by Anne Stuart
A villain wouldn’t care. The heartless, soulless creature he prided himself on being would accept her fate as her just deserts. He’d rescued her twice now, and the night was cold and wet. Only a sentimental fool would go after her.
He turned away from the window and poured himself a leisurely glass of brandy.
Her feet were numb. Surely she’d been this cold before, but at the moment, Emma couldn’t remember the occasion. Odd, that her feet would hurt so much when all feeling was gone. Every step was torment, yet still she moved onward through the blinding snow.
The wind had whipped her hair free from the knot at the back of her neck, and it blew in her face. Several strands were caked with ice, and she could feel frozen tears against her eyelashes. The sun must be rising, but she couldn’t see a thing in the swirling storm.
Freezing to death wasn’t supposed to be an unpleasant way to die. She wasn’t sure where she’d garnered that piece of information, but it lay in the back of her mind, embedded there like all useless bits of knowledge yet she needed that knowledge now. Because freezing to death looked to be very unpleasant indeed.
She didn’t know whether she’d reached the limits of Killoran’s property, and she didn’t care. She ran into something, hard, iron, slamming against it in her blind dash for shelter, and she sank down, huddling against it. It had to be a fence of some sort, and it provided no comfort at all, but she was beyond the point of hoping for comfort in this lifetime. All she desired was a swift, merciful end.
She wasn’t going to cry. She couldn’t stand the thought of any more ice on her face. She was shaking so hard she could hear her teeth rattle, and she kept waiting for that blissful, disorienting blanket of approaching death to wash over her. Where was it, damn it? She’d had enough of this vale of tears.
He loomed up, out of the blinding storm, before she had a chance to run. One moment she was alone, an ice princess. In the next she was being hauled roughly upward, by a caped figure.
She tried to struggle, but her movements were hampered by the numbing cold, and the creature simply scooped her up with almost uncanny strength. She managed a feeble shove, and he responded with a resounding curse. It was Killoran, of course.
“If you don’t hold still,” he said through the thick snow, “then I’ll drop you and let you freeze to death.”
It was hardly reassuring. She made one more vain attempt to free herself, and his response was swift, leaving her to subside with a pained whimper. He moved swiftly through the storm, taking less than a quarter of the time to cross the area it had taken her so long to traverse.
This time there were servants when Killoran kicked savagely at the door. Heat and light surrounded her, the chatter of voices, and then he dumped her, unceremoniously, so that she stood for a moment, ice-caked, weaving, in the front hallway.
“Poor lady,” an elderly woman’s voice clucked. “Where did you find her, my lord?”
She wanted to faint. She wanted to sink to the floor in a graceful escape, but she was made of sterner stuff than that. She squared her shoulders and looked up into Killoran’s face through ice-caked eyelashes. He was staring at her with a cool, unreadable expression.
“I fished her out of the snow, Mrs. Rumson,” he replied. “Take her and thaw her out, would you?”
“Where would you have me take her, sir?”
His smile would have struck terror in the heart of a Bow Street Runner. “I haven’t the faintest idea,” he said lazily. “She’s a bedraggled creature, is she not? Perhaps she might be presentable, but right now she doesn’t do much to excite my interest. See that she’s well taken care of, Mrs. Rumson. Doubtless I’ll find some way to make use of her.”
Emma was beginning to warm up. She didn’t like the sensation. “I’m not your possession,” she said, the effect somewhat ruined by the chattering of her teeth.
Killoran’s smile was sweet indeed. “Certainly you are, my dear Miss Brown. But we shan’t call you Miss Brown—that’s much too humdrum a name for a mad creature like you. I shall put my mind to it while you’re thawing out.”
She opened her mouth to say something, then shut it abruptly. It would be a waste of time. She needed to conserve her energy for another escape.
“Don’t even think it,” he said gently.
“Think what?” she blurted out.
“You aren’t leaving here until I’m ready to let you go. It’s extremely simple, and you strike me as a bright enough creature.”
“You can’t keep me here.”
“Of course I can. And the more you try to escape, the more you interest me. Your wisest course of action, my dear Miss Brown, is to become very conciliatory. Labor to do my bidding, please me in all matters, and I shall soon grow beastly tired of you and send you on your way.”
“No.”
“No?” he echoed, much amused. “Then consider your options. Here you have a warm bed, decent food, and I’ll replace those hideous clothes with something a great deal more suitable. Your alternative is selling your body on the streets.”
“At least I’d have a choice.”
“Don’t deceive yourself. Miss Brown. You’ll have no choice at all. You’d be dead before long, from a knife to the belly or the pox, it wouldn’t make much difference. One takes a bit longer, but you’re dead either way.”
“I’m not afraid of death.”
“Obviously not, since you’re not loath to deal it out on occasion. Come, child, you’re being foolish. Would it appease you to know that I have absolutely no interest in your enchantingly voluptuous body?”
She looked at him warily. “You don’t?”
“Not a bit,” he said calmly. “I can have quite any female who interests me, ones, I regret to say, who are a great deal lovelier than you are, pretty though you may be. I’ve lost interest in affairs of passion, my child. I’m more intrigued by affairs of cunning.”
“Then where do I come in?”
“I have need of you. Miss Brown. I’m counting on you to help me with a small problem concerning an acquaintance. Once that’s taken care of, I’ll see you’re suitably rewarded and sent on your way. Your options are not extraordinary, my dove. You can assist me and be generously recompensed. Or you can find a swift end on the streets of London. Trust me, child. I have no intention of touching you. You believe me, don’t you?”
She looked up at him. Her body was racked with shivers, her feet were blocks of ice, and her skin fairly screamed with pain. She ought to run, but she knew she’d finally reached the end of her endurance. He was looking down at her, faintly bored, slightly amused, and she believed him. She knew as well as anyone what she looked like, and in her current half-frozen, half-melted state she could hardly flatter herself by thinking he desired her. Besides, she’d seen his current mistress, Lady Barbara. The man would be mad to want her instead.
“I believe you,” she said, her voice not much more than a rusty whisper.
For a moment she imagined she saw a flare of triumph in his cool green eyes. If she had, it was gone in an instant. “I knew you were an intelligent child.”
“I’m not a child.”
“Compared to me you are. Mrs. Rumson should have your bath ready by now.”
She hesitated. “My lord…” she began.
“Call me Killoran. Only servants pay attention to the Irish peerage,” he said coolly.
“Are you certain…?”
“Don’t be tedious. Miss Brown. God, what a wretched name. Almost as bad as Pottle.”
“Pottle?” She was confused.
“What’s your name, child?”
She didn’t like being called child, but she had no intention of telling him her name. Cousin Miriam would like nothing better than to have her cousin returned to the bosom of her family. “Brown,” she said firmly. “Emma Brown.”
“Emma,” he said. “How very disappointing. You should be named Boudicca. You’re far more like some mythic warrior maiden than plain Emma Brown. Up to the bath with you
, Emma. You look as if you’re going to melt into a puddle in the middle of my Aubusson carpet, and that wouldn’t please me, you know.”
She looked down at her feet. She was standing in a very wet spot, and shivers were still racking her body.
The flight of stairs looked very long indeed, and she wondered how in the world she would make it up them without assistance.
One step at a time, she reminded herself. She turned from him slowly and began to mount the stairs, secure in the belief that the cool green eyes that followed her progress held no interest whatsoever.
She was a ridiculous creature, Killoran thought idly. And so very gullible, to believe his arrant lies. He would use her to destroy Jasper Darnley. He would use her for his own pleasure, if and when he chose to. And then he would dismiss her, without another thought, and if she ended up on the streets after all, it wouldn’t be his responsibility.
He didn’t give a damn who spent his or her foreshortened life on the streets. He still wasn’t certain why he’d decided she’d help him, why he’d drained his bowl of brandy with unappreciative speed and gone out into the storm after her. It was surely senseless to keep rescuing her, just on the chance she’d help him effect his final revenge.
Ah, but perhaps that was part of the sport. Her very unwillingness to be rescued from the consequences of her rashness amused him. Her lack of reaction to him, when he’d grown weary of impressionable young women willing to fall at his feet and into his bed, stirred his pique. And her luscious, pale-skinned beauty aroused him in ways he hadn’t even begun to consider.
She’d believed his promise, poor child. Believed he had no more interest in her than she had in him. She wouldn’t know what he was about until she was lying on her back in his bed, her legs wrapped tight around his hips, her strong hands digging into his shoulders, her voice crying out in pleasure and release.
Ah, yes, she had an education in store for her, one she couldn’t begin to fathom. He would seduce her, slowly, delicately, and so thoroughly that there wouldn’t be a waking hour in her life when she didn’t think of him.
And he would haunt her dreams as well.
Ah, he was a bad man. A very, very bad man. With a faint smile on his face, he headed back to the library, to devote the proper appreciation to his French cognac.
Chapter 6
“What are you planning on doing with her?”
Killoran looked up lazily from his breakfast of warm ale and sirloin. It was close to dusk, and he found he’d awakened with less of a headache and more of an appetite than he’d had in years. He hadn’t forgotten why. The luscious Miss Emma Brown was somewhere in the vastness of his London house, and that bleak, cold spot within him seemed temporarily alive. He had no doubt she was still there. His servants were rightly terrified of him. They wouldn’t be likely to let her escape, and if by any chance she outsmarted them, every single servant would have disappeared rather than face his wrath.
Unfortunately, he didn’t seem to have the ability to quell Nathaniel’s righteous indignation. Really, the young man was most irritating. If he weren’t so infatuated with Lady Barbara, Killoran would have sent him back to his father posthaste.
But Nathaniel’s heated, respectful passion for a notorious light-skirt was almost as entertaining as Emma Brown. Besides, his disapproval was doubtless good for Killoran’s benighted soul. Assuming he still had one, which Killoran strongly doubted.
“I’m not planning to do a thing with her, dear boy,” he drawled, leaning back in his chair. “Your suspicions wound me. She’s a waif, in need of protection from the harsh winter winds. Though, in truth, I don’t consider her particularly waiflike,” he added.
“I can’t countenance—”
“You don’t need to countenance a thing, Nathaniel. I would hardly have any interest in seducing the poor girl. After all, I could have Lady Barbara anytime I signify, could I not?”
The shot hit home, and Killoran wondered why he felt no pleasure at Nathaniel’s miserable flush. “It’s not my place to say.”
“You’ve never let that stop you before,” Killoran said lazily. “You feel no qualms about passing judgment on my designs for Miss Incognita. Why shouldn’t you give me your opinion of my relationship with Lady Barbara?”
“Miss Incognita,” Nathaniel said, deliberately ignoring the provocation. “I thought her name was Miss Brown.”
“That creature is no more Miss Brown than she is Miss Pottle.” Killoran decided to allow him to avoid the more emotional issue of his would-be mistress. “As a matter of fact, our little stray is a relation of mine.” He considered the notion, then smiled. “My half sister.”
“What?”
“Of course, we don’t acknowledge it openly. We’ll simply call her a connection by marriage, though unfortunately, marriage had nothing to do with the situation. Who would have thought my proper father would have proved so licentious?”
“She’s not your sister!” Nathaniel snapped.
“No? Well, I doubt you can prove it. Particularly since I have no intention of claiming the relationship openly. Merely a word or two, a hint, and the information will pass through society quite swiftly.”
“I’ll deny it.”
“Of course you will. So shall I. It will do no good. The ton will believe as it wishes. But they’ll accept her, knowing her pedigree is decent. Let’s see, who shall her mother be? Some titled English lady, perhaps? The daughter of a duke, who fell for the wiles of a dashing Irishman and succumbed to a moment of passion?”
“You’re a bastard.”
“In point of fact, I’m not,” Killoran said. “Would you rather I set her out on the streets? Your notion of Christian charity is at odds with reality, Nathaniel.”
“I don’t...”
“Consider this, my boy. If I’m amusing myself with my newfound relative, I’m less likely to spend time with Lady Barbara—giving you a chance to enjoy her bounteous favors.”
“Lady Barbara isn’t a plaything to be passed back and forth!” Nathaniel said furiously. “She’s not a whore!”
Killoran leaned forward and rang the crystal bell at his left hand, summoning Jeffries. “Why don’t you ask her yourself?” he suggested. “You may not like the answer.”
If Jeffries hadn’t appeared so promptly, Killoran would have laid odds that Nathaniel would have flung himself on him, doing his best to pummel him. Killoran counted his narrow escape unfortunate. Sooner or later he and Nathaniel would come to blows, and he was looking forward to it immensely. Particularly since he wasn’t at all certain of emerging the victor. Nathaniel was some ten years younger and possessed of the fire of youth and principles. All Killoran could offer was the wisdom of age and treachery. In a fair fight Nathaniel would win. But then, Killoran had no intention of fighting fairly.
“Jeffries,” he said, his voice dismissing the furious Nathaniel, “find my sister and bring her to me.”
“Your sister, sir?” Jeffries said, aghast. “And where would you suggest I look for her, my lord?”
“In the green room.”
“I beg your pardon, your lordship. Is the young lady your sister?”
Killoran smiled sweetly, never a reassuring sight. “We don’t acknowledge the relationship, of course. Perhaps we should call her my cousin. I know I can count on your discretion, Jeffries. I wouldn’t want the other servants to hear of this.”
“Absolutely, my lord,” Jeffries said. “I’ll find the young lady and bring her here.”
Killoran turned to Nathaniel once the door had closed behind the servant. “You see? It’s that simple. I shan’t have to say another word. By tomorrow morning every acquaintance will hear that I’ve taken my bastard sister under my wing, and society will be agog, waiting to take a look at her. It should be most amusing.”
“Is that why you brought her here? For amusement?”
“Among other reasons, none of them particularly licentious. Ah, Nathaniel, you’re beginning to understand me. If I lusted afte
r the creature, I would scarcely decide to pawn her off on society, would I? She’ll make a lovely sister.”
“Until when?”
Killoran blinked. “I hadn’t thought that far ahead. Until she ceases to serve a useful purpose. I suppose, once she becomes tiresome, I’ll send her away. That’s what I usually do. So behave yourself, Nathaniel. I could dispense with your company just as well if you continue to be so tedious.”
“That would please me no end.”
“Of course it would. Which is exactly why I have no intention of sending you away. Hostility entertains me.”
“You’re adept at inspiring it.”
Killoran blinked again. “Why, thank you, dear boy. I believe that’s the first compliment you’ve given me.”
Emma didn’t want to see him again. She wasn’t being missish or unreasonable in that desire; when she’d emerged from the bath, her clothes had disappeared, and the silk dressing gown of deepest black satin and bright silver buttons could only belong to one person.
It carried the same elusive scent his coat had held. Leather, and whiskey, and spice, and if she were a braver soul, she would have disdained the use of the robe.
But the alternative, walking around in nothing at all, was immodest and made her chilly, so she wrapped herself in his dressing gown and tried to pretend it belonged to the stalwart young man who had brought her to this strange house in the first place.
She slept fitfully on the wide, soft bed. She ate everything Mrs. Rumson brought her, then curled up in the window seat, the dressing gown tucked around her long legs, and stared out into the gathering snow. With the warmth of the fire it should have seemed pleasant. But all Emma could think of was life on the streets of London, wading through drifts, and she pulled the satin dressing gown closer around her body and shivered. Why in heaven’s name did this late winter have to be so harsh?
She didn’t hear the door open, but she knew he was there. He was a very silent man, something that would have unnerved her if she hadn’t developed a sixth sense about his presence. She was used to noise. Uncle Horace had been loud, blustering, and Cousin Miriam’s voice had quite often been raised in strictures or prayers. Even behind the closed curtains of the DeWinter house, there had been no stillness, no peace.
