Ripe for Pleasure (7 page)

B
efore Mrs. Whedon had time to fully settle onto the velvet seat of the carriage, Leo clambered aboard and crammed his way
onto the seat beside her. She twisted, putting her back to the corner, hoops and skirts riding up. Her wary eyes gleamed in
the dim light cast by the linkboys’ flambeaux as they ran past, shouting for custom.

The coach rocked hard as it set off, the muffled voice of the coachman cursing at those blocking his way. “How long do you
think it will take to clear all this?” Leo said, drawing her feet up into his lap. “We might not get home till dawn.” He eased
off one shoe and flung it carelessly across the coach, diamond buckle and all. “If we’re lucky.”

Anticipation curled in his belly, crawling up and down his limbs with the same tingle as a lightning storm. Outside, there
was chaos as sedan chairs vied with carriages and footmen fought over the placement of their masters’ coaches. Inside, it
was the eye of the storm, just quiet
enough for him to hear her small gasp as he pressed one thumb into the soft arch of her silk-clad foot. Beneath his fingers,
the delicate bones shifted. Kidskin slid over silk, promising something entirely wanton.

Mrs. Whedon bit her lip and flexed her toes like a cat responding to a hand down its back. Leo turned his head to hide his
grin and bent all his concentration on Mrs. Whedon’s foot. Nothing else existed, save the fact that it led—irresistibly—to
a finely turned ankle and shapely calf.

She made a small contented noise in the back of her throat as he slid his hands up her calf and slipped a finger beneath her
garter. Leo thumbed the hook loose and tugged the garter free, then bent and kissed the bend of her knee. The intoxicating
scent of warm flesh filled his nostrils; the knowledge that her naked thigh lay just out of bounds was torturous.

He gripped her stocking with his teeth and pulled.

“Those are twelve shillings a pair.”

“And worth every penny.” He stripped it from her leg and flung it after her shoe. “But you really should have much more engrossing
things to think about just now than the exorbitant price you’ve paid for stockings.”

She chuckled and pushed against him with her bare foot, her leg lolling outward in what he dearly hoped was a blatant invitation.
Leo put his open mouth against the soft flesh on the inside of her knee and sucked, and then blew across the wet mark he left
behind.

“My lord—” Her protest cut off as he bit softly above the mark left by her garter.

“My lady?”

“My lord.” Her breath hitched, her tone pleaded, and her hands were locked on his coat.

He licked a short trail up and over her knee to the inside of her thigh.

“I wasn’t—”

“Of course you weren’t,” he agreed, not moving from the spot. He knew begging when he heard it, and this was just the beginning
of their evening…

The sound of gunshots brought Leo upright and out of the haze of seduction as thoroughly as a cold bucket of water. The coach
shuddered to a stop, and he pushed Mrs. Whedon behind him. A second shot burst the small window in the door, sending a thousand
minute projectiles raining down upon them. Outside, there was shouting and the unmistakable sound of a horse in pain. Leo
flipped up the opposite seat and grabbed one of the pistols kept there before he flung open the door and waded into the fray.

He emerged into darkness that was only vaguely pierced by the greasy glow of the streetlamps. Leo cocked the gun and took
the scene in with a clarity that seemed to come only in times of crisis. One of the horses was down, thrashing in its traces.
Its mate was sideling, tossing its head in terror.

His father’s coachman, Tompkins, was struggling to cut the wounded horse free, while the footmen were locked in combat with
multiple ruffians armed with cudgels and knives. Leo shot one of them, then turned the gun about and hit a second man with
its heavy butt. He went down silently, but with a sickening lurch. Leo stepped over his body and pulled a man in a rough frieze
coat off one of the footmen.

A shot rang out from behind him, and the man in the frieze coat fell back, screaming. Leo spun about to find Mrs. Whedon,
the second pistol drooping in her hand. Their eyes met, and he thought she smiled, and then she was falling back into the
coach, screaming.

For the first time in his life, Leo actually understood what it meant to see red.

He got halfway to the coach before someone grabbed his arm. Nothing existed except his fists, the fools who had undoubtedly
been sent by his cousin, and the need to get to Mrs. Whedon. To Viola.

Leo didn’t realize that it was over, his cousin’s men either dead or fled into the night, until Tompkins—wig missing and livery
coated in blood—caught his wrist. “My lord, have done.”

“Mrs. Whedon?”

“Here.” Her voice was high, clearly frightened. Rage flushed through him anew. This wasn’t how a man did things. Wasn’t how
he or Charles had been raised to treat a woman. But Charles had turned his back on everything he’d been raised to believe,
been raised to be. And tonight Leo was ashamed to call him cousin.

Leo pushed away from the body on the cobbles and stumbled toward the coach. Mrs. Whedon was sitting in the doorway of the
coach, her gown in ruins, hair tumbling down her back, and blood trickling down one side of her face, dripping onto her chest.

Leo swallowed hard as his heart missed a beat and attempted to crawl up his throat. He pulled her up—perhaps a bit roughly,
judging by her hiss of pain—to examine her head. A bloody scrape marred her temple,
but that was all. Thank God. “Well, aren’t we rather rough and ready with a pistol?”

Viola flashed a wan smile, shrugging almost imperceptibly. Blood trickled over her brow. Her eyes fluttered, lashes batting
against the dark stream. One feather bent ridiculously over her forehead while the other stuck straight out.

She was more than she presented herself to be. More than he—or the world—gave her credit for. And it was his fault she was
hurt. He should never have shown those damn letters to Charles.

Leo wiped his thumb over her brow, clearing it for the moment. “We need to get this seen to immediately.”

“It’s just a head wound. They
do
bleed. I’ll be fine once it stops.”

“Perhaps…” Arm still locked about her waist, Leo glanced over his shoulder. All of his servants were still standing, but they
were clearly the worse for wear. One of the footmen had found his wig and was beating it against his leg, sending up a cloud
of powder. The other was clutching his arm, a grimace turning his face into a mask.

A crowd had begun to form; coaches and sedan chairs built up behind them as their owners disembarked to goggle at the scene.
A sudden disturbance ran through the gathering horde, and a familiar silver-headed man sauntered forth like a champion come
to save the day.

“Sandison,” Leo said with relief. “Please do me the favor of seeing Mrs. Whedon home. Mrs. Whedon”—he swung her up into his
arms and nodded to Sandison to lead the way—“you can trust Mr. Sandison as you would myself.”

“So not an inch further than I could push him,” she said with a brave attempt at a chuckle.

“As you would myself,” Leo repeated, giving her an extra squeeze for reassurance. “I’ll be with you as quickly as I can. Have
Sandison send for a surgeon. No arguments.”

She blinked, eyes huge, as though she were still trying to make sense out of the evening’s events. Leo placed her in Sandison’s
coach and stooped to rest his head against hers, nose to her ear, lips briefly brushing the corner of her jaw. That simple
promise was all he could give her in haste.

Knowing she was as safe as he could make her, Leo clapped his friend on the shoulder and waded back through the crowd to the
scene of misery his cousin had created.

“Aren’t you a fright.” Anthony Thane stood like the mountain he was in the center of the street. He took a pinch of snuff
and surveyed the wreckage rather like a traveler viewing some impressive foreign vista.

Leo yanked his cravat loose and passed it roughly over his face. No amount of laundering would save the frill of ruinously
expensive lace, so he might as well make use of it.

“It’s a certainty that blood and hair powder don’t mix.”

“Very helpful, Thane.” Leo scrubbed at his face one last time and thrust his cravat into the pocket of his coat. “Am I reduced
to a minor horror? Yes? Excellent. I see the night watchman has arrived, for all the use he’ll be. Can you handle him while
I see what can be done to clear the road? I don’t think I’m prepared to be polite at the moment.”

Thane spun on his heel and marched off in the direction of the watchman, who stood with his club dangling from his hand, a
look of pure shock upon his face.

“Tompkins?” Leo called for the coachman. “How bad?”

“I’ve had to put the gelding down, my lord. Joseph’s arm is broken, and Hamul has a nasty cut down his ribs. Oh, and the coach
door is ruined. Other than that, I’d say we acquitted ourselves quite nicely.”

CHAPTER 7

V
iola accepted Mr. Sandison’s proffered handkerchief and held it to her temple. The edge drooped, obscuring her vision. The
blood was already drying, the tightness on her skin distracting with each and every breath. Her hand shook as she pressed
the linen more firmly in place.

She’d shot a man. She’d never shot at anything but the pips on playing cards, and tonight she’d shot a man, maybe even killed
him. It had been absurdly easy. Seemingly unreal. Lord Leonidas had leapt from the coach, gun in hand, leaving the pistol’s
mate glinting in its secret box.

It had been in her hand before she’d even realized she’d reached for it…

As the coach rumbled into motion, Vaughn’s friend opened a panel behind him and withdrew a large, double-barreled pistol.
The panel closed with an almost silent
snick,
and he sat, leg braced against the door, gun resting loosely in his hand: a guardian at the portal.

“Do you all go about armed? Does every coach in London have a secret panel?”

Mr. Sandison chuckled, his whole demeanor seemingly relaxed as he swayed with the coach’s motion. “Life in London does seem
to call for a weapon far more often than one might assume.” He pushed the curtain aside with the barrel of the gun and stared
out into the dark street. After a moment, he let the curtain fall closed again. “Or at least my life certainly does.”

“Lord Leonidas’s as well.”

“Yes.” Mr. Sandison nodded in agreement. “Vaughn does seem to lead a most exciting life.”

He was looking directly at her, and Viola felt a blush rise in response. Ridiculous. She never blushed. Never. Though that
seemed to have changed of late… She pursed her lips, refusing to be baited. She pulled the handkerchief away from her head
and was relieved to see the flow had greatly lessened.

Mr. Sandison glanced at her. “Best keep it there a while longer.” He pushed the curtain aside again and returned his attention
to the streets. The occasional flash of light as they passed a streetlamp illuminated the coach for brief moments before plunging
it back into darkness.

The plush seat embraced Viola as she sagged backward, only her stays keeping her from crumpling into a ball. The invasion
of her house had been terrifying, but this, to be attacked on the streets, to see men wounded defending her… It was too much.
She simply couldn’t make sense of it. This clearly hadn’t been about seizing her manuscript. It had been about her. She’d
never imagined Sir Hugo would go to these lengths.

Did he think killing her would stop publication, or was he merely that angry over his humiliating encounter that evening?
And he was in breach of their contract. Had been for months, ever since he’d failed to make the quarterly payment that was
due. Ever since the first volume of her memoir had thrown him into an inexplicable rage.

Her hands began to shake, her stomach churning violently against the pressure of her stays. Her mouth watered as though she
were going to be sick. Viola shut her eyes and concentrated on the simple act of breathing.