The Winter Bride (A Chance Sisters Romance) (10 page)

“That is what a young man ought to be. Whatever be his pursuits, his eagerness in them should know no moderation, and leave him no sense of fatigue.”

—
JANE AUSTEN,
SENSE AND SENSIBILITY

T
he bell rang, calling the end of the bout. Several gentlemen applauded.

Flynn was panting. He flexed his jaw cautiously. “Damn, but you actually know how to box, Hyphen-Hyphen. Never would have dreamed a fine gentleman like yourself could throw such a punishing left.”

Freddy wiped a trickle of sweat from his brow. “You’re not so bad yourself, Irishman.”

“Shame those gentlemanly tactics would be no use in a real fight.”

Freddy stiffened. “I’ve been in plenty of real fights.”

“Sure, with other gents, I bet. But in the back alleys and down on the docks, if you get into trouble, they won’t be followin’ Broughton’s rules or anything like ’em, you know.”

Freddy eyed the big Irishman. He glanced over to where Jackson stood watching. “My friend Flynn here has offered me a challenge, abandoning the rules and showing me how they fight in the back alleys and the docks.” There were strict rules about how one behaved in Jackson’s boxing saloon.

Jackson considered it, then nodded. “I’ll referee, then, so it doesn’t get out of hand.” Several more gentlemen drifted over to watch.

The bell rang to open the round. Before it finished ringing, Flynn lashed out with a kick to the groin. Freddy just managed to avoid it and took the blow on the thigh. There was a murmur of disapproval from the watching gentlemen.

Flynn grinned. “I did warn you. I’m fighting dirty.”

“You don’t say,” Freddy drawled and, without warning, feinted with his left and at the same time tried to kick Flynn’s feet out from under him. What followed was dirty, exciting—and educational. When the first bout ended, Flynn showed Freddy a few of the more devious moves that had flattened him. Then the bell went and it was on again.

After three fast and furious bouts, Jackson called the end of the session. Freddy and Flynn staggered apart, sweaty, panting, battered, bruised, bleeding in a couple of places—and grinning.

A spattering of applause burst from those gathered around to watch.

Jackson examined their injuries himself. “Nothing that won’t mend.” He signaled attendants to bring towels and bowls of water.

Flynn splashed his face and rubbed a towel over his bare chest and arms. He was panting heavily. “That wasn’t a half-bad fight.”

Freddy nodded, too winded to reply. He wiped a trickle of sweat from his brow that turned out to be blood. He’d have quite a few cuts and bruises to show for the morning’s work—but beneath the tiredness and the aches and pains, he felt both relaxed and invigorated. The bout had purged him of the frustration and anger of the morning.

And somehow, in the process of trying to pound each other into the ground, by fair means and foul, he and Flynn had become friends. They washed, dried off and dressed again.

“Drink?” Freddy said. “Something to eat?”

“That’d be grand.”

Freddy touched the cut over his eye gingerly. It was still oozing blood. “My lodgings all right? I’d like to get this covered up before we meet any ladies.”

Flynn agreed and they strolled up Bond Street, reminiscing about fights they’d seen and some they’d participated in.

“When did you take up the noble art of pugilism?” Flynn asked as they approached Freddy’s lodgings.

“I was a scrawny young runt when I was first sent away to school. Some of the bigger fellows made my life hell, so I learned to box.”

“You kept it up, obviously.”

“I like the exercise.” They entered Freddy’s lodgings. He rang the bell for his manservant. “Claret, ale or brandy?”

“Tea, if you don’t mind.”

“Tea?”

“Picked up the habit in the East. I don’t mind the other, but it’s a little early in the day for me.”

“Tea, then, for Mr. Flynn, Tibbins, and some sandwiches. I’ll be back in a moment,” Freddy said. “I’ll just attend to this cut.”

A few minutes later he returned, having cleaned up the cut over his eye, smeared it with ointment and covered it with a plaster so as not to distress feminine sensibilities. At the same moment Tibbins returned with a tray bearing a pot of tea, two cups and a large plate of sandwiches. Outside it started to rain again. Freddy dropped into a chair in front of the fire and stared into the flames while Tibbins poured the tea, then withdrew.

Flynn stirred a lump of sugar into his tea and drank it in silence. He ate a sandwich. He ate another sandwich. He glanced at Freddy’s cup, which was untouched, and the plate of sandwiches.

“Not hungry?”

Freddy didn’t respond.

Flynn ate another two sandwiches. In the street outside a wagon rolled past, its wheels rattling over the cobblestones. “The boxing didn’t help as much as you hoped,” Flynn said after a while. “Care to talk about it?”

Freddy gave him a sharp glance.

Flynn shrugged. “Sometimes helps to get it off your chest.” He refilled his cup, stirred in some sugar and picked up another sandwich. “I know how to keep a confidence.”

There was a long silence, broken only by the sound of the rain beating on the windows, the fire hissing and the chomping of sandwiches.

Freddy picked up the tea, tasted it, grimaced, walked over to the sideboard and poured himself a brandy. Resuming his seat, he sipped and twirled the glass thoughtfully, gazing through the swirling golden liquor to the glowing coals of the fire.

“Woman trouble?” Flynn asked.

Freddy gave a dry laugh. “Not in the way you’re thinking. It’s my mother.”

“Ah.” Flynn ate another sandwich and lapsed into a companionable silence. You learned quite a bit about a man when you’d fought him, Freddy reflected. And he was Max’s good friend. Why not? It couldn’t hurt.

“My brother, George, died when I was twelve,” Freddy began. “He was the heir, you understand, the older brother.” He swallowed some more brandy.

“We did everything together—we were only two years apart. He was . . . he was the best brother a boy could have. And the best son. He was . . . perfect. Clever, brave, good at whatever he did, a quick student, a gallant rider to hounds, a brilliant cricketer . . . there was nothing he didn’t do well. Everybody loved him. I loved him.”

He stared into the flames awhile, then said, “I killed him.” He drained the glass.

“How—?” Flynn began, but Freddy held up his hand.

“It doesn’t matter how—that’s old history. The thing is, he died on December the fifth, sixteen years ago. And every year since, I go home on December the fifth—there’s a memorial service in the family chapel.” He looked at Flynn. “It’s the only time I ever visit Breckenridge, my childhood home. I stay away the rest of the year—my parents and I . . . well . . .”

He poured another brandy. “But once a year I go down there and attend the service for my brother. I endure—” He broke off. “My parents endure a day of my company, and the next morning I leave, not to return until the following year.”

Flynn frowned. “You don’t visit your family? Not even for Christmas?”

“I bump into my mother occasionally in town. She sometimes requires me to escort her to the theater or a party or some such thing. They always come to town for the season. And when Parliament is sitting, of course.”

“Your father?”

Freddy lifted a shoulder. “Rarely. We belong to different clubs, move in different circles.” He attempted a smile. “Mine are generally less respectable.”

Flynn ate the last sandwich. “The fifth of December is, what, about four weeks away?”

Freddy nodded. He leaned forward, seized the poker and stabbed at the coals heaped in the fireplace, stirring them so that sparks danced in mad spirals and vanished into the chimney.

“I’m the heir now. Because George is dead.”

Flynn nodded.

“They want me to marry and produce another heir. Another George.” He added, “In our family the oldest son is always George, the second always Frederick.”

Flynn crossed his booted feet, leaned back and waited. His gold earring glinted in the firelight. He was a good listener, for a pirate.

“For the past few years my mother has been thrusting muffins at me at every opportunity.”

Flynn frowned and glanced at the plate where only a few crumbs and a sprig of parsley remained. “Muffins?”

“Not the edible sort—females. Eligible females. Seriously marriage-minded eligible females, usually of the reforming type,” he added savagely, “because I’m a frivolous fool who can’t be trusted to manage the estate.”

“Can’t be trusted?” Flynn’s brows rose. “Then they don’t know—?”

“No, and I’m not going to tell them. Even if they believed me—which they wouldn’t—it’s none of their concern.”

Flynn nodded slowly. “I see. Well, I suppose you know your own business. So what’s the problem? You can’t tell me you’re worried by your mother’s attempts to marry you off to one of these, er, muffins, because I won’t believe it. You’re no weakling and you cut the apron strings years ago, I’ll be bound.”

Freddy nodded. “When I was eighteen. And you’re right: She can’t make me—
they
can’t make me do anything I don’t want to. I’m financially independent of them, thanks to Great-Aunt Adelaide and her fortune.”

“As I understand it, she left you a competence only, a useful sum. It was you who turned it into a fortune.”

“Partly with the help of Flynn and Co. Oriental Trading,” Freddy acknowledged. “But that’s not the point. The point is that my mother has now invited a flock of the most horrendous muffins to attend a house party at Breckenridge.”

“Your family home? And, don’t tell me, it’s coinciding with your visit on the fifth of December.”

“The only reason I’m going there is for George, and she’s blasted well desecrating the event with muffins.”

There was a short silence. Flynn rose and poured himself a brandy. He refilled Freddy’s glass too. “It’s a pickle,” he said after a while.

“It’s a bloody disgrace.”

“I suppose you’ve told her you won’t stand for the interference.”

Freddy gave him a baleful look. Of course he had. A hundred times.

“And there’s nobody else you want to marry?”

“I’m never going to get married.”

Flynn’s brows rose. “And here’s me thinkin’ you were quite the lady’s man.”

“That’s got nothing to do with marriage.”

“Indeed it hasn’t.” Flynn gave a gusty sigh of reminiscence. “Still, I’ve made up me mind to buckle down and become a good husband.” He glanced at Freddy. “Comes to us all in the end.”

“Not to me.”

“Not ever?”

“Never.”

“Then you’ll just have to put up with your mother’s muffin shenanigans. It’s that or bite the bullet and get engaged to some female you think you could bear to wed, if the worst came to the worst. If you were betrothed, your mother’d stop shovin’ muffins at you. And she’d have to cancel that house party.”

“What are you talking about? I just told you I don’t want to get betrothed. Or married.”

“I’m thinkin’ of one of those betrothals that go on forever—could even go on for years if neither of you were in a hurry. And hope that the girl eventually gets bored or fed up with you and calls it off—because as I understand it, in England it’s only the females who can call off a betrothal.”

Freddy stared at him. He swirled his brandy thoughtfully.

Flynn shook his head. “I know, it’s a mad idea. What woman would be happy to wait for years, you bein’ such a handsome piece of husbandly temptation, rich, and in line for a title.”

“You’re right,” Freddy said. “It’s a mad idea.” He put down his brandy glass, looked at the empty plate and gave Flynn an indignant look. “You’ve eaten all the sandwiches.” He raised his voice. “Tibbins, more sandwiches. And a fresh pot of tea.”

 • • • 

“W
hat happened to you?” It was the first thing she said to him, not even a good morning.

“Nothing. And good morning to you too.”

She rolled her eyes. “You have a plaster on your forehead, your jaw is bruised in several places and you have a swollen lip. And you’re limping slightly.”

“It’s nothing. Shall we go?”

“You’ve been in a fight.”

“No, no. Mr. Flynn was simply demonstrating some of the finer points of the art of pugilism as practiced in places he’s familiar with. And before you ask, we came out even.”

“Mr. Flynn? You two didn’t quarrel, did you?”

He grinned. “On the contrary; if anything, it cemented our friendship.”

She gave him a long look. “Men are strange.”

“Strange, but women seem to like us nevertheless.” He presented his arm in a jaunty manner. “Shall we?”

Damaris took it, giving him a sideways glance. “It does seem to have improved your mood.” She’d assumed that by now he’d be sick of walking her to work, especially since he’d been so grumpy and cross about the rain the other day. She’d half expected him either to drop it or to assign a footman to accompany her. Or to inform Lady Beatrice, which would effectively put an end to it anyway.

But there he was, as elegantly dressed as always, except for the unshaven chin.

It fascinated her, that chin. She longed to run her fingers over it, to feel the scrape of his dark gold bristles, the shape of the bone underneath.

Papa whispered reprimands in her head. She ignored him. There was nothing whatsoever improper in the way she was behaving. Any thoughts she had were just that—thoughts.

They walked on for a moment in silence, her hand warm in the crook of his arm. It was pleasant, she had to admit, this feeling of being cared for. Even if she could look after herself perfectly well.

Out of the blue he said, “You know some people believe you to be heiresses?”

“I know. Lady Beatrice started the rumor, didn’t she?”

“Oh, no, you’re quite wrong there,” he said with a mix of asperity and wry humor. “She assured me she didn’t
start
a rumor, she merely
denied
one.” He glanced down at her. “Thus ensuring everyone—”

“Believes it to be true.” Damaris laughed, shaking her head. “And I suppose she shows no remorse?”