Some Like It Wild

by Teresa Medeiros

  Pamela drew in a deep breath, praying God would forgive her for damning them all with her lie. “I’ve done better than that, your grace. I’ve brought you your son.”

  Chapter 10

  The duke jerked upright in his chair, feverish spots of color darkening the hollows of his cheeks. His hazel eyes burned with an unholy fire, and for an elusive instant he bore more resemblance to the vital young man in the portrait behind him than the wizened, prematurely aged man he had become.

  He opened his mouth but only a racking cough came forth. Lady Astrid leaped up from her chair and began to pound him on the back, shooting Pamela an accusing glare. “Look what you’ve done to him, you wicked girl! You ought to be ashamed of yourself! Why, such a strain could prove too great for his weakened heart!” As Astrid tenderly mopped his brow with her own handkerchief, then poured a fresh cup of tea and pressed it to his lips, Pamela frowned. Her concern for her brother’s welfare seemed to be genuine. “Just say the word, Archie,” she told him when his wheezing had subsided, “and I’ll dismiss these charlatans and their preposterous claims and send for the physician.”

  Pamela could not stop herself from flinching in pity when the duke fitfully batted his sister’s hand away. She retreated to stand at his right shoulder, wounded dignity evident in every line of her rigid posture.

  The duke’s piercing gaze was no longer fixed on Pamela but on Connor.

  “You,” he croaked out, pointing a palsied finger at Connor. “You don’t look the sort who’d be content to hide behind a woman’s skirts while she fights your battles for you.”

  Pamela began, “Your grace, I—”

  “He’s right,” Connor said, rising from his chair. “I’ve done all the hiding I care to do.”

  The duke’s voice was little more than a growl. “Then get over here, lad, and let me have a look at you.”

  Pamela held her breath, knowing Connor wouldn’t take kindly to being ordered about. Especially in such an imperious manner.

  But after a brief hesitation, he sauntered over to the duke’s chair and simply stood there, gazing down at the man.

  “Don’t just stand there hovering over me like the angel Gabriel come to condemn my black-hearted soul,” the duke rasped, crooking a finger at him. “Come down here where I can see your face.”

  His command left Connor with only one choice. Knowing that all of their fates hinged on this moment, Pamela dug her fingernails into her palm as he dropped to one knee in front of the duke’s chair, bringing them face to face and eye to eye.

  Pamela couldn’t see Connor’s face, but she had a clear view of the duke’s. It had gone as still as a death mask as he searched Connor’s face, his burning eyes its only trace of life.

  It wasn’t until he lifted a trembling hand to cup Connor’s cheek that she realized with a jolt of wonder that the sparkle in those eyes was no longer malice, but tears. “I should have known the moment you walked in the room,” he whispered, drinking in Connor’s features with a feverish thirst. “You have the look of your mother about you. Her eyes…”

  To Connor’s credit, he did not shy away from the man’s touch but simply placed his own hand over the duke’s to steady it.

  Pamela bowed her head, battered by a dizzying mixture of shame and triumph. The plan she’d set in motion when she and Sophie had fled London was finally coming to fruition. She truly hadn’t wanted to trick a sick old man, but by doing so, she had given Connor a chance to unmask her mother’s killer, and she had ensured her sister’s future. Her role here was done. At least for now.

  From this day forward, any communication between her and Connor would have to be conducted through whispered messages delivered by Brodie. There was no place in the life of a future duke—even a counterfeit one—for an actress’s daughter born on the wrong side of the blankets. She trusted Connor would keep his end of their devil’s bargain and help her expose her mother’s killer, but once that task was done, their association would come to an end as well. He would be free to live out his life as the next Duke of Warrick and she would be free to retire to the seaside to bake shortbread and collect cats.

  Suddenly desperate to escape this tender reunion that was no reunion at all, she surged to her feet. “Forgive me, your grace, but I realize you and your son are strangers to each other and must be eager to get reacquainted. I’m glad my search was fruitful and I was able to return him to you. I’ll leave the address of my lodgings and you can have your solicitor contact me about delivery of the reward.” She turned blindly toward the door, trusting Sophie would follow.

  “Don’t be so hasty, Miss Darby. Or so modest.”

  That commanding voice stopped her in her tracks. Because it did not belong to the duke, but to Connor. She slowly turned to find him standing at the duke’s side. If Pamela didn’t know better, she would have sworn he belonged there. The duke still clung to his hand, as if reluctant to surrender it for fear he would vanish back into the wild, never to be seen again.

  There had been some indefinable shift of power in the room. One that left Pamela feeling as breathless and bewildered as the duke’s sister looked.

  Connor’s cool gray eyes were more inscrutable than ever before, his heathered burr more musical to the ear. “Surely you don’t plan to rush off before my”—he hesitated for less than a heartbeat “—my father and I can properly thank you for bringing us together.”

  She dredged up a nervous smile. “I’m sure the reward will express your gratitude far more effectively than your words ever could.”

  Connor smiled at her, the dimple in his cheek even more devastating when complemented by the beguiling crinkles around his eyes. The smile was eerily similar to the man’s in the portrait behind him. “Just listen to her, your grace. The lass would have you believe she’s nothing but a greedy opportunist, when the exact opposite is true.”

  “It is?” Pamela whispered weakly.

  “It is?” Sophie echoed, forgetting all about her own vow of silence.

  “Aye, it is.” Gently extracting his hand from the duke’s grip, Connor sauntered toward Pamela, his grace as beautiful to behold as any predator’s. And just as dangerous. “She’s trying to hide her generous heart from us all so she won’t spoil our reunion. She doesn’t want you to know that I was truly lost until she found me.” Pamela held her breath as Connor took her hand and brought it to his mouth, brushing his warm, moist lips over her knuckles with an intimacy that made her shiver. “I know what we agreed upon, lass, but I can no longer keep our little secret.”

  Pamela gasped, believing he was about to blurt out that he was an imposter and get them all tossed into jail, if not hanged.

  She was too numb with dread to protest when he slipped an arm around her waist and steered her toward the duke, who had been watching their exchange with avid fascination. “I didn’t come here today to claim my birthright, your grace,” he said earnestly. “All I would seek on this day is your blessing.” Too late, Pamela saw the spark of devilry in Connor’s eyes. A spark she had seen once before when he had pressed the prop pistol to her heart and pulled the trigger. “Miss Darby’s only use for the reward will be for her dowry, because much to my humble gratitude and amazement, she has agreed to be my wife.”

  Chapter 11

  That miserable scoundrel! That wretched blackguard! That—that—” Pamela struggled to recall some of the insults so generously offered to her by the smugglers in the outlaw’s den. “That swiving, whoremongering son of a—” She slammed a hare’s foot into a dish of rice powder, sending a choking cloud of the stuff into the air and setting Sophie off on a chain of delicate sneezes. “Why, I should have let Colonel Munroe hang him with his own jabot!”

  Sophie shooed the cloud of powder away, then went back to trying to arrange the thick coils of Pamela’s hair into some sort of manageable coif. “If I’m not mistaken, I believe it’s customary to accept a marquess’s marriage proposal with a tad more grace.”

  “That’s the second time the
conniving wretch has led me straight into a trap. And the last, I should add.” Pamela leaned forward on the skirted stool, scowling at her reflection in the dressing-table mirror. She was starting to look nearly as feverish and mad as the duke. “I still can’t figure out why he would do such a wicked thing.”

  “What?” Sophie sighed wistfully, tucking a curl behind Pamela’s ear and securing it with a mother-of-pearl comb. “Declare his love for you in front of a roomful of people and announce that you’ve agreed to be his bride?”

  “Precisely! I knew he was a born villain but I never expected him to sink to such monstrous depths. Did you see the way that nasty Lady Astrid was looking at me? You’d have thought I was something he’d dragged in on the heel of his boot! And I thought the duke was going to have an apoplexy and drop dead right then and there. They no doubt believe I’ve decided the reward’s not good enough for me. That I’ve set my sights on the duchy itself!”

  Sophie leaned over Pamela’s shoulder, clutching the silver-backed hairbrush to her bosom. “Perhaps he spoke from the heart. Perhaps he’s fallen madly in love with you and can’t bear the thought of living another hour of his life without you by his side.”

  Somehow her sister’s teasing words cut deeper than Connor’s betrayal. Because for an elusive moment—when Connor had gazed deep into her eyes and tenderly brushed his lips over her hand—her own heart had dared to entertain such a ridiculous notion.

  But then she’d seen that wicked sparkle in his eyes and remembered that she was not her mother. Or even Sophie, for that matter. She would never be the sort of woman who inspired such passion in a man. Connor’s earnest words were meant to mock everyone in that room, including her.

  She sat up straighter on the stool. “I can assure you that Connor Kincaid loves only himself and what he stands to gain from our unholy little alliance.”

  “Well, if you don’t want to marry him, then I will. Or at least I would if he knew I was alive.” Sophie sighed. “I’ve never met a man so immune to my charms. You’d almost swear his heart already belonged to someone else.”

  “Perhaps it does,” Pamela replied softly, remembering the gold locket he had handled with such tender care and still wore next to his heart. “Ow!” she added as Sophie yanked another coil of her hair into submission. She rubbed her smarting head, glaring at her sister in the mirror. “I can’t believe Mama allowed you to dress her hair for all those years. It’s a miracle she didn’t end up bald.”

  “Maman didn’t wriggle nearly so much or have such impossible hair,” Sophie retorted, stabbing a hair pin into Pamela’s tender scalp. “And you shouldn’t be complaining. After all, you get to go have a proper supper while I’m left to languish here all alone.”

  Although Sophie made it sound like the foulest of dungeons, their elegant suite with its cozy sitting room, dressing room and adjoining bedchamber was more spacious than any lodgings they’d ever shared with their mother. In truth it was Pamela who envied Sophie. She would have liked nothing more than to crawl into the charming hand-painted half-tester and pull the sumptuous bedclothes up over her head.

  “If you don’t stop whining,” she said, “I’ll demote you to scullery maid and you can go gnaw on a chicken bone in the kitchens.”

  When her sister failed to laugh at her jest, Pamela sighed and swung around on the stool to face her. “I’m truly sorry about all of this, darling. If I’d have known we were going to be staying for more than afternoon tea, I’d have told them you were my sister, not my servant. I know this role won’t be an easy one for you to play, but at least I’ll know you’re safe and not at the mercy of some leering nobleman. I promise you that I’ll reveal your true identity just as soon as…” She hesitated, still determined to shield Sophie from the truth about their mother’s grim fate. “As soon as it’s prudent.”

  Although she appeared to be somewhat mollified by Pamela’s sympathy, Sophie’s nostrils still flared in a wounded sniff. “You could have at least had the decency to tell them I was a French maid.”

  Pamela swiveled back around on the stool, grinning at Sophie in the mirror. “You know, there are ladies who beat their maids regularly with a hairbrush to improve their dispositions.”

  Sophie tossed her head, her less than genteel snort telling Pamela what she thought of that idea. But she finished dressing Pamela’s hair with a minimum of yanking and poking, finally stepping back from the stool with a flourish of the hairbrush and a triumphant, “Voila!”

  Pamela touched a hand to her hair. She had to admit her sister had worked wonders with the scant resources at her disposal. Sophie had laced one of her own pink ribbons through the heavy coils before twisting them into a graceful Grecian knot at Pamela’s nape. The look might have been too severe if not for the clusters of glossy ringlets she’d coaxed forward to frame Pamela’s face.

  Gripping the edge of the dressing table, Pamela drew in a shaky breath. Her face might be too pale and her eyes too bright, but at least her hair was perfect.

  Now all she had to do was go downstairs and face her treacherous fiancé—and possibly the villain who was going to try to kill him.

  Connor restlessly prowled the length of his extravagant suite, waiting to be summoned for supper. Although the towering mahogany four-poster that dominated the bedchamber was larger than some of the jail cells he’d frequented over the years, he still felt as if the walls were closing in around him. At least each time the law had tossed him in jail, he’d known there was some chance of escape. He slipped a hand beneath his collar, rubbing the scars left by the hangman’s noose.

  He’d spent too many years roaming the mountains and moors, wild and free. He could barely breathe in here.

  It was the perfect den for a gentleman. The plaster walls had been painted a warm burgundy and were trimmed in forest green wainscoting. The furniture was all carved from rich warm cherry or gleaming mahogany the exact shade of Pamela’s hair. A pair of comfortable chairs upholstered in buttery brown leather sat in front of the black marble hearth.

  The air was redolent with the masculine scents of wood and leather, and there wasn’t a speck of dust to be seen. It was almost as if the suite had been waiting for him.

  Not for him, he corrected himself grimly. For the duke’s son.

  When the duke had touched his cheek and gazed at him as if he was the answer to the man’s every prayer, he had expected to feel a rush of triumph, not an overwhelming wave of pity and guilt. In that moment he would have given anything to be back in the Highlands, thundering across the moor on his horse with the law fast on his heels.

  His clansmen had once looked at him the same way—as if he had the power to make all of their dreams of reuniting Clan Kincaid come true. For almost a decade they had ridden by his side, thwarting the redcoats at every turn. They had been closer than brothers, the cords of loyalty that bound them thicker than blood. But eventually Connor had realized that the only place he was leading them was straight into a noose. So five years ago, on a misty Highland morning, he had mounted his horse and ridden away, leaving his men and his dreams far behind.

  Wheeling around, he strode to the window overlooking the gardens, desperate for a gulp of fresh air to fill his starving lungs. He grasped the window sash in both hands and tugged it upward. It did not budge. Judging from the thick layer of white along its seam, the window had been recently painted.

  Cursing the careless handiwork, Connor looked around for something to help him pry it open. He strode to the hearth and returned with an iron poker. He was on the verge of loosening the paint’s grip on the sash when the poker slipped in his sweaty hands. Its tip went crashing through one of the lower panes, sending tinkling shards of glass raining down on the cobbled walk far below. A cool rush of night air came pouring into the room. Connor swore, staring in dismay at the destruction he had wrought.

  “Ye’re supposed to use the poker on the fire, lad, not the window.”

  Connor turned to find Brodie grinning at him from the do
orway. With his knee breeches, white stockings and buckled shoes, he looked more like an overgrown schoolboy than a valet.

  Connor pointed the poker at him. “Sneak up on me like that again and I’ll use it on your thick skull.”

  His high spirits undampened by the threat, Brodie strutted across the room to the bed, clanking with every step. He opened his coat and a veritable treasure trove of booty came spilling out onto the counterpane, including a pair of silver candlesticks, a delicate gold thimble, a small bird cage, a porcelain butter dish, and a filigree clock.

  Connor blinked at the impressive haul. “I don’t suppose the butler asked you to bring all that up here to polish it.”

  Brodie plucked a silver spoon from the pile and admired his reflection in the shining bowl. “I’m just plannin’ for the future. If this duke o’ yers decides to toss us out on our ears tomorrow, I’ve no intention o’ leavin’ empty-handed. Besides, he has so much o’ this pretty stuff lyin’ about, it’ll be months before he misses so much as a thimble.”

  Connor returned the poker to the hearth before Brodie could steal it. “I hate to point this out, but if I’m to be master of this house someday, those are my things you’re stealing.”

  “In that case I’ll just consider it a wee advance on me salary.”

  “I’m not paying you a salary.”

  “Then I’d best go back for that silver-plated snuff box I saw in the library.”

  Brodie started for the door, but Connor stepped neatly into his path, forcing him to execute an abrupt about-face.

  “Aren’t you supposed to be polishing my boots or something?” he asked as Brodie made himself at home on the bed—reclining against the headboard and lighting a fat cigar he’d no doubt pilfered from the duke’s private stock.