“Quit spitting at me like an angry cat, and sit down here and listen.” Impatient now, Alec reached up, caught one of her hands, and tugged.
“Let go of me!” Pearl was a strong woman for all her blatant femininity, and succeeded easily in freeing herself of his grip.
“Damn it, Pearl!”
Determined to get things straight between them while he had the chance, he leaped out of bed stark naked, then wrapped his arms around her to hold her still.
“Get your bloody ’ands off me, or so ’elp me God, I’ll scream the place down!”
That was a very real threat, although she didn’t know it. Visions of Paddy bursting through the door danced through Alec’s head. Of course, he had no doubt that his old friend would accept the situation for what it was rather than what it looked like once he had the chance to explain, but in the state he was in, Paddy was unlikely to wait for explanations. The thought of coming to fisticuffs with Paddy made him clamp a precautionary hand over Pearl’s mouth. Good God, what a damnable coil!
She was struggling in his arms, furious now, so he wrestled her to the bed, pushed her down, and fell on top of her to hold her there, one hand pinioning her wrists.
“Damn it, Pearl, will you be still and listen?” he hissed into her enraged face. She tried to knee him by way of answer, and he shifted himself just in the nick of time. Still, the blow made him angry, and his eyes blazed down at her as he pressed her deeper into the bed.
“If you scream, I’ll gag you,” he threatened, and lifted his hand, holding it just millimeters from her mouth so that he could replace it quickly if need be.
“You’re a whoreson son of a—”
Alec clamped his hand over her mouth again. She continued her furious tirade against the human gag. Rolling his eyes heavenward, Alec got a firm grip on his temper and tried again.
“ ’Tis Paddy,” he said as she squirmed mightily beneath him, knowing himself for a coward but not daring to admit to his feelings for Isabella as a reason for fobbing off the vixen beneath him. Like himself, Pearl had a wicked temper when roused, and was capable of God knew what degree of mayhem. He’d known her once to have set a man’s breeches on fire—with the man in them.
“Paddy—he’s besotted with you, crazy with wanting you. He loves you, Pearl. Truly loves you. And what you and I have together can’t stand up to that.”
She went very still as he spoke, staring up at him with narrowed, suspicious eyes. Encouraged by the fact that she was no longer fighting him, Alec lifted his hand from her mouth again.
“Do ya take me for a flat, Alec Tyron?” she demanded furiously as soon as she could speak.
“ ’Tis God’s honest truth. I swear it,” Alec said sincerely. “Paddy’s been hankering after you for a long while; it’s been as plain as the nose on your face. And tonight he told me plain that he loves you, girl. He also told me he’d murder any other man who bedded you, even me.”
Pearl snorted. “Paddy’s a great oaf, and you’re no more afraid of ’im than you are of the air you breathe. ’Tis that bloody little Isabella what’s come between us, and don’t try to tell me otherwise! She’s turned your ’ead with ’er simpering airs, that’s what it is! You’ve always ’ad a ’ankering to be better than you are, and you think she’s just the ticket! Well, I’ve news for you, my fine buck: she may think you’re great between the sheets, but to a lady like ’er, that’s all the likes of you are good for! Once she gets back to her blue-blooded kin, she won’t give you the time o’ day! Then what will you do, eh? Don’t come cryin’ to me, ’cause I won’t ’ave you!”
“What I’m telling you about Paddy is true, so you can just leave Isabella out of this,” Alec began, nettled, when Pearl, with an enraged cry, managed to throw him off her with a single mighty heave. She bounced to her feet beside the bed, and turned on him like a spitting fury.
“It is ’er!” she hissed. “I knew it! You’ve lost your bloody fool ’ead over ’er, ’aven’t you, you bloody idiot? So protective you are! ‘Just leave Isabella out of this,’ “ she mimicked nastily. Her sneer changed to an expression of utter rage. “ ’Tis in love with ’er you think you are, don’t you, you great fool? Well, mark my words, she’ll never ’ave you, not for nothin’ more than a stud, and after this, I won’t either! You can get down on bended knee to me in future, and you won’t get me into your bed again!”
“Pearl …” Alec came off the bed and approached her, knowing that he had handled her badly but helpless to think of a way to retrieve the situation. Reaching out, he caught both her hands and tried to pull her to him.
“You can just keep your ’ands bloody well off me!” she cried, jerking them free and jumping back out of reach. Then, to Alec’s horror, Pearl burst into a torrent of tears. Good Christ, how much more could a man take in a single day?
“Aw, Pearl, sweetheart, won’t you just—”
“You’re so full of shit you stink, Alec Tyron!” Pearl shrieked, the suddenness of it making him jump. “I ’ate you, do you ’ear? I ’ate you! And I ’ate that bloody scrawny bag of bones you’re doin’ it to, too! By God, I do!”
With that she ran to the door, jerked it open, and fled along the corridor, her nightdress billowing behind her like a shimmering golden cloud. Alec followed her as far as the door, then hesitated, watching thoughtfully as she disappeared down the stairs.
Perhaps this was something that Pearl was best left to work out alone. He knew that once she was herself again, she would hate the idea that he had made her cry. Pearl was a proud woman, independent, feisty. Alec suddenly threw up his hands, shut the door, propped a precautionary chair beneath the knob, and went to bed, thanking God that it was Paddy who had to sort this particular female out, and not himself.
The next morning, neither Pearl nor Paddy put in an appearance at breakfast. With a mental shrug—perhaps Paddy was at that very moment taking his advice—Alec ate a light meal, then, with only one stop in town, drove back to Amberwood in a natty high-perch phaeton. He’d bought it before all the attempts on his life, and had scarcely had a chance to drive it. He thought exploring the countryside in it might tickle Isabella’s fancy. As he neared Horsham he patted the securely wrapped package in his pocket and whipped up his horses, absurdly anxious to see her again. He shook his head at his own foolishness. At near enough to thirty as to make no matter, he was behaving like a green lad in the throes of his first infatuation. But he had to admit, it felt good.
Grinning, he imagined Isabella running down the steps of Amberwood to greet him, imagined enfolding her in his arms, presenting her with her present, and carrying her off to bed. Later, they’d laugh at how she had cried when he’d left, and she would model the necklace of a dozen robin’s-egg-sized amethysts set in silver he’d bought her, along with matching earbobs. At the thought that he might be able to cajole her into wearing just the jewelry and nothing else for him, his heart speeded up. God, he’d missed her a ridiculous amount just to have been absent from her for less than two days. But making up for lost time together might have definite rewards.…
As he pictured Isabella, with her soft mouth and softer body, her eyes almost exactly the color of the stones in his pocket, his grin dimmed somewhat. Something about that delectable picture was bothering him. He thought of Isabella and he felt …
His blood ran cold as he realized that what he was feeling was that omniscient tingle of danger again.
LV
I
sabella walked into the inn at Tunbridge Wells with Bernard right behind her. She was cold with fear, but clearheaded too. If he was taking her into a public inn, he could not mean to murder her out of hand. Could he?
This inn was called the Pelican. It was a fashionable establishment, outfitted with crystal chandeliers and soft carpets, obviously used to catering to members of the quality. Upon their entrance the innkeep hurried up to Bernard, obsequious as he inquired if he could help my lord in any way. Bernard waved him away with an impatient look.
The taproom was all but deserted at this hour in the afternoon. Bernard, with a heavy hand on her elbow, escorted Isabella to a private parlor that he must have previously reserved. The knowledge that there would be few people within earshot should she be in trouble heightened the panic that she was fighting hard to control. If Bernard had schemed to have her murdered, and the evidence said he had, what were the odds that he would try again? Surely, if he had tracked her down merely to kill her, he would already have dispatched her in the carriage. If he was squeamish about doing the deed himself, the cretin accompanying him, who obviously had been hired as muscle, could have done the deed. The man looked capable of any violence, and stupid to boot. So perhaps she was safe, at lease for the nonce. Then again, maybe she was not.
The contrast between the Pelican and the Traveler’s Rest could not have been greater. The Traveler’s Rest had been squalid, malodorous and downright dangerous. But Isabella would have exchanged her present elegant surroundings for it in a heartbeat, if she could have exchanged her present escort for her previous one at the same time.
Alec, She clung to the image of him arriving to rescue her as to a lifeline. Alec would be returning to Amberwood soon, she knew. He would miss her, of course, almost immediately, and start to search. But had anyone seen the coach, and her abduction? Would he even know where to begin to look? Would he guess that Bernard had found her? Or would his initial assumption be that she had suffered an accident or some such mishap?
She had to face the fact that it could be hours, or even days, before Alec managed to track her down. At the realization, she cast an apprehensive look at her stone-faced husband.
So far Bernard had spoken not one word after he had identified her to the thug accompanying him as his wife. Isabella, too, had remained silent out of a mixture of prudence and fear. After all, what was there to say between an adulterous wife and the husband who had in all likelihood paid to have her killed?
In a ridiculously incongruous gesture under the circumstances, Bernard opened the door to the private parlor and then courteously stood back to let her precede him into the room. Even if he planned to kill her, Bernard, a gentleman to his fingertips, would observe the courtesies to the end, she knew. Before she bowed to the inevitable and entered, Isabella cast a despairing eye back down the corridor. Should she scream for help now, before he got her alone?
But then, she had to remember that Bernard could not know that she knew that he had planned to have her killed. It was possible that he might suspect that she had some inkling of his plans—and then again he might not, because his opinion of her intellect had never been strong—but he could not know for certain that she knew. Safety lay in pretending ignorance of his intentions until she could get away, or until someone came along to rescue her.
Isabella took a deep breath, entered the room, and crossed to the unlit hearth (the weather had continued unseasonably warm). Then, schooling her features so as not to show the fear that made her nervous as a bird around a cat, she turned to face her husband.
For the first time in almost a year, they were alone together. Bernard had closed the door, and as she watched him, he locked it. Then he turned to look at her, his hands still resting behind him on the knob, his back leaning against the door.
Had she ever thought him handsome? Isabella wondered, marvelling at herself as her eyes swept him. The lowering answer was, yes, she had. She had once found his tall, slender elegance admirable. His face was thin and clever, with aquiline features and an olive complexion. Lines scored it from nose to mouth and, to a lesser extent, around his eyes. But never until this moment had she thought to wonder if those lines had resulted from too many nights of dissipation. His hair was black, with distinguishing wings of gray above either ear. His eyes were rather slanted, and dark brown. On this day, as on every other occasion that she had seen him, he was elegantly turned out, in a coat of blue superfine and biscuit-colored breeches. His Hessians gleamed like mirrors, and sported white tops and tassels. His linen was immaculate. Whatever else he was, Bernard St. Just was every inch a gentleman.
“Now, wife. Now you may tell me where, and with whom, you’ve been.”
He made no move toward her, but his eyes glittered with malice. Isabella had never in all the years she had been wed to him heard him raise his voice, and he did not now. But there was an icy note underlying his words that warned of rage barely suppressed. She was reminded again that he had wanted her dead, and with difficulty held back a shiver. But she had to brave it out. Her life might very well depend on it.
“I … I was kidnapped. Surely you know that.”
“You were kidnapped, yes. Unless, of course, you staged the whole thing, which I never, until I received word that you were living incognito with your lover, considered. But even allowing that the kidnapping was genuine, that does not answer the question of where, and with whom, you have been for nigh on three months. The ransom was paid, in full, less than a week after you vanished. You never appeared. We—your father and I—feared you were dead. You father had Bow Street Runners searching for you. Indeed, Alpin, who accompanied me in the carriage, is a Runner. When I came upon you, you were clearly not being held against your will. You were free to return home anytime you wished. Yet you did not. If you do not wish to feel the full force of my wrath, you will explain yourself, madame, and quickly.”
His voice was silky, but the very silkiness of it frightened her. He sounded capable of any violence.…
“Well?” He rapped out the word when she didn’t reply at once. Isabella jumped at the sharpness of it.
“I …” she began, desperately searching for an excuse. Would he believe that her dreadful experience had addled her brain, so that she had forgotten who she was? Not likely. But she could not tell him about Alec, or that the reason she had not returned home when she could have was that she feared he would try again to kill her. Quickly, quickly, she must think of some other, reasonable, excuse.