The Raider’s Bride

by Kimberly Cates

  "Damn it, Ian, this is no jest! I—"

  "Have mercy, Tony. Have mercy," Ian groaned, interrupting him. He leaned his head back against the red cushions. "The brandy has not yet taken effect. I assure you, there is no reason to stir yourself up into a tempest, especially over Lemming Crane."

  "Oh, no," Tony blustered. "Nothing to stir myself up about. You just made me party to murder, for God's sake! Nothing at all out of the ordinary!" Tony's face washed red with fury. "I don't mind thievery. Robbing tax collectors has been tolerably amusing. And I've never balked at teaching some tyrannizing ruffian a lesson for tormenting someone weaker than himself. I've even grown fond of wearing those ridiculous masks and playing Robin of the Hood! But this business with Crane makes my blood run cold! I should have told you to go to bloody hell!"

  "That would have made things a bit awkward, don't you think?" Ian observed idly. "Insubordination can be dashed inconvenient."

  "Inconvenient!" Gray let out an impressive string of oaths, driving the toe of his boot into the leg of a mahogany table. A statue of Zeus in the guise of a swan seducing Leda teetered, threatening to tumble into the tray of sweetmeats.

  "There's no need to attack the statuary, Tony," Ian said, reaching out to steady the statue. "I can assure you that your soul is no more blackened by what happened tonight than it ever was. Lemming Crane will be Pendragon's guest only for this one evening. Then, when he is sufficiently miserable, I shall slip into a rear entrance of the cave and lead him back into the light—along with a list of others foolish enough to serve as English spies."

  If anything, Tony's face grew more thunderous, almost sick with betrayal. "You never intended to leave him there?" Tony gripped his own glass of brandy so hard Ian expected it to shatter. "All this time you planned to let him go?"

  Ian raised one dark brow and nodded in assent.

  "You bastard!" Tony hurled his glass against the wall, scattering shards of crystal across the room. "You could have told me what you were about!"

  Ian cast a dismissive glance at the bits of glass. "I didn't know I was required to consult you."

  "You always have before! From the moment we conceived the idea of Pendragon—"

  "We were both as drunk as lords that night, if I remember. A condition I intend to seek out tonight with great fervor."

  "Ah, yes. Get bloody drunk! That way you won't have to deal with anything or anyone. You won't have to be responsible for your stubborn—"

  "How I choose to deal with my life is none of your concern," Ian said, cutting him off. "I know that you think I can't get along without your advice, Tony, but we'll both have to get used to some changes. When you wed the virtuous Miss Mabley three months from now I can hardly be running off to your bridal bower to discuss the most expedient way to extract information from a spy."

  "Why the hell not?"

  "You know why!" Ian snapped savagely. "On the night we decided to take the path of rebellion, we agreed we'd involve no women or children in our lives. We're hunted men, Tony. A knife blade held to the throat of anyone we loved would jeopardize not only the two of us but the entire band as well. Tell me, if Atwood or Glendenning had your Nora trussed up in a cozy little cell, what would you sacrifice to save her? How far would you go to—Hellfire, what's the point in hashing through all this again?" Ian bit off a curse. "It's for the best that you leave the raiders anyway. Any man as infatuated with a woman as you are with Nora can hardly be expected to summon up devotion to any cause except bedding her."

  "You don't understand, do you?" Tony asked tightly. "I love her, but that changes nothing about how I feel regarding freedom. Independence. Because of Nora I have more to fight for. I want to start a family with her someday, Ian. A future—"

  Ian gave a dark laugh. "And to think everyone considers you the rational one between us. Ah, well, I've resigned myself to the fact that I can do nothing to sway you from this marriage, any more than I could stop you from getting into that duel with Manderly where you almost got your head blown off."

  "You would compare love to that! By God, there are times when I think you've succeeded in forcing ice to flow through your veins in place of blood. Just two weeks ago you received a letter telling you that your only sister was dead, and you didn't show so much as a flicker of emotion. You merely tripled your wager and tossed out the dice."

  Ian looked away as images rose unbidden in his mind. His sister, beautiful, selfish Celestia Blackheath, forever seeking love from any man who would pay attention to her, from their dancing master to their father's aged friends.

  Ian had been just fifteen when he'd last seen her, but he would never forget how her eyes had shimmered with hate. She had loathed him, and he supposed he couldn't blame her. He had been Maitland Blackheath's only son, worthy of their father's constant albeit negative attention, while she was a mere daughter, to be shoved aside as if she were invisible.

  There had been a time when Ian had wanted to mend things between them. Wished that they could share the grief over their mother's death, their father's selfishness.

  But there had been no room in Celestia's heart for forgiveness. No common ground for them to forge even the most fragile tie. There had only been the end of any illusion that a family had once existed in Maitland Blackheath's elegant Boston home.

  And now Celestia was dead.

  Ian had lounged at the gaming table after he received the news, knowing that he should feel something—sympathy, understanding, grief—for this woman who had shared his blood. Instead, he had tightened a hard shell around his emotions, and had cast out the dice....

  He drove away the memories and let his mouth curve into an arrogant grin, masking his feelings from Tony's perceptive gaze. "I won the wager that night, if I remember. Quite a handsome sum."

  "Damn you, Ian, stop this!"

  "You must forgive me if I don't have your reverence for the sacred institution of family, Tony. My father was a selfish bastard hungry for sons and my mother was a gentle, if weak, woman, desperate to do her duty by him."

  Ian drained the brandy in a fiery gulp, the liquor loosening his tongue as he told about the childhood he'd barely spoken of in his fifteen-year friendship with Tony Gray. "I watched my mother waste away through three miscarriages and two stillbirths. I saw her bury three children who died before their first birthday."

  He twirled the stem of his goblet in restless fingers, staring at the candle fire dancing in the cuts in the crystal. "She was bedridden when I was fourteen, and the doctor said there must be no more children. When I was fifteen, I watched her stomach start to swell, and I knew my father had refused to keep his infernal breeches buttoned."

  Tony's face whitened with compassion. "I'm sorry."

  Ian winced, uncomfortable as always at Tony's uncanny ability to see past his carefully guarded facade to the man beneath. He forced a bitter laugh. "My father was sorry, too. But he was far too virtuous a man to seek his pleasure in another woman's bed. Rather than condemn his immortal soul to hell for a dalliance, he condemned my mother to a slow, torturous death. That is what love means to me, Tony."

  Ian stiffened, the words he had spoken suddenly seeming to penetrate the haze of brandy and bitter memories, making him aware of just how much he had exposed to his friend, just how vulnerable he'd allowed himself to become.

  "It doesn't have to be that way," Gray said quietly. "Before I met Nora I wouldn't have believed that—"

  "Enough, by God's blood," Ian snapped. "I don't think I could endure listening to another litany of Miss Mabley's virtues. If you've finished lecturing me about my mistreatment of Lemming Crane, I'd appreciate it if you'd go off to woo your ladylove at once."

  Tony started to protest, stopped. "All right. No more about Nora. But as to Crane..." Tony paced to the window, shattered glass crunching beneath his boots. "Ian, I was not the only one among the raiders who was troubled by what happened tonight. I could feel their horror at what you were doing. They were afraid of you. Sickened by what you
had made them a part of."

  "Fear of the demon Pendragon is the most effective weapon we have against the English. I'm certain that by morning half of Virginia will have heard of the fate Crane supposedly suffered. Any spies left in this vicinity should be fleeing from Williamsburg in terror."

  "But your own men believe you murdered someone in cold blood."

  "It's possible that their fear of me is the most important of all. It will keep them from questioning my orders at times when the merest hesitation might cost them their lives. I don't doubt it will save their necks one day."

  "Either that or force them to betray you!"

  "Does it really matter whether it's one of the Crown's wolves who unmasks me or one of my own men?" Ian stared meditatively into his brandy, swirling the amber liquid around the crystal bowl of his glass. "I suppose there are those who would say it should. I fear I am far too cynical to trouble myself over such vague distinctions. No matter who brings me to face the king's justice, I will end up just as dead."

  "Sometimes I think that is what you want."

  Ian gave a shrug edged with an unaccustomed weariness. "Even the most brilliant gambler eventually faces ruin, Tony," he said. "We cast the dice every time we put on our masks and ride. Someday, my friend, even Pendragon will have to lose." Ian finished the last of his brandy, grateful to feel it smoothing the rough edges the night's hunt had left inside him. "Of course," he observed, "I have read that death is the greatest adventure of all. What do you think, Tony?"

  Ian levered himself to his feet and crossed to where a decanter glistened on a rosewood stand. Removing the cut-glass stopper, he poured himself another drink.

  He drank deep of the brandy, hoping to dull emotions that were too sharp and cutting. Emotions he had escaped so often at the bottom of a bottle or in the arms of a beautiful woman.

  But tonight he sensed that even those familiar remedies would not ease the restlessness inside him. He glimpsed Tony regarding him with those eyes that reminded him of a spaniel's—soulful and caring, with an odd innocence despite years of hell-raking almost as distinguished as Ian's own.

  Ian stripped off his frock coat and waistcoat, flinging them on the siege d'amour, a piece of furniture designed for entertaining multiple ladyloves at once. But even the sight of the damask-covered siege increased Ian's vague sense of loss, for it had been a gift from Tony, given as a jest one Christmas, in the days before Gray's devotion to the innocent Nora had dulled his thirst for such scandalous adventures.

  With impatient hands Ian ripped free the neckcloth that had fallen in cascades of lace down his chest. "I think I preferred it when you were ready to call me out for a duel, rather than having you stand there with the look of a father confessor on your face."

  "Then I'll leave you in peace—just as soon as you tell me when we are to release our friend Mr. Crane from the cave."

  "We?"

  "Ian, until I place my ring on Nora's finger, you will not be rid of me. Crane must be half crazed by now, and a madman is a dangerous thing."

  Ian forced a low chuckle. "Don't be an old woman, Gray! Crane will be so shaken after a brief stay as our guest that I could hold a loaded pistol to my heart, and I doubt he could manage to pull the trigger."

  "In your current state you'd probably let him try it!" Tony snapped, but Ian could see him battling valiantly against the smile that threatened the corners of his mouth. "Tell me when you're leaving, or..."

  The words died in Tony's throat, Ian tensing as well as they caught the sound of running feet hastening toward the chamber.

  "I thought you gave orders we were not to be disturbed," Tony said, his gaze narrowing on the door.

  "I did. Unless the blasted house is burning down, my servants should know better."

  One hand strayed to the hilt of the dagger concealed in Ian's Russian leather boot, while Tony's fingers rested with deceptive negligence on the hilt of the dress sword that hung at his waist.

  With instinct honed in countless nights of raiding, Ian took up a place favorable to defense and struck a casual pose, while Tony did the same.

  At that moment the door flew open, revealing a black youth of about sixteen dressed in silver livery. Obsidian eyes that had always snapped with fierce loyalty were filled with distress.

  "Sir, beg pardon to disturb," Priam stammered, "b-but it's the most awful thing..."

  Ian's gut clenched at the stricken expression on the youth's face. "Out with it, man," Ian snapped. "What the devil is amiss?"

  "Some—some person is here, sir, and I wasn't sure what to do about it."

  "Soldiers?"

  "No! It—it is a... a vicar, sir!" Priam said in a tone one would have used to describe the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

  "What the blazes?" Ian's hand fell away from his knife as he gaped at this young man who had distracted whole companies of soldiers with an icy calm and had suffered the even greater danger of juggling lies to Ian's more temperamental mistresses when his master was using the excuse of a romantic tryst as an alibi.

  A vicar. Priam's words echoed through Ian's mind. Fury rushed in to replace the tension of moments before. By God's blood, hadn't he endured enough? Ian thought. Crane's wailing, Tony's temper fit, his own grim memories? Now he was to be accosted by a vicar because Priam had failed to fling the man out the door?

  "Let me make certain I understand this," Ian said with quiet rage. "You raced down here, making me think half the English army was storming the gates, when it was nothing but that idiot Dobbins plaguing me?"

  The servant's Adam's apple bobbed in his throat. "Yes, sir. I mean, no, sir. It's not Mr. Dobbins, sir. It's someone I've never seen hereabouts. A Mr. Edric Clyvedon."

  In spite of the tension of moments before, Tony gave a low chuckle. "Clyvedon? I've never heard of him, praise the saints. Dobbins must be recruiting holy men from other parishes to battle for your soul, Ian."

  "All the more reason to hurl this Clyvedon idiot off my property at once. Priam, you tell this bloody vicar the same thing I've told Dobbins for the last fifteen years. Let him go to the devil in his own way and leave me in peace to go in mine."

  "I tried to tell him that, sir," Priam insisted. "Well, I didn't speak to him that way, but I told him you were otherwise engaged and that you had an aversion to vicars. But the child... Mr. Clyvedon said you must receive her or he would come and haul you out of this wing himself."

  "Child?" Could this abominable mess get any worse? "What the devil—"

  Tony's face glowed with a touch of his old amusement. "Some former mistress staking her claim upon your purse, papa?" Gray inquired so sweetly it set Ian's teeth on edge. "And after all the time you've spent lecturing the rest of us about taking precautions. To think that you might have grown careless."

  "Close your mouth, Gray, or I might decide to shoot you—that is, after I clean up whatever disaster has just landed on my doorstep." Ian started to stalk from the room, but Tony stopped him, pressing the glass of brandy back into his hand.

  "You'd better take this with you," Tony said, his eyes twinkling. "I have a feeling you're going to need it."

  "What I need is to be left the bloody hell alone." Ian snatched the glass from his friend's hand. "Do me the courtesy of being halfway to Pennington Grove when I return to this chamber."

  "I am, as ever, your obedient servant." Tony sketched him a mocking bow. "That is, as long as you tell me what time we are to meet tomorrow."

  "At dawn, then, if it's the only way to be rid of you," Ian snapped. "See to it that Mr. Gray is gone when I return, Priam, or it will go the worse for both of you." Ian spun around and stormed out of the room, Tony's chuckles echoing behind him.

  Ah, yes, this was so blasted amusing!

  All Ian needed was more damned upheaval! One time in his whole benighted life he had wanted to toast his feet at his own hearth, drink his own brandy, and spend the night sleeping in his own blasted bed.

  Alone.

  But no. He had to be pur
sued to his very doorstep, tormented first by Tony and now by this vicar.

  Ian could only hope the man possessed a strong instinct for self-preservation. Because if he did, one glance at the master of Blackheath plantation would send the man scurrying away as if the hounds of hell were about to devour him.

  Ian glimpsed a housemaid whispering behind her hand to a serving wench, and the fury tightened in his chest, growing fiercer with each curious pair of eyes he passed.

  By the time he reached the withdrawing room in which Priam had placed the visitors, Ian's head was throbbing and the brandy Tony had given him was nothing but fragrant fumes at the bottom of the glass.

  With the palm of his hand, Ian banged open the door. A remarkably short man of about fifty shot from his perch on a spindle-legged chair as if he'd been fired from a cannon. The man, presumably Clyvedon, looked as if he'd been tossed around hell on the devil's own pitchfork.

  Circles of sweat marked his frock coat. His wig was askew. His fingers twined almost frantically about a plain linen handkerchief while his eyes were round and somewhat alarmed, as if the man feared that someone was about to set his coattails on fire.

  His unkempt appearance was an astonishing contrast to the child who was enthroned on the settee, her azure satin slippers resting upon a velvet footstool, her tiny figure resplendent in a gown of rose-colored satin so elaborate it could have clothed the finest lady at King George's court.

  Honey-gold curls threaded through with strands of taffy color were arranged with amazing intricacy about her small face, while her chin tipped up in an expression of haughtiness that seemed out of place on a child who could have been no more than eight years old.

  Ian felt his brows knit as his glare brushed over the girl, but her cornflower-blue eyes showed not the slightest bit of childlike unease. Rather, she regarded him with the disdain of a queen.

  "A gentleman does not present himself to a lady without his frock coat on," the child announced, delicately pinching her turned-up nose. "Especially when he smells of brandy."

  "My dear Miss Lucy," the vicar protested, mopping the fresh sweat off his brow with the damp kerchief. "Please! You must not begin by displaying bad manners!"