A Scandalous Lady (26 page)

He let go of her hand and strode slowly to the window. A flock of gulls hovered above the rocks jutting into the Channel below. A sailboat glided through the water. Troyce sighed. “I was barely twenty-one when my grandfather started pressuring me to marry. Twenty-one, Faith. Hell, I'd not even sown my oats yet, why would I want to tie myself down with a wife?

“The pressure continued, and a year later, he issued an ultimatum—marry a woman who met his standards or he would cut me off. She had to be of noble blood, virtuous of character, and wealthy in her own right.”

“Why of his standards? Why not marry for love?”

“Because,” Troyce turned to face her, sat on the window ledge, and crossed his arms loosely over his chest, “my father had defied him by marrying my mother and lived in misery for the rest of his life. I swore then that I'd not make my father's mistake, but neither was I going to let some crotchety old Frenchman tell me how to live. Hell, I was young and arrogant and quite full of myself. I'd never wanted the title and didn't want the old man's money. I told him so, and vowed then and there to make my own fortune so neither he nor my parents could ever use it as a weapon against me. I went to America to learn of ships. My mother was horrified, my father ambivalent. Miles and I had a grand time.” He found himself smiling at the memories.

The smile faded. “Then . . . my mother died, my father grew ill. Westborough fell to ruins. The villagers raided the place, stole everything that might have saved their miserable lives. Most left after that, but some stayed on. They blamed my father for abandoning them and accused me of deserting them. And they were right. I should never have left. I should have accepted my duty. Instead, I ran from it, and I failed them.” He silently begged her to understand. “I cannot fail them again, Faith.”

“And I would not expect you to. They depend on you.”

“Why are you being so damned agreeable?”

“Do you expect me to forbid it? To fall to my knees? Beg you not to break my heart? I won't do it. If I was foolish enough to fall in love with you, it's my own fault. As you've so oft reminded me, milord, I am naught but a servant here, at your beck and whim until I repay the amount stolen from you in London.”

For several long moments, neither spoke. Troyce considered telling her that he'd developed feelings for her as well, but he wasn't sure if he would call it love. What was love, anyway? Besides, what purpose would it serve? Would it change anything?

No. Because no matter what he felt, he still couldn't have her.

So he did the only honorable thing he could do. “There's something else I must confess, Faith. Your debt to me is clear.” A knot rose in his throat. “You are free to go if you wish.”

She choked on a laugh. “I want no favors, Baron. I told you, I won't be your whore.”

“It's not a favor, Faith. I told you that when the money that was taken from me was repaid, your debt would be clear. I reclaimed the money from Swift when I went to London.”

He watched her calculate the days in her mind and felt his heart sink as her temper rose.

“You kept this from me?” she whispered. “You've had the money for weeks, and yet you let me believe that I was still indebted to you? Why? Why would you do that to me?”

“Because I was afraid you would leave.” Because it kept her close.
Kept
her indebted. What a bloody arrogant ploy. When had he become such a pompous ass? When had he sunk to the depths of the Jack Swifts of this world? “If you choose to leave now, I wouldn't blame you. I will not force you to remain here against your will.”

“And where the bloody hell am I supposed to go, Baron?”

“Wherever you wish. Maybe you could search for your family.”

“I told you, I've no desire to search for them.”

“My original offer still stands, Faith. You're welcome to stay here at Westborough for as long as you wish. You could live in the cottage, if that's what you want, and continue working in the manor. I can't pay you now, but until such time as I . . . as I marry, you would at least have food and shelter and clothing.”

He expected her to stay on? Watch him marry another woman? Cater to her and the children they would one day have? Go on and pretend as if nothing had happened on the decks of
La Tentatrice
?

He was staring steadily at her, as if waiting for her to decide, when Devon appeared in the doorway of the tower room.

“Troyce, I must speak with you.”

“Not, now Devon.”

“ 'Tis important.”

Grateful for the reprieve, Faith started out the door, only to find her way barred by Lady Brayton.

“No, you should stay, Miss Jervais, since this concerns you.” To the baron, she said, “This was found in Faith's room this morning.” She opened her palm and in it glittered the diamond brooch.

Faith felt every drop of color drain from her face. A roaring began in her ears, dimming the conversation around her.

“She's stealing from us—from me.”

“Like she supposedly stole your gown?”

“I was mistaken on that, but there is no mistake now. It was found in her room, on the floor under the bed.”

“That doesn't prove she took it.”

“Then perhaps you should ask her.”

“Faith?”

She forced herself to look at him, at his tight jaw, his tense shoulders.

“Can you explain how Devon's brooch came to be found in your room?”

Look what I found, Fanny!

Put it back, Scat.

Why hadn't he returned the baubles where he'd found them like she'd told him to? Her imagination conjured his young face, white with terror, ghostly screams of help, the clank of iron bars shutting, so vividly that she jerked.

“Faith?”

“It was me,” she whispered.

The baron went still. “What?”

“It was me. I st-st-stole it.”

The room got so quiet she could hear her heart beating. Ticking. Like minutes on the clock of her life.

“I don't believe you,” the baron said.

That she was able to keep her tone calm, flat, amazed her when every nerve screamed in panic. “I said I did it, Baron. Have you ever known me to lie?”

“Then say it again—
without
stuttering this time.”

She pinned him with blazing eyes. “Go to hell!”

“I know you didn't take this gewgaw any more than you took Devon's dress. So who are you covering for? Is it the lad?”

The room started to spin. He didn't believe her. The blimey son of a bitch still didn't trust her word, and Faith didn't know if she should laugh in joy or wail in sorrow.

When she refused either to reaffirm or retract her statement, his mouth flattened, and with determination in his stride, stormed between her and his sister, out the door.

“What are you going to do, West?” the duchess cried.

“Something I should have done long before now.”

 

Faith didn't begin to worry until late the next morning when the baron still hadn't returned. She told herself that he was a grown man. That he could take care of himself. But it wasn't like him to leave without a word to anyone.

Hoping to take her mind off the heap of worries piled on her plate, Faith alternated between pacing the tower floor and cleaning in a frenzy.

“Zounds, Fan, take a look at these!”

She glanced across the baron's study, where Scatter, who was supposed to be helping her dust the frames depicting the de Meir line, was instead reaching for one of a pair of ornamental cutlasses set on brackets attached on the wall. “Don't touch those, Scat. We're in a deep enough pot of boiling water.”

He ignored her, as usual, and lifted one of the curved swords from its holder. “Do you think we'll go to prison, Fanny?”

“
You
aren't going anywhere.” What would happen to her, she couldn't begin to guess. “It really bothers me how the duchess's brooch could have been found in my room.”

“It was in the sack with the rest of the swag when I put it back in the stables.”

“And you swear you put it back?”

“I swear on me life. Now the whole swag is gone again. I'm betting someone swiped me spoils, just like I told you they would.”

Aye, and that's what really had Faith perplexed. Someone in Westborough was stealing. It wasn't Scatter. And it sure wasn't her.

But someone was.

Sometimes she thought the best thing for all of them would be if she and Scatter just padded the hoof, like in the old days. What stopped her, she couldn't say. Maybe it was the fact that so much still lay unsettled between her and the baron. Or maybe it was that running seemed an admission of guilt. Or maybe it was just the not knowing who—or why—someone wanted her gone so bad that they'd make her look like she was stealing. Whatever the reason, she remained at Westborough, waiting for the lord of the manor to return. Then, and only then, when she could tell him to his face that she was leaving, would she leave.

“Scatter, I told you not to touch those,” she scolded him as he stood in the middle of the study, swishing the cutlasses through the air like a swashbuckler. “Now put them away before you get hurt—”

One of the swords clattered to the floor.

“Or they get broke.” And she wound up in debt to the baron again.

Sighing, she stepped down off the stool and picked the weapon off the floor.

“On guard!” Scatter immediately struck the pose.

“It's not ‘on guard', it's
en garde,
ye little bugger. Now for the last time, put them away.”

“Aw, come on, Fan! 'Member when we saw those sword-fighters down in Covent Garden?” He danced from one foot to the other. “
Swoosh! Swoosh!
”

She popped the flailing blade aside with the one in her hand. “Move, ye little leech.”

“I see you're no better at sword-fighting than you are at banister-riding.”

Faith spun around. “Your Grace!”

Lady Brayton entered the study and stopped beside Scatter. Her hair was perfectly coifed as usual, her gray silk gown immaculately pressed. She took the cutlass from Scatter and ran two fingers down either side of the dull, curved blade.

Not a word had been spoken between them since Lady Brayton accused her of stealing the brooch, but the woman's animosity hadn't lessened. Seeing her holding the sword, watching her slide her fingers down the curved blade, glimpsing a mysterious glint in her eyes made Faith wonder if, like the baron's, Lady Brayton's anger was the kind that simmered below the surface.

She gripped the grooved handle, tossed it up and down to test its weight. “I haven't held one of these in years.” The blade tapped against the one Faith held. “Good heavens, pardon me.” Another tap. “Oh, pardon me, again!”

Clutching the grip of her own cutlass, Faith warily eyed the duchess.

“Perhaps you should move aside, young man. I seem to be a bit clumsy with this big knife.”

Without hesitation, Scatter moved out of Lady Brayton's way. “That's a good lad,” she said.

Then
she
struck the pose. “
En garde!
”

Faith jumped back, both surprised and alarmed. “What are you doing, Your Grace?”

“Avenging my brother's honor.”

“I'm not going to cross swords with you!”

One dark brow arced. “Have you no honor of your own to avenge, Miss Jervais?”

And in that moment, Faith understood that, to back down would mean giving up any claim she had to innocence, to dignity, to pride. Aye, even to her place—whatever it was—in Troyce de Meir, third Baron of Westborough's life. And with a tight-lipped,
“En garde”
of her own, she struck the pose.

The clash started out a slow ringing of metal on metal as each woman felt out the other's strengths and weaknesses. Faith knew that her weaknesses far outweighed any strengths, for the closest experience she had with swordplay was with the sticks she and Scat used to use to beat off the rats. Her steps were awkward, her arc often low. But when she struck, she struck swift and accurately.

Lady Brayton on the other hand, was an obviously accomplished—if rusty—swordswoman, with a graceful flair for design and a sure, confident aim.

“ 'Tis a pity that you could not attend the ball, Miss Jervais.”
One point.

“Oh, I was there, Your Grace. And I had a glorious time.”

One point.

“I thought the roses were an elegant touch, didn't you?”

Faith's cutlass clattered to the floor. Bloody hell. Sighing at the fact that her suspicion had just been confirmed, she picked up the instrument, gave the duchess a silent
touché
salute, then bent her leg and lifted one arm over her head in readiness.

Again, blades rang as they danced about the study. Their skirts dusted the floor, and Lady Brayton's bustle struck several figurines, but their eye contact remained steady.

“Strange how your dress reappeared, isn't it?” Faith thrust, in as close to an accusation as she dared. “And how your brooch simply appeared in my room?”
Two points, with a bonus for audacity.

“ 'Tis nothing less than I expected from a dockside tart,” the duchess parried.

Emotions began to heighten, the rhythm grew quicker. Steel on steel echoed through the cavernous stone halls as the combatants moved from the study to the entrance hall.

“I never asked to be here, you know,” Faith said.

“Then why are you?” the duchess demanded from her higher position on the stairs.

“Because it's better than where I was heading.”

“I can sympathize with that.”

Shocked that the two might actually have something in common, Faith stumbled and nearly lost her grip.