His Mask of Retribution (6 page)

Check the pockets
, she heard the voice of common sense whisper in her ear. She reached out her hand, then hesitated, holding her breath, suddenly very aware of where she was and what she was doing. Slowly she touched her fingers to the shoulder of the nearest tailcoat.

The midnight-blue wool felt as smooth and expensive as it looked. Her eyes scanned the breadth of the shoulders. She let her fingers trace all the way down one lapel and it felt as daring as if she were stroking a tiger, as daring as if the highwayman was still wearing the coat. That thought made her heart skip a beat. She slid her hands within, checking the inside for hidden pockets, skimming down the tail to the pocket that was there, but nothing was to be found in any of them. She checked each coat in turn; the feel of his clothing beneath her fingers and the scent of him in her nose made her heart thud all the harder and her blood rush all the faster as she remembered the strength and hardness of the arm she had gripped so frantically last night and the weight of his hand around her arm in the rookery. And she wondered if this was what it would feel like to lay her hand against his shoulder, his lapel, his chest...

She gave a shaky laugh at the absurdity of her own thoughts. She did not like men, especially those who were dangerous. She closed the wardrobe door and, quietly and systematically, began to search the rest of the room.

The soap in the dish held the scent of sandalwood. She touched his badger-hair shaving brush and the handle of his razorblade, wondering that he had left such a weapon at her disposal. But then she remembered him in the rookery and knew that he had nothing to be afraid of. And another shiver rippled all the way from the top of her head down to the tips of her toes.

Everything was neat and tidy, everything in its place. Waistcoats, shirts, a pile of pressed linen cravats...and a black-silk kerchief. She hesitated, feeling strange to see it folded and pressed so neatly within the drawer. It seemed so harmless, so inconsequential, unlike the man who wore it.

There were two pairs of riding boots and three pairs of black slippers—all large. She did not look through his unmentionables, only closed the drawer so quickly that she wondered if his accomplice had heard the noise. Then she sat herself down in the easy chair by the fireplace, properly this time, and considered what she had gleaned of the highwayman from his room and possessions.

He was a gentleman, tall and broad-shouldered and strong. A man who wore a black-silk kerchief across his face. A man from whom one glance made her shiver, and of whom his scent alone made her heart beat too fast. A man for whom she felt both wariness and fascination. Nothing in the room had told her anything more than she already knew.

* * *

Knight did not return to his town house until dinnertime that night.

‘Did you win?’ Callerton asked, serving up the stew he had prepared.

‘Your money’s safe,’ replied Knight.

‘Nice to know I made a bob or two without leaving the house.’ Callerton grinned. ‘Shouldn’t Rafe Knight, gentleman and rake, be out celebrating his victory?’

‘They have arranged an outing to a gaming hell tonight.’

Callerton screwed his face up.

‘If I don’t go there’ll be questions. And we don’t want questions.’

Callerton shook his head. ‘Especially not this night.’

‘Is Lady Marianne in the yellow bedchamber?’

‘Took her back through at four just to be on the safe side. Thought I heard her having a rummage earlier in the day, but there was nought for her to find. I made sure of that before I put her in there.’

Knight gave a nod of gratitude. She had not succumbed to tears or tantrums. With a calm logic, of which he himself would have been proud, she had undertaken a search of his room.

‘Been a long time since you had a woman in that bedchamber.’

A vision of Marianne sprawled naked in his bed popped into his mind, her blonde hair splayed across his pillows, her bare breasts peeping from between the rumpled sheets to tease and torture him. He pushed the image away and clenched his jaw, knowing that he could not afford to think of her in that way.

‘Maybe too long.’ Definitely too long if he was having inappropriate thoughts about Misbourne’s daughter. He forced his mind to think of tomorrow and all that lay ahead. Once Misbourne gave him the document he would not see her again. And that could only be a good thing. He would not allow his thoughts to stray to her again.

‘Let us run through the plan again. We’ll not have another chance. And then we’ll send the boy with the meeting place and time to Misbourne so that he has not enough time to think up anything clever.’

Callerton gave a nod. ‘Even Misbourne isn’t bastard enough to risk his daughter a second time.’

‘I hope you’re right,’ Knight replied, unrolling the crudely drawn map. For his own sake, and for Marianne Winslow’s. He did not wish to consider what he would do if they were wrong.

The two men bent over the map and began to talk in earnest.

* * *

The morning was still dark when the highwayman’s accomplice led Marianne out of the back door and across a few streets. They travelled on foot, keeping to the mews and alleyways, so that she did not recognise where they were or the direction they took. In a narrow alley that ran down the side of what looked to be a hospital building, a black coach was waiting. They hurried over to it and she thought they meant to climb inside, but the coachman jumped down and she saw that it was the highwayman in his greatcoat and hat. His accomplice climbed up to take his place.

‘God keep you safe, friend,’ he said to the highwayman.

‘And you,’ replied the highwayman and glanced to the sky. ‘Dawn is breaking. It should be light enough by the time I am seen being trundled home three sheets to the wind.’

The accomplice nodded and with a flick of the reins was gone, leaving Marianne standing alone with the highwayman.

‘Are you ready, Lady Marianne?’ he asked.

She nodded, and he took her arm and guided her out on to the street. There was the smell of a dye house in the air. The houses were small and a little shabby, but this was not some rookery, and even if it had been she felt safe with the highwayman by her side. Ironic, she thought, but true.

They did not speak, just walked in silence. Even though the hour was early, the air stirred; London was awakening. A cart rattled by and two dodgy-looking characters passed from whom she averted her gaze. She was glad of the highwayman’s proprietorial grip on her arm.

They kept a steady pace heading onwards. It was only when they passed the great church that she realised they were going to the burying ground.

He led her through the gate and wove a path through the stones that marked the graves of the dead. The wind that howled across the ground was sharp, nipping at her cheeks and catching her hair, blowing strands of it across her eyes. Overhead, the sky was grey and dismal and the air ripe with dampness and the promise of rain. They walked on, their pace so brisk that she found herself slightly out of breath, walked on until they reached the larger stones and monuments erected by the wealthy. And then, quite suddenly, he led her behind a tiny mausoleum built in the style of a classical temple, the stonework of which was blackened by age and the smoke from London’s chimneys.

‘This is the place,’ he murmured, sliding a hand inside his greatcoat to produce a pocket watch. He flipped open the casing and checked the time. ‘Ten minutes,’ he said and the watch disappeared from sight once more.

Ten minutes and then she would be free. Ten minutes and all of this would be over. She would be back with her father and she would never see the highwayman again. Never know who he was behind that mask. She leaned back against the wall of the mausoleum and watched him.

‘For what it is worth, I am sorry that you had to be a part of this, Lady Marianne. But you were the only way I could reach your father.’ His eyes held a sincerity she had not expected to see.

‘This document that you seek must be very important to you.’

‘More important than you can imagine.’

‘What is it?’ She asked the question with little expectation of a reply.

He was silent for so long that she thought she had been right, but then he spoke. ‘It is the answer to a question I have asked myself for these past fifteen years.’

‘Fifteen years?’ Such a long time. Yet his eyes, his voice, his body, the way he moved—none were those of an old man.

‘June 1795,’ he said.

‘What happened on that date?’ She saw the flicker of pain in his eyes, there, then gone so quickly and replaced by such hard and utter ruthlessness that she felt shocked to see it.

‘Ask your father the answer to that question, Lady Marianne, and see what he says.’ That same half-whisper, harsher and angrier than ever.

‘You are wrong about him,’ she said. She did not know what lies the highwayman had been spun or why he had her father so wrong. All she knew was that she had to try, in these last few minutes they had together, to let him know the truth. ‘He is the best of fathers. I know you will not believe me, but he is a good man.’ She thought desperately of what she could say to convince him. ‘He is a governor of the Foundling Hospital and, although he took great pains to see that it was kept secret, he contributed much of the money for its chapel to be built. He gives freely to the poor, to widows and orphans especially, yet he makes no show of his charity, and he—’

The highwayman gave a hard, harsh laugh of amusement and shook his head. ‘The irony is not lost on me, Lady Marianne.’

‘There is nothing of irony in what he has done.’

‘Indeed? Foundlings and orphans!’ In the space of a moment his eyes had darkened with the shadows that moved within them. ‘He is your father. Defend him all you will, but not to my ears.’

She could feel the darkness that emanated from him, the barely suppressed anger tinged with bitterness. ‘What is this hatred that drives you?’

‘It is the desire for justice,’ he whispered.

‘More like vengeance for some imagined injustice.’

‘There was nothing imagined about it.’

‘What did he do to you?’

‘He took from me that which was most precious.’ And she remembered the words he had spoken to her father upon the heath, before he had taken her.

‘I don’t understand,’ she said.

‘Neither do I.’

Their gazes held, locked, trapped in the moment. She could not have looked away, even had she wanted to. She stared at the tall dark highwayman with his great black coat flapping in the wind and the dark mask that hid his face, the very symbol of the villain he was. He was a man like none she had known. Strong, hard, ruthless. And yet...

The wind howled through the gravestones and the first drops of rain began to fall. Still they looked into each other’s eyes, and the air was thick with a strange tension, like the unnatural calm before the storm, waiting for something she did not understand. She should have been more afraid of this man than any other. She felt that she was clinging to a great precipice, that her grip was slipping and she was beginning to slide inch by agonising inch towards the edge. And she knew what lay over that edge. She should have been grappling to regain her hold, but the edge was beckoning her closer and there was a part of her that found it dangerously alluring.

‘Who are you behind that mask?’ she whispered.

‘Do you really want to know?’ His voice was as quiet as hers as he stepped closer. She was surprised that she felt no compulsion to back away, even though her heart was pounding and every nerve in her body shivered. Her throat went dry, her mouth too. She wetted her lips and saw his gaze drop to them, before coming back to her eyes.

The tension wound tighter.

Another step forwards and they were standing so close that, were she to inhale deeply, she would feel the graze of her chest against his. He did not touch her, yet her body tingled as if caressed by his very proximity.

‘Marianne,’ he whispered softly.

She looked up into his eyes and could see each golden striation within them, every dark lash that outlined them.

His face lowered towards hers and she knew that he was going to kiss her. And for one absurd moment she wanted him to do it. She wanted more than anything to feel his mouth against hers, even through the silk. And then she remembered, and stepped away.

Her breath was ragged as if she had been running and she was trembling so badly that she had to clutch her hands together so that he would not see it.

He did not come after her. He did not grab her or force his mouth upon hers. He just stood there and watched her. The wind blew and all was silent and cool aside from the thump of her heart and the scald of her cheeks. Her eyes met his once more.

A noise sounded from the other side of the mausoleum, making her start and breaking the tension between them. Part of her was relieved and another part dismayed.

Someone was making their way over the grass of the burying ground. With a tiny nod of acknowledgement to her, the highwayman turned away and went to meet whoever it was he was waiting for.

Marianne sagged back against the wall of the mausoleum. She did not understand what had just passed between her and the highwayman. But it did not matter, for the person on the other side of the tomb was bringing the document from her father. In a few moments she would be free and walking away from this.

A shot rang out, shattering the peace and silence of the place. She moved to peep round the side of the mausoleum and watched all hell break loose.

Chapter Five

‘R
un, governor!’ the little lad yelled and began to run towards him. ‘It’s a trap!’

Knight saw three figures loom from behind the nearby gravestones and reacted even before he saw the first man take aim at the boy. He launched himself forwards, firing his pistol at the man as he scooped the boy up and ran for the nearest gravestone. The shot thudded into the other side of the stone as he dived behind.

‘I’m sorry.’ Smithy was white-faced, without a trace of his usual cocky bravado. ‘They caught me. Held a pistol to my head and made me bring ’em here.’

‘I understand,’ Knight replied to the boy in a low voice. He knew the men would be creeping closer, knew, too, that it was him, not the boy, they were after. He reloaded his pistol and risked a brief glance round the edge. Another shot rang out and some fragments of stone crumbled to the grass on his left. ‘Stay hidden,’ he whispered, then dodged away through the gravestones towards the tall obelisk stone far enough away from the lad and the mausoleum. He could only hope that Marianne had the sense to remain out of sight.

The bullets rained in force, the shots deafening in the silence of the burying ground, the stench of the powder like rotten eggs all around. The wind of a bullet whistled close to his right ear as he ducked behind the obelisk.

‘Don’t just stand there! Get after him!’ a rough voice yelled.

Knight reloaded the pistol again, smoothly and quickly, counting the seconds as the tread of boots crept closer. The first flicker of dark shadow to his right and Knight grabbed at the villain, wrenching the man in close and compressing the vulnerable area of his neck until he passed out. The body slid noiselessly to the grass.

‘Where the hell did he go?’ The villain’s whisper told him where they were.

The bullets ceased. There was silence, and in the waiting he heard the howl of the wind and the beat of his own heart. He ran to his left, aiming for the next gravestone, firing as he went, and heard the yelp and the slump of a body as his bullet went home. He made it behind the stone before the pistol shot cracked against it, then moved again, crouching low through the stones, working his way round towards the last of the three villains.

A bullet thudded into grass before him, tearing up the turf. One villain remained, with two pistols. Two shots had been fired. Knight didn’t give the blackguard time to reload, but broke cover and ran full tilt at him, slamming hard into him, taking him down. The man struggled, but Knight’s fist stilled that; then he grabbed hold of the villain’s throat and hoisted him up, pinning him against the nearest gravestone.

And then he saw Marianne.

‘Get back!’ he yelled but, as if oblivious to the danger, she ignored him and carried on walking until she had reached his side.

‘Where is the document?’ she asked the man.

‘Marianne, do as I say.’

She glanced up at him and he saw, before she turned back to the man, that she did not yet understand what her father had done. ‘I asked you a question, sir,’ she said to the man.

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, lady.’

She shook her head. ‘But...’

‘Misbourne sent you,’ Knight said to the man.

‘Yes.’

‘With the document,’ said Marianne.

‘To bring me in,’ corrected Knight.

‘No.’ The man strained to shake his head.

Knight saw Marianne look pointedly up at him. ‘You see,’ she said, almost triumphantly.

‘To kill you,’ the villain said.

She paled.

‘Then you had better run back and tell him that you failed.’ Knight threw the man on to the grass, allowing him to scramble to his feet and back away.

From the corner of his eye Knight saw other dark shadows slinking between the gravestones. ‘There are more of them. Take shelter behind the mausoleum, Marianne.’

‘So that you may keep me prisoner?’ She shook her head. ‘I will not do that.’ She edged away from him. ‘They are from my father. They have come to free me.’ And then she turned to run towards them just as the closest villain took aim.

It all happened so quickly. Marianne saw the man point the pistol straight at her. ‘Do not shoot! I am coming!’ She saw the disregard on his face, saw the plume of blue smoke and heard the roar of the pistol, but the air was already being knocked from her lungs as something big and fast and dark threw her to the ground. A second pistol shot exploded, so close that it made her jump, but she could not see anything because the highwayman was on top of her, shielding her from the danger. In a heartbeat he had dragged her up and hauled her behind the nearest gravestone.

‘Do not dare move from here,’ he whispered with a ferocity no one in their right mind would ignore, then he was gone.

She stayed where he had left her, hugging her legs to her body, trying to calm the raggedness of her breathing while her mind reeled with the shock of what was happening and the knowledge that her father had not done the one simple thing that would have secured her release. He had sent men to kill the highwayman and they had almost killed her. None of it seemed real. Even though she had seen the man fire the pistol at her, there was a part of her mind that refused to believe it. It was all some horrible imagining. Yet the wind was cold in her face and she could feel the dampness from the rain seeping through the thinness of her shawl as she clutched it tight around her shoulders. She really was here, alive and unharmed—and there was only one reason for that: the highwayman.

She heard the sound of feet running and then a shout. Then the sound of fists, fighting, grunts of pain. Another pistol shot and she could smell the gunpowder in the wind and see the drift of smoke even through the rain. A man began screaming in agony and she prayed,
Please, God, don’t let it be him.

‘You bast—!’ someone shouted, but the words were cut off and there came a thud of something hitting the ground hard.

Another shot. Then there was silence. A silence in which her breathing sounded too loud.

‘Marianne.’

Suddenly he was there, reaching for her, helping her up, and she did not even think of drawing away.

‘Are you all right?’

She nodded, not trusting herself to speak. Her gaze moved over the gravestone to the men that lay beyond. One was rolling around groaning and clutching at his lower trouser leg, which was soaked in blood. Three lay unmoving upon the ground. And another was slumped bleeding and lifeless on the steps that led down into the mausoleum.
Dead
, she thought and could not seem to move her eyes away from the grotesque sight.

‘Marianne,’ he said again, more softly this time.

She looked up into his eyes, at the fierceness and the urgency there. He was supposed to be the villain in all of this.

‘Give me your hand.’

There was nothing she could say, no words that would come. She put her hand in his and followed him through the gravestones.

And as they left, Marianne glanced back to the ruffians that her father had sent, and the mausoleum beyond with the name of its occupant carved into the stone lintel above the door: EDMUND KNIGHT.

* * *

Knight headed towards the warehouses and timber yards, keeping to the shadows and the alleyways, alert and watchful. He kept a pistol in one hand, hiding it within the folds of his coat, and the other hand was around Marianne’s waist, both securing and supporting her. To avoid attracting attention he wrenched the mask down from his face, letting it dangle around his neck as if it were a neckerchief, but Marianne did not seem to notice. Her eyes were dazed, her gaze fixed ahead, although Knight doubted she was registering much of her surroundings. Her face was so pale he wondered if she was going to faint. He could not blame her. He doubted most women, let alone one as indulged and protected as Marianne, could have remained unaffected after being shot at and witnessing a fight so brutal as to leave four men unconscious.

He glanced down at her dress, the dress that had been intended for her wedding. Several of the bows on the bodice were hanging by a thread. It was grubby around the hem and the rain had dampened the skirt so that it clung indecently to her legs. The fine lace shawl wrapped around her had a rip in it and the ribbon with which she had bound her hair was lost, leaving it long and damp around her shoulders. Her appearance was not so dissimilar to the women who surrounded them in this part of town. She looked beautiful, abandoned, wanton almost, except for her innocence and the vulnerability that she was no longer trying to hide. He held her a little closer and knew that, whatever Misbourne had done, his daughter did not deserve this.

Knight knew he could not risk heading home in the daylight. There was a chance that Misbourne had more men in the vicinity, that they were searching for him even now. The last thing he wanted to do was lead them to his house and his true identity. That, and expose Marianne to more gunfire and violence. He knew of an empty warehouse, which seemed the closest point of safety. And if Misbourne’s ruffians were on their tail they needed to get there fast. He guided her steadily towards it, unnoticed by those they passed as anything other than a man and his woman.

* * *

She had no idea where they were, other than that it was a dubious area of the city and that they were not so very far away from the church of St Luke’s. The warehouse was large and almost derelict, but it provided shelter from the rain and from what they had left behind at the burying ground. The highwayman barricaded the door shut behind them and led her across the dust and rubble to lean her against a bare brick wall. She could see that the windows were small and almost as high as the roof, letting in light but showing nothing of the outside world other than the gunmetal-grey sky. Several of the panes had been broken or were missing. Pigeons nested in the exposed rafters, making soft cooing noises. One flew overhead, the flutter of its wings loud against the quiet drizzle of the rain against the roof, and sat watching them from a nearby ledge.

She did not look at him because she knew he was no longer wearing the mask. And she was afraid of what that meant...for her and for him. His hat dropped sodden to the floor and the rustle of his clothing sounded; from the corner of her eye she saw that he was taking off his greatcoat. He moved away to shake the water from it and then wrapped it around her shoulders.

She stood very still and focused on the buckskin of his breeches, the scuffed leather of his boots...anything rather than look at his face, even though it was the one place she really wanted to look. She felt suffocated by the tension. The knot in her stomach tightened.
He was unmasked.
And she knew more than anything in the world that she must not yield to the overriding temptation, swore to herself that she would not. Yet standing there alone with him in that warehouse, with his coat warm around her shoulders and the scent of sandalwood in her nose, she could not help herself. Despite every sensible thought screaming at her to resist, she slowly raised her head and looked up into the face of the highwayman.

However Marianne had imagined him to look, the reality stole the beat from her heart and the breath from her lungs. He was a man like none she had ever seen, a vision incomparable. Such dark masculinity that made her stomach flutter and tumble and her blood race so fast she thought she might faint. She stared and could not look away, her eyes ranging over the straight manly nose, the rugged angular jawline and square chin. Over the mouth that, even hidden, had tempted her to taste it and, now exposed, made her legs feel weak and her head dizzy. Desire seemed to whisper in the warehouse all around her. Attraction pounded through her veins with such explosive force that she felt herself tremble. She met those searing eyes that were so branded upon her memory and saw the amber in them darken. Her mouth went dry. She dropped her gaze, shocked at her response.

Her heart was beating faster than a horse at full gallop. She kept her gaze low, praying he had realised nothing of her reaction, hoping he did not see the heat that was glowing in her cheeks.

Her focus fixed on the dirty hem of her gown. But the deed had already been done. She had looked upon his face. She could identify him. Both of them knew it. Her fingers gripped tight against the sides of her skirt as she waited for him to react.

And then she saw the single crimson drop land upon the pale silk of her skirt. There was a horrible sinking sensation in her stomach, for she knew what it was even before she raised her eyes to see the blood dripping from the fingers of his left hand, and the bright red stain that soaked the sleeve of his shirt. In that terrible moment everything else fell from her head.

‘You are bleeding!’ Her eyes shot to his.

‘The bullet skimmed my arm.’

The bullet that had been meant for her.
She stared at him, understanding fully for the first time what he had done.

He moved away to sit down, leaning his back against the red dusty bricks of the wall, and with his good hand began to unfasten his neckcloth.

‘Let me help you,’ she said and, shrugging off the greatcoat, she knelt by his side.

His gaze met hers. Then he let his hand drop away from the half-loosened knot of his neckcloth.

She leaned closer and, pushing aside the black-silk kerchief that still hung around his neck, her fingers finished what he had started. She unfastened the knot and unwound the linen strip from around his neck. In his highwayman’s guise he was not wearing the fine dress shirts she had seen in his bedchamber, but something much cheaper and thinner through which she could see a hint of the flesh of his chest and the dark smattering of hair that covered it.

He made to take the neckcloth from her and their fingers collided, but she did not release the linen.

‘I must bind the wound to stop it bleeding.’ His voice was low, that same half-whisper even though the mask was no longer tied around his face. ‘It is no sight for you, Marianne.’ The linen was taut between their hands.

‘Do you think I cannot face a little blood to help you?’ In the rookery he had saved her from... She could not even think the word. And not half an hour ago, in the burying ground, he had saved her life.