The Marquess Who Loved Me (31 page)

Her eyes flashed in a way that underscored her threat. Nick turned her loose. But he caught up with her as soon as she escaped the crowd and beat her to the church door.

“At least let me go in first,” he said.

She gestured him ahead of her. He tried the door and found it unlocked. The church was almost entirely dark. Only a single lamp illuminated the scene, enough to be visible through the windows but not enough to draw too much attention. Marcus knelt, facing a woman who sat in the pew closest to the door. With her dark bonnet and cloak, Nick couldn’t recognize her — but the concern and fury mingled on Marcus’s face gave him a guess.

“Close the door before Lucia catches a chill,” Marcus ordered.

Nick stepped aside, letting Ellie in to the church. But before he could close the door, a walking stick tapped against it. “Lovely night for a bit of worship, isn’t it?” Ferguson asked, strolling in before Nick could stop him.

Ellie had already rushed to Lucia's side. “What happened?” she asked, dropping into the pew next to her maid. “Did you feel faint?”

Nick knew the answer even before Lucia shook her head. “Your service is even more dangerous than I thought,” she said shakily.

The maid pressed her hand tightly against her left arm. Marcus tore a strip of fabric from what appeared to be her petticoat and handed it to her. She winced as she added it to the bloodstained cloth she already held against her skin.

“Did you see who shot you?“ Nick asked.

“How did you know she was shot?” Marcus interjected. “No one else seemed to notice. We came here rather than the pub to keep it quiet.”

“I heard the shot. The others must have thought it was a firecracker.”

“I heard it as well,” Ferguson added. He moved into the room, away from the door, as though he didn’t want to be the first man hit in a siege. “My question is, why hide here? Why not tell everyone else to take cover?”

Nick ignored him and knelt with Marcus in front of the ladies. Lucia was as calm as ever, but her breaths were shallow and her mouth was tight. “How badly are you hurt?” he asked gently.

“It’s a flesh wound — it will heal,” she said in a clipped voice.

Ferguson wasn’t accustomed to being dismissed. “My wife, my sisters, and everyone else seem to be in peril,” he said, as disinterestedly as he said most things. “I find myself quite perturbed.”

Ellie glared at him. “I am the only person likely to shoot you. Go back outside and watch over them, if you’re so concerned.”

“I believe I’m more concerned about you at the moment,” he said, leaning against the pew on the other side of the aisle, where he could watch both Ellie and the door. “Why did someone shoot your maid?”

“He was aiming for me,” Marcus said grimly.

“And your first thought was to hide? Why not gather men and search for him?”

Marcus ripped another strip from Lucia's petticoat. He moved to sit beside her, taking over the task of keeping pressure on her wound. “I’d rather she not bleed to death while I go off into the woods looking for a madman.”

Nick stood, leaning against the back of the pew in front of Lucia. The duke had a point, unwelcome though it was. “Care to join the search with me, your grace?” he asked.

Ferguson laughed. “Not until I have an heir more suitable than my cousin. Unless you know who the madman is?”

“I have my suspicions,” Nick said briefly. “And I doubt you’re in any danger. It seems confined solely to me and Marcus.”

“Or, more accurately, me and Lucia,” Ellie said.

Lucia sighed. “I should have shot both the highwaymen on the road. And here I thought I didn’t need another lesson in misplaced mercy.”

Her tone was surprisingly light. Nick didn’t know many men who would handle being shot so calmly, but Lucia acted like she had been shot every day of her life.

The surgeon arrived then, accompanied by Lady Christabel and a slight whiff of ale. “What seems to be the matter?” he asked, walking toward them. “I heard a maid wasn’t feeling well?”

He gasped when Marcus lifted his hand briefly to show him the blood. “She accidentally gouged herself on a nail,” Marcus said, lying smoothly. “She needs stitches.”

The surgeon turned to Christabel. “Perhaps you should wait…”

“Nonsense,” Christabel said briskly, striding over to Lucia. Nick slid out of the way, joining Ferguson across the aisle to make room in front of Lucia. “If I had my bag of herbs, we could make better progress, but let’s get you comfortable, shall we?”

She pulled away the cloth and tsked in sympathy when she saw the wound. “That’s a nasty scrape. Is it bleeding as much as before, or has it slowed?”

She kept asking questions with a gentle voice that Nick hadn’t expected to hear from her. The surgeon seemed content to let her take over, swigging furtively from the flask in his pocket when he thought no one was looking.

Finally, she wrapped another strip of petticoat around Lucia's arm. “Mr. Claiborne, if you will escort the lady to a private room in the pub, I shall meet you there. I keep a bag with the publican and can do the stitches there. Ask for some laudanum if the lady wants it…”

“No opium,” Lucia interrupted forcefully.

Christabel shrugged. “Then a glass of whisky wouldn’t be amiss. I’ll join you in a moment.”

The surgeon followed them out. If his destination was the pub, it was for his own glass of whisky. As soon as they were gone, Christabel looked Nick square in the eye. “That wasn’t a scrape. What really happened?”

He thought about lying. But Christabel already knew about the highwayman — with this attempt, the neighborhood was in even more danger. “She was shot. Someone used the fireworks as a diversion to make an attempt on Marcus.”

Christabel paled. She hadn’t reacted at all to the sight of Lucia's blood, but she suddenly looked like she might be sick. “How terrible,” she said faintly.

Ferguson, ignored until now, offered her his flask. To everyone’s surprise, she took it — and drank from it with nearly as little reaction as Ellie would have. “Thank you, your grace,” she said, still sounding dazed. “I knew you were concerned about a highwayman, but I didn’t expect this.”

“A highwayman, did you say?” Ferguson asked, his hand pausing as he replaced the cap. ”You’re the second woman tonight to mention a highwayman.”

Christabel nodded. “The story just seemed so…unlikely.”

“Doesn’t it, though?” Ferguson said, slanting a glance at Nick.

Nick gestured toward the door. “The fireworks seem to be done. We should return to the group before we are missed.”

Ferguson looked ready to argue, but Ellie nodded. “I will go with you to the pub, Lady Christabel. I don’t want to leave Mrs. Grafton alone during her ordeal.”

“I shall come with you,” Nick and Ferguson both said simultaneously.

She shook her head. “What do either of you know about nursing patients? Ferguson, escort your wife and the twins home. And Nick, I’m sure your talents would be better spent interrogating my guests.”

She was right. He already had a suspicion. Norbury’s absence from the fireworks had turned from enviable to damning. Waiting to confirm it might make the trail go cold.

But the thought of Ellie injured — or worse — instead of Lucia had Nick on edge. “Very well,” he said. “But find me when you return to Folkestone. We must talk.”

She paled at that, as pale as Christabel had been when discussing murder. Was she really that scared of what he might say to her?

“Of course, my lord,” she said. He told himself her voice was cool for the benefit of their audience, not as a genuine reflection of her feelings.

Then she swept out with Christabel at her side — two women who seemed ready to battle any foe.

Ferguson twirled his walking stick. “Shall we go hunting now, or after I’ve beaten you for hiding a bloody highwayman from me?”

Nick pulled on his gloves. “I meant to tell you, I’m sure, but I didn’t want to interrupt your monologues.”

“My father must had
detested
you,” Ferguson said, clapping him on the back. “Hunting it is.”

When Ellie returned to Folkestone shortly before midnight, she didn’t have to search for Nick. The door between his room and hers was ajar.

She shrugged out of her pelisse, hat, and gloves and tossed everything onto her bed. Then, before her courage failed her, she walked through the door. She had managed not to think of him at the pub, although brooding might have been preferable to the grisly sight of Lucia's many stitches. She had left her maid in Marcus’s capable hands — and, surprisingly, Lucia hadn’t protested his involvement in her affairs. But Ellie’s stomach suddenly felt full of stones.

Did Nick want her as much as she wanted him? Or was his love a phantom that no amount of desire could resurrect?

When she entered, she heard the echo of the previous night. He sat in the same chair, next to an equally large fire, and his eyes were hooded and unreadable.

”Will you join me?” he asked.

Asked. Not told. She shut the door and walked to him. When his hand extended, it wasn’t to stop her — it was to invite her to take the other chair.

Part of her wanted to stay on her feet, keep him off balance, gain the upper hand. But if she wanted him to be real for her, she was honor-bound to be real for him.

She sat. “Did you learn anything from the guests?” she asked.

It wasn’t the question she wanted an answer to. He shrugged it aside. “My batman returned from London — the tattoos were too common to learn anything from. Your brother and I made a bit of progress here, though. But all that will keep until tomorrow. Is Lucia feeling well?”

“She will live, although she’d feel better if she allowed Christabel to dose her with laudanum.”

They fell silent. Neither seemed quite able to make eye contact, not with the ghosts of the previous night’s conversation chilling the air between them. Then, abruptly, Nick stood up. “Stay there a moment,” he said. “I have something for you.”

He disappeared into his dressing room and returned a moment later with a small box and a leather pouch. “What do you want, Ellie?” he asked, his voice taut, as though he’d had to force the words out. “Pleasure? Or freedom?”

On “pleasure,” he raised the box. On “freedom,” he offered the pouch. As he waited for her response, his hands seemed perfectly balanced — a choice between two fates, with nothing to tip the scales.

Nothing but him. “Why must I choose?” she asked.

He sat down again, balancing the pouch on one knee and the box on the other. “Because I can’t think about any future beyond tonight if you’re here only because I coerced you.”

She laughed incredulously. “But you
did
coerce me.”

He nodded. “But if you had the choice, right now, to walk away with all your debts forgiven — would you take it?”

“I’d be a fool not to.”

Nick closed his eyes. For a moment, he was twenty-two again, reacting to that first, unbelievable moment of betrayal. But Ellie saw a difference in the tightness of his jaw, in the way he sighed but didn’t grimace.

He had expected that answer, in a way he hadn’t expected her to leave him the first time.

“I’d be a fool not to,” she said again. “But perhaps I’d rather be a fool than a pragmatist.”

“Would you rather be a fool than a free woman?” he asked, opening his eyes. “What about all your vows to be your own mistress?”

“I can still be my own mistress. But I would enjoy it more if you were with me.”

Her heart caught in her throat. It was as close to a declaration as she could get.

It seemed to be enough for him. In an instant, he’d set aside the objects in his lap, stood up, and pulled her into his arms. Her cheeks were still cold from her carriage ride home. His hands burned against them. He looked dead into her eyes, as though he could read her soul.

“I believe you,” he said.

He kissed her before she could think. Her body responded for her. She was ravenous for him, as ravenous as he was for her, and she wasn’t satisfied with the firm, hard, vow-sealing kiss he gave her. She wanted that, wanted to feel like they’d branded each other — but at this point, brands were superfluous compared to the marks they’d left on each other’s souls.

She opened her mouth and he took her offering. It was like they were young again, kissing with all the fuel of their dreams behind them — enough fuel to burn away their regrets. She dug her fingers into his shoulders, urging him on as she felt him start to unfasten the buttons down the back of her dress. He had a long job ahead of them — but then, they had all night.

Their kisses turned shorter, more like sips of pleasure compared to the long, thirst-quenching draught of their first one. He finished with her dress. She slid his jacket from his shoulders. The rest of their clothing followed in the same pattern — hurried, but smooth, and with no concern for worship or winning.

“Why wasn’t it like this before?” she murmured against his lips before kissing him again.

He pulled her chemise up over her head, tossing it to join his trousers on the floor. “Don’t know. But if we’re fools for this, we were even bigger fools to avoid it.”

He picked her up and laid her out on his bed — their bed. No matter what happened after, she would always consider it theirs.

“Do you know, this is the first time I’ve ever taken a lover to bed?” she said.

His hand had found her thatch of curls, but he paused and looked at her eyes rather than her breasts. “Truly?”

She leaned up on her elbows and stroked her hand over his heart. “You and I never had a bed — all those pesky chaperones. So it didn’t seem…right, with the others.”

“And here I thought I wouldn’t have to work to make this good enough.”