Between the Devil and Ian Eversea (14 page)

The air crackled with suppressed violence, like the prelude to a thunderstorm.

For the first time in a very long time, a surge of genuine fear swept her.

“And you’d know a bit about killing, wouldn’t you, sir?” Sutton finally said. It sounded a bit like an insinuation.

Ian smiled at this. Swiftly. It was like watching a saber being unsheathed.

His voice went silky. The voice a cobra might use, Tansy thought, to mesmerize its prey.

“Enough so that one more wouldn’t make a damn bit of difference to me, Sergeant.”

And before her eyes, Sergeant Sutton blanched. She’d never actually seen someone do precisely that before.

Sutton stared at Ian a moment longer, then muttered some oath under his breath and spun on his heel.

They watched him until he walked down the hallway and disappeared back into the party.

She cleared her throat. “Thank you,” she managed, with a certain amount of dignity. Her voice was a bit frayed.

He said nothing. He was staring at her as if he couldn’t quite decide whether she deserved killing, too.

“Killing?” she queried. “Done a lot of it?” she said, just to interrupt the stare.

The stare continued.

He still said nothing. He just studied her with those blue eyes, and she felt them on her like cinders.

“May I ask you a question, Miss Danforth?” His voice was still quiet, almost lazy.

She nodded permission.

“What the bloody hell are you playing at?”

Ah. Suspicions confirmed. He
was
angry.

She bit her lip a moment. “You don’t have to curse.”

Good God. Even she thought that was inane.

She could see he
almost
laughed.

“Oh, my
stars
. I do apologize for my rough ways.”

She almost laughed at that. She sensed that would be unwise indeed, because he hadn’t yet blinked. There was the sense about him of a coiled spring. Or a primed musket. Whatever anger he’d felt at Sutton—or at her—hadn’t yet entirely spent itself. And here she was alone with him.

“Answer me, please.”

He was probably a bloody good captain, if she had to guess. Scared the life out of his soldiers by just talking in a quiet voice.

“I’m not sure what you mean,” she hedged, though she was pretty certain that she did.

“Flirting with men, encouraging their attentions with wild, insincere, yet strangely effective flattery, generally causing an uproar, all so you can have all of them eating out of your hand, and then recklessly finding yourself in a compromising, even dangerous, position as a result.”

Oh. That.

You noticed!
she was tempted to say.

“All of them except for you,” she pointed out.

She couldn’t
believe
she’d said it.

It was fairly clear this had brought him up short. He was staring at her with something like amazement now.

“Or perhaps you’re . . . jealous?” she suggested hopefully, weakly. Half jesting.

Her own recklessness amazed her. But in for a penny, in for a pound.

And she wanted to jar a way past that stare.

She was sorry she’d said it when the next expression to take up occupation on his face was incredulity.

He shook his head slowly to and fro.

“I’ve watched you, Miss Danforth . . . in the midst of your games. And it’s so very clear you know little to nothing of the . . . shall we say, matters between men and women. I would wager my entire inheritance on it. And I find game playing combined with ignorance tedious. I’m not a boy.”

She was badly stung.

“The matters between men and women! Do you mean sex?”

A heartbeat of utter silence followed.

“I suppose you think you’re being very bold,” he said quietly.

She was fairly certain she had succeeded in shocking him.

Perhaps even rattling him.

She said nothing, because she’d shocked herself by saying it and needed a moment to recover.

“Have you ever even been kissed before, Miss Danforth?”

She contemplated which answer would incriminate her the least and impress him the most, though why she should want to do the latter eluded her. She
had
been kissed, but it hadn’t caused a single unusual physical response.

Whereas simply looking at Ian Eversea seemed to cause her senses to riot.

“Perhaps.”

She wouldn’t have blamed him if he rolled his eyes.

Perhaps mercifully, the incredulity was simply amplified a bit.

“It’s a risky game you play,
Tansy
. Why do you do it?”

She was angry now. “Because. I.
Can
. And because they like it.”

“I suspect you mean because they like
you
when you do it.”

This brought her up short. A tense little silence followed.

“Why do
you
do it?” she countered.
Ha!

His eyes flared in surprise, then anger swiftly kindled in them.

Splendid. She was certain she’d at least startled him.
Yes, Captain Eversea, I know about your alleged exploits
. She imagined saying that aloud. She discovered she wasn’t
that
brave.

But he ignored the question.

“I won’t always be lurking around corners when you face the consequences of your actions, Tansy. Not every soldier is born a gentleman, and not every gentleman understands the word no. Men are fundamentally brutes. Some just wear better clothes and have more money. You ought to be more afraid.”

He was undoubtedly correct. She
ought
to be.

“Come now, Captain Eversea, surely you of all people know that a little risk makes life less dull, altogether.”

He gave a short laugh. She suspected she’d surprised it from him.

“
My
risks are calculated, Miss Danforth. And informed by experience.”

“And you can’t possibly know that I know
nothing
about, as you say, ‘such matters.’ ”

He inhaled deeply, exhaled at length, sounding oh-so-long-suffering. “Oh, you know how to make them yearn, I grant you. You know how to get
attention
. There’s a look experienced women have, that’s all. A demeanor. And you haven’t the look.”

This was news. How on earth would an experienced woman look? Shocked? Tired? Wicked? Reflexively, she tried an expression that she thought might incorporate all three.

He laughed again, genuinely. “I’ve seen that expression on one of Colin’s cows, after she’d eaten something she ought not.”

Torn between laughing and scowling, she frowned.

“You don’t
need
the look. It isn’t something to aspire to, Miss Danforth. You’re going to marry someone with a title and all the money you’ll ever need, isn’t that so? Aren’t you destined for a duke or something of the sort? So don’t even think about practicing. Like I said, I won’t always be around to rescue you.”

“I imagine you’ve benefited from that ‘look’ any number of times, haven’t you, Captan Eversea?”

She was out of her depth with him, which made her even more reckless than usual. She was like a kitten with tiny sharp claws crawling up his trouser leg. She suspected he would indulge her only so long before he shook her off abruptly.

“Miss Danforth,” he said patiently. “It’s clear you want to goad me into saying scandalous things to you that you can take back to your room and savor, pore over at night like found treasure. You want my attention. You don’t want the consequences of that attention. You don’t even know what the consequences
are
. And for me, it’s just . . . it’s well, just rather dull,” he added with an attempt at kindness, and an intolerably condescending lift of one shoulder. “And in some circumstances, it might even be hurtful. And if someone I care about might be hurt as a result of whatever game you’re playing . . . I simply can’t allow you to do it.”

Dull!

Someone he
cared about
!

Oh, the
infuriating
humiliation. Her eyes burned.

For some reason all of this hurt mortally.

“You don’t know me at all,” she said, her voice a rasp, her face hot. She could only assume it was a scorching, unflattering red.

“I know you some,” he said easily, sounding bored. “And some is enough.”

He leaned back against the wall of the terrace, struck a flint against the box and lit a cheroot without asking whether she minded. He sent the smoke up into the air and aimed his gaze out over the landscape he likely knew the way he knew his own face in the mirror.

His own damned handsome, unforgettable face.

“Well, I suppose you’re right,” she said. “But you ought to know, isn’t that true, Captain Eversea? Because you of all people know it’s all about the
getting
of someone or of something. Everything you do. Everything else is a waste of time. God forbid a woman should evince an interest in you first. I’ll wager you’ll run like a frightened little girl.”

She couldn’t seem to control what came out of her mouth when she was around him. Surely this was inadvisable.

He turned his head sharply then, eyes wide in surprise, then hot with a real fleeting anger. She took a step back, as though he’d lunged at her with a lit torch.

Then something speculative settled into his gaze. He studied her long enough for her heart to flop hard in her chest, painfully, like an obsequious mongrel. Eager to be patted or kicked, whatever he preferred. And she was angry that she was so very inexperienced that she couldn’t stop her heart from doing otherwise.

At least she felt
seen
by him for the first time.

Oh, how she wished she knew what he saw.

“Know a bit about being a frightened little girl, do you, Tansy?” he said softly.

Oh.

She felt pinned like a butterfly to a board.

How, how,
how
she wished she had something to throw.

She opened her mouth. But she couldn’t speak. Her voice had congealed.

She simply turned and . . .

Well, she didn’t precisely run.

But she walked rather more swiftly than she might have done.

And as her footsteps echoed, making her feel as though she was chasing herself, he called after her, dryly, “You’re welcome.”

Chapter 14

H
IS TEMPER STILL ON
the boil, Ian found himself charging in the opposite direction from the festivities.

As it turned out he was on his way to the kitchen, which he hadn’t realized until he arrived. By the time he did, a certain fascination had begun to edge its way into his rather complicated anger, which flared bright and fresh every time he pictured Sutton’s hand closed around Tansy Danforth’s wrist as she struggled to pull it away. His gut knotted. What a pleasure it would have been to flatten Sutton. She could have been hurt. Or at the very least, quite inexpertly kissed against her will, and no woman should endure that.

How dare the girl put herself at risk like that? How stupid did one have to
be
?

He stopped abruptly and pulled in a long deep breath. He was fair enough to realize his anger seemed all out of proportion to the circumstances.

Is that why
you
do it?

Ah. And there he had it. What in God’s name had the girl heard about him? Or had that just been a guess aimed as skillfully as she’d aimed that musket?

This, perversely, amused him.

And at this thought he could feel something else sneaking in on the heels of his indignation. Something that felt a bit like . . . could it be . . . admiration?

Very, very reluctant admiration.

She
was
quick. He’d give her that.

When she wasn’t trying so bloody hard.

He paused in the kitchen. It was mercifully dimly lit and peaceful at the moment. Much to his delight, arrayed on a tray like the crown jewels as if awaiting his arrival, was a solitary fluffy, golden scone. Just the thing for his mood. Surely it was fate.

He reached for it.

From out of nowhere a blur appeared and spanked his hand lightly.

He yelped.

It turned out to be Mrs. deWitt.

“Ow! Why the beating? You hurt my feelings gravely, Mrs. deWitt.”

She laughed softly. “As if anyone could ever do that! Ach, dinna touch that, Master Ian. That there be for Miss Danforth.”

Even
scones
were held in thrall for the girl?

“That
particular
scone is for Miss Danforth?
Why
, pray tell?”

“Yes, ’tis ’er favorite, and one does like to spoil ’er a bit, now, ye see.”

“One
does,
” he said, but Mrs. deWitt missed the irony. “Surely, then, there’s another very similar scone for me.”

“Not until after the baking this afternoon.”

“I’ll give you a shilling for this one,” he said childishly.

She snorted. “ ’Ave some cheese.”

“I want a scone. I want
that
scone.”

“Ah, now, Master Ian, and will
ye
be marryin’ a duke, now, or some such, someday? Are ye all alone in the world now? Did ye win a trophy today?”

“Probably not, no and no,” he conceded.

“Well then,” she said, as if this decided everything.

Imagine that. Defeated by the cook. He wasn’t child enough to snatch it from her anyway, though he was sorely tempted.

“Let me find ye a lovely piece of cheese, Master Ian,” she pacified.

“Very well.” He’d decided to be gracious in defeat. He settled at the table and irritably shoved aside a vase full of flowers.

“Those be for Miss Danforth,” the cook said proudly, as if it were her own accomplishment.

“Shocking,” Ian said.

He eyed them critically. They were from someone who possessed a hothouse, which could be nearly anyone with money in Sussex. He was irritated suddenly, wondering precisely who it was.

“But she gave them to me, sweet girl she is. And she had the rest taken down to the churchyard. And she gave toy soldiers to little Jordy! She has a heart of gold, she does.”

It was all Ian could do not to choke.

Then again, he didn’t suppose he’d given much thought to Tansy Danforth’s heart. Or hearts, as he should say, given that she’d gone on a campaign to steal them from nearly every man she encountered, including possibly the one he would not allow her to have, and that was Landsdowne’s.

What went on in her heart? She
could
be hurt, that much he knew. She’d reacted like a wild thing prodded with a spear when he insinuated she might be hurting someone he loved.

He felt a little minute jab in the region of his solar plexus then. Sympathy, or guilt, he wasn’t sure. Suddenly he wished he could unsay it. He found the notion that he might have hurt her feelings surprisingly distasteful.

Mrs. deWitt slid cheese and a slab of bread slathered in honey in front of him. The honey was a peace offering.

“How did you know this scone was Miss Danforth’s favorite?” he asked.

“We have a visit of nights, and we’ve a bit of a bite to eat when we talk.”

He nearly choked. “You . . . ‘have a visit’?” He was bemused. “Of
nights
? You and Miss Danforth?”

“Aye, Master Ian, she’s but a young woman still and I think she’s a wee bit lonely. We chat a bit in the kitchen sometimes at night. Not every night. Sometimes very late. I leave one out for her, and if it’s gone in the morning I know she had trouble sleeping. She’s a young girl alone in the world. And here you all be, a big comfortable noisy family, and you know everyone you see and all the land, too. She’s a bit lonesome, aye?”

“She’s lonely because she’s alienated all the women in Sussex and bewitched all the men into injuring themselves and each other on her behalf.”

Mrs. deWitt laughed indulgently. “Ah, now, surely you exaggerate Master Ian, and wouldn’t that be just like you.”

“No, I mean it!”

Mrs. deWitt just chuckled some more at what she likely suspected were his antics. “Ah, ye always did have a fine wit, Master Ian. Think of it. ”

“Lonesome? Her constitution is made of iron. If she’d been born another gender, she’d give Napoleon a run for his money in terms of campaigns. She’s shameless.”

But even as he said it he could feel doubt encroaching.

“Of
course
her constitution is iron, Master Ian. She’s alone in the world, what choice has the girl? I dinna ken about shameless. I for one believe she’s as sweet as an—”

“Don’t say angel!”

“Oh, I suppose she’s just not for the likes of you, Master Ian. Ye never did take to the angels.”

But she winked at him with great affection.

Ian sighed. “No, I never did.”

Lonesome
. He recalled her expression when he’d asked her whether she knew a bit about being a frightened little girl. As if he’d seized the collar of her dress and yanked it clean off. Stripping her of some critical disguise.

And yet it had all been for her own good, of that he was certain.

Why, then, did he feel a sudden uncomfortable urge to apologize?

His curiosity got the better of him.

“But what do you
talk
about?”

“Aye, just a bi’ of talk between women, right? Budgets and cooking and the like. It wouldna interest ye in the
least.
” She said this quite inscrutably.

Just a day ago she would have been absolutely correct.

T
ANSY MANAGED TO
convincingly sparkle through the rest of the afternoon.

But the day had gone on too long, and the supreme effort it took to charm had given her a headache, as if she’d drunk too much champagne, which she hadn’t. She suspected it was a bit of a spiritual hangover, which had rather a lot to do with Ian Eversea’s brutally accurate summary and dismissal of her.

She sat down hard, propped her chin in her hands and tried hard to hate him, but all she could muster was a sort of resigned, honest misery. She felt rather like a shoddy magician whose secrets had been exposed. She couldn’t fault him, not really. She in truth rather admired it, which added a bit to her misery, given that she was fairly certain he now didn’t like her at
all,
if he’d liked her just a little before.

But . . . though there had been a moment when he helped her shoulder the gun, where the air seemed to go soft and dense as velvet, and she could have sworn their breathing had begun to sway at the same rhythm, like two rivers joining, and she’d strangely never felt safer or more peculiarly imperiled. And she’d wanted time to stop then, to freeze the two of them the way the entire crowd had frozen, so she could lean against him, because that’s where she’d always belonged, or so it seemed. And to just see what that moment was all about.

And at the recoil he had pushed her upright as if she’d been something aflame.

She thought about this. And decided she unnerved him, too. At least a little.

It cheered her, but it made her uneasy as well.

You mean because they like
you
when you do it?

Aargh.
Her cheeks went hot again.

Know a bit about being a frightened little girl, Tansy?

She dropped her hot cheeks into her hands. But then she raised her head slowly and took a long steadying breath. Because regardless of what he thought of her, it was strangely a relief to be
known
.

Oddly, she wasn’t tempted to throw her slippers at the wall this time.

The thing was, there were things she now knew about Ian Eversea that he probably didn’t even know he’d revealed. That he might not even know about himself. There was a certain advantage to being underestimated, at least for a time, and the advantage was that she could surprise him into a flare of anger—disconcerting as it had been to be in the path of those blazing eyes—because she’d prodded some sore place in him. She took no pleasure in hurting him, but there was still a little bit of a thrill.

And despite her resolve, she found that the hunger to know him had in no way diminished.

He might not have the slightest interest in Richard III, but she’d found a way into Ian Eversea, anyway, quite inadvertently.

Tansy gazed at the wall.

She unfolded her sheet of foolscap and spread it out neatly and read it to herself. And then, because she was fundamentally honest, she added to the bottom:

Fiercely loyal to those he loves.

T
HE NEXT AFTERNOON
Ian stopped in at the Pig & Thistle for a pint of the dark, which he’d been dreaming about for the last hour as he hammered nails into a decrepit paddock fence. Surely he’d purchased his way into Heaven with all of this work lately. Though his cousin the vicar assured him it didn’t work quite that way.

He pushed open the door of the pub and saw Landsdowne sitting by himself, enjoying what appeared to be a steak and kidney pie and a pint of the light. Landsdowne looked up, saw Ian and beckoned him over.

Ian pulled out a chair and reflexively raised a hand. When Polly didn’t appear in a heartbeat, he swiveled his head to look for her.

He didn’t see her, but Ned noticed him and without asking brought Ian a pint of the dark.

“I give Polly a bit of time off during the day, Captain Eversea. She goes off for a bit, but she should have returned by now.”

“I’m certain she’ll be here any minute, Ned. She’s a good girl.”

Ned brightened. “Aye, that she is. That she is.”

Polly Hawthorne was quite simply Ned’s heart, Ian knew. And he reflected again on the dangers of loving.
Anyone
. The thing that allegedly made life worthwhile quite had the power to destroy you, too. Interesting irony, that the thing that made you strongest was also what made you weakest. Altogether more dangerous than war, love was.

“How goes it, Eversea?” Landsdowne offered laconically.

“It goes quite sweatily. But we’re close to having a new roof on the vicarage.”

“Admirable. Every building deserves a roof.”

Ian gave a short laugh.

There was a silence between them. Ian drummed his fingers, wondering how to begin.

“What else is on your mind?” Landsdowne said politely, with a certain dry amusement.

“My sister . . .” He hoped Landsdowne would pick up the thread.

“. . . is magnificent.” Landsdowne completed this almost grimly.

Ian launched his brows and waited for more.

It wasn’t forthcoming.

So he decided to be blunt. “Do you still think so?”

Landsdowne gave a soft laugh. “Ah. Did you come here to ascertain my intentions, Eversea? I should have thought my intentions are quite clear by now.”

“And your intentions remain . . . unaltered in their course? Despite recent gifts sent to another young woman?”

“Are you perchance alluding to a certain blond angel who has lately alit upon Sussex?”

Good God, even Landsdowne talked like a fool about her.

Angel, my left hindquarter, he thought. He had enough of the gentleman left in him that he thought he would leave it unsaid, and he wasn’t about to enumerate what he considered her secret vices.

Unbidden came an image of that bare, vulnerable little crescent of fair skin between the collar of her walking gown and her bonnet, and the delicate blades of her shoulders, and her clear eyes staring back at him, wide and as shocked as if he’d struck her when he demanded the reason his opinion meant anything at all to her.