by Georgie Lee
Bart turned to see Lady Camberline standing beside Mr Flint’s carriage, two armed men flanking her. She didn’t wear the shackles of her companions, her title and sex sparing her from the harsh treatment she deserved.
Bart strode up to her, vile hatred tingeing every step. ‘What did you say?’
‘She’s in there, tied to a pillar in a cellar beside the cask, the one I lit to go off at any moment.’
Bart stared at her in horror and then at the house. He was about to rush back in and find Moira, to tear the place apart with his bare hands in order to reach her, when a deafening roar and a ball of fire lit up the night. The screams of the gathered ladies were lost in the rush of wind roaring across the grounds and blunted by the high wall. They all ducked as bits of bricks and wood rained down around them. Flames shot up into the sky, lighting up the trees and the faces of everyone before dying down into a blaze to gut what remained of the house like the horror and grief did to Bart’s heart.
He’d failed her.
It should have been me. I should have been the one to die, not her.
Moira had believed that Bart, deep down under the hard magistrate and the dedicated bachelor, was a good man worthy of her care and devotion. She’d been wrong. He hadn’t been worthy of her and he’d lost her for good because of it. If he hadn’t turned his back on her after they’d made love, but held her close, kept her in his house and away from these evil people, she might be alive and waiting for him to come home. Instead, he’d left her to die alone, believing he hadn’t loved her enough to make her his wife.
Bart staggered on his feet while the wicked Marchioness laughed at his misery.
‘Come on, you, get in the carriage,’ Mr Flint commanded Lady Camberline. ‘You’ll tell us everyone who was working with you.’
‘I won’t, for they will rise up and complete what I didn’t do.’
‘Get in the carriage,’ Mr Flint snapped.
The carriage door closed on her further protests and the shackles of the two French lords clanked while they were led away. Bart didn’t care. All he could do was stare at the flames and everything he’d lost. He’d let her go too easily five years ago and again today. Tonight, when he’d fought for her at last, he’d been too late. There would be no more chances, no more listening to her charming voice or enjoying her tender presence. She was gone for ever and it was all his fault.
‘I’m sorry, Moira,’ he breathed, but his apology wasn’t enough, it never would be for she would never hear it. Nor would she ever have the chance to obtain all the things she’d wanted, the happiness she’d deserved and he’d wanted to give to her.
‘Mr Dyer?’ Bart didn’t turn to face Joseph. All he could do was stare at the house as an outer wall collapsed into the inferno. ‘There’s someone you should speak with.’
‘I don’t want to see anyone.’ He wanted Joseph to go away and leave him to his grief and regrets. The plots, his assignment, accomplishments and determination to end the Rouge Noir meant nothing to him without Moira. In their time together, she’d given him something really worth fighting for and a reason to be a better man. He’d repaid her kindness with pain, sorrow and the end of her life.
‘I think you will want to see this one,’ Joseph insisted.
‘Bart?’ The voice of an angel drifted over him.
Bart whirled around to see Moira standing in the street behind him. The light of the fire flickered across her face and glinted in her blonde hair. It was the most cherished sight he could have imagined, more so than England after the horrors of war in Europe, or the end of a battle which he’d survived. ‘You’re alive.’
‘I am.’
‘I thought you were dead.’ He rushed to close the distance between them, taking her in his arms and meeting her lips with a kiss from deep inside his soul. The despair of only a moment before was replaced by her. He hadn’t lost her, not to his stupidity of this morning or the delays of tonight. She was here with him and he would never let her go again.
She met his kiss with a passion of her own before breaking from it to lean back in his arms. ‘I assume this means you’ve changed your mind about us being together.’
He slid his hand to cup her cheek, marvelling at the softness of her skin and her presence. ‘I was a fool to think I could live without you, or that my work is enough to keep me happy. It isn’t. All my victories and everything I’ve ever strived for mean nothing if I don’t have you to share them with. Marry me, Moira, please.’
* * *
Moira held her breath as she stared up at Bart. Rubble and dust whitened the shoulders of his coat and the light of the fire played in the darkness of his hair, but he didn’t notice any of it, only her. Tears filled her eyes, driving away the stinging smoke hovering in the air and the last of her sadness and doubts. In the darkness of the passages, when she’d struggled to escape the house, she’d thought of Bart, drawing from inside her a memory of his courage to bolster hers. She’d never in those moments believed she would escape to find him holding her as if she was the most precious thing in the world. He wanted her to be his wife, to share his life with her. She’d caught the amazement in his eyes when he’d turned to see her, felt the relief which had swept through him when he’d taken her in his arms and kissed her. It told her more than any words could how much she meant to him and the true depths of his love. He’d held back from her this morning, but he didn’t hold back from her now. She threw her arms around him, and whispered in his ear, ‘Yes, I will be your wife.’
She brought her lips to his, offering him the same kiss of promise he offered her. He would be her husband and the father of her children and she would be his wife. Nothing, not his fears or hers or the expectations of family and society, would ever part them again.
A crash of bricks and wood made them turn to see the single remaining wall of Camberline House crumble into the flames. In their bright flicker, Moira studied Bart and the serious set of his jaw. ‘The rest of the members of the Rouge Noir are still out there. They must be unmasked and found so they can never harm you or anyone else ever again.’
‘I know who they are.’ She tugged the list out of her bodice and held it up to him. ‘I found this in Lady Camberline’s study.’
He took the paper and read the names, a new determination entering his eyes.
‘Come with me.’ He grabbed her by the hand and pulled her to where Mr Flint stood taking to his men. Bart handed him the list. ‘Sir, we believe these people are also members of the Rouge Noir and must be apprehended before they can flee.’
Mr Flint read the list in the light of the burning house. ‘I agree. I’ll see to it at once.’
‘Sir?’
‘You’ve done well, Dyer, and you deserve a rest. My men will see to it these traitors are caught.’ Mr Flint clapped Bart on the shoulder, then nodded at Moira. ‘You have other matters to attend to.’
His order given, he walked off to speak with his men.
‘Are you disappointed you’re not seeing it through to the end?’ Moira asked, clutching Bart’s hand tightly, not wanting to come between him and the work he loved.
‘How could I be? I have you. It’s all I need.’ He touched his lips to hers and everything around them faded away.
Epilogue
‘Guilty.’
‘Guilty.’
‘Guilty.’
Bart watched from where he stood beside Mr Steed in the audience behind the solicitor and barrister for the Crown prosecuting the case. As ‘guilty’ continued to ring through the House of Lords, Lady Camberline’s face fell along with those of her barrister and solicitor. Bart smiled in satisfaction, then glanced up to the ladies’ gallery where Moira watched the proceedings. She returned a subdued smile, as happy as he was to see justice done and this period of their lives finally at an end.
Lady Camberl
ine was the last of the Rouge Noir to stand trial. Lord Lefevre, Lord Moreau and the others on the list provided by Moira had already faced their judgement and gone to meet their makers. Those further down the list had suffered less punishment, being stripped of their titles and estates. Bart and Moira had been called as witnesses in each of those trials making Mr and Mrs Dyer the most notorious married couple in England, especially when details of their involvement in what was now being called the Rouge Noir Plot became public.
At last it was Bart’s father’s turn to rise and call out his vote. ‘Guilty.’
Before he sat down, he nodded his approval at Bart.
* * *
An hour later, with the verdicts read and the sentence of death passed, Bart waded through the many men praising him and Mr Flint outside the House of Lords’ chamber to meet Moira.
She glowed as she watched him approach, the slight stoutness of her middle already beginning to show beneath her fitted pelisse. In a few months there would be something besides his trials to occupy Bart’s time and he welcomed the coming distraction.
‘Well done,’ Moira congratulated when he reached her.
‘I couldn’t have done it without you.’
She laid her hand on her slightly swollen belly. ‘I had to do it for everyone I love, including you.’
He took her hand and covered it with his. ‘And how is my little one this morning?’
‘Quite active. I imagine he or she will be just like his father.’
‘If it’s a boy, I hope so. If it’s a girl, I want her to be like her mother.’ He raised her hand to his lips and kissed it, then settled it in the crook of his arm and escorted her outside.
‘It’s hard to believe it’s over at last.’ She sighed as they left the shadow of the building for the sun of the street.
‘For us, perhaps, but not for others. My mother would like us to join them and the rest of the family for dinner tonight. Since the case is settled and we’re free to speak about it, I’m sure she and my sisters-in-law are planning to ply you for gossip.’
‘I would hate to disappoint them. Speaking of gossip...’ Moira removed two letters from her reticule and held them up ‘... I received a letter from Aunt Agatha this morning and one from Freddy.’
‘I told you they’d come around.’ Despite all of England, and even Bart’s father, praising them, Freddy and Aunt Agatha had remained a stubborn pair, offering little in the way of reconciliation, even after Bart and Moira were married. The estrangement had weighed hard on Moira, but Bart had told her to be patient, sure his old friend would eventually forgive her.
‘It seems I’m not the only Fallworth to create a scandal. Freddy and Miss Kent were married last week and very soon our child will have a new cousin to play with.’
‘A little sin usually humbles a man enough to forgive others.’
‘Indeed, and given Freddy’s sin, Aunt Agatha feels she is at last able to forgive mine, though she curses being surrounded by nieces and nephews who insist on flouting convention.’
‘I enjoy flouting convention.’ With his thumb, Bart stroked the underside of her palm, offering a promise of what would pass between them tonight.
She winked at him with a wickedness to make him wish they were already home, but with men filing out of the House of Lords they would not have a moment’s peace.
Mr Steed approached them, beaming like a street lamp. ‘With this kind of notoriety, I imagine your career as a stipendiary magistrate is over.’
‘It is, and good riddance to it. I have a wife and soon a child to think about.’ He exchanged an affectionate smile with Moira, making his solicitor partner roll his eyes.
‘I hope you don’t intend to give up your work as a barrister. I’ve already had twenty different men make enquiries into retaining our services. By the time your notoriety wears off, assuming it ever does, you might be richer than most of these lords.’
‘I already am.’ He pressed his lips to Moira’s, not caring where they stood or who saw them. Everything was as it should be, everyone safe, and their future as bright as the afternoon sun.
* * * * *
If you enjoyed this story, you won’t want
to miss these other great reads
from Georgie Lee
A TOO CONVENIENT MARRIAGE
MISS MARIANNE’S DISGRACE
THE CINDERELLA GOVERNESS
THE SECRET MARRIAGE PACT
Keep reading for an excerpt from AN INNOCENT MAID FOR THE DUKE by Ann Lethbridge.
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An Innocent Maid for the Duke
by Ann Lethbridge
Chapter One
Entering the owners’ private quarters at the gentleman’s club Vitium et Virtus, Jake, Duke of Westmoor, stifled a groan at the sight of the other two founding members lounging in heavy leather armchairs placed around a low table. One of the two empty chairs was his. The fourth supported a small gilded box.
‘This was the reason you sent for me?’
Even seated, the brown-haired, brown-eyed Frederick Challenger had a military air. At Jake’s words he snapped to attention and glowered. ‘It may have escaped your lofty notice, Your Grace, but today is the sixth anniversary of Nicholas’s disappearance.’
Jake tensed at the use of his title. The significance of the date had indeed escaped his notice, busy as he was with the affairs of the Duchy, but he wasn’t about to admit it. ‘I thought we were beyond all this.’ He had enough reminders of loss at home without adding to them here. The one place he thought of as a refuge.
‘Sit down, Westmoor,’ Oliver, the other member of their group, said, his green eyes snapping sparks in his burnished face.
Jake sighed, but did as requested. Or rather ordered. If Oliver hadn’t been such a good friend... No. Not true. He had no wish to alienate these men, his oldest friends. Without them he might not have survived the loss of his father and brother.
He glanced on the gilded box on the other chair. It contained Nicholas’s ring, the last reminder of their missing founder of Vitium et Virtus. Could it really be six years since Nicolas’s disappearance? It hardly seemed possible. Back then, they’d scarcely achieved their majority. Now look at them. All three of them reaching the grand old age of thirty. The intervening years had passed in a heartbeat.
Yet the shock of finding a pool of
blood in the alley outside Vitium et Virtus and Nicholas’s signet ring trampled in the dirt beside it wasn’t any less raw.
Oliver leaned forward and laid his hand palm up in the centre of the table.
‘You seriously intend to do this,’ Jake said.
The other two glared at him. Grudgingly, he placed his hand on top of Oliver’s, the warmth of another man’s skin odd against the palm of his hand. Frederick added his to the pile.
‘In vitium et virtus,’ they chorused like the bunch of schoolboys they’d been when they started this stupid venture. In vice and virtue. Even after all this time, the words sounded strangely lacking without Nicholas’s voice in the mix.
Withdrawing his hand, he picked up his brandy, lifting the glass towards the empty chair in a toast. ‘To absent friends.’
The others imitated his action.
‘Be he in heaven or hell—’ Oliver continued with the words they’d been saying each year for the past six years.
‘Or somewhere in between—’ Frederick intoned.
‘Know that we wish you well,’ they finished together. As if anything so nonsensical could bring their friend back.
They threw back their drinks, staring at the empty seat.
‘I was so sure he’d turn up like a bad penny before the year was out telling us it was all a jest,’ Frederick said.
‘If so, it would be in pretty poor taste. Even for Nicholas.’ Oliver said, his green eyes dark with the pain of loss they’d all felt since Nicholas’s disappearance. A loss Jake didn’t want to think about. There had been too many in his life. Each one worse than the last.
‘It would have been like him,’ Jake said, burying the surge of anger that took him by surprise. ‘Nicholas always was one for stupid japes. This club, for example.’
Troubled, he rubbed at his chin and felt a day’s growth of stubble. Hadn’t he shaved this morning? Surely he had.
‘I hear his uncle is petitioning the Lords to have the title declared vacant.’ Frederick rolled his empty glass between his palms. ‘Bastard can’t wait to step into his shoes. I wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t do away with him so he could get his hands on the estate.’
