Barbara Pierce (33 page)

“Without question,” was her flippant retort.

“Oh, good. I am so pleased we understand each other so well.” Fayne unlocked the front door to the town house he had rented, and opened the door. He gestured for her to enter. “Anyone here?” he shouted out.

No one answered his greeting.

Kilby sniffed and crossed her arms. “Nice, respectful staff you have, Your Grace,” she muttered sourly.

“A lot like my wife,” he shot back. “Well, there is no help for it. We are on our own for a few days.”

“What?”

He gave her an impatient look. “I have never kept a full staff on hand. There was never any need since I preferred living alone.” That was in the past. Unless he planned on moving them in with his mother, which he would rather not, then he needed to get his household in order. They had been living a vagabond’s life since they were married. Such a way of life was not for his new duchess. “Before we left for town, I sent word to my manservant to close up the house and dismiss the staff for a week. We were supposed to be gone longer.”

“Wait!” She stalled him on the stairs. “You are not leaving me alone down here.”

Fayne took her hand and led her upstairs to his bedchamber. This was not how he had envisioned their homecoming. The house was dark and uninviting. The succulent, alluring smell of roasting meat was not wafting from the kitchen. What he preferred to do was strip them both of their clothes and make love to his wife. Unfortunately, he had to be practical. Kilby’s attacker was out there, perhaps waiting for a chance to finish what he had started. Nipping was also roaming London wanting to reclaim his missing sisters. Fayne might not be able to lay his hands on his wife’s attacker, but he could track down her brother before the man caused any more trouble.

She sat on the edge of his bed and glumly observed him as he removed his shirt. The rest of his clothes swiftly followed. “You are determined to find Archer, are you not?”

He saw no reason to lie to her. “Yes.” Fayne picked up the clean shirt his manservant had thoughtfully laid out for him.

Kilby got up from the bed and crossed over to him. Once he pulled a clean shirt over his head, she smoothed out the linen and fastened the four buttons on his shirt. It
was the kind of intimacy that never failed to fire his blood. “I do not want to remain here alone.”

“You won’t.” Fayne did not want to distress her. He had let her think he was only pursuing her brother. Unfortunately, there were others in town who desired his head just as eagerly as Nipping. While he had no regrets about his life before Kilby, Fayne silently acknowledged that he had lived selfishly, loved a little too liberally, and had collected his fair share of enemies. Their early arrival was unexpected and he intended to use that element of surprise to his advantage. He would feel better when he had her tucked away someplace safe.

Kilby curled her hands around on of the end posts of his bed. “It is my opinion—”

“Enough!” Coolly, he narrowed his green gaze on her as he tied his cravat with efficient, brisk motions. The lady was too used to having her way. Fayne was planning on spending the rest of his life indulging her; nevertheless, this was one of the few instances he was insisting that she listen to his commands. “You are
my
wife,” he said, stressing his claim on her. “I expect obedience from my duchess.”

She looked so stricken by his harsh words, he almost took them back. Whether she realized it or not, he only wanted to protect her.

Kilby flounced away from him in a huff. She scowled at the ruby and diamond ring he had put on her left hand. “So much for marital bliss,
Your Grace.
”

They had not spoken another word to each other since their argument in his bedchamber. While she had dashed off a quick note to Priddy, Fayne had hastily finished changing his clothes. Distracted by his private musings, he had silently bundled her into the coach. Her mood vacillated from hurt to outrage as the carriage bounced and rumbled down the street. She had sensed from the beginning that Fayne was a
gentleman used to commanding his own fate, and the fates of those under his charge. His flash of temper and autocratic demand for obedience had disturbingly reminded Kilby of her brother’s disagreeable nature. The comparison had momentarily stunned her into speechlessness. Mutinous stubbornness had urged her to remain silent.

His temper had bruised her pride. If she had desired a sullen, unreasonable husband who planned on controlling every aspect of her life, she had merely had to wait for Archer to make his selection. As she had gotten to know Fayne, a seed of hope had sprung within her. Despite their hasty flight to Gretna Green, she had started to believe that they could build a comfortable marriage from their growing affection for one another.

She had been raised with the freedom to make her own decisions. It was unrealistic for Fayne to expect her to blithely surrender to all her husband’s dictates without question. If Fayne was planning on leaving her while he hunted down her brother and attempted to find out who was behind the attack at the lake, did she not have a say on where she should go? Obviously, he did not give a farthing for her opinion. The hateful man had not even bothered to tell her their destination!

It was only when she recognized the surroundings that Kilby’s anger began to dissipate. Fayne had not been completely boorish, after all. He had brought her to the Brawleys’ house, brought her to Gypsy. His thoughtfulness had her regretting several of her unkind thoughts. Kilby longed to see her sister again. She would have recommended the Brawleys’ residence herself. However, after she had been attacked at the lake, she had considered it best that she stay away from Gypsy until they knew who had tried to drown her and why.

Fayne had apparently weighed the risks against the benefits and had concluded otherwise. She could hardly
criticize the man for giving her something she wanted, now could she?

Fayne kept one hand on her arm and the other placed on her lower back as they approached the house on foot. Kilby wondered if he expected her to flee. She rolled her eyes at the idiocy of such a deduction, her lips parted as she prepared to thank him for reuniting him with Gypsy.

The door abruptly opened, and the Brawleys’ odd butler with his wild wiry gray hair stood on the threshold. Kilby had encountered the servant briefly during their last visit to the town house. Slightly unkempt, coarse in speech, and opinionated, he was not the kind of servant she would have expected Lady Fayre to employ. Nevertheless, the Brawleys treated him like a member of the family.

“Oh, ’tis you. Good tidings are in order, I hear, Your Grace. You seem no worse from your adventure,” the man boldly stated.

“I was fortunate, Hobbs. My bride was extremely gentle with me,” Fayne said genially, unruffled by the butler’s inquisitive nature. “Is the family at home?”

The servant turned his sharp gaze on her.
How odd,
she thought,
his left eye is more prominent than the other.
He also had the most fascinating eyebrows. The short spiky hair sprouting from his brow was black, except for ends closest to his wide nose. There, the hair was a long, wispy tuft of white that reminded Kilby of dandelions that had gone to seed. In his youth, the butler might have been taller than Fayne, but age and life’s burdens had bowed his lanky frame at the shoulders. Becoming increasingly uneasy under his frank stare, Kilby doubted very little escaped the man’s notice.

“Aye,” Hobbs said, finally returning his attention to Fayne. “Leastways, they are for ye. I have orders to turn away the curious.”

“The curious?” Kilby asked.

Fayne gave her an enigmatic glance since this was the first time she had deigned to speak.

“Him!”—he nodded at Fayne—“eloping with ye as he did, has caused quite a flap with the
ton,
I must say.” The butler gestured for them to step into the front hall. “Not to mention the family.”

“That will be quite enough from you, Hobbs,” Maccus Brawley said sternly as he calmly descended the stairs to join them. “Can’t you see you are terrifying poor Kilby.”

“Bah!” the servant said, contorting his face in such a manner that Kilby half expected the man to spit on the marble floor. “If she’s brave enough to tangle with the likes of him, I say the lass has mettle or is as balmy as the rest of ye.” Not waiting to be dismissed, the butler trudged off in the direction of the kitchen.

Fayne raised an inquiring brow at his brother-in-law. “It appears Fayre hasn’t had much luck wearing down his rough edges. I swear the man gets crustier each time we meet.”

“That means he likes you,” Mr. Brawley explained to Fayne. Moving to Kilby, he took her hand and kissed it. “Permit me to be the first to welcome you to our family.” Drawing her closer, he led her up the stairs. “Now that you both have returned to London, let me forewarn you. The family will insist that a celebratory ball is planned in your honor.”

Kilby glanced back at her husband. From behind them, she could have sworn she heard Fayne muttering something about the duchess and her damned balls.

“Uh”—she faltered for words that would not sound insulting to her new brother-in-law—“Mr. Brawley, while we are flattered by all the fuss, a ball is not necessary—”

“Perhaps not, but our mother will insist. It is best if we just indulge her in these matters,” Lady Fayre said dryly, meeting them at the landing.

She was not alone.

Kilby’s eyes filled with tears. Grabbing the front of her skirts, she dashed up the remaining steps and opened her arms. With a joyful gasp, her sister released Lady Fayre’s hand and ran toward Kilby. She wrapped her arms around Kilby’s waist, holding on to her tightly.

Kilby felt light-headed as she hugged her sister. Fayne had done this. With his help, they were both free from Archer. “Oh, Gypsy. How I have missed you!”

Fayne had loathed leaving Kilby. He took comfort in the knowledge that Brawley and his sister would look after his duchess until his return. Kilby had been so distracted by her reunion with Gypsy that she probably had forgotten why he was leaving her.

Ha! Not likely.

He had watched the wariness as it eclipsed her joyful expression when he had told Brawley that he needed to speak to him privately. Archer had tarnished what little affection Kilby had had for her brother. Nevertheless, he was still family. She did not want Fayne confronting her brother.

Kilby would eventually understand that he was simply protecting her, even from that perverted, idiot brother of hers. There was also her unknown assailant. If the villain wanted another chance to hurt Kilby, he would follow them to London.

Fayne still winced each time he recalled Kilby’s caustic retort to his high-handed demand for her obedience. It was not difficult to deduce her dour thoughts. She had traded her overbearing brother and replaced him with a domineering husband. For a lady who had been interested in marriage out of necessity, she was probably viewing their hasty elopement as a mediocre alliance. He was going to need more than charm to get back in her good graces.

Reuniting her with Gypsy had been a rewarding step
toward his goal. When he had kissed Kilby farewell at the Brawleys’ house, he had felt her lips soften under his questing mouth. His duchess was not pleased with him. Nor, on the other hand, was she wishing him to perdition.

After he hired a messenger to deliver Kilby’s note to Lady Quennell, Fayne sought out Ramscar at his house. The earl was not at home. Fortunately, his butler knew where he had gone. Fayne’s next stop was at Tattersall’s. At the horse auction he encountered not only Ramscar, but Everod and Cadd, too.

Turning away from the horse that was currently up on the auction block, Cadd was the first one to notice Fayne. “Ho! Do my eyes deceive me or does the very married Duke of Solitea stand before us,” he said, heartily hugging him and slapping him on the back. “I wagered Everod here that you and your duchess would not be seen for at least a fortnight.”

“You have ruined a perfectly good wager,” Everod said in mock disappointment. “I fear all of us greatly overestimated your prowess. My bet was for three weeks. Ramscar, you put down a month, did you not?”

The earl extended his hand to Fayne and they shook hands. “I did. I had assumed that your lady had you wrapped around her little finger to get a disreputable rake like you to come up to scratch.” He embraced his friend briefly before cuffing him lightly on the ear. “A word to your friends might be appropriate the next time you dash off.”

Everod chuckled, enjoying his friend’s downfall too much. “More likely she had her silken hands wrapped around his throbbing rod to get him to hie them off to Gretna Green without a word.”

Fayne accepted their teasing banter graciously. They were all recalling the night several years back when he had drunkenly lectured them all about the folly of marrying too young.

He had held his father up as an example of the price a man paid for hastily throwing away his freedom. It was only after his father had wedded and bedded his duchess that he had belatedly discovered the lady who owned his soul was the very married Lady Dening. Although he had sired a son on his lover, he had remained with his wife and the children she had given him. The duke’s decision had been honorable, but it had left him with a restless heart. He spent the rest of his life bedding one mistress after another, trying to recapture, albeit briefly, the happiness he had found with the one lady he could not publicly claim for his own.

It was a mistake he had planned on not making. Almost too drunk to stand, he had proclaimed that he would not marry until he was forty. His friends had boisterously cheered his decision and had made similar outrageous boasts of their own.

“Our hasty marriage was spurred by events beyond our control,” Fayne admitted quietly as he searched the faces of the gentlemen who had gathered to observe the auction. Nipping was not in the crowd.

Ramscar clamped a hand on Fayne’s shoulder. “Christ, you virile, randy bastard! You’ve already planted your heir in her belly.”

Fayne rolled his eyes heavenward. “Keep your voice down,” he cautioned, dreading Kilby’s reaction if the bawdy talk reached her ears. “All I need is to have the gossips counting on their fingers because my friend cannot keep his mouth shut.” Thankfully, no one seemed interested in their conversation. “I am making no such announcements regarding my wife’s delicate condition,” he deliberately drawled. “Yet.”