, Aubrey, if I may call you that?” she asked, her tone so gentle he felt an unwelcome rise of emotion in his throat.
“Or course, and ... much better,” he lied, giving the smile another go, but still failing miserably if the look in Dolly’s eyes was anything to go on. “Mrs ... Dolly,” he amended. “I most sincerely apologise for ... for ...”
“For?” she repeated as he stumbled over his words, one elegant eyebrow raised in enquiry.
“For ... presenting myself at your door last night at such an hour and ... and in such a state and ... for whatever passed after that.”
Dolly gave him a smile full of sweetness and took his arm. “Poor Aubrey, you are blue-devilled, aren’t you?” she said, guiding him to a leather chair and sitting him down in it. To his surprise she perched herself on the arm and tilted his head up with one warm hand.
“What a handsome fellow you are,” she said, her voice soft and seductive, but sounding almost as though she was talking to herself. “Did you know that, Aubrey?”
Aubrey looked up at her and swallowed. Of course he knew he was well-made. He had heard enough comments about his hazel eyes and the extraordinary dark auburn colour of his hair after all. He noticed the women turn their heads in his direction well enough t
oo. Little good it had done him with Violette though, not when his face was bid against Edward Greyston’s rugged features. The man was not only handsome, he was heroic and a marquess to boot. That by far trumped his hand, and he well knew it.
She gave a little sigh and shook her head. “Aubrey, if we’d made love last night as you suspect, I assure you, you would not have forgotten it.”
Aubrey felt the flush creep up his neck as an amused smile curved over her luscious mouth. Thankfully, it was more affectionate and rueful than mocking. He wasn’t sure his dignity could have stood Dolly mocking him.
Instead she reached out and pushed a thick curl of auburn hair off his forehead. “You were very drunk, and very unhappy,” she said, her eyes full of sympathy. “I think you’ve had your heart bruised, haven’t you, my courageous knight?”
Aubrey snorted and shook his head. “My pride suffered the worst of it, I think,” he said, ignoring the ache in his chest at the foolish hopes he’d allowed to blossom. “And I’m afraid courageous is not a word to describe me,” he added, hearing the bitterness behind the words only too clearly. “A damned fool, perhaps.”
She moved then and crouched at his feet, taking his hand in hers. “You’re no fool,” she said, her tone brooking no argument. “And this bout of self-pity will pass with the pain in your head,” she added with a smile. “But only you know what it is you’re afraid of.”
Aubrey scowled at her and turned away, staring at the flickering flames in the hearth. “My father thinks I’m a coward,” he said, remembering a youth full of his father bellowing instructions to him at Jackson’s. The Baron had believed if Aubrey learned to box he’d grow a backbone. But despite the years of lessons he’d never had the stomach for violence. Last year he’d finally worked up the courage to refuse to go anymore. His father had been furious. Aubrey turned back to meet her eyes.
Nearly Ruining Mr. Russell Page 9
