Sacrifice (Fashionably Impure Book 3) (9 page)

Miranda found herself perched on the edge
of her seat, chest tight with both apprehension and some frustration. “But
surely he’s told you what is keeping him there and why he must travel to New
Orleans? Surely, you must know more.”

Ruel’s look turned regretful, almost
pained. “No, my dear, he hasn’t written to me since the last time.”

Miranda folded her hands primly on her
knees, as though by doing so, she wouldn’t lose sight of her manners. That she
wouldn’t become demanding or shrill as the urge within her demanded. She took a
deep, calming breath. “New Orleans. What business can he possibly have there?”
she asked, a useless venting of her worry.

And her hurt.

Why wouldn’t he share why he had to stay
so long in America? Why wouldn’t he tell her why he had to travel?

Devil take it! She was his countess.

His wife.

And she was completely at a loss as to
what he was doing.

When she had first read his letter, worry
and dread had consumed her. She had told herself that Ruel would have the
answers.

Now that hope had been proved fruitless,
anger began to seep through her worry and concern.

Damn, Adrian, what was going on the other
side of the world to hold him there?

A chuckle from Ruel jerked her from her
whirling emotions. She looked up to see him grinning.

“Ah, New Orleans.” His tone turned a
shade wistful. “Where the liquor flows freely and the women are so exotically
beautiful that they can ravish a man’s senses with just a look.”

“Can they indeed?” Miranda asked, in a
snappish voice that made her cringe. And betrayed the doubts that made her
despise herself.

“Yes,” Ruel said, “the finest of them are
quite lovely in a dark, exotic way. Almost—” he turned to his countess. “Almost
as exotically lovely as my lady.”

His gaze seemed to caress Anne and then
he leaned over to kiss his wife’s olive-hued cheek.

A flush spread over Anne’s face. Then she
seemed to shake herself and she turned to Miranda, her dark eyes kind. “Adrian
has always been a constant and loyal man.”

Ruel’s expression sobered. “Yes, of
course he is. You needn’t worry, Miranda.”

****

But Miranda did worry. Especially as she
marked the days off on her calendar and another month passed.

She received a letter from Adrian, saying
that he had journeyed to another place in Louisiana called Natchitoches.

And his words had been strung together
oddly. His usual bold, yet neatly penned, script nowhere to be seen for
the
 
words were written in a jagged and
messy manner. Hard to read.

She remembered what Ruel had said about
liquor flowing freely there.

Had Adrian begun drinking heavily again?

The thought made her feel sick.

She had flown back to Mayfair, to Lloyd
House and demanded to see Ruel immediately.

He had not been at home and she had to go
to his chambers at the Inns of Court.

She felt every male stare burning into
her. She imagined that she could hear their titillated whisperings among each
other as she was seen entering the Earl of Ruel’s office.

How unwise to come here but she couldn’t
help it. She had to do something.

Anything.

When Ruel tried to make light of the
matter of Adrian’s continued absence, to tease her, she thrust the letter under
his nose.

“Look, look at that. Is that your
cousin’s normal handwriting?”

Ruel frowned and took the letter, closely
examining it. He glanced back up at her, his gaze serious. “If we do not hear
something more assuring from him in another two weeks, I will go to America
myself. I promise you. I’ll bring him home to you and Davey.”

He refolded the letter carefully before
placing it back in her hand. She tucked into her reticule. Then he enfolded her
hand with both of his large, strong ones.

The warmth of his hands bled through her
silk gloves and the concerned, paternal aspect to his regard comforted her.

She took a deep, ragged breath.

“Now don’t worry,” he said, the deep
timbre of his voice, not like a father, for he was too young for that. But he
was her husband’s older, male cousin. A powerful, wealthy earl.

And he was willing to be friendly to her,
to offer his power and wealth and experience to aid and protect her.

It was the closest thing she had ever
known to being in the shelter of a regular family.

She wasn’t alone in this.

He cleared his throat softly. “Promise me
that you will not worry and make yourself sick. You women have a way of doing
that and it won’t solve anything.”

“I’ll try not to worry,” she replied.

He smiled, ever so slightly. “I’ll drag
him home by his heels if I have to.”

****

The night had seemed hotter than it
should. Miranda rolled onto her stomach then thrashed her legs that seemed
hopelessly tangled in the damp sheets but she couldn’t get comfortable.

Eight months.

Adrian had been gone eight months.

Eight months of aching for him all alone
in her bed. These last few months of worry over what was happening.

Irritation poured over her and she rolled
on her back and stared at the ceiling.

Lord Ruel had his travel plans made and
he would leave for America within the next week.

More waiting.

Waiting for him to arrive in America and
to write to her.

She would have gone with him. But Davey,
in his growing sorrow and apprehension over Adrian being gone so long, had
begun to suffer from nocturnal stomach aches and nightmares again.

She didn’t want to subject him to the
rigors of sea travel nor did she wish to leave him behind.

She had written to Adrian about Davey’s
condition.

And heard nothing for over a month.

Hot anger flooded her, making her feel
hotter than ever. With a groan, she extracted herself from the damp tangle of
sheets then arose from bed.

She stumbled to the kitchen and asked her
sleepy-eyed housekeeper for some tea.

“Don’t you want some toast and cheese?
There is some of that cold duck as well?” Mrs. Williams, the housekeeper, said,
concern in her tone and her broad forehead creased with a frown.

Miranda shook her head.

She felt too sick at heart to eat.

“My lady, forgive the impertinence.”

Miranda nodded, listlessly.

“You don’t eat. You don’t sleep. You just
stay up, pacing in the corridor and the garden.”

Miranda said nothing. She did not feel
emotionally close to this new housekeeper and it was uncomfortable to have her
personal moments watched so closely.

The matron continued. “My lady, you are
losing too much weight. You really should eat something.”

Miranda placed a hand to her stomach.
“Please, just the tea. Lots of honey and cream.”

When it was ready, she took the tea out
to the garden and sat there slowly sipping, watching the sky turn from night to
a grayish sort of dawn.

The wind began to gust, carrying the
scent of rain. The briskness refreshed her and the growing violence of the
breeze suited her churning emotions. At the first drops of rain, she held her
face up to the sky. But when those drops became more of a torrent, she was
forced to flee inside.

The air was too hot, too humid.

Even the fire didn’t help remove the
dampness from the chamber. Waiting for Davey to awaken, she reclined on the
settee and dozed fitfully.

“My lady.”

Miranda pulled herself from the world of
her troubled dreams. “What?”

“A letter came for you.”

Her heart leapt into a rapid beat and she
sat, rubbing her eyes, trying to clear the remaining sleepiness from her brain.

The housekeeper placed the letter into
her outstretched hand.

“More tea, my lady?” the matron asked.

“Yes, please,” Miranda said, without
really thinking.

She was staring at the crumbled letter.
It bore several water splatters.

And a Philadelphia postmark combined with
the flourishing script that bore the name:

Mr. Jan Sexton

She flipped the vellum over. The heavy
wax seal was as impressive and self-important as any English noble’s.

She brushed her fingers over it. Then she
tore the vellum open and scanned the contents.

Dear Lady Danvers,

I hope this letter finds you well. It is
with the deepest regrets that I must inform you…

Her heart seemed
to stop. Her hands began to shake. She jerked her gaze away for she couldn’t
bear to read any more—

Chapter Six

With her
heart’s beat increasing to a gut churning speed, Miranda forced herself to read
on:

I
must inform you that Lord Danvers was overcome by fever in Natchitoches. He was
incapacitated by this illness. The necessity to provide him superior medical
care forced my hand. I was forced to remove him to Philadelphia. He is
recovering well now and should be returning to England soon…

Relief
washed through her, making her weak all over. She sagged back on the settee.

Drowsiness
washed over her and she fell into a deep slumber.

“My
lady.”

Miranda
startled awake. “What?” she said, on a gasp for she had been dreaming deeply.

She
looked about. The shadows were long. It must be afternoon. “Davey?”

Mrs.
Williams smiled. “He attended to his studies this morning and now he’s playing
happily in the garden.”

“Very
good.” Miranda stifled a yawn. She couldn’t believe that she had slept nearly
all day.

“My
lady, you have a visitor.”

“A
visitor?”

“Baron
Drake.”

Miranda
sat up and attempted to smooth her hair.

Once
Miranda had changed her clothes and received Drake in the withdrawing chamber,
he looked uncomfortable. “Unfortunate news will break soon. Too soon. It will
be a shock. And not even the news but the resulting rancor from peers that
Danvers might have expected to remain sympathetic to him.”

“What?
What do you know?!” she asked, giving explosive vent to her growing anxiety.

“Lord
Danvers killed the Duke of Winterton.” Baron Drake spoke the words
matter-of-fact, as though he had not just thrown her whole world off its axis.

With her
stomach seeming to be collapsing on itself, she backed away from him as she
threw a hand to her mouth. Then she jerked it down. “How? What? When?” The
words tore from her lips.

She was
shaking all over with the shock, the need to know everything. Impatience
pounded through her blood with every surge of her wildly escalating heart beat.

Drake
came closer and touched her arm. “Here, my lady, you need to sit.”

She
flinched away. “Tell me what happened!”

He
regarded her with those coldly intelligent, dark blue eyes. “The Duke of
Winterton is dead.”

“What?”
She took several steps back, recoiling what his terse sentence implied.

A cool
sort of sympathy softened his expression. “Lord Danvers shot Winterton from
behind. The bullet struck the duke in the head, as he lay unconscious from too
much drink, on his stomach in bed in a Natchitoches brothel.”

The
floor seemed to shift beneath Miranda’s feet. “No, no, no… it can’t be!”

“Please,
my lady, have a seat. Rest yourself a moment.”

“I can’t
possibly rest.”

“My
lady.” His voice became softer. A steely, deadly kind of softness. “You must
brace yourself for there is more.”

“More?”

No, not
more. She couldn’t possibly bear more.

He
motioned to the nearest chair. “Please, sit.”

Miranda
all but collapsed into the chair. She looked up at Drake.

His eyes
were colder now, his expression grim.

“Oh God,
please tell me, is he… is he…”

“He was
alive last I heard but how he managed to recover, I do not know.”

“What do
you mean?”

“A
bullet wound, infected like his—”