Lord Scoundrel Dies (29 page)

‘Yes.’ He sighed. ‘I don’t really want to
think about Miss Messingham or her future at the moment but I
suppose… Lampforth? How goes it?’

‘Oh fine, fine,’ Charlie said offhandedly.
‘What am I supposed to do with this female? Any clues?’

‘We’re coming.’ But he didn’t move. Instead,
his lordship’s other hand came up and he cupped Harry’s face.
Bending his head, he pressed a kiss against her surprised lips and
Harry’s legs went to cotton again, although for entirely different
reasons. Fear and desire, she quickly discovered, shared many of
the same symptoms but none of the same results. The kiss, feather
light to begin with, quickly deepened into something else entirely
as his mouth momentarily became harder and a great deal more
demanding. Harry forgot all about murderous debutantes, a
scoundrel’s demise and even poor Charlie who was only six feet
away, suddenly lost in the exquisite, surprising delight of her
first kiss.

When Talisker raised his head, he looked a
little strained. But perhaps it was only a trick of the uncertain
light.

‘More of that later,’ he said, a little
unevenly. ‘Although I might have known that you would be shockingly
easy to kiss.’

Breathless as she was, this shook her out of
her dazed preoccupation. ‘Excuse me, but you were doing the
kissing!’

He grinned. ‘I was, wasn’t I?’ Taking her
hand in his, he drew her forward and they walked up to Charlie, who
was doing his best to keep the limp form of Miss Messingham from
collapsing in an untidy head.

‘Girl’s a dead weight,’ he wheezed, as
Olivia’s limbs flopped this way and that.

‘Set her down, Lampforth,’ his lordship
said, coming forward to assist.

Between them, they laid Olivia gently onto
the pier.

Harry stared down at her. ‘What are we to do
with her? She killed Lord Sutton. Indeed, she seemed entirely
unrepentant. But she is not in her right mind, I fear.’

‘Yes,’ Talisker said thoughtfully, eying the
figure at their feet. ‘She’s extremely dangerous. Why did she bring
you out here?’

Harry grimaced. ‘She was convinced that I
knew what she had done. She intended to drown me, I suppose so it
would look like an accident,’ she heard his lordship’s quick,
indrawn breath at this, and hurried on, ‘but of course that would
not have worked for I am a very good swimmer. I was quite prepared
to jump in.’

He looked at her for a moment, expression
most peculiar but his voice, when he spoke was quite level. ‘Of
course you were.’

‘The thing is, we can’t just hand her over
to the authorities. What would happen to her?’

‘The madhouse, I should imagine,’ Charlie
said dubiously. ‘Not something I would wish on my worst enemy.’

‘We need to speak with her family,’ Talisker
said firmly. ‘That is to say, I do. There is no need for you to be
involved in this any further. I suggest Lampforth and I take Miss
Messingham back to her house so that we can talk with her parents.
I know that private sanatoriums are sometimes used for people with
Miss Messingham’s… ah, troubles. Something must be arranged for
her.’

Charlie cocked an eyebrow. ‘So we’re not
going to hand her over to the law?’

‘The resulting outcome would not be
pleasant,’ his lordship replied wryly. ‘And I fear it would cause a
great deal of unnecessary distress.’

‘I certainly don’t want that to happen,’
Harry agreed, with a little shiver. The law was rather inflexible
when it came to meting out punishment.

‘Excellent. Lampforth, can you watch her
while I return Miss Honeywood to her aunt?’

‘I’ll sit on her if she wakes up.’

‘Please, stay and help Charlie. I can manage
to get back myself,’ Harry protested.

‘I don’t care if you can,’ Lord Talisker
said, firmly recapturing her hand and drawing it through his arm
once more. ‘You are a female far too prone to trouble. I doubt I
shall feel secure letting you out of my sight again.’

This was far from unwelcome news. Actually,
as far as Harry was concerned, the idea of having Lord Talisker
remaining close enough to keep her out of trouble was entirely
delightful. She smiled at Charlie. ‘I shall see you soon?’

‘Count on it,’ he assured her. ‘And damned
glad you didn’t end up in the drink.’

With this touching sentiment, she and his
lordship began to make their way back towards the
entertainment.

There was silence for some moments, then.
‘I’m surprised you haven’t crowed about the fact that you were
right, yet,’ she said, with a swift, upward glance at his face. He
looked rather somber. ‘You have every right to. I wasn’t nearly
careful enough, was I?’

‘You meant well,’ he said ruefully. ‘And I
have no desire to crow. I’m just glad that…’ There was a pause,
then. ‘It would have been intolerable to lose you.’

Harry’s heart began to pound again. ‘Would
it?’ she inquired lightly. ‘But I have proved to be so irksome, my
lord. Your life could have resumed its peaceful tenor if Miss
Messingham had succeeded.’

He stopped abruptly. Turning towards her, he
dragged her unceremoniously into his arms and kissed her, so
forcefully that a carefully arranged cluster of curls at her ear
unfurled, spilling long locks of ruby-gold hair everywhere. After a
startled moment, Harry kissed him back, twining her arms around his
neck and thrusting her fingers into the thick, dark hair. As second
kisses went, it was impressive, especially when his tongue touched
her lips. Surprised, her own mouth opened and Harry discovered an
entirely new dimension of exquisite enjoyment.

‘Well I never!’

The voice, gloatingly
scandalized, brought them to their senses. They drew apart
reluctantly.
I am
ruined
, Harry thought dreamily.
Utterly and completely ruined
. After a kiss like that, it was impossible to
care.

Lord Talisker raised his head to stare at
whoever it was that had come across them. They had left the pier
behind and were no more than fifty feet from the festivities so
perhaps it had been a little rash on his part to have indulged in
such a passionate demonstration. Harry looked up at his face,
watching as he raised a daunting eyebrow.

‘Lady Lester,’ he said coolly, ‘are you of
the old school believing a man need wait until after the banns are
read to kiss his fiancée? Or do you approve of demonstrations of
affection prior to that event?’

It was such an unexpected,
such an outrageous answer that Harry gasped. She stared at him
while Lady Lester and her two companions, both of them old tabbies
with the worst tongues in London, gasped and hurried away. Within a
matter of minutes the news would be circulating that the viscount
had really taken the plunge and that he was currently – shockingly!
– kissing his future wife, who was
without
a chaperone
.

‘We’re getting married?’ Harry breathed,
trying to catch up with current events.

‘As soon as may be. Clearly you need taking
in hand and clearly, I am just the man to do so.’ He reached for
her again, slipping his arms around her to hold her close. ‘I am
hopeful that you will not run me ragged.’

‘You are allowed to be hopeful,’ she assured
him, infused with such an overflow of happiness that the entire
world was suddenly miraculous. ‘But I think we both know it’s a
vain hope for I cannot promise that I will not drive you mad.’

‘You already drive me mad, but for all the
right reasons,’ he murmured, seeking her mouth once more.

And he kissed her once again, thoroughly and
with consummate skill while Polite Society learned of the betrothal
of Viscount Talisker and Miss Harriet Honeywood who had made quite
an impact in a very short space of time.

I hope you enjoyed Lord
Scoundrel Dies. The second book in this series,
Why Kill A Countess?
will be
available June 2013