Mistress by Midnight (23 page)

“Thomas…” Harriet had been kissing his neck, her hands roving over his bare chest but now she slapped his face to regain his attention, and none too playfully, either. What a shrew. The sooner he was rid of her the better.

“You are not paying attention to me,” Harriet scolded. “You are thinking about your work.”

Tom silently admitted that he had been. He, too, had been in a permanently bad mood since Merryn had had the stupidity to be trapped in the beer flood with Garrick Farne and had ended up betrothed to him. His manipulation of her had been working so well. She had found out much useful information. Then everything had gone wrong. His attempt to blackmail her family had misfired spectacularly and he had ended up having to do his own dirty work after all.

Tom frowned, trying to think past the sensual barrage that was Harriet’s determined seduction. He knew that he had only one option left now. He had to go to Somerset and finish this job himself. Harriet started to lick and nibble at his chest, her tongue scampering over his skin and distracting his attention again. It was arousing, as was the fact that he was very close now to bringing down the Farne Dukedom. He had wanted that for a long time.

Harriet slapped him again, a little harder this time, punishing him for his lack of attention. Little witch. He caught her wrist and held it tightly. She kicked him, her bare foot catching his shin so that he winced. There would be a bruise there tomorrow. He tried to kiss her but she wrenched her head away and bit him on the lip. Hard. Her eyes were bright with malice and excitement. Tom tasted blood. He gave a roar, tumbled her off his knee and onto the rug. She dragged him down with her, and they rolled over, Harriet’s hair flying as she struggled like a wild thing in his arms, scratching and pummeling him. He held her arms above her head to prevent her from hurting him and she laughed up at him, eyes blazing with lust now and he pulled down his pantaloons and plunged into her and she screamed with excitement.

The door opened. Tom, buried deep inside Harriet, froze. His mind was utterly incapable of coherent thought. His body, so much more unsophisticated—so much more predictable—wanted to shaft Harriet until he was thoroughly satisfied. He wished he had locked the door. He wished his unwelcome visitor would take the hint and go away.

Then he noticed the beautiful silver slippers in his line of sight and the embroidered hem of the matching silver silk gown.

“Dear me,” Tess Darent said. Her voice was mild and sweet. “I see you are
very
busy, Mr. Bradshaw. Perhaps I should call back later?”

Tom felt himself start to wither. He did not dare look up. He had a very bad feeling now, replacing the transcendent bliss of a few moments before. He could sense his plans diminishing with the same rapidity as his erection.

Harriet was screaming now. Tom wanted to cover his ears because it was so piercing.

Then matters got considerably worse. The door opened again and Tom saw the very shiny top boots beside Tess Darent’s slippers. Two pairs. A masculine voice said, “For pity’s sake, Bradshaw…”

Someone hauled him to his feet. Tess was helping Harriet to stand and tidy her clothing. Tom turned. On one side of him was a man he did not recognize. He did not like the look on his face. On the other side was Garrick Farne. Tom liked Farne’s expression even less. And when Farne spoke, the smooth courtesy of his tone did not in any way cloak the iron beneath.

“Good morning, Bradshaw,” Farne said. “Do I take it that you will be making a formal offer of marriage to my late father’s ward?”

“Certainly not,” Tom said.

Harriet threw the sherry decanter at him. Then she started to cry. “I don’t want to marry him,” she sniffed. “I want a rich old Duke.”

“I’ll find one for you, Lady Harriet,” Tess said, patting her hand comfortingly. “I’m very good at that sort of thing.”

Farne glanced toward the traveling bags, sitting guiltily in the corner of the office. “Were you planning on leaving town, Bradshaw?” he inquired silkily.

Tom, normally a fluent liar, found that his imagination appeared to have failed him under Tess Darent’s clear blue gaze.

“We are looking for my sister,” she said very sweetly. “Once before you had information on her whereabouts, Mr. Bradshaw, so I wondered if you might help us now?”

Tom started to sweat. “I have no notion—” he began feebly.

“I expect Lady Merryn has gone to Somerset to find out about your by-blow, Garrick,” Harriet said maliciously to Farne. “I told Mr. Bradshaw all about the baby—”

It seemed to Tom that Farne moved so quickly then that one moment he was standing and the next Farne had him pinned in his seat with one hand at his throat. Tom tried to squirm and almost choked.

“My illegitimate child,” Farne said. His eyes were very intent. “Tell me what you know about that…”

Sherry dripping down his face, a bitter taste in his mouth, Tom knew that it was going to be a very bad morning indeed.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

B
Y THE TIME THE CARRIAGE
had reached Maidenhead they were all getting on famously. Merryn had discovered that the elderly gentleman seated across from her was a piano tuner on his way to tune a Broadwood grand for Lord Tate in Newbury. The fat lady on one side of Merryn was a Mrs. Morton, the widow of a very prosperous greengrocer, and the thin girl on the other side was her elder daughter Margaret, and they were traveling to spend the Christmas season with relatives near Barnstaple in the hope that Margaret would be able to catch a suitor.

“I did so wish Margaret to marry into the ton,” was Mrs. Morton’s constant refrain. “Goodness knows, her dowry is large enough but she did not
take
. And now—” she cast her daughter an exasperated look “—I very much fear that she will have to settle for a man who has to buy his own furniture rather than one who inherits it.”

“Well, that can be a blessing in so many ways,” Merryn said soothingly. “You have no notion, Mrs. Morton, as to the ugliest pieces of furniture we were obliged to have in our house when I was young simply because they had been in the family for so many years.”

As the day progressed, gray and drab with the hint of snow in the air, Merryn sat and watched the countryside unroll. As a child living in North Dorset her life and those of her sisters had been bounded by the nursery, the schoolroom and the village of Fenridge and its immediate neighbourhood. There had been few visits up to town. Stephen was the only one who had traveled and that distinction had made him even more fascinating in Merryn’s eyes. She had never traveled farther than Bath. The first time she had met Kitty was when Garrick had brought her to Starcross Manor as his wife. Merryn wondered now what had made Garrick make the infelicitous choice of taking his wife on honeymoon to a house a bare five miles from that of her lover. Kitty, she thought, with a sudden rush of feeling. Kitty would have asked Garrick if they could go there. Kitty had done it to be near Stephen.

For the first time in years Merryn felt hatred for Kitty Farne. Sweet, pretty Kitty Farne, who had had both Stephen and Garrick dancing to her tune. She had been so jealous of Kitty, not because Kitty had had Stephen’s love but because she had had Garrick’s attention, too. It had not been fair. Her thirteen-year-old self had been so jealous and resentful.

The coach passed Reading making good time and with plenty of stops to change the horses. At Newbury the piano tuner descended. Just outside Hungerford there was a close encounter with a private chaise driven by a reckless young man who shaved past them with only inches to spare.

“These young Corinthians,” Mrs. Morton said, generously handing around some boiled sugarplum sweets. “Do you have any brothers, Lady Merryn?”

“I had one,” Merryn said. “He died. He was a noted whip.”

The motion of the carriage started to soothe her into sleep. It was warm and stuffy inside, even warmer as Mrs. Morton had thoughtfully brought a spare blanket and insisted on lending it to her. Gradually the hours of the journey seemed to blur into one another as darkness fell. There was their arrival at Bath in a snow flurry, a room at the White Hart Inn where Merryn lay wakeful listening to Mrs. Morton’s snores through the wall, another carriage in the bright cold morning, this one considerably inferior in comfort to the mail coach. Finally she and Mrs. and Miss Morton rolled into the tiny seaside village of Kilve in Somerset, in the early afternoon and Merryn bespoke dinner and a bedchamber and arranged for a pony and trap to take her the final few miles to the village of Shipham.

It was a cold afternoon with a bitter winter wind off the sea that was edged with snow. Merryn huddled in the trap and shivered deep inside her winter pelisse. Now that she was here, she had no notion what she was going to say to Lord Scott. She thought she should have sent a note first. She should not have succumbed to this impatient desire to learn the truth. Except that it felt as though the whole of her future hung on understanding the past and now she was so close she could not wait.

The carter set her down at the entrance to Shipham Hall. Merryn put her hand on the metal gate that fenced the carriage sweep. The house stood back a little from the road, an Elizabethan manor, half-timbered, a modest family home. Merryn could hear children’s voices somewhere in the garden, the shrill calls and cries as they played, wrapped up in hats and scarves and muffs, running through the little box tree maze that was surrounded by lawns to the west of the house. A nursemaid in a crisp white apron, cap and coat who looked little older than a girl herself was running after them, laughing, throwing herself down on the snowy lawn and holding her side where she evidently had a stitch. Merryn could see an older child—seven or eight, with brown hair in a long plait, holding the hand of a toddler. There was another small child, a boy of about five, and another older girl who was fair. She had lost her bonnet and the cold winter sun shone on her hair and it was the exact silver gilt color of Merryn’s.

The nurse held her arms out to the baby girl, who toppled forward into them, laughing. The older girls were walking together now, up the icy steps that led to the terrace. Their heads were bent as they talked, solemn and preoccupied. Merryn could hear a woman’s voice from within the house, calling to them.

“Susan! Anne! Come inside and wash your hands before tea!”

Merryn’s heart stuttered a little. She peered closer at the girl with the silver gilt hair.

To Lord Scott of Shipham Hall… A miniature of my son Stephen…

“Susan! Anne!” The woman’s voice was louder. She came out onto the terrace, a tall woman in an old flowered gown, her hair beneath the lace cap a rich brown with just the faintest hint of gray. She was smiling. She took each child by the hand. And as they turned back toward the door, Merryn saw her face and the world stood still.

For a moment it felt as though she was looking at Kitty Farne, Kitty grown older and grayer and more lined but still with that pretty rounded face and smiling demeanor. Merryn knew that she must have made some involuntary movement because the little group on the terrace saw her and stopped. The child called Susan was looking straight at Merryn now. Her eyes were a clear, vivid blue, the blue of Merryn’s eyes, the blue of Joanna’s. She smiled hesitantly and Merryn saw that she had dimples in her cheeks just like Tess’s. Merryn’s fingers were tight about the iron fence now. The hard metal bit into her hands through her gloves. She could hear a strange roaring sound in her ears, as though she was about to faint. Down on the lawn the nursemaid was still playing with the babies. Merryn could hear their calls and their laughter but they seemed to come from a very long way away indeed.

Panic possessed her. She wanted to run, away from the sunlit garden and the child with the same blue eyes and golden hair that she possessed. Suddenly the images in her memory started to unreel like a spool of cotton. It was odd, she thought, how the tiniest details that one forgot in time could come back at any moment. For now she was remembering how very rounded Kitty had looked on the last afternoon she had seen her. Kitty, the thirteen-year-old Merryn had thought, had looked fat. She had even wondered if Kitty, unhappy in love, had been eating too many sweetmeats.

Kitty, Merryn thought now, had looked pregnant.

She willed her legs to move but they felt heavy, leaden. She found that she was trembling deep inside her pelisse, racked with shivers. She felt cold all over, cold all the way through. This, then, was Stephen’s legacy, a child whose existence none of them had guessed, a child whom Garrick must surely have known about but whom he had gone to great lengths to keep from her. She felt a vast desolation seep through her, as bleak as the winter night. She thought of how much she loved Shuna, Joanna’s daughter, and how much love she would have lavished on this other niece she had never known and she thought that her heart would break in two.

And then she heard the crunch of carriage wheels on the road behind her and felt a frisson of premonition touch her neck. She turned very slowly. She knew it would be Garrick. She knew that he had come, as he must, to protect Kitty’s family and Kitty’s child, just as he had done for the past twelve years.

Garrick jumped down from the curricle and took several steps toward her. The snow was starting to fall all about them now in huge white flakes. Garrick looked tired, his eyes strained, the stubble once again shadowing his cheek. Merryn realized that he must have driven through the night.

“Merryn,” he started to say. He put a hand out to her but Merryn stumbled back. She was aware of nothing but the most excruciating pain.

“You knew,” she said. “You knew how desperately I missed Stephen. I had nothing of him left, not one thing.” Her voice broke. “And all the time you knew that Stephen had a child. You were going to marry me and you were never going to tell me.” The snow was swirling about her now and she brushed it angrily from her face, brushed away, too, the hot tears of fury and despair. Out of the corner of her eye she could see the woman who looked like Kitty coming down the steps now toward them. She saw Garrick’s gaze flick toward her and then back to Merryn’s face.

“If we could talk,” he began but he fell silent as Merryn shook her head in a tiny gesture of repudiation.

“I don’t want to talk to you,” she said. “I never want to see you again.”

The woman had reached the gate now. “Garrick!” she called. She was smiling. “We did not know you were coming,” she said. “You should have sent word.” She looked at Merryn. Her smile started to fade.

Merryn turned and walked away. She felt numb and cold. All she could think of was Stephen, and the child that was his, and of Garrick’s silence. It made perfect sense, she thought. Garrick had told her that there had been an argument. He had discovered that Kitty was pregnant with Stephen’s child. Perhaps Kitty and Stephen had told him they were to elope together and so Garrick had shot Stephen through jealousy and revenge. And then he and Kitty’s family had formed a conspiracy of silence to keep Kitty’s child a secret from her father’s relatives forever.

Misery twisted in Merryn again, as violent as a knife. She had not known she could feel like this. It hurt so much, the anger and the raw pain. And yet there was something else there, too, a tiny voice that in the face of all the evidence whispered that she was wrong, that the man who had protected her and stood between her and death could not behave in such a way. It whispered to her to think again, to keep faith, because she had loved Garrick for a reason and although her faith was battered that love had not completely died.

There had been three shots, she remembered. There had been two bullets in Stephen’s body, but what had happened to the third? Garrick had told her that Stephen had tried to kill Kitty and she had wanted to disbelieve him because she had been so sure that Stephen and Kitty had loved one another. But if she had been wrong then Garrick had defended Kitty. He had tried to save her from Stephen. And if Kitty had been pregnant then perhaps Garrick had taken her abroad to shield her from the scandal as later he had tried to shelter and protect her child…

The hot tears scalded Merryn’s throat. The instinct that had prompted her to trust Garrick with her life, with her heart, started to unfold within her again, tentatively and a little fearfully. She knew she would have to go back, be brave, confront Garrick and hear the truth at last. And if that truth meant that all she had believed about Stephen and Kitty had been based on a lie then she would have to finally confront that, too.

T
HE TRACK ALONG THE CLIFFS
was wild and lonely on a winter afternoon. Eventually the path descended through patches of sea clover and thrift and the short springy grass and Merryn came down onto the beach below Shipham and stood for a moment inhaling the salt-laden air. It was so cold it felt as though it cut her lungs. Her tears had gone now. She felt numb and tired. She sat down on a rock at the edge of the sands. In a moment she thought she would turn and go back. She would find Garrick. She would listen to what he had to say.

There was a crunch on the shingle beside her. Merryn jumped and spun around. For a moment she thought she was imagining things. Tom Bradshaw was standing behind her, Tom in his London clothes looking debonair and tough and not particularly friendly.

“Hello, Merryn,” Tom said. He smiled, his dazzling, charming smile, but his eyes were opaque.

“What on earth are you doing here, Tom?” Merryn said.

“I followed you from the house,” Tom said. “I wanted to talk to you.” He half turned away from her, driving his hands into his pockets. “Quite a shock, isn’t it,” he said conversationally, “to discover that not only did Garrick Farne kill your brother, but he stole his child, too.”

“Stop it,” Merryn said sharply. “Don’t say that.”

“I suppose he’ll present it to you as being frightfully honorable,” Tom said, grinning. “Impossible choices, a promise of silence given on his wife’s deathbed, a child he knew could never bear his name because she was born too soon to have been his…” He shrugged. “You should appreciate all that, Merryn. I seem to recall that you were always frightfully keen on honor and justice and all those high-flown ideas.”

“What do you mean?” Merryn said, frowning. “How do you know all this, Tom?”

“Oh, I had it all from a friend,” Tom said. Merryn could tell that he was enjoying himself hugely. “She thought that the child was Farne’s own by-blow,” he added, “but I soon found out the truth, that it was his wife’s little bastard, not his own and after that…” He shrugged. “Well, the rest of the story was easy enough to come by. Servants talk, you know, when the price is right and you know whom to ask. And there are some servants here with long memories, people who recall Garrick Farne bringing the child here. They remember your father and the Duke of Farne and Lord Scott making a devil’s bargain to hide the truth and bury Kitty Farne’s shame with her. Your brother’s, too,” Tom added thoughtfully. “He was scarcely a lily-white innocent in all this, was he?” He looked at her. “Shall I tell you all about it?”