He knocked discreetly at the door and asked the butler if he might speak with Lady Darent. He had thought of approaching Joanna, but there was always the danger that he might find himself confronting Alex Grant instead. That would be a very different business from blackmailing a woman of Lady Darent’s apparent sensibilities. The butler gave him a supercilious look and Tom was almost certain he was going to refuse, but a hefty bribe helped the situation enormously and he was shown into the library. Nor did Tess Darent keep him waiting. It was barely two minutes later that he heard her step in the doorway and her voice.
“You asked to speak with me?”
Tom, who had been admiring the picturesque display of china that Lady Grant had arranged in a window alcove, turned abruptly. For a moment he thought he was seeing things, for in the light of the candles the woman standing in front of him looked like Merryn, sounded like Merryn and yet she most definitely was
not
Merryn. His instincts told him that even before the light shifted again and he saw that the superficial likeness was deceptive. This woman was taller than Merryn was, darker, lushly curved where Merryn was more angular. Tom realized vaguely that he had never considered Merryn beautiful, never really thought about her in such feminine terms because she had always insisted on being treated as an equal, like a man. This woman, in contrast, was lavishly, deliciously female. Tom swallowed hard.
The woman came forward into the light. “How do you do?” She extended a hand to him. “I am Teresa Darent.”
Tom automatically took her hand in his. Hers was warm and soft and it seemed to flutter within his grasp. He felt short of breath and oddly out of countenance. So this was the widowed Lady Darent, whom the ton called the much-married marchioness. This was the woman who was barely twenty-eight but had buried four husbands already, whom rumor said wore them out by her insatiable demands in the marriage bed. Suddenly Tom’s mouth felt as dry as cinders.
There was nothing predatory about Tess Darent. When he had heard the stories of her, Tom had imagined she would be one of those fast widows who indulged each and every one of their appetites whether it was for gambling, men or every other vice. He had thought of her as an older, wilder, more ravenous version of Harriet Knight. Now he saw her—touched her—he realized that her appeal was the opposite. She was entrancingly, fatally innocent. Every last man she met would want to protect and cherish her, Tom thought. She was irresistible, from the dimples that dented her cheeks when she smiled to the way in which she looked on a man as though he were the only creature on earth. She was smiling at him now and dimpling at him as well, as though he were a god, the most fascinating man she had ever met. Tom, who had thought he was immune to feminine wiles, could feel himself slipping and sliding somewhere very hot and tempting indeed. The combination of Tess’s winning charm and lusciously rounded body made Tom feel that his collar—and other items of clothing—were simply too tight.
“And you are?” Tess prompted him, and Tom realized that he had been staring. Probably his mouth had been hanging open, too. He knew he was making an almighty hash of this and if he was not careful Tess Darent would remember him in future as no more than an inarticulate oaf she had found loitering in the library. He tried to pull himself together.
“How do you do, Lady Darent,” he said. “I am Tom Bradshaw.” Smooth he was not. He groaned inwardly. This was not going quite according to plan.
But Tess was still smiling. Her gaze traveled over him, assessing, thoughtful, in no way a fool.
“How may I help you?” she asked. A small frown puckered her brow. “You must forgive me, Mr. Bradshaw—” she hesitated “—but I am not accustomed to meeting with mysterious gentlemen.”
“I’m not a gentleman,” Tom said before he could stop himself.
Tess’s lips twitched. He saw a gleam of amusement in her eyes. “Indeed?” she said. She put her head on one side, studying him. “So you are not a gentleman. Who then are you?”
This, Tom thought, was his cue to reveal his identity and that he had information on Merryn’s whereabouts that he was prepared to sell to her. Lady Darent would be horrified of course, shocked and distraught, but she would see the sense in agreeing to his terms in order to buy his silence. But he could feel himself struggling. Normally he had no qualms about introducing people to a few painful facts. But with Tess Darent it seemed wilfully cruel, like breaking a butterfly. He shrugged inwardly and squared his shoulders. He could do this.
“I have come about your sister, Lady Merryn,” he said. “I have information as to her whereabouts. And other information that you may wish to…buy…from me.”
He waited for the vapors, screams or swooning, but Tess Darent stood absolutely still. He was not even certain that she had understood him. He had heard gossip that she might in fact be a little short on intellect. Here was the proof, surely, in her blank expression. Then she spoke.
“How do you know Merryn, Mr. Bradshaw?” Her tone was impassive.
“She works for me,” Tom said. “So you see…” He paused, smiled winningly. “I know a lot about her. I could
tell
people…a lot about her.”
“I see,” Tess said. She moved slightly, resting her hands on the top of the library table as though she suddenly needed to draw strength and support. Well, Tom thought, his news would have come as a shock. No doubt she was appalled, frightened and uncertain what to do next.
“So,” Tess said, “let me understand you clearly, Mr. Bradshaw. Merryn works for you. You know her present whereabouts, and you wish to discuss exchanging that information for hard cash.”
She did not sound shocked. She did not even sound upset. Lady Darent, Tom thought admiringly, revising his opinion, was nowhere near as stupid as people said she was.
“That’s right,” he said. “You might wish to consider how much my silence is worth.”
“One bullet, I would think,” Tess Darent said briskly. She stepped back from the library table and Tom saw that she had a tiny pearl-handled pistol in her hand. She used it to gesture him to a chair.
“I don’t like blackmailers, Mr. Bradshaw,” she said very sweetly, “so I suggest you reconsider.” She paused, head on one side, the pistol rock-steady in her hand. “I wonder which part of your anatomy you value the most?” she pondered. “I think I can guess.” Her gaze fell to his crotch. She took aim.
“Wait!” Tom said. He burst out into a sweat.
Tess paused. “Speak, Mr. Bradshaw,” she said. She smiled at him. “I am listening.”
CHAPTER TEN
A
T SOME POINT
Merryn woke, feeling cold and stiff. One of her arms was numb where she had been lying on it and when she shifted it hurt so excruciatingly that she could not help but cry out. The darkness was absolute and the night was silent. She felt as though she had woken alone in hell, the beer fumes pressing down on her like a blanket, smothering the life out of her.
A second later, Garrick was beside her, crossing the space between them, reaching for her.
“Are you hurt?” His hands were already moving over her, checking for any injury. She willed herself to accept his touch as impersonally as he offered it but somewhere deep inside she was shaking in response.
“I am a little stiff, that is all,” she said. “And cold.”
And so very lonely…
Garrick drew her into his arms. She could see nothing of him. He felt more familiar now, though, treacherously so, as though she had learned how to be in his arms. The brief rub of his cheek against hers was rough with a day’s growth of stubble now, all evidence of the elegant Duke extinguished. The smell of him—lime cologne and the scent of his skin—was reassuring. It soothed her senses. Merryn was too tired now to try to distance herself from him either physically or mentally. Instead she tangled her fingers in Garrick’s shirt and drew him close, her head against his chest. She felt his breath stir her hair, then his body relaxed, his arms going about her more closely and holding her against him softly and protectively as though she were a child. Sleep crept around the corners of her mind again like mist. She let it claim her.
She woke again some unmeasured time later, her heart racing, the panic fluttering through her blood again as she gasped for breath. In her dream she had been thirteen years old, running through the meadow near her home at Fenners, the grass whipping her legs, her skirts tearing. She had to reach Stephen, had to get there in time because it was the only way to save him. Her heart was thumping with the effort of running but she knew it was already too late, knew Stephen was sliding away from her, dead, gone and it was all her fault… She gave a sob, coming fully awake, the tears choking her throat and the ghosts of the dream filling her mind.
Someone was holding her in a strong grip and for a moment she fought it, before she recognized his touch and all the fight went out of her.
“Hush,” Garrick said. His voice was a soft rumble in her ear and it soothed the frayed edges of her fear. “You are safe. All is well.”
Still dazed with sleep, her mind cloudy and dull, Merryn allowed herself to relax into his arms again. It was gentle and sweet and for a moment she clung to him. She was too exhausted to pretend to either of them. She wanted Garrick to comfort her, wanted his strength and his tenderness. For one long moment she allowed herself simply to hold him and be held and then she sat up, pushing the hair back from her face, made clumsy by both tiredness and acute physical awareness.
“Did you sleep?” she asked.
“I was honor bound not to, if you recall.” There was an undertone of humor in his voice. “So no, Lady Merryn, I did not sleep.”
“Thank you.” Suddenly Merryn wanted to see him. She was so tired of this darkness. Except when they were next face-to-face in the full light of day it would be the moment she walked away from him forever. Her heart lurched and she felt sick and torn.
“It must be past dawn.” Garrick had let her go and stood up. She heard him move a little away from her. She felt cold and repressed a shiver. “The quality of the light is different in here now,” he said. “You can see the chinks of daylight appearing. Soon we may be able to find a way out.”
Merryn scrambled to her feet, mad hope soaring within her. “Oh, let us try now!”
“Such haste!” Garrick sounded ruefully amused. She knew that he thought she was desperate to escape him and it was true; she was. Or perhaps it was herself she was trying to run from, and the persistent instinct that told her to seek comfort in his arms.
Garrick’s movements, too, were slow and stiff. She could see his outline now, a dark shape against the lighter blackness. He was right. The quality of the light had changed. Tiny specks of daylight were seeping into their prison, illuminating tumbled piles of brick and stone, and cold dark water lapping at her skirts. Merryn had almost forgotten how it felt to be warm and dry.
“Careful!” Garrick’s voice stopped her as she stumbled against a rough pile of brick. He caught her before she tripped and for a second he held her close again, a perfect fit against his side, as though she had been made specifically to lie within his arms, safe and secure. Then he put her from him with exemplary courtesy and for some reason Merryn’s heart tumbled into her soaking boots and she wanted to cry.
“I need to…” She paused delicately, unable to think of a way to express various urgent physical necessities to a man.
“I need to, too.” He sounded gentle and amused, easing her discomfort. “I will move a little away and turn my back. I undertake not to turn around.”
“Thank you.” Teeth chattering, cold, stiff and shaking, she hurried to do what she had to do.
“I hope you are not too hungry?” Garrick’s matter-of-fact tone as she rejoined him eased her embarrassment.
“I’m famished!” Merryn confessed.
Garrick laughed. “I am sorry that there is nothing we can do about that at present.” He held out a hand to her. “There is less danger of you falling if you hold on to me.”
After a second’s hesitation Merryn took his hand. It was warm, reassuring and slightly rough. She rubbed her fingers across his palm and felt the cuts and abrasions he must have suffered when the walls had first come down. She heard his sharp intake of breath and realized with a strange skip of the heart that it was a reaction to her touch. The thought made her feel confused, heady, powerful, a little in awe to be able to do such a thing to such a man with so small a gesture. For a moment she paused in the caress, then, unable to resist, stroked his palm again, aware this time of each tiny cut and chafe, sensitive to the tension she felt now in Garrick’s whole body and the way that the air between them seemed to shiver.
“Lady Merryn—” Garrick spoke very slowly, his tone was a warning.
“I’m sorry,” Merryn said, allowing her hand to lie limp as a frightened mouse in his.
Garrick sighed sharply and took a stronger grip on her, drawing her forward. She followed him carefully over piles of rubble that shifted disconcertingly beneath their feet, around fallen walls, under hanging beams. Garrick seemed very surefooted, stumbling only once and biting off whatever expressive oath had sprung to his lips. Merryn followed, her hand tight in his now, every sense she possessed aware of him, of the roughness of his palm against the softness of hers, the sound of his breathing.
“Where are we going?” she whispered, and he turned his head, so close that she felt his breath feather against her cheek.
“Toward the light.”
It sounded simple, but the light was elusive, skipping a little ahead of them all the time. Merryn caught her foot in the hem of her gown and almost fell again and Garrick went down on one knee and then she heard a ripping sound and the bottom twelve inches of her skirt and petticoats came away. “What on
earth
are you doing?” she gasped.
“Preventing you from breaking a leg.”
“And for that you needed to…to disarrange my clothing?”
In the growing light she actually saw him grin. He straightened up. “Don’t tempt me,” he said.
Merryn looked up into his face. He was standing so close to her that she could feel the heat radiating from his body. She felt her stomach swoop at the intimacy of it. She wondered if she would ever be free of the acute awareness she had for him.
For a long moment they stared at one another and then Merryn tugged on his hand. “Come along,” she said again, sharply, compensating for the warmth of her feelings with the chill of her tone. “Toward the light.”
She was not sure whether it was getting hotter in the darkness or whether she was starting to develop an ague. The gloom was disorienting now, with tiny pinpricks of light dancing before her eyes, tempting her on only to lead to deep pools of stagnant beer or piles of rubble that were impossible to traverse. Their progress was excruciatingly slow and when, finally, they were confronted by a blank wall with only the tiniest hint of light beyond, Merryn could have cried out of sheer frustration.
Garrick was kneeling on the floor; she heard the scrape and chink of metal on stone and then a strange, hot breath of stale air engulfed her.
“All these houses have open cellars beneath them,” Garrick said. “They lead on from one house to the next.” He straightened up, dusting his palms. “I need to go down and see if they are flooded. If not we have a good chance of getting out that way—”
“No!” Merryn was shocked by the terror that hit her as hard as a tidal wave. She grabbed him and shook him. “Don’t go!” she said. “It’s dangerous. You might drown—” Her voice broke on a sob. She realized that she was holding Garrick so tightly that the material of his coat was scoring her sore palms. She felt frightened, an inch away from losing all control. All she knew was that he could not leave her. With him she was stronger. Without him she felt lost. And if anything were to happen to him… She could not bear the thought of it.
And then his arms came about her and they felt like steel bands, so strong and firm, and his lips were pressed against her hair and she could hear his heart beating steadily against her ear.
“Merryn,” he said, “I have to go. It’s the only way we can get out of here—”
“No,” Merryn said. She burrowed closer into his arms. “You might be hurt—”
Garrick put a hand under her chin, forcing it up so that she was looking at him. Her heart was pattering like a trapped bird but she could still feel the steady beat of his against her hand and when he spoke, his voice was very calm, too.
“Nothing will happen to me,” he said. He bent his head. His lips were very close to hers. “I’ll come back for you,” he said. “I promise. I won’t leave you.”
I’ll never leave you…
The words trembled on the air between them.
Merryn prized her fingers from his jacket and took a step back. “I’m sorry,” she said.
“You have nothing to be sorry for.” He sounded fierce. The kiss he gave her was equally fierce, brief, forceful, setting her head spinning. He turned to go. Merryn closed her eyes and prayed hard that he would not be gone for long and that he would find a safe way out.
Barely a second later there was a scraping, sliding sound that started softly but grew to a ferocious roar, and then without warning the world was falling again, the dust thick as a cloud about them, the brick and stone plummeting down and the only constant was Garrick’s arms about her and his body shielding hers as once again he stood between her and destruction.
“G
ARRICK
!
G
ARRICK
!
”
Merryn’s voice sounded a very long way away and it came from a place Garrick did not want to go back to. He knew that to return would hurt; even now, with consciousness lapping at the corners of his mind, he could feel the pain eating at him in a dozen different places. But Merryn had never called him by his name before and that mattered. He did not know why, but it mattered profoundly. She sounded frightened and lonely. She was so brave. He had to help her.
He tried to move. Nothing happened. No response at all. Oh, well… At least he had tried. He started to slip back.
Something brushed his face. Her hair. He could smell the scent of bluebells—astonishing when they had been trapped with beer and dust that Merryn Fenner could still smell of fresh flowers. Then her hands were moving over him, shifting aside some of the dead weight that was pressing down on him and robbing him of breath. He felt something else against his face, something warm and wet… Tears?
“Don’t die.” She sounded furious. “Damn you…” More tears, though he heard her sniff as though she were trying to dash them away.
“I’m fine.” The words were no more than a croak. His throat was full of dust. So were his eyes. He could not seem to open them.
“I’m not going to die.” With an enormous effort he forced himself to move. A hundred muscles screamed in protest. He ignored them. “See?” He half sat. “I’m alive. I wouldn’t dream of robbing you of your revenge by leaving now.”
“Oh…” There was a world of emotion in her voice. Garrick cleared his throat and blinked the dust from his eyes. He could see Merryn now, kneeling beside him, a pile of stone next to her. They must have been crushed beneath it and she had wriggled free and arduously dug through the rubble that trapped him. Her hands were bleeding and filthy.
Garrick shook off the remaining debris. He was aching all over, battered from the onslaught of falling masonry, fresh cuts oozing from his arms where the sharp edges of several bricks had caught him. He felt the warm, sluggish seep of the blood. He looked around. They had been more than lucky this time. One of the roof beams had fallen from two floors above, spearing the ground not three feet away from them. He shuddered to see it.
“You saved my life again.” Merryn sat back on her heels, resting her battered hands in her lap.
“You saved mine, too,” Garrick said. They stared at one another. “It could become a habit,” Garrick added.
She gave him a hesitant smile. “Well… Thank you. Again.”
“My pleasure.” He raised his brows. “Have you noticed anything?”
“Only that you look extremely disheveled… Oh!” She clapped a hand to her mouth. “I can
see
you properly!”
He could see her, too. In the narrow shaft of light that now penetrated from above she looked like a dusty angel. Her hair was almost white with dirt, a stiff, tousled halo about her face. Her skin looked unnaturally pale under its coating of grime but her eyes gleamed as bright as sapphires. She was filthy, her skirts in tatters, the skin of her hands and arms chapped and rubbed raw, but in a heartbeat she had regained all her courage and confidence. Garrick felt his heart jerk with admiration. Gently bred women were not raised to deal with disasters such as this. When danger struck they showed whether or not they had that core of steel and Merryn had shown character through and through. She had been brave beyond measure.