The Highwayman (15 page)

“Applecross was, of course, where I started my search. The orphanage's records showed that one Farah Leigh
Townsend
succumbed to a bout of cholera, her tolerance having been weakened by her family's fatal disease.”

Farah knew all this, but found herself riveted, wondering if the Blackheart of Ben More was really going to sit in the only shadows of the bright room and uncover the only concealment she'd thought she'd had left. He'd used her real last name. Something she'd never disclosed to anyone, not even Dougan Mackenzie.

“A terrible disease, cholera,” he continued, watching her reaction carefully. “It spreads through tight quarters like Applecross, leaving mass devastation in its wake. A single case is unheard of. So, with a little coercion, as you call it, I learned that a fortnight after MacLean's death and Dougan's arrest, a ten-year-old girl vanished from Applecross and Sister Margaret covered up the disappearance, using the excuse of burning a diseased corpse to cover the lack of a body.”

None of this was news to Farah. Having worked next to the records commissioner for nearly a decade, she'd been able to sneak a look at her very own death certificate. “Where did you go after?” she queried breathlessly.

Dorian gave her a wry look. “A complicated search such as that takes money, of which I had none. So, I immediately set out acquiring some, and found a little success.”

Farah rolled her eyes to encompass her lavish surroundings. “Only everyone in the world knows how you set about it.”

“Not initially. For a few years I made my living as a highwayman. In those days, the trains didn't go so far, and the wealthy often traveled the rest of their distances in carriages.”

Farah straightened in the water before realizing that a dusky nipple bobbed above the surface before she ducked down again. “A highwayman? Did you hurt anyone?” she asked, hoping he hadn't noticed her mistake.

He had, of course. “I've hurt a lot of people,” he told the swell of her bosom. “But we can discuss that later. We're talking about
your
past right now. I feel we've quite exhausted the subject of mine.”

Farah's heart leaped like a startled rabbit. “I have no past. I was an orphan and then I ran from Applecross, made my way to London and—”

“
Don't
lie to me, Farah.” His soft voice was so terrifying, she'd rather he shouted. “You're terrible at it.”

She busied herself by groping at the bottom of the tub for her missing soap, using it as an excuse not to look at him. “I don't know what you mean.”

“I know who you were … who you
are.
”

“Impossible,” Farah insisted. “I'm nobody.” There. She'd found the soap, but pretended to still be looking, as she chased it with slippery fingers.

“You are
far
from nobody. Farah Leigh Townsend, daughter of the late Robert Lee Townsend, captain of the Prince Consort's Rifle Brigade in the Crimea,
and
more importantly, Earl Northwalk. You are the only living heiress to what has to be the most controversial, contested fortune in Britain until quite recently.”

His every word pinned her to the floor of the tub. She sank to her chin, wishing she could just slip below the surface and hide in the murky safety of the water without lethal consequences. He saw too much.
Knew
too much, and that could ruin everything.

“You're mistaken,” She made another attempt at denial, hoping that she could convince him of her identity. “Farah is a common enough name, and Leigh a very ordinary middle name, so your mistake is understandable. But, in case you were unaware, Farah Leigh Townsend was recently discovered in a hospital in London, having miraculously recovered from amnesia.” She finally mustered the strength to meet the skepticism bleeding from Blackwell's every pore head-on. “She married a Mr. Harold Warrington, Esq., not a month ago, to whom she'd been long betrothed. So you see, Mr. Blackwell, it is infeasible for me to be who you claim.”

His eyes narrowed on her and he spoke his next words very carefully, though caustic reprimand leaked like venom from his lips. “Imagine my surprise when I saw the banns in the papers. The long-lost heiress of Northwalk secretly married, the title of earl bestowed upon her husband, who happened to be her deceased father's steward and of little to no blue blood. Naturally, driven by the oath I'd made all those years ago, I arranged a meeting with Mrs. Farah Leigh Warrington, and knew the moment I laid eyes on her that she was an imposter.”

“That's ridiculous,” Farah scoffed. “How would you know a thing like that?”

A secret smile threatened the bleak lines of his mouth. “I know a thing or two about imposters, con artists, thieves, and greed.”

“Yes, I've heard you're something of an expert.” Farah usually didn't possess much in the way of a temper, but it seemed that ire made her feel less helpless than fear.

“Indeed,” Blackwell confirmed. “So believe me when I say that I recognized a soul as black as my own and just as devious.”

“I find it highly improbable such a thing exists.” Farah began to seriously consider an attempt at escape, modesty be damned. It only took one glance at Dorian Blackwell's long and powerful limbs to squelch the panicked impulse immediately.

She wouldn't get far, and she could only imagine how he would punish her this time. Farah couldn't tell if her barbs had affected him or not, but she couldn't think of another reason he would silently study her for such a long time. “Believe it or not, there are villains out there more evil than I,” he said finally.

“Doubtful.”

The upholstery of the chair protested as Blackwell's strong fingers tightened on the arms. “I haven't hurt you, have I? Touched you, even?” His smoky voice echoed with challenge. “I know men who would tear you apart just for the pleasure of hearing you scream. They would make you beg for death before they finished with you. They would use every part of your body and soul until they both shriveled and died and they'd leave you in the gutter like so much filth.” Blackwell stood then, his boots impossibly quiet on the marble as he stalked closer. “I may be a villain and a reprobate, but I am
not
like
them.
”

“No, you only associate with and employ them.” Farah's bravado began to fail, and she grasped it with the desperation with which someone about to be swept downriver would reach for a rope. “Your hands may appear clean, but everyone knows you're tainted with rivers of blood.” And she'd do well to remember that.

“That is where you're wrong, Farah. If blood needs to be spilled, it is
my
hands that do the spilling.” Frost glazed over any of the warmth and interest he'd shown before, and suddenly her bathwater felt chilly and stale.

“I'm not going to help you hurt anyone,” she vowed.

“I wouldn't ask you to.” He again stood at the foot of the tub, staring down at her with his unholy eyes. “I only require that you claim what is rightfully yours.”

“Someone else has already claimed it! The rightful—”

“Deny it again, and you won't like the consequences.” Farah was fast coming to realize that the more toneless his voice became, the more dangerous he was.

“All right, yes!” she hissed. “I am—was—Farah Leigh Townsend. But don't you think there's a reason I never claimed to be her? That I took on the name of someone else and a life of relative obscurity?”

“I assumed it was Warrington.”

“It's not
just
Warrington. Much of my father's wealth was obtained the same way yours was. The spoils of war, the deaths of enemies, the cloak-and-dagger of lies and espionage.”

“How do you know this?”

“I remember him and my mother fighting about it when he returned from the Crimea.” A band squeezed Farah's chest as it always did when she thought of the past. “My parents loved me, at least, I remember them loving me. So why they would betroth me to a toad like Warrington is a complete puzzle.”

Blackwell shrugged. “Sometimes greed is stronger than love.”

“No, it isn't,” she argued. “Not
real
love. Only fear is stronger than love … and even then only if you allow it to be. My parents must have been afraid of something, in trouble, somehow.”

“And then they died.”

“Precisely.” She returned the soap to the tray, and didn't miss the glimmer of something like regret that touched his features as he watched the action.

Deciding to ignore it, Farah ran her wet fingers over eyes made tired and puffy by her prior tears. “I could never stand the idea of marrying Warrington. He was my father's age, and always unsettled me as a child. I was told my family died of cholera … Though as I grew older I always wondered if maybe…” She let the thought trail off into the steam, unwilling to give it life with her words. Could her life be that cruel? Was everyone she loved taken from her by the evil deeds of another?

Distracted from his ire, Blackwell gripped his chin in a thoughtful gesture. “This is all beginning to make sense.”

“I don't see how it possibly can. My head is spinning.”

“A week ago, a member of the peerage approached one of my men, Christopher Argent, about a business contract of a rather sensitive nature.” Blackwell cast her a meaningful look.

“Argent.” The name pricked Farah's memory. “One of your friends from Newgate.”

“One of my closest business associates,” he corrected slyly. “Argent contacted me right away. A king's fortune was offered for the disappearance of a certain employee of Scotland Yard.”

Astounded, Farah gasped. “You can't mean…”

“You. Mrs. Farah Leigh Mackenzie. Warrington found you, after all, and he wanted you dead.”

“No.”
Farah began to shiver in the tub, and Blackwell folded his arms tightly across his broad chest, as though to force them to be still.

“You see, there is no returning you to your old life,” he said victoriously. “If I hadn't made you disappear, he would have hired someone else to do it.”

“Why would he want me dead? He already has everything he could desire, I'm no threat to him.”

“On the contrary,” Blackwell said. “You threaten everything. You could
ruin
everything and expose him by claiming your title.”

“But … I wasn't going to!”

“He couldn't be certain of that. A risk is better taken care of before an actual threat presents itself.”

Farah couldn't believe her ears. “Is that how
you
conduct your affairs?”

“Absolutely.” He said this without shame or remorse, and Farah found she didn't want to look at him anymore. She hid behind her eyelids as her thoughts raced. What did she do now? She'd been happy—well, contented in her life. She'd had a purpose and knew her place in the world. Now everything had changed. There was no going back, and yet she couldn't see any options on how to move forward.

“I haven't anything to prove that I am Farah Leigh Townsend,” she began. “Especially now that someone else has adopted the name. Also, a woman can't claim the title and lands of the peerage without being married. On top of everything, I'll have to explain why I was posing as a widow all this time, and I have no evidence of any foul play in my family's death. I don't even know where to begin!”

“Leave all that to me,” Blackwell offered.

Farah's head snapped up. The way he stood, like a general surveying his massacre over a battlefield, made her uneasy. “And you'll take care of it all for a debt to a friend a decade gone?” she asked dubiously.

“Of course not,” he scoffed. “I am, after all, a businessman. I can return your fortune to you, in exchange for access to the only part of London society still denied me.”

“I—I don't understand,” Farah stuttered. “How will I do that?”

Blackwell leaned over the tub, bracing his hands on both sides, his powerful shoulders bunching as they supported his considerable weight. “Simple,” he purred. “You'll marry me.”

 

C
HAPTER
N
INE

Aye, Fairy, ye'll have to resign yerself to being a highwayman's wife.

Sounds like an adventure!

Farah stared mutely at the man looming above her with disbelief while memories stole through her bones like a soul lingering in a graveyard.

Dougan's earnest dark eyes, alight with love, possession, and tender vulnerability, glowed at her through the obscure veil time cast on all reminiscences. How romantic the prospect had seemed when they were children, without the understanding of reality to temper their exuberant dreams of the future. But an entirely different set of eyes glowed down at her now, these displaying arrogant calculation and the possession of a much more adult variety.

A highwayman's wife, indeed.

“What makes you think I'd marry the likes of you?” she declared with vehemence when she again found her voice. “That's easily the most ridiculous proposal I've ever heard.”

“Please,” he scoffed, lip curling in distaste. “You forget I was there when Morley proposed to you. Besides, a proposal denotes a question, and I have yet to ask you one.” He pushed away from the tub and turned from her, his shoulders bunched tighter than before. “I informed you that you'll marry me, and marry me you will.”

Farah squelched the childish impulse to splash him with water. “I most certainly will not!”

“It is foolish to deny the inevitable,” he threw over his shoulder.

That did it. Farah stared daggers at his broad back, knowing they were sharp enough for him to feel them, even though he faced the windows. “Explain to me how becoming the wife of the Blackheart of Ben More improves my circumstances. Other than your ill-gotten money, what else have you to offer me that I could possibly want? You said yourself you have no heart, no soul. A tarnished reputation. You don't love me. You can't even stand to touch me. Why would a woman like me
ever
want a life with a man such as you?”