Never Deceive a Duke (30 page)

The lad backed away, almost cringing. “You must go next, Your Grace. I shall go last.”

“The hell you will,” said Gareth. “Go.
Now
. That’s an order.”

The boy did as he was bid, but he looked about ready to cast up his accounts. Gareth watched him nimbly descend. It was not the ladder he feared, then. “You’re next,” he said over his shoulder to Kemble. “And none of your damned theatrics.”

“You must go first,” said Kemble as Gareth withdrew from the window.

A few feet away, Talford’s bed burst into flame, along with the rug beneath it.

“You will go, by God,” said Gareth. “Or I shall throw you bodily, and you’ll likely break that perfect nose of yours—perhaps even a leg to go with it.”

Kemble’s eyes swept down him. “Yes, you might, mightn’t you?” he murmured. “Fine, Lloyd, go fricassee yourself for all I care.” He swung a leg out, and the rest of him smoothly followed. Kemble descended the rungs so gracefully that one would imagine he did so every night of the week. Hell, perhaps he did, for all Gareth knew.

“Your Grace, please!” Coggins’s voice was strident. “You really must come down now!”

Gareth already had a leg out. Just as his second foot found a rung, with his hands still on the windowsill, a clap of thunder sounded that resonated off Selsdon’s walls and sent a tangible shudder through the carriage house.

Please, please God,
Gareth prayed as he clambered down.
Please let it pour.

“Your Grace!” Coggins was holding his own hands prayerfully before him as Gareth turned. “Oh, thank the good Lord!”

The footmen pulled down the ladder. Gareth surveyed the crowd. “Is that everyone?” he said. “Has anyone gone unaccounted for?” he asked, unfurling the wet cloth from his mouth.

Talford stepped forward just as a dollop of rain struck Gareth’s forehead. “All my men are accounted for, Your Grace,” he said. “God bless you both.”

“Fine, then,” said Gareth. “Those of you who are ill, get the hell out of this rain. Go into the kitchen and put on some tea. The rest of you get round to the courtyard and join the brigade.”

Everyone hastened round the buildings, but the rain was now pelting down. The smaller patches of fire were turning to steam and smoke. In the courtyard, Mrs. Musbury was still barking orders like a sergeant major, the hem of her nightgown dragging soddenly over the cobbles. Someone had wisely turned all the horses out to pasture. Watson stood to one side of the courtyard, grimly surveying the damage.

“Gabriel!”
To Gareth’s shock, Antonia darted from the crowd, looking small and rather terrified. She wore a heavy woolen cloak, but beneath it one could see the flannel of her wrapper and a pair of dainty pink bed slippers. “Oh, thank God!” she cried, flying to him.
“Gabriel!”

Gareth caught her by the shoulders, an unexpected joy surging through him. “Antonia, what are you doing out here?”

“Oh, Gabriel, I could not find you!” Another clap of thunder sounded and she jumped, but held fast to his arms. “They said you had gone into the carriage house! I imagined the worst.”

The rain was steadily picking up. Gareth managed to smile at her. “But as you see, Antonia, I really am safe,” he said. “Please, my dear, go back inside. This storm is coming on so fast.”

She clung to his arms, her blue eyes wide, her lashes tipped with raindrops. “I don’t care about the storm!” she cried. “I care only for you. Oh, Gabriel, I—I know you don’t wish me to say it—but I care for you so much.”

She was speaking rashly, out of panic, he knew, but his heart felt a stirring of hope. He just prayed for her sake they did not have an audience. “My dear girl,” he said quietly. “Don’t do this.”

“No.” Her voice was sharp. “I cannot help it. Don’t be angry with me,
please
. I have been so frightened. When I could not find you, I thought…I thought my life was over again. I need you, Gabriel. Even if you do not feel quite the same, please just—”

He cut her off, tightening his grip on her shoulders so that he would not drag her into his arms as he so desperately wished. “Antonia, we cannot speak of it here.”

“When, Gabriel?” she whispered. “I must see you.
Tonight
.”

He glanced worriedly about the crowd. “Very well,” he murmured. “But please, go back into the house, my dear. That is what I need you to do just now—keep yourself safe. For me, Antonia?”

Just then, Nellie Waters shoved her way through the crowd. “Lady Antonia, this is madness!” she whispered. “For the love of God, please go back inside the house before you catch your death!”

Gareth turned Antonia gently around. “I suspect if you refuse Mrs. Waters, she will simply stay out here with you and make herself sicker,” he said quietly.

With obvious reluctance, Antonia nodded and walked away. For an instant, Gareth hesitated, wishing to go after her, but someone saved him from his folly by clearing his throat sharply behind him. “Mr. Watson needs you, Your Grace,” said one of the footmen.

“Yes, of course.” Hastily, Gareth crossed the courtyard. The bucket brigade was breaking up. The fire would soon be out. “It’s bad, isn’t it?” he said, joining Watson.

The estate manager nodded. “But everyone got out alive, thanks to you and Mr. Kemble,” he said. “And the rain is coming on fast. I think the worst is over—well, almost.”

“Almost?” Gareth looked at him, disconcerted. “What do you mean by that?”

The estate agent flicked a troubled glance at Gareth. “There is something you are going to have to see, I suppose,” he said, starting across the courtyard toward the bay in which the fire had begun.

The doors still sat wide open, their interior sides charred. “What was in here?” Gareth asked Watson as they surveyed the damage. “Some sort of wagon?”

Watson pointed into the dark, smoldering depths. “The new threshing machine,” he said grimly.

Gareth cursed beneath his breath. “Machine breakers?”

Watson shrugged. “So I first assumed,” he said, dragging one of the doors shut. “Until I saw
this
.”

The door’s interior was blackened, but on the front side, much of the white paint was intact—as were the bloodred letters scrawled across it. Gareth felt as if someone had knocked the wind out of him. As if the boys from Shoreditch had just hammered him to the ground again and left him gasping for air.

Burn in hell, Jew.

For an inestimable moment, Gareth could only stare at it, the rain running down his face. Watson looked pained. “I am sorry, Your Grace,” he finally said. “I felt…well, I felt you ought to see it.”

Behind him, he could feel the servants’ eyes as they took in the scene. “Leave it open,” said Gareth sharply. “Just…leave it open so everyone doesn’t have to see it.”

“It’s filth, Your Grace,” said Watson firmly. “Pure, unadulterated filth—and I am sorry. People don’t believe that way any longer. They truly do not. England is beginning to change.”

“Well, someone hasn’t,” Gareth murmured.

Watson surprised him then by setting a hand on his shoulder. “I shall tear it down tomorrow, Your Grace,” he said quietly, “and finish the job of burning it.”

Someone appeared at Gareth’s elbow with a black umbrella. “Mother of God,” whispered Dr. Osborne, looking at the door. “Someone needs to hang for this.”

Gareth turned and dragged a filthy hand through his wet hair. “Thank you for coming, Osborne,” he said. “Come on. Let’s get inside and—”

Another clap of thunder cut him off, and it was as if the heavens split wide open. The deluge began in earnest. Gareth grabbed the doctor’s arm. “Inside Watson’s office,” he shouted over the din. He grabbed Mrs. Musbury and dragged her along with him.

“Into the kitchens, everyone else!” she shouted. “Go! Go, quickly!”

The servants went around the office toward the lower kitchen door. Osborne and Watson followed Gareth and Mrs. Musbury into the office. Kemble brought up the rear. Coggins had vanished. They burst inside just as a bolt of lightning tore through the sky.

“Oh, I have never been so glad in all my life for a thunderstorm!” said the housekeeper, shaking herself off. “Oh, Your Grace. Mr. Kemble. You were very brave indeed!”

“Who amongst the staff has been injured?” Gareth asked, his gaze shifting from Mrs. Musbury to Watson. “Was anyone burnt?”

“Edwards, the second footman, broke a finger, I think,” Mrs. Musbury offered. “An accident passing the water buckets.”

“Fine, Edwards is your first patient,” Gareth ordered the doctor. “And then you must see to everyone who is still nursing swollen tonsils. I have a notion every damned one of them was out here in this smoke and rain tonight.”

“Yes, I fear so,” Osborne agreed, checking the contents of his satchel.

“Then kindly see to Mrs. Musbury,” Gareth continued. “She has a weak chest, and the duchess has already chided me about keeping her standing in the rain.”

The housekeeper looked affronted until Gareth winked at her. She allowed Osborne to escort her away.

Watson sat down at his desk. Gareth flopped down into a nearby chair, feeling filthy and weary. A heavy silence fell across the room. Gareth saw Kemble had a streak of soot across his high, usually immaculate collar, and a tuft of his hair had been scorched. Poor devil. He had not signed on for this.

“Machine breakers, eh?” said Kemble skeptically. “But in this case,
anti
-
Semitic
machine breakers? I wonder how many of those are wandering about the south of England with red paint and a tinder box?”

“You have a theory?” asked Gareth quietly.

“A theory, yes.” Propped casually against Watson’s drawer-stack, Kemble was looking grim. “But no more than that.”

Watson sat wearily back in his desk chair, his hands shoved deep into his coat pockets. “It is almost as if whoever did this could not resist one last malicious stab,” he said. “And it
could
be machine breakers, I daresay. And yet I do not think so. We haven’t even used the bloody thing yet. And we’ve put no one out of work—nor planned to. The entire staff knows that.”

“I know what I should like,” said Kemble, coming away from the file cabinet to brace his arms wide on Watson’s desk. “I should like ten minutes alone with that last stable hand you shoved out the carriage house window.”

Gareth looked at him in surprise. “What, the lad with the runny nose? Whatever for?”

Kemble frowned pensively. “The boy looked…guilty,” he answered. “He was sick, yes. But it was more than that. Had you not ordered him out the window, I’m not at all sure he meant to go. And then, when you ordered the sick into the kitchens, he didn’t leave. He joined Musbury’s bucket line.”

“Damn,” said Gareth. “Did he indeed?”

Watson pushed his chair away from the desk. “You are speaking of Howell, I think?” he remarked. “A big lad of about fifteen? He’s been abed and feverish the last two days. I can’t think what he could have done to feel guilty for.”

Kemble slowly shook his head. “It may not be what the boy has
done,
” he answered. “It may be more a case of what he has heard or seen.”

This time Gareth dragged both of his filthy hands through his hair. “Christ, another mystery!” he said. “Kemble, speak with the lad tomorrow. Find out what he knows.”

“By all means, Your Grace,” said Kemble, his gravity giving way to waggishness. “After all, my hair has been singed and my favorite coat ruined. Someone
really
must pay.”

Gareth crossed his arms over his chest and regarded him assessingly. “So, do you care to share with us your theory?” he asked. “Who is to do this paying?”

Kemble set his head to one side. “I am not perfectly sure,” he admitted. “But if I were a wagering man, I should guess it will be our old friend Mr. Metcaff.”

G
abriel pressed his back to the damp stone wall of the alley, his heart pounding. He heard nothing; nothing but the clatter and clamor of a busy port. The rumble of barrels rolling across wood. The creak of the cranes. The familiar hue and cry of the dockyard—much of it in foreign tongues. But they had lost him. He was free. Gabriel drew in a deep, shuddering breath and turned the corner toward freedom.

The shouts rang out at once. “Oy, there’s the lit’le bastard! After ’im, Ruiz!”

Gabriel was off in a flash. Feet pounded down the cobbles behind him as he dashed through the twisting, turning streets of Bridgetown. His lungs were about to burst. He saw a shadowy alley up ahead, but as he made for it, a tavern door flew open. A thin, dark-haired man stepped out, and snatched him up as if he weighed nothing.

“Ho, what have we here?” he chortled. “A little pickpocket, perhaps?”

“P-please, sir.” Gabriel had begun to shake. “Don’t let them take me.
Please.”

The three sailors drew up near the door, panting. “Thank you, sir,” said Creavy. “The lad gave us the slip on the dock.”

The man did not relinquish his grip. “And what would be the name of your ship?”

Creavy hesitated.
“The Saint-Nazaire.
Why?”

“Not all captains are reputable,” said the dark-haired man. “What is your interest in this boy?”

“Why, he’s indentured, sir,” said Creavy almost defensively. “We have a right to seize him.”

The dark man sneered. “Indentured? He doesn’t look old enough to shave!” He glanced again at Gabriel. “In fact, the lad looks awfully like my long-lost cousin from Shropshire. I believe I shall just take him home with me.”

Creavy’s eyes narrowed wickedly. He took a step nearer.

In a flash, the dark man drew a knife—a long, lethal-looking thing which had been strapped to his thigh. “Don’t even think of it.” His voice was soft and calm. “There are a dozen men inside that tavern. Half are my friends—and the other half my employees.”

“But—but the boy’s ours by rights,” rasped Creavy.

“Fine,” said the dark man. “You go get the lad’s papers of indenture from Larchmont—yes, I know all about the
Saint-Nazaire
—then bring them to Neville Shipping down by the careenage. I shall have a look at them—and then, if I’m satisfied, why, I’ll give you the lad. What could be more fair?”

As the men walked away, Gabriel drew in his breath on a shuddering sob. “Will they be back, sir?”

The dark man patted his shoulder. “Not a chance in hell. Come on, boy. Let’s get you to safety.”

As the fire hissed and steamed its last, Gareth returned to the house through the kitchens to make sure everyone was accounted for. Mrs. Musbury had put on one of her gray serge gowns and was pouring coffee for the exhausted crowd which was gathered in her sitting room. Nellie Waters was bustling about with a mop, sopping up puddles of water and tidying the piles of wet coats and boots. Gareth found Dr. Osborne in the stillroom splinting the broken finger.

He flicked a glance up at Gareth. “I believe we have escaped without serious injury,” he said. “Have you any idea who might have done this?”

Gareth shook his head. “No, not yet,” he said grimly. “But I will—and may God help him.”

Seated at the narrow worktable, the footman was looking a tad pale. Gareth set a hand on the servant’s shoulder. “All right there, Edwards?”

“Yes, Your Grace,” he said. “It is a clean break. It does not hurt—well, not much.”

Gareth smiled wearily. “Thank you for your efforts tonight,” he said. “Go back to your bed, Osborne, if this is the worst of it. I thank you for coming so quickly.”

With that, he hastened upstairs, stripped to the waist, and sluiced off the worst of the smoke and the grime at the washstand. He forced himself to forget about the fire, but he could not forget the stark, almost hopeless, expression in Antonia’s eyes tonight. She really had been terrified for him; so terrified she had put aside her own fear of storms to come looking for him. Patting his face dry with a towel, Gareth caught his own gaze in the mirror. The man who looked back seemed…different, somehow. His face, shadowed with a day’s worth of beard, seemed leaner, his eyes harder. These few weeks at Selsdon had changed him, and not in the way he had anticipated.

Gareth wondered what his father had looked like at this age. Much the same, he supposed. Major Charles Ventnor had been thirty-six years of age upon leaving for the Peninsula, already battle-hard and battle-weary. Gareth remembered that his father had been tall, broad-shouldered, and golden-haired. That his laugh had been rich and deep. That his eyes had lit with happiness when he’d looked at his wife. And that was about it. Gareth’s was a child’s memory, all he would have to sustain him throughout the rest of his life.

He was surprised to find himself missing his father so much. But perhaps now, of all times, it was understandable. Had he lived, Gareth could have asked him what it was like when a staid and serious-minded man fell head over heels in love at such an age. Would it go away? Get worse? Or would it grow and become something beautiful and all-encompassing, as his parents’ devotion had done? Even time and distance had not lessened their love. Religion and class-consciousness had not altered it one whit.

And suddenly, Gareth knew what his father’s advice would have been. To chance it. To risk it all—regret, hope, happiness—with Antonia. But Antonia’s situation was not quite the same, was it? She had never been allowed to make her own decisions. She had never been given choices. And so long as her husband’s death hung like a shadow over her head, she would have few.

But Warneham and his father were in the past. Antonia, perhaps, was his future, though in what form, he was not entirely sure. Her words tonight had given him hope when they should not have. And now he burned with the need to see her. To hold her. Gareth threw down the towel and went to the dressing room for clean clothes.

When he reached her sitting room door, Antonia answered on his first soft knock, wearing nothing but her nightgown. “Gabriel!” she cried, diving into his arms. “Oh, I am so glad to see you. Are you unhurt? Is everyone safe?”

He set his lips to the warm turn of her neck. “Everyone is fine, love,” he said. “We were fortunate.”

“No, we were not fortunate,
you
were brave,” she answered. “You and Mr. Kemble. Everyone was speaking of it. Why, if the two of you had not risked…had not risked your lives to—oh, God!”

“What, love?”

“Gabriel, you could have been
killed!
” she whispered, her voice choking. “And now I don’t know whether to kiss you or to slap you senseless.”

He speared his fingers into the thick, loose hair at the back of her head. “I vote for
kiss,
” he murmured. “Being slapped senseless isn’t nearly as exciting.”

Antonia leaned fully against him, turning her face to his. He molded his lips over hers, gently at first. And then it was as if a spark burst to flame between them. As with that night on the rampart, it was a sudden, fierce longing which could not be contained. An elated relief to find that they were alive and together despite whatever tragedy the world had thrown at them. Gareth deepened the kiss and was lost to her.

Antonia felt Gabriel’s arms come about her, warm and strong. She gave herself up to it; the allure of his touch, the hunger of his body. She felt that sweet, familiar ache go twisting through her, drawing at her very core. His mouth moved over her face, kissing her temple, her eyebrow. But it was not what she wanted. Sensing it, Gabriel returned his lips to hers, surging inside on a kiss that left her knees trembling.

His touch was insistent. Commanding. What she burned for. She pressed her body fully against his, offering herself out of love and desperation. His hands flowed over her, firing her skin. One hand slid beneath the curve of her buttock, and Gabriel pulled her firmly against the hardening ridge of his arousal.

Antonia knew she should urge him toward the bedroom, but there was a delicious wickedness to making love in the middle of one’s sitting room. “Take me,” she murmured against his mouth. “Now, Gabriel, please.”

“Antonia,” he whispered. “Oh, God.”

She felt Gabriel urge her backward. The edge of her rosewood secretary struck the backs of her legs. His mouth never leaving hers, he lifted her up. Her pens skidded off the desktop, landing somewhere on the carpet. They ignored them. His hands found her breasts, weighing them and rubbing them until her nipples ached and she was arching almost off the table, aching for more.

Antonia’s fingers went to the tie at the throat of her gown. Gabriel pushed the soft flannel off her shoulder and bit gently at the bare flesh. Inexplicably, a tremor ran through her. She sought out his lips, and he took her with a renewed desperation, exploring the recesses of her mouth with deep, hungry strokes. Antonia felt reality swirl away as he pushed up the hem of her gown.

Parting her legs, she let herself swim in the sensation of his touch, and as he plunged into her mouth again, she let her hand slide round his waist. She drew out his shirttails and skimmed her palms up the warm, hard muscles of his back. “Gabriel,” she murmured. “So beautiful.” She felt his body shiver with pleasure as his heat and tantalizing scent surrounded her. Soap and citrus. Wood smoke and a hint of musky male. His breath was sawing in and out now, his hands heavy and demanding.

Antonia slid a little nearer to the edge of the table and let her fingers go to the buttons of his trousers. In a heated rush, she unfastened them. The satiny head of his erection sprang away from the taut muscles of his belly. “God, Antonia,” he rasped. “I have to have you.”

“Then have me,” she whispered, frantically pushing away the fabric of his drawers. “Here and now. Don’t think. Don’t talk.”

“Why do I always find those words so persuasive?” he muttered, rucking up her nightgown. He stepped nearer and kissed her neck, his teeth nipping none too gently down her throat. Swiftly, his hand eased fully between her legs, touching her flesh, which was already wet with need.

He moaned and slipped one finger inside. “More,” she choked, sliding her hand up his warm, velvety erection. “Now.
Please?
”

In response, he pulled her to the very edge of the table. Antonia listened to her breath roughen. He pressed himself into her and entered her hard on one stroke. “Oh!” she said.
“Yes.”

He thrust again, making the table thump hard against the wall. Antonia did not care. She let her head roll backward, almost emboldened by the fear of discovery; by the almost desperate need they felt for one another. Again and again, Gabriel plunged into her, holding her on the very edge of the desk, on the very edge of implosion. Unable to restrain herself, Antonia strained instinctively against him, an urgent, physical need building and building.

“Antonia,” he choked, one hand going to her breast. “Antonia, I can’t resist…”

She could think of nothing but the driving force inside her, of the desperate need to ease her torment as she urged herself against the heat and weight of him inside her. Gabriel’s hands and mouth were desperate, too. The urgency ratcheted up. She felt him thrust and thrust again. She cried out, and Gabriel’s head went back, his spine drawn taut as a bow. The rhythm drove them, dragging her to that fine, sweet precipice until her climax seized her. Her body shattered with sensation. Gabriel withdrew almost completely, then thrust deep on one last stroke. His head went back, the tendons of his neck straining, his cry of pleasure soundless as his warmth flooded inside her.

For long moments, they simply held one another, his head resting on her shoulder, his brow damp with perspiration. Then Gabriel’s conscience seemed to prick him. “Good Lord, Antonia,” he whispered. “I cannot believe I did this to you. Here. On a desk, for God’s sake.”

She lightly kissed the curve of his ear. She didn’t care. She couldn’t even fathom the risk they had just run. Every logical thought had been obliterated by her need for him. The desire which kept springing up between them seemed eternal and white-hot. “Gabriel,” she said quietly. “I love you. I know…I know you don’t wish me to say it. Perhaps not even to think it. But there, it is said.”

Gabriel lifted his head, and their gazes met. He cupped the side of her face in his hand, his eyes a little sad. “Perhaps, Antonia, you simply love how I make you feel?”

“Stop it, Gabriel.” She laid her hand over his alongside her face. “I am not like…like anyone else you have had sex with. This is not about physical pleasure.”

“No?” He lifted one eyebrow.

She felt her face flame. “Well, it
is,
” she admitted. “But it is so much more than that.”

His smile was muted. Wordlessly, he pulled his body from hers, then lifted her off the desk, and restored her nightgown to order. He shoved his shirttails back in with a few quick stabs. “Antonia, I care for you,” he finally said without looking at her. “A great deal. You deserve to know that.”

“Do you?” Her voice was amazingly steady.

He turned his back and walked to the window. The very window at which she had stood on that awful morning when she had denied making love to him. But her need for him could not be denied; she knew that now.

“I care for you, yes,” he said again, staring out into the rain. “Do I love you? Yes, Antonia. Desperately. I think you know that.”

He loved her?
Yes, he must. Gabriel was not the sort of man who said things he did not mean. Hope stirring in her heart, Antonia followed him and set both her hands on his upper arm. “I cannot know, Gabriel, unless you tell me,” she answered. “I cannot guess. I am afraid, even, to hope.”

He shook his head, his eyes focused somewhere in the distance. “Antonia, let us not rush into anything,” he cautioned. “You have been through so much. You have had so little opportunity to choose what you want.”