It only hurt when he breathed.
So the unexpected gasp his lungs expelled when Daniel caught sight of Thea flinging herself from the carriage and racing toward him cut like a sword slicing across his ribs.
She looked like sunshine, even when the spontaneous smile on her face transformed into a flat line, even when she came close enough he could see that the depths of her mossy eyes were drowning in worry—over him. But neither her fading smile nor the growing alarm dimmed how she lit up his entire day. Amazing really, considering her bedraggled state.
Sludge. Her ugly dress, now soaked and muddy—and torn near the hem, he couldn’t help but note, when a fair amount of ruined stocking showed—put him in mind of sludge. Sewer bracken.
Yet Thea outshone it still.
“My lord!” she exclaimed, reaching him with breathless abandon. She immediately lifted one ungloved hand to feather fingertips over his cheekbone. “Whatever happened to you?”
Granted, his eye was halfway swelled shut, but nothing was broken—not even cracked, or so Crowley had assured him when Daniel washed up and suffered the man’s thorough inspection before departing his bachelor residence to make the jaunt to Thea’s. His tiger had already taken his carriage round back.
Daniel had considered sending his regrets and staying home tonight—not dismaying her with his freshly beat-upon visage—but it seemed his mouth had other plans, ordering his team and driver made ready before he was even dry from his bath.
But Thea—
Dear, battle-worn Thea…
Daniel pulled her fingers from his eye and ran his opposite hand down the back of her head. Straggly strands of saturated hair fell over her shoulder, left an increasingly damp spot over one breast. A breast with one very beaded nipple. “And you?” he intoned, trying—and failing—to keep the concern from his voice. “You look a fright.”
“Me?” She blushed, turned to wave Sarah on and just as swiftly took his hand in hers, opened the door and hauled him inside. “Never mind me, my lord. Your face. What—”
“Oh, Miss Thea.” At the sound of them entering, Mrs. Samuels came bustling. “Land sakes, child, we thought to have ye back hours ago. About ready to call out the Royal Navy, we were— Oh.” Catching sight of Daniel, the woman skidded to a halt. “Lord Tremayne? We weren’t expecting ye so early.” Her gaze swung to Thea and she forgot all about him. “Look at ye, child! All—”
“I am fine, truly. Would you send up some warm wash water? Start the fire in my room if it hasn’t been already?”
The housekeeper hurried off to do her mistress’s bidding and Daniel, silently bemused at seeing this calm, capable side of Thea, waited to learn what she might do next. He was stunned when, rather than direct him to wait in the parlor while she changed, she swirled back to him and cautiously touched the cut beneath his eye. “How you must be hurting. Come with me. I’ll see that you’re taken care of.”
He didn’t tell her his face was so numb he couldn’t feel a thing. Didn’t tell her Ellie’s witchy cream had taken away the worst of the sting and blessed him with more relief than he deserved.
Didn’t tell her that having her fuss over him nearly made the pain in his ribs and the guilt weighing his heart all worth it.
Nay, for once, Daniel gladly kept his mouth shut. Was at peace to meekly follow Thea’s guidance, thanks to her hand wrapped gingerly around one set of swollen knuckles, and let her lead him up the stairs.
Finding Lord Tremayne bruised and battered upon her doorstep had chilled Thea more than her icy dress. When they reached her bedchamber and she saw that though the makings of a fire were in place, the hearth was cold, she drew him straight into the windowless dressing room, which tended to be warmer especially when outside temperatures threatened the windowpanes.
Releasing him, she busied herself lighting candles and then turned to shut the door behind them to preserve what heat remained.
“Well now.” She swung back, gazed up. And the look in his unswollen eye—the sight of him, so big and so close—elevated her temperature ten degrees. “Well.”
He leaned back against one wall, arms crossed negligently in front of his chest. His neckcloth was as carelessly tied as she’d ever seen it, as though tonight he couldn’t be bothered with the intricacies of doing it up proper.
Although “proper” was hardly an applicable term when one considered the rest of him: his face had suffered the repeated application of someone’s fist, that was for certain, and he’d used her preoccupation with the candles to dispense with other formalities—removing his greatcoat, tailcoat, and waistcoat. The lack left him looking indolent as he lounged against the wall, more compelling in his shirtsleeves than any man had a right to be.
Thea knew she should be wary of him, feeling guarded and distant. Especially given his ravaged state and Sarah’s recent warnings of love and whores (nasty business, that; Thea decided to put it promptly from her mind).
How could she be expected to erect walls between them when his very presence made her both secure and aware all at once? Secure of herself and aware of him. When he made her feel more feminine than she ever had, made her want to be closer to him? Had her, in fact, marching forward and pulling one of his hands free to inspect the damage done to his knuckles.
Before she could tsk more than twice, he curved his broad hand around hers and tugged, inviting her to meet his gaze. What she could see of it, the flesh surrounding the one eye so puffy a good portion of it was obliterated.
“There is so much gentle strength in you,” she said quietly, feeling the power in the blunt-tipped fingers that held hers. “I don’t know how I know it, but I know I’m safe, even though your demeanor is so fierce and fearsome.”
He tried to smile, but with the swelling pulling his skin it looked more like a sneer. “Would never hurt you.”
“I know that, silly man. You chopped my mutton.”
“Eh?”
“The night we met, you chopped— Oh, never mind it. Will you tell me how you got hurt?”
She waited but he said nothing.
Her hand grew hot within his hold; her entire arm simmering as he feathered gentle caresses over her skin, parts south flaring to life at the heated look he gave her. But he’d yet to explain. “My lord?”
“Mmm?”
“Did Lord Penry do this? Attack you? Pound your face?”
He shook his head once.
“Are you going to tell me what happened?”
He thought a moment. “I walked into a d-d— Ow!” He hissed when she squeezed his fingers at the lie. He finished wanly, “A…door?”
So he didn’t intend to tell her? All right, neither did she relish confessing how her blunder-headed afternoon had gone. “A door? One with a nasty streak it appears.”
“And you?” he inquired silkily, taking up her other hand and spreading both her arms wide so he could survey her from fallen hair to mud-splattered hem. “Where— What of your…day? Stroll into the ocean? Embrace a shark or…two?”
“Oh, that…” She whirled from his loose hold, too embarrassed to confess her folly while standing beneath his inspection.
“Aye, that.” Lord Tremayne came up behind her, halting her retreat by pulling her spine flush against his chest.
“My lord. Stop. I’m drenched.” But she couldn’t stop herself from sinking against his strong, stalwart body and her protest was halfhearted at best. “I’ll ruin your clothes—”
“Hang my clothes,” he said hotly, his breath tickling her ear. He pulled her tight to him with one arm snug across her middle. “Thea—were you set upon by footpads?”
“Nay,” she rushed to assure him. “Nothing so dire.”
“Attacked by angry geese?”
That had her laughing and hugging his arm. “If you must know, you wretched man, I became lost. Lost in the rain the first time I ventured out and it was—it was—” She swallowed the growing lump of fear, determined not to give in to unrealized what-ifs. “’Twas…”<
br />
So very frightening. Wandering the streets for what amounted to hours, wondering if I’d ever find my way back. Back home, back to your arms—
“Alas!” She shoved his comforting touch away and broke free, scrubbing at her eyes. “’Twas no fun at all. I detest feeling so very helpless and alone.” Hearing what she’d divulged, Thea rushed to cover the admission. Edging farther away, she shrugged. “Though I hadn’t realized it, I must have wickedly awful compass sense and—and—”
The heavy gait of his steps shadowing her gave but a second’s warning before he spun her to him again, this time chest to chest.
He flinched and his breath hissed out. But he only held her more securely as his fingers went to the buttons at her nape. “So you d-did have a fright.”
He swore, but his fingers remained gentle. She stared at the column of his throat, again catching that elusive scent of his and drawing it deep into her lungs. A faint memory teased—
Once several buttons were undone, he curved his hand around the base of her neck. “You’re freezing.” It was a growl. “Where’s that water—”
As though summoned, Mrs. Samuels knocked and forged inside at his brisk “Enter.”
She started to step back but he kept her in his embrace.
Both Mrs. and Mr. Samuels came into the small room, carrying steaming pots, which they placed on the washstand. “We’ll be but a moment and I’ll have refreshments brought to your chamber as well,” she told them, kindly keeping her eyes averted. “Sam already has the fire going and the room is warming nicely. Will there be anything else, Miss Thea? Lord Tremayne?”
She let him answer in the negative as her mind was working feverishly, thanks to the spicy scent of cloves and something else, something faint but sweet, taking her back to when she’d first seen him—when he’d arrived late to Sarah’s and had drawn such a chorus of greetings just before sitting next to her.
“Wait.” Recklessly, her mind on two different paths at once, Thea called to Mrs. Samuels. The woman popped her head back in and Thea said, “The master chamber down the hall. Please heat it as well.”
“Certainly, miss.”
Once they were alone, Lord Tremayne went right back to undoing her buttons and she returned to resolving what kept niggling her brain. Astonishingly, the experience of being undressed by him paled as she pieced a large part of the Tremayne puzzle together.
“There now. Lean…” He coaxed her away and started tugging the sodden, tight-fitting sleeves of her dress down her arms. “Forgive me.”
His words arrested her from the fact that the bodice of her dress had just drooped forward, leaving her upper half covered by only a damp chemise. That and long, stubborn sleeves, adhering like glue to her elbows. “Forgive you? What ever do you mean?”
“I’ve…” Though it appeared all his energies were focused on peeling down her left sleeve, Thea had the sense he didn’t see his efforts at all, that his attention was aimed inward. “Remiss. Horri…bly so. Not to have stationed a footman here or…assigned you a coachman or—”
“Stop.” She was practically giddy. He felt guilty over not giving her more servants? “Remiss? When you’ve blessed me with so very much? ’Tis I who needs to learn directions. You fight for sport, do you not?”
“There.” The left sleeve finally free, he pierced her with his one good—and one swollen-narrowed—eye. “What?”
“You. The bruises.” She was so relieved to have figured it out. “Like cockfighting—you fight for sport.”
She’d heard of men who wagered on roosters or dogs trained to fight to the death. Knew how popular boxing had become, men actually enjoying hitting each other. She’d just never seen anyone who’d done it, timepieces and Mr. Hurwell’s droning diatribes about equestrian races being the extent of her “social” interaction the last few years. “Pugilism,” she said with satisfaction. “I’m correct, am I not?”
A slow, crooked grin spread across his mouth as he nodded. “Aye. Like cockfighting,” he confirmed, “only with fists.”
“As opposed to your cocks?”
Thea couldn’t believe she’d said that.
She knew the word, of course. Living in the slums had enlivened her vocabulary if not her life, but she’d never before uttered it.
Lord Tremayne didn’t seem able to believe it either.
He stared at her a moment, eyebrows raised, breath held. Then they both laughed. He winced, then laughed again. Thea howled so hard her stomach hurt.
How grand her life had become since meeting him.
In the bedchamber, Mr. and Mrs. Samuels shared a surprised look.
She silently deposited the tray with wine, fruit and cheese and several wedges of roast beef upon the dainty circular table while he—not so silently—set down the bucket of coal beside the hearth and beefed up the flames.
Together they turned and exited the room, securing the door behind them.
It wasn’t until they were approaching the bottom of the second set of stairs that Mrs. Samuels spoke. “Didn’t his man of affairs lead you to believe that Lord Tremayne was rather a somber fellow?”
“That he did.”
“He doesn’t sound somber to me.”
“Someone needs to teach that boy how to duck.”
Funny how breathing without her hurt but laughing with her only tickled his ribs. She’d surprised him, this mistress of his.
Had from almost the moment they met.
But something surprised him more when he freed her right arm—and was confronted with the bruises lining her wrist.
For a split second, Daniel thought he’d been too rough on her that first night. But then sanity prevailed. Lord knew he’d seen enough bruises in his life to know these weren’t fresh. Had to be several days old. There were individual finger marks as well as some deeper yellowing, indicating it hadn’t been the first time someone had used force on her.
Rage stormed his gut; he hated seeing anyone abused by bullies. He’d lived with it enough as a child, seen how cowed Ellie had been around their father, experienced his own fortitude and will draining away too many times to count to stomach it happening again—to anyone he cared about.
The overpowering need to protect Thea flooded through him.
Her eyes were still sparkling with their shared laughter while he had to exercise every bit of restraint he could summon. Keeping his grip on her loose, he raised her arm between them. “Who…did…this?”
She looked completely startled for an instant, then her eyes flicked to the discoloration before jumping back to his. The laughter withered and she pressed her lips into a tight line.
“Thea?” His thumb smoothed over the old injury, his gaze pinning hers, demanding answers.
He watched her gather determination around her like a cloak. “Nothing you need concern yourself with.”
He refused to let her get away with that. Unintentionally, his hold constricted until the subtle start she couldn’t hide reminded him to temper his anger at her unknown assailant. “I am concerned.”
“Just my troublesome old landlord.” She tossed her head as though to prove how unaffected she was. The gesture was ruined by a long hank of damp hair slinging onto her shoulder, bringing to mind the day she’d had. “He won’t bother me further.”
Daniel purposefully gentled his grip, giving no indication how ferociously he wanted to throttle the absent man. “You’re sure?”
“Positive.”
Despite her tone, he could see the thought of the bastard flustered and frightened her. Daniel would make damn certain no one would ever put that look in her eye again. He’d send Swift John to her first thing tomorrow, tell the boy to stay. From now on, if she needed him, he’d know in a hurry.
Before he could reiterate she was to use the servant as her own, Thea leaned down to step from the sludgy dress. Then she stood, not quite shivering, in her chemise. Instead of meeting his gaze, she addressed a point some three inches above his shoulder. “If you’ll wa
it in the bedchamber, my lord, I’ll wash and be out to join you directly.”
So that’s how she intended to play this? He glimpses a teeny bit of honest fear and she pokers up stiff and pushes him away?
Not hardly. Blocking the door with his body, Daniel jerked at his neckcloth, wincing when his knuckles protested the stubborn knot. Working it loose, he leaned to the side and snared her gaze. “We’ll wash together.”
He watched comprehension sink in as he dispensed with the neckcloth and undid his shirt cuffs, the mild protest of his ribs worth it when he ripped the shirt overhead and tossed it behind her. Worth it because the prim, detached look dropped from her face and she exclaimed over the fresh mottling on his side.
He’d never thanked a flush hit more.
Stripped to the waist, he reached for her chemise—ready to bare the rest of her—but she hauled out of reach. “Wait. Do you care to tell me why Sarah thought Lord Penry did this to you?”
So he is out to smack some sense into me?
Daniel smiled grimly and sidestepped her question. “Never saw him.”
“My lord…” There was a threat in her tone, as though she chastised a sword-wielding grasshopper bent on terrorizing her begonias.
The image had him laughing again. “’T-tis true. Crossed paths not at all with him—”
“Nor with a door, I’d imagine.”
He had the grace to look ashamed. Why hadn’t he just told her he sparred?
Because Elizabeth always made it out to be so much more? Father beat it into you until you came to believe it—you think you deserve being punished because you lived while David died.
That wasn’t true. Not anymore.
However, an uncomfortable piece of honesty made him recall how he had thought he deserved a pummeling today for his treatment of Tom.
The sudden burst of clarity was startling.
But it paled when she stepped forward and touched an old scar on his shoulder. “There now. I shall badger you no more. Only tell me what—or who—caused this…”
Lusty Letters: A Fun and Steamy Historical Regency (Mistress in the Making Book 2) Page 6
