by Laura Parker
“How would you know my—?” Something in his expression stopped her protest. “Very well, though people will remark upon it.”
“That is the point. If you are to fleece this spa town of its gold, you must devise as many distractions as possible. Where I will take you, the formality-conscious Beau Nash will not be there to bar the door.” He smiled and it was as cold as his heart. His fingers slipped from her face to the top of her properly cut neckline, which he rimmed with a finger. “Buy a more daring gown. Modesty will not serve you.”
His fingers spread across the full swells straining against her bodice and traveled leisurely downward. “I don’t suppose you have any jewels? A pity. Still, you will not need them if your gown is cut with sufficient cunning.” When his fingertips reached the edge of her neckline he curled them inside and felt for an instant the moist warmth welled between her tender breasts.
Even as Sabrina drew a breath in umbrage, he lifted his hand and moved away. He had strolled all the way to the door before he turned back to her. “Tomorrow afternoon I shall call upon you. Be ready. I will not cool my heels upon your tardiness.”
Sabrina wondered dazedly if this was what she wanted, after all. “What shall I tell the countess?”
“Nothing. I shall see to that matter myself. I do not like tale-bearers or prattling women.”
“I am neither.”
A moment earlier she had thought he might force himself upon her. Now he surveyed her with all the warmth he might have shown a lapdog. “See that you do not yield to the temptation. It is an all too ubiquitous failing of your sex.”
“You are hateful, my lord.”
“It will serve you best if you remember that.”
When he was gone, Sabrina stood along time in the silent gloom feeling sorely abused and neatly caught by circumstance. The wager she had made with the Viscount Darlington might well be the biggest and most dangerous gamble of her life.
Chapter Twelve
The sudden cry on the street was cut off abruptly but its shrill of terror was enough to penetrate even Jack’s brandy-laced thought.
He shook his head like a dog upon awakening, aware more of the rough trot of the bearers of his hired sedan chair than of the cause that had aroused him. Upon leaving the countess’s residence, he had repaired for an hour to a tavern where in a private parlor and with a bottle of brandy as solace, he had sulked.
The second cry was more subdued than the first, but he recognized it as female.
Even as he did it, Jack wondered why he bothered to jerk aside the curtain meant to veil him from the worst of the town’s smells and sounds. But once he did, his quick gaze immediately spied the altercation ahead in the lane dimly lit by a smoking torch.
A gentleman in satin coat and lace made a threatening gesture at the young woman who was being held with her arms pinned back by a second man. The pantomime played out quickly as the gentleman struck the girl two vicious blows, one to the face and the second to her middle. It was just the sort of tableau that should have gone unremarked by a jaded soul like himself, who was accustomed to encountering examples of life’s brutality on any corner. He did not feel particularly like playing Sir Gallahad. But he did not like the odds nor the nor the fact that it was a woman against two men.
“Halt!” he cried to his startled bearers and stepped out of the chair the instant they set him down. Belatedly, he realized that the altercation was taking place on his block, not far from the door of his Bath quarters. Even as her pitiful cries echoed in the lane, Jack saw an imposingly large shadow emerge from a doorway in the middle of the block.
“The devil!” he exclaimed in ill humor. He recognized the girl’s would-be rescuer as none other than his man Zuberi.
“Fool! They might slay …” Jack let the thought trail off He doubted any ten men could do Zuberi substantial harm as long as it remained a hand-to-hand fair fight.
Then he saw the narrow gleam of a deadly blade being unsheathed by the well-dressed brute who turned to face the unwelcome Zuberi and his disinterest in the fight evaporated. Zuberi was not a man who feared much, but even he was at a disadvantage with a yard of steel.
Ignoring the protest of the chair bearers that they had not yet been paid, he strolled purposefully toward the fray.
Personal fear did not enter his thoughts as his drew his pistol from his pocket and advanced on the melee. Neither courage nor conceit fueled his lack of trepidation, only a hard-earned confidence in his own mastery of the situation.
The man in the velvet evening coat and Zuberi were slowly circling one another. Zuberi’s long arms were stretched out before him to fend off the expected thrust of a blade. The other man stood apart, heaping invectives against the girl who was kicking him with a viciousness that Jack surmised would leave the fellow black and blue shins. The girl broke free then stopped short and screamed when she noticed his approach.
That was a damned silly thing for her to do, Jack thought indifferently, considering that the weapon he held was drawn for her benefit.
“Which of you gentlemen prefer to be shot first?”
The two men started at the pleasant sound of a gentleman’s cultured voice addressing them. The one with the sword quickly lowered it while the other grabbed and thrust the girl before him as a shield. Why had she not run, Jack wondered in exasperation. Stupid goose!
“Evenin’ guv’nor,” cried the velvet-coated gentleman with the drawn sword. “We was after savin’ the poor girl from bein’ attacked by this black savage. Just gon’ to show ’im a thing two about manners.” Jack was now near enough to see the man’s smile pleat the pox marks on his face.
“ ’Tis a lie!” cried the girl whose arms were painfully pinned back by the other man. “They’re after murderin’ me ’cause I won’t go with ’em!”
“ ’Ere now. None of that,” the man answered almost casually as he delivered to her a stinging slap with the back of his hand. Zuberi made a sound very much like that of a bellows put to sudden great pressure.
Jack stifled a yawn. “I’m equally uninterested in the points of the quarrel between you. Simply choose which of you must die in order that the chit may be released.”
He pointed his pistol at the velvet-coated man, who immediately dropped his sword. As the barrel moved toward the chest of the other man, he backed away from the girl so quickly it ratcheted up a smile at the corners of Jack’s mouth. “That’s as I thought. Zuberi?”
“Well met and a great good evening to you, my lord,” the servant intoned with a warm wide smile of greeting.
“I suppose you are now sufficient to the matter?”
Zuberi’s face altered to one that made Jack glad he had never gained the larger man’s rage.
“Well enough.” Jack grasped the girl by the arm and pulled her ruthlessly from the lane toward his door. “Don’t look back,” he snapped when she twisted in his grasp. “You won’t like the results. Zuberi will, in his own inimitable words, smite them hip and thigh, and a rare hash he shall make of them.”
With the sounds of a beating at their backs, Jack and his freed hostage entered his abode.
Five minutes later, during which time Jack had consumed a bumper of brandy, Zuberi entered the tiny salon of Jack’s rooms, his face as unmarred as before. Only his torn shirt and bleeding knuckles gave any indication that he done any other than return from a stroll through the park.
“I should like to propose, Zuberi,” Jack began in a frosty tone, “that we refrain from further altercations in the lane. The neighbors may begin to suspect that we are barbarians rather than simply Barbadoans.” As he spoke he moved forward and extended to his servant a glass of brandy.
“I am pleased to see you looking well, my lord. I have this fortnight longed for our reuniting.” Zuberi took the glass and after a brief pause to received Jack’s assent, turned it up and drained it in one thirsty swallow.
“Wirra! And where were ye afore now?”
The sound of the heavily Irish-accented feminine voice caused both men to turn around. Standing in the doorway with a hand on each hip was the cause of the street brawl. The left side of her mouth bore a bleeding bruise. A raw patch in her scalp showed where a fistful of vivid red hair had once been. Her bodice was torn in three places and little more was left of her shredded skirt than a scrap of linen. Altogether she presented a perfect caricature of a street slattern.
Something familiar about her, thought Jack as she marched up to Zuberi.
“Leaving me to fend off every sort of durty haythurn from the gutter, that’s what!” She poked the huge man in the chest. “A pox on ye!”
“Mistress, please allow,” Zuberi began with the most tender of looks at her. “My lord Laughton, viscount of Darlington, I beg the humble opportunity to present—”
“So this is himself, is it?” She made a gesture toward Jack, but she was plainly addressing Zuberi. “Did ye ken me for a fool? I’m no so green as that. I’ll not be tradin’ me vartue for the likes o ’im!” She turned to leave.
Before she could take more than a step Zuberi scooped her up from behind.
“Put me down, ye great black beast from hell!” the girl screeched
Wincing, Jack watched his servant struggle rather vigorously with the girl and wished himself anywhere but here.
Without asking his master’s permission, Zuberi finally managed to deposit the mad-as-a-wet-hen girl on a chair. She was up in an instant and halfway across the room by the time Jack blocked her path.
For the first time Jack studied her face and it drew him toward her with a frown. “Have we not met before?”
She hesitated only a moment and shoved him hard. The brandy had made him less steady then he knew and she passed him in a flash.
When Zuberi moved to give chase, Jack put a restraining hand on the larger man’s arm. “Leave her. ’Tis clear the wench knows nothing of the kindness done her or believes herself to have been better served by a thrashing than a rescue.”
His disdainful remark brought her to a halt three steps from the door. “Honest hard work never put fear into the likes of me,” she said proudly. “But I’ll not go slaypin’ with this dodgey gentleman.”
“My master would not have you,” Zuberi replied with quiet dignity. “You look no more toothsome than a rat come into the house through a crack. Though I vow you’re not so ugly that my master may not require a second look when you’ve been properly cleaned and dressed.”
A smile, which he refused to give life, tugged at Jack’s mouth over Zuberi’s over-generous compliment. He proclaimed in withering tones, “I never embrace the Irish. They’re even more unpredictable than savages.”
“Aye, and what of it?” the girl responded roughly. “For all that, I’m a respectable lass, I am.”
“The fair green isle, home to my first master,” Zuberi intoned so rapturously one might have thought he was on intimate terms with that verdant isle. He moved closer to the girl, his dark eyes all but devouring her. Strangely enough, she did not seem to diminish when measured beside him. The thought struck Jack that she was quite a bit taller than she had appeared when he had approached her on the street. Something, certainly, familiar in that height and hair. Perhaps if he had consumed less brandy it would come to him more quickly.
“I did not like much about my first master but I did admire his tales of his homeland.” Zuberi lifted one large hand, as if he could not bear not to touch her. Yet his gesture stopped short of the tangle of vivid hair that tumbled about her shoulders. “I most especially liked those of St. Patrick’s way with snakes. You have met him, perhaps?” he questioned with the guilelessness of a child.
The girl blinked. “Know Saint Patrick? Is it that mad you are, Mr. Blackamoor?”
“If this touching little scene is done,” Jack said in a drawl that precluded any other choice, “I will continue my journey to bed.”
The girl looked at Zuberi and he returned her look. The pair were clearly infatuated, Jack thought scornfully and wondered at the attraction. For the girl, certainly, but Zuberi’s women were usually more voluptuous and patently feminine.
“Verily, I am ashamed that I did not come to escort you home.” For such a large man Zuberi sounded remarkably contrite. “But I could not leave when my lord was expected. Yet I vow I never brought you here for his delectation, oh champion of the Gladiators.”
Jack’s head whipped around so quickly his mind reeled from his liberal application of liquor. “Gladiator?”
Zuberi dragged his gaze from the girl and Jack would have sworn, if it were possible, that the large man blushed. “I am guilty, my lord, of a most indulgent vice. I went back to Lincoln’s Field Theater every day for a week after your departure from London. Three times, my lord, I witnessed this wondrous lady hold sway over her opponents, vanquishing both large and ferocious harlots.”
“Don’t tell me, you were so stricken by love for this female Hercules that you absconded with her.” Jack’s voice dripped with sarcasm.
“Oh no, my lord. It was my great and bountiful joy to offer her employment when she was defeated.”
“Lost a battle did she?” Jack thought fleetingly of the twenty thousand pounds that she had once cost him by not doing so.
“Never. I was thrown out for winning,” she answered with all the indignant wrath of a disaffected duchess. “Me manager wanted me to toss the fight, only I wouldna’.”
“I see,” Jack murmured though he did not understand, nor did he care to.
“She is a champion. Champions do not choose defeat,” Zuberi agreed. “I told her my master can find other work for her.” A great smile of satisfaction spread across his face. “And so I brought her here to you.”
Jack allowed himself a second deep swallow of brandy before saying to Zuberi, “As you have brought her here without my permission, she is now your problem. I expect you to deal with it without resource or reference from me.”
The girl eyed him equally hard. Irish contempt, he thought. And then she turned to Zuberi. “I’m that sorry I called ye a beast. But you will own you are black.”
“No?” Zuberi’s face was as expressive as a mime’s. “Are you certain?” He lifted back his free arm to inspect it. “Oh, you are right.”
“Daft man!” The girl giggled self-consciously. “You are a fey spalpeen.”
His brow furrowed. “Is this good?”
“Well, it’s no so bad as it might be.”
Zuberi’s handsome, broad-featured face split in a grin so irresistible that it soured Jack’s mood even further. Yet they seemed no longer aware of his existence. His gaze cut briefly to the girl who was now tucked under the branching shadow of the enormous man’s long arm. The devil! She had, he was certain, already seduced his man!
Chapter Thirteen
London, November 1, 1740
“You win again, my lord!”
Gwendolyn Carrington’s sultry voice was laced with petulance. “That makes fifty sovereigns I owe you.” She leaned back suggestively against the satin squabs of the bed that served as their card table.
It was clear from an observation of the unbroken, smooth curves of her body that she was without stays. Being free, the easy play of her fine figure was revealed beneath the clinging lines of her silk maroon dressing gown. Her gaze, at once sensual and practiced, gave away her position as a mistress. To whit, she was mistress of the Earl of Lovelace.
“Can you think of no more just repayment, Lord Randolph?”
Her fine attributes so temptingly offered would have seemed enough of an invitation for any man worth the designation to a dalliance far more enjoyable than cards.
Randolph smiled at her indulgently. “Shall we try another hand? Your luck may yet turn.” He reached for the deck of hand-painted French cards.
His lack of response poured gall into Gwendolyn’s already wounded pride. This self-imposed celibacy of his had lasted more th
an a fortnight. It was all very well that he was generous in his keeping of her, for he had rented this small but well-appointed house, and provided her with a carriage and pair. Yet she had once thought the better part of her luck to be in snaring a young, handsome, and thoroughly virile protector. For once she had expected to thoroughly enjoy her service on her back. Yet, the earl had not bedded her above three times before having lost interest in the activity she loved best. He had remained so capable of resisting her charms that she had begun to worry. Did another besot him? Was he thinking of turning her out for another, or was he being tempted away? No matter. Tonight she was determined to win him back into her bed and into her avidly accommodating embrace.
She fluttered a hand at her neckline, inviting attention to its daring depth. “Do you not find the room much too warm? I fear the fire is too well-banked.”
When he did not look up from shuffling the deck, she reached out and snatched the deck from him, then tossed the cards clear of the bed onto the floor.
“See here, Gwen!” he began in faint annoyance but then he smiled and threw up his hands in defeat. “Very well. No more cards. I really should go.”
“Must you?” Smiling at him, she slowly tugged loose the first two ribbons of celestial blue, which held close her bodice. Twin breasts pale as alabaster and crowned by rosy nipples pushed into view.
Alas, the view could not persuade Randolph away from his morose reflection. Lotte had run away from him. Everything and everyone reminded him of that vexing fact.
Gwen saw his expression darken and hoped it was an indication of the struggle taking place within him to remain with her. To add to the enticement, she twitched open her dressing gown, unveiling small round knees and slender calves sleeved in blush silk stockings that were an erotic study worthy of Hogarth or Rowlandson.
Though she could not know it, her dimpled knees only reminded Randolph of Lotte’s, whose were as smooth and blushed as ripe peaches.
