by Cheryl Holt
“Why would he kick us out? It’s the middle of the night.”
“But dawn’s coming. He might order us back to the city.”
“He’s not my father,” she sniffed. “He can’t tell me what to do.”
“Well, he can tell me so while I’m downstairs, prepare for us to depart.”
Ramsey leaned over the bed and stole a quick kiss, hating to have the erotic interval conclude so abruptly. He’d wanted to wake up with her, to learn what outrageous act he could convince her to perform next. For a girl who’d been a virgin a few days prior, she was incredibly creative.
He hurried down the hall, wearing just his shirt and trousers, not bothering with shoes or coat. He was dizzy and disoriented and in no condition to spar with Michael.
When he’d left London with Rebecca he’d lied to Michael, claiming he was on his way to Dover to check on their liquor smugglers. Michael demanded absolute loyalty from people, so Ramsey couldn’t predict Michael’s response. Michael dealt with large sums of money and had to be certain that those around him were reliable. There was always too much at stake, so he didn’t allow second chances. He couldn’t.
Had Ramsey squandered Michael’s trust? In all their years together, Ramsey had never deceived Michael on any topic. Had Rebecca been worth it? He couldn’t decide.
Michael was in the parlor, in a chair by the fire, still drinking, still smoking. He motioned for Ramsey to sit, and Ramsey slinked over like the cur he was.
“Sorry,” he mumbled yet again.
“You keep repeating that, and I heard you every time. You can stop now.”
“All right.”
“You said you could explain.”
“And I can!”
“Give it your best shot.”
“I like her. You know that.”
“I could have sworn I told you to leave her be.”
“I tried!” Ramsey declared.
“Not very hard.”
“No, not very hard at all. I guess I couldn’t resist.”
Michael sipped his whiskey, his blue eyes like daggers boring a hole in Ramsey’s gut.
“Why are you at Orphan’s Nest?”
“We…ah…were traveling to Scotland to marry.”
“You were going to marry her? Seriously?”
“I was.” Ramsey nodded vigorously.
“But…?”
“She got cold feet and didn’t want to.”
“She got cold feet.”
“Yes.”
“Not you. Her.”
Michael was dubious, and Ramsey shrugged. “Originally she thought it was a good idea. She was desperate to escape her brother-in-law’s trouble, but she’s reconsidered. I expect she’s hoping she can find somebody better than me.”
Michael snorted at that. “I expect she can too.”
“So…we’ve just been passing the time.”
“I already talked to the butler.”
“Oh.”
“He informs me that you two are disgusting.”
Ramsey and Rebecca had used the house in sordid ways, eating and imbibing and generally making fools of themselves.
Rebecca was wild and loose, and since she’d always lived with her fussy older sister, she’d never had a chance to misbehave. But she’d definitely reveled in Michael’s home.
They’d fornicated in every room—except Michael’s bedchamber—but in the end, there hadn’t seemed any reason not to try it. Yet with Michael on the premises and his being extremely irate, Ramsey felt awful.
“How did you know we were here?” Ramsey asked.
“I didn’t. I was riding north, hunting for you. I simply stopped to sleep for the night.”
“Why were you searching?”
“Miss Wells left a note for Magdalena about your eloping. Maggie was worried. She thinks you’re a bad influence.”
“I am a bad influence? Obviously she doesn’t know Rebecca very well.”
“You’re blaming this on Rebecca?”
“Damn straight.” Ramsey studied Michael, gauging his dour mood. “Am I fired or what?”
“I couldn’t fire someone who’s been the friend you’ve always been to me.”
Relief swept through Ramsey. “Thank you.”
“But I wouldn’t deem it amiss if I beat the crap out of you for being an idiot.”
“Would you like to?”
“Not really. Your head’s so hard, I’d likely break my hand. You’ll have to work to worm yourself back into my good graces though.”
“I will. I’ll do anything, Michael. You know that.”
“I thought I knew that. I’m not so sure anymore.”
“I’ll make it up to you. I promise.”
Michael scoffed, his gaze irked and angry.
“What now?” Ramsey inquired.
“Now…you’re about to get married.”
“What do you mean?”
“We’re saddling some horses, and we’ll keep on for Scotland. You’re not coming back to London unless it’s with a leg-shackle on your ankle.”
“I don’t believe Rebecca wishes to wed.”
“When have you or I ever listened to a woman?”
“Never?”
“Never,” Michael agreed. “We’re not about to start with an annoying tart like Rebecca Wells.”
Michael rose and marched out.
“Where are you going?” Ramsey asked.
“To explain the facts of life to your fiancée.”
“Maybe…ah…you should let me speak to her. She can be stubborn.”
Michael glared over his shoulder. “That vixen has your prick wrapped around her little finger. I’m not about to waste time letting you tell her anything.”
Michael reached the stairs and climbed to his bedchamber, Ramsey tagging after him like the faithful dog Rebecca accused him of being. As he arrived at his room, he didn’t bother knocking, but then it was his house, and Ramsey and Rebecca had blatantly intruded.
Luckily she’d dressed—at least as much as she could without a maid to help. Her anxiety evident, she was sitting on the bed, her hips balanced on the edge of the mattress, her feet on the floor.
On seeing Michael, she scowled and demanded, “What’s happening?”
“The minute the sun crests the horizon, we’re riding for Scotland,” Michael told her.
“Scotland! What for?”
“The two of you are marrying, just as quickly as I can accomplish it.”
“I don’t want to marry Ramsey.”
“That horse is out of the barn, Miss Wells. You’re about to be a bride, and I can’t deliver you back to your sister without a ring on your finger.”
“What if I refuse to accompany you?”
“You don’t have a choice, so I suggest you get used to the idea that you’re about to be a wife—with Ramsey Scott as your husband.” Michael peered at Ramsey and, his derision clear, he muttered, “Poor girl.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Felicia huddled in her carriage, the curtain tugged back so she could peek out at the proceedings down the block. Magdalena Wells had returned to her establishment to find a heavy chain barricading the door, the windows being boarded up.
“I don’t understand,” Miss Wells complained.
“Which part is confusing you?” James Blaylock asked her.
He was acting in an overbearing manner, pretending to be a government official, and from Miss Wells’s deferential attitude, he’d definitely succeeded in fooling her.
When Felicia had decided to put her foot down about Miss Wells, she hadn’t been able to glean any sympathy from her mother, so she’d taken matters into her own hands. Mr. Blaylock seemed to be the only person in the world sensitive to her plight, so she’d sought his assistance.
Apparently he and Mr. Scott were old enemies, though Mr. Blaylock wouldn’t confide the root of their quarrel. But his dislike was potent and unwavering. He’d been practically gleeful over the chance to inflict secret harm on Mr. Scot
t, with that harm being perpetrated against Miss Wells.
When he’d suggested his ruse to Felicia, she’d been more than happy to follow his advice. Miss Wells wouldn’t realize it was a sham until it was much too late.
“This is my building,” Miss Wells said. “I’ve owned it for years.”
“The prior owner was a Mr. Sterns? Is that correct?”
“Yes, but he was Vicar Sterns. He was a preacher.”
“You bought it from him?”
“No, I inherited it when he died.”
“He was behind in his taxes.”
“What has that to do with me?” Miss Wells inquired.
“They are due and owing.” Blaylock smiled a grim smile. “Can you pay them? It’s quite a substantial sum.”
He was holding a sheaf of papers, and he shoved them under her nose, pointing to the number at the bottom. She gasped with astonishment.
“Of course I can’t pay that much, and I’m sure you’re mistaken about this.”
“I’m not.”
“What is your name again?”
“Mr. Blaylock.”
“What is your function in this situation? I don’t believe you ever made it clear.”
“I work for the tax assessor,” he lied.
“Oh.”
Felicia snorted with amusement.
She had to wed Mr. Scott, had to comply with her father’s edict but if Mr. Scott was in love with another woman, she would not go forward. It was beyond the pale of what she could abide.
Felicia had grown up imagining the handsome swain she’d eventually marry, but as she’d stepped into adulthood, she’d had to accept that none of her dreams would come true. In her union with Mr. Scott, she would have the sort of tedious, unsatisfying life that her friends and her sisters were forced to endure. Their husbands all had mistresses and illegitimate children from their many affairs. They spent their money on trollops as well as on homes, clothes, and food for their second, alternate families.
Felicia would not live that way!
Mr. Scott was out of town, so it was the perfect time to act. She’d begged him to send Miss Wells away, but he’d refused, and his disregard had incensed her as nothing had in ages.
She didn’t have control over much, but she intended to have control over this. Miss Wells would not remain in close proximity to Mr. Scott where she would cloud Felicia’s existence with her scandalous presence.
“How can I rectify the dilemma?” Miss Wells asked Mr. Blaylock. “Whom should I contact?”
“There’s no one, really—unless you’re prepared to tender the whole amount.”
“But…but…how would I?”
“That’s not my problem, Miss Wells.”
“You’re being ridiculous. You can’t simply confiscate my property and board up the windows without my permission.”
“I can and I have,” Blaylock pompously retorted, “and since the taxes are in arrears, the place isn’t actually yours anymore.”
“Stop, please,” Miss Wells fumed. “I must write a letter to…to…”
“To whom, Miss Wells? Is there someone who could pay for you?”
Miss Wells gnawed on her cheek, and Felicia wondered if she was pondering Mr. Scott. Would the Jezebel dare mention him? If she named Mr. Scott as an ally, Felicia couldn’t predict how she’d react.
Miss Wells’s shoulders slumped. “No, there’s no one who could help.”
“And there’s the other matter too,” Mr. Blaylock continued. “You’ll have to answer for it in court.”
“What other matter?”
“The charges of pandering.”
“Pandering?” Miss Wells asked. “What is pandering?”
“Do you deny that you supply girls to work in Mr. Scott’s bordello?”
Miss Wells scowled. “That I what?”
“Don’t pretend, Miss Wells. Mr. Scott has already been questioned, and he’s admitted your scheme.”
“My scheme?”
“When a pretty girl eats at your purported charity mission”—Blaylock imbued the word mission with an enormous quantity of disdain—“you steer her to Mr. Scott.”
“I most certainly do not. He’s a menace to society. I try to keep people away from him.”
“A likely story, Miss Wells, and we have too many witnesses who say otherwise.”
“What witnesses?”
“Mr. Scott for one.”
“I demand to speak with him at once.”
“I’m afraid that won’t be possible.”
“I demand it!” Miss Wells tried again.
“Now then, if you’ll come with me?”
Blaylock clasped her arm and urged her toward his carriage, and though Miss Wells protested and dragged her feet, she was much too small to halt Blaylock’s forward momentum.
Felicia let the curtain drop. There was nothing more to see. Blaylock would stop by to chat with Felicia after he was shed of Miss Wells, and no doubt, the rest would conclude without a hitch.
Poor Miss Wells…
Mr. Blaylock was extremely competent, and he had Miss Wells’s downfall planned to the last detail. She would be dumped into London’s convoluted and chaotic prison system. In the official records, her name would be misspelled so that—even if a person thought to search for her there—she wouldn’t be listed on any prisoner manifest.
If she survived her incarceration—many didn’t—and her case ever came to trial, Blaylock would bribe witnesses to testify against her. She’d be convicted and transported with no trouble at all.
Mr. Scott would return to the city to find the mission shuttered and Miss Wells vanished into thin air. No one would be able to inform him where she was or who had taken her. She’d disappear as if she’d never lived in the paltry neighborhood, as if she’d never known Mr. Scott. She would be gone forever, and Mr. Scott would swiftly forget her.
Felicia sighed. She hadn’t realized she could be so cruel, that she had such a malicious streak buried deep inside. But honestly, when faced with such an outrage, how could she be expected to look the other way?
She knocked on the roof of her carriage and ordered her driver to pull away, and she didn’t glance back. Not once.
* * * *
Michael slowed his horse and proceeded down the street to Maggie’s charity mission.
If he’d had an ounce of his wits remaining, he’d have continued on past her building and kept on to his club, which had been sorely neglected of late. Considering the shady characters who patronized his establishment, and the rough brigands with whom he did business, there was no telling what shape the accounts were in.
He’d escorted Rebecca and Ramsey to Scotland, had stood with them as they’d recited their vows. Though he hadn’t been rude enough to carry a pistol into the church, he might have been holding a gun on one member of the bridal party—and it hadn’t been Ramsey.
His friend had been perfectly delighted to wed Rebecca Wells, but Rebecca hadn’t wanted to, even though she was good and thoroughly ruined. Despite how Michael had scolded her and chastised, he couldn’t make her feel guilty. During the ceremony, he’d guarded the door lest she try to sneak out when he wasn’t watching.
Michael had never been the most moral man, but he’d been shocked by Rebecca’s attitude. She’d been particularly blunt in explaining how she’d used Ramsey to escape her brother-in-law, and she insisted that matrimony had never been on the table between them. Ramsey had offered to help her, and she’d accepted with no strings attached.
She appeared to like Ramsey and they certainly got on well, but she didn’t trust him, and Michael couldn’t blame her. Even though Michael had vouched for Ramsey a dozen times over, he hadn’t been able to convince her that Ramsey wasn’t such a bad catch.
Michael sympathized over her reservations but for pity’s sake, she had shred every ounce of reputation she’d ever possessed, and in the rules of her world—which she seemed to think no longer applied to her—she had to wed. Besides, if the
y hadn’t, what would Michael have said to Maggie when he returned to London?
Michael had fixed the mess by forcing a marriage. Rebecca had been furious, but to hell with her. He didn’t know what Maggie’s opinion would be, but he hoped she’d be glad, and since the union was an accomplished fact, it was too late to complain.
On the trip south he’d left the dissolute pair at Orphan’s Nest with instructions to enjoy a short honeymoon, but after that, he expected Ramsey to get back to work.
Ramsey had promised he would, but the poor oaf was so besotted that Michael had no idea if he’d ever see the man again or not. He might just keep on and on with Rebecca until his cock fell off.
After riding away without the newlyweds, he’d had a lengthy opportunity to deliberate his own future. What was it he wanted out of life? What direction should he take?
He’d never been prone to reflection or regret. He picked a path and blustered down it, but recently he was careening from one horrid decision to the next.
He’d relished the chance to poke Lord Stone—and his peers—in the eye by marrying into the ton, but Michael didn’t actually care about a grand match. He didn’t care about Felicia or her father. As her husband, he’d never experience anything but misery.
Felicia would never forgive Michael for pushing himself on her, so the whole arrangement was a hideous folly. His secret wish was to wed and replace the family he’d lost somewhere on the way. Marriage to Felicia wouldn’t bring him any of the boons he sought. She’d be wretched forever, so why torment her?
The question had vexed him throughout the journey. Vanity was driving him, and it would stick in his craw to cry off, but if he did he’d no longer be engaged to Felicia. And if he was no longer engaged to Felicia, he could become engaged to someone else, that someone being Magdalena Wells.
Once he’d reached that realization, the rest had been easy.
Maggie was tough and smart and funny and resilient. She wasn’t afraid of Michael, wasn’t alarmed by his past or overly concerned about his status or ancestry. She understood him better than anyone—better even than Ramsey who’d been around in Michael’s earliest memories.
When he’d quarreled with her about Felicia, he’d kept claiming that he wanted to be happy, and Maggie made him happy, so happy that he wondered if he hadn’t fallen in love with her. He’d never been in love and had always assumed he couldn’t suffer such a ridiculous sentiment, but if it wasn’t love, how could he explain what was occurring?
