“Obey me just this once, Caro. I won’t let him kill me, I promise.”
Edward appeared unmovable above her, rather like a white knight come to the rescue. She had never loved him more than she did that moment.
She poked him in the chest with a shaky finger. “I won’t ever forgive you if something happens to you. I will not be a merry widow.”
“Go.”
She wavered. “Should we send for a constable?”
He shook his dark head. “I don’t think so. I’ll talk some sense into him. I’ll come as soon as I’m done.”
Caroline bit her lip, playing for time. She couldn’t let him go in there alone, could she? “Even after you spoke with him before, he didn’t give up.”
“He will this time. A kiss for good luck?” He was smiling at her as though he hadn’t a care in the world.
“There isn’t time for kissing.”
He smiled down at her. “There’s always time for kissing, Caro. A quick one.” He bent and brushed her lips. It was an entirely different kind of kiss, and all the sweeter for his restraint. It was she who threw herself headlong into his embrace, losing control. She drank in his taste and his scent of lime and horse, drowning her senses with essence of Edward. He untangled her gently. “Go. I’ll be fine.”
Caroline watched him mount the steps. The door still hung open. He stepped inside, pausing on the threshold. “I absolutely forbid you to follow me,” he said quietly. He shut the door, and she heard the resolute click of the new locks.
Damn! She couldn’t sit around gossiping with Serena and do nothing. Serena had more keys to Number Seven even after giving her the front door keys. Caroline could go through the garden wall and enter by way of the kitchen or back door. But first she had to get the cords cut from her wrists. She hurried down the sidewalk, tripped up to Serena’s door and lifted the lion’s head knocker.
Serena had a butler, as did all the ladybirds lucky enough to find themselves safely off the stage or out of the alleys and onto Jane Street. Putney was no Hazlett, but proper just the same. He hadn’t batted a rheumy brown eye when she turned up earlier looking like a drowned rat, locked out of her own house. He didn’t react now, although he took in the rope with a quick flick of his ascertaining eyes. Caroline had no way of knowing how long she’d slept. The sun was still a vibrant orange ball in the sky, but surely her arrival twice on his doorstep in various states of distress in one day was unusual. Caroline confirmed it by her next words.
“Putney, lock every door and window. Fetch a knife to untie my hands. Do you have a gun as well?”
Putney took it upon himself to alter the order of the orders. He reached into his pocket, unsheathed a small knife and efficiently sawed through Caroline’s bonds.
“Yes, Lady Christie. I believe there is a gun in the household.”
“I need it.”
“Do you plan on shooting someone, my lady, or would you like me to do it for you?”
Caroline swallowed her laughter. Putney was a gem. Rubbing her chafed wrists, she followed him and his jingling keys around the ground floor as he checked the locks.
“I’m not sure yet, but I don’t think your involvement is necessary. My husband is next door.”
Putney paused at a heavy red velvet drape, allowing himself the tiniest frown. “Lady Christie, if I may be so bold, I don’t advise that you kill your husband. The murder of a peer is a very serious offense. I’m sure the legal separation will be adequate.”
Everybody knew everything on Jane Street. “You misunderstand, Putney. I was attacked by Lord Randolph Pope. My husband plans to do something to him, I’m not sure what. I’d feel ever so much better if I helped him.”
“Are you an expert with firearms, my lady?”
Caroline thought back to her unsupervised childhood. She and Nicky had shot their share of pickle jars and pots. “It will all come back to me, I’m sure. Really, I’m going quite mad with worry. Could you hurry?”
The butler drew himself up. “It is my responsibility to protect the lady of the house. As Miss Serena is off with her gentleman until tomorrow, it is my duty to protect you. I was once quite good with my fists, you know. I daresay it will all come back to me.”
Caroline was skeptical. If Putney had ever fought, it was in the featherweight category about a thousand years ago. But his arms were folded across his narrow chest and he looked implacable. “Oh, very well. If Serena’s not even here, we won’t worry about locking up. Let’s go.”
“I am sure Lord Christie would not appreciate it if we interrupted him. I expect he told you to stay away and that he would come here when it was over.”
“How did you—Wait, I just thought you said you’d help me. What was all that talk about being a fighter?”
“Indeed. If our security is breached, I shall ensure with my dying breath that you are safe. If you feel my fists are inadequate, I shall position myself at the front door with a truncheon. But you will not leave the premises, Lady Christie. Lord Christie would have my hide if I enabled you into danger.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake! My husband could be lying in a pool of blood right this minute and that revolting viscount heading for France!”
“Doubtful. Lord Christie seems eminently qualified to deal with the task at hand. Would you care for a cup of tea, Lady Christie?”
“I don’t want any bloody tea! I’ve already been Pope’s prisoner once today. I won’t be yours.” Caroline raced to the front door. It was, as she requested, locked.
Putney came up silently behind her. “Perhaps a sherry then. Something to calm your nerves.”
Caroline felt her heart go black. “Give me the keys, Putney. If you don’t, I’ll find that truncheon.”
“Now, my lady. You’ll thank me in the end. And don’t get any ideas about going upstairs and climbing out the balcony window. Miss Serena told me all about that.”
She had been too good for too long—except for the interlude with Edward, when objects came so easily to hand and were tossed with smashing satisfaction at the walls. At him. Caroline picked up a particularly ugly vase. Serena would be grateful it was gone.
Putney looked at the fragments at his feet. “Tsk, tsk. Lord Buckley gave that to her, you know. There is plain white ironstone in the kitchen which has much less sentimental value. Shall we go belowstairs?”
Caroline admitted defeat. She was behaving like the spoiled child Edward accused her of being. But if she never heard him accuse her again, she’d simply die. She burst into tears.
Putney placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. “There, there. It will be all right. We’ll give Lord Christie a quarter of an hour, how’s that? If we’ve no news by then, I’ll go round personally and find out what’s what.”
“I—I’ll go with you,” Caroline sniveled.
“We’ll see.” Putney went to the drinks cupboard and poured her some sherry. “Oloroso. Excellent, as I understand.”
Caroline took a small sip. She had never been much for drinking spirits—at least that was one fault she did not possess. Oh, a glass or two of champagne with Edward when she was nervous or love-flushed. A drop of brandy when she had a cold. But she’d seen firsthand what alcohol had done to those she loved, and would never follow them to their graves in that manner. She smoothed her wrinkled gray skirt, imagining she must look like she’d been run over by a dray cart. Love Lane, as she recalled. She’d once wished such a denouement for Edward, but now she prayed with every ragged breath that he would be safe.
So she could send him on his way again.
The brass clock on Serena’s mantel ticked along. Putney puttered about the room, trying to appear is if he wasn’t trapping her within. Just when she thought she’d go completely mad, the knocker sounded on the front door.
Caroline raced to it, leaving the elderly butler far behind.
“Don’t open it yet!” he huffed. “Look out the sidelight to make sure it’s Lord Christie.”
Edward’s tall form was v
isible through the wavery glass. Caroline threw open the door and screamed.
“Shh, Caro. It’s not my blood. Everything is all right, I swear.”
Caroline reached for Edward’s ruined cravat, which was spattered with bright crimson droplets. His coat was torn, and he’d made an attempt to wipe more blood from his left cheek, streaking it from beneath one eye to his shadowed jaw. “D-did you kill him?”
“Just planted him a facer. Or several. I suppose I broke his nose, but he was no beauty to begin with anyway. Caro, come inside and sit down. I must talk to you.”
She looked out to the empty street. A few leaves fluttered across the sidewalk. “Where is he?”
“You’re safe. He’s on his way home to pack, and then he’s taking a little trip.”
Caroline’s panic reemerged. “You just let him go? What if he comes back?”
Edward took her by the elbow and drew her into the hall. “He won’t. I promise. Let’s go into the parlor.”
Putney hovered, but one look from Edward sent him scurrying elsewhere.
Trembling, Caroline sat back on the ruby velvet sofa. “You’ve terrified Putney. He was very kind to me.”
“I’ll make it up to him later.” Edward went to the drinks table, poured himself a brandy and downed it in one swallow. Caroline’s sherry glass was still nearly full, but she had no desire for it. Her hands shook too much to hold it.
Edward had an odd smile on his face. “Pope and I had a little chat. It seems he blames you for his current predicament. Once you exposed him in that book of yours—what was its name?”
“The Vicious Viscount.”
“Very apt. He has been unable to bed any woman successfully since its publication. His wife left him, you know. High class courtesans will have nothing to do with him, and rightly so. They know his reputation after reading your book. Everyone in the ton does, it seems. No one wants to take a beating for Randolph Pope’s pleasure no matter how large his purse. He was forced to resort to common streetwalkers, where he failed to perform despite repeated use of the rod on those poor souls. Not only that, he picked up a rather unpleasant affliction. You’ve made his life quite miserable, Caro.”
“Good.”
“Now who is the vicious one?”
She had no remorse. She had tended to Lizzie’s back. “Wh-what was he planning to do to me?”
“Nothing half so sinister as we might have expected. He was going to hold you for ransom, a rather modest one when all is said and done. He wanted me to pay for his treatment at an Austrian spa for gentlemen he’d heard about. It seems he’s spent what’s left of his fortune on quack remedies for impotence. No doubt there are just as many quacks in Austria, but at least he’ll be on the Continent and not in Mayfair. I’ve readily agreed to provide him with the blunt. With any luck, he’ll fall off an alp and that will be the end of him.”
“The Count’s Courtesan.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Nothing. What happens when he is cured and comes home?”
“Should the cure prove efficacious, I expect he’ll be too busy being his old self to worry about us. But he’s not a well man, Caro. The years of debauchery have taken their toll. You overpowered him rather easily, did you not?”
Caroline thought about it. She hadn’t seen Pope fall backward, just heard the spectacular results. He had looked quite gray-faced and grim once she’d got her hood off. For a few seconds she’d thought he was dead. Maybe it was close to his appointment with the devil.
“You told me you spoke with him before, and yet he still tried to harm me.”
“Yes, I spoke with him. When I confronted him this summer, he of course denied making any threats against you. Dressed me down for sending Mulgrew and his men to warn him off. Swore it must be Douglass who was to blame for anything Rossiter heard. But it was Douglass who wrote to me telling me Pope was becoming increasingly unhinged. I told you that at Bradlaw House last night. And still you ran away.”
Caroline felt a twinge of shame. “I’m sorry, Edward. I wasn’t thinking about Pope.”
“When I discovered your room was empty late this morning I thought Pope had taken you. I’ve never known such despair. But then I found the bedsheets strung together. I realized you were up to your old tricks. And I was angry, so angry I had to talk myself out of giving you a spanking when I met you on the steps.”
He had kissed her instead, quite memorably. “A spanking? Surely I’m too old for that.”
“I wonder. Someone should have raised their hand to you long ago. You’ve run wild all your life.”
He didn’t know the half of it. And wouldn’t.
“But,” he continued, “I’m willing to overlook your impulsivity. I put a great deal of pressure on you at Bradlaw House. No wonder you wanted to teach me a lesson. This time we’ll just sit down like two normal people and—”
“What do you mean ‘this time’?”
“We keep starting off on the wrong foot. I’d like to pretend the past six years never happened, but I’m a realist. I was even ready to let you go after last night, Caro. I told you so. I heard all your ‘lasts,’ every one of them. There was no need for you to climb out windows and frighten farmers. Mr. Mitchell sends his regards, by the way.”
Yes, she had been adamant about leaving. But it was she who was not ready to let him go, which was why she ran away.
“Yes, you’d convinced me. Utterly. I spent all night working on another list and was prepared to send you home in comfort. I even let you sleep in, figuring you were exhausted from our last night together. Every time I said the words ‘last night’ in my head, Caro, I felt as if I were stabbed—by a fork. But then, I finally went into your room, and you were gone. The window blew shut in the rainstorm, you see. I didn’t see the sheets at first. I thought you’d been abducted, and I realized I could not let you go when I found you.” He reached to cup her cheek. “If we can simply forgive each other for the past, we should be able to make our marriage work.”
“I don’t want to be forgiven, and I don’t want this marriage to work, Edward! How many times must I belabor the point? We are not suited. You think I should be spanked, for heaven’s sake! I’m much more than a spoiled child. I am a woman who knows her own mind, and I know that I don’t want to be married. To you, or anyone else.”
“Balderdash. You write romance novels. Of course you believe in marriage.”
“They are made-up stories, Edward, written out of boredom and for coin. Not everyone deserves a happy ending.”
His gaze was steady. “You think so little of me to deny me happiness?”
“It’s not—oh, please, Edward, I’ve had a rotten day. I walked miles and got soaked and rode in a vegetable cart! I’m worn out from travel and attempted kidnapping. I-I smell. Just leave me alone and we can discuss my philosophy of life another day.”
“No. I want to know why you don’t think you deserve a happy ending.”
“It was just a figure of speech. I meant not everyone gets a happy ending. Life is frequently unjust. Lovely people have dreadful things happen to them. You lost Alice too soon, for example. My brother died.” Her throat constricted. She was so tired she didn’t have the strength to battle back the tears.
“I want you to tell me, Caro. It’s time.”
She wiped her cheeks. “You won’t understand.”
“Try me,” he said softly.
Chapter 23
Celestine had committed an unconscionable crime. No one must ever know her secret. No one.
—Secrets and Seduction
She told him it was impossible for her to think with him so close to her on the couch. She limped over to the window, and he felt some guilt for continuing to press her. But the air was suddenly charged between them, the truth floating just beyond his fingertips. The red maple tree in front of Number Six was a blaze of glory, almost as glorious as the river of tangled red hair falling down her back. He’d not been able to manage it at all playing lady’s m
aid at Bradlaw House, though it had been most enjoyable trying. He wanted to gather her in his lap, brush her hair, soothe her, make love to her. Instead he counted the clicks and whirs of the mantel clock.
She was silent for the longest time. He had almost given up waiting when she began, her voice raspy. “I will tell you everything. And then you will see why this is pointless. You will hate me.”
“I will not.”
She gave him a lopsided smile. “We shall see. I won’t go back to the very beginning. Needless to say, you are right. My childhood was as naughty as you imagine. My father didn’t concern himself with me much, so I can’t remember ever getting spanked. I’ll start with Andrew, shall I? That was when my life got interesting.”
Her tone was so bitter Edward nearly asked her to stop the forced confession. But she rushed ahead. “Andrew came to live with us when I was seventeen. He was so beautiful I could not help but be dazzled. He seduced me. No, that’s not right. We seduced each other. He’d had—he’d had a truly terrible life. His guardian found him on the streets of Edinburgh and made him his catamite. Andrew was only seven years old.”
Edward was appalled. No one, not even his rival Andrew Rossiter, deserved such a fate. “That’s indefensible.”
“Yes. Andrew thought that was all there was to life. It was all he was used to, all he expected. He took up with my brother when they were at school. They were—they were lovers.”
“I went to public school. That’s not as unusual as you might think.”
“I know that now. Some men do not like women. My brother was one of them. He was nothing like Andrew’s guardian. He would never have harmed a child.”
“No. Most men of that persuasion would not. They are simply seeking affection like the rest of us, although they can be hung for it. That guardian was a predator of the worst kind.”
“He was. I’m glad he’s dead.” She traced a circular pattern on the glass. “When I found out about Andrew and Nicky, I was devastated. I thought Andrew loved me.”
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