Once a Rake (Drake's Rakes) (8 page)

The older man nodded absently. “How is your arm healing up?”

“Fine, sir. Almost back to form.” As if he’d tell the old goat if it weren’t. Damn Ferguson for his quick reactions. The blackguard had damn near shattered his elbow.

“Excellent. Go back and make absolutely certain that neither Ferguson nor that flask ever show up again. Get whatever help you need.
I
will determine when you have looked long enough.”

Waving to the loader who followed a good twenty paces behind, the old man accepted two shotgun shells, slipped them into the barrel, and snapped the gun closed. Stricker was about to step back when the man abruptly swung the shotgun right at his chest. Stricker’s instinct was to shriek and fall. Instead, knowing exactly what that would cost him, he stood stock still.

Lightning fast, the older man pulled the gun a few scant inches to the left and fired twice, bringing down a quail Stricker hadn’t even heard. Stricker felt deafened, and his bladder threatened to loose. It didn’t help his peace of mind that the old man then cast a speaking glance at him.

“Just to make sure you have all the help you need,” he said. “I believe I will contact Madame Ferrar. She can be most…persuasive, if needed.”

She could be most lethal. Stricker wanted so badly to say no. To tell the old man that he was finished. That he could no longer associate with people who hired monsters like Madame Ferrar. Instead, before the man had a chance to reload, Stricker bowed in acknowledgment and walked away.

Ian felt a bloody idiot. He had meant to be so thoughtful, sneaking out of Sarah Clarke’s shed before anyone could find him and accuse her of harboring a fugitive. He had imagined he could make it at least as far as the next farm along the coast.

He hadn’t made it a hundred feet. Now he sat once more, his back against the cold, wet stone of the stable, sucking an egg from one hand and holding onto an old scythe with the other, just in case he needed to defend himself.

It was too lowering for a Scot who had survived ten years on the Peninsula to have been brought down by a fever. But here he sat with no more strength than an infant, and a brain that wandered aimlessly about. He was more cold and wet than the stones at his back, and afflicted with a peculiar tightness in his chest. Even the damn scythe felt too heavy to lift.

Without warning, the stable door creaked open and early sunlight washed in.

Ian blinked. “Blast,” he muttered, disgusted with himself. He’d left it too long.

He knew he should scramble to his feet, prepare to fight. He could manage no more than to just sit there, squinting into the light, an empty eggshell in his hand, the scythe on the dirt floor. He heard the footsteps first; a quick, precise staccato. A shadow separated itself from the door. He closed his eyes rather than face what was to come.

He waited for a cry of discovery. For condemnation, for recognition, for death; he almost didn’t care which anymore. What he got was a wet snout in the neck.

“
A bhidse!
” His eyes jerking open to find himself being delicately sniffed by a porker almost the size of the redoubtable Willoughby. Just as pitch black, this one was more delicate about the face, with liquid black eyes.

Ian blinked. “I gather I am addressing the lovely Marianne?”

His voice came out scratchy and thin, which irritated him anew.

“Elinor, actually,” came Sarah Clarke’s voice from the doorway. “She is much too pragmatic to be Marianne. The last time Willoughby returned to her from one of his fancies, she kicked him in the face.”

Determined not to betray the relief he felt at a familiar voice, he dropped the scythe to scratch the porcine lady’s ears. “A stalwart female.”

His reward was a grunt and a burrowing at his shoulder. It was his turn to grunt as the movement sent a sharp pain slicing through his side.

“What are you doing here?” Sarah Clarke asked, still not moving from the doorway. “I searched for you last night.”

He carefully shrugged. “One of my best talents is the ability to seem invisible.”

“Of course.” Her voice was dry as dust.

Ian made the mistake of looking up then, to see Sarah Clarke approach. Her form was suddenly limned by in the dawn light. Her hair, which had seemed so mousy, gleamed in a nimbus of old gold around her soft face, and her movements seemed imbued with grace. She was not a beautiful woman. Her looks could only be labeled as modest. And yet, like a thunderclap, they leveled him.

Her face, so unremarkable, looked suddenly soft and feminine, her mouth the perfect size and shape to be kissed, her chin rounded, with just a hint of a dimple. And her breasts, which he hadn’t even noticed before, pulled at the practical cotton of her brown dress, inexorably drawing Ian’s attention. Breasts to cushion, to comfort, to support a weary man when the world grew too heavy.

That would have been bad enough, but as she stepped closer, a bucket in her hand and the other up to brush back a tress of hair, he saw that her hands were trembling.

So, the cool voice was only a front. He looked more closely to see that faint lines had blossomed at the corner of her eyes, and her rather pink lips had flattened out. She was distressed.

He wanted to pull her into his arms. He wanted to ease the taut line of her shoulders and bring a smile to that face. He wanted to stroke her cheek, unwind her tightly bound hair, and reassure her that all would be well.

With no warning, desire surged like an overfed river; his cold body flushed as if he were slouched beneath a Spanish sun. It had to be the fever, he thought desperately. There could be no other reason for his reaction. He liked women. He’d had his share; he’d regretted a few. But he had never been laid low like a lad seeing his first milkmaid.

She was approaching, her expression tentative. His heart sped, and his fingers itched to move. He clenched his hands into fists as the pig, hearing her mistress’s voice, turned and grunted.

“You really came back?” he heard himself ask like a calfling.

She scowled. “I did not think I would be able to move you on without food.”

“I appreciate that.”

Stopping before him, she set down the pail. “Don’t be,” she said as if she found injured soldiers in her stable every day. “You are just another chore.”

He attempted a smile. “Does it help at all that I am a very grateful chore? You could so easily have set the militia on me.”

Flushing, she ducked her head. “I regret what I said last night,” she said. “I did not mean for you to leave while you were still sick.”

“Ah, wheesht, lass. Ye are a true friend to my sisters. I canna ask for more.”

She stood rather stiffly, as if absent an answer. Silence stretched, punctuated by the rustlings and fretful mutterings of the inhabitants of various stalls.

“Tregallan,” he said, squinting up at her.

She froze. “Pardon?”

He gave her the best smile he had in him. “I was feshing here all morning, trying to remember you. Fiona wrote regularly, you know, all about school and her friends. Lizzie Ripton, Pippin Knight, and Sarah. Sarah Tregallan. It’s why I did nae remember you earlier. I remember her telling me that her friend Sarah Tregallan had contracted a marriage…contracted. Sounds as if you’d come down with the ague, doesn’t it?”

Poor Sarah,
Fiona had described her to him.
The example of how we would be treated if the world knew we had no father either. If it were not for Lizzie and Pip and me, she would have no friends at all, and that is simply wrong.

It was, he thought, seeing the strain in her soft hazel eyes. He and Fiona had been lucky. They had found a father after all, and he had been a viscount. A rank bastard in behavior, but definitely not in lineage. A viscount who had passed on his name. Evidently Sarah Tregallan hadn’t been so lucky.

“This was the marriage?” he asked. “To the missing Boswell?”

“It was. It is.”

“And was it a good thing?” he asked, knowing he had no right.

She tilted her head, the sun seeping through her tousled hair. “Why, yes. I have a home, and work to do, and animals to enjoy.”

“Like Elinor here?”

She gave an abrupt nod. “She accompanies me on rounds each day,” she said, giving the pig a scratch. “She likes to make sure everyone is behaving. Off with you now,” she said, tapping the pig on the rump. “Your babies are hungry.”

Elinor obligingly turned and trotted back out of the stables. Ian battled a useless wish for her owner’s touch. A tap on his own rump wouldn’t have come amiss at all. His body was already anticipating it, shivers chasing up and down his spine.

His attention returned with a snap when Sarah crouched down before him and plucked the emptied egg from his fingers. “Yes,” she said, considering it. “I thought you might still be close when I came away from the henhouse with a lighter basket.”

“Apologies, ma’am,” he said with a lopsided bow of the head. “Your hens were most obliging.”

She shook her head. “Yes, they are quite silly enough to be susceptible to a handsome man. It is your hair. Reminds them of a cock’s comb.”

“Well, it’s fitting,” Ian admitted. “I’m feeling a bit of a coxcomb.”

“And so you should. Exactly what was the point, sir, in moving from my potting shed to my stable?”

“The company, of course. A gelding, a donkey, and two goats, from my counting.”

“Were they so intimidating that you felt the need of some support?” She reached out to the scythe.

“Don’t touch that,” he snapped, closing his fist around the handle.

She yanked her hand back.

He gave her a rueful smile. “It’s nae much,” he said. “But it gives me the illusion that if needed, I can fight my way past my foes.”

It also kept his hand safely away from her hair. He was positively twitching with the need to run his fingers through it. His filthy, sweat-slicked fingers, which he was sure she would not appreciate.

Without asking permission, she reached out to lay her hand against the side of his face. “As I suspected. You are hot as an oven. And still wet. What am I to do with you?”

“You are to push me out the door and on my way,” he answered, his voice humiliatingly uncertain. “Then, when the searchers inevitably return, you may show them your empty buildings with impunity.”

“Don’t be daft,” she said, not moving. “It would not matter if I had nothing in these buildings but cobwebs. It is still a principle of mine never to allow Cousin Martin to set foot over my threshold.”

“But you don’t argue that I should be on my way.”

She had been rising, but his words stopped her. “No, Colonel,” she said, bending back down. “I do not.”

She was crouched before him, her skirt puddling in the dirt, her sun-streaked hair untidily scraped back. Her eyes were hazel, he thought. Plain eyes, plain brows. And yet they mesmerized him. There should be nothing special about her eyes. About her small, practical hands. And yet he couldn’t keep himself from reaching out to take hold of one.

The connection was instantaneous. Something in her, something deep and bright and strong, infused him with heat. Something in the slightly rough texture of her skin shook him to the core. He swore that a current snaked between them, like fire arcing across treetops.

Her expression didn’t change by an iota. She went so still Ian wasn’t sure she breathed. And yet he knew that she felt it too.

She was the one who first broke contact. Lurching to her feet, she grabbed for her pail and strode over to the stall that held a pedestrian-looking bay hack, who knickered at her approach.

“Yes, Harvey,” she soothed him with a rub on his nose. “Your food is coming. First, though, I must care for the foolish human.”

“I can hear you,” he reminded her.

“I know.” Setting down the pail, she bent out of sight. “I don’t believe you will be wandering about for a while, but if you do, it would be best to stay away from Harvey here. He bites.”

“I know,” Ian said ruefully, holding out his arm to display his mangled jacket. “He attempted to breakfast on me earlier.”

Chuckling, she returned to the horse. Reaching into her apron, she pulled out a misshapen lump of biscuit. “If you wish to gain his favor,” she said, smiling up at the horse as he daintily lipped the mass from her outstretched hand, “he does love my cook’s biscuits. I believe it is because he is the only one with teeth strong enough to chew the things.”

Giving the nodding horse a final rub, she picked up two blankets and carried them back to Ian. “Here,” she said, briskly arranging them over him. “These will have to do until I can get back out here. Old George might have some clothing that would fit you.”

“He must be a good size, Old George,” Ian retorted, snuggling under the scratchy, horse-scented wool.

She straightened. “Something to keep in mind. Now, I will go about my day so my actions here don’t raise suspicions. After breakfast, I will tend to that side of yours and bring you food. Unless you prefer hay, that is.”

“Thank you. I’d not say nae t’ a steak.”

She scowled. “You’ll not say nae to porridge. That is what we have. We usually have eggs, but someone ate them.”

He tried his best smile. “Offer oats to a Scot? Lassie, I ken I’m in love.”

Pursing her lips, she looked down at him. “It occurs to me that your brogue is as capricious as my pig.”