One Wicked Night (14 page)

She simply whispered, “Thank you, my lord. That man was certainly no gentleman.”

“If you wanted to be pawed, that’s your affair. I thought, however, you might save yourself the embarrassment from doing so in polite company.”

One, two, three; one, two, three
. He struggled to concentrate on the beat of the music in the tense silence that followed, until Serena’s uncertain voice interrupted him.

Serena looked so damned sincere. He’d swallowed this lie once before. “But you said nothing of the matter I truly wish to understand. Why did you let me bed you in the first place?”

Serena’s gaze darted to a couple close by. “Can we continue this discussion elsewhere?”

His first instinct was to refuse. He shouldn’t become more involved with a married woman he could not banish from his memory. But somehow, he needed to understand the whys of their explosive night together, needed to understand what circumstances had driven an ethereal virgin to his bed.

“Follow me,” he said, then escorted her off the floor.

Once out of the cloying fragrances and hot air stifling the ballroom, Lucien breathed deeply. He turned to face Serena in a deserted alcove just round the corner and down the hall. In the background, the orchestra began a country reel as Lucien watched an apology move within her stunning smoky eyes.

“I
am
sorry,” Serena began. “I realize I should have insisted you take me home. I knew it was improper. But . . . after you rescued me, I could not repay your gallant deed by leaving you intoxicated and grief-stricken.”

The duchess was full of surprises. She hadn’t approached him with false remorse, one of Ravenna’s favorite ploys. She shed no tears designed to win his pity. Christ, Ravenna could have won awards performing her act in London’s theaters, had she set her mind to it, but Serena’s expression was entirely different. Nervous, but startlingly direct. What act was this?

Despite the fact she was married, Lucien wanted to touch her. Her gardenia-like scent filled his senses, reminding him of the pleasure gardens where they met, where he had first noticed her unique fragrance. It also reminded him of the hours they had shared heaven, each giving and receiving it, in his bed. He pushed the memory and the accompanying regret away.

“So you thought to repay me with your virginity?”

She folded her hands nervously before her and bowed her head. “No. You looked sad and desperately in need of someone to comfort you. I know because . . . I needed those things myself. I realize I should never have allowed—”

“Shhh. I did the chasing,” he admitted softly. “I maneuvered you into my coach.” He sighed. “Just tell me what sort of reaction you expected to provoke from your husband.”

“Provoke?” she asked, puzzled. “I expected to provoke nothing. As I said, it was an impulse I simply did not . . . could not resist.”

He paused, weighing her words for truthfulness. “How is it you’re married, but had never been touched before?”

She bit her lip, chewing on it for long moments until he ached to take it between his own and soothe the enticing, abused flesh.

Finally, she blinked once, twice, then swallowed. She looked away before answering, “My . . . my husband and I rarely occupy the same household, on purpose, I’m afraid. We’ve been known to have terrible rows—”

“That doesn’t account for your wedding night. Why didn’t you have one?”

She swallowed again. “My husband was ill at the time, and by the time he was well, I had grown quite accustomed to . . . being alone.”

She was breathing a little too quickly. Her eyes were too wide, and directed anywhere but at him. She was lying. Apparently, this temptress practiced her own form of evasion, albeit an artless one. What was she hiding?

“Fascinating,” he drawled. “Perhaps you would like to tell me the truth now?

“Lucien?” he heard a familiar voice call. “Oh, Lucien?”

He swore softly, his brows drawing together in a scowl. “Later, you will give me the truth, Your Grace. All of it.” Whirling away, he replied to the intruding voice, “Yes, Aunt Elizabeth?”

He saw her halfway down the passage. Because he was burdened by an injured knee, she moved quicker and greeted him just a foot away from Serena.

“I’m finished.”
For now.

****

With a sigh of satisfaction, Cyrus leaned back in his seat, relaxing to the sway and rock of the carriage. He eyed the passing London scenery, watching as they drove out of the city toward Hampstead on the Heath. Sultry late summer air hovered all around, slowly giving way to the whisper of coolness the nights provided.

His journey promised to be a productive one. Lord Mansfield was not only a good host, but also open-minded to a sound political argument, even when the views opposed his own.

Life in general was better than ever. His career was at a pinnacle he had never hoped to reach, even in his wildest youthful imaginings. And most of all, he had a beautiful wife, who might even now be carrying a child—the child that would rid him of Alastair’s impending threat to the dukedom.

Sweet Serena, he thought, shaking his head. As he had anticipated she would, she had followed the urging of her young body and heart once he had given her leave. Her choice of a lover had surprised him, however. Cyrus had imagined she would gravitate to a sensitive, romantic type, not a war-hardened soldier and marriage-cynical lord.

But Cyrus was not displeased. According to his investigator’s latest report, Lord Daneridge was more than a little infatuated with Serena. That gave Cyrus cause to breathe easier, for he had no doubt Lord Daneridge would protect Serena from any threat Alastair posed after he himself cocked up his toes. He had seen to that.

Suddenly, hoofbeats and a gun blast sounded behind the coach. Cyrus peered out to see two burly men, masked and armed, galloping past his vehicle.

“Stand an’ deliver,” one shouted.

The two thieves had blocked the road. Realizing escape was next to impossible without armed riders, Cyrus gave the signal to stop.

Dust flying, the coach rolled to a halt. One bandit yanked the door open. Cyrus studied the young face. He looked East End hard, indifferent to such trivialities as pain and compassion.

“Get out, Yer Grace. We got business with ye.”

“Now see here,” his coachman Roberts said, waving a pistol of his own. “My employer will not deal with the likes of you.”

In a quick blur, one highwayman raised his gun and fired. The coachman fell to the ground out of Cyrus’s sight, leaving him to fear the extent of his employee’s injuries.

Then Cyrus felt the coach sway as his footmen stepped off its back, no doubt creeping off in the dark to save their own pretty skins. The bandits’ cries of “bloomin’ cowards” confirmed his suspicion. He was alone with two highwaymen, who were both armed and unafraid.

Fear broke a sweat on Cyrus’s skin. By God, they did mean business.

Calmly, so as not to give the appearance of rebellion, Cyrus stepped from the coach. “I’ll come out, gentlemen. I’m assuming you would like all my valuables?”

The two men exchanged glances, as if conferring, before the one before him spoke. “Aye, all o’ them.”

Without a word, Cyrus gave over the watch from his waistcoat, the rings off his fingers, as well as his snuff box and all his currency, right down to the last farthing.

As the thieves counted the money, Cyrus asked, “Does that complete our transaction?”

The one before him shook his mangy head. The tight line of the man’s jaw and the ruthlessness in his dilated eyes sent a tremor of dread snaking up Cyrus’s spine.

“Not quite, Yer Grace,” the thug said. “We was hired to kill ye.”

CHAPTER NINE

Serena paced in the drawing room nearest the entrance hall. She wasn’t in the mood to appreciate the soothing qualities of the rich burgundy- and ivory-hued surroundings.

Restlessly, she whirled about. Her eyes darted to the Chinese mantle clock. Sweet mercy, that hour hand was inching close to the three o’clock mark. Where could Cyrus be at this time of the morning? He’d said he would return from Hampstead no later than midnight. He was nearly three hours late, a rare occurrence for a man who prided himself on the utmost punctuality.

Please God, don’t let anything have happened to him
. Cyrus couldn’t leave her alone, not without his comforting friendship.

Ever since she had confessed to her liaison with Lucien Clayborne, a brightness in Cyrus’s eyes, absent since the early days of their marriage, had reappeared. His step seemed lighter, his mood consistently jovial—all because he was banking on the potency of one man and the fertility of his wife. And she herself was beginning to put some merit into the possibility; she was over three weeks late in her menses.

The front door crashed open, startling her from her thoughts. Heart pounding, breath held, she raced down the stairs to the entrance hall.

A specter from her nightmares swayed where he stood—Cyrus’s coachman, filthy, bruised, and bloody. Gruesome splotches of blood stained his gold-trimmed uniform. His hair hung limply, wig askew. Fear and dismay etched the ravaged lines of his face.

“What’s happened? Where is my husband?” she demanded, trying to force aside the feeling that Fate’s hands were grasping for her throat.

Serena never heard the rest. Feet flying, she darted across the entrance hall, out the open door, into the chilly night air. Terror clawed at her. Would her premonition be a gruesome reality? Vaguely, she heard the uproar of the servants rushing out behind her.

“Wait! Your Grace!” she heard the porter call.

She knew what that shout meant—felt it in the darkest, most dread-filled part of her soul, but not for an instant did she consider stopping. Cyrus was still in his coach, not alighting the minute he’d pulled to the front, as usual. That fact, accompanied by the coachman’s pale, disheveled state, could only mean something dreadful, unthinkable, had happened.

Around her, the thin yellow light of the flares permeated the London fog swirling eerily before her, filling her head with the surreal visions of gray, deathly faces. The burning cloths from the flares with their oil-saturated scent exploded in her head, spurring her forward.

Not Cyrus. She had prayed for his safety. “Please don’t punish him for my sins,” she implored above. “Please let him be alive.”

Serena never stopped her frantic dash until she reached the coach, gleaming a sinister black in the cold night. With numb, trembling fingers, she yanked the door open.

Cyrus lay inside, pale and still, his form stretched awkwardly across the seat, as if he’d been dropped that way. Shock haunted his achingly familiar, death-frozen eyes.

She backed away in horror. “No!”

Cyrus couldn’t die. He wasn’t ready to leave this earth. She wasn’t ready for life without him.

Her desperate eyes roved his form, wanting more than anything to deny the drying crimson stains of his life’s blood covering his face and once white shirt.

Cyrus could not die. She wouldn’t let him. Life without his gentle guidance was too frightening. “Have the porter take him to his room. Lay him out on his bed. I will heal him.”

“’Tis sorry I am, milady, but it’s too late.” Vaguely, Serena noted her maid’s pale face and sorrowful eyes.

Her feet moving with their own will, Serena tried to climb into the coach. Without the aid of the steps, the waist-high vehicle became an obstacle she felt compelled to overcome. If she could just touch him, certainly she would discover this was a hoax, a cruel trick of the dark. Her arms ached, her knees stung where she scraped them. Still, her only thought was to close the distance between her and Cyrus.

She struggled into the vehicle, sinking to her knees at his feet upon the coach’s floor. Through the ghostly light of the flickering flares, she saw blood covering the familiar face stemming from a shot to the forehead. Cyrus’s coloring was an unnatural gray. His chest did not move.

Serena released a guttural animal sound. The hot rush of tears and a swell of nausea rushed from the flood of grief and the powerful urge to deny what her eyes told her.

Caffey’s hand touched her shoulder. “Come inside, milady. It’s much too late to be out.”

Serena’s sobbing began anew. Grief crashed through her, robbing her of all but the will to cry. What would life be like without his wisdom and patience?