Читать книгу Regency Pleasures and Sins Part 2 - Elizabeth Rolls - Страница 41

‘I knew you’d come to rescue me.’

‘And are you glad I did?’

Emily sent her saviour a somewhat startled look. She had intended her vibrant declaration to convey her praise and gratitude, yet Mark’s response had sounded cynical. ‘Could you not tell how pleased … how relieved I was to see you?’ she demanded, rather piqued.

‘Given the circumstances it would have been ill advised to look disappointed. You might once have been betrothed to your kidnapper, nevertheless you have your reputation to consider.’

‘What do you mean by that?’ Emily breathed fiercely. She had been feeling quite enervated by the day’s chaotic events, but now her temper was stirring, sparking vitality into her. ‘Do you think I was pleased to find the Viscount had plotted to abduct me?’

‘I believe that once you would have been pleased to be the Viscount’s wife.’

Emily felt the full force of his trenchant blue gaze. Her chin went up, but her heart plummeted. Whilst she had been in captivity, Mark had soared so high in her estimation that she feared she might be coming to like him very much indeed. He had been her hero, the man on whom she had pinned all her hopes. She’d trusted he would bring everything right and, up until a few moments ago, he’d lived up to every expectation. In fact, so beguiled by him had she become, she had acknowledged that he stirred her heart … and body … in a way that no man had, even Nicholas …

Now he had ruined it all. He had just forced her to recall that recently she had been sure she didn’t like him. Suddenly she felt quite depressed … quite sad.

‘It’s true Nicholas and I were betrothed many years ago,’ Emily eventually said. ‘He now has a wife. I hope you are not hinting I might welcome the attentions of a married man.’

‘And if he were not married?’

‘It would make no difference,’ Emily returned immediately.

‘Devlin mentioned you were still passionately fond of one another.’

‘Well, he had no right to say any such thing! It is a lie!’ Emily choked. ‘I loathe him, and I don’t believe he likes me much either. If he had any kind of regard for me, he would not have wanted to treat me so abominably. Not that any of it is your business.’ Emily paused after that outburst, fiddled with her cuffs. ‘I have satisfied your inquisitiveness simply because you have gone out of your way to assist me today.’ Her voice was husky with emotion and spontaneous tears shone in her eyes. A hand sprang to her face to irritably dash the wet away.

As they had thundered towards London Mark had enquired if she were warm enough, if she wanted to make an early stop. Beneath his courteous consideration for her comfort Emily had sensed that he was in a brooding mood. She had anticipated an early interrogation, even a scolding for having put herself in jeopardy by going off alone with Riley. What she had not expected was this odd atmosphere that had erected a barrier between them. On the journey, when her attempts at conversation received a monosyllable in reply, she’d lapsed into quiet. She had at first imagined Mark was preoccupied with putting distance between the curricle and possible pursuers. Emily now suspected the space he’d wanted to maintain was between them.

Since they had joined forces to solve the mystery of Tarquin’s disappearance, she had grown accustomed to those blue eyes smouldering at her in humour or desire. Now he was different; his attitude was unerringly polite but aloof. And she didn’t like it. She wanted soothing words and strong arms comforting her. She wanted his approval and his affection.

‘I’m sorry, Emily, I didn’t mean to upset you.’ Mark pinched at strain between his brows, feeling churlish in the extreme at having let suspicion conquer courtesy. Since he had discovered Emily had been tricked into going with Riley, and for what vile purpose, he had been frantic with worry for her safety. Now, instead of cherishing the gift of her presence, and her safe deliverance, he was acting like a jealous buffoon.

Emily had endured more than enough already today, yet he had just added to her troubles. His hand slid to enclose quivering white fingers. ‘I had no right to say any of that, or pry into your past. Forgive me …?’

When Emily remained silent, Mark sat back in his chair with a heavy sigh. ‘For hours I’ve been dreading what your captor might do to you, Emily.’ His admission was quiet, almost diffident. ‘Devlin tried to make light of it all. He hinted you were a willing participant and had a secret life as his mistress … it maddened me.’ He passed a hand roughly over his face. ‘I’m a fool, I know, to suspect one word that bastard uttered might be the truth.’

Feeling reassured by the explanation for his bad mood, Emily twisted her wrist beneath his to clasp his palm. ‘I was so very glad you came for me, Mark,’ Emily stressed softly. ‘It was only the thought that soon you would burst in to rescue me that kept my spirits up.’ Her small fingers tightened reflexively about his as a wave of relief shuddered through her. ‘I prayed you would get my note in time and find clues to where Riley had taken me. Had I lost hope and trust in you, I doubt I would have found the strength to resist.’ Her voice trembled into silence and she stifled a sob with her knuckles. ‘I stabbed Nicholas in the leg with a fork to get free and was about to throw a candelabra at him when you turned up.’

Mark chuckled softly, raised her fingers to his lips and tenderly saluted them. ‘Devlin was never a match for you.’

The inflection in Mark’s voice made Emily sure he was not simply referring to her plucky attack on Devlin.

Gently, reluctantly, Mark disengaged his hand from fingers that felt temptingly sensual. He used it to grab his glass and take a swallow of brandy. ‘Drink your wine before it cools. It will revive you. We still have many miles to travel.’ He pushed her hot toddy closer to her on the table.

Emily rewarded him with a smile and gratefully toasted her cool palms on the steaming cup. Quickly she took a glance about at her cosy surroundings.

It had been impossible to safely travel on without allowing the horses to be rested and watered. They had broken their journey at this wayside inn on the Guildford Road. The saloon bar of the Rose and Crown had been crowded with boisterous locals so Mark had taken a private room for them. The landlord—a jovial fellow with a patch over one eye that lent him an incongruously piratical air so far inland—had shown them to the back parlour of the establishment. Whilst leading the way through the narrow corridors, he had apologised profusely that they could not have the best parlour, but that, he explained, had been taken earlier by a family on their way to Guildford. The other he had available was very nice, he’d assured them, and so it proved to be. It was small, but quite clean and tidy and adequately furnished. Once ensconced in wing chairs positioned on either side of the glowing grate, Mark had assured her they would be back on the road within an hour and in Mayfair before midnight.

In truth, Emily had been grateful for the stop. Since they’d set out back to London at breakneck speed there had been no proper opportunity for much conversation to pass between them. After their recent fraught exchange, Emily wasn’t sure whether she would rather maintain this amicable quiet than have the answers to the pressing questions rotating in her mind. It seemed talking invariably led to bickering. But she knew they must talk, and at great length, for there was so much she needed to know.

What news was there of Tarquin? What would happen to Riley, and to Viscount Devlin? Mark had said Nicholas would pay and so he should. Such despicable behaviour deserved punishment. But a scandal? Please, no! Her parents did not deserve to be embarrassed by their foolish daughter as well as their wayward son.

Mark watched flitting emotions etch strain on Emily’s heart-shaped countenance. Wisps of fair hair had escaped from the knot at the back of her head to embellish skin made luminous by misty night air. Her eyes were languid with sleepiness, the lids low.

Mark needed answers to those questions that still pitilessly tortured him. The Viscount had schemed to trap Emily today, and she was genuinely angry over it. But had she once willingly been Devlin’s mistress? If so, would he have eventually again coaxed her into consenting to sleep with him?

Mark took a swig from his brandy, aware that he felt ashamed of the quickening in his loins. She looked desirable despite her ordeal, too beautifully vulnerable to be alone with a man who wanted her as much as he did. Despite their differences, he knew she trusted him, felt safe with him, yet he could not banish the lustful thoughts pricking his mind.

He suspected she was not as innocent as a genteel spinster ought to be. But how experienced was she? Had Devlin taken her maidenhead, or had his devilish plot been devised so he might finish what he’d started years ago?

Mark rose abruptly and strolled to the window. He struck a broad hand on the frame and looked into the blackness, his thoughts as hot as his loins. If he were to kiss her … and she were to melt against him as she had done before … what harm in that? They were miles from home and prying eyes, and if she were knowing and compliant … there were rooms upstairs.

‘Are you hungry? Would you like something to eat?’ Mark asked abruptly. He shoved back from the window and paced to and fro to ease his rigid muscles.

‘I’m not hungry at all. I ate dinner with Nicholas …’ Emily glimpsed an immediate fierce light in Mark’s eyes at another mention of the Viscount. Quickly she added, ‘At first I thought it best to humour him as much as possible and accept his hospitality, while I waited for you.’ Inclining her blonde head, she brought her cup close to her lips and took a sip from it. She was obliquely aware of Mark’s jerky movement as he snatched up the decanter and refilled his glass.

‘Very wise …’ he eventually said with barely a hint of irony. His empty glass was replaced abruptly on the table.

‘Are you still angry with me?’ Emily asked quietly. She gave him a sweet, tentative smile. ‘I know I have put you to a lot of trouble. I know it was rash to go with Riley. Actually, it was a stupid risk; I know it now I have had time to think sensibly on it. But I honestly thought Tarquin might be in peril.’ She traced the rim of her cup with a slender finger, watching the movement as she said, ‘I was terrified my brother might die all alone … cold and hungry.’ Her soft lower lip was nipped between worrying teeth. ‘I didn’t know what to do; that was why I came to try to find you at your home.’ She sighed and shook her head. ‘I hoped so much that you would be there to counsel me.’ She finished what was left of her mulled wine, then made a rueful admission. ‘That’s not quite true. I didn’t want your advice; I wanted you to take away the burden of it all and deal with it for me.’

‘And I would have done that, I swear, Emily,’ Mark vowed huskily. ‘I’m not angry with you. But I am angry with Devlin and Riley, and with your dolt of a brother who brought about this fiasco. I’m angry with myself too.’

Emily would have interrupted at that point, but Mark gestured for her silence. ‘Let’s not speak of any of it again tonight.’ A long finger moved on her cheek, teasing back a stray curl that spiralled close to her mouth. ‘You’re safe and that’s the most important thing.’ He tilted up her face so she must look at him. ‘You’re tired and overwrought, as is natural considering what you have been through. And if that were not enough to get you immediately back to Callison Crescent, there is your family to think about. We must get you home, and hope you have not been missed.’ A frown corrugated his brow beneath a fall of dark hair. ‘Heaven only knows what excuse will satisfy your parents if they have noticed your absence.’ Mark gently urged Emily to her feet and, fetching her cloak, courteously placed it about her shoulders. ‘If you are ready, it’s high time we set again on the road.’

‘Mr Hunter?’

Mark halted immediately on hearing his name barked in a cultured female voice. He turned his head. What he saw caused him enough dismay to make him swear beneath his breath, although his expression altered not one iota.

Emily was positioned slightly in front of Mark, and her slender frame had tensed statue-still for she, too, had recognized those haughty tones. Even before Mark’s low curse reached her ears she knew she was once more that day in awful trouble. Her stomach lurched, and she pressed a hand against the wall to help support her on legs that felt boneless.

‘I thought I recognised you, sir.’ Mrs Violet Pearson emerged fully from the doorway of the Rose and Crown’s best parlour. She pulled her shawl tight about her scrawny arms to ward off the chill. But her inquisitiveness had been roused far too much for her to yet go back inside and seek the warmth of the blazing logs.

When her son, Bertie, had gone upstairs to bed in a sulk, he had not properly closed the door behind him. Violet had cast a purposeful look at Mr Pearson, but he had contrived to nod off in the chair at that precise moment. Violet had thus stomped to perform the office herself rather than tolerate the draught. Just for the once she was glad that her husband and son could be lazy and inconsiderate for, as she put a hand to wood to push the door shut, she had spied something very interesting indeed in the corridor.

A lady and gentleman, glimpsed through the aperture, had seemed familiar to her. For the fleeting moment she had them in her sights Violet had been instantly put in mind of another kind of familiarity: the kind shared by people in love. Not that Violet had experience of such sweet intimacy with Mr Pearson, but she conversely relished the bitterness the lack provoked.

Violet was sure she could scent a rat … or rather a scandal, for although she had not got a good view of the young woman with Mr. Hunter, she had got a peep at golden hair curling beneath a bonnet. She also recalled seeing a classic profile and an enviably curvaceous figure. Few women could boast such remarkable attractions, and grace of movement. Naturally, she would never let on to the chit, or her mother, that she thought her pretty. So could it be Miss Emily Beaumont?

Violet knew that Mark Hunter and Tarquin Beaumont were chums, so there was a connection of sorts between Emily and Mark. But it seemed remarkably odd that the two of them might be at an inn, halfway to Guildford, at ten of the clock at night. Perhaps Miss Beaumont was with a relation who was elsewhere in the building … or perhaps she was not …

Violet’s riotous imaginings turned her mind feverish and her face florid. Suddenly she jerked to her senses as she became aware that Mark Hunter was almost at the door, and on the point of exiting the building now he had returned her a nod and a muttered greeting.

Violet sought swiftly to detain him. ‘Fancy bumping into you here, sir,’ she called shrilly, speeding in his wake. ‘Are you going, as we are, to the Festival in Guildford? Last year it was a delight; the orchestra and the singing divine …’

‘No, ma’am,’ Mark replied with a hint of irritation clipping his tone. ‘I’m travelling in the opposite direction towards London.’

Violet Pearson was not so easily put off by a dark look and a curt response. She sidled the corridor wall, her head leading the way as she tried to get a better look at the dainty female partially obliterated by Mark’s large frame. Violet’s tongue flicked excitedly to her lips; she was very aware that the fellow was deliberately trying to shield his companion from view. A glitter brightened her eyes. Would she be returning to town with a juicy tale to relate concerning the family of her arch-enemy? She advanced determinedly on the couple, already savouring the piquancy of a rousing victory over Mrs Penelope Beaumont.

Mark propelled Emily forward. She understood perfectly the instruction in his firm guidance and did her part by quickening her pace and keeping her bonnet brim low to shield her features.

Violet put on a spurt, and the exertion served her well. Suddenly she got a proper look past those powerful shoulders that, preposterously, were almost as wide as the corridor. ‘Why … Miss Beaumont, is it not?’ she purred. ‘How are you, my dear? And how is your mama? Is she here with you?’

Emily stood rigid and tongue-tied for a moment. Obliquely a corner of her mind registered that she was hopelessly, irrevocably compromised. But she turned slowly to receive Mrs. Pearson’s horribly gloating look. ‘No, she is not,’ Emily said in a lightly quavering tone.

‘Oh … I see,’ Violet said, immeasurable insinuation conveyed by those few words. Barely containing her glee, she added sweetly, ‘I expect you heard me say to Mr Hunter that we are off to the Festival in Guildford. Are you going there? Or are you also travelling back to London?’

Emily moistened her lips, about to speak, but Violet piped up again. ‘If your parents are not here, I expect your brother is escorting you. No doubt Tarquin is somewhere about the place.’ She gave an exaggerated peer about as though she might spot the fellow lurking in a corner. ‘Of course, I know you would not be here alone with Mr. Hunter … would you?’

‘Miss Beaumont is travelling with me,’ Mark interjected coolly. He gave the woman a purely cynical stare. ‘Enjoy the Festival, won’t you …’

‘Indeed I shall,’ Violet said. She twitched a smile, and her skirts, in a travesty of respect. Even a blast of cold air as the couple went out into the night could not shift her. She stood for some minutes shivering in the draught, a wondrously smug smile on her thin countenance.

‘She is a malicious witch and will delight in making trouble for our family.’ Emily’s face fell forward into her cupped palms. ‘Oh, why did I ever set out today on such a stupid mission? Everything is now so much worse!’ she wailed.

The curricle sped on through the night, but one of Mark’s hands relinquished the reins to slide about Emily’s shoulders and draw her close against his side. A thumb smoothed against a wind-chilled cheek, back and forth in soothing rhythm until she succumbed to his comfort. A small hand snaked about his waist and she clung uninhibitedly to him, her eyes screwed tight against the breeze and burning tears.

‘Hush …’ Mark said softly. ‘You did what you thought best, and your brother is fortunate to have a sister as loyal and caring as you.’ The equipage raced smoothly on as he encouraged her head against his shoulder.

Emily snuggled readily into the lee of his powerful body, a watery snuffle muffled against his coat. ‘My intention was to shield my parents from further distress! Now look what I have done! I have increased their troubles tenfold!’ She miserably shook her head back and forth. ‘A wayward son is one thing. Society will tolerate a young man sowing wild oats, but not the shameless behaviour of his unmarried sister.’

‘Hush, Emily.’ Mark dropped his face to hers, nudging up her chin so he might touch together their lips. She tasted salty-sweet and he relinquished her mouth reluctantly to concentrate on the dark road. ‘It is not insurmountable. There are ways and means of putting this right …’

‘There’s only one way and you know it.’ Emily choked on a hysterical giggle. ‘We must announce we are to be married. And I think you know far too much about me now to ever want to do that!’