Come the Night (The Dangerous Delameres - Book 1) (18 page)

The florid Englishman scowled at his utterly incomprehensible mistress, feeling his patience wear away. “Enough of these dramatics. I trust I need not remind you exactly
who
pays for that wine you consume so freely and that crystal you toss about in your tempers. Also that exceedingly expensive gown you have just spilled perfumed powder all over. Now cease this nonsense and come here to kiss your lord and master as you ought.”

“Lord? Master?” A stream of scalding French assailed his ears. In short order Sir Charles was condemned as the bastard son of a Marseilles pickpocket and a Rouen street prostitute, while his person was portrayed in terms most close to a four-legged ass.

The Englishman spat out an oath.
“Enough,
Ang
é
lique. It is your duty to receive me — to
submit
to me.” His voice grew cold with arrogance. “And you will do it here and now, do you hear me?”

“Hear you? I expect
everyone
in this stupid little village has heard you!
Oh, comme tu es vulgaire!”

With that she spun about, hurled herself quivering with anger through the door to her boudoir, and slammed it shut.

The bolt slid home with a thump.

“Ang
é
lique, enough of this shameless disobedience! I’ll have no more of it, do you hear? Come out now or I’ll—”

At that moment broad shoulders encased in black silk eased from behind the curtained alcove. “Problems, Sir Charles? She is a firebrand, that one. You have all my sympathies.”

Millbank gasped and swung about. His hand went to his throat. “You! By God, is there no end to your effrontery?”

“None, I believe,” the Lord of Blackwood said comfortably, leaning back against a silk-covered wall. “But let me give you a little advice about women. It is best not to push them too hard, you know. A bit of sugar here, a soft caress there, and you’ll make much better headway than with a stream of curses.”

“I’ll give you advice! Aye, after I see you hang!”

The highwayman merely twirled his purloined goblet lazily, then emptied it. “A satisfactory wine. I would have preferred something with more character and more staying power, but perhaps this is best suited to your tastes and abilities.” He set the crystal down gently, his dark eyes never leaving Sir Charles’s mottled face.

And then, very slowly, his foil hissed from its sheath and rose to Millbank’s neck.

“But I think you show very poor judgment in the women you harass, my friend.”

“W-women?”

“Alas, I refer to Miss St. Clair.”

“S-Silver? What gives you the right to defend that damnable—” Abruptly, the foil’s point lodged against his throat.

“I don’t believe I heard that. I could not, could I, my so dear friend?”

“Er, n-no. That is, I—”

“Excellent. Now we shall begin again. Miss St. Clair is not to be further disturbed, do you understand me?”

A desperate nod.

“Not good enough, I’m afraid. Say the words.”

“Silver — not to be b-bothered.” Sir Charles was gasping as he spoke.

“And you will cease to visit her at Lavender Close Farm. Ever again.”

“Dash it, man, that’s—” Cold steel flicked lazily against his chin. “Er, that is, I won’t. No more. Lavender Close F-Farm,” he finished hoarsely.

“Very good. You are a man of tolerable sense, I see. And now, I shall trouble you only a moment longer and then you may return to your fetching mistress. You will have your hands full with that one, I think. But first, I’ll have your word that those shipments of copper pipes you’ve been holding up will miraculously be restored to Miss St. Clair tomorrow.”

“Shipments?” the baronet blustered. “Don’t know what in the devil you’re talking about. I’ve nothing to do with—”

Again razor-sharp steel played over Millbank’s person, this time settling low to brush the part of his anatomy that had been hard and clamoring for his mistress. “I suggest you think harder, my friend,” came the silken warning.

“Very well. Yes, I bloody well
have
been holding them up! Damned improper for the wench to be turning her hand to a common trade. My own sister-in-law! By God, the whole countryside’s laughing at me!”

“And they’ll laugh at you more if you should happen to have an accident, my dear Charles. An accident that deprives you of that part of your flaccid anatomy that is determined to seek its pleasure in Ang
é
lique’s bed this night.”

The Englishman blanched. “You — you wouldn’t!”

A slow smile played over the hard lips shadowed by the black mask. “Shall we find out? Here and now?”

Millbank turned the color of day-old oatmeal. “N-no, damn you!”

“Very well. Then I believe that Lavender Close Farm will hereafter be removed from your itinerary.”

After a moment the rotund peer gave a stiff nod.

“I don’t believe I heard that.”

“I shall p-pay no more visits to — to that woman.”

For a moment the highwayman’s eyes took on a dangerous glitter. “That woman? What exactly are you trying to say, my friend? If you have slurs to cast, then you’d best do it clearly so that you can be understood.”

Sir Charles, though a bully and a braggart, was no fool. “It was, er, nothing. None of
my
business, after all,” he added stiffly. “M’ wife’s sister. Her problem if she—” He caught himself as the highwayman’s blade inched against his neck. “Er, none of my business at all.”

“Exactly,” Blackwood said silkily. “And I suggest you remember that, Millbank. I have ears everywhere, you know. If I should happen to discover that your tongue has been wagging…” His sword flashed.

A fragment of white linen floated to the floor. There it lay, quivering in the wind.

“I trust we understand each other?”

“Er, q-quite.”

“Excellent. Now I have a curiosity to know where you acquired all that gold.”

“What gold?”

Blackwood pulled a fat purse from Millbank’s pocket and tossed it on the rug.
“That
gold.”

“Er — won it at the gaming tables. Yes, had a streak of luck, so I did.”

“But you haven’t been to the tables,” came the relentless silken voice. “Not tonight. Not last night either.”

Sir Charles began to sweat. “A p-private game, it was.”

“Indeed.” The highwayman’s foil rose.

Then he frowned. Voices were approaching down the hall. “Turn around,” he ordered the sweating baronet.

In one swift movement Blackwood tore a strip of satin from the damask curtains and tied it around Millbank’s eyes. “Now you will count. Up to five hundred, shall we say? And you will not move until you have finished. Is that clear?”

“Very.”

“I am delighted to hear it. You may begin.”

The Englishman began to count, his voice unsteady. After a few moments Blackwood inched into the alcove beside the open window. But not before he had relieved Millbank of half of his gold sovereigns. There were worthier causes that money would go to — starting with Silver St. Clair.

Millbank was at thirty-five when the highwayman slipped into the darkness. He was at ninety when Ang
é
lique opened the door of her boudoir. Her rouged lips pursed with surprise when she saw the curtains flapping loosely behind him.

“Charles? Whatever do you do there? And that cover over your eyes — it is more of your silly games,
non?”

“Ang
é
lique? Is — is there anyone behind me? Anyone else in the room at all?”

“No, of course not. Only me. But why—”

“Then shut up, damn it, and come untie me,” Millbank ordered furiously.

~ ~ ~

“Damned fool whelp. Always were, always will be.” Jonas stared at the dark figure leaning unsteadily against the door. “What deviltry you been up to now, Master Luc?”

“Nothing for you to worry about, Jonas.” The man in black swayed slightly. “Just a bullet from one of Carlisle’s men tonight.” He stripped back his cloak, frowning.

“Not
again!
You’re bleeding like a pig, boy! What have you got for brains?” Jonas caught Luc as he began to sway. He stared angrily at the reckless figure who had been in his keeping since he was a lad of seven.

“Don’t know how to bend,” he muttered, tugging at the damp linen. “Don’t know how to do nothing but have yer own way. Aye, it’s a Delamere ye are, through and through. From one end of your stubborn head to the tips of your arrogant toes.”

“Delamere no more,” his half-conscious burden muttered. “Jus’ Black’od. Damned bloody highwayman. Wanted f’m Norwich to Nottingham. Ladies love me, don’ ye know?”

“Ladies, bosh. Light-skirts mebbe. Jes like yer father, ye are. Aye, full of fire and bother, old Andrew was. Till he met yer ma, that is. See if she didn’t turn him right round her little finger though.” The old servant studied the jagged wound he’d uncovered at his ward’s shoulder. “Wish the duchess was here now, damned if I don’t.”

Suddenly hard fingers caught at Jonas’s wrist. “Don’t tell ‘em. Can’t tell ‘em. I’ll bolt if ye do. Don’t think I won’t.”

“Hush yer mewling, Master Luc. They’ll be hearing nothing from Jonas Ferguson. I’ve held my tongue this long, and I reckon I can hold it awhile longer. But the day’ll come when they have to hear. And when it does, see if I don’t plant myself right down beside you so I can watch the fur fly, boy!”

Luc made an unsteady sound that was part gasp and part laugh. “Agreed.”