“I should say not, sir.” The butler appeared dutifully horrified at the suggestion. The Admiral considered sloth as number two on his own personal list of the seven deadly sins. Right after adultery and before patricide.
Mr. Claremont appeared in the doorway, his head inclined toward the book in his hands. The sight of his unyielding shoulders tied all of Lucy’s sensible intentions into a hopeless tangle. The Admiral stared pointedly at the mantel clock and cleared his throat with the force of a cannon shot.
Claremont looked up then, riveting Lucy with the guileless blink of his cinnamon lashes behind the polished lenses of his spectacles. “My apologies, sir. I became so engrossed in Lord Howell’s account of your triumph at Sadras that I lost all sense of the time.”
Her bodyguard’s bland innocence was so convincing that even Lucy was tempted to believe him. The man was a consummate liar. A trait her treacherous heart would do well to remember.
Claremont slouched in his chair and began to thumb through a sheaf of yellowed letters, missing the piercing gaze the Admiral leveled at him. Lucy could almost see the cogs of suspicion jerking to life in her father’s head.
A splinter of foreboding twisted in her stomach. She knew better than anyone that the Admiral’s trust, once lost, could never be regained.
Lucy huddled alone in a corner of the carriage, thinking how immense its interior seemed to have grown with Mr. Claremont riding atop with Fenster. Not even the threat of freezing rain from the bruised charcoal of the sky could drive him to seek her company.
They were off to the Theater Royal in Drury Lane to watch the great Sarah Siddons portray Lady MacBeth. Lucy thought direly that the tragedy was an appropriate counterpart to her mood. She tried to hum the melody of “That Banbury Strumpet, As Sweet As A Crumpet,” but found the hollow sound an unbearable reminder of how empty her life had been before Mr. Claremont had elbowed his way into it.
Since discovering her sketches of Captain Doom, her bodyguard had retreated behind a demeanor of cool professionalism. The man who had taken such wicked delight in teasing and cajoling her the night of their impromptu picnic had vanished, replaced by a punctual, neatly garbed stranger who treated her with the respectful deference of a servant.
There was nothing in Claremont’s performance to complain of to her father. He tipped his hat and bowed graciously to her every wish. At social functions, he remained with the carriage or stood at rigid attention in the corner, his aloof glower making the guests fidget. Even Sylvie remarked upon his uncommon devotion to duty.
But when Lucy stumbled out of bed each morning at dawn, the gnarled oak tree beneath her window stood sentinel alone, its naked branches shivering against the bleak sky.
His deliberate distance punished her in ways she hadn’t anticipated. She realized for the first time how much she had secretly enjoyed his impertinent scowls, his mocking smiles, his exaggerated yawns at her father’s ramblings. His expressive face was now closed and unreadable.
She toyed fitfully with her gloves. Claremont’s defection had left her no choice but to resume her lady of-the-manor posturing, but her spirit was no longer in the game.
The carriage drew to a halt. Catherine Street teemed with the bustle of Saturday night—the chatter of the crowds, the cries and curses of the drivers, the stamping and whinnying of the restless horses.
When the door to the carriage failed to open, Lucy tapped on the front window with the ivory handle of her fan.
Fenster’s homely face appeared, screwed into a jack-o’-lantern’s grimace. “Sorry, miss. The traffic’s in a devil of a snarl. We’ll have to wait it out.”
Lucy gathered her gloves and reticule. “Sylvie will never forgive me if we miss the opening curtain. It’s only a few blocks. We shall walk.”
Claremont spoke without turning around. “That would hardly be advisable, Miss Snow.”
All the more reason to attempt it, she thought wickedly. “John,” she called out. “Please help me down.”
Instead of the freckled footman, it was Claremont who opened the carriage door, wrenching it with such force that Lucy was surprised it didn’t topple off its hinges. She was unprepared for the quizzical warmth melting inside of her. The hint of a sulk around her bodyguard’s mouth only made his face more compelling. She was beset by a terrible urge to touch him, to trace his expressive lips with her fingertips until the lines of tension around them thawed.
“I cannot recommend this,” he said. “It will be very difficult to protect you in this crowd.”
“Nonsense, Mr. Claremont. I have the greatest confidence in your abilities.”
He didn’t budge or offer her a hand so she was forced to brush past him to climb out of the carriage. The brief contact dizzied her. Ignoring the brisk wind biting through her thin cape, she swept ahead of him, giving him no choice but to follow. The glow of the scattered street lamps barely pierced the evening gloom.
After they’d traveled a block, she dropped her fan, then hesitated. “Would you be so kind as to retrieve my fan?”
He did, slapping it into her palm.
A few more feet and her satin reticule slid off her arm. “How clumsy of me.” She cast him an entreating look. “Could you …?”
His breath escaped in rhythmic puffs of steam. Scenting victory, she marched ahead as he bent to retrieve the reticule, ducking into the darkened doorway of a bookseller’s shop. She was too engrossed in her game to notice the three dark shapes who darted into an adjacent doorway.
She peeped around the corner just as Claremont straightened. His eyes scanned the crowd, searching for her. The raw concern on his face shamed her until she reminded herself that he was probably more worried about his monthly wages than her well-being. She was gathering her cape to flee to another hiding place when a hand clamped down on her arm, a hand lightly sprinkled with ginger and smelling of spice.
Claremont’s face was as resolute as she had ever seen it as he marched her back toward the carriage.
She stumbled along in front of him, painfully aware of the curious stares of the crowd. “Where are we going? The theater is that way.”
“I’m not taking you to the theater. I’m taking you home. I’ve a job to do and if you persist in behaving like a wayward child, you give me no choice but to treat you like one.”
“You’re my bodyguard, not my nursemaid.” Lucy tried to plant her feet on the pavement to no avail. “Stop it this instant! You’re making a public spectacle of us. Do you want to cause a scandal?”
With no warning, he shoved her into a deserted alleyway, carrying their spectacle into the realm of the private. The comforting chatter of the crowd suddenly seemed very far away.
As he drew her around to face him, his hand still clamped like a vise on her arm, she realized she’d finally succeeded in what she had set out to do. All traces of indifference had been wiped from his eyes, vanquished by glittering fury. He loomed over her, his familiar features obscured by shadow, his big, warm body no longer a refuge, but a threat.
This was no phantom to fuel her midnight fantasies who could be safely banished by the morning light. This was a man—six feet of pure masculine animal tempered by years of experience.
The taste of Lucy’s triumph was bittersweet. She could only gaze up at him and try not to tremble.
“We wouldn’t wish to damage your father’s precious reputation, now would we, Miss Snow?” he bit off between clenched teeth. “So walk with me or, as God is my witness, I shall carry you.”
Lucy stuck out her lip a mutinous inch, but the Admiral had taught her since birth that there was no shame in surrendering if you were outgunned and out-manned. Mr. Claremont accomplished both with negligent effort.
“Very well,” she said.
He wheeled around and took a few steps toward the mouth of the alley, obviously expecting her to follow.
Defeat made Lucy reckless. Her glove fluttered to the cobblestones. “But not until you retrieve my glove.”
He piv
oted slowly, staring at the dainty scrap of silk she’d tossed down like a gauntlet between them. A disbelieving smile slanted across his face. More alarmed by his ferocious good humor than she’d been by his anger, Lucy took a step backward. Her shoulder blades came up against a sooty brick wall.
He pointed a finger at her. “You, my dear, can retrieve your own bloody glove. You can also balance your own embroidery frame and sharpen your own damn pencils. I’m tired of being led on a merry chase by the likes of you. I’m not your nursemaid or your lady’s maid. For all I care, you can run sniveling back to your father because the two of you deserve each other.” He tossed her reticule at her. She reacted just quickly enough to keep it from falling. “I quit!”
Panic seized Lucy as he turned to go, his broad shoulders silhouetted against the feeble lamplight. What if this were to be her last glimpse of him? What if he melted into the teeming crowd, disappearing from her life as abruptly as he’d come into it? A blade of pain knifed her heart.
Her gaze darted around the deserted alley, searching wildly for any excuse to make him stay. “You can’t just abandon me,” she wailed. “What if Captain Doom should abduct me?”
He waved a derisive arm in her direction. “He’s welcome to you as far as I’m concerned. And God pity the man!”
At that fresh insult, Lucy drew herself up, swallowed her panic, and gathered her pride. “Your resignation is not accepted, Mr. Claremont. You’re dismissed!”
He disappeared around the corner.
Lucy’s triumph at winning the last word faded as quickly as her show of spirit. She slumped at the back of the alley, utterly alone. She hadn’t felt so miserable since she’d embedded her father’s favorite letter opener in Captain Doom’s unsuspecting shoulder. It was as if she’d not only done another person injury, but mortally wounded herself.
She ought to be celebrating, she told herself fiercely, blinking back tears. Wasn’t this what she had wanted all along? To be rid of Claremont. To drive him into resigning from his position so she could regain her precious independence. Her privacy. Her solitude.
She turned her face to the wall, discovering too late that Mr. Claremont’s apathy was far more tolerable than his absence.
The brooding sky chose that inopportune moment to dump a bucket of frozen rain on her head. Its icy teeth chewed through her thin cape, soaking her finery without mercy. She was so enveloped in her haze of misery that she never saw the menacing shapes come creeping out of the shadows.
“Lost yer fine gent, did ye, lass?”
Lucy jerked her head up to find a mouthful of blackened and broken teeth only inches from hers. She recoiled from the stench of the speaker’s breath and blinked the rain from her eyes to discover two grimy, rag-swathed men.
The second of them, whose long, lank hair looked no worse for the wetting, clucked at her in sympathy. “Come now, girl, don’t be sad. We may not ’ave as much coin as that fine fellow, but we knows ’ow to show a lady a good time.”
Only seconds before, Lucy had been certain she had reached the very nadir of her existence. Now she discovered that she had dedicated her entire life to maintaining the appearance of propriety only to end up being mistaken for a prostitute in some dreary London back alley. Mr. Claremont’s perverse sense of humor must have corrupted her, for she found herself choked with helpless laughter instead of tears.
She swiped rain from her eyes, confounded by the odd mixture of despair and hilarity. “I’m afraid there’s been a dreadful misunderstanding, gentlemen.”
“We ain’t no gents,” came another voice, low and threatening. “And you ain’t no lady.”
Lucy’s amused chagrin faded as a third figure emerged from the shadows. His narrow face had the sharpness and cunning of a fox’s.
His rabid gaze snaked to her reticule. Its satin skin was swollen with her handkerchief and everpresent watch. “Seein’ as we ain’t got no coin and you do, mayhap you could pay us for our services. We’re worth it, ain’t we, mates? All the wenches says so.”
Their harsh laughter grated across Lucy’s nerves. Her heart began to thud dully in her ears. She inched toward the mouth of the alley only to discover her path blocked by the men. She had no parasol with which to defend herself, no tender, teasing bodyguard to protect her.
Fighting the paralysis of terror, she forced a coy smile and dangled the reticule in front of Mr. Fox-Face’s greedy eyes. His ragged whiskers twitched in anticipation.
“I doubt even the three of you together are worth this much gold,” she said.
He snatched at the bait. Thankful for the solid weight of her watch, she swung the tiny purse in a wide arc, smashing him in the ear. Before she could flee, the other two were on her, dragging her to the cobblestones in a flurry of straining limbs and rending silk.
Gerard lounged against the wall next to the alley and waited for Lucy to emerge. He supposed she was sulking, expecting him to soften and return to retrieve both her and her precious glove. His self-contempt mounted as he realized he was doing it again—playing his role as bodyguard with such flair and conviction that even he was coming to believe it. How could he hope to protect Lucy when the most dangerous threat to her was him?
He tilted his head back, letting the icy darts of rain stab his face. They did nothing to cool his rage. The time had come to bring this ridiculous charade to an end. He’d known it the instant he’d seen Lucy’s damning sketches and listened to her tender defense of Captain Doom. It was a pity, he thought, that the jaded pirate would never fully appreciate the loyalty, however misguided, of his enemy’s daughter.
He shoved himself away from the wall. He had thought to see his young mistress home for the last time, but surely even the disaster-prone Miss Snow could make it one block to the security of the carriage without his protection.
He ought to be thankful to be free of this farce, he told himself as he slipped the spectacles into his coat and started down the pavement. But unbidden memories pelted him with every step: wrapping Lucy in his coat to shield her from the rain, feeding her sugary comfits from his fingertips, drawing her so tightly against his body that she’d felt like a part of him that had been missing since birth. A phantom limb that now ached all the more because of its fleeting restoration.
With no effort at all, Gerard could feel her melting against him through her thin negligee as she’d done in that moment when he had enfolded her in his arms. Could feel the tickle of her damp hair against his cheek. Smell the lingering scent of soap warmed by the secret hollows of her flesh until it incited his body like an aphrodisiac. His loins pounded an exquisite protest, torturing him as he deserved.
He hastened his steps. He might have removed himself from Miss Snow’s service, but he still had unfinished business with her father. The rigid contours of his pistol prodded his ribs.
A muffled yelp sounded behind him. He stopped. The crowds streamed around him, recoiling from his fierce expression.
“Her bloody Highness probably wants me to step on a cockroach for her so she doesn’t soil her dainty little slipper,” he muttered. “Sorry, Princess, not this time.”
Ignoring the hollow clench of his gut, he resumed walking, his long strides surer than before. He was done playing knight in tarnished armor to Lucy Snow’s lady bountiful.
He froze in his tracks. For over the raucous clamor of the crowd had flown a sound he’d never thought to hear. A single name couched in a terrified scream that chilled his blood to ice.
Gerard.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
THE IMPACT OF GERARD’S FIRST STRIKE against her attackers rattled Lucy like a broadside from a seventy-four-gunner.
There was no time to feel relief, no time to do anything but crawl through the confused tangle of arms and legs to cower against the wall. Helpless to stop shivering, she drew the tatters of her cape around her, deafened to everything but the uncontrollable chattering of her own teeth.
Her bodyguard dispatched the hooligans with ruthless efficiency. He
grabbed the one by his long, stringy hair and smashed his face into the bricks. The man collapsed in a groaning heap upon the cobblestones.
Another rushed at Gerard’s back. Lucy tried to scream a warning, but her swollen throat refused to cooperate. Her hoarse squeak proved to be superfluous, for with the well-honed instincts of a born street brawler, Gerard wheeled around and drove his fist into the man’s face with enough force to dislodge the remainder of his rotting teeth. The enraged thief was fool enough to draw a knife and charge him again. Gerard grabbed the man’s wrist before the jagged blade could pierce his cheek and twisted.
Lucy slammed her eyes shut at the resulting crunch.
Her eyes flew open at another sound, even more damning than the last.
Gerard stood with his feet braced wide on the damp cobblestones, deadly mastery etched in his stance. Even more deadly was the gleaming pistol cocked in his hand. Lucy stopped shivering. A primitive thrill shot through her as she realized for the first time what a dangerous man her protector truly was. Primitive, for instead of cringing in repugnance, her heart swelled with pride.
The object of Gerard’s lethal attention was the be-whiskered leader, who had taken advantage of his compatriots’ recklessness to slink toward the crumbling wall at the back of the alley.
The man lifted his shaking hands in a plea. “ ’Ave mercy, gent,” he whined. “There ain’t no call to shoot me. We meant no ’arm t’ the little lady. We thought ye’d had yer fill of ’er and wouldn’t mind us takin’ a turn.”
Gerard’s expressive mouth curled in a sneer of contempt. “That’s where you made your mistake, chap. I never let another man touch what belongs to me.”
His arrogant assertion, however much of a bluff, should have outraged Lucy. Instead, it sent another peculiar thrill tingling through her.
Gerard’s gun arm tensed, and for one terrible moment, Lucy thought he was going to shoot her assailant down cold. Then he slowly lowered the pistol and the man fled, scampering over the wall like a terrified rodent.
Thief of Hearts Page 13
