The Undercover Duke

by Michaels, Jess

  He held out the paper, and Lucas grabbed for it in frustration. His mind swirled on Diana now and her safety. He couldn’t think of anything else.

  “We need horses, Jessup, immediately,” Stalwood snapped.

  The butler’s mood changed in an instant. His posture changed into a military one and he scurried off to call for the mounts. As he did, Stalwood turned to Lucas. “What is the letter?”

  Lucas jolted and stared down at the folded page. “I don’t know.” He drew a breath before he flipped the letter over and gasped.

  “That seal,” he said, touching the red wax. It had been stamped with the image of a reaper. The mark of death.

  “Caldwell,” Oakford breathed. “He used that seal for correspondence about our plans.”

  Lucas’s stomach turned as he opened the letter and read it out loud. “You are in my way and I grow tired of it. Come to where it began, where it ended for dear George Oakford. If you do not, his daughter may end there too.” He paused as a lock of hair fell from the page.

  Oakford caught it. “Diana’s hair,” he whispered.

  Lucas nodded. “Come alone,” he finished.

  Stalwood shook his head. “Obviously that isn’t going to happen,” he said.

  Lucas jerked his gaze over. “No, but it must look like I’m alone.”

  “It must look like you’re with me,” Oakford said, his eyes growing wide. “It’s you and me he wants, not her. Perhaps if he can have us both, he’ll trade her freedom and then…”

  “You think I would allow you to involve yourself in this when you have already proven yourself to be a traitor?” Stalwood cried out, catching Oakford by the collar and shaking him. “How do I know you haven’t orchestrated this whole thing as a way to get to Willowby?”

  Lucas stared at Oakford, trying to read him. Trying to decipher if this were, indeed, a trap and a trick. “You hated Caldwell after what he did to Diana,” he said softly. “You wanted out.”

  He nodded. “I told you I did.”

  “And you tried to save me,” he said. “By bandaging my leg that day.” Oakford bent his head in silence. Lucas glanced at Stalwood. “I’m willing to take the chance.”

  “Are you mad? You are one of my best agents, there is no way in hell that I would—”

  “Diana is an innocent in this,” Lucas interrupted. “I will not let the woman I love be murdered while we argue. Oakford is going with me, and that is the end of it. You will follow with as many agents as you can move in secret.”

  “I’ll begin gathering them. It’s a five-hour ride to that estate. We can leave within two. Excuse me,” Stalwood said, and rushed from the foyer.

  Lucas watched him go, then grabbed Oakford’s arm and dragged him from the house.

  “Where are we going?” Oakford asked as Lucas shoved him toward one of the horses Stalwood had called earlier.

  He swung up onto his own mount and turned him toward the street. “To that estate. There’s no way I’m waiting two hours to go after Diana. When Stalwood realizes we’ve snuck off, he’ll rush his duties and can follow right behind.”

  Oakford smiled as the two men urged their horses into a run and entered the street together. “I want to ask you something,” he said as they raced through the busy lanes toward the eastern edge of Town.

  Lucas pressed his lips together. He didn’t want to have a long conversation with this man, this traitor. He didn’t want to think about anything but Diana and how he could save her. From Caldwell, but also from the pain that she would experience when she saw her beloved father was alive and had conspired against her and everyone he supposedly loved.

  “You said you loved my daughter,” Oakford said when Lucas was silent. “Is that true?”

  Lucas glanced from the corner of his eye at this man he’d once called friend. “Did I say it out loud?” he asked. “Yes, it’s true. I am in love with Diana.”

  Oakford nodded, and then he sighed. “Good. Because the likelihood I’ll come out of this without my neck stretched is almost zero. I would be happy to know that she was loved and taken care of by a man I have long considered a son.”

  Lucas jerked his face toward Oakford. Not so long ago, those words would have meant a great deal. Now… “If I was your son, how could you do this? To me, but also to her? How could you do it to her?”

  Oakford sighed. “I was weak, Willowby. I was up to my neck in problems and terrified for her future, so I was weak. I hope you’ll be stronger. She deserves that.”

  “She deserves more,” Lucas agreed, and then they rode in silence, both lost in thoughts of the woman they’d loved.

  The woman they’d put in danger.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Diana sat in a fine parlor in a comfortable chair. At the sideboard, Caldwell prepared a cup of tea for her. It all would have been very civilized if her hands weren’t tied. If the other furnishings in this house weren’t covered in cloths, because the place they’d broken into was unoccupied.

  If she weren’t in pure terror not just for her life, but for Lucas. And if she weren’t still processing what Caldwell had told her hours ago in London: that her father was alive. A lie, of course. It had to be a lie. Why Caldwell would tell it, aside from causing her pain, was another question entirely.

  “You like two sugars, do you not?” he asked.

  She glared at him. “Why pretend you care? I’m not your guest.”

  He smiled over his shoulder. “One of the things that attracted me to you all those years ago was your fire,” he said. “That must be what Willowby likes, as well.”

  “Do not compare yourself to him,” she hissed, turning her face when he brought the cup to her and lifted it to her lips. “You are not half the man he is.”

  Caldwell’s smug smile faltered a fraction. “Yes, so I’ve heard more than once. Do you really think he’s worth more because of his title? His fortune?”

  “No,” she said softly, and thought of Lucas. Thoughts of him were all that kept her focused and centered in this terrifying ordeal. The only thing that kept her from succumbing to the swell of anxiety that kept rising in her chest. “He is worth more because of his goodness, his decency. His bravery and his heart. That is what makes him fifty times the man you are, you craven, bloodthirsty coward.”

  He set the teacup aside, and then he gripped her face in his hand, smashing her cheeks as pain shot through her.

  “That’s enough now,” he said, quiet even as he hurt her. Controlled. “I’ve spent quite enough time hearing about the virtues of the Undercover Duke from my superiors and your father and everyone else. If only he’d died when he was supposed to, but that was Oakford’s fault. He’s the one who bandaged Willowby’s leg so he wouldn’t bleed out on the lawn right outside this very window.”

  Diana froze, thinking of what Lucas had told her about the knot in the bandage that had been around his leg when he woke up after the attack. That knot she’d recognized and tried so hard to explain. And yet here was the best explanation.

  One that said this bastard wasn’t actually lying to her. That her father was alive.

  She turned her face and wrenched her cheeks from his grip. “What makes a man like you?”

  He smiled. “A lifetime of scrambling for every little thing I earned. Of watching men like Willowby be given what they did not deserve. Of being injured in the field and realizing I was risking my life for nothing.”

  “What about your family?” she asked. “What about your wife and your children? Are they not worth being decent for?”

  He turned his head. “My wife and children mean nothing to me. I married because it was expected and her father’s name helped me in my position. She is but a burden, as are they.”

  There was something in his tone when he said “they” that belied those cold words. She thought he didn’t care about his wife—that was true. But the children…that might be a different story.

  He walked away, back t
o the sideboard. As he did, she looked out the large window and saw a puff of dust coming up from the direction of the road. Her heart leapt. Rescuers. Lucas. Only she didn’t want Caldwell to notice that.

  She had to distract him and give whoever had come for her their best opportunity. She knew only one way to do that.

  “Did you know about our daughter?” she asked, every word like a stab to her broken heart.

  He spun around and faced her, his face bloodless and shocked. “What?”

  “I became pregnant after our ill-thought tryst,” she whispered. “Did you not know?”

  “Liar,” he spat.

  She bent her head and the tears came easily. “I wish I were. But it’s true.”

  He was silent for a long time, what felt like an eternity. Then he said, “Oakford never told me. Even when he tried to break our partnership, he never said a thing.”

  She flinched, for that statement was, once again, proving that her father had been a traitor. She shoved her heartbreak aside and focused.

  “I named her Mirabelle,” she whispered. “She did not draw a breath.”

  His cheek twitched and he gripped his hands at his sides. Then he erased the emotion, using those same spy skills she’d seen her father and Lucas employ so many times. Push the pain away, erase the anger, leave behind…nothing.

  “That is probably for the best,” he croaked.

  She struggled against her bindings. “For the best?” she screamed. “You heartless, empty bastard!”

  He stepped toward her, but before he could respond, he glanced at the window. “Riders,” he grunted. “Close, too.”

  She couldn’t help but smile, and he looked down at her with a glare. “You knew, did you? Saw them coming?”

  She shrugged her shoulders as best she could while tied. His anger returned, and he backhanded her. Her lip smashed against her teeth and she tasted blood. Some trickled from the small cut there.

  “Good,” he said. “A little blood will help. Now, let’s get ready for our visitors, shall we?”

  He left the room, tugging a pistol from his waistband as he walked, and she pulled against the bindings. “Boyd!” she called out.

  He ignored her, of course. She drew a few long breaths. She could not focus on what was happening with Lucas right now. What she had to do was get herself free. Pain shot through her wrists as she twisted her hands, trying to get a sense of the knot he’d tied at her wrists. She could feel the loops of it against her flesh, and closed her eyes as she pictured the image of it.

  When she had it in her mind, she slid her fingers along, trying to find the end of the knot. There it was, against her left palm. She began to push, twisting the rope, attempting to trace it backward through its path. Slowly, she felt it working, loosening by tiny fractions toward her freedom.

  She heard voices outside, male sounds, shouting. Too far away to identify them. She had to hurry. She pushed more, pulled more, closer and closer but not quite free.

  The door to the parlor opened, and she stopped fiddling with the rope as she looked up. Lucas entered first, his face drawn with anger and emotion. When he saw her, his expression lit with relief.

  “Diana,” he breathed.

  Tears prickled and she blinked at them, not wanting to show weakness. “I’m fine,” she whispered. “I’m fine—oh, you shouldn’t have come.”

  “As if I wouldn’t come for you,” he said.

  She glanced toward the door, expecting Boyd to walk through next, but instead it was someone else. And as she stared, her heart nearly exploded from her chest. There was her father, in the flesh. A bit thinner, perhaps. His cheeks covered in scruffy facial hair. But here, alive.

  And everything Caldwell had said was true.

  “No,” she moaned, her eyes coming closed as the world began to swim before her eyes. “No, no, no!”

  In his years on this earth, Lucas had heard many a terrible sound. Death was common in his line of work and he’d listened to many a deathbed confession, many a pained moan.

  But he’d never heard anything worse than the sound coming from Diana’s mouth as she stared at her father and her world came crashing down around her. And even worse than that, he could do nothing in that moment to comfort her. He couldn’t even touch her.

  Even if he could, what would he say or do? Her father was alive and she had to accept that everything she’d ever believed about his heroism and goodness was a lie. He understood it, for he had endured the same set of emotions when he saw the man.

  For her it had to be multiplied a hundredfold.

  Caldwell entered the room, gun pointed at Oakford’s back, a wide grin on his face. “Look at our little family reunion,” he said, that cruel lilt to his voice like a file against Lucas’s spine. “Say hello to Papa, Diana.”

  She had not stopped looking at her father since he entered the room, and Oakford had not looked away from her. She shook her head. “Why?” she whispered. “Why would you do this?”

  “I’m sorry,” he said softly. “The situation spiraled out of control and I should have protected you better. But I shall now.”

  With that, he turned to Lucas and pulled a pistol from his boot. Lucas staggered and Diana screamed as they both realized what was happening.

  “You bastard,” he growled. “You ever-loving bastard.”

  Oakford bent his head slightly. “I have to do what’s best for Diana, and this is the only way.”

  Diana stared as her father backed up and glanced at Caldwell. His partner looked as shocked by this turn of events as he did. “You had a gun?” Caldwell murmured.

  “Yes. We can talk about this, Caldwell,” Oakford said.

  Caldwell half pivoted toward him. “Talk about what? You betrayed me and you stole my money and my information. Do you know how much trouble that’s caused for me since you pretended to be dead? I had a price on my head for a while, Oakford, and it’s your fault.”

  “I have what you want,” Oakford soothed, that same tone Diana had heard him use with injured men a dozen times, a hundred. “And I have Willowby here to boot. We can mend our relationship, can’t we? Go back to our partnership.”

  “Father!” Diana screeched, struggling against her bindings. “Please don’t do this. Please!”

  Her father ignored her, but she saw Lucas watching her. His expression was twisted in pain as tears streamed down her face. “I’m sorry,” she whispered and wanted to say so much more. “I’m so sorry.”

  “I know,” he murmured back.

  “How can I trust you after what you did?” Caldwell hissed, seemingly oblivious to the world of unspoken communication flooding between his two captives. “After the chaos you caused these past six months? For all I know, you’re working alongside Stalwood and he has a dozen men coming here to destroy us all.”

  “He doesn’t know,” Oakford said.

  Lucas set his jaw and his outrage was plain in every fiber of his being. “So this is why you showed up to my home today, told me these stories that Diana was in danger. Were you two in league, using her to get to me?”

  Caldwell shifted. “You knew I had her?”

  “I knew you’ve been looking for me,” her father said with a shake of his head. “You must know I have done the same for you. I realized you took her and why—I owed you a boon for you to think of granting me one. Your letter to bring Willowby to you was well timed, it convinced him of my truthfulness. We were always a good partnership, Caldwell, even if this time it wasn’t planned.”

  “You convinced me to come with you alone,” Lucas breathed.

  Her father nodded. “I thought a threat against Diana’s safety might cause you to be undisciplined.” He held Lucas’s stare for a long moment and then looked at Caldwell. “So he’s here. If you let Diana go, we can get rid of him together.”

  Diana struggled in her chair anew. Her hands were almost free. “No, no, please. Don’t hurt him, Father. You love him—like a s
on, you used to tell me.”

  “I love you more,” he said, glancing at her. “No matter what you think.”

  “Then don’t take him from me.” She stopped struggling. “Please, please don’t take him away from me. I love him. I need him.”

  Lucas froze at those words. His eyes came to her and she held them for what felt like forever before he whispered, “Diana, let him do this. Your life is worth far more to me than my own. Look at me.”

  She turned her face and met his eyes. “Lucas…”

  “I love you,” he said, and it was so beautiful and clear, so true. She believed it even though this was a moment of panic. “I promise you, this is for the best.”

  “Well, this is all very romantic,” Caldwell snapped, dragging her back to the moment and the dangers within it. “But there is no letting Diana go and killing him as an escape. Stalwood already knows—he must, if Willowby suspected you.”

  “Stalwood knows nothing,” Oakford said softly. “When he delivered the case file to my old home here in London, where Willowby was staying upon his return, I snuck into the house and stole the incriminating facts. If Willowby suspected, it was not with evidence to back up his claims. It will take Stalwood months to sort through this new mess. Enough time for you to complete whatever plans you have and go wherever you desire. All you have to do is let Diana go.”

  Caldwell shifted, and it was clear his mind was reeling with all these possibilities. “No. I’m not letting her go. She’s close to Stalwood. She wept on his shoulder at your false grave. If she loves Willowby, she would tell.” He lifted his hand and pointed his gun at Lucas. “It would be better to kill this one now. Then if you return what you stole, you and I can negotiate about Diana. That’s the best way.”

  He began to press the trigger, and Diana watched as Lucas braced for it. In that moment, her hands came free at last and she hurtled herself toward him, to block the bullet, to save his life.

  The gun made an awful sound and Lucas watched in horror as Diana lunged from her chair, suddenly free of the bonds that had held her there, and threw herself in front of him.