The Rogue (13 page)

O
n the fourteenth of January, Torquil Sterling had perished aboard his own ship sailing from Newcastle-Upon-Tyne. His brother, a passenger on the vessel when bandits beset it, laid the merchant to rest in the sea, and traveled onward to London where he informed their cousin of the tragedy.

Torquil Sterling had indeed resided in the Duke of Loch Irvine's house in Edinburgh while doing business at Port Leith in September and December. But Lady Melville's information was not entirely accurate. Torquil Sterling had not let the house; the duke had invited him to stay there as his guest while he was absent.

Constance learned this from Lord Michaels through subtle probing after Lady Easterberry departed. But the baron seemed distracted, and soon excused himself.

“Remarkable,” Eliza said, pouring whiskey into her teacup. “Do you think Torquil was as handsome as his brother? Cheekbones like that are family traits, you know.”

“You doubt it?”

“That the biddies of Edinburgh have outdone themselves this time? Oh, no. I accept that entirely.”

Constance stood up. “I will ask him.”

“What exactly will you say, child? ‘Dear Mr. Sterling, although I cannot manage to take my eyes off of you when you are in the room, I wonder if you can tell me whether your brother was an abductor of innocent girls before he died in your arms?'”

Constance left her. Many times she had been upon the verge of telling her companion about the Falcon Club. Never more so than now did she wish to explain precisely how successful she had been on numerous occasions at stealing information from people who never knew they were being robbed.

But Saint was different. With him, untruths unraveled upon her tongue. She could not lie to him.

But he could not be found. None of the servants had seen him since morning, and when she went to the mews she learned that he had taken his horse out hours ago and had not yet returned.

He never dined with her family, although her father had invited him to do so. After dinner, she went to bed, remembered the thrill of feeling his body against hers, and found sleep elusive. In the morning she would send a maid to inform her fencing instructor that she would not appear for her lesson. If he thought her craven, so be it. She had an appointment to keep with Maggie Poultney's mother. Innocent girls, after all, were the reason she now pursued the Duke of Loch Irvine.

“H
E BARRED THE
door to me!” Dylan sprawled on his back on his bed, an arm thrown across his face.

“With an actual bar?”

Dylan uncovered his eyes and raised his head off the mattress to scowl at Saint. “With a pistol clutched in his fist.” His head plunked onto the counterpane anew. “He threatened to shoot me if I tried to see Chloe again.
Me.
I am a
baron
, for God's sake. What must a man do to impress a damned member of the provincial gentry?”

“Hold on to his monthly income longer than an hour, I suspect.” He ran his fingertips along the edge of the rapier, testing the sharp edge. The fine whetstone had worked wonders.

Dylan sat up. His face was a splotched mess of despair. “I must see her soon. But how? Where?”

“Perhaps you will encounter her upon one of your many social calls.”

“If
only
. . . But, wait, that's it! I will ask Lady Constance to beg Loch Irvine to send Edwards and his family an invitation to his party tomorrow night. The old curmudgeon won't refuse an invitation to a duke's house.”

“Except, apparently, this duke's house while you reside in it.”

“Edwards won't put it together. He doesn't know Loch Irvine's courting Lady Constance. It's rumor, of course.” He moved to the edge of the bed. “Which puts me in mind . . . She asked me about Tor today.”

“Who asked you?”

“Lady Constance, you noddy. Don't you listen to me when I'm speaking?”

“Hardly ever.”

“P'raps her father wants to expand his ventures and he's set her to investigating opportunities. She could do it. She's frightfully intelligent for a woman. But by God, she's a beauty. Loch Irvine was speechless seeing her today. Couldn't string together more than five words of sense at a time.”

He should see her wearing breeches.
Although, if things went Loch Irvine's way, he would see her wearing nothing at all.

Dear God
, he had to get out of this place.

“If he is as eloquent as all that, you and he must have had plenty to talk about.” He climbed to his feet and went to the door.

“You are a regular wiseacre, cousin.” But Dylan's voice had altered yet again. “Do you know what they're saying about Loch Irvine?”

“As I am not a party to the calls you make among Edinburgh's best and brightest, I do not.”

Dylan waved that away. “Servants talk. My man spoke of it to me this morning.”

Saint did not bother noting that he hadn't a “man.” Nor had he ever. And in his exalted position in a noble household—reserved for dancing masters, drawing masters, and tutors—the only others in the house who spoke to him with any freedom were the butler and housekeeper, as well as the coachmen because his very fine horse made him worthy of notice. But those upper servants were above gossip.

“Well, aren't you curious?” Dylan pressed.

More than he wanted to be. “You seem eager to share.”

“They say he's got a club.” The words sounded peculiar, at once breezy and forced.

“Don't men like you have multiple clubs? I thought you took membership in at least three.”

“His
own
club, muttonhead. Head of it. But this one ain't a sporting club, or even a scholarly thing.” He peered askance at Saint in the manner he used to look at Monsieur Banneret when he was guilty of some misdeed. “It's, well, it's the sort of club a fellow don't talk openly about over tea. The sort Tor would have liked quite a lot, I suspect.”

“Not you?”

“Nossir!”

Saint showed his skepticism.

Dylan shrugged. “Not since I met my pearl.” Abruptly transformed, he lay back on the bed, arms akimbo. “I'll engineer her invitation to Loch Irvine's party. And then tomorrow night after I've held her in my arms again . . .” Staring up at the canopy, he heaved a dramatic sigh. “You've never seen a prettier girl, Saint. And she'll be mine.”

The contentment on his face was so real, Saint had to
smile. Dylan's infatuation was a simple thing, complicated only by her father's disapproval. Once that was overcome, the pair's happiness seemed assured.

He deserved that happiness. Abandoned in the West Indies by parents who preferred to enjoy life unburdened by a child, Dylan had been raised by servants who barely tolerated him. Only the plantation's steward, Georges Banneret, had paid the baron's young heir any attention. Yet despite it all, he had an innocent, childlike appreciation of others that required only merriment and fond fellowship. Now, with Chloe Edwards, he would have that.

Tomorrow night, after the lovers' reunion, Saint would bid his cousin good-bye and leave them to their happiness.

T
HE
E
AST
R
OAD
to Leith departed beyond the royal palace and bent toward the port to the north. Partway there, a westward turn into cultivated fields wended to the Duke of Loch Irvine's house.

Night had already fallen when the Duke of Read's carriage joined the crush of vehicles before the house to disgorge the elite of Edinburgh. Torches illumined all, and jewels glittered upon ladies' necks and gentlemen's fingers as they eagerly passed through doors flanked by footmen in smart livery.

Constance accepted Lord Michaels's hand to step onto grass damp with a smattering of snow. The house was lit from every window, sparkling gold and welcoming. She had not imagined the duke capable of such a festive show, and after so few days in town. Quite clearly he wished to impress. But whom, exactly?

The event was all anyone had spoken of around tea tables and in the parks all day. The enigmatic duke had never before hosted a party, not at either of his two castles or here. He might never again. No one dared miss it.

Amidst the chatter, Constance had heard the names of Maggie Poultney and Cassandra Finn whispered. She wondered if the gossips imagined the duke had a horde of
maidens imprisoned in his house that they might accidentally discover during the evening.

Her prospective betrothed stood at the base of the stairs in his foyer, dressed in a black coat and stark white shirt and neck cloth, torchlight casting his features into harsh angles. He crossed through his guests to her and her father.

“Sir. My lady. Doctor,” he said with a shallow bow, entirely ignoring Lord Michaels and Eliza.

Her father perused the crowd. “A fine turnout. My compliments, Loch Irvine,” he said and moved off.

Their host returned his attention to her. “You're lovelier than an angel.”

She disliked it when men called her what she was not: angel, goddess, occasionally savior.

“And yet you look positively diabolical. What a pair we must appear.”

“Aye, you've a tart tongue between those teeth.”

“Do I? I thought I was merely being honest. Lately I am trying very hard to be so.”

He peered at her with scowling eyes. “This—” He gestured curtly. “I've done this for you. You understand?”

“For me? How kind of you. I do like a good party.” Considerably less than she liked a hard ride or an hour with her bow and a quiver full of arrows. “Thank you.”

“I know less than half o' these folk,” he grumbled.

She tucked her hand into his arm. Beneath her fingertips was thick, hard muscle. It felt alien. She thought of Saint's lean strength and how easy yet impossible touching him had always been, and she got weak with longing she could not cast off even as she was taking another man's arm.

“Shall I make you acquainted with your guests?” she said.

Nodding, the duke allowed her to lead him about.

M
USIC, CONVERSATION AND
a great quantity of fine food characterized the Duke of Loch Irvine's party. He was not entirely taciturn; although he seemed not to enjoy the
conversation of most of his guests, he spoke with Dr. Shaw at length.

After several hours, Constance left him to make her way from guest to guest at her own pace. But she sought out one man in particular.

Sir Lorian Hughes was thirty-five years old, with sandy hair, long, poetical sideburns, and an impressive physique. She knew he boxed in London; once he had boasted to her of his conquests at Gentleman Jackson's. At the time, he had been dangling his comfortable fortune and good looks before hopeful maidens. When she made her disinterest clear, within the sennight he offered for Miranda Priestly.

Lady Miranda Hughes was now nowhere to be seen. Instead, in a corner of the drawing room Sir Lorian spoke with a young lady of black curls and rosebud lips who Constance recognized as the daughter of an Edinburgh family of no pretentions.

A hand on her elbow arrested her. Constance turned.

“Oh, dear.” Miss Anderson's cheeks turned crimson. “Mama told me not to be so forward. She says I am all
hands
.”

“No worry.” Constance clasped the girl's fingers in quick reassurance. “I am not as starchy as I should be either.”

“You, starchy?” Miss Anderson giggled. “Oh, Lady Constance, how I would someday like to be like you, so—so—
graceful
.”

“What a dear you are.” Sir Lorian was leading Miss Edwards toward the dining room now. “Was there something you wished to speak with me about?”

“Yes. That is . . . everybody is saying that Mr. Sterling is among your party. No one among my friends has yet made his acquaintance. I hoped you would not mind making an introduction.”

“Mr. Sterling?”
Here?

“Yes. He is . . .” The girl's cheeks turned even pinker. “
Compelling.
Why, look. He wears a sword when no other gentleman does. Is it not
illegal
to do so?”

He was here.
That she saw him every day in her own house mattered nothing now. This was public. This was
reality. This was the world they had never been in together. This was the world in which they were not allowed to be together.

“He is an accomplished swordsman,” she managed to say.

“Is he?” Miss Anderson's eyes rounded. “How utterly
romantic
.”

She had once thought so too. Fool that she was, she still did. “I will be glad to introduce you,” she said with a smile. She did not want to introduce him to pretty girls, not even girls he could not possibly court, like this daughter of a baron.

And then he was walking toward them and, like the girl at her side, she could only stare. He wore a dark coat of very fine cut and the same partial smile upon his lips that had driven her mad from the first night she had ever seen him. He looked like a gentleman. With the naked sword at his side glimmering in candlelight, he looked like more of a gentleman than all the other gentlemen in the place, thoroughly handsome and quite possibly dangerous and perfect.
Perfect.
The way he looked at her now, as though there were no other women in the room, the house, the entire world, made her want to scream.

He bowed. “My lady.” Then he turned his attention upon Miss Anderson.

Maude smiled prettily, stammered a bit, complimented him on everything she reasonably could—his sword, his coat, the buckles on his shoes—and when he thanked her with an economy of words, she launched into a monologue about everyone she had yet spoken with at the party.

He listened attentively, smiling a bit each time she paused for acknowledgment. Finally Lady Easterberry appeared with her other daughter, Patience Westin.