Barbara Metzger (23 page)

"I saved myself because I always feared you'd be back. That's why I didn't marry Sir Gilliam, or accept your offer, Lesley.” She turned back to Phillip. “And I don't care what you say or who you say it to. I hope they hang you!"

The footman had looped the reins of Hartleigh's horse around a bush, then returned to Maisie and the children, but he was keeping a careful watch. Careful enough to hear a word or two. So Lesley drew Carissa away a bit and asked, “Are you sure? If I hand him to the army, he will spew every drop of poison he can think of. I could have him impressed into the navy. He'd be gone long enough to be declared legally dead, if he survives at all. Many do not."

"No, he'd survive, and I would know he was alive. I'd never be free. Pippa would never be safe."

"You're right. I could, ah, dispatch him myself, though, before he spouts his filth. It would be a pleasure."

"What, become a murderer?” She pulled on his arm. “You must not! I would never forgive myself if you had that on your conscience the rest of your days. Besides, then you could go to jail, for everyone would know he wouldn't fight back. No, it is better for the army to handle this if he was a deserter. I will leave London before any of the ugliness lands on your doorstep, or Her Grace's. I only pray Pippa never finds out what her father was."

Lesley patted her hand, on his sleeve. “Very well, Carissa, he goes to the army. But you are not going anywhere."

"And neither are you, Hartleigh,” Phillip shouted. While Lesley's back was turned, he'd pulled a pistol out of his pocket and now bashed the viscount over the head with it. Lesley went down and Carissa started to scream, until Phillip warned, “One more sound and I kill him. They can only hang me once.” He snatched up the reins to Lesley's horse and jumped into the saddle. He called to her as he galloped past, “I'll be back for what's mine, darling."

Sue and Pippa were both crying, the footman was running after the armed madman on the stolen horse, so Maisie was shrieking, and Lesley lay on the ground with his head in Carissa's lap, bleeding all over her new gown, while the dog licked his face. It was a good thing the duchess had warned them there must be no hint of impropriety.

Tears were streaming down Carissa's cheeks until she saw the viscount's eyes open. The rogue had the nerve to smile at her, after frightening her nearly to death. She jumped up, letting his poor broken head fall back into the dirt, and shouted at him, “I told you I didn't belong in London!"

"Never turn your back on a jackal, Cap'n. How many times have I told you that?” Byrd shook his bald head, the seagull tattoo flying from side to side, he was that angry at missing the set-to. He should have been there, defending his master. For sure the viscount had made mincemeat of it. And his noggin. “You had to be the fine gentleman, expecting everyone else to play by the rules. You deserve to have your skull cracked."

Byrd was clipping the matted hair away from the wound on Hartleigh's head so he could clean it. Lesley was cringing with every snip of the shears. “Damn, go easy with the scissors. It'll never grow back."

Carissa had sent for Byrd the second they were back at Hammond House, figuring that the old sailor would know better than any sawbones what the viscount needed, having been in so many brawls himself. She was standing by with clean towels and warm water. She knew her complexion was turning green as the water in the basin turned red, but Byrd nodded approvingly. “You've got bottom, at least, missus. Not like that silly chit Maisie. She set up such a screeching, ‘twould be a wonder iffen the infant's milk don't curdle."

The duchess was prostrate with her smelling salts, and Aunt Mattie had swooned altogether at the first sight of Lord Hartleigh, as the footmen half carried him into the house.

The Bow Street investigators had been by, and the sergeant major of the local army barracks. Carissa had given them Phillip's portrait, telling Pippa that since the bad man in the park looked so much like her papa, the miniature would make their job that much easier.

"Don't worry, Mrs. Kane,” Inspector Nesbitt had assured her. “We'll find Cantwell, by George."

Carissa was not convinced. She would not let Pippa leave the house, no matter how many extra guards and footmen Lesley hired, nor would she herself go out. The man was unsteady, but he was not stupid. After all, he'd avoided capture all these years, hadn't he? He could grow a moustache or wear a wig, and walk right past a watchman holding his picture. No, they were not safe, and neither was the viscount now.

"Besides,” she told Lesley, trying to convince him to let her leave, “if they catch him, there will be a dreadful scandal. I would not bring such a disgrace on your house."

"There will be no scandal,” he said through clenched teeth as Byrd poured spirits in the wound.

"No scandal? You must be concussed after all if you think this is a simple matter of some deb running off with her groom. The only way people will stop talking is if I am not here for them to dissect."

"Lassie's got a point, Cap'n."

"And no one asked your opinion, Byrd. Ouch! Dash it, Carissa, just where would you go, where you and Pippa could be protected, where a bumblebroth won't matter?"

"I have been thinking, and I've decided that my father will just have to take us in. Not here in London, of course, but at Macclesfield Park in Somerset. The dower house is empty, so he wouldn't have to look at us. A groom or two with pistols would be enough of a guard in the country, where no stranger can go unremarked."

"He might not be unnoticed, but a bedlamite like Cantwell won't be stopped by a farmer with a pitchfork, either. And I'd wager that's where he'll look for you first, chickens returning to roost. That's why the fox is seldom hungry, Carissa. No, you'll stay right here until my head stops spinning and I can figure what's best to do."

"There is no reason for me to stay, I tell you. You've proved to the ton that I am a lady. That's what you wanted, isn't it? Now he'll prove you foisted an imposter on them, a liar and a cheat and a fortune hunter."

"Deuce take it, you are none of those things! You were a victim, by heaven. And I tell you, there will be no disgrace. You mightn't have been married to the rotter in the first place!"

Even Byrd stopped his patchwork to listen more carefully.

"That's right,” Lesley explained. “Cantwell was the deserter; you married Kane. If it turns out that his real name was Cantwell, or something else entirely, then your marriage vows were invalid in the eyes of the law. And you weren't with him long enough to be considered a common-law wife, either. I have men checking on the legalities right now, along with parish records and Cantwell's enlistment papers. If you weren't married to him, you cannot be tarred with the same brush."

"Not married? You mean I was never legally wed?"

"Exactly. Phillip Kane never existed,” he said with a pleased grin, until Byrd started stitching his scalp back together.

Carissa was horrified. Not that the big man was taking bigger stitches with her best sewing needle, but over the viscount's words. “But that makes Pippa illegitimate!"

"Only until I can change her name to mine."

"Change her name?"

"When we marry, Carissa. Haven't you been listening? I am the one with the battered brain box, not you. You are free to wed, or will be as soon as the legal chaps get the mess straightened out. We'll get a special license. My name will protect both of you from any gossip, and then I can make sure you're safe."

Free to wed? To wed Lesley? For a moment she caught a glimpse of heaven, then fell back to earth with a crash. “Safe on account of a special license? What makes you think that a scrap of paper will bother Phillip Kane? You are as cork-brained as he is. A marriage certificate did not keep him with me; it will not keep him away. Besides, no court can deny that Pippa is his child. What if he decides to claim her as his own?"

"He cannot claim anything, goose. He is a wanted man, a criminal. He'd be up on charges simply for striking a peer in the park."

"Yes, but I am not so certain I wish to declare my daughter born out of wedlock."

"My daughter was."

"But I am not a light-skirt, my lord."

He shook his head, then groaned. “No one said you were, dash it. Hell and damnation, I should have killed the cur when I had him."

"And what if he'd killed you? He was the one with the pistol, not you, Lesley. And you heard Byrd. Phillip would not have fought fair. I'd rather be his wife than have you dead."

"You are not that dastard's wife, blast it!"

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Carissa sank into despair. She'd never be free of the cloud that was Phillip Kane. Lesley sank back into depravity and debauchery. If Phillip Kane wished to find him, he'd be easy to spot at the clubs, the gaming hells, the low dives. Besides, the viscount had unfinished business.

He was not so lost to sanity that he went unarmed. Lesley did not carry a pistol, since, still seeing double occasionally, he feared shooting Wimberly the butler by accident. Then again ... But he did take his sword stick, and he did take Byrd.

He also took a heavy purse. When he could not wager for what he wanted, he purchased it outright. In a matter of days the viscount had bought up a fortune in vowels signed by Broderick Parkhurst. The holders of the notes were pleased, for they never thought to see a ha'penny of their winnings else. No one knew how large Sir Gilliam's fortune had been, but young Broderick could have bankrupted Golden Ball.

When he had them all, or enough to purchase an abbey, Lesley and Byrd paid a call in Kensington. They went in the morning, without stopping to change their clothes, since that was the only time Parkhurst was liable to be home.

The schoolteachers next door were returning from their morning constitutional, little terrier in tow. They sneered. Leslie let Glad off his lead.

"Damn, Cap'n, I never seen a dog climb a tree that way."

"That isn't a dog, Byrd. It's a fur-ball with feet. Good boy, Glad."

He used the knob of his walking stick to rap on the door of Parkhurst's house, then waited.

"Seems like no one's to home, Cap'n."

"Nonsense.” He rapped again. Carissa wanted this blasted house, and by Jupiter, she was going to get it. She'd never live there, no, and nowhere Lesley wasn't, for that matter, but she should have whatever her heart desired, as he fully intended to do. He no longer wanted a respectable woman to rear his daughter and his eventual heir, a responsible female he could install in the country and visit occasionally. The viscount had finally stopped fooling himself, and none too soon, as Byrd was the first to tell him.

He wanted Mrs. Kane. Not for his daughter, not for Carissa's demure dignity or her daughter, and not because he'd damaged her reputation. He wanted her for herself, for himself. And he wanted her badly enough to move heaven and earth, or that muckworm Mason, out of his way.

"Mr. Parkhurst is not at home,” Mason told them when he got around to opening the door. There were no other servants and the place looked like Parkhurst had tried to ride his horse through it, with about as much success as he usually had atop a horse. The clunch would fall off Blackie, the viscount thought.

Mason was looking out of sorts, as well he might with the house going to rack and ruin after he'd lied and cheated to get it away from Mrs. Kane. Likely Parkhurst had reneged on their agreement about sharing the wealth too, the way he had reneged on paying his gambling debts.

"Oh, he'll be home to me,” Lesley said, waving a sheaf of papers with Parkhurst's signature on them. Mason obviously recognized the writing, for his rat-black eyes narrowed. He opened the door and stood aside for Lesley and Byrd. He shut it again in Gladiator's face.

Broderick Parkhurst was not as inebriated as he wished to be, when Hartleigh entered his bedroom. Byrd stayed by the open door, arms crossed over his massive chest in case Parkhurst decided he'd rather not pay attention to what Lord Hartleigh was about to say, or in case Mason was paying too much attention.

Parkhurst might not have read a hand of cards right in a month, but he could read trouble on Hartleigh's face. “I don't have your woman and I don't owe you anything. Go away."

"You are wrong, as usual.” Lesley tossed the stack of gaming chits onto the bed. There were so many, Broderick's nose barely poked out of the mound. He pushed them away, holding one near his bloodshot eyes with the arm that was not in a plaster cast. “Oh."

"Oh indeed. How did you think you were going to pay all of these? And the tradesmen's bills, your account at Tattersall's, the stables for your breakdowns."

"I thought I'd come about. One big win is all it takes, you know. M'friends thought so, too. Kept finding new places for me to try, to change m'luck, don't you know."

"I know you've been fleeced royally, by every Captain Sharp and ivory tuner in town. That's who I purchased your vowels from."

"You mean they cheated?"

"The same way you cheated Mrs. Kane."

"The housekeeper? Uncle's convenient? Your doxy? What's she got to do with these?” Broderick ruffled some of the papers together.

"Nothing, you jackass, except it was her money you gambled away with your so-called friends. Now it is time to repay her for the wrong you've done. I would strongly suggest you not mention her name so disrespectfully again in my hearing."

Broderick held up his broken arm and looked toward Byrd, standing in the doorway still. “You might as well go ahead and get it over with, beat me to a pulp or whatever you have in mind, ‘cause I couldn't afford to pay for candles, much less this king's ransom. Besides, if you don't kill me, the moneylenders will, or Mason."

"What, not paying your partner his share? No honor among thieves and all that, I suppose. And you've been to the usurers, besides? Lud, how did you survive this long with sawdust for brains? No, don't tell me. I have wasted enough time over this claptrap as is. I have a bargain for you, Parkhurst, so listen carefully. I will make good on your debts, on three conditions. One, you sign over the deed to this house to Mrs. Kane. Two, you sign a statement that you were aware Sir Gilliam had another will. And three, you leave the country forever."