Nicole Jordan (8 page)

Swiftly Raven crushed the feelings of warmth she’d so briefly entertained. Kell Lasseter didn’t deserve her admiration. He was a mere gamester, one who doubtless had rescued her only because he didn’t want his brother being thrown in prison for life. And he had held her there against her will. She should despise him for his despicable treatment of her.

A closed carriage awaited them on the street. When asked, Raven gave the coachman her great-aunt’s address and allowed Lasseter to hand her inside.

Without speaking, he settled beside her and then remained silent as they got under way. Perversely Raven almost wished Lasseter would talk to her, even if only to harangue her again for shooting him. She needed the distraction. The knots in her stomach had returned with a vengeance, for she recalled just how hopeless her future now was.

Disaster stared her in the face. Her character was in ruins, her dreams shattered. Her grandfather would doubtless disown her the way he had his own daughter. And her mother…Mama would have been devastated to see her mired in scandal and disgrace.

Raven shut her eyes, remembering her mother’s final moments—her once-beautiful face wasted by fever, her strength drained by the fatal illness. But her grip had been fierce on her daughter’s wrist as she had pleaded in a voice hoarse with desperation:

“Promise me, Raven. Swear to me you will wed a nobleman who can protect you from my folly.”

“I promise, Mama. Of course I promise.”

The pale lips had formed a frail smile of relief. “I can die in peace now.”

Oh, Mama.

Tears welled up in the back of Raven’s throat at the memory, while the chaos of her emotions threatened to overwhelm her again. Elizabeth Kendrick had lived for the day her daughter could return to England and take her rightful place in society without fear of being branded a bastard. And now that dream lay in ashes.

Pain sliced through Raven, while a sickening sense of inevitability swept her. There was no possible way for her to fulfill her promise now. And she had no one to turn to. She felt desperately alone, bereft of all sense of direction or purpose.

“Here,” she heard a low male voice murmur beside her.

She took the handkerchief Lasseter offered her and brutally bit back a sob, cursing herself for being such a weakling. When she felt his penetrating gaze on her, she turned her face away and clenched her jaw till it ached.

Raven had herself under better control when the carriage drew to a halt. But she sat staring out the window a long moment, knowing there was no way to avoid a tempest when she faced her relatives.

“Do you need more time?” Lasseter asked. Amazingly enough, his dark gaze held sympathy.

“Yes, but I suppose it would be pointless, since the outcome wouldn’t change.” She stiffened her spine. “There is no hope for it. I must brave the dragon.”

“Dragon?”

“My great-aunt, Lady Dalrymple. She has been waiting for me to cause a scandal since the day I arrived in England. No doubt she’ll derive great satisfaction because I have lived up to her poor opinion of me.”

“You think she will hold you to blame for what happened?”

“Absolutely. I’m certain no other young lady of her acquaintance would have managed to be abducted on her wedding day.”

His sensual mouth curved in a half smile that strangely was devoid of sarcasm. “You are indeed rather unique in my experience, Miss Kendrick,” he remarked, making it sound more a compliment than a slight.

He opened the carriage door and carefully descended, then turned to help Raven down. When he shut the door and made to accompany her, she shot him a quizzical look.

“I intend to see you safely inside,” Lasseter said, and Raven didn’t argue. She was absurdly glad to have him beside her.

They had started up the flight of steps together when she saw him grimace. Realizing his wound must be paining him, she offered her arm for support. Lasseter gave her a long, measuring glance, but after a moment’s hesitation accepted her assistance, draping his arm around her shoulders and allowing her to bear some of his weight.

“You really should have a cane,” she murmured, striving to ignore the intimacy of the contact. “My grandfather keeps several here at my aunt’s house. I will find one for you.”

Thankfully he released her when they reached the landing. Her stomach churning, Raven pushed open the front door and entered with Lasseter behind her.

For a brief moment she considered taking the coward’s way out and simply sneaking up to her rooms. But the two footmen standing at attention in the entrance hall had already spied her. And just then her aunt’s butler appeared.

“Miss Raven!” Pleasure and relief wreathed his lined face. “You have returned! Were you harmed?” The aging butler caught himself. “Forgive me, miss. We have been frantic with worry, awaiting word of you.”

“Thank you, Broady.” Raven managed a smile. “I wasn’t seriously harmed. Will you please inform my aunt that I am home?”

“Certainly, miss, and his lordship as well. Your grandfather has taken to his bed, he was so distraught over your disappearance.”

Raven felt a renewed surge of guilt. She had been so concerned with her own dire circumstances, she hadn’t wanted to think about how her grandfather’s health would be affected by her abduction. The shock of her ruination might very well kill him.

Just then her aunt called out from the rear parlor. “Raven, is that you?” The silver-haired dame came into the hall. “In God’s name, are you all right?”

“I’m well enough, Aunt.”

“What happened? We feared the worst.”

“Perhaps we should speak in private,” Raven suggested, preferring not to air the shameful details in front of the servants.

It was no doubt a measure of how overset Lady Dalrymple was that she ignored the suggestion. “All we could think of was that someone held a grudge against Jervis…or perhaps Halford. Who were those brutes who abducted you?”

Raven gave Lasseter a quick glance. His mouth was set grimly, and she sensed the tension in the muscular lines of his body. He expected her to denounce his brother, she knew, and yet she found herself hesitating.

What point would be served by naming Sean Lasseter as her abductor? Did she truly want to see him in prison? And what of the consequences to Kell? He could very well be implicated in his brother’s machinations.

She owed him more than that, Raven realized. Hehad saved her from his brother’s violence, after all. And he had behaved honorably last night, after a fashion. He’d succored her in her dire need without taking advantage of her terrible vulnerability. How many other men would have acted with the same nobility? And then she had shot him for his efforts….

Raven took a steadying breath, committing herself. “I’m not certain who they were, Aunt. They wore masks and never showed themselves before they struck me unconscious.”

Beside her, she sensed Lasseter’s sharp glance. She could feel his gaze boring into her as she went on with her fabricated tale. “Thankfully, this gentleman rescued me. This is Mr. Kell Lasseter, Aunt. Mr. Lasseter, my great-aunt Catherine, Lady Dalrymple.”

He gave a brief bow, while the elderly lady stiffened.

“Lasseter? Of the Derbyshire Lasseters?”

“The same, my lady,” he responded.

“You are Adam Lasseter’s eldest son.” When he didn’t deny it, a mingled look of horror and distaste claimed her haughty features. “I am acquainted with your unsavory reputation, sir! You are a notorious gamester, your mother was an Irish nobody, and it is common knowledge that you murdered your uncle!”

Shocked by the last charge, Raven couldn’t help but stare at Lasseter.

The smile he gave was dangerous. “I wonder which you consider my greatest crime, Lady Dalrymple? The fact that I’m a gamester, of Irish blood, or rumored to be a murderer?”

She shuddered, while her hands rose to her cheeks in dismay. “Dear God. I had hoped…We are ruined!” She suddenly glowered at her great-niece. “Howcould you, Raven? How could you bring this murderer into our midst?”

“Murderer?”

Raven gave a start to hear her grandfather’s gruff voice. He had descended the stairs halfway, garbed in his dressing gown, and his face was flushed with outrage.

Holding on to the banister with one shaking hand, Lord Luttrell pointed his cane at Lasseter. “Seize that man!”

For a moment, no one moved. Then the footmen suddenly understood the command and hastened to obey, leaping forward to apprehend Lasseter.

When they tried to grab his arms, however, he fended them off with lightning-quick reflexes—lashing out with his fists and delivering several hard blows to the face and stomach of each footman, felling them both with ease.

Raven gasped to see the two strapping servants lying on the parquet floor, groaning and wheezing for breath. Even injured, Lasseter had been more than a physical match for them—although now he was gritting his teeth, obviously in pain from the bullet wound in his thigh.

“Damnation, I said seize him!” her grandfather roared.

When the elderly butler moved forward, Raven hastily stepped into his path, holding her arms out wide, shielding Lasseter and determined to protect the aging butler as well. “Broady, stop!”

She cast a frantic glance above her. “Grandfather, you don’t know what you are doing.”

“I do! I intend to have that scoundrel arrested and thrown in prison!”

“You are gravely mistaken. He is not a scoundrel!”

“If he abducted my granddaughter—”

“But he didn’t! Indeed, he rescued me from the brutes who thought to hold me hostage.” She hesitated only an instant before embellishing her tale further. “Moreover, he was wounded defending me. Truly, I owe him a debt of gratitude.”

“Finally you admit it,” she heard Lasseter mutter in a wry undervoice.

Raven gave him a sharp glance over her shoulder, daring him to challenge her lies. She thought she saw a mocking gleam of humor in his dark, penetrating gaze, along with something that appeared almost like admiration as he stood there flexing his bruised knuckles.

Her great-aunt, however, had a look of stark shock on her face to see two of her servants splayed on the floor of her magnificent entrance hall.

“Broady,” Raven murmured, “will you please assist them?”

With a brief glance at her ladyship, the butler answered, “Of course, Miss Raven,” and hurried to comply.

When he had helped the footmen to their feet and escorted them toward the rear of the house, Lady Dalrymple shook herself from her stupor and resumed her tone of haughty outrage. “What in heaven’s name are you thinking, Raven Kendrick?” She glared at Lasseter. “I will not have this…savagein my house.”

His own gaze remained cool, and so did his tone. “It pains me to disoblige you, my lady, but I have no intention of leaving until this situation with your niece is resolved.”

Raven intervened hastily. “Mr. Lasseter should be allowed to sit down, for I’m certain his wound is paining him. And Grandfather, you must sit as well. You should never have left your bed.”

“Well, you are the reason he was driven to his sickbed!” her aunt retorted caustically.

“Why don’t we repair to the parlor to discuss this in a civilized manner?” Raven replied, gritting her teeth.

She led the way into the parlor and was glad when all three followed her. Only her grandfather, however, took a seat. He was clearly making an effort to control his temper, Raven thought, but he didn’t look particularly well.

She remained standing, not only because she felt less vulnerable that way, but because she could more easily hide her inner turmoil. The violent fisticuffs just now had shaken her more than she would have expected, but so had her relatives’ precipitous anger at her rescuer. It disturbed her to see Lasseter condemned out of hand. The charge of murder was a grave one, certainly, but despite the aura of potential danger that hovered over him, she found it hard to credit that he was actually a murderer. At the very least, she was willing to reserve judgment about his past until she had proof one way or the other.

Yet it was her own future that distressed her most. She could think of no tolerable outcome to this nightmare. And the worst could still happen. Her grandfather’s health could prove irrevocably damaged by the shock he’d sustained. Or he could try to throw Lasseter in prison or challenge him to a duel…. What a disaster that would be.

She cared about her grandfather—and even her great-aunt—and didn’t want them to be hurt further by this debacle. But how could she spare them? She could flee England, as Lasseter had suggested, in an effort to shield her family from disgrace, but where would she go? And her escape would still leave them to bear the brunt of her shame. Unless she could somehow manage to extricate herself from the scandal, she would take them down with her.

Her great-aunt had resumed ranting, Raven realized belatedly, but she had missed most of what had been said.

“Catherine, you will give Raven a chance to explain what happened,” Lord Luttrell interjected gruffly.

Raven bestirred herself to respond. “I am sorry, Grandfather, but I have no good explanation for yesterday’s events. Believe me, I would have spared you this if I could.”

“I take leave to doubt that!” Aunt Catherine asserted. “You have been waiting to humiliate us ever since you arrived.”

To Raven’s surprise, she felt Lasseter move to her side, as if prepared to defend her, and she was heartened by his unspoken support.

“That is totally untrue,” Raven answered her aunt, setting her jaw. “You make it sound as if I chose to be abducted.”

“Well, whatever the truth, we are totally ruined now. Several hundred people saw you jilt Halford at the altar. We did our best to hush up the scandal, announcing that you were suddenly taken ill. But no one will believe that flimsy tale for long. Indeed, we are already suspected of prevarication. Halford has been here three times demanding to see you and was furious when we couldn’t produce you. The last time he declared he had washed his hands of you and would cut all connection with us. And Lord and Lady Wycliff clearly smelled a lie….”

Raven bit her lip in dismay. Brynn Tremayne, Lady Wycliff, was one of her closest friends. And Brynn’s husband, Lucian, had been like a guardian to her when her other dearest friends had left for America last summer. They both would have been gravely concerned for her. In fact, had Lucian known the truth of her abduction, he might very well have invoked all his vast resources at the Foreign Office, where he worked, and turned London upside down searching for her.