The Ravishing One

by Connie Brockway

  There is more to relate but being ever mindful of your cautions, I will wait until we meet in person to tell you this very important news.

  Until that time I remain, as always, your servant,

  James Harold Barton

  Carr waited within the carriage while his liveried lackey dashed up the stairs and rapped sharply on the town house door. The young night was already dark. A thin rain had begun and beneath the lamps bracketing the front door, the whitewashed steps glistened like bones.

  A servant answered and, after an amazed look at the carriage waiting on the street, slammed the door shut.

  Carr gazed out incuriously. ’Twasn’t the first time his appearance caused such a reaction. Awe, he supposed. A woman suddenly appeared perched atop the lamppost at the corner of the street. It was Janet.

  “Now, what are you doing here?” Carr murmured. He would have called out but the experience of the past five years had taught him the uselessness of doing so. She’d only fade. She always did.

  Janet was apparently enjoying a prolonged ghostly snit. She was miffed at him for something or other. It couldn’t be because he’d killed her. She’d forgiven him for that or she wouldn’t have bothered warning him to leave on the night Wanton’s Blush had burned down. So there must be some other reason for her stubborn silence.

  He couldn’t begin to guess what. Not that he particularly cared. Better a silent ghost than a nattering one. It’s just that he felt a bit injured by the unfairness of it—Sure enough, she’d begun to shimmer and then fade and finally she snuffed out. He turned his hand over, studying his nails.

  The door at the top of the steps swung open again and the footman bowed low. Carr’s servant leapt down the steps and flung open the carriage door.

  Carr alit and mounted the steps slowly, ignoring the flustered footman as he moved without hesitation into the hall and down the narrow corridor to the open door on the left. These little town houses were all patterned the same. This could only be the sitting room. And of course it was. He entered. Thomas Donne stood in the center of the room, awaiting him.

  Carr looked about. A pleasant, pedestrian sort of room. The requisite bookshelves holding gold-embossed leather works, the blue velvet draperies, the Aubusson carpet. Everything quite standard.

  “Lord Carr,” Donne rumbled, his gray eyes canny in his sun-darkened countenance. “It’s been a long time. Won’t you be seated and tell me to what I owe this visit?”

  Carr shrugged off his light cloak. The footman flitting nervously behind him caught it before it hit the floor. “You may go now,” Carr dismissed him. The man looked at Donne and, after receiving his nod, backed from the room.

  “I have a salve that might be able to help that,” Carr said, taking the seat Donne indicated.

  “Sir?”

  “Your skin, man, your skin. I have a salve that can bleach out some of the tan.”

  “Thank you, but no.” Despite the smile and mild tone, Thomas did not relax but prowled along the edges of the room. Carr remembered the attitude well; Thomas Donne had lounged and moved and stalked through society like one great Bengal tiger. He’d been quite an attraction for the women on the few occasions he’d visited Wanton’s Blush. “I doubt you’ve come here to advise me on cosmetics.”

  Carr planted the tip of his cane between his feet and folded his hands over the heavy knob. “Of course not. I have come to blackmail you.”

  He’d hoped to disconcert the bruising Scotsman; he’d failed. Which, now that he thought of it, seemed to be becoming something of a pattern lately. Indeed, the last few times he’d made that particular announcement, he’d been met with only impassive resignation. No histrionics, no shock, no horror—as though his victims resigned themselves to their fate before he even had the fun of stating his intentions. Rather mean-spirited of them.

  “Oh?” Donne finally sank down into a chair opposite Carr, resting his right boot on his left knee. “How?”

  “I know who you are. I know you are Thomas McClairen.”

  Donne’s gaze remained impassive. He waited for Carr to continue. Wise man. At this point in the conversation so many of Carr’s victims began a tedious string of denials, epitaphs, and explanations. This was rather a nice change of pace.

  “I have only to—”

  “Yes, yes,” Donne interrupted impatiently, “you have only to say the word and I’ll be hanged. Threat duly noted. Can we get on with it? What do you want?”

  Carr pursed his lips, disgruntled. The man was a killjoy after all. It wasn’t as if Donne were pressed for time. He obviously hadn’t been about to leave for some engagement or other. Yet here he was … rush, rush, rush.

  “Well?”

  Carr released a long-suffering sigh. “I want in on the insurance fraud you and your partner are involved in.”

  Not a flicker of anxiety. “We’re not involved in any insurance fraud.”

  Ah, this was more like it.

  “Really? And here I am, come straight from my daughter, who, by the way, is so covered with the profits from your scheme that she’s a walking advertisement for it.”

  “She told you James was involved?”

  “No, my dear. I told her. She did not deny it.”

  “Doesn’t sound very convincing to me.”

  “Oh, it was. Believe me. Indeed, my little black-headed lambikins had obviously been anticipating my arrival. She had a plan all drawn up for me to convince Barton to let me become his partner.”

  Donne watched him silently. Had the man no conversation? Gads! “It seems my darling wants the ownership of Bramble House.”

  “Bramble House?”

  “Yes.” Carr frowned at the fold of his cuff and gave his hand a little shake, resettling the gossamer lace more elegantly about his wrist. “Oh, don’t fret if you’ve never heard of it. No one has. ’Tis a country house once owned by Fia’s dead husband, now owned by me. MacFarlane deeded the place over to me some months before his demise—as well as a good many other things. Too bad for Fia … and his son, of course.”

  “MacFarlane had a son?” Donne asked curiously.

  “Has a son. Weedy, unprepossessing creature.”

  Donne’s mouth flattened with distaste, why Carr could not yet say. “Why does F—your daughter want it?”

  “She wants it because it’s a wealthy property, and the estate vast enough, and the lands fertile enough, that were she to own it she would be able to live quite comfortably on the income it produces.”

  Donne’s expression tightened. Carr rested his chin atop his hands folded over the cane handle, watching. He wasn’t about to inform Donne of Fia’s rather desperate desire to be free of him. It might awaken some kindred spirit in the tall sea captain, though Carr rather doubted it. Even when Donne had been a guest at Wanton’s Blush and Fia had pursued him with all the guileless ardency of fresh womanhood, he’d withstood her charms, her allure, and her less than subtle offers.

  Poor Fia. For Thomas Donne nothing would ever alter or mask the fact that Fia was his enemy’s daughter, would always be his enemy’s daughter; nothing Fia did would ever make him forget that.

  “But enough about Fia,” Carr said. “And Barton. It’s you I am interested in. Shall we come to some sort of agreement, Donne—or should I say McClairen?”

  Donne shrugged. “Mind you, I am not convinced James has done any wrong, but clearly your daughter has been pressuring him to some such ends. If I agreed, you would have to stop Fia from coercing James.”

  “I wouldn’t have to do anything,” Carr said. “If we enter partnership, Barton will terminate his operations soon enough. I mean, even a besotted fool must see that for every ship in a fleet to catch fire or be waylaid by pirates would be a bit much.

  “And Fia? Once Fia realizes she’s been outmaneuvered she’ll quickly release her hold on Barton and turn her not inconsiderable faculties toward trying to find yet another means to secure her”—he paused; he’d been about to say “release”—“house.”
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br />   Thomas regarded him narrowly. “And if I refuse you’ll tell the authorities who I am.”

  “Exactly! Of course, if you’re lucky you might be able to escape England, but you’d never be able to dock safely in an English harbor again, and since England owns the seas …”

  “I understand.”

  “I was sure you would.” Carr stomped the end of his cane against the carpet, signaling a close to this end of the proceedings. “So. How do we go about the next phase in our partnership?”

  Donne scowled into space, thinking. Carr allowed him the time. He despised hasty, emotional decisions.

  “It will take a month or so,” Donne finally said. “We’ll need to buy cargo. It has to look right, though. I’ll need to go to France and procure the sorts of things that might reasonably be insured at great value and shipped to foreign ports for profit. Brandy. Linens. That sort of thing.”

  His dark brow furrowed. “We won’t need to find a receiver since there won’t ever be any receiving. We’ll load on and the night before we’re to put out to sea, there’ll be a fire.”

  “Excellent,” Carr exclaimed, his eyes shining with inspiration. “But I have an even better idea.”

  “Do you?” Donne said dryly.

  “Why not collect twice on the cargo? Load it, have it inspected by Lloyd’s, and then, just before the fire, offload it. We can store it someplace and sell it later, too.”

  “Fine.”

  Carr pouted. “I thought it was a damned good idea and you don’t seem at all enthusiastic.”

  “Forgive me. I take an unaccountable exception to being blackmailed. Besides, I fear for the lives of the men on the docks. Fire can spread far easily.”

  He feared for the dockworkers’ lives? Carr thought incredulously, and could think of no reply other than a small “Oh.”

  Donne’s lifted his gaze to Carr’s face. “I want something out of this, though.”

  Carr waggled his finger chidingly. “Uh, uh, uh. Mustn’t threaten the threatener.”

  “I’m not making threats. I’m telling you the only way you’ll get what you want from me. I have no great love of England. Exile from this island wouldn’t be relegating me to hell on earth, as you seem to imagine.”

  His words sounded real, all the more real for being sneered. Carr considered. He did not like making accommodations for those he victimized. But here, he intuited, he had no choice. Donne would flee without a backward glance. “What?”

  “This …” Thomas leaned forward and began talking.

  Ten minutes later, when Carr left the house, the footman who held the door heard the earl laughing.

  It was not a pleasant sound.

  Thomas hurled his brandy snifter into the fireplace. Flames exploded above the glowing embers, spitting raucously. With a growl, Thomas swung away.

  He’d thought having James gone in three short weeks would be soon enough to pry him from her clutches. And he was not nearly as sanguine as Carr about the odds of Fia obeying his command to stay away from James. She might just do something desperate if she found her back to the wall.

  Unfortunately for her, his was already there.

  Chapter 10

  Fia took the chair by the window. Earlier she’d angled it so that the light streaming through would fall full on the face of anyone sitting in it. After the strain of yesterday’s meeting with her father, the morning sunlight would be unkind to her. Every line, every shadow, would be pronounced. Idly, she began sorting through the stack of letters in her hand.

  “I don’t understand!” Pip exclaimed. He had not sat down since his arrival ten minutes earlier.

  Fia sighed heavily, clearly relating annoyance, and regarded the boy coolly. Though his flesh still had a waxy aspect and he’d lost weight, he moved without difficulty and his breathing seemed easy.

  “What is it you do not understand?” she asked heavily. “I have made plans to travel out of the country with a dear friend of mine. I shall be gone a fortnight or longer. What is so difficult to understand in that?” The lie came easily. The thought of hiding here while everyone believed her to be abroad was heavenly.

  “Who is this friend?” the boy demanded.

  She picked up a silver letter-opener. She must not allow Pip to involve her in some emotional scene. Were she to answer in any way other than coolly, it would only convince him that there was, indeed, sentiment between them. “I don’t think that is any of your concern, is it?”

  “But …” The anger drained from his young face, leaving only pain and transparent confusion. “What have I done? You seem different.”

  “Do I?” Her voice rose in surprise. “In what way?”

  For a moment she thought he would refuse to answer, but then, he was young and had been wounded and it was only natural that he should seek to wound in return. His lip thrust out belligerently. “You have become callous,” he said. “And unfeeling. I want to know why.”

  She paused for a moment’s aloof consideration, as though his harsh words had not affected her in the least. As though the dull ache in her heart did not exist. “Perhaps, m’dear, it is you who have changed,” she finally suggested. “Perhaps coming so near a tragic end has changed your perceptions of things. And people.”

  “Are you saying that you were always cold and … and uncaring?”

  She laughed. “Not at all. I am saying that perhaps I never was quite the soppy little sentimentalist you apparently thought I was and that now you have realized this. I am sorry if the reality is a disappointment. But in my own defense, most men would not agree with you.” She pouted slightly, fluttering her lashes. The boy flushed.

  “Perhaps you are correct, Lady Fia,” he said stiffly.

  A knock sounded at the door.

  “Come in,” Fia said, glad of the interruption.

  Porter opened the door. “Lady Fia, I was—” He saw Pip and stopped. “I am inopportune—”

  “Not at all,” Fia said. “We are done, are we not, Pip?”

  The boy began to protest and then thought better of it. “Yes. But I would like to say, ma’am, that I already know ‘the friend’ with whom you will be traveling.”

  Fia’s brows climbed. Since her proposed travel, as well as her travel companion, were completely imaginary, this was a most interesting turn of events. “Really?”

  “Yes,” the boy said gruffly. “And for the sake of that image of you I once held in my … in such esteem, I am duty bound to warn you against him.”

  “Do tell,” she murmured. “And why is that?”

  “Because Thomas Donne once claimed to be my friend and you can see for yourself how well he respected that relationship, since he used my injury to ingratiate himself with you and plans to go abroad with you!”

  “Thomas Donne?” she repeated. “He told you he was leaving London with me?”

  “No.” Pip shifted uneasily on his feet but he did not recant his claim. “But he did say as how he would be leaving London for a few weeks. And when he came to see me whilst I was convalescing he spoke of you. I thought at the time his tone derisive and his manner disapproving but I see now that it only masked his real intent … to understand you better.

  “I am not so stupid or callow, ma’am, that I cannot add two and two.” He laughed bitterly, but he was not much good at it and his laughter broke. “And to think he had the temerity to warn me against you.”

  She recovered quickly. “Ah, yes, well. Men will commonly put their own interests above that of others. Even their friends’.” For all Pip’s jealous suspicions, Thomas’s plan to leave London had nothing to do with her. She turned half away from Pip, aware of Porter standing with telltale silence on the threshold.

  “Men?” Pip echoed sarcastically.

  “And women, too, of course.” She looked over her shoulder at him. “Ah … thank you for your concern.”

  He did not respond.

  “I believe Porter had something of a private nature to impart to me.” It was a dismissal and
a not particularly kind one. Pip flushed and shoved his way past the butler.

  Fia waited until she heard the sound of the front door slamming shut before saying wearily “What is it, Porter?

  “I know it is not my place to try to discern the intentions of your friends and admirers, Lady Fia.”

  “Probably not,” Fia agreed with a trace of irony.

  “But I would be remiss in my duty if I were to suspect someone of perpetrating an unpleasantness on you and then neglected to warn you, would I not?”

  “Oh, dear. Is this an ethical question, Porter? Because, if so, I gravely doubt I am qualified to answer it.”

  “Not at all, Lady Fia. I merely seek to ascertain your wishes.”

  “Ah, I see. Well, speaking for myself, yes, were you to suspect someone of a dastardly plan against me, I would certainly welcome being forewarned.”

  Porter nodded. “Then I must concur with Master Leighton’s suspicion concerning Captain Donne.”

  Fia’s ennui vanished. “Why?”

  “Captain Donne came to call on you earlier today.”

  “What?” Fia said. “Why was I not informed of this?”

  “Because Captain Donne specifically told the footman—a young fellow named Bob—not to bother you. The captain came early, far earlier than any society lady is likely to have arisen; indeed, earlier than many a woman in a simpler household rises. He asked to see you. When Bob said you were not yet receiving company, Captain Donne laughed with some embarrassment, alleging how chagrined he was at his eagerness to see you.

  “At that point Bob marked Captain Donne down as another besotted swain. The captain then proceeded to ask him a number of questions about your habits: when you could most often be found at home, your daily routine, when you were most likely to be alone … that sort of thing.”

  Fia frowned. “And Bob told him?”

  Porter winced slightly. “I am afraid so, Lady Fia. Captain Donne tipped him most handsomely and took his leave, asking Bob not to mention that he’d been here and explaining that it did nothing for a man’s cause to have the lady suspect his eagerness. And Bob, a recently failed suitor himself, agreed.