Regina Scott (15 page)

Vaughn frowned, fingers kneading hers as if he too longed for action. “But who? I know only two gentlemen besides my uncle who might be linked to this. One was Lord Winthrop, Lady Claire’s husband, and he is dead.”

“And the other?” Imogene pressed.

One side of his mouth turned up. “Lord Gregory Wentworth.”

“Oh, surely not,” Imogene said, then laughed at the grin on his face.

“Agreed.” He sighed and released her. “This is maddening! Someone put that bullet through Uncle’s heart, drowned Repton and shot Todd. Three men are dead! That is a fact.”

Just then a carriage turned off the main drive and headed in their direction. Imogene threaded her arm through Vaughn’s and set them walking toward the palace in the distance.

“Perhaps the three deaths aren’t connected,” she suggested, amazed she could even discuss such a matter without flinching. “Perhaps we should be looking for three culprits.”

“Again you say ‘we,’” he replied, tone light.

Imogene squeezed his arm. “You brought these matters to my attention, sir. You cannot expect me to dismiss them.”

“Why not? Sometimes it seems everyone else has.”

The carriage, a high-perch phaeton drawn by a team of dappled gray horses, was quickly overtaking them. Imogene stepped off the path, and Vaughn joined her.

“The matter concerns you, and therefore it concerns me,” she assured him.

“And the fact that I suspect your father is the villain in the piece has nothing to do with your interest.”

Imogene waved a hand. “Certainly not. That suspicion doesn’t bear additional discussion.”

Vaughn frowned and pulled her farther from the path. Imogene glanced at the phaeton in time to see it veer accordingly. Vaughn whipped the hat from his head and waved it wildly. “Ho! There are pedestrians here!”

The horses thundered on. Imogene could see the foam flying from their bits.

“Run,” Vaughn ordered. “Now!”

* * *

Vaughn seized Imogene’s hand and tugged her to the left, back the way they had come. All he had to do was get them beyond the horses’ path, and they would be safe. She stumbled on her gown, and he caught her up against him, turning her away from the vehicle. The phaeton rumbled past, the wind whipping her skirts tight to her legs. She clamped her free hand to her bonnet.

Vaughn steadied her, then glanced after the carriage. What had the driver been thinking? Even as he watched, the fellow was slowing the horses, then turning them. He might be coming back to apologize, but Vaughn intended to take no chances.

“Into the trees,” he said to Imogene. “Hurry.”

She didn’t argue. She lifted her skirts and darted across the grass as the carriage picked up speed again.

Vaughn pulled her under the branches of a sycamore and pressed her back against the bark. “Stay here.”

“While you are flattened? Never!”

Her gaze was bright, her pointed chin raised like a weapon. The fire in her never ceased to amaze him or to appeal to his heart. “And here I was congratulating myself on your obedient nature,” he teased.

She snorted, a decidedly unladylike sound he could grow to love.

Vaughn bent his head to peer inside her bonnet. “Stay here, so I needn’t fear for your safety. Please.”

Her look remained defiant, but she snapped a nod.

Vaughn ventured out from under the tree. The carriage had passed, rolling back to the more populated areas of Hyde Park. The driver glanced back and for a moment met Vaughn’s gaze.

Vaughn’s eyes narrowed as Lord Wentworth whipped up his horses and disappeared around the bend. It seemed Vaughn and Imogene had both been wrong. The toad had the capacity to kill. The question was, who was he after: Vaughn or Imogene?

Chapter Fifteen

A
s soon as he was certain the carriage had gone, Vaughn called Imogene out from under the tree.

“Are you all right?” he asked as she joined him in the sunlight.

She was glancing around the grass with a frown. “Fine. What of our murderous coachman?”

“Fled to plead his conscience, it seems,” Vaughn replied. “But I’ll feel more comfortable when I know you’re safely at home.”

“You think this has something to do with my father, don’t you?” she challenged, her gaze returning to his.

Vaughn shrugged. “Very likely, I fear.”

“Then why,” she asked, “would I be safer at home?”

Vaughn raised his brows. “Surely your mother or your servants would prevent him from hurting you.”

As if to prove it, she set off toward Mayfair, her skirts whipping, and he could only fall in beside her. “If he’s capable of toppling the crown,” she said, head bowed as if she watched her path, “he’s certainly capable of doing away with his own daughter. But why, sir?”

Before Vaughn could answer, she shook her head. “No. I refuse to see my father’s hand in this. I’ll return home because Mother may need me, but first I want you to tell me what you intend to do next.”

He hesitated. Warned as she was about her father’s possible treachery, she might keep Vaughn’s plans secret. On the other hand, believing her father innocent, what was to stop her from confessing all?

She glanced his way. Once more her intentions shouted from every inch of her body. Her face was pinched, her shoulders tight, her steps determined. “I won’t give you away. You can trust me.”

How easily she made the promise; how easily she trusted him. Should he not extend the same courtesy?

“My best chance of learning more at the moment is that driver,” Vaughn said, taking her elbow to help her around a bump in the path. “I intend to find him and make him tell me what he knows.”

She was looking ahead, so her bonnet hid her face, but he could hear the smile in her voice. “I would almost like to see that. Do remember, however, that Lord Wentworth has some pretensions toward being a gentleman. You cannot clap him in the stocks because it amuses you.”

So she also had recognized their would-be assailant. “A shame to be sure,” Vaughn drawled.

She glanced his way again, green eyes crinkled up. “You will report on your success, I hope.”

“If I learn anything of import,” Vaughn promised, “you will be the first to know.”

She nodded as if satisfied, and they trudged along in silence a moment. How brave she was, how enthusiastic in her disposition. He could imagine many a young lady would have reacted differently to his suspicions, the galloping horses, the brush with danger: screaming, fainting and crying and wringing her hands. Imogene merely advised him to take care how he pursued his investigation.

They reached the fork in the path, with one side leading to the Oxford Street corner and the other toward the powder magazine.

“I should probably go alone from here so no one sees us together,” she said, pausing. “Until we sort this out, I would prefer not to burden my father with the knowledge I had visited with you.”

“So you intend to defy him.”

She made a face. “I will discuss the matter with him at the first opportunity, I assure you. Until then, being with you is necessary to find him and assure his safety.”

“Nobly said,” he replied with a smile.

“Stop that,” she scolded. “I’m not trying to go behind my father’s back. I’m trying to protect all of us. The less my family knows of our involvement, the easier that protection will be.”

He could not argue with her on that score. “Of course,” he said. “There is one small problem, however.”

“Oh?” She glanced up with a frown, and he leaned closer and tugged out the cluster of leaves that had lodged in her bonnet.

“There. All better.”

She gazed at him, lips tilted in a smile, cheeks still flushed from their adventures. Her eyes were greener than the spring leaves and just as alive with promise. How could any man resist? He bent and brushed his lips against hers.

Desire and delight poured through him in equal measure. Why was it her and her alone that raised such feelings? Once again he found himself humbled.

She pulled back with a sigh. “Really, Mr. Everard, I begin to think your cook is deficient in her skills and you must be starving. I shall have to come armed with pudding to protect myself if you insist on tasting me every time we meet.”

Vaughn laughed as he straightened. “No confection can possibly compare to your sweet lips, my dear.”

Her face was even redder. “Go on, now, and be careful. Send me word when we are to meet again.”

He took her hand and bowed over it. “Your most devoted servant, Lady Imogene.”

Releasing her and straightening again, he watched her walk away. But he wasn’t surprised to feel as if she’d taken a piece of him with her.

* * *

Despite Imogene’s brave words, Vaughn refused to let her out of his sight. He followed at a distance until he saw her reach her home, then set off in search of his quarry. The toad had to be acting under orders from the marquess, but Vaughn knew the fellow wasn’t as adept at hiding. He’d been driving a phaeton, very likely his own from the quality of his team. He’d have to return home with it eventually.

Unfortunately, when Vaughn checked at his lordship’s town house, he found that the fellow had already returned and left again. Making the rounds of gentlemanly haunts took a while, and the toad had apparently been ensconced in White’s for an hour before Vaughn found someone willing to bring him in as a guest. He stalked through the comfortable rooms, searching. Gentlemen at cards glanced up and pulled their coins closer. Gentlemen reading the papers near the fire held the sheets higher, and more than one page trembled around the edges.

His quarry took one look at Vaughn approaching his wingback chair and washed white. “Afternoon, Everard,” he said, though he stuttered on the name.

“How glad I am to see you, my lord,” Vaughn said, pulling him to his feet. “I believe we have unfinished business you began in the park this afternoon.”

The toad yanked free his arm. “No idea what you’re referring to.”

“Surely you remember,” Vaughn said, aware of more than one gaze now turned their way. “It had to do with a phaeton and pair.”

“Not interested,” he said, stepping back, booted feet firm on the carpet. “Peddle your wares elsewhere.”

Vaughn grit his teeth. Closing the distance, he lowered his voice. “I saw you, you maw worm. I know you were driving that carriage. Why did you try to run us down?”

Panic danced in the toad’s eyes. “You’re mad.”

“You’re the one who’s mad if you think I’ll stand by and watch a lady be hurt.”

The panic disappeared like a candle snuffed out, leaving a cunning behind that chilled Vaughn. “The lady means nothing. My future depends on keeping you occupied. If she is hurt along the way, no one but you will weep.”

Vaughn’s hand moved of its own volition, twisting up into the creature’s cravat and lifting the taller man right off his feet. “You will leave the lady alone.”

The toad’s eyes bulged. “Unhand me!” he rasped.

“I say, that just isn’t done,” someone murmured close by, and Vaughn heard chairs scrape and fabric protest as bodies moved.

He refused to let the man escape. “What are you planning? Tell me!”

“Never!” He kicked out, and Vaughn dropped him. Staggering, he gasped in a breath.

“I think, sir,” said a portly older gentleman who had come up on Vaughn’s right, “that you should leave.”

“No.” The toad held up a hand as he wheezed. “My right. Demand satisfaction.”

Gasps echoed around him. Vaughn smiled. “A shame. You refused to answer my questions and give
me
satisfaction. Why should I gratify you?”

His eyes glittered. “Because unless you do, the lady in question will never be safe.”

Something tightened inside him. If the toad could attempt to run Vaughn and Imogene down, would he stop at hurting Imogene in the future? Unlikely, given the way he was demanding a fight now. The marquess might have ordered the toad to keep Vaughn distracted, but surely even he would quail at the violence and recklessness of the toad’s methods.

Vaughn knew he had to be stopped, yet he hesitated. Once the thought of a duel would have fired his blood. Once he’d have been the one demanding it. Now the thought of wounding a man, even the toad’s sad excuse for manhood, seemed a sacrilege somehow.

“What’s this?” Lord Eustace, the man who had let Vaughn in, pushed his way to the front of the growing crowd. A sandy-haired fellow in his early thirties, he was a great favorite with the ladies and gentlemen alike for his usually affable ways and skill at whist. “That’s no way to talk, Wentworth,” he said. “I suggest you apologize like a good fellow.”

“A gentleman,” the toad said, each word a nail in his own coffin, “has no need to apologize to the lesser orders.”

The murmur turned against him now. “A gentleman doesn’t give cause to apologize,” Lord Eustace countered.

Vaughn saw the toad grimace, tugging at his ruined cravat. Still, even though he had once craved Society’s good opinion, something drove him harder now. “Well?” he challenged Vaughn. “What’s it to be? The lady’s safety or your own?”

“I’ll second you, Everard,” Lord Eustace said, blue eyes narrowing. “I don’t much fancy a fellow who threatens a lady.”

“Here, here,” someone else put in.

“Hardly a lady,” Wentworth sneered. “The tart in question has gone into the shrubbery with Everard a few too many times.”

Ice water flowed through Vaughn’s veins. “Take that back.”

“Why? Afraid someone will question your heir if you marry her?”

More gasps echoed, and Vaughn heard someone mutter about Wentworth’s odds of losing. He had little doubt he could teach the toad a lesson, but still something held him back. That new conscience of his was entirely too demanding.

“Rather question your intelligence for making such a statement,” he countered, turning away in disgust.

He felt the toad’s hand on his shoulder. “Don’t you dare walk away from me, you coward!”

Vaughn looked back at him, and the toad dropped his hand. “Do you honestly think I care what you think of me?”

“You may not care for your own honor, but you care about hers. Shall I say her name aloud? Shall I let all these fine gentlemen know who to seek for their next mistress?”

The thought of any man approaching Imogene with such a degrading request made him ill. Half the men around him looked equally sickened. The other half looked far too eager.

“Primrose Hill, tomorrow at dawn,” Vaughn said.

Wentworth’s smile was triumphant. “Pistols, then.”

“I believe,” said Lord Eustace, stepping between the two of them, “that Mr. Everard is the aggrieved in this case. He shall have choice of weapon.”

Choice? That had been taken from him. But perhaps this duel could serve one purpose. “The blade,” Vaughn said. “And know this, Wentworth—when I win, I expect answers.”

* * *

Imogene’s afternoon was nearly as difficult. It had started nicely enough. She’d caught sight of Vaughn once as she’d walked home, and knowing he was watching over her made the trip somehow easier.

Still, she’d shied when she’d crossed the street and a carriage had turned the corner. The coachman had acknowledged her with a tip of his cap. She’d smiled with a shaky breath before continuing on.

Small wonder she was skittish! What had Lord Wentworth been thinking to come at them that way? She understood enough about horses to know they would balk at running down a person, but even a glancing blow from the carriage would have injured her or Vaughn greatly, and God forbid they should fall under one of the iron-clad wheels. What could have goaded his lordship to take such action?

Not an order from her father, she was sure. She refused to believe Vaughn’s suspicions about the marquess. She could understand how he’d reached those conclusions, given the stories he’d told her. But there had to be another explanation. It was up to her to find it.

Her mother, unfortunately, was in no condition to help, even if Imogene had felt comfortable confiding the terrible tales to her. In the wake of her husband’s disappearance, Lady Widmore had retired to her room with a headache that had required a dose of laudanum to nurse. She would not likely rise before dinner. The servants were equally unhelpful, tiptoeing around, faces drawn. With her father unaccounted for, they feared the worst.

She’d prayed for his safety twice already, but if she’d truly thought him in danger, she would have gone to the magistrates. As it was, she could not like hounding him any further. She only wished she knew how to help. Surely the best approach lay in clearing his name. But how?

Left to her own devices, she went to the music room, but her compositions failed to engage her. The notes blurred before her, and her fingers stilled on the keys.
You did not create me to live in fear, Father. Your Word says as much. You intended me for a purpose, and surely it was helping my family. Show me what to do now.

Thoughts and concerns tumbled over each other in her mind. Vaughn wanted proof of her father’s guilt. She wanted proof of his innocence. Would her father have left any evidence of his plans, whatever they were, in the house? She closed the keyboard and went to check his library.

The room was quiet and far too clean. A quick look in the desk showed that it hadn’t been used for work in some time. Blank parchment stood ready for her father’s hand, and his signet seal sat waiting near the wax. The only thing she had proved was that her father was well prepared.

She knew of one other place he might leave a clue as to his whereabouts. Imogene climbed the stairs to the chamber story and stood outside the closed door of her father’s room. She had never entered his bedchamber before. There had been no need. Her father had always come to her, always supported her. Shouldn’t she help him now, even if that meant trespassing on his privacy?

She turned the handle and entered. She wasn’t surprised by the rich trappings of the room, the black marble fireplace, the brocaded draperies on the window, the velvet hangings on the bed. She was more surprised by the darkness. The walls were painted a deep purple above the gray wainscoting, the materials all a rich crimson. Her feet sank into the thick pile of the carpet as she crossed the floor.