Once, he recalled stating he’d be ten feet under before taking Winterbourne’s advice. Well, metaphorically, he now was.
A scotch mist was falling and he wrapped his coat close, wishing he’d requested the carriage drop them nearer. It was not the weather for Shanks’s pony as the drizzle soaked into your very bones and there was only one way he could ever imagine warming up.
“If you want my advice, I’ve a pertinent rule,” Jack began, and all at once, Rakecombe regretted opening his mouth, as he now remembered the chap’s rules came in two varieties: useless and downright useless.
“Number twenty-four, in case you are noting them down for future use,” Jack continued, spreading his arms as though issuing an eleventh commandment. “If your leg is stuck in the jaws of a trap, you have two options: writhe around and cry out or lay still and conserve energy, but either way, you’ll lose the leg.”
Rakecombe halted his stride so hastily, he almost slipped on the damp cobbles, the cane saving his arse and pride. “That’s ludicrous and it’s not even a rule.”
Pursing his lips, Winterbourne shook his head wearily. “The rule is don’t get trapped in the first place, but once you are…you’re buggered. Accept it.”
Grumbling, Rakecombe wheeled left and made his way down the back of Charles Street.
His leg wasn’t stuck. No, his whole blasted body, head and soul were stuck and Aideen’s jaws were formed of iron.
Bluey’s skin had taken on a flush and his eyes glittered with fever, but he was vaguely compos mentis.
“I got word,” he rasped, “that a couple of foreign fellas ’ave been seen over the river at some Southwark warehouse, so I done a bit o’ inn-hopping there before I came to yer. It were in the Nag’s Head I overhead some fellas nattering French.” He shifted and winced. “I could only understand a bit o’ their parlezvous lingo, and me nous-box feels like it’s stuffed with wool, but I ’eard the name Stafford mentioned and” – he swiped a sweaty hand over his brow – “they got somethin’ important at that warehouse.”
“Documents? Or something more sinister? Gunpowder?” Rakecombe frowned: the plot thickened.
“Dunno. Sorry, guv. It were noisy and…”
“No, I’m indebted again, Bluey. You did well.”
“Not that well, I got bleedin’ stabbed. Must have heard about my nosing around and followed me. Ta for saving m’bacon, by the way.” A female giggled from the adjoining room. “Guv?” said Bluey, frowning. “Can that Jack the lad be trusted?”
“With your life, yes,” answered Rakecombe.
“But not with me wife, eh?” He chuckled but instantly regretted it, holding his stomach in pain. Indeed, Winterbourne had disappeared to help the pretty blonde prepare Bluey’s laudanum.
“When did you marry? I didn’t even know.”
“We keep it hush. For the best in our line o’ work. Been hitched seven years now.”
Over time, he’d chatted with Bluey about their lives, but never had he thought to ask about female companionship. “And have you never…worried about her, considering your employment?”
“She’s got a better aim than me with the pops, but I did nearly end our courting at one point.” He twisted onto his side, and those blue eyes of his nickname dulled. “Yer know I was born within screaming distance of St Giles’ Church, but I had no intention of dying there. Hard to get out the gutter, it sucks you down.” He grimaced. “But I’ve always been good at…hearing things. She were a touch above me, a teacher, and I told her, I told her I could get her hurt but yer know what she said?”
Rakecombe shook his head. At last some decent advice, even if it was from a dubious character with even more dubious morals. Although whether his were lower than Winterbourne’s was disputable.
“She told me her mother died when she were thirteen. Some coxcomb trampled her with his flash rattler and prads. Then her sister died when she were fifteen – the lung sickness. And her father drank himself to death before her sixteenth birthday.” He closed his eyes as though the candle lamp was too bright for them. “She said there was just as much chance of Mr Grim carrying you away whilst you lay content and unaware in a soft feather bed than of a blade to the heart. And I couldn’t really argue with that.”
He nodded. Those words concurred with Jack’s advice at the soirée the other night and he silently cursed, loathing it when other people were right.
“Yer have to be careful,” continued Bluey, “and we are, very. I’ve another gaff in the Rookery and I don’t introduce her to no one in my work. In fact, yer the first. But my life wouldn’t be worth living without Harriet. And I trust her to take care of herself.”
That shook Rakecombe to his core.
Did he trust Aideen? His worry was that she would do something perilous like Gwen, who’d been similarly headstrong and wilful.
“I treasure your confidence in me, Bluey. But what of the future?” he asked. “I know you have that farm in Kent but I thought it only for income.”
“It’s our retirement place. Peace and clean air. I was gonna work here for a couple more years but maybe we’ll start early, especially if I’m getting slow and need to lie snug for a while. Never saw ’em coming,” he muttered feverishly.
“None of us have eyes in the back of our heads, Bluey.” Aware his informant needed rest, he stood and lowered a hand to his shoulder. “I shall leave you to your adept wife, but if you need anything, let me know. Anything at all.”
“Will do, Guv. And how’s that luscious-arsed wife of yours?”
“She’s…” He thought of Aideen’s flashing eyes, her soft body, her taunts and syrup words. “…perfect.”
Walking the eerie streets with Winterbourne was becoming a habit but he had to say it was quite pleasant to have a companion for once.
Usually, he tramped home, letting the fog curl around him, and it felt as though he was utterly alone in the world.
A prickling at his nape slowed his stride, a sense of being watched, but as he glanced around, only a stray cat slunk from the shadows, eyes glinting with disdain in a lantern’s glow.
Early on the morrow, they would investigate this Southwark warehouse, but there was nothing to be done tonight. Only a fool – or Bluey – went to those areas of town after dark asking questions.
“Nice couple,” mused Jack.
Then again, being alone did have its advantages. He merely grunted.
“Very…close.”
Rakecombe halted in the murky street, stabbing his cane on the cobbles. “Spit it out. I can hear something jangling around in that empty brainbox of yours which you can’t wait to share with me.”
“Very well. Since you asked so nicely.” Jack rocked on the heels of his hessians, the bloody tassels swinging like a doxy’s arse. “I realise you are trying to keep Aideen at a distance because of the danger, but those two make it work. You just have to try.”
“There are reasons–”
“I may be the most genial rogue in town – Lady Sutherland’s description, not mine – but I am not senseless. I know something dreadful happened to your sister, something you obviously blame yourself for as Kelmarsh mentioned it. But you cannot live life on past regrets.”
Rakecombe hated tête-à-têtes. His mother had always wanted him to talk about it too.
“I held Gwen in my arms as she died.” He couldn’t hide the hoarseness in his voice, even after twelve years. “I can’t forget it. You don’t understand. What if–”
“What if it doesn’t?” Jack interrupted. “What if you lead a full life with all its normal trials and tribulations?” He glared. “You want to be melancholic? Then what if you get mauled by a bear next Tuesday afternoon whilst promenading Grosvenor Square? What an utter waste of all the time you’ve spent married. You could have been happy but instead you were a miserable old curmudgeon.”
Rakecombe stomped on in silence for a while, the streets gradually filling with more frequent pools of yellow glow from the Mayfair gas lights.
>
But there was one niggling detail he could not and would not let go of.
“There are no bears in England.”
“That is where you are mistaken, my dear Rake. Happened at a fair I attended last month. The bear escaped and ate three people. I managed to save the bearded lady, but the fortune teller never saw it coming. Last time I ever venture forth to Hampshire,” he grumbled with a wink.
Chapter Twenty
There’s truth in fiction…
Socially awkward, few friends, bad-tempered and haughty.
Yes, thought Aideen as she sat in bed reading, there were more than a few striking similarities between her husband and Mr D, but unlike Miss Elizabeth, she’d had to marry the man before violent love had been proclaimed.
She plonked her well-thumbed volume on the bedside table and instead picked up the letter she had received earlier today. It was from an ecstatic Cordelia. An ecstatic Cordelia, who at the time of writing had been passing the night at an inn near Northampton with Lord Oakdean.
My dearest friend,
I apologise profusely for not bidding you farewell, but this past day has been somewhat of a rush as James and I have decided to marry at Gretna Green!
I have always wanted to visit Scotland, but Aunty warned me it was full of barbarians. James assures me, however, this is not the case.
We are at an inn. ALONE.
Why did you not warn me, dear friend, that nightcaps would be the least of my concerns? It was quite a shock, I can tell you, but oh what a rapturous one!
James and I still have much to learn about each other, but our deepest emotion is the same – Love.
I do so hope you can find this with the duke, as I have beheld your anguish when you think no one is looking. I know he feels equally for you as his gaze possesses that same anguish when it catches in your direction – which is A LOT.
I had better end my letter there, dearest friend. James has got that look in his eye again.
All my love,
Cordy.
Obviously, Mrs Greenwood had succeeded in subduing the news that her pristine daughter had eloped to Gretna Green, as nothing had reached the papers or been gossiped about at tea.
She was happy for Cordelia, for the excitement and love her friend had found, but she also couldn’t help feeling bitterly, wickedly jealous.
It was awful to bear such an emotion but so it was. She could pretend otherwise but there was no point lying to oneself – or maybe there was. Maybe if one repeated something enough it would come true.
Aideen took a deep breath. “I am not jealous as my husband will enter through that door at any moment and declare undying love.”
The adjoining door opened. “Aideen, are you awake?”
Well, one out of three wasn’t bad.
“Yes.”
Alex strode in – as if he ever walked in any other way – and then stood by the fire, even though it was unlit. He wore that black banyan again and she couldn’t help the tremble as she remembered pushing it from his shoulders, kissing that odd tattoo. The curl had returned, draping its way across his forehead in defiance of its strict regime.
Why was he here?
A glass of brandy sat cradled in his palm, but he placed it on the mantel and swiped a hand over his face. If she didn’t know better, she would say he was nervous.
“What are you reading?” he asked.
“Oh, nothing important, darling husband.” She twiddled with her plait, unsure about continuing with the sweet act as her fists ached from all the clenching…as did her jaw.
A smile surfaced. “You do tell fibs, don’t you, my mavourneen?”
Now there was an agreeable endearment, Irish and loving. “Only trivial ones.”
After crossing to the bed, he sat on the very edge and expressed…nerves again. It was infectious. Had he come to give her bad news? Was he leaving for the Continent on a mission?
Rakecombe pushed his hair back, although that ridiculous curl he’d never been able to get rid of slipped down again. Thorn had once suggested egg white as a remedy – never again.
Walking home with Winterbourne – when he’d been able to get a thought in edgeways – he’d decided to talk to Aideen this very night. He couldn’t bear it any longer.
Attempting to stay away from her resulted in failure and frustration, so he’d have to do the complete opposite. But in order to keep her safe, and far from the danger he brought to those close, he needed Aideen to understand a few matters, comply with a few…instructions.
So, whilst eating supper, he’d written a list with twenty-three… He hesitated to say rules, more like codes of procedure which must be followed.
Compliance with instructions, he knew, wasn’t an Aideen trait but surely if she understood the reasoning behind his list, all would be well.
But where to start? She looked so young and innocent with her hair plaited into submission, hands folded saintly, although the gossamer night-rail belied her true colours. Black, of course – the wicked wench.
“I told a falsehood,” he confessed.
She didn’t reply, scarcely raised a brow, and he realised his wife wasn’t going to make this easy for him. But then again, it was exactly that prickliness he adored.
He coughed. “I stated that I married you for an heir. Gave the impression I was forced because of that kiss at the Beckfords’. But you were right, I could have bundled you off somewhere, and if I wanted an heir so desperately, I would have married some horse-faced debutante with excellent bloodlines.”
Silence met his confession. Was she really not going to help at all?
Obviously not.
“However, I was extremely worried about my vocation affecting your safety, so decided we should live…separate lives.”
He waited.
Silence. She pursed her lips and…
But no, they rested again. Mute.
Damnation, this was more painful than being tattooed.
Clearing his throat, he continued, “I have realised since our wedding that this is not feasible. Our attraction is too great, and we are both…discontented, are we not?”
Surely, she would have to answer a question?
She merely nodded.
Bugger.
“So, I hope to…begin our marriage again. Start anew. Spend evenings together. Read. Dine. The theatre and so forth.” He fiddled with his signet ring and then hastily thought better of it – fidgeting and fiddling were a sign of worry, and he wasn’t…at all. In any way.
A horrible thought occurred.
What if she didn’t wish to start anew? He didn’t mean to sound arrogant but he naturally assumed she would be amenable. But her silence was speaking a thousand words and none of them were “that sounds lovely, Alexander, get into bed”.
“Erm, to facilitate your safety, however, I have come up with a list of–”
“What do you feel for me, Alex?” she interrupted at last.
“Feel?” He frowned. What did that have to do with anything? “Er…”
“Is this attraction you speak of purely lust which will diminish with time?”
God, no. He adored her smiles and kindness, her vibrant eyes, and he liked simply watching her restless energy. He also adored it when she got annoyed and waved her arms around like a mad windmill. But telling Aideen that was a bit like stuffing your hand in an escaped bear’s mouth and expecting a lick.
“Not at all. I very much enjoy your company.” There, that sounded good. He also relished and craved it, but steady on.
“Hmm,” she replied.
He tried again. “I have a list, Aideen, which I hope–”
“Why did you pretend to be a Welsh seducer? And please be aware only one answer is correct.” She flipped the plait over her shoulder and crossed her arms.
Blast. Why had he done that?
“I was jealous?”
She unfolded her arms and smiled. Phew.
“Absurd but correct.”
Good. Now…
“Aideen, I have a list–”
“What happened to Gwen?”
Although she had been rather uncommunicative so far, Rakecombe had felt he was at last getting somewhere until that question. Just the name on her lips caused his throat to dry and blood to chill.
“Gwen?” he stalled.
“Gwen,” she repeated.
“She was my sister. She died.” Don’t ask, his heart rapped out. Please don’t ask.
“How did she die?”
“I do not wish to discuss the matter,” he replied, using the tone that petrified worldly matrons and made young cubs wet themselves.
“But I do,” Aideen said, “because I have a feeling she taints everything you do, everything you say.”
Glaring at the rust coverlet, he considered leaving, but a supple hand swept his face, pushed that bloody curl back and then slipped down his neck.
He’d never told anyone – not properly. His mother had been given the barest of details to spare her the pain, and his leader at that time had received a report devoid of emotion. Kelmarsh knew the most but the words had been garbled out with anger and pain.
“I can’t…” But he couldn’t leave either because fingers delicately caressed his nape and he craved more.
“Join me in bed, Alexander,” she whispered, and he knew. He knew he’d reveal all if she continued to whisper in his ear, that beautiful Irish lilt soothing his soul.
She brought him vexation and worry and barbed words, but she also brought peace and contentment and gentleness. Such a dichotomy. He had to protect it, treasure it.
Throwing his banyan to the floor, he clambered into bed as she shifted over to make room, but he didn’t want that, and pulling her back to the centre, he laid his head on her breast – so soft but with a heart thundering his presence like cannon fire.
A sigh reverberated through her and then those fingers returned, brushing his hair, nails lightly scratching.
“Mother said Gwen was daring from the moment she was born. Always getting into scrapes, crawling where she shouldn’t and generally twisting everyone around her plump little fingers. She was utterly spoiled by us all.”
Let Sleeping Dukes Lie Page 17
