Wicked at Heart (24 page)

"Are you
daring to suggest that I — that I cheated the navy, sir and kept the money for
myself?"

"I
am."  The flat, lethal stare did not waver.

Rothschild went
red under that malevolent scrutiny.  He leaned forward, his knuckles whitening
on the arms of his chair.  "S-surely there must be a mistake.  Perhaps
your
records are incorrect, my lord, as I distinctly recall making that shipment.  In
fact, I remember it as well as I remember what I ate for breakfast
yesterday."

Morninghall only
fixed the cowering man with an icy glare and, circling something with his
pencil, continued on.

"Interesting,
how a whole shipment of clothing could just . . . disappear," he murmured,
his left forefinger whispering down a column of the hulk's figures, his right
hand holding a quill pen and matching each entry against Rothschild's.  Gwyneth
watched his eyes moving beneath his long lashes as he worked, noted the banked
anger that was creeping into the previously flat tone of his voice and his
misleadingly detached expression.  "Isn't it, Rothschild?"

The contractor's
brow beaded with sweat.  He gripped the arms of his chair, looking as though he
were about to flee.

Finally the
marquess let out a controlled, ominous sigh, carefully laid the quill down on
the table, and idly studied his perfectly manicured fingernails.

"It would
seem that you have sent clothing to the prison ship that never arrived —"

Rothschild leaped
to his feet.  "There was a mistake in the bookkeeping.  I'd never do such
a thing!"

"— sent
other shipments that were not only partials, and of inferior quality —"

"I'm
telling you, my lord, there
must
be some mistake!"

"— and
here, on the twenty-third of April, even sent an entire order of shoes to the
prison hulk, all of which were falling apart, and all of which" — the
marquess lost interest in his hand and, looking up, turned his glacial stare on
the cowering contractor — "were
one size
."

Rothschild's
face drained of color and his eyes darted from side to side, like a cornered
animal.  He looked to Gwyneth for help, but she only shook her head.

Morninghall was
relentless. "I'm sure they were a most
comfortable
fit, weren't
they, Rothschild?"  His tone was dangerously soft, crackling with
undercurrents of threat and violence.

Rothschild's
face contorted.  He made to back away, but the marquess was slowly getting to
his feet, his eyes completely devoid of soul, pity, or mercy.

Rothschild
shrank backward, cowering against the wall and staring up at the marquess as he
advanced.

"Damon?"

Gwyneth's voice
broke the spell, and slowly he turned to look at her.  His eyes burned with
fury; his stance was rigid with rage.  He was angry — beautifully, wonderfully,
magnificently, angry —
and it was about time.

"Don't,"
she said quietly.

His nostrils
flared, and she saw the gold flecks glittering in his wintry irises.

"I need
you, Damon," she murmured, again using his Christian name and intently
holding his gaze.  "The prisoners need you.  If they put you in gaol for
murder, neither of us will accomplish anything."

Her quiet, steady
voice seemed to have the right effect.  The marquess stared flatly at Rothschild
for another long moment; then, a blood vessel throbbing in his temple, he
turned, gathered up all of the ledgers, and pulled Gwyneth up from her chair.

"Let's
go."

Rothschild
exploded in outrage.  "You can't take those!  Those are
my
property!"

Desperate, the
contractor threw himself in front of the door.  Without missing a beat,
Morninghall bore down on him, crunched his lapels in his fist, and tossed the
man aside like so much garbage.

"Find
yourself a solicitor, Rothschild, because you're damn well going to need
one."

Gwyneth, hot on
his heels, was hard pressed to contain her unladylike whoop of triumph.  She
knew that Morninghall's tightly coiled anger had been building since his
attack, and she could only hope the fury that made the air crackle around him
was not simply because he'd found a release for that anger, but because she had
finally awakened him, truly
awakened
him, to the treachery and horror
the prisoners under his care were forced to endure.  Was he fueled by guilt over
all that he hadn't seen before?  Had the tour belowdecks, the suffering in Toby
Ashton's eyes, and, now, blatant evidence of the corruption that permeated the
contractors' community finally turned that malevolent energy that was so much a
part of him toward something noble and good?

God help them
all: the devil was out for blood.  Things would be happening at last.

~~~~

It was nearly
dark by the time Damon, with Lady Simms still in tow, managed to track down Bolton
at a gathering of senior naval officers at the George Inn — where he rudely
upset the assembly and made a formal complaint about the discrepancies he had
found between the contractor's and the ship's records.  Then, leaving the smoky
room in an uproar, he dragged Lady Simms back out into the street and blindly
made his way toward the waterfront.

"You were
magnificent, Morninghall," she was saying, happily.  "I knew you'd
come around to the right way of thinking, if only your eyes were opened."

Something
exploded inside of him.  "Spare me the hero worship, madam, and don't
deceive yourself into thinking I'm anything I'm not.  I'm only doing this to
get you out of my hair, out of my life."

"Of course
you are, my lord."

Her blithe tone made
him all the more furious.  How dare she try to paint him as some angel!  He was
savage and awful, and he didn't give a damn about anything except getting back
to his cabin, slamming the door shut, and drinking himself into oblivion.

Why am I so damned
angry?

It was the attack;
it had to be.  It hung between them like a gangrenous stench, and
she
was either too polite or — more likely — too scared to bring it up.  And he
sure as hell wouldn't.  But his secret was out now, and as he'd spent these
past hours waiting for her to open her mouth and mention it, to confirm that he
was indeed as barking mad as his mother before him, he had felt the tension and
the fury building.

And building.

But she hadn't
said a word.

Christ, he still
wanted to — to ravage her, to destroy her before she could destroy him.

He glanced down
at her, walking so trustingly beside him, and hated her all the more for her
blind faith that he wouldn't lay a finger on her.  He hated himself too.  She
thought him compassionate, did she?  She thought he had a heart?  If only she
knew that, at this very moment, he was one step away from throwing her into
some shadowy doorway, ripping the clothes off her back, and driving himself
into her like an animal just to prove he wasn't as damned compassionate as she
thought.  Kind and good, eh?  She'd be singing a different tune, indeed, when
he was finished with her.

But that was the
problem, wasn't it?  Despite his fury, his so-called hatred for her, he didn't
want
to finish with her.  For here it was, ten o'clock and nearly dark, and the last
thing on earth Damon wanted to do was bring her back to her little house in
town, part company with her, and once again be left standing outside in the
dark.

Alone.

The very word
sent anxiety humming through his blood.  It was as if there was something awful
living in his body and he was trapped inside his own skin with it, with no way
out.  He told himself his sudden jitters had nothing to do with fear.  They had
everything to do with loneliness and that he suddenly found the idea of parting
from her . . .

Painful.

"My
lord?" she jolted him from his thoughts.

He looked about
him, temporarily disoriented.  They stood on a quiet street in the dark,
lantern light spilling from a window overhead, a gentle breeze fluttering the
sleeves of her gown and carrying with it the sound of laughter and revelry from
a distant tavern.  Out in the harbor, just visible through an alleyway,
anchored ships threw dancing patterns of light upon the black water.  When had
it grown so dark?  How the devil had they gotten here?  He had no idea what
route their feet had taken, no recollection of so much time passing, nothing.

"It's late,
Morninghall," she said, squeezing her arms over her chest in the chill
night air.  "My sister will be worried about me."

He looked away,
selfishly reluctant to let her go, hating himself for this sudden —
dependence
on her.   Still, the attack lay heavily between them, and he knew he needed to
say something about it, maybe even thank her for —
oh, God
— holding
him.  But he couldn't, so instead he set his jaw and stood there, kicking at a
loose cobblestone, delaying the inevitable.

"Any
gentleman would walk me home, you know."

"If you're
looking for a gentleman, you've made a damned poor choice."  He kicked harder
at the stone, trying to contain the writhing knot of emotion within his chest. 
"I'm hardly a suitable escort."

"You're not
a madman, Damon.  Stop tormenting yourself."

"No?  Then
what the hell is wrong with me?" he shouted.  "You stand there and
tell me I'm not going to end up in a damned asylum just like my mother, you
tell me I don't have some fatal disease, you tell me there's not something
mortally wrong with my brain —"

"It's late,
Damon.  And I'll tell you no such thing, because I don't believe any of it. 
Let's go."

Maddened by her
quiet patience, he seized her elbow and leaned down into her face, preventing
her escape.  "If only you knew what I want to do to you right now.  If
only you knew how I want to throw you down, right here in the street, and drive
myself into you until you're screaming for mercy —"

She only looked
at him, unfazed, unconcerned, infuriatingly unworried.  Such a reaction shook
him to the core and he saw red, wanting only to shake her until her teeth fell
out, to crush her against the brick building behind her and slam himself into
her again and again until he roused some iota of respect for his anger, some
smattering of fear, loathing,
anything
—

He spun away,
driving the heel of his hand against his brow, baring his teeth and clenching
his eyes shut with the effort it took to control his violent impulses.  He
turned his face heavenward, his chest rising and falling as he tried to steady
his breathing.

A moment went by,
then he felt her hand, that achingly sweet little hand, tucking itself into the
crook of his elbow.  "Come, let us walk," she said, gently.

He exhaled
sharply, and with a curse, allowed her to lead him along.  God, his head felt as
if it were going to explode.  He didn't want her to talk about his attack, yet he
was furious that she wouldn't.  He hated her, yet he wanted her more than he'd
ever wanted anything in his life.  He feared her, desired her, thought he'd
very well kill any man who dared look twice at her, and here she was, expecting
him to walk her home, as though he were a — a goddamned
gentleman
or
something.  Didn't she know the only one from whom she needed protection was
him
?

They walked in
silence, neither speaking, their footsteps echoing against the buildings on
either side of the street.  For Damon every step was an exercise in control. 
It took everything he had to will his face into its comfortable facade of
stone, all his strength to calm the frenzied emotion that was spinning inside
his head.  Eventually he began to notice the night wind on his cheek, the
coolness of the air, the faint scent that still clung to the woman who walked
so trustingly beside him.  Fresh peaches.  He wondered if it was perfume or
bath soap.  He wondered if she knew he was homing in on it as a bee to a
flower.  He wondered what she would look like in the bath, the bar of soap sliding
over her wet and glistening body, oozing great frothy bubbles down her arms,
her legs, between her breasts, as candlelight played over her silken, dripping
skin . . .

"You are
not safe with me," he said at last, his voice hoarse with strain.

"Really?  I
beg to differ, Morninghall, for you have brought me safely home.  See?  There
is my house just ahead.  Truly, you have proved yourself to be a most admirable
escort."

And she was
right.  There were her stairs with their wrought iron railing, their pots of
pretty flowers, shining softly beneath the glow of an upstairs lamp.

It was time to
let her go.

His heart
started tripping in his chest.

They stood
together for a long, awkward moment, neither saying a word.  He looked at her,
looked away, didn't want the evening to end.  Finally, she sighed and pulled
her fingers from his elbow.

The night was
deadly quiet around them.

"My little
sister, Morganna, used to have attacks just like yours whenever a thunderstorm
hit," she said softly, almost to herself.  "She would run screaming
from the room, fall into the sweats and shakes, and hide under the bed until it
passed."

Damon swallowed
hard and looked down at the light pooling across the cobblestones.  "And .
. . did
she
end up in a madhouse?"

"No, she
ended up married to a wonderful man who loves her and worships the ground she
walks on.  And do you know something, Morninghall?"

"What?"

She paused, a
little smile of encouragement on her lips, her voice dropping to a secretive
whisper.  "She's no longer afraid of thunderstorms."

He glanced at
her.  Stray light made tiny stars in her eyes, and her mouth was curved in a
shy smile.  There was nothing severe or militant in that open face.  It was
girlish, charming, and tilted in that coy angle most women adopted when they
wanted to be kissed.