Teresa Medeiros (48 page)

Both family and servants gave him wide berth. Not even the wounded bafflement in his mother’s eyes was enough to make him lay down his pride and break his silence. It hurt too damned much to believe Emily would turn on him so easily. She made no more visits to his room, and he spent his nights pacing the spacious suite like a caged tiger. As his panic grew, he began to make his own inquiries into Nicholas’s business ventures.

He returned from one of those sojourns late one evening, shaken to learn Nicky had booked two passages on a tramp steamer sailing for New Zealand within the week. Discovering Emily had gone out to attend the opera with her
dear friend
Mr. Saleri only fueled his panic.

“You did what?” he roared at the bewildered Edith. “You allowed her to go out unchaperoned?”

“You never wanted her chaperoned before in his company,” she protested, her lower lip trembling. “You said he was an old friend of her father’s. How was I to know?”

“If you’d use that porcelain head of yours for something besides hanging your ringlets on, you would have known,” he shouted.

Edith dropped her embroidery and burst into noisy sobs. Lily and Millicent closed ranks around her, patting her heaving shoulders and giving Justin looks that would have shamed the devil himself.

He paced away from them, running a hand over his weary eyes.

His mother shoved her bulk out of her chair. “You were always a good boy, Justin. Your father never even had to take the cane to you. I’m beginning to think that was a terrible mistake.”

Justin spun around. “What did Father need a cane for? He had his sarcastic wit and his demeaning remarks for weapons. I wish he’d had the common decency to give me a beating with his fists.”

Emily’s dulcet tones cut through the chaos. “Here now. What’s all this fuss about?”

They all froze, staring at her. She stood in the doorway of the parlor, dripping sophistication. A cream-blue dress of ruched satin hugged her hips, falling to scalloped ruffles draped to reveal an ivory underskirt. She wore marthing gloves studded with pearl buttons, and her hair had been swept back at the temples by mother-of-pearl combs. Combs he had bought for her, Justin realized, fighting blind rage.

Her skirts rustled as she swept in and knelt beside Edith, handing her a handkerchief from her satin reticule. “There now. You mustn’t cry so. You’re getting your lovely embroidery all soggy.” She straightened and looked at him, her gaze free of reproach, or any feeling at all. “Didn’t they tell you? I just went to the opera.
La Traviata
. It was marvelous. I do so love all things Italian.”

Justin bit back the obvious retort. What was she trying to do? he wondered. Provoke him to murder right there in the parlor. “I need to talk to you.”

She smothered a yawn into her gloved little hand. “In the morning perhaps. I’m off to bed now.”

She strolled out, her bustled rump swaying beneath its satin sheath. There was dead silence for three long, lazy sweeps of the mantel clock’s pendulum. Edith didn’t dare even to sniffle. Then somewhere in the house a door closed. And locked.

That muffled turn of the key was Justin’s downfall. He slammed out of the room and climbed the stairs two at a time, not caring anymore who heard him traverse the darkened corridors to Emily’s room. His thigh struck a table, overturning it. The photographs toppled and struck the floor in an explosion of shattering glass. His long strides devoured the carpet until he stood outside her door once again. Sometimes he felt he’d spent half his life there.

Justin didn’t waste time knocking or toying with the knob. And he definitely wasn’t in the mood to beg. So he simply lifted his leg, and in one powerful motion, kicked the door down.

Chapter 34
 

E
mily pressed her palm to her thundering heart. Justin stood in the doorway, the splintered door lying like an altar of pagan sacrifice at his feet. The shattered lock dangled from its mooring. He stretched out his arms and braced his weight on either side of the door frame. His lazy grin never reached his eyes.

“Hello, darling. I thought you might need some coal for your fire. Or has someone else been stoking your flames these days?”

His clothes were rumpled. His untrimmed hair hung in shaggy disarray. His eyes were red-rimmed and wild from desperation and lack of sleep. He was everything the polished and urbane Nicholas Saleri could never be.

She broke away from his compelling gaze, forcing herself to remain cool, knowing there was only one way to earn any peace for either of the men she had loved.

She slipped an airy note into her voice. “If you must know, Nicholas has asked me to marry him.”

The wild look in Justin’s eyes deepened. “What a tidy way to wrap up your inheritance! He marries you, takes you back to his mansion in New Zealand. And how long do you think it will be before the new Mrs. Saleri suffers a tragic accident? A week? A month? I know Nicky. Once he has your money, he’ll have no further need for you. You’ll only be an encumbrance to him. He’ll dispose of you just as he did David and me.” Justin crossed to her. “Have you forgotten what a monster he is? My God, he plotted your own father’s death.”

She lowered her lashes before he could see his own agony mirrored in her eyes. She had to use all of her wiles and passion to convince this man she hated him. She closed her eyes, summoning back all those feelings of anger and abandonment she’d fought so hard to vanquish.

When she opened them, she knew they sparkled with furious contempt. “He wasn’t the one who pulled the trigger though, was he? Or the one who lied about it for seven years.”

Justin ran a hand through his hair. A cynical laugh escaped him. “Nicky always was a randy little bastard. He’ll probably let you live for a little while. At least until he tires of your skills in bed.” He lifted a mocking eyebrow. “And we both know how considerable those are.”

Emily drew back her hand and slapped him. He stared at her, giving her a harrowing glimpse of his utter helplessness before his eyes hardened to polished amber.

With one smooth motion he shoved her back against the wall. His powerful hands cupped her throat and his voice lowered to a husky growl. “If you think I’m capable of murder, you’re bloody right. Because as God is my witness, I’ll kill you myself before I’ll let him have you.”

He ground his lips against hers in a brief, raging kiss, then he was gone, leaving her heart as splintered as her door.

She slid down the wall to a sitting position and pressed her mouth to her knee to muffle her anguished sobs.

•    •    •

“Sir, sir! Please! You must wake up.”

Someone was shaking him. Groaning, Justin batted the persistent hands away and rolled to his side. His fingers struck something cool. He pried his bleary eyes open to discover it was the taloned foot of the settee. He vaguely remembered collapsing in the study in the wild hope of silencing the torment in his head long enough to let him sleep. But it was stupor, not sleep, that had finally claimed him.

David’s face had danced through his restless slumber. In his dreams he had reached for him, but David had vanished, just like Emily.

“Sir, please! You don’t understand. You have to get up!”

The genteel hands lost their patience. They fastened on Justin’s lapels and jerked him up, shaking him like a rag doll. The round moon of Penfeld’s face finally penetrated the shrouded gloom of the library. The valet looked dangerously near tears and that fact, more than any other, stirred Justin to consciousness.

“Penfeld? My God, what is it, man? What’s wrong?”

The valet’s plump lip quivered. “She’s gone, sir. For good this time, I fear.”

Emily stood on the deck of the steamer and watched the coast of England melt into the dawn mist. Every rhythmic chug of the engine’s pistons, every wave riding against the iron hull, carried her farther away from Justin. She pulled up her hood, drawing it like a cool veil over her seething emotions. As Nicky rested his hands on her shoulders, her gloved hands clenched on the rail.

“It’s only a matter of time now,
cara mia
. Once we find that land grant he tampered with, we’ll have the evidence we need. We can take it to the authorities and, with your testimony, have him put away for life. He’ll never harm either of us again.” He gave her shoulders a reassuring
squeeze. Emily shuddered. “Don’t be afraid, love. I’ll take care of you now. Once we’ve put this ugly business of the past behind us, we can discuss our future. But first we must bring your father’s murderer to justice.”

Emily faced him. “Yes, Nicky,” she said, standing on her tiptoes to kiss his cheek. “That’s really all I ever wanted. Justice.”

As her bedroom door flew open, Olivia Connor, the Duchess of Winthrop, rolled over and sat up in her modest tent bed.

“Opening the door instead of going through it? How dreadfully conventional. You disappoint me, son.”

Justin strode across the room and flung himself to his knees beside the bed. He wrung her hands in his desperate grasp. “Please, Mother. I need your help.”

Her rag-wrapped curls bobbed knowingly. “It’s the girl, isn’t it?”

“Isn’t it always?” His beseeching eyes searched her face. “Father’s fastest ship. I have to know. What is it? Is it a steamer? A sailing ship? Think hard, Mother. Emily’s very life may depend on it.”

She absently twirled a ringlet around her finger. A slow smile dawned on her face. “I should have thought of that sooner.” She beamed up at him. “Why, the fastest ship would be the
Olivia
, of course!”

Sailors scurried like ants over the polished deck of the graceful clipper known as the
Olivia
. They scrambled up and down ramps, staggering beneath the crates and barrels of supplies for the long journey ahead. They shimmied up the towering masts to secure the sails, all the while casting their new master some very uneasy looks. Even the most grizzled and salt-beaten of them was aware that London gossip reputed him to be a madman. Should they bid a tearful farewell to their mistresses and wives? Was he about to send them all on a dark voyage of destruction?
They found it even more perplexing that their young captain stood straddle-legged on the deck, bellowing instructions as if he’d been born to command.

Justin was well aware of their trepidation, but there was damn little he could do about it now. He was determined to have the ship outfitted and asail by nightfall if it took every sailor in London to do it. The sea had brought him Emily, and he was more than willing to harness the sea to keep her.

As he stalked to the prow of the ship, the cool moist air filled his lungs. A blanket of fog had hung over the harbor all day. The slender spars rose like ghostly fingers into the darkening sky. The massive bosom of the clipper’s figurehead jutted over the water.

Justin reached up and ran his fingers over her carved cheek. “Wish me luck, Duchess,” he whispered. “I’m going to need it.”

“Sir?”

Justin swung around to see a figure emerging from the fog. A carpeted satchel swung from his hand. A heavy woolen pea coat had replaced his frock coat, and a parrot-green bandanna hung at a jaunty angle around his neck. But even those things did not shock Justin as much as the dangerous-looking rifle slung across his back.

“Penfeld?”

The valet clicked his heels and gave him a snappy salute. “Aye, Cap’n, reporting for duty.”

A rush of helpless affection blurred Justin’s vision. God seemed to have dedicated himself to making amends for giving him Frank Connor for a father.

“Ah, Penfeld, I can’t ask you to follow me halfway across the world, searching for a woman who may not even want me to find her.”

“Pish posh, sir, if I may be so bold as to say so. I’ve discovered civilization isn’t to my taste. I’ve come to believe a bit of adventure, like a cup of hot tea, warms the blood and keeps a man’s heart thumping.” He reached into
the deep pocket of his coat. “Forgive my presumption, but I stopped at a shop on my way to the harbor. I thought you might have need of this.”

Justin almost ducked as a long-barreled pistol came sailing at his head. He caught it between two fingers and ran his hands over the sleek metal. It was the first time he had held a pistol in his hands since he had killed his best friend with one.

The valet’s eyes sparkled with a determination to match his own. Justin gave him a roguish grin and tucked the pistol into his waistband.

He strode down the deck and threw an arm around Penfeld’s shoulders. “Come on, you old tar, there’ll be no slackers among this crew. There’s work to be done and bonnie fair maidens to be rescued.”

Emily sat in a chair on the deck of the small steamer they had booked in Melbourne, watching Nicholas shave. He insisted on shaving outdoors, where the light was better. A white towel was slung around his neck and his shirt was half unbuttoned to reveal the smooth muscles of his chest. He leaned over the round mirror clipped to the railing and puckered his sensual lips.

Nicholas was talking. He was always talking. He talked incessantly, always about himself. She wondered why he’d bothered to rid himself of her father and Justin in such a clumsy manner. If they had remained his partners, it would have taken him only a few years to bore them to death. At least she’d been spared fending off any romantic advances. She understood now why he was satisfied with only chaste pecks on the cheek. No man that much in love with himself could have any desire for another. He seemed content to satisfy his own selfish pleasures with the mirror.