Randall's Romance (Behind Closed Doors) (10 page)

Gravesend hadn't confessed to any more than Jason already knew before he died. And now he was left, staring down at a corpse on the floor of an inn full of smugglers. Someone might have heard his shot, though he'd muffled the sound.

Revulsion, triumph, hate, frustration. They all boiled up inside him. The stupid bastard had refused to give up his master, had remained stubbornly silent in the face of Jason's threats, his promises. In the end he'd had no choice but to kill the man.

Mortimer Gravesend lay on the ground at his feet, fat face crinkled in an expression of permanent shock. "What did you expect you stupid sot? I told you I'd shoot you."

The door swung inward, and Jason raised his gaze from the body on the floor at his feet to meet startled green eyes. Randall. The turmoil inside him stilled to a manageable level, he nearly smiled. So pleased was he to see the man that he'd nearly taken a step forward before the second red-coated figure stepped through the doorway. The second king's officer had a carefully blank expression, and that reminded Jason that they were in a public venue and discretion was called for. He forced himself to stay where he was, letting the smoking Manton pocket pistol in his hand fall to the tabletop next to a decanter of cheap whisky and a soiled glass.

"Jason." The appalled horror in Randall's tone brought Jason up short.

He studied Randall's face intently, dismay growing in his heart. "Randall, I told you what I needed to do. You said you understood my feelings."

Throwing up a hand in a gesture for silence, Randall turned to the man behind him. "Step outside. I believe Reilly will need help at the public room door."

His hackles rising, Jason watched as Randall closed the door behind his underling and stepped up to Gravesend's body. "You knew, Randy."

A bitter glance was cast in his direction. "I knew how you felt, yes. You knew my duty as well was to arrest this man and see him up for trial."

"He deserved death."

"Oh for fuck's sake," Randall began pacing the room, his boots striking the wood floor with angry thuds akin to a judge's gavel. "Why? I left you with the doctor's orders to stay in bed or risk permanent injury. Why could you not just trust me to see to this?"

Snorting in disbelief, Jason watched his pacing lover. He schooled his features to reveal nothing of the conflict he felt. "Because as you say, I knew you would do your duty."

"He's not even the leader of this traitor's ring!" Randall burst out, pausing to stare down at Gravesend with disgust.

"He refused to give up his superior, but he did let slip a bit of information that will allow me to track the man down. I am closer to completing my revenge than before, Randy. I can feel it."

Randall's head snapped up form contemplating Gravesend and he stared at Jason, mouth falling open in an "o" of astonishment. "You can't be serious."

Jason stared him down, heart thudding in excitement.

"You are. Don't you know what you've done here, Jason?"

"I killed a traitor who colluded in the cold blooded murder of my men. It was justified."

A deep frown marred Randall's handsome brow. "This isn't the battlefield, Jason. It's a pub on British soil. You can't dispense justice as though you were ordained judge and jury. The man was a peer, as such he is entitled to a trial in the House of Lords."

"He was a traitor, a danger to our troops and our populace."

"You may be accustomed in your work to doing as you please, without regard to what is considered right or moral, Jason, but this isn't the anonymous killing field of a foreign city at war time. No one can chalk this up to an accident, or unknown villainy."

Ah. He well knew how many of the "regular army" viewed those who gathered intelligence, even when they relied upon that intelligence to get through battle. Somehow, he hadn't expected Randall to look down on him for it though. Hardening his heart against the pain of certain loss, extrapolating Randall's disapproval from his manner, Jason pointed out, "I've killed many a man, and never on a battlefield, all in the service of my country. In my profession, one makes decisions quickly and acts upon them. Justice has been served."

"Murder has been committed." Randall asserted flatly, meeting his eyes squarely.

"Murder? I think not. The man was a criminal." Jason sneered, glaring down at the corpse of Mortimer Gravesend.

"That would have been for the courts to decide." Randal spun about on his heel and made another circuit of the room. "Where is the honor to your colleagues in this act, Jason? Tell me. Because I fail to see how doing something so dishonorable does them justice."

"It's a start. I'll track down the man responsible, and you may as well understand that I'll kill him too." He challenged Randall with a quirked brow.

"You still don't understand do you?" Randal's mouth drooped at the corners and his eyes narrowed slightly. "I am an officer of the King's army, sworn to uphold the laws of the land. I was sent here to apprehend that man, in the course of an investigation."

"You never would have killed him, Randy and to be honest, I wouldn't have wanted you to. This was something that I had to do." He studied his lover's face, and so saw the exact moment when he shut aside his emotions and became completely an officer of the law again. "I have a different, less aristocratic code of honor, I suppose. It allows me to value things like justice above jurisprudence."

"I have no recourse but to arrest you for murder."

Outrage flared in his heart, and his mind. "Fuck you. You don't have to do that." He hated the inner part of himself that wanted to plead with Randall for understanding, to remind the man that he'd made promises. "You promised you'd never let me down." The words were out, and he couldn't call them back. They struck true, too. Randall's face whitened, his lips tightened, his knuckles turned white on the doorknob.

"That was before I knew you would let
me
down." Randall's shoulders drooped, he rested his head on the oak door.

Jason searched the room for another way out. There were several windows hidden behind somewhat moldy drapes. He could be out of here and on his way back to London of his own accord in seconds, if he were willing to do what was necessary. His head told him to pick up the pistol and strike Randall with it, render him unconscious and make his escape. He'd done it easily enough once, hadn't he? He knew just where to strike to do the job quickly.

Remembering the battering the man had taken the night before though, he couldn't bring himself to inflict more damage upon the body that had brought him so much pleasure, that he'd enjoyed touching, fucking. "I don't want to hurt you Randall. There's no reason you can't just let me walk away from here."

"You think not? The thing about this that tears me apart isn't that you've demonstrated that you don't trust me, or that you have no respect for my honor, my integrity. It's that if I had any choice at all, I'd just turn around and walk away, let someone else find the body and let you ride off into the night."

"Then do it." Jason urged. "Just leave and I'll meet you back in Chaldon when it's all over, and we can pick up where we left off." He was humbled by Randall's apparent willingness to sacrifice his own code of behavior.

"I can't."

"You can. Just step out into the hall and act as though nothing has happened."

"You can't even bring yourself to trust me that much? That when I tell you something cannot be done, you can't just believe me? Very well then. I'll step into the hall. You go right ahead and climb out that window you've been eying."

He opened the door and stepped through, pausing just on the other side of the threshold. Jason scooped up his cooled weapon from the table and shoved it in the pocket of his black great coat. He'd crossed the room and had one hand on the drape when Randall's final words registered.

"But don't bother coming to Chaldon. I shan't be there."

Chapter Thirteen

"Report." Randall ordered, stepping into the dim hallway to find three of his men eyeing him, expressions blank.

Lieutenant Harris stepped forward smartly. "Gayner and Lloyd caught a Frenchie trying to sneak in the back, sir. They've got him in irons out back." Randall stepped forward and closed the door soundly behind him as he caught the other men attempt to discreetly peer over his shoulder into the recesses of the room.

Closing the door didn't seem to help. Muffled noises came from the room behind them, and the three officers appeared unable to look away from the closed door.

Randall let his shoulders sag. While there was always the chance that Jason had slipped away, it was more than likely that Jason had attempted to leave through the window, and discovered that it too was guarded. His men had come prepared to face resistance, and Jason, while a formidable opponent, was outnumbered by at least ten men. He could only hope that Jason didn't do anything foolish, that he would not be furthered injured. Schooling his expression to show only stern authority, he directed his troop of borrowed men into action. "That will be our other man. We'll need two men to remove the corpse from this room. The corpse will need to be turned over to the magistrate, and these two men to goal pending transport to London for trial." Images of Jason as he'd seen him that morning flashed before his eyes, complexion pale, blue eyes dark with injury and remembered disappointment. He'd seemed so lost, vulnerable, like a soul aching to be found and cared for. Randall had responded to that look with all the noble and base feelings a man was capable of. He wanted Jason physically, the man was perfect in form, attractive, and God knew he had just the skill Randall enjoyed most in a bed partner. But inside, that part of Randall that had just begun to blossom, to realize that he had the right to seek more than illicit passion and stolen moments, had recognized Jason. The realization that he was really and truly in love with a man he'd scarcely met had nearly floored him. He'd heard himself making promises he'd had every intention of keeping, but the man standing over a corpse with a smoking pistol had not been the man in his bed that morning. That man hadn't seemed capable of cold-blooded murder. That man had seemed to need him and everything he could offer, and he'd leapt at the chance to serve him.

Staring down his men until they realized he wasn't going to explain what had happened behind that door and scrambled into action, Randall stiffened his spine and hardened his heart. Jason had made his choice. The matter was out of his hands. Jason was out of his hands. Why the hell couldn't the man have just stayed home in his sickbed as he'd been told? All day Randall had been holding that image of Jason in his bed at the back of his mind, a carrot held out to keep him going one more mile, one more task despite his aching body. He'd imagined returning to his home late at night and sneaking into his warm bed, curling up next to Jason and sleeping the sleep of a man who'd done his duty, for God, country, and lover.

Randall strode down the hall, ignoring the calls of his subordinates. The publican met him at the door. Randall waved him off, "Thank you for your cooperation. We have no further interest in this place."

He was beset with a sudden urge to hurry back upriver to his little house and Cecy. Oh good Lord Cecy. What if Jason in his desire for revenge had done something to her? Had she tried to stop him from leaving? While he'd told Jason he wouldn't be at home, it looked like he had every need to return anyway.

His feet picked up speed without conscious volition and he reached his horse practically running. The stalwart beast nickered at his approach, and he slowed, breathing deep to calm himself. It wouldn't do to spook the capricious horse.

His Benedict was fleet of foot and had the endurance of an elephant, but the creature was temperamental. He'd been ridden hard today, allowing Randall to reach Newton-Bushel in record time.

"You can make it another few miles, can't you Ben?" Swinging his leg over, Randall settled into the saddle.

"Sir!"

"What is it?"

"The gentleman would like to speak to you."

"Tell him we have nothing to say to one another." Randall turned Benedict in the direction of home and set off.

The ride was long enough for him to cool down. He spent much of it cursing his foolishness in falling for a man like Jason Dancourt, who had no understanding of honor, or of love.

When he spied the little house he and Cecy shared, the house he had dreamed of inviting Jason to share with them, he let the anger go. Being angry at Jason for being Jason was futile. If he were honest with himself he could even admit that he wasn't angry at Jason for killing the traitorous Gravesend. If the men under his command had been massacred, he might have been tempted to follow the same route, to act outside of convention.

No. He stared down at the small house. Its windows glowed with welcoming, cheerful light. Cecy had wrought miracles in the gardens, the house and furnishings had the potential to be a real home. He liked it. He liked the peace, the cantankerous neighbors, and the cohesiveness of the community.

He'd imagined Jason living there with him, without even being aware of it, his subconscious had crafted dreams of the two of them meeting over the breakfast table, sharing rashers of bacon and pots of coffee in lieu of tea. Perhaps Jason drank chocolate, as so many of the French did in the mornings.

He'd built an entire future on the possibility of a life with Jason that didn't exist, couldn't exist, because Jason didn't give a fuck about him. Jason's actions tonight had made that clear.

All Jason cared about was his revenge, and that revenge would destroy him.

Having Jason arrested hadn't been his finest moment. If he'd thought about it, he probably could have come up with some way of getting Jason out of there that didn't involve criminal charges. Jason's simplistic an eye for an eye attitude was understandable. He hadn't made any secret of his intentions.

The fact of the matter was, he'd been too hurt by Jason's lack of faith in him to bother thinking of a way out. He'd reacted in anger, and stormed off full of righteous indignation. But he knew that he couldn't let Jason hang, and he couldn't prevent the man from his path of vengeance.