London's Last True Scoundrel (34 page)

She stood and shook out her skirts with the air of shaking
him
from her life.

Suddenly the frustration, the turmoil, all of it, bubbled over. Savagely he said, “Shall we kiss and part, then, my dear?”

He gripped her arm and yanked her toward him. She gave a hiccupping sort of gasp and stared up at him with wide, fawn-like eyes.

A small, choking sob burst from her, before he set his lips to hers.

Her rigid body seemed to stiffen further, but he didn’t take that for rejection. He merely deepened the kiss, sliding his tongue along the seam of her lips. With a soft, agonized cry, she melted against him, flowed around him. She filled his senses with the scent of violets, the sweetness of her mouth, the petal softness of her skin.

He lifted his head and tugged at the ribbons that secured her bonnet beneath her chin, pushed the confection off. Then he held her close, burying his nose in her bright curls, calling himself every kind of fool. He
had
come here to break with her, but he hadn’t found the courage or the necessary ruthlessness to do it in the callous manner he’d intended.

He couldn’t deal her the blow she waited for every time she made a connection with someone. Every time she fought to make her world secure, someone knocked that security out from under her.

He knew, deep down, that she’d acted out of a need to strike first. She cared for him; he felt it in her kiss, in her bittersweet surrender.

He’d come here to break with her, but she’d done his work for him. He ought to take her at her word rather than kissing her and calling her a damned little fool.

“My sweet, foolish Honey,” he murmured into her hair.

But he was the fool. He was far too stupid and weak and selfish to do what he needed to do. Ending it might not have made any difference, but at least he would have known he’d done all he could.

Now …

He raised his head so he could look into her face. Her eyes, a little dazed, stared back at him in dawning confusion.

“I won’t let you go,” he said in a voice thickened with passion. “I can’t.”

She blinked. Her lips, deeply pink and a little puffy from his kisses, formed a whispered question. “What do you mean?”

He took her by the shoulders, ran his hands up and down her forearms. “I stayed away to protect you, Honey. But I can’t go on doing it. I need to explain.”

He led her back to the seat to sit by him while he told her an expurgated version of the night in the alley.

She turned pale when he mentioned the threat against her, but she remained composed enough until he reached the end of his tale.

“I’ll find the man responsible,” he said, “if I have to comb England to do it. In the meantime, men I trust will guard you against harm.”

Agitated, she laid a hand on his arm. “Oh, but you must not! It is too dangerous. Davenport, do be careful.”

He covered her hand with his. “I am taking care. But they will contact me again, and when they do, I’ll be ready. I won’t make the mistake of underestimating them next time.”

“Enlist your cousins’ support,” she urged. “They are capable men, powerful, too. They can help you find him.”

He’d considered it, of course. The notion of asking for help, even of Ashburn, was abhorrent to someone who’d survived on his wits alone for so long.

But he’d been self-indulgent and stupid to have held on to his pride when Honey was in danger. How much better could four of them cover the ground than Davenport alone? Plus the Duke of Montford. The duke had connections everywhere.

It was time to put pride aside for Honey’s sake.

“Yes. I’ll do it. In the meantime, it would be best if you and I pretend our engagement is no more. I don’t want the blackguard getting wind of it.”

She lowered her gaze. “Yes. I—I understand. That would be best.”

He looked down at her with a twinge of unease. “You’ve taken this remarkably calmly.”

Perhaps the terrible news had not yet sunk in. The weasel had threatened her, for God’s sake! He’d knifed a man in the belly.

She gazed up at him, her eyes bright with tears. “You will find him and stop him. I know it.” She made a helpless gesture. “Oh, it is crackbrained of me, but I—I don’t fear a deadly assassin nearly as much as I feared losing you.”

She couldn’t mean it, not really, but his heart blazed with joy.

“You
are
cracked, my sweet. Deliciously, wondrously insane.” But he said it with a strange catch in his throat, as he caught her to him and kissed her with a passion and a hunger and a desperate, mad hope that he could keep her safe with him forever.

CHAPTER TWENTY

“I see your Mrs. Walker takes her cue on interior decoration from the Prince Regent,” observed Cecily as she entered Hilary’s bedchamber.

Weeks ago, such an observation would have mortified Hilary, for the ton decried Prinny’s garish interiors. But she had weightier things on her mind today than Mrs. Walker’s questionable taste.

Frustration gnawed at her, but she could do nothing to help Davenport except keep herself safe. She rarely left the house except to attend her evening engagements. There was always a Westruther cousin with her on these occasions. They guarded her most faithfully and she gleaned news from them of Davenport when she could.

He never came near her. Probably to keep up the pretense that she was nothing to him. In her opinion, it was too late for that, but he’d been adamant. He didn’t want to take any chances.

They’d announced the end of their betrothal to their respective families. She’d endured an hour-long harangue from Lord deVere over her broken engagement that had sorely tested her composure. DeVere only let her remain in London because she assured him she was on the brink of being admitted to the hallowed assembly rooms of Almack’s. And, she suspected, because now that Lady Arden had taken her under her wing, he needn’t go to any trouble for her.

“Scrubbed up well enough, haven’t you?” said deVere, eyeing her up and down. “Maybe you’ll catch a husband yet.”

She didn’t want to catch another husband. She wanted Davenport with a ferocity she’d never felt about anything or anyone before.

Now Hilary smiled at Cecily’s quip about the décor. “Mrs. Walker’s aesthetic is an acquired taste. I admit, I have yet to acquire it, but one never knows.”

Cecily chuckled. She removed her bonnet and set it down, then stripped off her gloves. “Show me what you will wear at Montford’s ball.”

Trixie hovered in the corner, awestruck at standing in the same room as a real-live duchess. Hilary gave her an encouraging smile. With a start, Trixie brought forth The Gown.

Giselle had refused to consider stark white for a young lady of Hilary’s coloring, no matter how appropriate the hue might be for debutantes. This gown was a shade the modiste called
beurre,
a buttery cream, overlaid with a robe of the finest ivory net, embroidered all over with tiny gold leaves.

“Ahh,” said Cecily. “Ravishing! Giselle has outdone herself, has she not? I’m so glad Davenport took you to her. She is a genius.”

Cecily opened the drawstring on the reticule that dangled from her elbow and drew out a ruby velvet pouch. “I brought you something.”

A single strand of lustrous, creamy pearls spilled onto Hilary’s dressing table. Cecily picked it up and held it against the gown. “Yes. Just the thing. I have the earbobs and a bracelet to match and combs for your hair.”

“Ohh,” Hilary breathed, touching the smooth, cool pearls with tentative fingertips. “I’ve never worn anything so fine.”

The warm glow in her chest expanded to fill her. She met dark eyes that reminded her so much of Davenport’s it made her heart ache a little. “Thank you, Cecily. I shall take great care of them.”

“They will be yours when you marry Davenport,” said Cecily. “I simply liberated them a little early from his strongbox.”

Guilt punched Hilary in the solar plexus. She ought not wear the Davenport jewels. Not under false pretenses.

“You took them without Davenport’s knowledge?” she said, trying for a neutral tone.

Cecily blinked in surprise. “Oh, no. In fact, he asked me to choose something for you.”

Hilary digested this, hardly knowing what to think. “Hasn’t he told you of our decision not to wed?”

“Yes, but that is nonsense, so I didn’t listen.” Cecily waved a hand in dismissal. “You two are perfect for one another, and when you have both stopped being stupid and miserable, you’ll see it.”

There didn’t seem much point arguing. Hilary wished Cecily might be right, but in her heart she knew Davenport didn’t truly love her. He liked her. He liked bedding her. His chivalrous instincts were roused because she was in peril. For one, brief moment in the rose arbor, when he’d held her in his arms and kissed her, she’d hoped … But he didn’t love her.

“How is he?” she asked.

“He is … distracted, short-tempered, and altogether impossible,” said Cecily. “And yet, in some way I find difficult to put my finger on, he is more himself than he has been since his return.”

Conscious that Trixie overheard every word, Hilary said, “I daresay it was a big adjustment after so many years away.”

“Yes,” said Cecily slowly. “I’m coming to realize how much of an adjustment it has been.”

Hilary darted a glance at Davenport’s sister. Had he confided in her about the latest development?

With a glance at the waiting maid, Cecily seemed to shake off her thoughtful mood. “We shall speak of that anon. Right now, we need to think about your hair.”

Tapping her fingertip against her lips, Cecily ran a speculative gaze over Hilary’s coiffure. Trixie had proven herself a quick learner with deft fingers and an eye for the styles that suited Hilary’s face.

Despite the importance of looking her best at Montford’s ball, impatience skittered down Hilary’s spine. For once, she didn’t wish to discuss frills and furbelows. She wanted to know about Davenport.

“You have remarkably pretty hair and you should make the most of it,” said Cecily as she circled her, viewing her from every angle. “Something loose, I think. Simple, yet sophisticated.”

Hilary looked doubtfully at her maid, who raised her eyebrows and blinked in response.

“Sit, sit!” Cecily made a shooing motion toward the dressing table and Hilary obediently sat. “I’ll show your maid how it’s done.” She smiled at Trixie and beckoned. “Come along; I won’t bite.”

Hilary blushed and protested at Cecily so demeaning herself as to arrange her hair, but Cecily waved away her objections. “I like doing it,” she said.

When Trixie had perfected the coiffure Cecily showed her, Hilary ordered tea for them in the upstairs parlor.

“Thank you for showing my maid that style,” said Hilary, handing Cecily her cup. “It is perfect.”

“You don’t have any sisters, do you?” said Cecily. “Well, neither do I, of course, but I lived with Rosamund and my other cousins at Montford House for years. She and I were forever creating our own coiffures and practicing on one another.”

Cecily rolled her expressive eyes. “Imagine growing up side by side with such a beauty. Intolerable! The only thing that saved me was that I’m so dark. If I’d been fair like Rosamund, I should have eaten my heart out with envy.”

Hilary laughed. “I doubt that. I’ve rarely seen sisters closer than the two of you. Why, you complete each other’s sentences.”

“Only when we are in company. When we are alone together, we don’t need to finish our sentences at all.” Cecily sighed. “It is a pity Rosamund is so adorable. I wanted to loathe her when I first arrived at Montford House.”

She sipped her tea. “Oh, but I was an angry child. I spent so long being furious at Jonathon for leaving me—as if dying was his choice. Ironic, isn’t it? I never knew how close to the mark I was. I was only beginning to reconcile myself to his death when he was resurrected.”

“It must have been a shock.” It was bad enough for Hilary when he’d announced his identity. Imagine if one thought one’s beloved brother died and he later returned.

She regarded Hilary shrewdly as she set down her cup. “Has he told you how that came about?”

“Yes, he has,” said Hilary. Tentatively, she said, “And now he is in danger again.”

“Only this time,” said Cecily with a grim little smile, “he has the might of the Westruthers at his back.”

*   *   *

Davenport mulled over his notes again, tamping down his impatience. The scene of Xavier’s library was wholly different from when he’d been there last.

Papers were scattered everywhere. His cousins came and went, delivering pieces of intelligence gleaned from sources high and low throughout London. Davenport was the obvious one to receive and collate the information, piecing fragments together like a jigsaw. But the enforced lack of physical activity made him edgy and frustrated.

He needed to be a hundred places at once. Kicking that weasel-faced villain’s head in and forcing him to spill his guts about who’d hired him. Interviewing lowlife villains and hired cutthroats, scientists, apothecaries, intelligence officers, and military officials.

Visiting Nail, who even now languished at death’s door after the weasel had stabbed him in that alley. Davenport had insisted on hiring a nurse and calling in an experienced doctor, but both professionals had shaken their heads. They must wait and see.

He was bloody well sick of waiting.

He wanted to be with Honey. He wanted to see her triumph at Montford’s ball, then take her away and do unimaginably wicked things to her body.

He needed to
do
something, not sit here behind a desk.

But the task of finding the instigator of the weasel’s activities was too large for one man. He’d been forced to delegate. They’d all used their various connections among the military and the government; even the Duke of Montford had lent his efforts. All of them drew a blank. Ashburn had met with universal derision when he’d raised the subject of Davenport’s invention with various members of the Royal Institution.

Such attitudes could be feigned, of course. However, Ashburn’s subtle suggestion of significant monetary reward for a man who could synthesize such an explosive as Davenport had claimed to do didn’t meet with more than tepid interest.