Texas Viscount

by Henke, Shirl

  “Oh, so now I’m bein’ ‘lordshiped’ again, even when we're alone together.” His voice was low and intense. He'd make her get over her protective sense of decorum, one way or the other.

  “You are a viscount and I am a teacher. The differences in our stations will never change.” It came out more like an excuse than a statement of common sense as she’d intended it.

  He treated it that way. “The hell with stations. I was raised in a bordello and made myself a millionaire. Titles be damned. I desire you, no one else. I thought after Saturday night you'd be convinced of that.”

  Sabrina drew back. “You need not dissemble, my lord. I saw you with Madame Samsonov.” Heavens, that sounded jealous! His grin widened once more, indicating that he knew it. “I have no claim whatever on you. If you wish to cavort with every dancer and actress in London, it's of no moment to me.”

  “Now, why don't I believe that?” he asked rhetorically. “You have my word that I'm not in the least interested in that female—at least not in the way you think,” he added, wondering how he was going to soothe her ruffled feathers and at the same time conceal his true reason for associating with the icy Russian beauty. “I'd sooner mate with a praying mantis. Did you know the females eat the males after?”

  “After?” She jerked back, appalled at what he was suggesting.

  He nodded solemnly, trying to divert her. “Gospel truth, Sabbie. I read it in a science book.”

  “That does not make it appropriate as conversation between gentlemen and ladies—and do not call me ‘Sabbie.’ I saw you following—”

  Josh decided that actions were probably better than words. Before she could frame the question he could not answer, he seized her hand, rubbing tiny circles around the racing pulse of her wrist with his thumb. He'd always found that a good gauge of a woman's feelings. “Forget about that damnable toe dancer.”

  Sabrina tried to jerk her hand free but he pulled her closer, using his good arm to force her to perch on the edge of the bed. “I'm not in the least interested in your new inamorata, praying mantis or no,” she lied. “In fact, I was just giving my notice to your uncle when you interrupted bleeding all over the carpet. Did some jealous lover shoot you?”

  “You're the one who's jealous, and there's no reason.”

  “Oh?” She succeeded in pulling her hand free and fairly jumped to her feet. Damn the man, he was beguiling her again. What she needed to do was place some distance between them...and find out what on earth was going on. “Then who shot you? And why were you skulking around my cousin's lodgings yesterday?”

  Josh sighed, trying to shift his fuzzy brain into a higher gear, but it was stuck somewhere between first and second and he was too tuckered out to engage the clutch. He tried to reach up to her, but when he shifted his weight on the mattress, his injured arm shot fiery pain all the way to his fingertips. He muffled an oath as he fell back against the covers.

  “Now look what you've done. If you're not careful, you'll start the bleeding again,” she scolded, examining the wrappings on his arm.

  “You patched me up, didn't you?” he asked, vaguely recalling her instructing Michael and bandaging his arm before he'd gone down for the count. No question she still cared about him. Before she could reply, he gave a low moan and closed his eyes. Might as well play-act up a storm if it would keep her sitting beside him so he could smell that faint essence of wildflowers and feel her thigh pressing against his side. Lordy, the woman went to his head faster than a double shot of bourbon at the end of a hard day's ride.

  Sabrina murmured to herself about male foolishness and felt his forehead to see if he was starting a fever, one of the things the physician had cautioned them about after examining the wound and commending her on stopping the bleeding so efficiently. Josh felt cool enough, but touching him made her feel feverish. The man was a womanizer and would break her heart. If she had any sense at all, she’d stand up and walk away.

  She leaned closer.

  And drank in his face while those devilish green eyes were closed. His black lashes lay against the wind-burned tan of his cheeks, the square cut of his jaw was faintly bristled with beard, and the sculpted beauty of his lips looked so inviting. How could she ever forget the way he'd employed them, kissing her until she was breathless, a mere bit of clay for him to form for his own designs?

  Then she felt his good arm encircling her waist and pulling her forward as he murmured softly, “I'll die if you don't kiss me, Sabbie.” Somehow she found her mouth drawn to his. Unable to resist, she pressed her palms against his bare chest and opened her lips as he raised his head to meet her in a searingly gentle kiss that gradually grew deeper, hungrier.

  Only the sound of the earl clearing his throat in the open doorway broke the spell. Sabrina shot from the bed as if launched from a cannon before Hambleton sauntered into the room, looking amazingly well pleased, considering that his sole heir had just experienced a brush with death. She knew her cheeks must be flushed and her clothing mussed, but she refrained from calling further attention to herself by straightening her dishabille.

  Instead, she stood very still and studied the elderly gentleman as she said, “I must be going. The physician seems to feel the viscount will recover, although you must instruct the servants to watch for fever.”

  Before she could make good her escape, Hambleton replied, “Tut, my dear young lady. You have proved a far better nurse than any of the servants. I'd prefer that you remain to care for my nephew.”

  “But I'm not a nurse, I'm a teacher of decorum, and this is most...most indecorous,” she replied, hating the way her fair skin and frazzled nerves betrayed her.

  “Nonsense. The boy's been shot, and you knew how to stop the bleeding. Dr. Maynard said so himself. No higher recommendation than that. You'll stay. I've sent for your clothing and such. A bedroom's been made ready for you...directly next door.” He motioned imperiously to the doorway connecting this room with the adjoining one.

  “That's a right good idea, Uncle Ab,” Josh drawled. “You never know when I might take a fever. I've been prone to overheating ever since I was a tadpole.”

  Sabrina looked from her “patient” to her employer. Her former employer, she reminded herself. But she knew that if she walked out of here, her dreams of founding a school would be forever lost...as was her heart. What more could happen? She was already in love with the Texas viscount. Although she could not hope for a permanent relationship with him, this would be her only opportunity to be near him before he went on with his life.

  “Very well, I shall remain for a day or so,” she replied primly. She could use the time inside Hambleton House to learn what Josh and his mysterious friend had been doing that had led to a shooting.

  * * * *

  Edmund Whistledown stepped from the earl's office with a sheaf of documents in his hand to be delivered to Whitehall posthaste. He was surprised to see Sabrina standing at the end of the long hallway with a look in her eyes that could only spell trouble for him. “Hullo, Coz. I heard you were staying to tend to the viscount. Awful business,” he ventured as she drew near in a no-nonsense stride.

  “We need to have a word, Eddy,” she said, indicating he should follow her into a small sitting room across the hall.

  “Er, his lordship's secretary gave me these papers. I'm off to Whitehall—”

  “I do not give a fig if you're off to be knighted. Into the room, Edmund.”

  Shoulders slumping, he followed, allowing her to close the door firmly. When she turned to face him with her arms crossed over her chest, foot tapping steadily against the polished hardwood floor, he knew he'd been found out. She waited for him to confess. He could never win when Aunt Mildred or Cousin Sabrina cornered him this way.

  “Crikey, Sabrina, I'm sorry about all this mess.” His complexion, already sallow, turned an even paler shade as he said, “Those chaps from Epsom didn't...they didn't—”

  “No, I was fortunate enough to be spared that indignity,”
she interrupted coldly. “Mr. Loring came to visit me, hoping I would pay a bill I already gave you money for. He explained about the way you've been using my hard-earned funds...and lying to me in the bargain.”

  “I... I didn't mean to lie, but if I'd told you about Epsom—”

  “I would have been appalled by your folly, but I wouldn't have left you to be beaten to death by fellows such as Mr. Loring described,” she replied.

  His Adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed repeatedly, hanging his head. When he spoke, his voice was so low it was barely audible. “I was ashamed. You're right, I was a real ragger at the racecourses. You see, I won at first, and then when I lost, I thought it would only be a matter of time before my luck changed again.”

  “But it never did.” Her comment was not a question.

  “I was that scared, Coz. Bentham's man Killian, he's off his onion. He'd as soon slit a man's throat—”

  “Spare me the gory descriptions. I have sufficient imagination to envision what would have happened to you. All the more reason to tell me the truth. Do you owe them more?”

  His head hung even lower. “Well, I paid Bentham a hundred seventy—”

  “One hundred seventy pounds?” she echoed incredulously. That was far more than what she'd lent him. “Where did you obtain such a large amount of money? Surely you aren't reduced to stealing from your employer,” she whispered, horrified as a guilty expression she remembered well from childhood settled over Edmund's narrow face.

  “No, I've stolen nothing from his lordship,” he answered her uneasily.

  Sabrina could tell when he was evading the truth. “Then how did you come into a small fortune such as that? No one else in our family has anywhere near that kind of income.”

  “It's a long story,” he replied with some petulance.

  “Sit down. We shall take all the time necessary for you to assure me that you are not a thief.”

  Edmund sank onto the chair she pointed to and commenced wringing his hands as he spoke. “This buck I'd seen a time or two at Epsom and Sansdown, he came up to me and asked how I was doing one day when I was on my way to work. He'd given me some good tips on horses before, when I was winning.” His voice faded but then he continued, “I explained how I was really down on my luck. That Bentham and Killian had threatened me. He said there was a way I could earn some quid really fast. Since I'd already borrowed more than you could afford to lend me, I jumped at the chance.”

  “To do what?” she asked, one hand clutching her throat, half afraid of his answer as she realized why Josh must have been following him. Had her Texan been using her to get to Edmund? She suppressed the thought and concentrated on her cousin's reply.

  “Deliver papers, that's all. I'm a courier. It's real respectable, Coz, honest it is.”

  But when he explained how the “courier system” worked, Sabrina became distinctly uneasy. “Allow me to get this straight. A man cloaked in darkness hands you a packet of papers, and you in turn take them to a rendezvous site and slip them to some foreigner. Do you know neither man?”

  “Well, I couldn't see the chap who's given me the papers, no. He meets me behind the Golden Hind Inn—you know, the pub near my lodgings. It's always dark in the alley. And the buck I give 'em to, well, he's a Frenchman. At least he talks like one. Tall and has black curly hair.”

  “I saw you in the park with him several weeks ago,” she said. At the time she'd thought something about the scene had been off, but she hadn't been able to put her finger on what. If only she could remember what the other man looked like, but it had been too great a distance and she'd paid more attention to Edmund than to his companion. Then too, she'd had other things on her mind...such as nearly breaking her neck and Josh’s kisses. Suppressing those thoughts, she asked, “Can you recall any details about this fellow?”

  “Oh, he's a real buck. Dresses to the nines. Maybe he sounded more German than French,” he added as an afterthought.

  “What makes you think that?”

  “He sometimes says da instead of oui or yes.”

  “Edmund, Germans say ya not da, ” she replied with a sinking heart. “Da is Russian for yes.”

  His eyes grew huge and the Adam's apple bobbed again. “Crikey, and our government is put off about them building a railway to some ocean or other, isn't it?”

  “A bit of an understatement,” she replied tersely. “What explanation did these French-German-Russians give you for the secrecy if all you were doing was acting as a business courier?”

  He hesitated again until Sabrina resumed tapping her toe. “They told me I was working for our government—in an unofficial way,” he said with a sigh. “That some French businessmen wanted to build a canal in Central America and they wanted to stop them. I was sworn to secrecy.”

  It made sense. Edmund had been made to feel important and was given badly needed money while he believed he was doing some dashing deeds for king and country. Now she was the one who sighed.

  “This is bad, isn't it, Sabrina?” he asked glumly.

  “Perhaps not. Do you know where this fellow from the racecourses can be found?”

  “Not even his name. And I haven't seen him since he put me in touch with the chap I meet in the alley.”

  “I was afraid of that. We shall just have to find out what's in those documents and turn them over to the police. When are you supposed to receive your next ‘assignment’?”

  “I don't know. A note with the time on it just appears under the door of my room at the boarding-house.”

  Nothing but frustrating dead ends. Sabrina studied her cousin, whom she had practically raised since he was a sickly child. Was he telling her the truth now? Or was this another fabrication to buy her cooperation? Sabrina simply did not know.

  “Very well,” she said carefully. “As soon as you receive another note, let me know immediately. Speak of this to no one, do you understand?”

  He nodded, seemingly relieved to have placed the burden on her slim shoulders once again. “You're an absolute trump, Sabrina. I know you'll get us out of this,” he said brightly.

  “Us?” she echoed, raising one eyebrow.

  After dismissing Edmund, she paced about the sitting room, trying to figure out how to proceed. Although he did not believe it, Edmund's employment by the earl had to be connected to the quagmire he'd been drawn into. Josh, too, was involved in this tangle in some way. What could the old man and his nephew be doing? Surely they were not spies in the pay of the Russians?

  She dismissed the idea as too preposterous to consider. But Russia was a traditional foe of England, and tensions between the two governments had never really dissipated since the Crimean War over a generation ago. Coming from America, what would Josh have to do with this Old World rivalry? Perhaps some secrets lay hidden in the earl's office.

  “As long as he insists I remain here and tend to his precious heir, I'll avail myself of the opportunity to do a bit of snooping,” she murmured to herself, beginning with finding out why said heir had been shot—and by whom.

  * * * *

  Josh felt greatly restored after a hearty supper of roast beef and potatoes. Cook had first prepared consommé and a bit of that nasty fish in aspic, but he'd sent Benton back to the kitchen to demand real food, not catfish bait. He'd even threatened to dump the hot soup over his valet's head if the poor servant did not do as he was told. Nothing brought a man up to his full strength like a good chunk of Texas—or, he conceded—English beef.

  He’d not seen Sabrina since their encounter at his bedside earlier in the day. Gazing speculatively at the adjacent room, he considered that she’d be sleeping there in a short while. Or not. He grinned, wondering what his uncle was up to. If he didn't know better, he'd swear the old goat was matchmaking. First, he'd arranged for her to tutor him, then set up that fool weekend with the Chiffingtons, knowing full well that he'd disgrace himself in front of the marquess and his darling daughter.

  With Sabrina there to comfort him.
>
  Josh grinned. What a night that had been. And tonight would be even better, thanks to his uncle, who'd seen to it that she would be next door. First he'd have to be certain he was up to the night's exertions. He sat forward and carefully swung his long legs over the side of the bed. Then, using his good arm, he reached for the brocade dressing robe lying on the chair. He winced at the long stretch, managing to snag a sleeve and reel in the slithery garment, but before he could put it on, the door opened.

  “What in heaven's name are you doing?” Sabrina asked as a startled Josh quickly bunched the dressing robe over strategic parts of his anatomy. Then, seeing who it was, he smiled in that slightly off-center way that made his eyes—and her heart—dance.

  “Why, Sabbie, I was just getting up to stretch my legs, sorta work the kinks out, you know?”

  “What I know is that you have lost much too much blood to be cavorting about without assistance. You have no reason to leave that bed,” she scolded.

  He watched her standing in the doorway as if she might turn tail and run. “You and I both know I have every reason,” he said, casting a glance toward the adjacent room she would use tonight.

  “Even if I were to permit it—and I hasten to add I will not—you're far too badly injured to...perform,” she finally managed, her face heating up to match the fire in her heart—and other places she refused to think about.

  “Close that door and come here, Sabbie. We'll see how well I can perform,” he said in a husky voice. His eyes willed her to obey, but he had no idea what he'd do if she refused. After all, he wasn't about to win any foot races.

  Sabrina stood transfixed. The need—no, she admitted, the desperate hunger—for his touch held her in thrall. If she possessed one iota of sense, she should turn and walk away. After all, he couldn't very well chase after her.

  “I've asked you not to call me Sabbie,” she said, frozen in place as their eyes met and held.