One for the Rogue

by Charis Michaels

  The butler was nodding now, ducking back inside and closing the door behind him. Emmaline embarked on the icy steps, and Beau took her elbow.

  “Careful,” he said, his voice miraculously calm. A groom whipped open the carriage door, and he stepped back so she could climb inside.

  I’ve said it, he thought again. And I still draw breath.

  It was only a name. A string of letters. It meant less to him than possibly to any man, ever. Saying it did not make it his identity.

  Emmaline settled on the carriage seat and watched him with worried, cautious eyes. She knew the title haunted him. She knew, and now she would ask him about it.

  The only thing he wanted less than identifying himself as viscount was explaining why he detested it.

  He looked away and collapsed on the opposite seat, rapping twice on the ceiling to signal the coachman to drive.

  “Would it be cliché to thank you again?” she asked. The carriage rounded the corner of Portman Square. “Surely you know how—”

  “Yes,” he said softly. “It would be cliché. And yes, I know. I wish I had been in London the night he’d gone. I wish I could do more.” I wish I could touch you. The thought rose, unbidden, in his mind. He shifted in his seat.

  The dowager carriage was cramped and tattered. With the windows closed against the morning cold, the pervasive smell of him—horse and boot sludge—permeated the small space. He’d folded his height inside what felt like a rolling cupboard.

  Beau hunched, making an effort to, at the very least, approximate distance, but it was no use. They were knee to knee.

  Emmaline balanced on the opposite bench, fully contained with artful grace. Not even a whisper of skirt brushed his knees.

  She told him, “You’re the only one who has done anything at all. I shall never be able to repay you for racing here. You took over, didn’t you? The only one. Even if we never—” She stopped and looked out the window.

  He ached to reach for her, but he squeezed his fingers into a fist. “No suppositions. We will follow every lead until one of them takes us to him.”

  She nodded.

  Despite her poise, she looked fragile. Tired and fraught and on the precipice of a very high peak. She looked as if she were bracing for the devil around the next turn. This frailty was either new or newly revealed. The resiliency she’d shown the night he’d arrived in London had surprised him. He could not remember ever having been so impressed. She’d forgone the expected hysterics or useless sequestered vigil and carried on like a working partner in the search. Anyone else would have run mad, but she had been self-reliant and tough, and her nerve bolstered everyone else. His respect for her, already so great, had soared.

  Respect. He smirked at the irony of the word, looking at her now, relishing the sight of her, finally alone with him. Respect for Emmaline had been the last thing on his mind during his time in Essex. He’d called up the memory of undressing her after he’d fished her from the canal, fantasizing about all the different paths that could have taken. There were so many delicious things to teach her. He did respect her, of course, but was it respect that caused his heart to thud and his hands to itch to reach for her?

  The roads of London were wet and slick and crowded this morning, and the carriage rolled on in halting jerks. It became work to balance on the seat. She braced herself with her hands on either side, rocking with the motion.

  It occurred to him that he knew at least a hundred tricks for disarming a lady in a moving carriage. What irony that now he would not employ a single one. He watched her instead, wishing he could say the thing that would give her even five minutes of peace.

  She turned back from the window. “I failed Teddy by not forcing him to learn the name of our street and number of the dower house. If he could but recite it, this man from Covent Garden could bring him home today. If he knew where he lived, he might already be home.”

  “How did Bryson bring him home when I came upon him in September?”

  “I usually put a card in his pocket with my name and address, just in case. But there was no time for the card. He went with the duke’s boys to the garden unexpectedly. It’s a miracle he even took his coat.”

  “This is your fatigue talking. All of us are running on too little sleep. You are not to blame.” He sighed and sat forward. His hat flopped into her lap, and she laid it on the seat beside her. Their knees brushed.

  “You’ve slept least of all . . . ” She touched his knee when she said this, her gloved fingertips just grazing the fabric of his buckskins.

  Beau blinked, trying not to watch her hand. He wanted her, even now. He was a cad. A rogue and a scoundrel, just as Lady Frinfrock had said.

  She went on. “Luckily, His Grace has not made the leap. If he knew Teddy could not tell a stranger that he lived in Portman Square, the duke would have more fuel to his fire for guardianship.”

  Beau nodded, trying to keep up. The soft thrum of fingertips on his knee slowly unraveled him. “I don’t care about the duke,” he said.

  “Yes, well, Ticking certainly cared about you. I thought he might burst with shock at the sight. You crowded in and reported the only real progress we’ve had.” She studied him. “He believed you to be my friends from church. And then you stepped forward and properly introduced yourself.”

  Beau recalled the duke’s expression in that moment. The designation of “viscount” had transformed him from Invisible to Relevant. Or more to the point, from Invisible to Threat. The regard was night and day, and it had gratified him, just a little.

  “He will not set you to the margins of this search or of your life,” Beau said.

  “We’ll see about that. But I thank you for standing up to him. I know . . . I know it troubles you to invoke the title. It was a sacrifice.”

  “I don’t want to talk about the title,” he said.

  His voice was harsh, too harsh, and her hand froze above his knee. She pulled her hand back. “Forgive me.”

  “You’ve too many problems of your own to take on my complicated resentments.”

  “I should like to help you.” Her voice was a whisper. “In any way I can.”

  His mind was a whirl of all the ways she could help him, so many ways in this carriage alone. Instead, he said, “Help yourself by working with Elisabeth on this list of clergy. When you get down to business, you’ll find her knowledge to be exhaustive, but she struggles to organize her thoughts concisely. Being succinct is not her most ready skill, God love her, not in the way it is for you.”

  The duchess smiled at this—a real smile, despite the clawing worry—and he wondered if he’d ever charmed a woman by simply telling her she was capable.

  She returned her gloved hands to his knees, first one and then the other. He stared at the tight gray leather.

  “Your notes,” he went on, clearing his throat, “the ones you gave me from the night that Teddy was lost, were impeccable, by the way. Very useful. Elisabeth is smart and thorough, but she can become distracted and overdo. I’ve seen your notations, not to mention borne witness to your list of my own faults and shortcomings. I’ve faith that you’ll keep her on task.” He looked at her. “Try to produce the best list in the shortest amount of time. I don’t have to tell you that time is of the essence.”

  “Thank you for giving me some purpose and allowing me to contribute. I’m not sure I could bear any more sitting and waiting.”

  “Well, my goal is not to distract you, if that is what you think. You’re very organized. I’ve no doubt you’ll make a fine bookseller when you reach New York.”

  She made a noise of frustration. She squeezed her eyes shut. “New York is the last thing I can think about.” She made the noise again and dropped forward, laying her head on his knees.

  Beau went still, staring down at the back of her head and the embellishments on her hat. He held his breath. It had been a long time since a beautiful woman had collapsed across his lap. It was an innocent gesture, not meant for him. She was
overwhelmed.

  Even so, he thought he could ride through the night with her laid out across his lap.

  When she didn’t move for five beats, six, an eternity, he settled one hand on her back. Carefully. Gently. A comforting, brotherly gesture. It was his first time to touch her, to really touch her, since the day she’d fallen into the canal.

  “You cannot let this defeat you,” he managed to say. His heart beat as if he’d never been alone with a pretty girl in a carriage before.

  She turned her head to the side. “If you find him—”

  “When we find him.”

  “When you find him, Ticking will restrict our freedom all the more.” She sat up suddenly, and Beau jerked his hand away.

  “But perhaps I should be restricted,” she said. “I cannot believe I’ve allowed this to happen twice.”

  “Stop,” he said. “Your devotion to Teddy is without question. Just look at the grand scheme you’ve devised to get the two of you all the way to New York. If you blame yourself, then the duke has already won. Do not fall prey to his rhetoric; it’s nonsense.”

  She swiped away a tear and nodded. “Thank you,” she whispered again. Two simple words, easily said and heard a thousand times a day, but something about the way she said it, deeply felt, deeply personal, made his throat constrict. For a moment, it was hard to breathe. Her hands were still on his knees, and she gave them a little squeeze. He looked down at them and then up at her. She stared back with a slow, shy, unmistakable look. Invitation.

  Beau’s heart stopped. He checked their location out the window. Two blocks from Henrietta Place. He swore in his head. He’d almost made it. Almost. Now the restraint felt like the most grievous waste of time.

  “Emma,” he whispered, and he scooped her hands from his knees and brought them to his lips. He kissed her knuckles through the leather and then tugged, one swift movement—come.

  She went, slipping her hands free, and encircled his neck. She fell against his chest. Her hat gouged him immediately, a faux ivy sprig to the throat. Penance, he thought.

  She chuckled and reached up, unpinning it and tossing it on the seat beside his own. When she returned to him, he locked his arms around her, pulling her tight. He closed his eyes and reveled in the spare-but-solid weight of her, the smell of her, the particular softness of her cheek against his throat.

  “Oh, Duchess,” he sighed. To speak now would only betray himself, but he could not not say the words. “I’m so sorry this has happened. I wish I could make it all go away.”

  “I wish I did not have to trouble you. I feel horrible for pulling you away from your business in Essex.”

  He shook his head, rubbing his lips across her hair.

  She raised her face up, her lips dangerously close to his own, and he willed himself not to respond. It wasn’t that kind of embrace, but he had spent all of its adult years not knowing of another kind. His body throbbed, and he pressed one chaste kiss on the top of her hair. And then another. And then one more, slow and lingering, not chaste at all.

  She pulled away and tipped her head up, raising her lips to him. Beau stared at her mouth—easily the favorite feature of a face filled with favorite features—and he whispered again, “Emma.”

  She closed her eyes and resistance was futile. He lowered his lips gently to hers.

  The kiss surprised him. It was nothing like before, on his boat. Not better or worse, simply different. He gently nibbled, and her lips moved just as softly. Almost at once, they both seemed to need a harder, more fortifying union, and he cradled the back of her head and went deeper. For one long moment in time, they were fused, holding and being held. Beau, usually so ready for the next pleasurable thing, willed the world to stop, just for a moment, to prolong it.

  But the feel of the road beneath the carriage changed. The jostle of the road turned to the jiggle of cobblestones. They’d turned into Cavendish Square. Henrietta Place would be next. Only a minute more.

  Beau dragged his face away, stringing kisses across her cheek until he could plant another on her lips. She scrambled to keep up, trying to catch his mouth and kiss him back, and they laughed a little.

  He squeezed her once more, and she squeezed him in return, and then he lifted her, bodily, from his lap and settled her on the opposite seat. She patted her hair and reached for her hat. He watched her repin it, reveling in the efficient grace with which she wielded the awful thing. She smiled up beneath the brim, a sad, resigned smile.

  Beau smiled too, realizing, perhaps for the first time ever, that there were other types of embraces. Sweet and tender, intimate or soul-feeding. Restorative. Necessary. He saw how these could be just as potent as the hot and seductive type.

  Some of these might, he thought, even be more potent.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  The viscount did not linger in Henrietta Place. He explained to Elisabeth and Emmaline how the list of possible clergymen would be the most useful, and then he took a horse from the stable and left.

  On another day, she thought, she would have the time and energy and space in her heart to consider the sight of him leaping onto a horse and riding away. She would have, perhaps, hours or days to relive the kiss in the carriage, or the look on his face when he’d finally done it, the sound of his voice when he’d said her name.

  But not today.

  Today, her brother was missing in the bitter cold of winter, and the Duke of Ticking was outraged that she’d defied him by taking the carriage and leaving with another man. Today, there was work to be done. The only time and energy and space in her heart was for Teddy, and for fear, and for hope.

  They set to work on the lists immediately, with Elisabeth rattling off names of pastors and vicars, priests and rabbis at random. Emmaline took down their names and locations and asked for a map of the city. Next, she organized the list based on proximity to where the dancers had supposedly seen her brother in Covent Garden. After she’d put down all the benevolent-minded churches close to Covent Garden, she made lists of all the other churches, arranging them in easy-to-follow routes that ran from Covent Garden outward. Taken together, the list missed no possible houses of worship, from the central most to the most far-flung. Luckily, Emmaline knew many of the churches from her own comings and goings to evade the duke, an unexpected resource. All the while, Elisabeth stood ready to help, marveling encouragingly at Emmaline’s acumen and speed.

  “I cannot say how much of a contribution it will be,” Emmaline told her, “but I am grateful for something to do besides wring my hands and receive the duke at regular intervals.”

  “Yes, Beau was clever to task you with this,” Elisabeth said thoughtfully. “He is a far more proficient leader than anyone gives himself credit.”

  “Oh, he is very clever,” said Emmaline, perhaps a little too quickly. Her friend stared with interest, and she added, “That is, his recklessness need not overshadow his other useful talents.”

  “Indeed.” Elisabeth watched her. “Your enthusiasm for him is . . . refreshing.”

  Emmaline was not sure how to respond to this. She did not feel refreshed or enthusiastic. She felt distracted and distressed and grateful. But anyone who bore witness to his leadership in Teddy’s search could tell that she and Rainsleigh had some rapport. But it was a rapport born of necessity and crisis. They were hardly sweethearts. Outside of Teddy’s disappearance, the viscount was a consummate Lothario who drank too much and lived on a canal by choice. She was soon to be an expatriate in America, and her surprise virginity had sent him bolting to the door. Really, they couldn’t be less suited.

  And the embrace of today?

  Well, the embrace of today was meant only to be a comfort.

  And Emmaline was a widow in half mourning who should know better.

  “Did Beau say when he would come back for the list?” Elisabeth asked, watching her copy the last of it.

  “Two hours,” Emmaline said.

  Elisabeth nodded. “That gives you forty-five minute
s to lie down before he comes.”

  Emmaline protested, but Elisabeth would not hear of it. “When Beau finds Teddy, you will be no comfort to him at all if you do not rest. You haven’t slept in days. Sleep now to keep up your strength. I will awaken you if we hear anything. Anything at all.”

  It was the mention of Teddy’s comfort that convinced her. He would be sick and wet and terrified after all this time. And she was so very tired. So very numb and tired and heartsick. She scarcely remembered the walk to a guest room, and she was fast asleep before she’d even settled her head on the pillow.

  “Your Grace? Your Grace?” Miss Breedlowe’s face, tight with urgency, hovered above Emmaline as she swam through a fitful sleep to wobbly consciousness. “Emmaline, will you awaken?” Miss Breedlowe repeated insistently, as if they were both late for something very important. It was unlike her, Emmaline thought groggily. Always so calm, Jocelyn. She got on with Teddy because of her calmness.

  Teddy! Wakefulness returned like a bucket of cold water, and Emmaline bolted upright in bed.

  “Teddy,” she said, throwing off the covers and swinging her feet to the floor. Her vision blurred and the room tilted, but she blinked, willing herself awake. “How long did I sleep?” she asked, searching the floor beside the bed for her shoes. Daylight shone through the windows. Afternoon light? Oh God, the next morning? It felt as if she’d sleep for a week. “Teddy,” she said again, her only coherent thought.

  “Malie,” came the answer from across the room.

  Emmaline froze. Breath left her lungs, and she gasped. She knew that voice. But did she dream it?

  She spun and saw her brother, her wind-whipped, matted-haired, slightly thinner, very-much-alive brother standing at the foot of the bed.

  “Teddy!” she sobbed, scrambling to grab him and clutch him to her. “Oh, Teddy, my brave brother”—she pulled away now and stared through tears at his face—“where have you been, Teddy? I’ve been sick with worry! We’ve been looking for you for days!”