Something About Emmaline (23 page)

“You did it, milady,” Thomas said. “Thought we were goners for sure when he laid down that queen. However did you get the king?”

“Yes, Emmaline, do tell,” came a familiar voice from behind them. “How did you conjure that card?”

All three of them came up short.

Sedgwick.

“M-my lord!” Simmons stammered.

Emmaline glanced over her shoulder and looked Alex straight in the eye. Now was no time to show fear, no matter that her legs quaked beneath her. “I didn’t have to conjure anything. I always win.”

“Yes, I can see that now.”

“Milord—” Simmons began.

The baron cut him off. “I will deal with you later, Simmons. This is between her ladyship and me.”

“Perhaps if we all just went home…” Emmaline suggested.

“You can’t go there,” he said, cutting her off as well.

“Because of this?” Her hands balled into fists and stuck to her hips. This was exactly the reason why she hadn’t confided in him to begin with. “If it’s because I helped the staff regain their stolen wages, I’ll have you know I was only—”

If she thought she knew him, he surprised her completely by laughing and tugging her into his arms. “No, my little
spitfire. It has nothing to do with the fact that you just outcheated probably the best sharp in London.” He laid a kiss on her forehead. “You can’t go home because my grandmother would be rather upset to find the current Lady Sedgwick looking like a scullery maid.”

“Your wha-a-at?”

“My grandmother.”

Simmons hadn’t been standing as far away as he might have, and was obviously eavesdropping. “The dowager has arrived? Impossible!”

Alex glanced over at him. “Very possible, Simmons. She landed on our doorstep not an hour ago. And in a fine fettle at not being able to meet my wife.”

Emmaline tried to breathe. Lady Sedgwick? Oh, she had gone too far in her deception if she’d drawn
her
to London. Alex was one thing, but his grandmother?

“Sedgwick, this is a catastrophe,” she said.

He nodded in agreement. “But I might have an idea of how to get you back home,” he told her. “Simmons, I need you and Thomas to go to the house and very discreetly do the following…”

He explained his plan to them and Emmaline stared at him in wonder. Who would have thought that under all that starch, Sedgwick could be so devious?

Of course, she reminded herself, this was the man who’d managed to make up a wife.

Then with Thomas and Simmons dispatched, Sedgwick caught up her hand and began leading her in the opposite direction.

The warmth of his fingers lent her the hope that she’d find a way out of this latest wrinkle. And she clung to his grasp with more tenacity than the purloined king she’d held earlier.

After a block or so, Sedgwick finally spoke. “Am I to presume you overcame your aversion to cards?” He slanted a wicked glance in her direction.

Emmaline flinched.

“As well you should cringe,” he told her. “Just tell me you won that fortune fair and square.”

She said nothing. What could she say? Really, it was more a question of moral ambiguity than right or wrong.

“Demmit, Emmaline,” he shot at her. “Do you realize the danger you were in back there? That man you were playing against was no footman or callow youth. He had every marking of a cardsharp. You risked too much. You risked
us.
”

Us?
Whatever did he mean? Emmaline’s gaze shot to his, only to find him looking straight ahead, as if seeing a future he had no right to dare.

Of them, together.

No, she was just imagining this. Imagining that he cared enough to find a way to let them stay together.

But didn’t he know, didn’t he realize that it was out of the question? No matter that it was what she wanted more than anything.

“So do tell,” he began. “How is that you were able to beat him, when you have confessed to merely a passing skill at parmiel?”

She heaved a sigh. Perhaps it was time for the truth.
All of it.

Oh, heavens no. Emmaline didn’t dare. For to tell him the truth would put an end to any notion that they could stay together.

“I have a slight talent for cards,” she said. That wasn’t quite the truth—her skill for cards was legendary, to the
point where she’d been unable to play in the regular circles of sharps and gamesters who made the rounds through the inns and byways of England.

Sedgwick came to a stop at a corner, and they waited there as a carriage passed. “And let me guess,” he said. “This skill of yours was how you came to make your living.”

Why did she think she could continue to gammon him? She took a deep breath and nodded.

“Before you were shot or after?”

“Both,” she confessed.

Sedgwick groaned. “Is that what Lady Neeley meant when she wrote to the duchess about your indiscretions—you cheated Sir Francis at cards?”

“I didn’t have to cheat to take his money,” she shot back. “I beat Sir Francis fairly. He’s a terrible player.”

“And were all the players you encountered as terrible as him?”

She glanced away again.

“Oh, demmit, Emmaline, don’t tell me you went about the country, not only posing as the Duchess of Cheverton’s companion, but gaming your way through the most gullible of the country gentry?”

“Well, when put that way, it sounds quite disreputable,” she said. “But that is hardly the case. I never played against anyone who couldn’t afford to lose…or didn’t deserve to.”

Sedgwick gave a snort of disbelief.

Oh, bother the man and his pompous aristocracy. She loved him with all her heart, but sometimes…

“’Tis easy for you to stand there so high and mighty, but not everyone has your position in society or your fortune,”
she said. “I daresay you wouldn’t be so toplofty without your fat accounts and scraping servants about.”

“My servants do not scrape,” he said, his shoulders straightening with noble indignation.

“If you say so,” she said, “but the world outside your protected sphere isn’t the tidy and orderly place you would imagine. In fact, it can be quite dangerous. Especially for a woman alone.”

Oh, demmit, she’d said too much. For his gaze narrowed, and then focused on her brow.

“You were shot for cheating,” he said, his words more of an indictment than the concern he’d shown earlier. “That’s how you became injured.”

“No, Sedgwick, that’s not why I was shot. If you must know, I was shot because I objected quite vehemently to being raped. Raped by one of your peers who thought it was his right and privilege to have any woman not of his class.”

“You weren’t—”

“No.” Emmaline’s voice was tight and closed off. He’d strayed too far into her secrets again and now she was pushing him away. But this time he wasn’t going to let her.

“Tell me what happened,” he said as he led her down a quiet, empty street.

She shook her head.

“Emmaline, have you ever told anyone?”

“No one has ever really cared to hear the truth,” she said, as if she were daring him to do just that.
Care.

Care about her.

“I want to know. Know everything.” His words rang with a sincerity that she’d never expected. Like Elton’s confes
sion earlier in the day, Sedgwick’s request burrowed into her heart and took root.

Where it had no place to even hope. That Sedgwick wanted to know the truth about her could only mean he wanted no more lies between them.

And yet once she told the truth, the entire truth, the admiring lights he saw in his eyes tonight would go dark forever.

She was sure of it. Yet how could she not tell him? She owed him that much.

Emmaline heaved a sigh, and stared down at the cobblestones. “If you must know,” she told him, “the night began well enough. We were at the Drake in Surrey, with Hawthorne choosing the marks and me playing the hands.”

At this point, he interrupted her. “Who is Hawthorne?”

Hawthorne?
He would want to know the details. But this was Sedgwick, and he did deserve to know. Everything.

“My husband.”

“Your what?” he erupted, coming to an abrupt halt.

“You heard me. My husband.” She tried to get him to continue walking, but he stood his ground.

“You’re married?”

Emmaline glanced heavenward. “Yes, but it isn’t what it seems—”

“Not what it seems? When one’s wife confesses that she is already married—”

Her hands went to her hips. “But we aren’t, Sedgwick. We aren’t married.”

“But if you’re already married, that means we can’t—”

Can’t what?
She looked up at him and saw the truth. Saw his thoughts, saw his heart as if it were emblazoned in the very shock she spied in his eyes.

Oh, dear heavens he meant for them to marry. She didn’t even want to hear such a thing. They couldn’t marry, and that was just the way it was. For a thousand reasons beyond her own small impediment. And the foremost one being that proper barons did not marry cardsharps.

Oh, but if they could…She shook her head. “Do you want to hear my story or not?”

“Yes, but—”

“No more questions. I’ll indulge you with this story, but no more questions. That was our agreement.”

He made a noise in the back of his throat that sounded mostly like a growl, but she had to assume he was going to acquiesce.

After all, Sedgwick was a patient man, in the bedroom and out, so she knew he’d listen to her sorry tale, but the entire truth could not be forestalled much longer. Especially given the dowager’s arrival in their midst.

“Go on,” he bade her.

“Thank you,” she replied. “Now, where was I?”

“T
he Drake in Surrey,” Sedgwick told her.

“Ah, yes. Hawthorne had found—”

“Your husband, this Hawthorne, approved of your cheating?”

“Yes, Sedgwick, my husband approved. Gads, he was the finest mace cove in three counties. ’Twas why I married him. If you can’t beat them—” she started to say.

“I don’t believe marriage is part of that maxim.”

“It was at the time,” she told him. “So, do you want to hear my story or not?”

He grit his teeth together, as if biting back an objection, then nodded for her to continue.

“As I was saying, there were two perfect marks. Local gentry, young and in their cups. However, they wouldn’t play against a woman, so Hawthorne joined their table, much to my objections.”

“I thought he was a good cheat.”

“He was good at cheating, terrible at cards. I’ll have you know that not all cardsharps cheat by sleight of hand or other such methods. Many work with a partner to spot cards from across the room or act as a distraction.”

“The serving girl back there. The one with the…” he fumbled over the right way to describe her.

“The one with the spilling bosoms? Yes, but she was to distract Gatehill. Actually, the young pot boy from the Tottleys’ was paid to distract—” Emmaline glanced over at Sedgwick and he looked about to be ill. Really, the man needed to get out more. She heaved a sigh. “Shall I continue?”

He took her hand in his. “Yes.”

The warmth of his fingers curled around hers, reassuring and full of something she dared not even consider.

Well, once he’d listened to her entire sordid past, he wouldn’t be so forthcoming, but she owed him the truth, especially after she’d lied to him about tonight.

“At first,” she said, continuing her story, “he was winning.”

“At first?”

“That was always the case with Hawthorne. I knew the night would most likely end with us being evicted, so I went upstairs to our room to pack and perhaps get a few hours’ sleep. Besides, the public room had emptied out and it would have become obvious that Hawthorne and I were working as a team if I stayed. I had to cross my fingers he would be able to continue his lucky streak.” She paused for a second.

“But he didn’t,” Sedgwick said, prompting her into the darkest part of the story.

“No.” Emmaline closed her eyes. She couldn’t do it. She’d never told anyone what had happened in that room.

Sedgwick, dear and wonderful Sedgwick, must have sensed her hesitation and gathered her close. “If you don’t
want to continue…” His strength surrounded her.

Then it struck her. She had to imagine she could dare anything enveloped in Sedgwick’s arms. Even this, the nightmare that still brought her wide awake at night.

“I awoke to find Hawthorne coming into the room,” she whispered. “Then to my horror, his two gulls came in as well.”

Sedgwick took a deep breath. She felt his arms tighten, as if ready to launch himself into the coming calamity.

“Hawthorne had lost more than he had, more than we had. More than I had that I hadn’t told him about.”

Sedgwick let out a small laugh. “You held out on your own husband?”

“I may have been young when I married him, but not completely insensible to his deficiencies. I have to confess I had some coins hidden where not even he would find them.”

He tousled her hair lightly. “So what happened next?”

Emmaline heaved a sigh. “Hawthorne had offered my services for the night. To both of them. When I protested, he knocked me on the bed and told me to shut up.”

“Shut up, you little conniving bitch.” Hawthorne turned to his companions. “You can have her, gentlemen, do with her what you will. She’s a lively piece if you rough her up a bit.”

She lay on the bed struggling to find air. He’d hit her so hard it had knocked the very wind from her.

Hawthorne?
she wanted to gasp. Certainly he’d betrayed people in the past, but she was different.

But hadn’t that been her father’s protest when she’d run off and married Hawthorne?

Button, my lass, he’ll not be true to you. He’ll leave you in sorry states one day, mark my words.

Now her father’s prediction was coming true, if the lascivious gleam in the two young men’s eyes was any evidence. Yet, hadn’t she always known that one day, somehow, Hawthorne would lead her to something so terrible that there might not be a way out of it?

Even worse, when she looked up, she spied the man she loved in the process of plucking up her hairbrush and slipping it into his pocket.

Gads, no. He knew about her stash, her hiding place in the handle. He knew and he was stealing everything she had saved.

“Goodbye, my dear,” her once-beloved husband said as he made his exit.

Beloved no more.
The wretched bastard.

But as much as she wanted to spit and curse at him, she was in a sorry state indeed. Then she remembered the one bit of advice from her father she still could put to good use. Better than one of her grandmother’s pithy sayings.

Keep it close and keep it loaded.

And thankfully, she always had. Her gaze sped to her valise under the window. So very close, yet too far away to help.

With Hawthorne now gone, the first man said, “Come on, wench. Show us how you fight for it.” He reached out, caught hold of her gown and tore it from her body.

As she started to struggle, began to scream, the other man slapped a meaty paw down on her mouth, pinning her to the mattress. His other hand wound into her hair, so she couldn’t struggle.

“Don’t be doing that,” he warned her, whispering into her ear while his large paw of a hand cut off her air. “The innkeeper has had more than his fair share of trouble of
late, what with the excise man and the magistrate breathing down his neck. He’ll not want to be awoke by your caterwauling.”

The other fellow was fumbling with his pants. “Not to mention the ruckus we caused last week with that gel he brought in from London for us.”

She didn’t wait to find out what sort of trouble they had caused with that poor wretch. She could well imagine. She kicked the largest of the two in his swollen groin, sending him sprawling backward, howling in pain and swearing a blue streak.

His friend released her, only long enough to clout her in the head. He hit her so hard, she flew from the bed and lay in a heap on the floor. Dazed and confused, she shook her rattled senses, struggled to stop the room from spinning. But this time, luck was on her side. She looked up and realized she’d landed under the window, and within reach of her valise. She shoved her hand inside and managed to grasp her pistol.

Now all she had to do was to be able to see straight enough to find her target and to make good the one shot she had.

In the path of moonlight streaming through the window, she thought she spied a looming figure coming toward her. She certainly heard the black, ugly promises he was spewing and knew there was only one thing she could do.

She raised her wavering hand and pulled the trigger.

The pistol exploded to life and the bastard fell aside.

“Did you kill him?” Sedgwick asked. His question wasn’t filled with condemnation, but rather wry hope.

Emmaline shook her head. “No. I only winged him. But it was enough to fell him for the time being.” She paused, pulling together the last vague threads of her story and not telling exactly where she’d nicked the blackguard. “I don’t remember much past this. I got up to run, but I had only taken a step or two, when I was shot.”

She could hear Sedgwick’s jaw working, then his terse, anguish-filled question. “How did you survive?”

“Luckily for me, the innkeeper was in dire straits. He was under a cloud of suspicion by the local authorities, and the good citizens of the town had been making a hue and cry to see him closed down. The last thing he needed was the squire’s son being shot under his roof, never mind a woman of questionable reputation dying in one of his upper rooms. There would have been an inquest at the very least. So they hauled me out of the village and down to the main crossroads, throwing me to one side of the road, assuming that I would perish before morning, well away from the inn, leaving them free of suspicion.”

“How did you learn all this?”

“I found out later.” Without thinking about it, she touched her forehead. It pained her still, but it had been a lesson in duplicity that she’d never forgotten.

“The next thing I knew, I was in a gypsy’s wagon,” she told him. “They had happened by in the wee hours and one of the children spied my arm sticking out from the bottom of a hedge. The leader wanted to leave me be, saying it wasn’t their concern, but his mother, a woman of some power, decried such a notion and said it would bring ill fate to their family to ignore my plight. She claimed that one day I would be able to repay her family in kind.” Emmaline
smiled. “Whatever the reason, I have her to thank, for she also had considerable skill as a healer. She cleaned my wound, stitched it closed and gave me a draught to sleep.”

“And you remember all this?”

She shrugged. “Bits and pieces. I remember her face, the smell of herbs, and the voices, low and in their own tongue. I learned the full story later, when I was a bit more awake.”

“Then what happened?”

“The caravan continued for a week or so until they came to a small village high up in the hills, and the old woman declared this was where I needed to go. They left me with a kindly vicar and his wife, who took me in without even blinking an eye. The old gypsy woman intimated that I was quality and it would do them well to help me. So they cared for me and I followed the old woman’s lead and let them continue to think that I was a well-to-do victim of terrible circumstances. Slowly I recovered, but eventually my stay came to a crisis.”

“How so?”

“A heavy snow fell and stranded a large party in the village. The Duke and Duchess of Harringworth. There was no room at the inn to house all their servants, so the vicar and his wife were pressed to offer rooms as was everyone of some standing. I overheard the vicar, a singularly devout man, telling his wife he knew not what to do. They needed my room but hadn’t the heart to oust me.”

“However—”

“Yes, however, when faced with the opportunity to house the duchess’s companion it was more than even he could pass up. He needed a new roof for the parish, and perhaps if the duchess’s companion was well pleased with her accommodations, she would recommend his case to Her Grace.”
Emmaline paused. “You see, I was in the best guest room and they could hardly offer the duchess’s dearest companion the attic.”

Sedgwick nodded. “I see their dilemma.”

“So you can imagine who was moved to make way for their well-connected guest.”

“A lesson you heeded,” he noted.

“Most decidedly,” she confessed. “But the lesson didn’t begin until later that day when the duchess wanted to play parmiel but enough players couldn’t be found.”

“And let me guess…”

Emmaline grinned. “In a single evening I discovered an entirely new quarry—rich and bored matrons.”

Sedgwick laughed. “I assume you took ample advantage of the situation.”

“Not at first,” she said. “The duchess was the most overbearing, frightening woman I’d ever met. Besides, I was stunned that people played with so little thought to the outcome.” She glanced up at him. “Though my amazement wore off quickly when I realized there was a stake to be had.”

He laughed. “And so you gained one.”

“Yes. But better still, because I learned to read with my mother’s copy of
Debrett’s,
I possessed a working knowledge of society.”

“I take it that’s how you knew so much about Clifton and Lady Oxley.”

She flinched. “You heard about Lady Oxley?”

“How could I avoid it? Hubert recounted Lady Lilith’s grievances in detail this evening on the way to the theater.”

“I’m sorry about that,” she offered.

“Actually, I’m quite impressed. It sounds like you have the entire thing memorized.”

“I do.”

“Prove it,” he demanded.

“Ask me something,” she challenged back. “Anything.”

“Fine. Lady Pepperwell, for instance. Who was her mother?”

Emmaline glanced toward the night sky. At least he could have tried a little harder. “Lady Pepperwell’s mother was Miss Mary Trippley, the second daughter of the fourth Baron Nocton. I believe the current baron resides at Nocton Park, which adjoins Sedgwick Abbey. Isn’t that so?”

Sedgwick’s mouth fell open.

“Care to try again?”

He shook his head. “I’d say your lessons were put to good use. Can you really recall it all?”

“Everything but for the pages I’m missing,” she told him. “As my grandmother would say, everything has a purpose. And my ability to recite those entries allowed me to converse quite readily with the duchess and her companion. Meanwhile, the duchess was a wealth of information about the inner workings of society. The sort of
on dits
that aren’t on the venerable pages of
Debrett’s.
”

“Ah, the bread and water of the
ton
—gossip.”

“Exactly. And when I left the vicar’s I had a new purpose—”

“And a new identity,” he added.

She nodded. “Yes. I saw how the vicar and his wife nearly fell over themselves trying to coddle the duchess’s companion. So after a little time spent probing the duchess’s extensive connections, I was able to winnow out who would make the best employer—”

“Or rather the most convenient,” he noted.

“Exactly. The Duchess of Cheverton rarely if ever comes
to town. But when she does she is known for cutting a wide swath with her biting and blistering comments.”

“A woman to be feared,” he said.

“Yes, and one that most everyone would like to curry favor with. While her disdain is dreaded, her favor is regarded as a social
compli,
for occasionally she takes pity on some young lady and sees to it that she secures a fabulous match. So by posing as her companion, everyone would want to come to my aid—”

“And at the same time, perhaps gain the duchess’s largesse.”