"The truth!" Giles laughed. "The truth is whatever you can make people believe, Rogue! Your vagabond years must have taught you that much."
"Mais oui! My vagabond years!" Robin laughed. "'Tis you who should have been the happy wanderer, mon cousin, only you didn't have the decency, the courage, or the honor to own up to your crimes!"
"I've never been a damned knight on a white charger like you, if that's what you mean, cousin," Mountheathe snorted, "but, as for honor, I don't think you can claim that one any more. The on dit is that you abducted your new duchess from a coach on the King's Highway. I'd hardly call that honorable! What's more; they're saying she is naught but a drab, dowdy little governess. I should like to see your prim and proper mouse of a wife. No doubt you share a 'grand passion'!"
Robin grinned. "Why, you have already met her, my lord." He crossed the room to Lucia, gently removing the poker from her hand. "Ma chérie, this rag-mannered ruffian is my cousin, Giles Bridland, Lord Mountheathe. Giles, my wife, Lucia Cothcourt Amberley, sixth Duchess of Lynkellyn."
"You are the Saddewythes' governess?" Mountheathe gaped at her, but his astonishment, quickly became derision. "Your new duchess looks adorable in her dirt, Coz, but I should think you could afford to hire at least a small staff on the bundle you stole from me." He paused to take snuff from a delicate porcelain box, then returned it to his pocket. "You were ever adept at bending pretty women to your will, Rogue, but don't you think waiting to take a bride until fifteen minutes before Grandpapa's deadline was shaving it a bit close? And then, to drag this 'lady', whose own family, so Cavanleigh tells me, refuses to acknowledge her, into our clan? Well, you're slipping, Rogue! Damned, if you ain't!"
"My bride and I were wed before midnight on March twenty- eighth, Giles, and she is of good family. Those are the only stipulations the late duke laid down and I have fulfilled them. If you wish to see the legal documentation relevant to the affair, you must visit Mr. Gleason."
"Bride!" Giles hooted scornfully. "When I came in, I thought she was one of your doxies, doubling as a servant, but I don't suppose it matters to you whether you take her as wife or wench, does it, Rogue, as long as you do take her? And when you tire of her, as you inevitably will, she can discreetly sell her charms to some other man -- very rich, of course -- who will shower her with gold and jewels for the privilege of bedding a duchess. Only think how the family coffers will swell with the -- the fruit, so to speak, of her -- er -- labors! I even know a few men who might be interested! Let's see, there is Lord Mancroft. Does she mind crowds? Surely you recall how fond he is of performing before an audience? Then, of course, the Earl of Chilcot would undoubtedly pay a pretty penny. You remember him, don't you, Rogue? Has a habit of leaving his mistresses bruised and bloodied."
Robin took a step forward. "Damn you, Giles! You are treading dangerously close to a challenge. I would relish any chance God granted me to splatter your brains all over a field of honor. An insult to my lady wife is a fine excuse to do it!" As his anger rose, Lucia hurried to his side and laid a hand on his arm. Glancing at her, he forced his temper into calmer channels. "Give it up, Giles! Grandpapa's fortune is mine and you can't do a damned thing about it!"
"That fortune may be swelling your pockets today, but they'll be empty again soon enough. I quite recall how you used to gamble away your quarter's allowance, then beg for loans from your friends. Money always did flow through your fingers like water. I suppose the bulk of last year's income is already gone?"
"C'est vrai," Robin said.
Giles grinned nastily. "How much?"
"Eighty thousand pounds." Robin's his eyes never wavered from Giles's face.
Lucia gasped and Giles's mouth fell open. "Eighty! You've lost eighty thousand pounds in one day?"
"Not lost exactly, Cousin. I paid off the mortgages on the ducal estates. The Amberley family is no longer in debt. And now, I really must ask you to leave, Giles. Her Grace and I will be receiving callers in a fortnight if you wish to honor us." Robin bowed, holding out Giles's wig a second time. "And do take your hair with you, s'il vous plâit."
Mountheathe snatched the unfortunate wig from Robin's hand. He started for the door , then turned back to say, "You do realize that you won't be received by anyone who matters?"
Amberley studied a speck of dust on his coat sleeve. "My dukedom and its' attendant fortune are all that matter, Giles. People who do not choose to acknowledge me are of no consequence." He brushed the dust away with distaste.
Giles slammed his dusty wig on his close-cropped head and stomped toward the door, suddenly whirling as he reached the threshold, a wicked gleam in his eye. "Before I go, I want to congratulate you on your marriage, Rogue. Such a lovely bride! When I held her in my arms and tasted her sweet lips," Bridland kissed his fingertips, "'twas heaven! I can hardly wait to sample her charms more fully. You will send me word when you've tired of her, won't you? Or perhaps we could share?" He bowed and was gone, his laughter floating back to them from the hall.
Their graces waited in silence until they heard the front door close. Fury glinted in Robin's hooded eyes and a sardonic smile played about his mouth as he looked at Lucia. "And did you find 'heaven' in Giles's arms, ma douce?"
"Certainly not! He forced his embraces upon me, Robin! I found the whole incident extremely distasteful." She turned away to stare out a grimy window.
"Vraiment! And what of my embraces, Lucia? After all, I have forced a marriage upon you!"
An uncomfortable silence hung in the air. "You are my husband. The law and the church say that I cannot deny you," Lucia said at last.
Crossing the room, Robin whirled her around to face him. "Yes, I am your husband, ma douce, and you'd best remember it!" His fingers dug deeply, painfully into her shoulders. "I'll not be cuckolded by Mountheathe or anyone else. You are mine, Lucia, and I'll have the life's blood of any man who tries to steal you from me. If I lose you, I lose everything."
"Robin, I assure you I did not encourage your cousin! I am doing my best to obey you and submit to your wishes." She cringed.
His blazing eyes met her terrified ones and he relaxed his grip a little. "I don't want your submission! I don't want you to fear me! I want your companionship, your loyalty, and your friendship. I need you to stand staunchly beside me through the coming ordeal. I don't want a slave! I want a comrade-in-arms! How I yearn to trust you, Lucia, but I leave you for only a few hours and I return to discover that Georges has been offering you an escape and Mountheathe has been making love to you!"
"I'd hardly call it that!" she cried indignantly.
Fury danced in Robin's eyes and surged roughly in his voice. "If he so much as looks at you again, I shall run him through swiftly and with great joy."
"Lord Mountheathe was not making love to me, Robin! He accosted me. How can you believe otherwise when I have given you my word that I will not betray you? I have promised that I will not leave and I will add to that a vow to remain loyal and faithful for the year that I must live with you. I do not fathom your anger, sir. Lord Mountheathe's kiss meant nothing to me. It was, in fact, repugnant!" She searched his face, bewildered. "You have no cause to be jealous, Robin!"
He jerked his hands away from her as if physical contact burned him. "I am merely protecting my fortune," he said. "That means guarding you from anyone who might seduce you away from me. Do not play me false, Lucia! You will only jeopardize your own freedom, and mayhap your life. I do know how to deal with a Judas!"
Chapter 9:
In Which Their Graces Ride in the Park
In a frenzied campaign to make the mansion liveable, Lucia's household staff attacked every room in Lynkellyn House with soap and water. Drapes, tapestries, and carpets threw off their dirty grey for brighter colors. The floors and woodwork glowed with a rich, warm sheen and the windows, flung open to let in the air, sparkled in the spring sunshine. Day by day, the accumulated dirt and grime of twenty years retreated as the duchess advanced.
The mornin
g after the Amberleys moved into their abode, Lucia, armed with a list of household needs, sallied forth with Anne and a footman to challenge the London shopkeepers. Since Robin and Georges had already gone riding in the park, Lucia asked Laddock, the new butler, to inform the duke, upon his return, that she had gone shopping.
It was late afternoon before Lucia finished her errands. As she handed Laddock her bonnet and gloves, he said, "If it pleases Your Grace, His Grace wishes to see you in the library immediately."
Outside the library's open double doors, Lucia hesitated, nervously smoothing her skirts, then stepped across the threshold and closed the doors behind her. Lynkellyn sat at his desk, his quill whispering steadily across the paper as he wrote in a ledger. She stood before him unconsciously twisted her fingers as tense, silent seconds ticked by. Finally shattering the stillness, she said, "You wished to see me, Robin?"
Shining through large French windows, the afternoon sun turned Robin's auburn locks to fire as he returned his pen to its holder and looked up. "To speak the truth, my sweet, I had despaired of ever seeing you again."
"Didn't Laddock give you my message?"
"That you had gone to the shops? Mais, oui!" Robin sat back in his chair. "Was it a passage to Spain you purchased? Maybe it was Italy or America? Or perhaps you've decided to accept Georges's kind offer of sanctuary?"
Lucia squared her shoulders. "I bought scrub brushes, bed linens, and bolts of drapery fabric, Robin. I had no intention of running away!"
"Indeed?" Robin raised one auburn brow. "I fear I must lay down a few rules, Your Grace, lest your intentions change. From this moment forward, you will personally inform me before you leave this house for any reason and I will want a list of the places you intend to visit. Also, you will take along a servant of my choosing."
"A spy, you mean!"
"A guard! I'll not have my newly acquired fortune fleeing to the Continent the minute my back is turned."
"You seek to imprison me!"
"If it is necessary!" Robin rose and skirted his desk to confront her. "I'm determined to keep my legacy away from that bastard, Mountheathe, and you will not jeopardize my only chance for revenge."
"Have you nothing in your heart but greed and vengeance?" she said.
Flushing, Robin paced the length of the room, his eyes glinting with anger. Halting before the French windows, he watched the genteel traffic passing in the square. "It isn't only about revenge, Lucia. You and I both know what it is to be starving and homeless. When my luck changed and I began to win, I guarded my little horde of coins well, determined that I would never go hungry or sleep in a filthy alley again. I have lived as befits a gentleman for years now, but, in my dreams, I still bed down in a stinking gutter, the stench of the chamberpot clinging to me and a demon hunger three days old shredding me inside." He turned to face her. "You know that nightmare. I've seen it in your eyes and in your struggle to hold onto a governess's fragile respectability. My grandfather's fortune will ensure that we and our children shall have food and clothes and a home for the rest of our days, ma chérie."
"In a year I shall be free to go where I wish and live as I choose," Lucia said.
Danger glinted in Robin's eyes. "Oh, no, my sweet! You shall never be free of me! You please me more than any woman I've ever bedded and I want you as much today as I did on our wedding night; so I'm certainly not going to let you go, beloved wife, especially since both church and state will uphold my claim to you. Besides, my child will need his mother."
Lucia paled. "What of your promise?"
"Only honorable men keep promises. I am a 'shameless blackguard', héin?" He smiled mockingly. "It won't be so bad, ma chérie. You will always command wealth and luxury and Lynkellyn Castle is a beautiful place to raise our children!"
"I don't want your money! I don't want your children! I don't want genteel imprisonment in your castle! I only want to be as far from you as possible. You are the most hateful, hurtful man I have ever met!" Fury at her husband and her powerlessness was driving her almost to tears.
"You will stay with me, Lucia," Robin said. "You are mine and I'll not lose you. Try to flee from me and I shall find you no matter where you go. This world is not large enough to hide you."
Lucia stared into those steely grey eyes. "You are despicable!"
He stepped toward her. "We are twin souls, you and I. We understand each other in a way no one else ever can.
Shaking her head, she backed away from him. "Never am I your twin! You are a monster! A devil!" When she felt the library doors at her back, she turned, flung them wide, and burst into the hall, ignoring a surprised footman scrambling to attend his duties. Running down the hall to the staircase, she lifted her skirt and took the steps two at a time.
When she reached her room, she locked the door and began to pace, her fists clenched at her sides. She would leave him, she fumed. It was exactly what the scoundrel deserved. The problem was how to escape and where to go. She could not afford to hire a coach to the corner, much less buy passage out of England. She had nothing to sell and Robin had given her no pin money, lest she use it for the very purpose she was contemplating. She thought wistfully of the guineas she had stashed away in her portmanteau for just such a flight, but her baggage had been left behind in the Saddewythes' coach. Her lips tightened. Alas! All an escape promised was a return to her old life, anyway.
Shuddering at the thought, she slowly sank into a chair, forced, for the present, to admit defeat. She had been hunted, trapped, and caged for display like some zoological exhibit.
Bitter tears scalded her cheeks. The truth of this whole unhappy tangle was that, even had she the opportunity, she would not leave Robin; at least not for this one year. She had pledged herself to stay and a Cothcourt, no matter how angry, no matter how disgraced, did not break a promise.
***
Robin watched Lucia flee the room, his face impassive. Only the hard set of his mouth and his smoldering eyes, partially concealed beneath sleepy lids, suggested that he was fighting his temper. Filling a glass from the decanter on his desk, he tossed off the wine.
"Devil, am I?" he muttered, glaring out the windows at the passing world. After fuming for another moment, he crossed the room and pulled the bell. Laddock appeared.
"Convey my compliments to Her Grace and ask her to join me here at five o'clock, ready for a ride in the park," he commanded. "Saddle Belshazzar and Diablo."
"Very good, Your Grace. Begging Your Grace's pardon, but a trunk just arrived a few minutes ago. The footman who brought it didn't offer an explanation, but merely said that his employer, whom he wouldn't name, told him to leave it here. What would Your Grace like me to do with it?"
Robin shrugged, irritated. "I've no inclination for mysteries just at present. Put it in my chambers. I'll examine it later. Pray convey my message to Her Grace."
When Anne bustled into the duchess's chamber, Lucia was laying on her daybed, gazing at nothing. Dejection had settled over her like a blanket of snow. She sat up, dismayed, when the maid announced that Lynkellyn requested her company yet again. "Ask His Grace to excuse me, Anne. I am quite exhausted from this afternoon's outing."
"Very well, Your Grace." She left the room to carry out her orders only to return a few minutes later, extremely flustered. "Your Grace! His Grace insists! Laddock says as how he said he would come up and dress you himself if you refuse." She blushed rosily. Lucia blanched.
"My habit, if you please, Anne," she said in a small, shaky voice.
Lucia sat before her dressing table as Anne combed her ebony tresses into a fashionable style. "Shall I powder your hair, Your Grace?" she asked, reaching for the box.
"No time. The duke is waiting for me." The maid helped her into her habit and she picked up her gloves from the dressing table, saying reluctantly, "I suppose I must join the duke."
A few minutes later, she stepped into the library wearing a blue velvet habit with a double set of ivory buttons down the front. A small, blue
velvet hat reminiscent of the cavaliers of a century before set at a rakish angle on her head, the bonnet's brim caught up on one side with a silver brooch with a white feather curling down to caress her cheek. "I am ready to ride in the park, Robin." She said, speaking barely above a whisper.
"And in very good time!" His drawl held a congratulatory note as he looked up from his ledgers. "You see, ma chérie, we deal very well together if you do as I bid you."
Lucia's chin lifted and a martial gleam lit her eyes. She opened her mouth to speak, but, rising from his desk, Robin forestalled her. "I've had enough of your tongue for one day, my sweet! You will obey me docilely or I will lock you in your chambers for a few days without so much as your maid for company."
"It's you who should be locked up! In Newgate! Preferably forever!" Lucia flung at him savagely, all traces of fear washed away in the swift current of fury.
Robin skirted the desk to grasp her wrist. As he tilted her face up to his with a hand beneath her chin, the glint in his eyes made her shudder. "I intend to tame you, my tigress, so retract your claws and resign yourself to my company and my guidance," he said. "'Twill be the most pleasant course for you and the least troublesome for me."
His eyes bored into hers, daring her to challenge him. At last, she wrenched her gaze away, daunted by his fiery glare. "I am not an object to be paraded about, then stored away until you have need of it, Your Grace, and I will not be treated like one!"
Robin laughed. "No, my sweet, you are not an object. You are the means to a most satisfactory end. As long as I have you and the child you are going to bear me, Mountheathe will never inherit a farthing of the old duke's fortune; so you are going to stay with me and be my obedient little wife. I shall do whatever is necessary to gain your compliance. Now as to the purpose of our sudden public appearance: unsavory tales of our singular wedding have already spread through Town, due, sans doute, to Saddewythe's busy tongue. Since the truth is damaging to my campaign for respectability, we must demonstrate to the world that our union is a love match and that Saddewythe witnessed a scandalous, but romantic elopement, not a criminal abduction. While we are riding in the park this afternoon, we are newlyweds in love and you will act accordingly. Enfin, we will play at this charade any time we are in public."
The Rogue's Revenge Page 11
