Hold Your Breath 01 - Stone Devil Duke

by K. J. Jackson

  The thug stumbled closer.

  Aggie froze, overcome with the bile that shot up from her stomach. Please. Not two of them at once. A brutal hand twisted her skin. Waves of pain followed by waves of pain.

  Laughter rang in her ear. Aggie tried to suck breath into her crushed lungs, gathering the last of her energy to try to fight one last time, when she noticed out of the corner of her eye the bastard in front of her dropping soundlessly to the ground.

  A dark figure with a gleaming, blood-stained knife, stepped over the now inert body.

  She was thrown, and the last thing she saw before her head hit the brick wall and blackness swallowed her, were familiar grey eyes.

  Grey eyes rushing toward her in a desperate effort to stop her fall.

  Grey eyes flooded with rage.

  ~~~

  “Hell, Aggie.” Devin got to her just as she hit the ground.

  He glanced over his shoulder, only to see the cloaked figure disappear around the coach. Running footsteps echoed down the street.

  On his knees beside her, Devin gently tilted Aggie’s face toward him. Blood ran along her temple from a gash. Her eyes closed, she wasn’t moving.

  Devin put his ear to her chest. Her breathing, although raspy, was close to normal. Shaking her slightly—as gently as he could, considering the anger he just barely had control over—he attempted to prod her awake.

  He looked out past the coach into the street again.

  There was nothing that would give him more satisfaction than to go after that damn bastard and give him a death he would beg for.

  But Aggie was unconscious. And he would not leave her alone.

  His only option was to hope that she would be able to describe the man when she woke. That bastard had to be the fifth one Aggie talked about. The leader.

  Devin would destroy him. Aggie would have peace. He would make certain of it.

  He moved one foot for balance and slipped his arms under her. Picking her up gently, he took care not to jostle her too much.

  Bunching up her hood under her head for support, he laid her on the floor of the hack. He didn’t want her to roll off the seat as they moved.

  Closing the door, he turned and leapt to the driver’s perch, setting the horse quickly in the only direction he could.

  ~~~

  The pounding on the front door rudely awakened Howard and Beatrix Rutland.

  Howard, disgruntled at his interrupted sleep, decided to take the pleasure of a good tongue lashing at the intruder, away from the butler and do it himself.

  “Of all the most inconsiderate,” Howard muttered as he pulled open the front door while tying his robe. The sight that greeted him jolted him awake. “What the hell…?”

  Devin strode into the front hallway, an unconscious Aggie secure in his arms.

  “Aggie! Dear God—is she all right?”

  Devin nodded in the affirmative.

  The two men stared at each other. Howard with a perturbed look. Devin with an expressionless face. Devin waited for Aggie’s uncle to come to his conclusions.

  “You know what this means, Dunway?” Howard asked several moments later.

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Well then, get my niece up to the spare bedroom, two doors down on the left.” Howard’s thumb gently rubbed across Aggie’s forehead, both bloody and dirty with soot. His fingers stopped at the open gash.

  His voice softened. “What the hell happened? She will be fine, will she not?”

  “Yes, it is just a minor cut. But I will send a doctor as soon as I leave here.”

  “Do I want to know what happened?”

  “No.”

  Devin turned from Aggie’s uncle and carried her up the stairs to the spare bedroom. He laid her on the bed, removed her cloak and boots, and pulled the covers of the bed around her.

  Stepping back, he paused a moment, looking down at her soot-lined face. His eyes paused at her forehead, crinkled hard, even in sleep. Pain—physical or emotional? Either way, it didn’t disappear from her with unconsciousness. Devin’s gut hardened.

  Instinct made him lean back in, and he laid a gentle kiss on her forehead before striding back down the stairs into the foyer.

  “How long will it take?” Howard’s face glowered an angry red after having several minutes to work himself up.

  “One day.”

  Howard nodded. “Well then, I will be expecting you tomorrow at eleven, Dunway.”

  “Make it ten,” Devin replied. Hand on the door, he stopped. “If the doctor is worried or she does not awaken today, let me know. And under no circumstance are you to let her out of this house.”

  Devin disappeared out the door into the morning’s first rays.

  { Chapter 9 }

  “Aggie, sweetheart, wake up, honey.”

  The gentle prodding voice of Aunt Beatrix, coupled with the jostling of her arm, pulled Aggie out of the deep abyss.

  “Aggie, honey, you must get up if we are to be ready.” Aunt Beatrix continued her gentle demands.

  Aggie turned over onto her stomach in bed, one bare arm flopping down the side of the bed. Her head sank deep into the feather pillow, and she fought consciousness to regain the cavernous sleep she was just lost in.

  Then her head started to pound.

  Skull near exploding, she sat up, swaying with grogginess.

  Why her aunt would be at her townhouse, prodding her awake, was beyond Aggie at the moment. But wait. She squinted through her pounding forehead, scanning her surroundings.

  She wasn’t at her townhouse. She was at her aunt and uncle’s home.

  Befuddled, she found focus on her aunt, sitting on the edge of the bed. The pain sent nausea to her stomach, and she raised her hand to her forehead to touch the origin of the painful shards. Fingers slid across a scab that ran just past her hairline, and her eyes opened wide, bewildered. Aunt Beatrix smiled at her sympathetically, patted her hand, and dabbed a tear off the edge of her own eye.

  “Aunt Bea, why…” Aggie’s raspy voice broke off as fuzzy shreds of nothing floating through her mind. She didn’t even know what to ask in her groggy state.

  Eyes growing wider as moments passed, Aggie demanded in a low whisper, “Aunt Bea, how long have I been asleep?”

  “Oh, dear, it has been a day and a night,” Aunt Beatrix said. “You woke up yesterday, do you not remember?” She waved her hand. “It was only for a short while, though. You arrived here about six yesterday morn. Giving us quite a fright, I might add. But no need to worry. It is now only nine in the morning, and you still have plenty of time, sweetheart.”

  “Time?” Aggie asked. The throbbing in her brain ruined any chance she had to follow Aunt Beatrix’s scattered talk.

  “Why yes, time to get properly attired for the wedding,” Beatrix said, rising from the edge of the bed. She walked across the room to fetch a light cream gown with a low-fitted bodice, embroidered by French lace and complete with a flowing train.

  “I had the maid try to wash that dreadful black stuff off your face, but she just made it worse. And you shoved her away. None too politely. So you need to wash it yourself, it is quite smeared, my dear. Unfortunately, there is no time for a bath. I would prefer that there be time, but I have to listen to Howard. It is what it is.” She laid the dress at the end of the bed. “Put this on, and I shall be back with a maid in a few moments to do your hair. It was certainly lucky that I had bought this dress for your birthday on our last trip to France.”

  Birthday. France. Bath. Did she say wedding? Aggie fought the sway as a feeling of dread twinged into the corners of her mind. Why would her brain not work? “What is going on, Aunt Bea?”

  Aunt Beatrix gave her an odd smile, then scooted out of the room without so much as a glance back at Aggie. No answer to her question.

  The feeling of impending doom grew. But at least her headache had moved from vibrating sharp pangs into her body, to a persistent pounding located mostly in her mind.

  Not able t
o make her brain function, much less grasp what her aunt prattled on about, Aggie decided to follow the simple instructions Aunt Beatrix had left her with. Wash her face.

  Aggie pulled herself out of bed, each movement sending painful shards through the thumping in her head. She wore a shift that wasn’t hers—when had that happened?

  Both hands clasped onto her head to hold it still, she trudged over to the basin with tepid water and looked at herself in the silver encased mirror poised above.

  Alarm shot through her. She looked freakishly terrible. No wonder her aunt looked at her with such worry.

  The dark soot on her face had smudged and expanded, her hair could not have been in more disarray, and was that dried blood trailing down her cheek?

  What the hell had happened to her?

  As much as she tried to get a solid thought in her head, she couldn’t grasp onto anything. Sighing at her own blasted ignorance, she dunked the washcloth into the bowl.

  Face scrubbed raw, she walked over to the gown her aunt had left for her to wear. Why her aunt would have her wear such a gown at nine in the morning was beyond her muddled mind’s comprehension. Shaking her head, she put on the dress. Simple instructions. Hold onto those.

  Sitting heavy onto the settee, she closed her eyes, attempting to get her mind in working order again. She followed back through the darkness. She was at the ball. The Samuelson ball—no, the Appleton party. Inside, then out. She smelled roses. Then Devin. Oh God, Devin. He kissed her. A flush rushed her cheeks. He kissed her hard.

  Then what?

  Her aunt and uncle. Hell.

  She hit a big black wall of no memories. Nothing after that.

  A knock on the door made her jump. Without a reply from Aggie, her aunt bustled in with ribbons, maid in tow.

  Aunt Beatrix pulled Aggie to her feet, turning her and starting up the long line of buttons in the back of Aggie’s silk gown. The maid started working on the tangled blond ends of her hair.

  Buttons done, her aunt steered her to the stool before the little mahogany vanity to sit. She started to untangle the other side of Aggie’s hair. For having an excruciating headache, neither the maid, nor her aunt afforded much gentleness as they worked through the snarls. Frenzied, even. Aggie turned her head and caught sight of a clock atop the corner bureau. Ten minutes to ten.

  “Aggie, honey, your uncle has yet to share the full story with me, but frankly, I am not sure I actually care to know how you showed up on our doorstep yesterday morning.”

  Aggie tried to concentrate on her aunt’s chattering, but the explosions in her head still commanded more attention.

  The maid finished plaiting Aggie’s hair, and went on to twist in the ribbons.

  “I guess I would prefer to remain ignorant about the whole ordeal. Especially since you are alive and healthy. I do not need my imagination running away without me.” Aunt Beatrix tugged a lock of hair, re-igniting the aching through Aggie’s skull. “And even though your uncle and I had this goal in mind, we had hoped to go about these activities in a more proper way—mind you, we are not about to argue with the situation, after all, lemons and lemonade, dear.”

  Aunt Beatrix followed the maid around Aggie’s head, tucking and twisting strands to her liking, deftly creating beauty. “Your mother will not be privy to the details of when and how you showed up on our doorstep yesterday—not that she could even comprehend it, poor dear.”

  “Details?” Aggie interrupted. Why would her aunt need to hide details? Aggie tilted her head to her aunt. “What details, and why would they upset my mother?”

  “Oh dear, you do not recall anything of arriving here?”

  Aggie shook her head. The maid stepped away and left the room.

  Her aunt clasped her hands in front of her ample bosom. “Truly? Nothing at all?”

  The feeling of dread from earlier intensified in Aggie’s gut. “Aunt Bea, what happened?”

  “Well, dear…” Aunt Beatrix hedged, playing with a rogue strand of hair along Aggie’s forehead. “As I said earlier, I do not know why or how the Duke of Dunway came about bringing you to our doorstep—”

  “Dev—his grace brought me here?”

  Realization filtered through Aggie’s headache. No, it couldn’t be. It wouldn’t be possible. There was no need. And why the hell couldn’t she remember anything?

  “Aunt Bea.” Aggie’s voice punctuated her words as dread stiffened every pore in her body. “Just whose wedding will I be attending today?”

  Aunt Beatrix’s sympathetic smile was all the answer Aggie needed.

  ~~~

  The coach had just made it outside of the city limits.

  Devin looked across the carriage at his new wife, only to catch a rabbit-trapped-in-steel-claws look, and inwardly winced. He was not a brute dragging his woman off by the hair, but he felt every bit of it.

  He knew she didn’t want this. Hell—it was him. He wanted this. He wanted her. And he had made it happen. He wasn’t forced into this marriage. He could have taken her to her home, called a doctor, and walked away.

  Sure, she might have been ruined—but he couldn’t do that to her. Not after all she had suffered. He wanted her, enough to make this happen—anyway it needed to.

  He had hoped Aggie’s aunt would have let him have a few moments alone with her before the wedding to explain the situation calmly. He knew Aggie would need the rational explanation, but her aunt was ferocious about keeping the wedding, if not the engagement, proper.

  Avoiding the petrified set to her face, his eyes swept over Aggie. Before they left she had changed into a traveling ensemble, with a deep purple jacket fitted close to her body, accentuating her curves. He had not allowed her time to change her hair, so it was still bundled atop her head with ribbons intertwined, but now a jaunty little matching hat sat half atop the bundle. Soft honey wisps curled about her neck, and Devin’s thoughts meandered to brushing them aside when he got the chance to enjoy her sweet skin again. To actually make it downward along the gentle slope, clothes not hindering progression to the tips of her breasts.

  Devin shifted slightly. Damn, he wanted her. All the more so when she didn’t have charcoal smeared on her cheeks, a drunkard’s smell about her, and men’s breeches on. But maybe the breeches could make an occasional appearance—they did curve around her buttocks nicely.

  He pulled his eyes off her and busied himself with plucking nonexistent lint off his pants. Had he known he would be anticipating bedding Aggie with this intensity, he might have thought twice about immediately leaving for Stonewell. An afternoon in his bedroom would have wiped the panicked look from her face, he would have made sure of that. But leaving for his main country estate was the safest choice.

  He wanted his new wife completely out of danger, and the best place for that to happen was at Stonewell. His own selfish lusting would have to wait. At least until tonight.

  Aggie took a deep breath, and his eyes shifted upward on her body. Not exactly a sigh, but it noticeably raised her chest. Damn enticing. Devin stretched out a leg and exhaled silently. It was going to be a long ride.

  He knew he was going to have to make this sudden marriage right for her, though, before he touched her. He wanted her willing, open. Not performing a duty.

  For himself, he had decided Killian’s jammering-on about heirs maybe did have some merit. As bonus, it would shut his friend up. Although Devin generally disliked the thought of having a wife—mistresses were far simpler to manage—he did enjoy children, and Aggie could provide him with that.

  As for settling on a wife, Aggie was a fine choice. He knew she was as honorable as a woman could get, and that life with her didn’t contain the threat of ever being boring. Plus, he admitted to himself, he was becoming somewhat fond of the nymph. Not to mention he felt an inescapable need to keep her safe.

  But how to convince her the marriage was a good choice? She would benefit tremendously from the marriage. She would be protected, her family would be protected, she
would have more comfort and money than she could ever desire, and, she could come and go as she pleased.

  No. Devin corrected himself. She couldn’t come and go as she pleased. Her safety depended on it for now, and when the threat was removed…well, it would be better for their future children if she refrained from gallivanting about.

  Regardless, she would be content. If he explained it to her, he was confident her posture would not reflect the defeat of a person sentenced to the gallows. He looked out the carriage window, searching for a way to start.

  “I am sorry.”

  Devin’s startled eyes darted to Aggie. Did he really just hear that? “What was that?”

  “I am sorry, and please do not make me say it again,” Aggie whispered, her gaze directed at her white-gloved, clasped hands.

  Devin still didn’t believe his ears.

  “I know that marriage was the last thing you wanted. I know that it was my own idiocy and, well…stubbornness that got us into this situation.” Her eyes stayed down. “I have just been alone for so long, with so much to handle. I did not know how to accept your help. I wanted to trust you, truly, but it was so hard, and I could not. Not after…I should have gone about things differently. So I apologize.”

  Devin brightened. She was finally straightening out her misguided notions. “Aggie, I—”

  “But,” she interrupted, “I do not apologize for trying to protect myself or my mother and sister. I did what was necessary, and no matter how much you disapprove of my methods, something had to be done and I was the only one who could do it.”

  Of course not. There was no straightening. She felt bad about the outcome, but still believed what she was doing was unavoidable.

  Devin’s mouth drew into a tight line, but he nodded. He liked the apology enough to let the other comment slide. He despised the situations she continued to put herself in, but their marriage effectively ended any chance she had of repeating her actions. Truth told, he understood why she did it. Panic, and the need to control one’s own fate—for good or bad, drove her.