Wicked As Sin

by Jillian Hunter

  “It wasn’t his fault,” Rosalinde whispered. Like Alethea and several of the other village girls, she was intrigued by Gabriel, and his misdeeds only enhanced this forbidden interest. “He threw the doctor’s son into the street for making abuse of the old peddler.”

  Alethea would have done the same thing if she’d been able. The elderly peddler never sold anything of value. He had been a soldier once, and he did no harm. The villagers bought from him to be kind.

  But even after Gabriel had dragged the doctor’s boy out of the gutter, he’d pounded him until several of the village elders had pulled Gabriel off. The apothecary’s daughter said there had been a great deal of blood, the peddler wept, and the apothecary had taken Gabriel aside to confide, “We all know he deserved it, but in private, Gabriel. You’ll suffer for this, not him. Hold it inside, boy. We all have to hold it inside.”

  That might have been the end of it. The bully was too afraid to tell. But the physician had been driving by in his phaeton, and Gabriel’s stepfather had stepped out of the pub to see what had drawn the crowd in the street.

  “He was drunk as usual,” the girl told Alethea. “And when he found out what had happened he shook Gabriel like a rat and mocked him. ‘Aren’t the Boscastles born to better? Isn’t that what you think? Well, you’re going to be punished as if you were my blood.’”

  From the snippets of news she’d gleaned during her visits to London over the years, Alethea came to realize that Gabriel had only explored his attraction to trouble. She thought it was a shame, but no one else in the village seemed surprised that he’d pursued a hard path. It was hoped that his brothers had done better for themselves. His mother had returned to her native France when her second husband was murdered in a brawl one night. The last Alethea had heard, Gabriel had allied himself with his London family.

  Still, no matter what he’d become or done, she had to wonder what life had served him in the intervening years to carve those cynical angles in his face. He was a fine-looking man whom she remembered with sad fondness, though he was certainly not the best-mannered gentleman she had ever met.

  But then she knew well not to trust a man on his manners alone. And how easily they could deceive.

  The gentleman to whom her parents had betrothed her before their deaths had violated her at a ball held in London the evening they announced their engagement. Lord Jeremy Hazlett had been due to leave for Waterloo on the following day. Forcing her into one of their host’s private bedchambers, he had explained that since they were to be married anyway, he might as well enjoy an early honeymoon.

  It was over before she could wage a fight. In fact, he raped her so quickly and efficiently, not even removing their evening clothes, that she suspected it wasn’t his first time. When he was done, he warned her not to cry.

  But she had cried a little, in the cloakroom, and a woman, a famous courtesan named Audrey Watson, had somehow guessed what had happened and insisted on taking her discreetly in a private carriage to her establishment on Bruton Street until Alethea felt better and could face the other guests at the ball again without giving herself away.

  Two hours later, the shock of what Jeremy had done turning into cold anger, she had returned to the party and stood at his side while everyone congratulated them and wished Jeremy well in battle. Jeremy laughed and held her hand as if nothing had happened, as if he hadn’t utterly destroyed all her illusions or even noticed that she had spent the past two hours, ironically enough, in London’s most exclusive bordello being consoled by its owner.

  Jeremy went off to war, not apologizing for what he’d done. Alethea returned home and waited for him to send her a letter breaking off their engagement. She waited to find out whether his violation had resulted in a pregnancy. And while she was waiting, a French cannonball killed her betrothed and he became a hero.

  Sincere expressions of shock and sympathy arrived at her brother’s country house in the form of cards and callers. But all Alethea could think as she listened to and read these well-intended words was that now she would not be forced to marry the monster. Nor was she liable to marry anyone else.

  In fact, she had been resigned to waiting for him to return and atone for what had happened. Yet when she stood at his ceremonial grave site, she could not make herself cry, and she felt guilty as the attendant mourners praised her courage when, in truth, she was wishing her dead betrothed a speedy journey to hell.

  It was tempting to hope his demise had been divine punishment for his cruelty. But in order to accept this as a possibility she would have to believe that all the other brave, righteous men who had died in the war without dishonoring women deserved their fate.

  She was well acquainted with too many friends and families who’d lost loved ones to credit this assumption for a minute. Jeremy was gone, a champion, an infantry dragoon at Waterloo, and she was suddenly free to withdraw from Society with sympathy for her position. She would perchance become a spinster, a governess to her brother’s children should he ever work up the courage to propose to the young lady in London he desired.

  Alethea’s life had been forever altered. She bore a stain, invisible to others, indelible to herself. But gradually, as the months passed, she found her spirits rallying. She was still alive, and her practical nature could not tolerate a future of pointless self-pity.

  Now Gabriel had returned to threaten not only her hard-earned peace of mind, but that of the village he had terrorized in his youth. She did not know what she felt for him, only that, after a long spell of dormancy, she had started to feel again.

  He was not the first boy in Helbourne’s history to be put in the pillory to learn a lesson. But what he had learned, she thought, was not as much how to behave as how to survive. At his age, it was probably too late to change.

  And she was afraid the same could be said of her.

  Chapter Six

  Gabriel laughed to himself at the notion of ghosts as he rode up the hill to his darkened estate. Wasn’t he a man who gambled on chance? Ghosts? Well, a person learned to live with them. He thought the fact that Alethea had warned him not to expect much of Helbourne Hall was a rather misguided but sweet attempt on her part. He expected little of his ill-gamed winnings. Few men wagered away a property of any real value; he would be a fool to anticipate being welcomed to Helbourne Hall with cheers of joy. He understood himself to be a usurper, considered vulgar even by county standards.

  He did not anticipate, however, the bullet that whizzed over his head and embedded itself in the door frame upon his maiden entrance to the house.

  He swore and threw his saddlebags to the floor. His glance lifted to the indistinct figure that darted behind the gallery balustrade. “Stop right there, you bloody coward. I’ll cut off your ears and pickle them.”

  “Sir, sir—have they shot you already? Oh, goodness. That was fast.”

  A pleasant-faced woman with unkempt white hair bustled toward him from the passage screens. At first glance she brought to mind the thought of a fairy godmother, waving what appeared to be a magic wand in her hand. On closer inspection the wand resolved into the deadlier aspect of a carbine.

  He scowled as the figure abovestairs peered sheepishly through the railing. “And you are the…gatekeeper?”

  She lowered her weapon with a startled look. “I’m the housekeeper, sir, Mrs. Miniver. Pray do not be angry that we have taken the liberty of defending ourselves. We’ve had no master to guide or protect us for months. But now that you’re here, it will all change for the better.”

  “I wouldn’t count on that,” he said, staring past her. “Is it your custom, Mrs. Miniver, to greet all guests, especially your master, with a carbine?”

  She bobbed a belated curtsy. “My apologies, sir, but you never know who’s going to walk through the door these days. We’ve had all sorts of nasty visitors in recent months, gamblers and the like. Men one would not wish to acknowledge in the street, if you catch my meaning.”

  Gabriel walked around her.
He definitely did not envision a future here. “Where is the rest of the help? My horse needs stabling and proper attention. I would like some brandy and the chance to explain what I expect from the staff during my stay.”

  She glanced up uneasily in the direction of the gallery. Gabriel reached back to wrestle the carbine from her hand and aim it at the balustrade. “One of my personal rules, as silly as it sounds, is that I am not to be used for target practice. Do you understand, up there?”

  “Aye, sir,” the rusty voice of an elderly man replied. “I thought you might be one of them village boys breakin’ in again. I’m Murphy, your butler.”

  “We do have a time with the local lads, sir,” Mrs. Miniver said. “What with no stable master to assert his rights, the riffraff are bound to take advantage. Of course now that you’re here, we’ll be protected.”

  “And who’s to protect me from you?”

  She hurried after him, wiping layers of dust from the hall stand with her apron. “A strong young lord like you is what we’ve lacked, no disrespect intended to the past sorry sods who ruled the house. I expect we’ll all be put to rights now that you’re here to show everyone what’s what.”

  Gabriel could have laughed. God pity the ignorant souls who thought he would be the one to bring discipline to this house. Well, he would if he had any intention of staying.

  “My horse needs water and food,” he said firmly. “I am willing to wait until tomorrow to formally introduce myself and—how did you phrase it—put everyone to rights.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “That brandy—”

  “Right away, sir. Make yourself at home.”

  At home?

  Who of sane mind in the past two centuries could claim to feel at home in this cobwebbed excuse for a crypt? He stared up at the dust-enshrouded portraits that hung upon the oaken walls. Good enough, he supposed, to impress those whose own ancestry did not claim substantial roots in English history. He stepped closer, noticing a dark object hanging from a wall sconce. “What on earth is that?”

  “Damn me. It’s one of them bats again.” She banged her hand against the wall. The creature did not bulge. “I don’t know where they come from.”

  He backed away from her. “Where do you come from? Bedlam?”

  “Oh, no, sir. Newgate.” She hovered behind him as he turned, shaking his head.

  “We have prayed to be delivered, sir,” she added. “’Tis a good sign for us all indeed that you survived that accursed bridge.”

  He pulled off his riding gloves. “Are you acquainted with our neighbors, Mrs. Miniver?”

  “Lord Wrexham? A fine gentleman, sir.”

  “And his wife?”

  “Why, he’s not married yet. Any day, we’ve been led to understand.”

  “Does he keep mistresses?” he asked bluntly.

  “Good heavens, I shouldn’t think so. Not with Lady Alethea living in the house.”

  “And Lady Alethea’s husband lives with them, I assume?”

  “She has no husband, sir. A heartbreak that. She lost her beloved in the war and has not been herself since. She used to be full of lovely mischief, that young lady, and now she either rides about the fields or sits in her brother’s house alone with her books.”

  “I’ll take my brandy now, Mrs. Miniver,” he said quietly. “You may bring it out to me in the stable. I’m very particular about where my horse sleeps.”

  Chapter Seven

  Alethea slept better than she had in months, dreaming of epic heroes who wore billowing capes and rode thundering horses. For the first morning in almost a year she took the time to find her favorite forest-green riding habit in her wardrobe instead of the solemn black silk she usually wore. She brushed her hair one hundred times and wove a white ribbon into her braided curls. She rushed downstairs, full of energy, to play with her three dogs before she took her morning ride.

  In fact, she had just walked her gelding to the courtyard when Mrs. Bryant, the long-legged and vigorous vicar’s wife, pulled into the driveway in her gig. Alethea’s trio of dogs started to bark, knowing there was always a treat in one of Mrs. Bryant’s overflowing baskets. They gathered eagerly as she slid down from her seat.

  “Don’t go riding yet.” Mrs. Bryant pulled off her straw bonnet and waved it across the pasture to Alethea. “I have a call for us to make together.”

  Mrs. Bryant had made no secret of the fact that she was concerned about Alethea’s future. She confided in anyone willing to listen that the young woman had become so withdrawn in her grief that she was liable to wall herself up in her brother’s house. It wasn’t a normal grieving seclusion, in Mrs. Bryant’s opinion, although if she had ever guessed at the true reason for Alethea’s self-imposed solitude, she did not say a word.

  Alethea suppressed a sigh. “I’ve already got my horse saddled and ready to exercise. Has someone taken ill?”

  “Not as far as I know. It’s the new master of Helbourne Hall. I’m hoping I can persuade him to stay. Why don’t you ride ahead of me? I’ll catch up in my gig after I deliver some cheese to Widow Hamlin.”

  Alethea tapped her riding crop against her knee. “I’m not in a mood to make a social call. I’ll only spoil your welcome.”

  “Well, I can’t go alone,” Mrs. Bryant insisted, even though she drove by herself day and night, over hill and stream, when one of the villagers fell sick.

  The afternoon breeze stung Alethea’s face, betraying a hint of an early autumn. She thought of a man with thick black hair, a twisted neckcloth, and blue eyes that drew her like a dark crystal. “Actually, I already met him last night—I had to warn him about the bridge and—”

  “Good.” Mrs. Bryant hurried back to her gig. “Then you can introduce me. And we’ll stay together—just between you and me I think the servants are ruling the roost at the hall. It’s high time it stopped. Do you think—I know you’ve only just made his acquaintance—but is it possible that he’s the man we have all been waiting for to take control?”

  A hundred devils were boring holes into Gabriel’s dreams. One of them dug its talons into his shoulder and shook him without mercy; he ignored the aggravation. He was bone-tired after the hard ride from London and four hours of mucking out a decent stall for his horse in an Augean stable that hadn’t seen fresh straw or a pitchfork in a month, if then.

  Two bottles of brandy downed at dawn, his horse watered, brushed, and fed, he washed himself at the ancient pump, rinsed the travel dust from his mouth and hair, then dropped into a dead sleep. He couldn’t say he remembered what he’d been dreaming about. A woman with dark eyes and silver slippers with a bat on her shoulder. He wanted to undress her.

  He awoke with reluctance. His shirt hung unbuttoned off one arm. He groaned in protest, throwing his elbow over his face.

  The sharp-taloned demon shook him harder.

  Demoness.

  He forced open one bloodshot eye, then promptly closed it upon recognizing the creature who was demanding his soul. Lord help him, if he had to surrender it to anyone, it might as well be her.

  “Sir Gabriel, are you all right?” she asked in a voice so stricken that any man of good conscience would answer to put her mind at rest.

  Instead, he played dead, wondering how she would react. His heart began to beat against his ribs. His male body awakened so abruptly he was tempted to pull his coat over that part of his anatomy that behaved as a barometer at the most inopportune times. But he didn’t have his coat.

  She stretched across his prone form. “Well, you’re still breathing,” she murmured, “and there’s a brandy bottle—oh, two of them. Wake up, you wastrel. To think I was worried about you. Oh, wake up.”

  “I am awake,” he muttered. “Come back later when I’m coherent. I want to stay in bed, if you don’t mind.”

  “You aren’t in bed,” she exclaimed, wrenching at his arm. “The vicar’s wife will be here any minute. Do sit up and at least pretend you are not insensible.”

  “The vi
car?” That got his attention. He lowered his arm. “What vicar? Did I ask you to marry me during the night?”

  “Yes.” She tugged his rumpled cambric shirt up to his shoulder. “And we have a child on the way.”

  He grunted. “I’d remember that even if I’d soaked my head in a gin barrel all night.”

  “By the look of you, you came close. Please make an effort to present a decent appearance.”

  “What does the vicar’s wife want with me, anyway?” he asked irritably, scratching his stubbled cheek.

  Alethea studied him in chagrin. “She’s coming to welcome you as the new master.”

  “Master of what?” He picked a piece of straw from her skirt.

  “Of Helbourne Hall,” she bit out, staring down at his hand until he lifted it away. “It might have escaped your notice, being as sober and alert as you are, Sir Gabriel, but your house is tumbling down rafter by rafter, the stables stink, and your servants are the most slovenly lot of misfits ever to disgrace the domestic profession.”

  “It isn’t my fault.” He frowned at her. “And I don’t care.”

  “You have to,” she said in a demonic voice that tore right down his spine like a razor. “You won the house. The responsibility for it falls on you. Now get up before I—”

  “Before you what?” he asked, his eyes glinting in challenge. In fact, it was one of the few things she said that caught his interest.

  She leaned down until her nose touched his. “I shall carry your drunken carcass to the horse trough and dunk you until your eyes cross.”

  Resigned that she would grant him no rest, he finally deigned to give her his full attention. His heavily lidded gaze wandered over her, returned to her dark gypsy face. It amazed him that after all these years she could still make him feel like howling at the moon.