A Scandalous Deception

by Lynn Messina

  Obviously, Fazeley had no cause to visit the Salt Office or the Navy Office or the Stamp Office or the Hawkers and Pedlars Office, and it was far too early in the year for summer exhibition at the Royal Academy. That left only the antiquarian society, which wasn’t the most unlikely direction for a man who had decided to make ceremonial knife-wearing fashionable. Perhaps he wanted one of its members to evaluate his jade dagger or suggest another weapon, maybe a sword, that would look just as dashing about his waist.

  Such an errand was in keeping, she thought, with the meticulous man who made a record of every grain of rice he consumed.

  Very well. He had been en route to the Society of Antiquaries of London at Somerset House when he was accosted from behind right about—Bea stopped several feet from the door of the Daily Gazette—here.

  Immediately, she was knocked from behind as a man in a brown hat scowled at her for halting suddenly in the middle of the busy sidewalk. She was bumped again, this time from somebody walking toward her, and she realized how easy it must have been for the killer to plunge the knife into the earl’s back and escape undetected. With so many people jostling and being jostled, Lord Fazeley wouldn’t have noticed anything was amiss until after the blade had been fully inserted and by then the perpetrator would have disappeared into the crowd.

  It was a clever way to commit a murder, she thought. In sight of dozens of people and yet hidden from the view of any one person in particular.

  As clever as it was, it didn’t account for the troubling fact that the earl had been attacked with his own weapon. Her theory of the stranger approaching from behind did not account for how he removed the dagger from the front of his victim. That part simply did not make—

  “We must move,” Kesgrave said, wrapping his fingers around her elbow and pulling toward the buildings that lined the sidewalk.

  As she emerged from the crush of people, her shoulder was jolted again, this time by an elderly man who growled, “Watch where yer going.”

  Angered by the unfair abuse, she opened her mouth to tell him to watch where he was going, but her grip on the books slipped and the pile fell to the ground. She immediately dropped to her knees to pick them up, grabbing the two tomes nearest to her as several pages of his lordship’s manuscript escaped their ribbon and blew away. Horrified, she threw her body on top of the stack to contain the rest of the pages, landing on her elbows with a thud as Kesgrave ran off to chase the unruly sheets down the block. Scrambling to her knees as pedestrians on the busy sidewalk growled and tripped around her, she scooped up the earl’s memoir and winced in the pain from the scrape on her arm. Ignoring the sting, she pivoted on her knees to gather the other four books and found herself suddenly shoved backward onto the sidewalk as pain exploded in her right eye, then her left.

  She was under attack.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  The world around Bea darkened and dimmed as a hulking figure climbed on top of her, wrapped his hands around her neck, squeezed threateningly and leaned forward. “Stay away,” he said before bashing her with his fist one more time and running off.

  Stunned as much by the violence as the pain, Bea lay there, on the Strand, her head on the stone, her arms clutching the manuscript, only a few feet from where the earl had died.

  She could not get her mind to work—to cry for help, to call for the duke, to pick herself up, to gather the rest of the books, to chase after her attacker.

  It was the pain. The punishing jabs to her face hurt with an intensity she could not have imagined, and already her bruises had swollen so magnificently, her vision was impaired. Her throat ached from the pressure he had exerted. He had impeded her breath for only a second, but it was enough for her to know what choking felt like.

  Stay away.

  The threat, echoing in her ear, spurred her first coherent thought: Stay away from what?

  Mr. Cornyn’s publishing house?

  That made no sense, she thought, for the only point of danger associated with the firm remained clasped in her arms. She retained possession of Lord Fazeley’s manuscript, so the work itself could not have been the motive for the assault.

  As she considered the question, other parts of her brain began to function as well, and even before someone kicked her thigh—and yelled at her for lazing about—she knew she had to get off the ground.

  Sit up, she ordered herself.

  And yet, as a wave of pain slashed from ear to ear, she realized it was too ambitious a plan.

  Fine. Just move.

  Quickly, before another impatient pedestrian abused her, she pushed herself up and over…up and over. Now she was only a foot away from the building. One more roll and she could lean against it for support. She would do that just as soon as she had the wherewithal to raise her head.

  In a moment, she thought, remaining still for several seconds.

  And perhaps a few moments more.

  “Good God!” Kesgrave yelled, suddenly there, suddenly cradling her head in abject horror as he examined her face.

  No, she thought with a perverse sort of humor, she could not presume to know with what kind of horror he examined her face, for her sight was too impaired. The swelling in her eyes had reduced the view of the world to a mere play of shadows, and the duke’s appearance was no more distinct than her attacker’s.

  For all she knew, Kesgrave had been her attacker.

  Ah, but no, she thought, as the duke shifted positions so that he was sitting on the ground next to her and gently helping her raise her shoulders from the dirt. She could not mistake his presence for anyone else’s.

  “Careful,” he said softly, helping her lean against the wall, where there was considerably less foot traffic. “Careful.”

  She appreciated his concern, but she did not think it would make a difference to her wounds if she were careful or not. The throbbing in her face would continue regardless of how delicately she laid her head against the bricks.

  Sighing deeply, she said mildly, “The killer objects to our investigation.”

  Kesgrave’s laugh was a hollow sound as he said with equal mildness, “I object to the killer.”

  Bea closed her eyes, for there was little purpose in keeping them open, and asked if the duke had managed to find all the missing pages. “I was distracted by my own endeavor and lost track of yours.”

  “I did, yes, though a horse was standing on top of one of the sheets, which is why it took me so long to gather them all,” he explained. “We must go. It’s not good to linger here long.”

  Although she was in too much pain to consider or care about the ridiculous and appalling site they must present to the world, she knew the Duke of Kesgrave could not dismiss it so easily. “Ah, but think how this will burnish your reputation as a bold leader of fashion, your grace,” she said. “By the end of the week, we will see marquesses cradling the bruised heads of their footmen and viscounts dabbing at the open sores of their butlers.”

  “Yet again you underestimate my position if you believe my reputation requires further burnishing, Miss Hyde-Clare,” he said kindly. “My concern is not for myself but for you. Your bruises are going to continue to swell until we apply a cold compress. As the veteran of many bouts at Gentleman Jackson’s, I can personally attest to the value of ice. To that end, I will have to ask a boy to deliver our location to my driver, Jenkins. Do wait a moment.”

  Bea wondered where he thought she might wander off to as she watched him approach a young boy, deliver his instructions and hand over a few coins. After a few enthusiastic nods, the boy ran off to do his bidding. She rather expected Kesgrave to stand by the curb and wait for his carriage to arrive, but instead he returned to the building and sat down beside her on the rough surface.

  She resisted the urge to show concern for his clothing, which was much finer than hers, and returned to the treatment of facial bruises. “Is there perchance a compress cold enough to reduce the swelling entirely, perhaps by four o’clock?” she asked.

  K
esgrave flatly said no and then pointed out that even with a magical compress being so accommodating, other telltale signs of her brawl would remain. “Your face is turning ever more purple and blue as we speak, and your lip is severely cut.”

  Bea knew it. Of course she did. From the very moment the villain’s fist had connected with her face, she’d known there would be no way to hide the events of the afternoon from her family. Naturally, they would be horrified by the abuse she had suffered and anxious for her safety and truly sympathetic about the pain she endured, but her aunt and uncle would also be appalled by the steps she had taken to provoke the attack. Although she hadn’t administered any of the blows to herself, they would hold her wholly responsible.

  Choosing not to dwell on the things she couldn’t change, she repeated the word brawl aloud and pronounced herself very fond of its hard-edged reality. “May I now call myself a brawler?”

  “Between this episode and your encounter with the locked shed on the Skeffingtons’ property, you’ve quite definitely earned the designation,” the duke said gravely. “But rather than think of charming epithets for you, my dear, we should come up with a way to curb your interest in pursuing violent criminals. It does not seem to work out to your advantage.”

  “Ah, now you sound like Aunt Vera,” she said lightly, although she was somewhat disconcerted by the sincerity in his tone. “Soon you will be calling me wan and advising me to pinch my cheeks before climbing out of the carriage.”

  “I did not expect such cruelty, even from you, Miss Hyde-Clare,” he said with elaborate offense, “who has no respect for my dignity. But I’m going to overlook it on account of your being driven to lash out at others due to the great pain you are no doubt in. After the relief of a cold compress, you will regret your malice and wish to apologize. Please know that I already forgive you.”

  “Your consideration humbles me,” she said, smiling and then wincing as she felt the full severity of her lip injury.

  “I should hope so,” he said. “You should also be humbled by my interest. It’s not every young woman I question about her compulsion to seek out murderers. I trust you will be sensible enough of the honor to respond and not insult me again as a diversionary tactic.”

  His tone was soft and serious, and although she had a diversionary tactic at the ready—asking archly if he knew many young women who were compelled to seek out murderers—she felt a desire to answer honestly. There was something about sitting together outside a newspaper office along a bustling London street that felt oddly private, as if the wildly public space offered the same intimacy as the drawing room.

  “I would like to say I’m driven by a high-minded need to see justice done, but the truth is a lot more self-serving. I appreciate the challenge.” She shifted her position slightly to look at his profile, handsome and hazy in the soft light of her diminished vision. “As a middling young woman with few prospects, no fortune and crushing shyness, I’ve had little opportunity to stretch my mind in new directions. I read a lot, mostly biographies and travelogues and stories about inventions and novel ideas. I love discovering new things because every bit of arcane knowledge I acquire feels as if it’s part of a larger puzzle. But I’m not a fool. I know there is no larger puzzle. There is just this, the everyday existence of appeasing Aunt Vera and humoring Flora. And yet, when I came across the battered body of Mr. Otley in the Skeffingtons’ library, I felt as though I’d finally stumbled upon the puzzle. Everything made sense as an odd-shaped piece waiting to fall into place, and I liked it,” she said, pausing to take a deep breath before admitting to an even more self-serving truth. “Indeed, it made me feel clever, and I loved that.”

  Although the admission was more candid than she’d intended, she didn’t succumb to the expected embarrassment or awkwardness. Instead, she felt only relief and peace, as if something that had been stirring inside her for a long time had been soothed. ’Twas a strange sensation and one noticeably at odds with the throbbing in her face.

  Sitting next to Kesgrave, her sight impaired by the swelling and her view limited to only his profile, she could not read his reaction to her confession. She would find out, of course, if she gave him a moment or two to respond, but the occasion was too rife with honesty for her not to try to elicit a few truths in return. “And what is your explanation, your grace? Why do you find yourself compelled to seek out murderers? I must confess that I assumed your actions were spurred by a desire to outwit me. I figured your ego could not stand the fact that it was I, not yourself, who identified Mr. Otley’s murderer and so you sought to vindicate yourself in your own eyes by identifying the earl’s. You will note, I hope, that here I do display proper understanding of your position, as I don’t believe you would bother to vindicate yourself to anyone else. But your actions since the beginning of the Fazeley affair seem to refute that charge, and I find I’m all out of theories to explain your interest.”

  Kesgrave laughed lightly and turned his head a few degrees, providing her with an imperfect view of his bright blue eyes. “Although your cogent, sincere and reasonable response deserves an equally intelligent reply, I’m afraid I cannot issue it. I am as confounded by my behavior as you are, Miss Hyde-Clare. I will own that I find your lack of respect irritating and have been moved by a desire to tweak your ego in return. But I do not wish to best you. Indeed, I felt an inordinate amount of pride at your astuteness at Lakeview Hall.”

  It was a terrible answer, terrifying and exhilarating all at the same time, and Bea ordered herself not to read into it. Just because he made it seem as if the compulsion to investigate Lord Fazeley’s death could somehow be connected to a desire to be with her did not mean that it actually was. Indeed, he hadn’t implied anything of the kind, merely observing that his rationale was unknown even to himself.

  And yet she knew it wasn’t that simple, for there was the waltz to consider and the way he had interrupted his opera outing to visit her. Although under no obligation, he had repeatedly sought out opportunities to spend time with her, and only the most hardened cynic could convince herself there was no connection between them at all. Bea’s cynicism wasn’t quite that entrenched, and as she thought about it now, she conceded that they did indeed have a bond and quite a strong one at that. The investigation first into Mr. Otley’s murder and then Lord Fazeley’s provided them with a mutual occupation that was as rare as it was engrossing. Of course Kesgrave felt a desire to be with her, for there was no one else with whom he could discuss these matters. When he had dashed out of Artaxerxes during intermission to provide her with an update on publishing firms in London, his intentions had been sincere. He’d felt a genuine desire to share what he knew with her, however slight the information was.

  Did she believe that was all it was between them?

  Bea recalled the intensity with which he’d regarded her during their waltz and knew their connection was something more than just the camaraderie of colleagues. Even so, she believed that was all it could be, for the Duke of Kesgrave was too firmly rooted in the augustness of his lineage to allow it to become anything else. As the responsible steward of the Matlock family legacy, he required perfection, grace and beauty in his future wife. Raised with those exacting standards, he would never be able to look at her plain face, with its pale skin and impudent freckles, and see a duchess.

  As she herself could not make that imaginative leap either, she didn’t blame him for it. Nor did she blame herself for finding him irresistible, for he was among the most coveted men in the kingdom. Every school miss having her first season sighed over his handsome, lithe form, and it only made sense that repeated exposure to his person would have a disruptive effect on her feelings. If her sense of judgment was so degraded that she’d actually formed a tendre for him, she knew it was only a short-lived problem. As soon as the matter of Lord Fazeley’s death was resolved, their connection would be severed and her good sense would be restored.

  She looked forward to that moment as much as she dreaded it.r />
  The silence between them stretched while these thoughts raced through Bea’s head, and saddened by the prospect of a future without the duke’s maddening, teasing presence, she tried to come up with something to say that would reveal no trace of her true feelings. Recalling their early association in the Lake District, she began to list many of the foods that were on the dinner table during one of their meals at the country estate. “Quenelles of chicken with peas and fruit jelly, fish patties with olive paste, eels à la tartare, stuffed tomatoes, veal cutlets, poached eggs, fillets of salmon, meringues with preserves.”

  Kesgrave met with this extraordinary response with composure, which further endeared him to the susceptible young lady, who admired his insouciance in the face of absurdity. “If this is your way of telling me your brawl has made you hungry, a not uncommon reaction to physical exertion, I regret to inform you, Miss Hyde-Clare, that I left the quenelles of chicken in my other coat.”

  “I’m making a catalog of all the dishes I yearned to throw at you during our second or third supper at Lakeview Hall,” she explained. “You were discussing the Battle of the Nile with our host and being particularly pedantic.”

  “Ah, yes,” he said, as if grasping something that had evaded him for a long time. “HMS Goliath, HMS Audacious, HMS Majestic.”

  He listed the ships now as he did then—in order of appearance in the battle, per the dictates of maritime tradition—and Bea immediately corrected him, scrambling his neat arrangement in lieu of hurling chicken. “HMS Majestic, HMS Goliath, HMS Audacious.”

  Although the comment was sparked by a contrarian impulse, Kesgrave smiled in comprehension and Bea felt a sense of perfect accord settle over her.

  This feeling alone explained the compulsion to investigate, she realized with sudden clarity. She’d experienced it once before, in her bedchamber in the Lake District when they discussed who might be responsible for Mr. Otley’s death, and she would gratefully do many foolhardy things to feel it again. She would certainly do nothing to end it now, and neither, it appeared, would the duke, for the happy moment endured for several minutes, interrupted only by the appearance of his groom.