A Dangerous Courtship (13 page)

"Well, m'lord, and bidin' my time till you were the same. Though I'll be honest and say there was many a day I feared you'd just dig a grave for yourself at Fountains and lie down in it."

Julian nodded. "I won't say I didn't consider doing just that a few times, my friend." A moment of silence followed; then Julian asked, "And Wil? How does the boy fare?"

Garn gave a small grunt of a laugh, though this one didn't quite reach his eyes. "No longer a boy, he's tall as a tree and just as hard to sway."

"Oh?"

"Aye, m'lord." Garn shrugged. "At ten and five, he's worse than I ever was at that age, all full of vinegar one minute and black mood the next."

Julian nodded, remembering his own self at that age, not quite a man but wanting desperately to be treated as such. "And Meg?" he asked.

"Just as hard to sway." His voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper. "I think she's knittin' you a scarf m'lord—one to reach to your toes and back, no doubt."

Julian laughed. "Not
another
one," he joked good-naturedly.

"Aye. Another. And proud of it. Red, this time, as bright a red as any bleedin' sunset over those oceans you so like to travel."

Julian just shook his head, knowing full well he'd wear the damned thing, no matter how long or how ugly. "I meant to tell her that the pastries she made and you delivered to Fountains were as tasty as any I've ever had," he said.

"I'll share the message," Garn replied. He watched as Julian rubbed some of the salve to his battered eye. "How many of 'em?" he asked, his tone turning serious.

"Two," said Julian.

"They came in search of you?"

"I don't think so, though I can't prove that. Gad, Garn, but the night was hectic. Fountains, believe it or not, was as busy as any turnpike this night."

"Go on," said Garn. "I'm listenin'."

Julian winced at the sting of the salve, then, cussing beneath his breath, slopped another healthy dose of it to his swelling and tender eye. "It all began with a woman. She came looking for a package—one that was to be placed somewhere in the abbey at the height of Midsummer's Eve. Those damnable dogs reached her before I did, but I managed to get her hand in mine and pull her up from their jaws. Then the two of us went tumbling over a ledge. I struck my head during the fall, Garn. Saw stars and the whole lot, then opened my eyes and found I could hear again."

Garn nodded at that part of the story. "Thank God for women, eh?" he said—and grinned, a sad sort of grin.

Julian thought of Garn's young bride then. An image of her, of what he supposed she must have looked like, must have
been
to Garn, flitted through his brain.

"Aye, my friend," he agreed softly.

But the image of the bride long dead was soon swallowed by the memory of Veronica thundering into his brain. Just the thought of her, of holding her, kissing her, half aroused Julian. "At least, I think so," he added in a mutter.

Julian didn't need to have his loins grow tight at mere thoughts of the reckless, headstrong Veronica, he decided violently. So thinking, he delved deeper into the jar of salve and plastered another dollop to his bruised face. The stuff smarted like hell and he told himself he was glad for the burning pain of it.

Garn raised one blond brow, clearly sensing some inner turmoil within his master—one caused by the lady, no doubt—but of course, the brawny man said nothing.

Julian scowled, suddenly not liking that he was such an open book for his friend. He endeavored to continue his story.

"Her coachman and some guide came following after her. Had a devil of a time skirting around them, but we managed it, long enough for her to tell me about the package she was after. Then a short time later what should I see but a lad—an urchin, actually, by the looks of him—coming into the abbey and placing a package in the crumbled stones of a pillar. I intended to question him, but he ran off. Two thugs showed themselves the minute I got the bundle in my hands. They thought to make mincemeat of me, but I rallied back and learned they'd been hired not to get the package, but to mangle the person who reached for it. It seems that whoever hired them did so through a tangled network of lowly miscreants."

Garn digested this information, acting no more alarmed than if he'd just been informed of the price of chickens on the day's market.

After a moment of contemplation, he asked, "And the package?"

Julian settled back in the chair, done with the salve. "It wasn't really a package, but rather a bit of sheepskin with the fleece on it—of the variety your Meg raises—and tied tight with twine."

Garn's brows lifted at that news, but he said nothing.

"And here," Julian continued, "is where the tale turns truly ugly, Garn. I pulled back the sheepskin to find a familiar chess piece—from the very set I'd brought home to the earl. One of the horseman, to be exact. Fashioned of that beautiful black ivory and fitted with a gold base. Do you recall how long I took in deciding what type of base should fit to each piece, Garn?"

"Aye. Too bloody long, m'lord," said Garn. He'd have smiled at the memory if not for the gravity and cruel, hideous reality of what had been that night's end. A dark light flitted through his gaze. "But I thought that chess set was... was lost among the ruins of your father's home, m'lord."

Julian nodded. "It was. Or
should
have been," he said. "I remember clearly placing it atop the sideboard that first night home, alongside all of my father's other presents. Everyone else was in the front parlour. I remember because my mother... she—she had just redecorated the room and wished to have me make a toast to my father there. So I left the chess set on the board, boxed and wrapped and tied with that monstrous, ridiculous bow. Do you remember that bow, Garn?"

"Aye, m'lord, I be rememberin' it You chose it because the earl would laugh at its gaudiness. And you, above all, wanted to see your father laugh that night because you'd been gone so long and missed him so terribly."

"Yes... yes, that's right," whispered Julian, now vividly caught up in replaying that night in his brain for what must surely be the millionth time, if not more.
"Gad,
Garn, but that chess set should have burned, melted, disintegrated, like everything else in that house... like
everyone
else."

Pain ripped a path through Julian's soul, as it always did when he thought of that grim August night.

Garn suddenly leaned forward. "Are you saying, m'lord, that whoever laid those explosives did so to get at the chess set?"

Julian got a grip on his emotions, took a deep breath, then said, "After tonight's revelations, Garn, it seems a likely possibility I shouldn't be ignoring. The diamond tucked inside one of those pieces was—
is
—worth a bloody fortune. Even more than the vast holdings of the Eve estates."

"The unholy bastard," Garn snarled, shifting his powerful arms atop the table and leaning forward even more. Darkly he whispered, "I swear to you, m'lord, if I ever find the person who did this, I'll gut him like the swine he is."

Julian believed him.

"There's more, Garn," he said. "The horseman in the packet... its base had been worked off, and a note was tucked inside, one demanding the Eve Diamond be revealed before the end of the Summer
Season. There was no signature. No note of where to leave any information. 'Tis clear the person who took the set is now minus the diamond... and they must have reason to believe that whoever came for that package at Fountains knows where the diamond is."

"The woman?"

"No... I don't think so. I trailed her back to her rented rooms in Ripon and questioned her. She seemed truly clueless as to what the package held, but she did say she was retrieving it for a friend, some 'well-heeled lord' in London. That's why I'm here now, Garn. I'm going to go with her, back to Town, under the guise of her guard. She knows me only as Julian. Thinks I'm some kind of specter turned riverkeep, or some such rot. Whatever coil she's enmeshed herself in via this
friend
is, as we both know, a dangerous one."

Garn skewered him with a tight look. "Do you trust her, m'lord?"

The man's question took Julian by surprise.
Did
he trust Veronica?

"She could be leading you into a trap," Garn continued.

Ah, yes,
Julian thought
,
a perfect trap
.

But it wasn't the type of trap Garn was thinking—it was of a more physical kind. One of desire and need, one the lady could doubtless weave about him with her sheer beauty, innocent charm, and that reckless, ardent abandon she'd displayed beneath the onslaught of his kisses.

The very notion unsettled Julian more than he cared to admit. He yanked himself away from thinking of Veronica's many enchantments.

"What I am certain of, Garn, is that she came to Fountains on an errand for another. And the packet she sought contained a piece of the gift I'd last given to my father. It's my belief that whoever sent her to Yorkshire most likely knows something about the blast that killed my family. I intend to trail her to London and enter into her circles. And intend to do all of this not as the seventh Earl of Eve, but as her hired guard."

Garn didn't even bat an eye at his lordship's wild plan. He simply nodded that understanding nod of his, and then asked, "How can I help, m'lord?"

Julian had known his manservant would react in such a way. He could forever and always count on Garn. There was no finer friend who walked the earth, Julian knew.

"I need you to go to London as well. I'll need a runner of information."

"Aye. I'll be that man, m'lord. Just tell me where and how."

"Go to my flat in St. James Place. My solicitor, Crandall, has a key. Tell Crandall I've returned to Town, get the funds you need from him. Tell him I'll contact him when I get to London. You wait for me at the flat. I will arrive there as soon as I can."

"Aye. Consider it done."

Julian nodded, realizing that he had no more time to spend in the cottage. He had a twenty-minute ride back to the village. And Veronica was waiting—or at least she'd better be.

"M'lord?" said Garn, as Julian made ready to leave. "You haven't told me the woman's name, or even where she resides."

"Her name is Veronica. Lady Veronica. That's all I know." He thought a minute, remembering how she had shuddered and turned away when he'd first touched her. Then he added, "No, there's one other thing I know about her. She's been abused, Garn. In some way, she's been hurt by someone."

Garn's blue eyes met Julian's black ones.
So the woman was a lady, no less, and had been hurt by some fiend.
The look in Garn's face registered those facts. He'd known a like lady at one time... had even married her, in fact, and laid her down in her grave, to boot.

Julian bade the man good-bye, then headed out of the cottage to his mount. He angled his body up and on to the saddle, reined the stallion about, and then headed back to Ripon and the coaching inn. Back to Veronica of the violet eyes, bewitching smile, soft curves... and the penchant to get out from under the thumb of her hired man.

Julian was anxious to be near her again, to smell deeply of her rich, heady scent Too, there was much he wished to learn about Veronica, about the soul inside of her, about why she'd feared he would strike her when they'd first met... and about why a lady such as herself seemed so eager to get away from her coachman.

Not even a full hour had passed since he'd seen her last Odd, but it felt like a lifetime.

Julian was glad when his horse moved into an even fester lope.

* * *

Garn closed the door of the cottage once he'd seen his master and good friend had gotten safely on his way back to the village.

When he turned, he found Wil standing at the threshold beside the bedroom opposite Meg's.

"I heard voices," the young man said.

Garn sized up the youth, who'd grown tall as a post in what seemed to him an amazing short period of time. His eyes were green. Like Annie's. His mouth was wide and mobile, and this, too, Garn knew to have been bequeathed to him by the mother the boy had never known. His hair—a riot of golden reddish curls—was also reminiscent of the woman Garn had loved so fiercely and lost too soon.

But the young man's stance, his attitude, his temper, and his mistrust of the world at large, even his strong, finely muscled body, were wholly his father's.

And that, damn it all, was what Garn hated most—the father he now saw mirrored in the boy he'd tried to love but never quite could.

"'Tis nothin' to worry yourself over, Wil. Go back to bed."

"It was the Earl of Eve who was here."

Garn hooked a look at him. "Aye, and so it was. What of it, boy?"

Wil defiantly shoved back a splay of curls spilling over his brow. "I thought he'd gone to Fountains to die," he said. "I thought you never expected to see him again."

Garn never minced words, and he did not do so now. "Aye," he said, nodding once. "I'd expected just that. But he's healed now and has no more need of those ruins."

"He's going back to London?"

"I think you know the answer to that, boy. I think, in fact, you heard everything."