Need coursed through her and she fell into the kiss, parting her lips and plundering him. At some point during their ride she’d lost her bonnet with its dreaded veils, and now it was her hair tumbling around her, according them some sense of privacy.
“Charley.”
She became aware of footsteps around them and lifted her head. He tugged her back down into another long kiss.
“Charley.” The voice was closer, louder.
She pulled away. “It’s your brother again.”
Charley groaned and released her, helping her to her feet, smoothing her skirts while her cheeks heated.
Twice caught kissing Charley Everly. Even for one such as she, that was scandalous. And the wild ride…she gripped a handful of skirt. “I’ve given all of London a look at my knees.”
“And lovely they are.” That voice was feminine.
She pushed back her hair and found a pretty blonde woman next to Mr. Gibson, curling her lips in on a smile. Was this Paulette? But no, Mr. Gibson’s wife was in the country somewhere. And this woman’s dress was a plain servant’s twill.
“Did we catch them?” Charley was arranging his coats.
She heated again and moved in front of him.
“We don’t know yet. Let’s get you inside, Miss Kingsley.”
Mr. Gibson reached for her, but she sank back against Charley and fumbled for his hand.
“Ah, leave her to Charley, Bink.” The woman smiled brightly. “But Miss Kingsley, Bink is right. We’ll be safer inside while this rumpus dies down, and more comfortable also. Lean then on Charley’s arm and we’ll move ourselves inside, shall we?”
There was a music to this woman’s speech, the accent so familiar.
The lady took Graciela’s free arm as they moved down a wide path through the garden. “There now, they haven’t bothered with an introduction, but I’m Sirena, James’s wife.”
“James?”
She waved a hand. “Lord Bakeley. I’ve already had a tumble with your Reina this morning. Aye, she’s charmed all of us, she has, including my James. We’ve found some old toys for her, and we must buy her more. At the moment, Perry has her in hand so your Francisca and the nursemaids can rest a bit. She’ll not nap, though, she won’t, that little mite. But I hear Charley has the power to sprinkle the Dustman’s powder.”
Her head was spinning. “The Dustman?”
Sirena laughed. “It’s a fairy character.”
“And not an Irish one,” Charley said.
“So they say. They say that, like our Charley, the Dustman is not a bit Irish.” Another jolly laugh followed. “But I say magic that puts children to sleep and gives them sweet dreams must be Irish.” They entered through the servants’ door and Sirena leaned closer. “Charley has a reputation as a lady’s man, but I don’t believe it for a second. He’s but sprinkling fairy dust and putting them to dreaming about his great prowess.”
“Sirena.” Charley turned to face them, aghast. “Don’t listen to my bawdy sister, Gracie. She is Irish, you know.”
Sirena punched his arm. “So I am, and here’s another one.”
Mr. Gibson had followed them in.
“My father’s surgeon is an Irishman. He does not have your red and golden hair, though.” Her heart twisted. O’Malley had always teased her that he was black Irish, descended from the wrecked survivors of the Armada, and they were cousins many times removed. He had sailed with Papa on this voyage. If Papa was lost, so was O’Malley.
Charley lifted her hand. “One skirmish at a time, Gracie. If your father and his Irish surgeon are alive, we’ll find them. But we must first deal with Kingsley and Carvelle.”
His eyes begged her to trust in him. His gaze, his touch, warmed her.
Mr. Gibson clamped a hand on Charley’s shoulder. “Kincaid is here.”
He blinked, squeezed her hand, and smiled. “You have straw in your hair,” he whispered. “And your gown is ripped. And you’ve lost that fashionable hat.”
“And it is all of your doing,” she whispered back.
“Yes.” His eyes gleamed wickedly. “A pity we cannot finish it.” He lifted her hands and kissed them both. “Will you come with us? Or will you go up with Sirena to change and check on Reina?”
Oh, he was clever—he was offering her a choice. She sensed he did not want her with him when he spoke to Kincaid, yet he would not forbid it. And he knew how strong the pull was to the child.
“Reina must come first, and then I will change and find you, and you will report the news to me.”
He grinned and dropped a kiss on her forehead. “At your command, my lady.”
And then he was off, knocking elbows with his brother. At the doorway he looked back and smiled.
Her heart lurched.
Qué tonto. What a fool.
She must forget passion. She must reach for intelligence, before she tumbled head over ears into loving this Englishman.
Bakeley and Kincaid sat in the library, heads bent over papers. They both looked up when Charley and Bink entered.
“How did you fare?” Bakeley asked.
Bink cast him a quizzical look and went for the table laid with cold meats. Charley swiped a hand through his brow, went to the sideboard and poured a drink.
“That bad?” Bakeley asked. “Or that good?”
“A bit of both,” Bink said. “And a wild ride at the end. The villains ambushed us.”
Charley threw back a gulp and let it burn down his throat.
“The lady is safe?” Bakeley’s voice held concern.
“Sirena has her in hand,” Bink said. “She met us in the stables.”
“Any injuries?” Kincaid asked.
“I don’t know. Charley and I took horses and left.”
“A horse,” Charley said. “A horse was injured.”
Bakeley stood, eyes narrowed and glinting with murder. Horse breeding was more than one of the family’s businesses, it was a shared passion for him and his lady.
“How badly, I don’t know, only that I heard the first shot and then the horse’s scream.”
“I’ve informed the head groom,” Bink said.
Bakeley paced across the room to the window.
“They’ll know what to do,” Charley said. “By now a crowd has gathered, yet it would not do to draw Shaldon’s heir to the scene.”
Bakeley’s face glowed. “If he’s killed an innocent horse—”
“I’ll take care of getting you satisfaction.” Charley set the glass down. “And not in some twigged-out pistols at dawn. Don’t worry, Kincaid, that I don’t have the stomach for it.”
Kincaid grunted. “Did McCollum betray you?”
“No.” Or so his gut told him.
Bink shook his head. “Kingsley and Carvelle had been in to see him that morning. I’m guessing they had people lingering around to see if she would visit.”
“We shouldn’t have dressed her in black. It was too similar to the disguise at Watelford’s.”
“No, Charley. The disguise was a good one until...” A smile creased Bink’s face and he shook his head again. “McCollum’s clerk is in someone’s pay, I’ll warrant, but whether it’s Carvelle, or Kingsley, or both, I don’t know. He identified us because Charley here couldn’t keep his hands off my wife.”
Bakeley’s head went up and his eyes narrowed. Kincaid was as usual, inscrutable.
His stomach churned, or maybe that was akin to the fluttering he’d felt after Gracie’s announcement. “Yes well, it’s a day of good news all around. You’re expecting an heir, Bakeley, and I’ve just become engaged to Miss Kingsley.”
Bakeley exchanged looks with Bink. “Have you indeed. And when is the wedding?”
“That’s the rub. As soon as I said yes to the lady—”
“You said yes?”
“Bink was there. He can attest. Once she learned that Shaldon is her new guardian—”
“Father?”
“Yes. Stop interrupting. Once she learned
that Shaldon is her new guardian, she offered for me. I said yes, and then she began plotting how to get out of it. That is what we were discussing when you left us alone for a few minutes.”
Bink laughed. “And a very convincing argument you were making.”
“Sit,” Bakeley commanded, and pulled over a chair. “We have much to talk about but I’ll hear this story first.”
Upstairs, Graciela shed her torn outer clothing and slipped on a new gown.
A new gown, not a made-over one. Lady Sirena had said so, gabbling non-stop as Francisca did up Graciela’s laces and hooks and her ladyship’s own little maid fixed her hair. Lady Sirena had stayed with her after her visit to the nursery, following her and Francisca back to her bedchamber.
Now, Francisca’s face was a mask of determination, not a bit servile, though out of politeness, the few words she spoke were in her even more indecipherable English. Graciela would have laughed if her head were on right, or even still attached to her neck.
It had been quite the morning.
“Oh, I do like your hair done more loosely,” Lady Sirena exclaimed.
The maid had left her curls to their wildness, framing her face, coiling low on her neck, unlike the tight, pomaded style Lady Kingsley had enforced.
“And the dress—’tis a dream. The color makes your skin look like cream. I’m glad, I am, that Madame delivered the start of your wardrobe. She was so disappointed you’d gone out.” Perched on the side of the high bed, Lady Sirena swung her feet just as Reina would have done.
With her back to her ladyship, Francisca adjusted a pleat and rolled her eyes.
The modiste she’d visited with Lady Kingsley had been decidedly English, dressing her in whites that made her look swarthy and foreign. Who was this Madame?
She fluffed the skirt of the dress. The blue wafted like soft bay water, the tiny flocked flowers floating upon it. “It is a lovely dress, but let this be the end of them. I fear I cannot pay you right away, and I would not be in your debt.”
A rap on the door brought Lady Perry, who clapped her hands together and smiled. “She is sleeping finally, even without Charley’s help, and the dress is perfect, as Madame said it would be.”
Lady Sirena waved her hand. “She’s fretting though, Perry. Miss Kingsley, you’re not to worry. ’Tis only one dress, and such a pleasure it is for us to see you in it.” She smiled wickedly. “For all of us.”
Her cheeks warmed. Lady Sirena had caught her sprawled over Charley, and the both of them kissing. And then there was the matter of the engagement, which the ladies could not possibly know about because she barely knew of it herself.
“Madame will be along early tomorrow with another morning dress. She is wishing to measure you in person.”
The modiste would come to her in person. Lord Shaldon was indeed powerful.
Lady Sirena laughed. “She’s very clever, Madame is, taking a lady’s measure from her clothing. But it is better to measure the person, especially when one is addressing needs such as a corset.”
“There is no need—”
“I beg you to allow it.” Lady Sirena had hopped from the bed and now her small cool hand clasped Graciela’s. “It was but a year or so ago that I ran from a monster with naught but the clothes on my back.”
“It’s true,” Lady Perry said. “And a lady must have clothes.”
She found it hard to breathe. “I am not a lady.” Not here. Not in England.
She had been a lady, or almost so, years before, when she had danced at her older friends’ Quinceañeras and wondered which of the handsome young men who flocked to the parties would be hers. And then her father had decided they must leave, this time taking them on the long voyage back to the West Indies, dropping them with friends in Tampico and leaving, because what he must do was too dangerous.
And then Mama had decided they must leave there and go to Veracruz. Papa had no notion of that journey, nor the dangers they’d faced. She had never lived so close to the land, so close to the edge of survival. It had cost her all claims to gentility.
Lady Sirena might have fled a monster, but it was to go from one cultured drawing room to another. In this country, Graciela might as well have been an opera dancer, or a flower seller, or one of the Rom threading their wagons down bumpy lanes and sleeping under the stars. She could never meet the standards of these people, especially the ladies.
Well, except for these two, who seemed determined to keep talking. “You’re not only a lady, you’re a wealthy one, to boot, I hear. Your father had the forethought to put money aside for you and not leave you to running through the woods and knocking on the neighbor’s kitchen door to take you in.” She patted Graciela’s hand. “There now. If anyone can get you set to rights, ’tis Lord Shaldon and his sons.”
Lady Perry eyed her thoughtfully. “Especially his son, Charley.”
A bottle crashed on the dressing table, scent filling the air. The little maid rushed to help Francisca mop up spilled liquid.
“It will be all right, Francisca,” Lady Perry said in her careful Spanish, and then turned back. “Shall we go below and find out all the news?”
Francisca nodded, her mouth pressed firmly closed.
“Let me join you in just a few moments,” Graciela said. “I would have a quiet word with my maid.” In private, so I may stay her hand from throwing more bottles.
When the door closed on the ladies and the other maid, Francisca turned a shaking finger on her. “That man—”
“Do not worry yourself. I have a plan.” And you are not going to like it. Graciela swallowed. “And we must prepare ourselves for the opportunity to leave.”
Charley paced from one window to the other, another brandy in his hand. Gracie should be down soon, and he was waiting on one more report.
“Carvelle is a cagey one,” Kincaid said. “We’ve knocked on every inn door and brothel and gin mill in a twenty-mile radius. We’ve traced every place he’s known to frequent. Kingsley, however—”
A tap on the library door stopped him. One of Kincaid’s men, a brawny dark-haired Scotsman, ushered in Penderbrook and another man.
Charley glanced from Bink, sprawled in an armchair near the cold fireplace, to Bakeley, his elbows resting on the desk. Both men sat up at the intrusion.
He set down his glass and rubbed his hands together. “How did it go, Laughlin?”
A smile crinkled the other man’s lips. “It was all I could do to keep from laughing, old man.” He brought a package from under his arm and nodded at the glass on the table. “We’ve earned one of those at least, have we not, Pender?”
Penderbrook smiled. His brothers frowned.
Charley went to the sideboard and poured out two more glasses. “You know Penderbrook. The other fellow is my old chum, Henry Laughlin.”
“Sir Henry Laughlin.” Bakeley tapped the desk. “Newly appointed magistrate?”
Bakeley did have his finger at the pulse of London.
“That is correct, Lord Bakeley.” He bowed. “At your service.”
“What have you done, Charley?” Bink said. “I thought we weren’t going to involve the authorities.”
“I’m afraid this was more my doing than Everly’s,” Laughlin said. “Well, mine and Penderbrook’s. That broadsheet and the rumors abounding could not go unremarked.” He laughed again. “Great fun to see the look on Kingsley’s face. Though I’ve muddied my new boots, so Kingsley’s had his revenge. I’ve never seen a garden quite like that. It didn’t take my men long to find the treasure, though.”
Bakeley help up a hand. “Back up.”
“Laughlin visited Kingsley’s townhouse on a tip,” Charley said. “He found a bloody dress belonging to Miss Kingsley buried in the garden.”
“Here.” Laughlin set the package on the desk. “I thought perhaps her servants could identify it.”
Bakeley straightened in his chair. “That’s damned devious.”
Charley flashed his brother a grin. “Thank
you. And now let’s hear it. How were you received, Laughlin?”
“Kingsley arrived after the discovery, already in a snit from some bad news or other. His lady had taken to her bed and refused to come down. All but threw me out of the house, the pompous bastard.”
First his disappointment at the bank and then the appearance of a magistrate. Kingsley should be good and rattled. He might even lead them to his accomplice. That was the hope anyway.
He saw Kincaid’s expression draw in and shutter. “Laughlin can be trusted in this matter,” Charley said. This did not involve the safety of the kingdom, only the life of one precious woman. And perhaps a little girl.
“You’ll be lucky to have your position by dinner,” Bink said. “Kingsley has powerful friends.”
Laughlin shrugged. “What a pity. I’d just begun to enjoy it.”
“We have a few friends of our own, Bink, do we not?” Charley handed the glasses around.
Voices in the hall silenced the men. The door opened and three ladies entered.
But he only saw Gracie.
Charley experienced that mysterious lack of oxygen again, as if he were struggling up several flights of stairs after a night of drinking. The dots in his vision were there also, outlining her sweet startled face. Even Sirena’s voice had stilled.
Bakeley broke the hushed silence with a round of introductions, and when Charley saw Laughlin bend over Gracie’s hand and the gleam in his eyes, he roused.
He took her hand away from Laughlin and tucked it into his arm. She’d donned a blue dress, and curls were scattered over her forehead and cheeks. Breathless, it made him. Like a girl. That would not do.
“What is this? The ladies could not find a black gown for you?”
She turned a scowl up to him and grimaced. The faint shadowed bruise still lurked on her cheek, reminding him of the seriousness of the threat posed by her guardian.
“I’m teasing. You’re lovely. In all honesty I could not breathe when—”
“Mr. Everly.” She slid her gaze toward Laughlin who was studying them unabashedly.
“Miss Kingsley.” Bakeley came around the desk and blocked the other men’s view. “Charley told me your happy news. You have my sincere welcome and wishes for happiness,” he said, too quietly for the other men to hear.
The Rogue's Last Scandal: A Regency Romance (Sons of the Spy Lord Book 3) Page 12
