The Scandalously Bad Mr. Milroy

by Alexandra Hawkins

  “Why complain about a nonexistent wager?”

  Tipton’s light-blue eyes gleamed wickedly. “A nonexistent wager.” He mulled over the notion. “I regret I have never seen you in the prize ring, Mr. Milroy. I admire finesse.”

  He glanced down at his bloodied knuckles, which were already beginning to swell. Keanan cocked his head back at the room. “Those men prey on the vulnerable. They just underestimated how formidable a fighter from the streets is when he’s riled and nasty.”

  Sir Thomas Bedegrayne looked like a man who loathed bestowing gratitude on a man he had disliked on sight. Not that it mattered. In Keanan’s present mood, he was tempted to shove that appreciation back down the baronet’s throat, along with a few teeth.

  Something in Keanan’s eyes must have revealed his violent thoughts. Instead of backing away, Bedegrayne seemed ready to meet any challenge. “This isn’t finished between us, Mr. Milroy,” Bedegrayne warned.

  No gratitude. Fine. He preferred it that way. “Whoever said it was, old man?”

  Seventeen

  It was three in the morning when Drake returned home. He and Milroy had parted ways once they had exited the club. Standing with him against the Malefaction Society had been a decision based on emotion. Wynne’s misery at their hands clawed at his gut. His half brother was correct. Drake’s silence about the wager had pulled her into the unscrupulous game. He would have made a pact with Old Nick to assuage his guilt.

  Oddly, he could not regret standing with a man he had been expected to hate since his birth. Exuding strength and confidence, Keanan Milroy was an astounding foe. The manner in which he vanquished his enemies proved he had shown some restraint when handling his unwanted sibling, a fact for which Drake was eternally indebted.

  This night’s adventure also enlightened him to a difficult truth: Milroy loved Wynne Bedegrayne. While the man had not said the words, he had purposely taunted five gentlemen into focusing their hatred on him. Drake could not think of a more quixotic sacrifice, or a deadlier one.

  Opening the door, he froze at the activity within. Candles lit the hall and numerous rooms. He could hear voices in the distance and wondered if his father had stirred the house up again in one of his drunken rages. Somewhere above, his mother would be brazening out the hostile beast. A part of him was tempted to back out the door and find other accommodations. Duty had him putting a reluctant foot on the first step.

  A maid appeared from above. Her droopy eyelids widened upon recognition. “My lord!” Whirling around, she disappeared, crying out, “Ma’am! He’s here!”

  Indistinct agitated feminine voices heightened at the news. Drake did not realize he was bounding the steps two by two until his mother met him at the top. She wore a long, unadorned white nightgown. Her long black hair that had silvered around her face hung loosely down her shoulders; her nightcap had been forgotten. He was used to seeing her immaculate, her feelings locked behind a mask of cool tolerance.

  Two steps and he was gripping her arms. He shook her, wanting the horror and sorrow in her tearful gaze to vanish. “Tell me!”

  “Reckester is dead.”

  Denial was a snarl on his lips as he pushed her away and strode toward his father’s door.

  “I summoned a physician when they brought him home,” his mother said, imploring him to understand that she had done all she could. “His color was terrible, and the wound—” Shuddering, she froze at the threshold, refusing to enter.

  An elderly man he did not recognize stood over his father, wiping his hands. Another man, younger, perhaps in his forties, leaned against the wall with his arms crossed over his chest. His blue uniform and red waistcoat identified him as part of the horse patrol.

  “My lord, I am Dr. Moore. You are the son, I take it?” the older man asked, the weariness of the hour roughing his voice.

  His throat swelled with emotion at the fresh slash of scarlet defacing the pillow under his father’s head. “Does he live?”

  “He had already expired when”—he gestured to the other man—“this gentleman found him.”

  “Peters, milord,” the man said, unwinding from his casual pose. “I spotted two nimmers bending over him not far from the Silver Serpent. They scattered at my shout, nipping His Grace’s coat and boots in their flight.”

  “Did he…” He swallowed and tried again. “Was he able to tell you what happened?”

  “No, milord. He looked no better than he does now. Some patrons of the gambling hell heard my shout and came running. One or two of them identified him so I was able to bring him home.”

  “There was little anyone could do,” the physician said, tipping Reckester’s head to the side, exposing blood-matted hair and a hideous indentation where the back of his head should have been.

  Drake looked away, gasping for air devoid of the stench of death. His mother was sobbing just beyond the doorway. He brought his clenched fist to his brow, striving for mastery over his sour stomach.

  Clearing his throat to fill the awkward, grief-stricken silence, the officer said, “Bashed in the head for his clothes and purse, is my guess. Since you have no need of me, I’m off to report to my conductor.”

  “I want you to find the villain who did this. Hire as many men as you need.”

  The officer’s proper reply droned in his ears and then he departed. Sweat trickled down his back as he stared at his father. The physician had adjusted his head, concealing the violence. It offered him little comfort. The ghastly image would be burned in his brain forever. All he had to do was close his eyes to see it.

  Drake approached the bed. His hand touched his father’s arm. The lack of life he felt beneath his fingertips had him retreating. If his father had found peace, his visage did not reveal it. The final moments of pain had been eternally frozen. There was dirt and bruising on one translucent cheek.

  He spun away, seeking the cleansing air of the open window. Someone had murdered his father. Had it been an unfortunate robbery, or had his father crossed the wrong foe? Creditors both honest and corrupt were still hounding their man of affairs. A cuckolded husband, perhaps? Or a bastard son determined to have his vengeance? The possibilities bombarded his skull until they became merciless daggers. He startled at the hand on his shoulder.

  The elderly man’s gaze was sympathetic. “There is nothing you can do for him now.” He cocked his head toward the sound of crying. “Help me get her to bed. She needs some laudanum, and from your expression, I would say, so do you.”

  Until that moment, he had forgotten about his mother. Once he believed there had been no love between his parents. Hearing her watery weeping, he decided that he had an incomplete understanding of the sentiment. Burying his grief, he followed the physician out the door.

  * * *

  Keanan arrived at the Bedegraynes’ front door at precisely eleven o’clock. He felt optimistic when the butler had not shut the door in his face and had requested that he wait in the drawing room. Seeing Sir Thomas Bedegrayne at the threshold smote his hopes into dust.

  “Do you intend to keep her from me?”

  The older man closed the door. “Do you think it is possible?” There was no anger in the question, just curiosity.

  “No,” he bluntly replied. “We had words when we last parted. I need to see her. I want her to know she does not have to be afraid anymore.”

  “Are you telling me I cannot protect my own, Mr. Milroy?”

  The old man would be challenging him to a fight before he left this house. “A man can only protect what he can see.”

  Sir Thomas’s brows rose. “And you think you see my gel better than her papa?”

  “Begging your pardon, sir, but a wily lady such as your daughter requires a man’s full attentiveness.”

  Nodding, her father said, “I cannot disagree with your logic.” He opened the door. “You, there,” he called out to a passing footman, “fetch Miss Bedegrayne. She has a caller.” He stared at Keanan. “What I have not reasoned out is if you ar
e the man to do it.” He left Keanan mulling over how a man went about convincing him.

  * * *

  Wynne headed for the drawing room, uncertain who would call upon her so early in the day. The only one she knew who cared so little for rules was Keanan Milroy. The mysterious caller had spoken first to her papa, and she doubted her father would have consented to their meeting, least of all allowed him in the house.

  As she opened the door, her lips parted at the sight of him. He was dressed more for a brisk canter through Hyde Park than for calling. Suddenly uncertain, she peered behind her, wondering if Papa was off, intent on breaking out his prized flintlock brass-barreled blunderbuss pistols.

  “I did not use trickery to see you, Wynne. He knows I am here.” Keanan removed his hat and scrubbed at his short hair in the brisk, agitated manner that she had always found endearing.

  “And he was agreeable?”

  “Bedegrayne feels indebted for the moment. I am not counting on this lapse being everlasting.” Any humor he felt was strictly on the surface. His fingers crushed the brim of his hat, while his stare glutted on every movement she made. “I need to touch you,” he helplessly admitted. “Will you let me hold you?”

  He was already crossing the distance and gathering her to his chest. Burrowing his nose into her hair, he inhaled deeply, drawing in her essence.

  She rested her cheek against his chest, finding strength in the contact. “Papa told me what you did,” she murmured, thinking her statement had as many omissions as her father’s tale. All she knew was that Keanan and Lord Nevin had confronted Middlefell and his cronies and ended their game.

  He drew back far enough for the meeting of their lips. This kiss was meant to soothe. It was not filled with the drugging passion she knew was capable between them.

  “You should have told me.” Recalling how he had learned of her private distress, he pressed his fingers into the flesh of her upper arms. “I could have ended their game weeks ago. It is your damnable pride, woman. You would rather shoulder a burden that would bow a man instead of asking for help.”

  Her green eyes frosty, she walked out of his embrace. She preferred the anger instead of the vulnerability with which he had greeted her. Wynne had already given him so much of herself. If he took another piece of her soul, she feared the hollowed remains would shatter.

  “Why should I have confided in a man who played his own games?” she demanded, pleased by the raw frustration in his answering scowl.

  “I had my reasons,” he growled. “Hell, Wynne, maybe you can tangle your family up by twisting the guilt, but I fight dirty, too. This is not about Reckester.”

  “Oh, I disagree. If Lord Nevin had contemplated his immortality with another agreeable lady, you would have hunted her, not me.”

  Her quiet certainty had him floundering. “Ridiculous. I might have approached this fictional woman. Perhaps—”

  “Seduced her?”

  He muttered under his breath a perfectly obscene oath. “If you want truth, Wynne, I cannot say how far I would have pursued her. Is that what you want to hear?”

  “I seek not your confession. Nor do I judge you,” she said tightly, her tone implying that she did.

  “Your heart is as green as your eyes for all this fluttering outrage.” He paced away from her, his hand rubbing the steady throb in his neck. “I was not chasing after another woman. It was you I wanted. You I pursued.”

  The puzzled exasperation she heard in his confession ruffled her pride. “I have no quarrel with your actions, Keanan. It is your, ah, raison d’être that has given me some restless nights.”

  His eyes fired to a cold black. “You could not resist, could you? Throwing French words at me like a man would throw his fist when a man’s back was turned. No one more than I is aware of the chasm between us. I never pretended to be an educated man, leastways, not from the kind of tutoring your precious brothers can claim. Fight me if you like, my damson, but even you cannot deny this truth. It was my mouth suckling your breast, my cock surging deep, averring you as mine. Greedy for the pleasure only I can give, not once were you thinking of our differences, or my lack.”

  She refused to be ashamed of their lovemaking. It was the words he refused to speak that made her want to sink to the floor and weep. “You boorish braggart! I am aware of what was offered and what was taken. I also am quite aware of what you rejected.”

  He stood there, his gaze steady on hers. Curiously detached, Wynne watched his fingers curl as if he was imagining her within his grasp. He exuded such passion with a glance. It saddened her that whatever he felt simmered within, never boiling over into the words she yearned for as much as his touch.

  “Coward,” she spat, reveling in seeing his cheeks whiten, the insult stabbing through skin and muscle to the bone. “Why did you come here?”

  “Why, indeed? You ungrateful hellcat!” he said, exploding. “You have been shadowed by trouble since we first met. I have ended it.”

  Her fingers trailed along the delicate surface of one of her mother’s favorite vases. “Perhaps, for me. What about you? These men are not used to being thwarted.”

  His expression became guarded. “Well, neither am I. It’s something you and those scoundrels should pay heed to.”

  He had put himself at risk. They could have already issued challenges, and he would never admit it. “You are not responsible for me, Keanan Milroy.”

  “Nor you for me,” he said, matching her banked frustration. “It’s no business of yours.”

  And more’s the pity, she thought, because he spoke the truth. “It is a clever talent you have, dissevering your body and affection. I cannot pinch off my feelings so ruthlessly. So I have to choose.”

  Wary now, he bared his teeth. “More conditions, Wynne?”

  She lifted her shoulder in a careless shrug, defying the bowing strain in her spine. “If you like. My role in your campaign against your father is over, since I have no intention of marrying Lord Nevin.” Sensing his protest, she cut him off with a look. “You have risked your life protecting my reputation. Being your mistress negates your noble deed.”

  Horrified, he tried to approach her but halted at her retreat. “You are not my mistress!” he thundered.

  “Oh.” She staggered against the pain. “Well, less than.”

  “No! You are twisting my meaning, damn you!”

  She placed her hand on her stomach, already mourning him. “You have never allowed me into your life. Not really.” She turned to face him. “Oh, I know of your hate, your ambitions. What of love, Keanan? There must be people in your life you care about?”

  Her calm query seemed to agitate him. “One or two—does it matter?”

  Against her wishes, tears filled her eyes. “Indeed, sir. Why have I never met these people that claim a place in your miserly heart?”

  “They have no place in your world, Wynne. Neither do I.”

  “Oh, please. Have the courtesy of admitting the prejudices are your own. I have never thought less of you for your poor upbringing. What shatters my heart is that wanting me shames you.” She turned away and wiped frantically at her falling tears.

  Appalled, he grabbed her arm, preventing her from retreating. “Ashamed? What idiocy! My breath freezes in my chest, just looking at you.”

  “Do you think you are the first man to tell me that I am beautiful?” she cried. “Scores of men have spouted forgettable lines of flattery, hoping to gain my heart. I felt nothing, except regret that I could not return their sentiment. You were the only man who ever made me truly feel. I offered you everything … risked all, in hopes…” Her voice failed, consumed by anger and grief.

  “What did you hope, Wynne?” he relentlessly pressed.

  She shook her head. “No more. I cannot give you more without destroying myself. Leave me something after you have moved on.”

  “This does not end here!” His rough kiss hurt them both.

  She tore her arm from his grasp and stepped out of
reach. “It must. If not for my sake, then for the sake of the child growing within me.”

  He clutched his stomach. Staggered, he braced his hands on his knees. “A child. Are you certain?”

  “That you are the sire?” She backed up a few more steps. “I never thought you would be so blatantly cruel.”

  “I claim the child,” he snapped, visibly sweating. Jumping up, he stalked after her. “I am not my father!”

  She flinched at his vehemence. It had not been her intention to accuse him of the misdeed he despised Reckester for. “Yelling at each other solves nothing. I-I just wanted you to understand why it ends here. No more games, Keanan. You will have to find your revenge without my help.”

  “This is your solution? Telling me about our child and then running away?”

  “Not running,” she shouted at him, matching his volume. “Living!” Seeing his pained expression, she strove to soften her voice. “I am not your mother. My family will not throw me into the streets, leaving me to starve or prostitute myself. My son will not spend his life waiting until he is strong enough to best you for abandoning us.”

  The tears brimming in his eyes horrified them both. “I never took you for a coward, Wynne. I am not the only one afraid here. You are running so fast, the grit and wind are blinding you.”

  “I am just simplifying things. You are just upset I am giving up before you.”

  “I am not the one pulling away.”

  “Nor have you ever asked me to stay.” Taking one last risk, she kissed him on the cheek, tasting his tears. “I will never forget you.”

  She glanced up at him. He looked furious, purposely keeping his hands at his sides as if he did not trust himself to put his hands on her.

  “Nor will I forgive you, Keanan, for not accepting more.” She quietly retreated from the room, ignoring the underlying vehement plea she heard when he roared her name.

  * * *

  Keanan blindly walked the streets for hours. The image of Wynne’s pale face overwhelmed by quiet misery haunted him. She had asked him politely to leave. No, worse, she was severing all ties to him. Even carrying his child could not bind her to him. Half crazed by desperation, he had run after her.