An Unlikely Duchess (33 page)

****

Caroline was late down to breakfast the next morning having danced herself into exhaustion the night before.

Last night had been one of the happiest of her life. She did not want to dwell overmuch on the reasons why, just enjoy the memories and discuss the events with Rebecca.

She had been surprised to return to the booth last night to Lady Sarah’s news that Edward had sent a message to their box to say that Rebecca was feeling tired and he was taking her home. But then, had he not escorted her home from the opera just the other night? Perhaps it was an excuse to spend some time alone.

Caroline had smiled at the thought of Rebecca and Edward being so much in love and had relaxed. Lord Hadley had joined their party so she felt a little better about how often Mr. Crawdon had claimed her to dance, though she had to turn away from Lord Hadley’s and Lady Sarah’s rather vulgar display.

She had come home much later than anticipated and was unsurprised to find that Rebecca and the dowager had already retired.

Now she rushed downstairs to find out Rebecca’s wonderful news.

Upon entering the dining room she was surprised to find the dowager dining alone.

“Good morning, your grace,” she greeted the older lady politely.

“Ah, there you are my dear,” came her answer. “I had quite given you and your sister up this morning.”

“My apologies, we stayed out much later than anticipated,” said Caroline. “Though I am surprised that Rebecca is not up yet. Perhaps she really is unwell.”

“Whatever do you mean?” asked the dowager.

“His grace returned her home quite early last night, your grace. It cannot have been after midnight. She was feeling unwell…” Caroline trailed off at the dowager’s confused look.

“My dear, I did not retire until past midnight last night, in fact I was writing your mother. Lady Rebecca did not return home.”

Caroline lowered the plate she’d been filling.

“She—she did not come home?”

She felt sure that the duke would not have been so stupid as to take Rebecca to his house. Rebecca would be completely ruined.

Without another word, Caroline ran up the stairs and burst into Rebecca’s room. There she found Maura, cup of chocolate in hand looking as alarmed as Caroline felt.

“Maura,” Caroline barked, “what time did Lady Rebecca return last night?”

“I—I do not know, my lady,” Maura stammered, “she told me not to wait up, that she would be very late. But, her gown is not here and her night rail is still laid out. And her—her bed. It has not been slept in.”

A panic gripped Caroline’s heart and she looked frantically around the room as if searching for a clue as to what was going on here.

The dowager appeared in the doorway.

“Rebecca has not come home, your grace,” Caroline said numbly. She could see by the older lady’s expression that they were both thinking the same thing — she was in Edward’s house.

Dear God did neither of them care about the scandal?

“I cannot think that Edward would do this,” the dowager said though doubt tinged her voice, “he has never put so much as a foot wrong in Society since he gained his title. He would not do something like this.”

“I think we should pay him a visit immediately,” was Caroline’s only answer.

The dowager nodded and left to send for the carriage. And Caroline wondered which of them she would strangle first.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Edward was awakened by a pounding on his door and in his head.

“Go away,” he bellowed as he turned over.

Bailey ignored his command and entered the room anyway. Edward was not surprised.

“Bailey,” he croaked, “I am going to need one of your concoctions to rid myself of this blasted headache. And before you begin the sermon, do not. I have made a royal hash of my life and drinking an entire bottle of brandy is only the half of it. Not that it made me feel any better. I still could not stop thinking about the damned girl. She—”

“Your grace,” Bailey, surprisingly, interrupted Edward and, not only that he sounded graver than Edward had ever heard him.

Edward lifted his pounding head to look at his valet. The older man’s face was drawn.

“Good God man, what is the matter?” Edward asked jumping out of bed and throwing on breeches and a shirt. It was a testament to Bailey’s state of mind that he did not even wince as Edward pulled clothes randomly from his closet and threw them on haphazardly.

“Is it my mother?” Edward demanded as fear seized him.

“No, your grace, the dowager is quite well,” Bailey answered to Edward’s relief.

But his relief was short lived as a fear unlike any he’d ever known gripped him at his shaken valet’s next words.

“It is Lady Rebecca, your grace. She is missing.”

Edward did not wait for Bailey to finish. He sprinted from the room and tore downstairs. He did not even know where he was going but the sound of voices drew him to the drawing room.

He entered and stopped dead in his tracks.

His mother was wringing her hands by the fireplace and Lady Caroline was sobbing quietly into a handkerchief on the chaise.

“What the hell is going on?” he demanded, fear making his voice louder and harsher than he intended.

“Oh Edward, it is Rebecca. She is gone. She is gone.” Here his mother started to cry too and Edward could not get his head around the words.

“What do you mean, gone? Gone where?”

“We do not know, your grace,” Lady Caroline lifted her head and her eyes shone with tears that spilled down her face. “We thought she was here.”

“Here? Why would she be here?”

Caroline looked at him in exasperation before answering, “Because you brought her home last night when she was unwell. Only, her bed has not been slept in so we thought perhaps you had taken her here. But clearly you haven’t and now I do not know what to think.”

An icy feeling of dread settled into the pit of Edward’s stomach.

“Lady Caroline.” He walked further into the room and dragged his hands through his hair in agitation. “I have no idea what you are talking about. I did not bring your sister home. She — we, we argued and I left. Oh God, I left her there alone. I was so angry. The things she said! I—”

“You did not bring her home?” the dowager repeated, cutting into Edward’s panicked confession.

“No I did not,” said Edward then turned back to Lady Caroline, “Who told you that I did?”

“Lady Sarah.”

Edward clenched his jaw then turned to his butler. “Get my horse. And hurry,” he said as he swept from the room back to his bedchamber to ready himself.

“Your grace, I have taken it upon myself to send for Mr. Crawdon, he will be here directly,” Bailey informed him as he helped Edward into his jacket.

“Thank you, Bailey.”

“If I may be so bold, your grace, I think it would be wise to wait and hear what exactly happened last night before you go tearing off to Lady Sarah’s.”

“Wait?” Edward whirled round and snarled at Bailey, “wait while she is God knows where? That woman knows something and I intend to find out what it is.” He took a deep breath and looked at his old friend and confidante. “Bailey, she has to be safe. She has to be.”

His face crumpled in despair and he bowed his head as the weight of his panic bore down on him.

Bailey reached out and gripped the younger man’s shoulder. He’d never seen his master lose his composure and he wasn’t about to let him do it now.

“Your grace,” he spoke gently but firmly, “I believe that the lady is safe and will be found. And I believe that you will try harder than anyone to bring her home. But you must keep your wits about you. You will not help her if you lose your mind now when you need it most.”

Edward looked up into the wise eyes of his valet and smiled a little.

“You are right, Bailey. Thank you.”

Bailey merely nodded and left the room.

Edward would get her back if it killed him.

****

By the time Edward’s horse was ready, Tom had arrived and was in the drawing room with the ladies. He looked more serious than Edward had ever seen him.

“Tell me what happened,” was Edward’s only greeting to him.

Between them, Caroline and Tom told of last night’s events, of how Lady Sarah had apparently received a message from Edward himself that he was taking Rebecca home. It only stood to reason then that she was behind everything going on here.

“I think it is past time I paid a visit to our friend, Lady Sarah,” said Edward grimly.

“I am coming too,” said Tom rising.

Edward did not argue.

He turned to his mother and Lady Caroline. “Will you remain here or return home?” he asked as he made his way to the door.

“We shall stay here, I think,” the dowager answered. “I do not want to be at home with the servants speculating about what has happened. Yours do not know us well enough to pry.”

Edward merely nodded his agreement before sweeping from the room.

Tom looked over at Caroline, curled up on the chair as if trying to protect herself from the horror of the situation.

He walked over and hunched in front of her, forcing her to look up into his face.

“We will find her, Caroline, I swear it,” he whispered fiercely. Caroline nodded once and then, with a swift kiss to her head, he left to follow Edward.

Caroline watched them leave.
Dear God, I hope so,
she thought desperately.

****

Rebecca came to again and was relieved to find that although her head still hurt and her stomach still heaved, her vision had cleared and she seemed to have her wits about her a little more than last time.

The first thing she noticed was that it was bright out. Daylight was seeping through the flimsy curtains covering the windows. That must mean that they’d travelled through the night, ‘they’ being Rebecca herself and whomever had taken her.

The second thing she noticed, with surprise, was that she was no longer in a carriage. She appeared to be lying on a bed in a room that was surprisingly luxurious compared to the carriage that had brought her here.

Her confusion and instinctive fear mounted.

A fierce stabbing pain in her wrists and ankles that she had not noticed at first due to the overwhelming pain in her head drew her attention. When she looked down she saw, to her horror that she was tied up with tightly knotted rope.

Panic bubbled up inside her as she looked frantically around to try to ascertain where she was, but she did not recognise the place at all, sure she’d never been here.

She could feel her breathing becoming shallower as the panic threatened to overwhelm her and forced herself to remain calm. It would do no good trying to figure anything out in the middle of an attack of hysteria.

She slowed her breathing and forced her mind back to last night, dismayed to find she had no real memory of it. There had been the carriage ride with Lady Sarah and the horrible things the woman had said about Edward.

Edward… there it was again. That vision of him walking away from her. They had argued. That was it! They had argued about the things Lady Sarah had said and Rebecca had told him — oh God, she’d told him that she did not love him.

He had left and that was really the only thing she could remember. So, where was she and who had brought her here?

Her breathing froze as the door to the bedroom slowly creaked open. And the panic that she had supressed mere moments before welled up in full force.

“Ah, you are awake.” George Simons smiled widely. “I was beginning to think you’d sleep through the day as well as the night.”

He spoke happily as if it were perfectly normal to have the daughter of his landlord tied up on a bed.

“Where am I?” Rebecca croaked hoarsely.

“We are in a hunting lodge a little ways outside of London. I won it from an idiot baron who had more money than talent for cards. Isn’t it just like you lot, throwing money away, never having to work a day in your lives for it? Well, this is mine now.” He paused and looked back at Rebecca. “And so are you.”

Rebecca swallowed back the panic she felt. She had never heard him talk so much and his speech was rapid and rambling. There was an insane gleam in his eye. Rebecca feared he was quite mad.

“Mr. Simons.”

“My name is George.”

“I do not think it appropriate to call you that,” she said carefully, wondering at his mood.

He threw back his head and laughed.

“Trust me, Rebecca,” he deliberately used her name and stalked toward the bed. Rebecca’s whole body stiffened in fright. “We will not have any cause for formality when I am done with you.”

Rebecca bit back a sob of horror, not wanting to imagine what he meant but she was no fool. She wished with all her heart that Edward were here to keep her safe. To help her.

But even if he knew where she was, and how could he, who was to say that he would care? Rebecca had said awful things to him. And all because of what that horrible Lady Sarah said. Well, what if the lady had lied?

Stop it, Rebecca,
she chided herself. This was hardly the time to wonder about the duke and Lady Sarah. She was tied up with a mad man for goodness sake.

“H-how did I get here? I do not remember.”

“Oh, that was easy enough. Course I had to get around your precious duke first, did I not? Always hanging around. Always watching you. I did not like the way he looked at you, Rebecca. He looked at you like you were his. But you are mine. You know that, don’t you?” he crooned.

He sat on the bed and stroked her face. Rebecca could smell the stench of old sweat and whiskey from him but did her best not to recoil from him. She had a feeling that any sort of negative action would tip him over the edge.

“George,” Rebecca whispered, trying to keep her voice level, “you know that you cannot treat people this way. You cannot tie people up. You cannot kidnap them.” She tried to sound as reasonable as possible.

“Oh I haven’t kidnapped you, we’re eloping,” he said matter of fact.

Rebecca took a calming breath and tried again. She must attempt to reason with him, to keep from angering him, until she figured out what to do and how to get out of here.