“I wish you godspeed, Lord Andrew.”
“And I wish you luck in making my stubborn siblings see reason. Farewell, my new brother. Stay in touch….”
No animosity, no hard feelings, just a young man who understood that another man was only doing his duty and took nothing personal from it. Even so, Ruaidri sailed home with a heavy heart.
He’d only been gone for a day, and yet he found Nerissa much as he’d left her, morose, distant, and sad.
He knew about pride and the toll it took on a person. He knew about regrets and how hard it was to acknowledge them. And he knew about heartache when he saw it.
If ye don’t have family, he thought, ye don’t have anythin’.
He wondered if Brendan had reached New York. He’d carried a flag of truce, his ticket for sailing that singularly unique and justifiably famous schooner into New York without getting blasted to Kingdom Come. But having a duke on board was rather good insurance against such things, Ruaidri thought.
He rather wished he had a duke on board to guarantee him that same safety as, unable to get so much as a smile from his wife, the dullness in her red-rimmed eyes hurting him in places he hadn’t realized were capable of feeling pain, he pulled together his crew once more and set a course south.
Toward New York.
Where, he hoped, he’d have it out with Lucien de Montforte once and for all. Before he found some mighty English warship to bring him back to England. Before he boarded it and sailed away.
Before it was too late.
* * *
The shadows were long outside the inn, autumn’s dead leaves skating down the cobbled street outside on a wind off the mighty Hudson.
He could have dined with General Clinton tonight, been feted and fed, bowed and scraped to and toasts drunk to his health. It wasn’t every day that a famous and powerful duke all the way from England visited a place like New York, especially in the middle of a war. Lucien might otherwise have embraced such expected treatment, but he was in no mood for it tonight, and even less for company. Sycophants. Posturers and fools. People begging favors, people seeking audiences. This was only his second night in this colonial hell-hole, and his impatience with those around him had reached its end.
He wanted nothing more than anonymity.
And to be alone.
One of the benefits of being in a place where nobody knew you, of course, was that you could put on your hat, throw your greatcoat over your fine clothes and go find a rough-and-tumble tavern where it was all the more certain that nobody would know you, nobody would want something from you, and you could spend the evening drowning your sorrows in a pint of ale.
Or maybe two.
It was as he was lifting the second heavy tankard to his mouth that his senses all prickled with alert, and he paused and looked around him. People milled about, eating, laughing, drinking, playing backgammon, but Lucien de Montforte knew that he was not alone.
Someone slid into the chair across from him and he raised a surprised brow.
“O’ Devir,” he murmured, and took another sip of his ale. “Back for more, are you?”
“Aye, well, ye know me. Just a dumb Irishman. I’ll always come back for more.”
Lucien eyed him flatly. “What do you want?”
“Well now, what I want is to be back home with my wife, talkin’ about buildin’ a life together and preparin’ for a little one. Know what my pet name was for her, Your Grace? I called her Sunshine. Called her that because she was bright and warm. Because she was full of sunlight and cheer and she lit up everythin’ around her, includin’ me heart.” He raised his hand to summon the tavern wench, who was quick to set him up with a cold, foaming tankard of his own. “But she’s not full of sunlight and cheer any longer, and the reason for that is us. Or more specifically, you.”
Blackheath, his nostrils flaring with contempt, looked away, but not before Ruaidri saw the flash of pain in the dark eyes, eyes that were sunken and exhausted, eyes that looked haunted.
“What do you want?” the duke asked again, not deigning to even look at him.
“You to come back to Newburyport with me.”
“You’re mad.”
“Not mad. Desperate.”
“I would sooner spend time in the company of a street sweeper than I would yours, you para—”
“Aye, yes, I know, we’ve been all through the whole parasite-thing and what ye think of me, and I don’t really give a fuck what ye think of me so let’s just get that over with and out of the way, now. What I do give a fuck about is yer sister’s happiness.”
“You are crude, O’ Devir.”
“Guilty as charged.”
“You tire me.”
“Ah, well, the feelin’s mutual.”
“I don’t know what the devil our Navy’s coming to if they’d just let a blackguard like you into New York. The enemy, for God’s sake. How did you find me?”
“It’s common knowledge that ye’re a guest of the general. I waited outside his quarters and then followed ye.”
“Where’s your ship? How were you not apprehended?”
“’Twas easy enough to drop anchor in Connecticut and hire a local fisherman to bring me the rest o’ the way.”
“This is…unacceptable.”
“Not to me it isn’t. Worked out quite well, actually.”
Ruaidri sat back in his chair, sipping his ale and studying the duke until the Englishman finally turned his head and deigned to fully look at him. When he did, Ruaidri was taken aback, and not by the very visible evidence of their brutal fight apparent in the duke’s bruised and cut cheekbone that was suddenly presented to him. He expected sullen fury, disgust, even hatred in his brother-in-law’s face but no, the black eyes were flat and dead, like a stone that had lost its polish.
“You came all the way down here to get me? At risk to your own life in a bastion of English strength and power?”
Ruaidri grinned and raised his tankard in a mocking little salute. “Guess I’m just a dumb Irishman.”
The two sat together, the duke staring down into his ale, Ruaidri giving him time to digest both the fact that he’d sought him out and the reason for it. Neither said a word for a long moment. Horses and carts clattered past the window just outside and nearby, a group of British officers laughed and swore good-naturedly as someone lost in a game of cards.
At last, Blackheath shoved his nearly-empty tankard aside and wearily rubbed at his brow. “How is she?”
“Hurtin’.”
Blackheath said nothing, but the skin tightened perceptibly around his mouth.
“Hurtin’ because she misses her family. Hurtin’ because she said things to you in the heat of the moment she wishes she could take back or say differently, hurtin’ because she wants yer forgiveness as much as you want hers but she’s got the same stubborn pride as you do so there she sits, mopin’.” Ruaidri took a sip of his ale. “Just like ye’re doin’.”
“She asked me to leave, to get out of her life, and so I did.”
“We all say things when we’re angry. Doesn’t mean we actually mean them.”
“Does she know you’re here?”
“’Course not.”
The duke took off his tricorne, which he’d had pulled down low over his forehead, and Ruaidri saw more reminders of their brutal fight. The cut on his cheekbone went all the way into his hairline, his lip was swollen, and there was a puffiness above one eye.
“You look a damned wreck, Brit,” Ruaidri said, and took another sip of his ale.
“Yes, well, you wouldn’t win any beauty contests yourself.” Blackheath stared hopelessly down into his ale. “Should’ve killed you when I had the chance.”
“You had the chance and didn’t.”
“As did you, and you didn’t take it, either.”
Ruaidri rubbed at the bruise on his own temple. “So where does that leave us?”
“Alive, for a start.”
“And you down here and her
up there, and both of ye so full of hurt that ye can’t think of anything else.”
Lucien said nothing.
Ruaidri crossed his arms on the table and leaned close. “A long time ago, Blackheath, back when I was just a young lad, the press-gang came to my village in Connacht. I was taken away from home and forced to serve the Royal Navy, and when they dragged me away from my little sister I had no idea that it would be thirteen years before I’d see her again, thirteen years before I’d know that my mam had died, thirteen years before I could begin the business of healin’ and forgiveness. In all that time there wasn’t a day went by that I didn’t wish I could get back home and see my loved ones, to take care of them as a brother and son should. My da had died years before and the women in my family, well…they were my responsibility.” He leaned back and took a sip of his ale. “But the Royal Navy…it’s a jail sentence for a pressed man, and those opportunities to take care of my own were denied me. When I finally got away from the English and started fightin’ for this side, I was so full of righteous, pig-headed pride that I let my need for revenge, my quest to prove myself after years of ‘aye, sir’ to people who’d as soon spit on me than acknowledge I was as human as they were, get in the way of goin’ back home. I nearly lost my sister because of that pride, and I see you sittin’ here doing the same damned thing as I did.”
Blackheath said nothing, only staring down into his drink once more.
“I may not be the man ye’d have chosen for yer little sister any more than I’d have chosen Christian to be the man for mine. I know how it feels to see one’s little sister fallin’ in love with someone that ye’d just love to hate. And I know how hard it is to let go, to give that permission to your sister to find a life with a fellow of her own choosin’, to set her free to find her own happiness.” Ruaidri leaned close once more, his gaze intent as he stared into the duke’s eyes. “You owe her that, Blackheath.”
The duke remained silent, a little quiver at the corner of his mouth the only sign that Ruaidri’s words were hitting home.
“I’m no blue-blooded Englishman, I’ll never be able to give her London balls and appearances at Court like that piece of shite Perry or any other nob ye might’ve picked for her could do. But I can give her happiness, I can give her the freedom she’s craved all her life to spread her wings and be Nerissa de Montforte O’ Devir, not Lady Nerissa, not a pretty little bird in a cage watchin’ the world go by and resentin’ the bars that keep her from joinin’ it. What do ye think will make her more happy, Blackheath? Balls and Court appearances and wealth and status, or the wings to fly high and free?”
“What are you, a damned poet?”
Ruaidri shrugged. “No, just an Irishman.”
“She will be poor here, dressed in rags, living the life of an American bumpkin.”
“She will be my wife, Blackheath, and I think ye know enough about me by now to know that I’m nothin’ if not ambitious. I’ll go far in this new country, I’ll attain things here that I, a lowly Irishman, could never aspire to, let alone reach back in yers. Yer way is the old way, Blackheath, and everythin’ about ye represents it—the privileges and expectations of class, birth and breedin’. This is the new world, and ’tis proud I am to call myself an American. Like it or not, I represent the new way of things, hope, liberty, opportunity, and I can give your sister all of that and let her be free to find them herself, without being constrained by name and title and class expectations. She has a chance to fly here, Blackheath. But she can’t do it unless you set her free to try her wings and the two of ye make peace with each other.”
“I’m not going back there.”
“You’re a bigger fool than I am if ye don’t.”
“She hates me.”
“She loves you. Ye’re her damned brother, for God’s sake.”
The duke looked up and out the window, unwilling to meet Ruaidri’s eyes, and the lines around his mouth grew deeper, the skin almost white.
“Family is all we’ve got, Blackheath, all any of us got. What else is there? Who else is there? There’s nothin’ on God’s green earth more important than our families. You know that; ’tis why ye’re here, why ye chased yer sister and me across the Atlantic, why ye were willin’ to go to an American jail for killin’ me the other night. It’s also why ye didn’t kill me. Ye didn’t do it because of any mercy toward me or fear of incarceration or even death should ye’ve managed to cleave my skull in that first strike. Ye did it for her.”
The duke looked down, but not before Ruaidri saw a sudden gleam of moisture in the corner of his eye.
“I know I’m not the family ye wanted or would’ve chosen for her, but I’m the family ye’ve got, and ye’re the family I’ve got, and you and I need to make the best of that, if only for her sake.”
A muscle worked in Blackheath’s throat and he stared rigidly out the window. “Always heard the Irish were stupid, not wise.”
“Aye, stupid. I’m an American naval officer who risked everythin’ comin’ into a British stronghold to come get ye. Can’t get more stupid than that, eh?”
“Why did you do it?”
“Because of her. Because I love her.” Ruaidri picked up his tankard and drained it. “Because if I let ye sail off across that ocean and somethin’ happens to ye, ’twill kill her. Because if I leave here empty-handed, her guilt and grief over how ye two left things is going to gnaw a hole in her heart that will never heal.” He directed a hard stare at his brother-in-law. “’Twill leave one in yours, too.”
The duke remained looking away. “It took courage to enter this place and to face me.”
“It doesn’t take courage to face ye, Blackheath. Just desperation.” He stood up. “Come back with me.”
The duke finally looked up at him, something unreadable in his black, fathomless eyes. Defeat. An acceptance. Despair. “You really do love her,” he said tonelessly.
“If ye have any doubt, then the man standin’ across from you is a figment of yer imagination and this entire conversation is a product of that ale ye’ve been starin’ into for the past hour.” He picked his hat up from the table and reaching into his pocket, left a generous amount of coin in its place. “Are ye comin’ with me or not?”
Blackheath looked back down into his drink, and Ruaidri waited.
Blackheath didn’t move.
“The hell with ye, then,” Ruaidri muttered. His own heart twisting with anger, he donned his hat, turned, and stalked away. Toward the door. Back into the lion’s den and what he hoped wouldn’t be detainment, capture, or imprisonment if anyone recognized him or the man he just left decided to turn him in. But before he could reach out and grasp the latch to let himself back out into the cold November afternoon, another hand was there on the door, pushing it open for him. An elegant hand, strong and well-bred, the back of it draped in expensive lace that peeped out from under the cuff of his coat.
Ruaidri paused, and the duke waited.
Held the door open for him with a faintly perceptible bow.
“You are quite right, O’ Devir,” he murmured, meeting Ruaidri’s gaze with a resolute one of his own. “Family is all we’ve got.”
Chapter 33
“Family is all we’ve got,” Andrew was saying, making himself comfortable in the library in a chair near the fire. “You’ve got to forgive him, Nerissa. He only did it because he loves you.”
Andrew had returned from Boston the day before, his explosive’s secret still his own, both the Americans and the English the poorer for not having the formula and the world itself, Andrew thought, all the richer for it. Offers of monetary compensation, arguments about the nobleness of the American cause…none of it had swayed the young English inventor and Adams was not one to stoop to threats or torture. Andrew had left the frustrated but quietly resigned American leader to lament British stubbornness and had made his way back to Newburyport.
“He hates me,” Nerissa said. “Oh, God, why can’t I stop crying?”
“I
t’s the baby talking,” Mira Merrick said, passing through on her way out the door.
“Oh, I need Ruaidri,” Nerissa said, and put her head in her hands. “Why, Andrew, did he send you home in some random vessel instead of bringing you back from Boston himself? Where is he? I need him so badly….”
Above her, Andrew and Mira exchanged glances; then Mira shook her head, opened the door, and slammed out into the frosty morning.
“Told me he had business to discuss with Adams. He’ll be back, only takes a few hours to sail home from Boston.”
And a few more to sail home from New York, Andrew thought privately. Providing one doesn’t get caught.
“I don’t think I can bear it once you leave,” Nerissa said plaintively. “You’re the only family I have left. And you’ll be going home soon.”
“Yes, I am.” He got up and came to sit next to his sister, troubled by the gauntness of her beautiful face, the hollowed look in her quietly suffering eyes. He took her hands. “I have someone to get back to, Nerissa.”
“Celsie,” she whispered, and dug at a loose thread on her cuff. “I’ll probably never see her again.”
“Never’s a long time, Nerissa. This war won’t go on indefinitely. It can’t. We’ll come visit.”
She nodded in a quick, jerky little motion.
“And Lucien, you and I both know he’ll pull strings to get your name cleared. Move mountains, if he has to. He’s good at that. If anyone can do it, he—oh, damnation,” Andrew said, and moving closer to his sister, pulled her into his embrace as the mention of their eldest brother’s name caused the tears to flow once more.
“I wish I could take back what I said to him,” she said brokenly. “I can’t live like this.”
“Stop beating yourself up over it. You had good reason to be angry with him.” Andrew cleared a long fall of blonde hair from her face. “He did, after all, try to kill your husband.”
The Wayward One (The De Montforte Brothers Book 5) Page 34
