Never Love a Scoundrel (13 page)

Ethan looked away. “I never meant for that to happen.”

Jason gaped at him. Was he apologizing? What the bloody hell was Jason supposed to do with
that
? “You could have fooled me. It seemed you came here that day with an agenda to push me as far as you could.”

The gray eyes so like their father’s pinned him with a sincerity Jason couldn’t quite believe. “I did. I hated you.” He shrugged. “You hated me. We’re even.”

“Except for the part where you left me bleeding and scarred for life.” Both inside and out.

“And I regret that.” He sipped his whisky. “But tell me, brother, if the situation had been reversed, what would you have done?”

Jason wanted to say he would’ve helped him, that he would’ve ensured the staff knew it had simply been a fight between brothers and not the violent unhinging of a madman. But he couldn’t. Even now, if he were presented with the opportunity to ruin Ethan, he’d take it. Isn’t that what he was hoping to gain by helping Bow Street?

Polishing off his drink, Jason went to the sideboard and poured another. “So you want to be a gentleman and you think to gain my support to accomplish that?”

Ethan blinked at him, as if he wouldn’t have put it that way. “I
am
a gentleman and I’d hoped to take my place as your half brother. It seemed that might work best if we weren’t trying to kill each other.”

“If you’re a gentleman as you claim, where have you been these last seven years? Why emerge now?”

Ethan finished his whisky and then set the glass atop Jason’s desk with a loud clack. “It doesn’t matter. I was foolish to think we could overcome the past.”

How Jason wanted to just ask him outright about his activities. Was he taking over the theft ring? Was he responsible for the theft on Curzon Street? However, he presumed Bow Street wouldn’t want him to be so unsubtle. “If I thought I could trust you, things might be different.”

Ethan’s stare was probing, expectant. He looked more like their father than ever. “So try.”

Jason set his glass down on the sideboard and leaned forward. “Give me a reason.”

With a loud exhalation, Ethan looked at the floor for a long moment. When he raised his head once more, his features were tightly stretched. “I’m not what they say. Not now. I’m trying to change.”

“How?” Jason wanted details. He moved a step forward. “What are you trying to change?”

“Hell,” Ethan muttered. “Just give me some time. Will you do that? Soon, I’ll tell you everything.”

And until then, Jason was simply supposed to have faith in the person who’d destroyed his life? No one was that indulgent. “Why not now? If you tell me, it would go a long way to establish trust.”

“It would also go a long way to getting you killed.” His gaze was intense. “Just be patient, will you do that?”

“You clearly know what I’ve heard. Put that with the Ethan Jagger I know, and I have no choice but to believe you’re up to no good.”

“You’re so goddamned suspicious.” Ethan shook his head and murmured, “Just like your mother.”

“What did you say?” Jason’s self-control suddenly and completely snapped. He lunged at Ethan and slammed him backward into the bookshelf. Ethan’s head made a dull thud as it hit the wood of the shelf, but he didn’t seem affected. He pushed back at Jason and swung out, catching his jaw with his knuckles.

Scalding rage poured through Jason, stripping him of rational thought. He only wanted to punish this man who’d done nothing but hurt him and his mother. He sent his fist toward Ethan’s face, but the blighter dodged the strike. Ethan moved quickly with his own fists, driving them into Jason’s sides, first one then the other.

Jason grunted and lashed out again. This time he caught Ethan’s cheek with the first blow, though he missed with the next. Ethan was fast, his defenses good. He punched Jason in his scarred cheek.

“You move slow, old man,” Ethan growled.

White fury blinded Jason for a moment as he grabbed Ethan’s upper arms and threw him against the other bookcases. His frame slammed into the wood, and several books fell from the shelves. Jason drove his fist into Ethan’s gut, and relished the whoosh of air he exhaled and the grunt that followed.

Ethan slid to the side and found his footing. He sent another fist into Jason’s side, sending a searing burst of pain along his ribs. The bastard knew exactly where to hit. And then it dawned on Jason. Ethan was fighting like a pugilist.

“Have you been working out with your fighter?” Jason asked, his breath coming in harsh pants as he sent another pair of punches toward Ethan’s face. He only connected with one, but it was a good hit to Ethan’s nose.

Ethan brought his hand to his nose and rubbed a knuckle over the end. “Yes. Father would’ve been very proud.”

The son of a bitch.
Of course Benjamin Lockwood would’ve been proud. The only thing he liked better than his whores was fighting. And leave it to Ethan to take after him
and
rub it in Jason’s ruined face. Jason roared with rage and reached for Ethan’s neck. Just as his fingers were closing around the collar of Ethan’s shirt, hands pulled him backward. Jason tried to throw them off. His vision tunneled until all he could see was Ethan’s taunting face.

“Let him go, my lord.” North’s even tones broke into the fiery haze in Jason’s brain.

“You’d best leave,” Scot suggested from somewhere to Jason’s right. He had to be talking to Ethan.

Jason threw one of his retainers off him, freeing his left arm. “No, he can’t go. I’m not finished.” He swiped out at Ethan, trying to grab his cravat and hopefully choke him with it.

But Ethan was too fast again. He moved quickly out of his reach and then delivered a sharp jab to Jason’s ribcage again—in the same spot he’d already hit twice before.

This prick was
not
going to best him again.

Jason reared up and pulled his right arm free. Then he dove on top of Ethan and tackled him to the floor. Ethan’s head grazed the desk as he fell. Jason pulled his hand back to deliver a blow to his face, but someone grabbed his fist and held him fast.

Hands hauled him up and away from Ethan. “Let me go, goddammit!” he roared.

“Get him out of here,” North said. From where his voice originated, Jason guessed he’d been the traitor who’d stopped him from hitting Ethan.

Two footmen helped Ethan up. Ethan’s hand went to the back of his head and when he brought it down, blood striped his fingers.

Ethan’s mouth lifted in a semblance of a smile as he sent a mocking gaze at Jason. “Get what you wanted?”

Jason pulled at the men—what, three of them?—holding him. Fingers dug into his biceps; they weren’t letting him go. He glared at Ethan with all the malevolence boiling his insides. “Not even close.”

“Then I’ll look forward to the next time.” Ethan nodded at the men holding Jason. “‘Evening, lads.” Then he turned and left the office.

The door closed after his departure, and the men released Jason. He strode for the door, intent on going after Ethan and pummeling him into dust, but Scot got there first, his back slamming into the wood. He shook his head. “Not now. You’ve got a house full of people.”

Those words permeated Jason’s brain like no others could. Scot may as well have said, “Do you want a repeat of seven years ago?” If he took his fight with Ethan outside of this office, everyone at the party would see the outburst and perhaps conclude that Jason really
was
mad. Then his parties would cease, and he wouldn’t allow Ethan to take his sole enjoyment from him too.

He strode to the sideboard and poured another whisky. The door clicked, and when he turned back to the room he saw that only North remained. His butler regarded him with wary eyes. He said nothing, but stood between Jason and the door.

“I won’t go after him,” Jason said, gripping his whisky as if it were the only friend he had. But he knew it wasn’t. North and Scot were more than retainers who valued their jobs. They’d saved Jason from making a colossal mistake—again—because they cared.

North nodded once, but didn’t relax. His gaze lost a bit of their guardedness, but his tense posture said he was still vigilant.

If Scot were here, he’d ask questions, but North would simply wait for Jason to speak, if he wanted to. And Jason didn’t want to. He tossed back the rest of his drink and set the glass behind him on the sideboard.

At length, the door opened. Scot stepped inside and held the door. Cora swept into the office, her scarlet skirts brushing over Scot’s boots.

“Darling,” she said, coming toward Jason.

What the hell had Scot done bringing her here? Was she supposed to somehow provide solace? He didn’t want that. He didn’t want
her
. Not now.

As she moved closer, he wanted to retreat, but couldn’t because he was already up against the sideboard. He slid to the side a bit.

Cora’s forehead creased with concern. Her dark eyes looked over him curiously, lingering on his cheek, which was surely reddened from Ethan’s blow. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” he ground out. “You should go.”

“No, let me help you, darling,” she cooed.

He didn’t want sympathy or coddling. He wanted release. And then he realized he could get that with her. Take her upstairs to the bedroom they usually used and fuck her until he was senseless. But he didn’t want that either. He didn’t want
her
. He wanted to nurse his anger and plan his next move.

He pierced her with his darkest stare, knowing he looked ferocious. “No. Get out.”

Her eyes flashed with some emotion—pain, perhaps. But Jason didn’t apologize. He couldn’t. She turned, and Scot opened the door for her, shutting it firmly after she exited.

Jason tried to force the tension from his shoulders by shaking his arms out. That was when he realized his hands were shaking of their own accord. He curled his fingers into fists and glared at his retainers. “What the hell were you thinking?”

“I thought she might help,” Scot said without a trace of regret, his hand still on the door. “You and she get on well. And have for quite some time.”

“That doesn’t mean you bring her to me after what just happened. You feel the need to guard me from my guests, but you bring her in here as an offering?”

Scot let go of the door. “She’s not a guest, she’s your mistress.” Now there was a trace of apology to his tone, and he added, “Isn’t she?”

Jason scowled at his valet. “No.” He didn’t want to think about Cora right now. He wanted to plan Ethan’s downfall. He pinned North with a vicious stare. “How’d that bastard get in without my knowing?”

North took a step toward him. “Might I pour you another glass of whisky?”

“Don’t patronize me. How did he get in?”

“I’m not certain, my lord.” He clenched his jaw. “It could be that he presented his invitation to the footman and I was perhaps otherwise detained with a guest.”

Possibly, but Jason rather thought the blighter had snuck in.

North refilled Jason’s glass. “Here. I’m not patronizing, I’m fortifying. Put yourself back together and go back out there when you’re ready. And smooth things over with Miss Stroud. You upset her.”

He’d sought feminine companionship any way he could get it for so long, and now he didn’t want it. At least not from her. For some reason, Lydia Prewitt’s dark-as-hell eyes appeared in his mind. Sparkling. Flirtatious. Expectant, as she’d been on the street yesterday. And he’d been obnoxious.

He drank his whisky and threw a nod at North and Scot so they’d leave.

Jason’s gaze raised to the portrait of the man who’d created two men who despised each other and who potentially had the power to ruin each other. “What a bloody mess you made. All because you couldn’t be faithful.” Jason wouldn’t make that mistake. He wouldn’t make promises he didn’t intend to keep. Which is why long-standing relationships with women had no place in his life. He wasn’t his father.

He threw back the rest of the drink, relishing the hot trail it burned down his throat. Then he quit the office in search of Cora Stroud so he could tell her she was no longer welcome in his bed.

Chapter Eight

LYDIA ADJUSTED
the cap covering her blond curls as she made her way down the back stairs of her town house. Quietly, she opened the door and stepped into the scullery. She’d waited to leave until she knew all the servants would be occupied in other areas. She hurried across the empty space and out the door, then rushed up the exterior stairs. Without a backward glance, she headed east toward her destination: Lockwood House.

Dressed as a maid in a plain dress, apron, and cap, she drew no one’s attention. Anxiety coursed through her veins. She’d never ventured anywhere by herself. It was beneath her station, Aunt Margaret would say, unseemly.

It actually felt quite liberating.

Exhilaration overcame her anxiety until she thought about where she was going. What would Lord Lockwood say when she infiltrated his den of disgrace?

She mentally shook her head. He’d hosted another party two nights ago. Aunt Margaret was only too eager to spread that information, and already Society was abuzz with his continued indiscretion. Did he not realize he couldn’t hope to gain invitations to events like the Whitmore Ball if he insisted on hosting vice parties? Clearly not. And it was also clear he needed someone to tell him so. Lydia had elected herself that person.