She tasted of sweet wine and cherry tarts and he wanted nothing more than to lose himself in the soft flesh of her body. It was almost painful, but he managed to pull away. “Cecelia,” he said softly.
“But…” she protested.
“We’ve stopped.”
She reached for him. “I don’t want to stop.”
“The carriage has stopped.”
His words managed to sink through. “Oh. Why?”
“I don’t know. It’s damnably bad timing, but you need to get up.”
“Alright,” she grumbled as she slipped off his lap and returned to her seat.
She’d barely had time to smooth out her skirts pull up her bodice when a rap sounded at the door. “Lord Clarendon,” the driver called out. “Pardon me, milord, but the road’s blocked.”
“Just a minute.” Rand quickly buttoned his breeches, tucked his shirt in and pushed the door open. Hat in hand, his stooped body illuminated by the lantern he held in the other, the driver stood waiting just outside the door. “What is it Giles?”
“There’s a carriage stopped dead in the middle o’ the road. Ain’t nothing else. Jest a carriage.”
Damn. “Is it broken down?”
“Not that I kin see.”
“Can we get around it?”
“Dunno, milord. Be a mite close, but meybe I could push it outa the way.” He shifted nervously. “Begging yer pardon, but if I could ‘ave a word in private?”
Nonplussed, he jumped to the ground with Cecelia’s loud sigh of exasperation ringing in his ears. They walked a few paces from the carriage and then he looked expectantly at the man and said quietly, “What’s afoot, Giles?”
“Didn’t want t’ upset milady, but the driver’s been shot dead. Man’s still in ‘is box but there ain’t nobody inside.” He paused. “Shot in the face. It’s a gruesome sight, milord.”
Rand raked his finger through his hair. “Bloody hell. I’ll have a look.” He went back to their carriage.
Cecelia nearly pounced on him. “What happened?”
“I’m not certain. I’ll know more in a few minutes.” He retrieved two ivory handled pistols from beneath the bench seat and slipped one in his pocket.
“Why do you need those?” Cecelia said with surprise. “Do you expect trouble?”
“No. The coach may have been robbed. Highway men are common enough, though they’re likely long gone by now. But it doesn’t hurt to be cautious. I’ll be right back.”
He was just out the door when Cecelia said, “Wait. I want to go with you.” She rose to follow but he turned and leaned his arm against the open doorway preventing her exit. “Stay put,” he ordered.
Her eyes widened in dismay. “But why?”
“I have no idea what I’m walking into. I would feel better if you remained here.”
“I don’t want to stay here alone.”
“You won’t be alone. Giles is staying with you.”
“But you have both guns! What if something happens?”
“Giles is armed and he’s an excellent shot. Isn’t that right?”
The driver patted his pocket and then drew a knife from his boot. “Yes, milord. Armed to the teeth.”
Cecelia opened her mouth, then abruptly closed it. She sank back down on the bench. Satisfied that she had given up her argument, Rand unhooked another lantern and set off toward the other carriage. Moments later, he uttered an oath when he held the light over the body of the driver slumped in the box. Gruesome wasn’t the word for it. Both the man and the bench were covered with blood and his face was little more than a bloody pulp. He swore beneath his breath. “Half the bugger’s head is gone.” He hadn’t seen anything this grisly since leaving France.
His thoughts were interrupted by a loud gasp. Rand turned. Cecelia stood less than ten paces behind him with her hand over her mouth. He quickly moved the lantern so that the man’s face was hidden in the shadows. The knowledge that she’d left the carriage and seen this made him go cold with fury. He strode to her side and grasped her arm none too gently. “What’s the matter with you?” he hissed through his teeth. “I told you to stay in the carriage. There was no need for you to see this.” Then he looked over at Giles who was right behind her. “You were supposed to keep her away from here. Or didn’t I make myself clear?”
“I’m sorry, milord,” Giles blurted out. “She was right determined. Didn’t have no way of stopping milady. Didn’t ‘pect you’d want me t’ just grab ‘er arm or shoot ‘er.”
Rand wasn’t so certain of that at the moment. His jaw clenched. A pulse throbbed at his temple. Was there no way to curb her impulsiveness? Had she done as he said, she would have been spared this. “You should have stayed where you were, Cecelia.” His voice was still rough was anger.
“I…” She continued to stare in the direction of the man’s body.
“You what?”
She shook her head. “What happened to him?”
“Somebody shot him,” he said brusquely. He paused. “There could be others. I need to look. You should go back.”
She trembled. “There are harnesses for two horses,” she said in an odd, off-key voice. “Where are the horses?”
He shrugged out of his coat and put it over her shoulders. “You’re cold. Go back to the carriage, Cecelia.”
“Where are the horses?” she repeated dully.
Horses. She thought of the horses. He wasn’t surprised. One’s mind could latch onto the oddest things when in a state of shock. Anger gave way to concern. He put his arm around her and said, “I need to find out if there are others.”
She stared at him blankly. “Did someone steal them?”
“The horses? I imagine so. Will you stay with Giles?”
She nodded.
“Take her back to our carriage. There’s a flask in the side compartment. Give her some brandy.”
He waited until Giles had helped her inside before he turned back to the carriage. The leather curtains were drawn. His fingers closed around his pistol and he flung the door open. As Giles had said, it was empty. He leaned in and gave the interior a cursory glance. Had there been any valuables inside, they were now long gone. Then the old familiar prickle traveled down his neck. A faint moan reached his ears and he turned his head searching for its source. A man was sprawled by the side of the road. He knelt beside him and tried to determine his injuries. Blood pooled on the ground beneath his head but he appeared to have been beaten rather than shot. Rand tried to rouse him by nudging his shoulder and the man groaned. His eyes opened briefly, then closed again.
“Can you sit up?”
“Non,” he moaned. “Tete. Mal.”
French. The accent was strong. Rand held his lantern over him, paying attention to the well cut jacket and expensive boots. The only thing he could think to do was take him home and send for a physician. The rest would be sorted out, later. He eased his arm beneath his shoulders and gently brought him to a sitting position. The man turned his head suddenly and retched, then fell limp.
Rand hollered for Giles.
The driver promptly appeared. “Gor. Another one. ‘as ‘e been shot milord?”
“I don’t think so but he’s pretty badly beaten. He regained consciousness long enough to empty his belly. Damn, but he’s bleeding like a stuck pig.” Stay with him while I get something to bind his head with,” Rand directed. He rose and headed to their carriage. Cecelia was sitting inside with her hands in her lap. “I need your petticoat,” he told her. “For bandages.”
She seemed to have recovered from her shock and without hesitating reached beneath her skirts and yanked them off. “Did you find someone else?” she asked as she handed them over.
“A passenger. We’ll need to take him home with us and send for a doctor. There’s a blanket beneath the bench. Could you take it out? Giles and I can use it as a stretcher to get him into the carriage.”
The first sensation Andre felt was excruciating pain. Pain that hammered against h
is temple and seared across his skull. Then voices. A distant murmuring that faded then returned again. Where was he? He moaned and stirred.
“I think he’s conscious.” The voice was feminine and the words softly spoken.
He opened his eyes to a vision so lovely he wondered if he had died and gone to heaven. He gazed at her and for a brief moment, forgot the pain. She had the countenance of an angel. A light shone behind her illuminating the feathery curls that framed her face. Longer curls cascaded over her shoulder and shimmered in the glow. Wing like brows arced over glittering eyes. Did he know her? He lifted his head slightly and was rewarded with a cruel jolt of pain. He moaned again. This was not heaven. Pain such as this did not exist in heaven.
She spoke to him in a gentle tone. “Sir, you mustn’t move. You’ve been badly hurt.”
The light was painful. He wished to continue gazing at her, but could not. He closed his eyes and moistened his lips. His throat was dry. It was a struggle to speak. “Where am I?”
“You were shot in a highway robbery.”
The cultured drawl did not belong to the beautiful lady. He slowly opened his eyes again. A gentleman was leaning toward him, but his face was hidden in the shadows. “We’re on our way to Fenton Abbey. You will stay with us until you are able to travel.”
“Merci.” The blackness was creeping up on him again. He welcomed the oblivion it would bring.
“Who do you suppose, he is?” the angel asked.
He waited for an answer but heard nothing beyond the wretched throbbing of his head and the rhythm of the carriage. Who am I? A heartbeat before the blackness claimed him, he realized he didn’t know.
Chapter Fifteen
“My lord.” Winston’s proper tones broke through the marquis’s haze. He looked up from his coffee. It was his fifth cup. He’d had little sleep and was hoping to clear his head.
“Yes?”
“Dr. Tibbs has finished with our guest. He wishes to speak with you.”
Rand nodded. “Show him in here. We drug him out of bed at an ungodly hour. The least I can do is offer him breakfast and a cup of coffee.”
Dr. Tibbs was a short, slightly portly man of middle years. His hair had been combed over to one side in a poor attempt to disguise a balding pate and his clothes were rumpled. He looked very much like what he was. A country doctor. He gratefully accepted the coffee that was offered and made a trip to the sideboard and piled his plate with eggs, sirloin, thick slices of bread and a generous helping of kidneys before seating himself across the table from the marquis.
“He was pretty badly thrashed,” he remarked as he cut into his sirloin. “Highway men, you say?”
“It appears so. The driver was killed, both horses were gone and there weren’t any valuables in the coach or on either man.”
Tibbs shook his head and took a sip of his coffee. “This isn’t the first time he’s cheated death. He’s an ugly scar on the left side of his chest. Looks like a bullet barely missed his heart.”
“You think he’ll survive this?”
“He’ll hurt like hell when he wakes up and he won’t be very pretty for a couple of weeks, but as long as he doesn’t develop an infection, he should pull through.” He paused. “The loss of memory, though, I can’t say I’ve had any experience, but I’ve read a great deal on the subject. He may remember everything in a day or two. Sometimes it comes back just like that.” He snapped his fingers. “And sometimes it never does. The mind is a peculiar thing.”
Rand frowned. “He’s lost his memory?”
Tibbs regarded him over the wire framed spectacles. “You didn’t know? I suppose you wouldn’t as he hasn’t been in a state to carry on a conversation. The gent has amnesia. Can’t remember a damned thing about who he is or where he came from. Doesn’t remember hiring the coach. But he knows what year it is and that Bonaparte is in exile and that the Prince Regent is our monarch. Why the mind can remember some things and not others is a mystery. I don’t know if we’ll ever find out why.”
“Hell and the devil,” Rand muttered. “What do we do?”
The doctor shrugged. “Nothing much you can do, my lord. Keep him quiet. Let the wounds heal and hope his memory returns.” He blotted his mouth with his napkin. “It’s best to keep him sedated awhile. I’ve given him laudanum. He should sleep most of the day. Maybe he’ll remember something when he wakes up.”
The marquis thoughtfully rubbed his hand over the stubble on his chin. “I’ve sent missives to the coaching houses trying to find out where the carriage came from. I hope to hear back from them soon.” He grimaced. “It’s too bloody hot to keep the driver’s body for long. Poor bugger.” He paused. “The coaching house should be able to tell us who our mystery man is. Maybe a name will trigger his memory.”
“Would you like me to send someone out to care for him for a week or two? I’ve someone in mind--Mrs. Kraft is an excellent nurse.” He chuckled. “God knows she’s had enough experience. She’s raised six little heathens into manhood. They’re brawlers. Every last one of them. Not a week goes by that one of them doesn’t have a cracked rib or gash that needs to be sewn up. She can be gentle and compassionate when needed, but one doesn’t dare cross her if she has it in her mind what’s best for the patient. I’ve seen her force the vilest tasting medicine down the gullet of men three times her size then roll those same men over to change their dressings and give them baths. And all the while they would be cursing her to hell and back. Not all of her patients like her, but most of them get well.”
“I’ll trust your judgment in this. If she’s available, that would help tremendously.”
“I’ll send for her the minute I get home. Oh the gent’s French by the way. Seems to understand English fairly well, though. It’s a good thing as my French is pretty rusty and Mrs. Kraft’s is nonexistent.”
Rand nodded. “I assumed he was. I spoke to him in English but he answered in French.”
Tibbs dipped a chunk of bread into the meat juices that had pooled on his plate. “It appears your first case as magistrate involves robbery, murder and a lost identity.” He took a healthy bite of the bread.
“Oh, hell,” Rand groaned. “It hadn’t even occurred to me that I would be the magistrate. It's a task I'd just as soon leave to someone else.”
Tibbs swallowed his bread and nodded. “Welcome to Devon, my lord.”
He shifted, then moaned. The slightest movement brought pain. His head pounded. His face ached. And he was so very tired; too tired to think, his arms and legs, too heavy to lift. Time was illusive. He drifted. Occasionally he dreamed of the angel but mostly there was blackness. He welcomed sleep for when he woke the headaches were blinding. The kind that brought tears to his eyes and caused him to vomit into a basin held by the woman who tended him. Not the angel, but an older woman with a sharp voice and work roughened hands. She bathed the sweat from his forehead and body. Gave him sips of broth and then a bitter drink that put him to sleep. Once when the pain had eased, he tried to sit up but dizziness and nausea swept over him, his ears rang and the edges of his vision turned black. He slowly laid his head back down on the pillow. He slept and dreamt of the angel.
A doctor came. An idiotic, short, rotund man, who removed his bandages, poked and prodded and asked asinine questions that took great effort to answer.
“Does your head still hurt?”
“Oui.”
“Are you dizzy?”
“Oui.”
“How many fingers am I holding up?”
“Deux.”
“Do you know where you were born?”
“Non.”
“What is your name?”
He hated the question. The short fat man peered at him over wire rimmed glasses.
“Do you remember your name?”
He wanted to curse at him but it would take too much energy. Everything took too much energy. “Non. Leave me.” he muttered. He only wanted to sleep and dream of the beautiful woman.
Cecelia f
elt a sudden draft of chilled air intrude upon her senses. More asleep than awake, she groped blindly for the covers and found nothing but air. Instinctively she curled into a ball in an attempt to warm herself.
“Wake up, slugabed.”
“No,” she mumbled.
Something pinched her bottom and she tried to brush it away. “Go away. And give my covers back.”
“Wake up.”
“Mmm.” She curled up even tighter.
“I thought we could ride to the ruins this morning. Unless of course, you’d rather sleep all day.”
She rolled over and opened one eye. Wearing a grin, her husband stood by the bed looking uncommonly countrified in buff breeches and a brown jacket. “You’re taking me to the ruins?” she asked. “Why didn’t you mention this last night?”
He sat on the bed beside her. “Because every time I promise you we’ll go, something happens. I didn’t want you to be disappointed if it rained or some new catastrophe spoiled our plans. But the weather is marvelous, Cook is packing our luncheon and I’ve let Ella know that you won’t be giving lessons today. I’ve even rung for Mattie. All you need to do is get dressed, have breakfast and meet me at the stables in an hour.”
She pushed herself into a sitting position. “I don’t need an hour. I’ll meet you in half an hour.”
“Impossible. There isn’t a woman alive who can get dressed and have breakfast in half an hour’s time.”
She snorted. “Is that a challenge?”
His hazel eyes lit with laughter and the corners of his mouth kicked up. “Do you want it to be?”
“I do.”
“Then, I look forward to proving you wrong.”
She scowled at his arrogance. “And I look forward to proving you wrong.”
Laughing, he rose from the bed just as Mattie entered with a tray holding Cecelia’s morning chocolate. “You’ll find your mistress in a tremendous hurry, this morning,” he told her as he pulled out his fob watch. “Let’s see. It’s exactly eight thirty-four. I’ll expect to see you at the stables, madam, at four minutes past nine. And not a minute later.” In no apparent hurry to leave he propped his shoulder against the bed post and folded his arms across his chest. “What do you plan to wear? As I recall, you have a number of riding habits and I’ve an inclination to help you pick something out. Of course, you would need to try several of them on before I could make a decision.”
The Devil's Own Luck (Once a Spy) Page 23
