Suzanne Robinson (29 page)

Kate bent backward to avoid more contact with his body, but he kept leaning. She lost her balance. Catching herself with her hands, she realized that he’d forced her back to the ground and was on his knees straddling her body. She tried to get her legs under her, but he lowered himself on top of her. Smothering the beginnings of an objection with his mouth, he pressed his body down until her breasts flattened against his chest.

She pulled her mouth free of his and said the one
thing that kept her from unleashing her own passion. “What about the Beechwith?”

Breathing hard, Alexis lifted his head and glared at her. “Forget Carolina.”

“I’m not a pliable English miss. I don’t forget my lover’s mistresses. I won’t let you touch me and then go to her.”

Alexis held Kate’s arms to either side of her head. He favored her with a smile that sent a tremor of dread through her body. Lowering his lips to the exposed flesh of her chest, he whispered to her between kisses.

“I’ll have you, here, in the dirt of my garden, and there will be no need for me to go to her. My Katie Ann.”

She felt his tongue slide beneath the edge of her gown. Arousal warred with her instinct for self-preservation. She wrenched her arms free, grabbed the hair on the back of Alexis’s head, and yanked.

“I told you. I don’t share.”

Alexis cursed and jumped to his feet. “No woman orders me about.” He picked up his discarded glove and crop.

“I don’t want to order you about,” Kate said, standing too. “I only want you to treat me as if—”

“As if you were a Lady?”

She shook her head, but he ignored her.

“You’re lying to yourself. You’re a hot-blooded little savage who takes pleasure in arousing me and then putting me in the stocks.”

Putting her hands on her hips, Kate raised her voice. “You came after me. I did nothing.”

“Nothing! You could give lessons to a king’s mistress.” He tugged on his glove with sharp, jerking movements. “I’m not through with you, Katherine Grey. Take the warning. I’m not through with you, and your demands and your pride won’t help you the next time I want you.”

He turned his back and walked away. Kate uttered a
cry of rage, then stooped to pick up a clump of dirt and threw it. The lump splattered against the outside wall of the kitchen as the door slammed behind Alexis. She picked up another dirt clod, intent on hitting Alexis even if she had to follow him into the castle. Her reason returned before she got out of the garden. As satisfying as it would be to hurl mud in the face of that snake, she wasn’t foolish enough to think she could do it and escape without reprisal. No, upon examination, hitting the Marquess of Richfield with a handful of dirt before dozens of his servants was not a good idea.

Kate dropped the lump of dirt and wandered back to the spot where she’d been digging. Val was wrong. Alexis didn’t need her, not as she wished to be needed. Alexis wanted her, like he wanted Mrs. Beechwith. She would think that after being the object of lust himself so many times, Alexis would know she needed more from him. Wiping the sweat from her forehead, Kate sighed. She wasn’t doing anything right, not anything to do with Alexis. Confused, that’s what she was. Confused.

After their fight in the kitchen garden, Alexis alternately glared at Kate and ignored her. Kate either glared back at him or pretended she didn’t care that he snubbed her. While she was feeling sorry for herself, the Earl of Cardigan was recovering from his head injury. A week after Hannah’s death, he asked Kate to walk with him. He promised to make no advances. Since she was tired of sulking in her room and she didn’t much care how she spent her time, she agreed.

She was waiting for the earl outside the castle walls on the lawn before the “back door” drawbridge. Down the path that led to the stables, two men came toward her, Cardigan and Alexis, their voices raised in argument.

“He should be in gaol,” Cardigan said.

“He didn’t do it.”

The earl halted and stared at Alexis. “You’re protecting him, de Granville. Harboring the man who tried to kill me. If you had any honor, you’d hand Beaufort over to the authorities this moment.”

“You question my honor, sir?” Alexis asked. “By God, I’ve had enough of you. We can settle the matter in the usual way.”

“Tomorrow morning, before I leave.”

“Done.”

Kate had been staring at the two men. At last she found her tongue. “That’s ridiculous.”

Alexis tossed his head. “Women know nothing about a man’s honor.”

“I know about honor, and I know about stupidity, and facing off with dueling pistols is stupid.”

Ignoring her, Alexis inclined his head to Cardigan and left them. Cardigan took her arm and guided her away when she continued to glare after the marquess. They took a path through the woods. Kate waited until her own temper had cooled before speaking.

“Dueling is against the law.”

“My lovely Miss Grey, I refuse to speak of it.”

“Men. All right, let’s talk about what happened in the keep. Are you sure you didn’t see who hit you?”

Cardigan pursed his lips. “I was preoccupied.”

Kate forbore from asking the nature of his preoccupation. The bastard had probably been kissing Hannah.

The path was beginning to wind into an S curve. Cardigan stopped beneath the heavy limbs of a tree whose trunk was so wide, it had to be several hundred years old. He took Kate’s hand and kissed it. She pulled her hand away.

“Miss Grey, it is obvious to me that you aren’t happy in your engagement to de Granville.”

“Ha!”

He edged nearer to her. The earl was shorter than Alexis, but still taller than she. A slim man, he moved with a quick grace that she assumed served him equally well in the cavalry and with women. Beginning to feel nervous, she tried to edge away from him, but he kept coming, and she found herself back up against the old tree.

“You promised to leave me alone,” she said.

“You’re afraid of me. Do you still carry that knife?”

“I am not afraid of you, and, yes, I still carry it.”

He stopped so close to her that his breath stirred the fine wisps of hair on her forehead. “Prove that you aren’t afraid.”

Kate narrowed her eyes. She was about to say something mutinous, but the earl interrupted her thoughts.

“A lovely girl like you should be worshipped, my dear. You are glorious, and de Granville is a fool to let you out of his sight.”

He darted at her and Kate, caught off guard, stood still with her eyes open while he kissed her. His lips were strange to her, for they weren’t Alexis’s. And since they weren’t Alexis’s, she didn’t want them on her mouth. She put her hands on the earl’s chest and shoved.

She had forgotten how experienced he was. He countered by fastening his arms around her and squeezing her between his body and the tree. His hand rubbed her neck, then caressed its way down to her breast and squeezed.

Cardigan lifted his mouth from hers. “Oh no. I’m not about to let you get to that knife.” He kissed her again.

Kate tore her mouth free and stomped down hard on the earl’s foot. The yelp he let out was most satisfying. She watched him hop on one foot for a moment as she straightened her clothing.

“Ass,” she said. “You’re lucky I used my foot instead of the knife.”

Without giving the earl another glance, she swept back toward the castle.

“Stupid man,” she muttered. “All men are idiots. Groping, rutting fools.” Realizing Cardigan was coming after her, she broke into a trot.

She hadn’t gone far when she heard another yelp. She listened, and there was another cry. It was Cardigan. Was the man trying to get her back by pretending to have hurt himself? He was capable of such a trick. After checking to make sure her knife was in place, Kate ran back the way she had come.

Veering around a turn in the path, she almost ran into the earl. He was standing with his back to her. Opposite him stood Valentine Beaufort wielding a Scottish dirk she recognized from the armory.

“Val?” Kate started forward.

“Stay where you are. No, move away from the earl, Kate. Farther. That’s good.” Val’s hand flexed on the handle of the dirk. “I thought you were gone.”

“I heard a shout.”

“The coward,” Val said. “He won’t stand his ground.”

“You’re mad,” the earl said. His eyes bulged wider every time Val moved the dirk.

Kate held out her hand to the younger man. “Now, Val, you don’t want to do this.”

Val laughed. He lunged at the earl, then jumped back. Cardigan yipped and scuffled out of the way. Val circled his prey, taking swipes at him and taunting him. As the play continued, his breathing grew labored.

“Everyone thinks I killed Hannah in trying to get you.”

He jabbed at the earl’s stomach.

“So I decided I might as well be hanged for your murder too.”

The earl dodged a backhanded slice. Val stepped away and lowered his weapon. He was sweating and his eyes never left Cardigan. To Kate he seemed oblivious to anything else but the man he wanted to kill.

Val hefted the dirk. “It’s time for your execution, my
lord hero. I wanted to hang, draw, and quarter you, but I’m not strong enough.” He ran his finger along the edge of the blade. “My men were smashed like raw eggs thrown at a stone wall. They burst open, and their insides spilled out and ran all over the ground. Now I’m going to cut you open and spill your guts like theirs were.”

As Val talked, Kate noticed a movement beyond his shoulder. Around the last turn in the S curve came Alexis. Since Cardigan was speechless, she had to keep Val’s mind off killing long enough for Alexis to reach him. She licked her lips and clasped her hands in front of her. “Oh, Val, please don’t do this. I couldn’t bear it if you were hanged for murder.”

At her desperate tone, Val finally turned his gaze from the earl and looked at her. “Why would it matter to you? Your eyes are filled with the beautiful Alexis.”

“He doesn’t want me anymore, and I … I’ve come to admire you.” Kate thought smoldering thoughts about Alexis and stared at Val. Wetting her lips, she took a step in his direction. “Please, Val.”

As Kate moved, Alexis threw himself at Val. The two hurtled to the ground, and the dirk flew across the path. Cardigan shouted. Backpedaling away from the fighters, he drew a small pistol from his coat. The barrel of the gun waved and dipped as he tried to get a clear shot at Val.

Kate skittered away from the rolling and grappling men and stopped behind the earl. She saw the gun bob first in one direction and then another. Alexis and Val were wrapped around each other in a vicious hug. She heard the click as the earl cocked the pistol. Kate hauled up her skirt, palmed her knife, and threw it. The blade sank into the earl’s biceps.

Cardigan shrieked and dropped the gun. At the earl’s cry, both Val and Alexis froze. They looked up at the wounded man as if he’d suddenly turned into a blue pig. Motionless, they watched Kate retrieve her knife from the
earl’s arm, wipe it on his coat, and replace it in the sheath strapped to her calf.

Cardigan sank to his knees, his fingers pressed against the wound. Blood spilled out over his fingers and he moaned.

Alexis loosened his grip on Val and helped his friend rise. Val’s gaze was fixed on the earl’s arm. Kate went to him and put her hand on his shoulder.

Val’s attention never wavered from the wound. Suddenly he turned his head away. “I thought I wanted to see his blood. I was wrong.”

Alexis threw his arms around Val as his knees buckled. With Kate’s help he lowered the man to the ground. “No more blood, Alexis,” he said, his eyes fluttering closed. “I’m sorry.”

Kate put her hand to Val’s cheek. “I think he’s fainted from exhaustion.” She glanced up to find Alexis’s furious gaze boring into her.

“Do you always expose your legs to strange men?” he asked. “Do you make a habit of declaring love to one man while betrothed to another? Fulke was right about you, wasn’t he? I have made myself ridiculous by linking my name with yours.”

Kate rose and bit her lip to keep it still. “Then by all means, my lord, unlink our names. I won’t stop you.”

She ran away. It was the only thing she could do to keep him from seeing her cry.

Alexis closed the door behind the physician and returned to Val’s bedside. It had taken all his influence to keep Cardigan from having his friend arrested. The reprieve was temporary, though. The earl had been persuaded to leave the matter in Alexis’s hands for only one week.

After pulling the covers higher on Val’s chest, Alexis
sat down in an armchair and rubbed his face with both hands. One bloody disaster after another, he thought.

He’d managed to make Kate hate him. It was the passion that had done him in. No woman should mean that much to him, no woman like Kate. She was such a brilliant and ingenuous little creature. Funny how she was blind to his great transgression and yet battened on a little fault like Carolina Beechwith. She kept insisting he was incapable of killing. But she hadn’t been with him in the Crimea.

If only she hadn’t made him so angry. In his entire adult life no woman had ever boxed his ears so thoroughly as Kate had on the wall walk. And the silly part about the whole thing was that he was more or less innocent.

Oh, he’d been tempted to make love to Carolina that night, but only out of spite. In the keep, Carolina had been as insistent as ever, but he’d only been able to think about Kate. His mind had persisted in showing him pictures of her—Kate hiding her tears when he hurt her, Kate attempting a maidenly walk, Kate sitting on his lap and swinging her feet. As he’d made himself kiss Carolina, he’d heard Kate calling herself a Fallen Woman. He’d pulled away from Carolina after that kiss, an apology on his lips. That was when he’d heard the scream.

At his side, Val stirred. He opened his eyes and groaned. “You sat on my ribs.”

“Unfortunately I didn’t break any.”

“I didn’t kill her.” Val closed his eyes again.

“I know that, you young ass.”

Val smiled, but Alexis could tell he was drifting off to sleep already. Leaving his friend to the ministrations of his valet, Alexis went to his own rooms where Meredith had a hot bath waiting. He soaked in the steaming water until his skin was uncomfortably wrinkled. He almost fell asleep, but Meredith got him out and into a dressing gown.