The Reckless One (8 page)

He was watching her carefully, seeing whether his words caused pain. It flashed through her thoughts that perhaps Orville was one of Lord Cumberland’s agents sent to the Highlands to rout further insurrections.

If so, he would get no joy from her. She knew by heart the tale of her brother’s supposed cowardliness and dispossession. She should. Thomas had created it. It allowed him to move freely among these English usurpers—despised by them as a traitor to his people at the same time as they embraced him for being a
roué
willing to spend money.

“I’m afraid he’s not greatly regarded by his kilt-wearing brethren. But don’t look so sad, Miss Donne. I hear his wealth greatly succors him. And you.”

Favor continued regarding her reflection, a vain woman bored with the conversation of a tiresome man.

“Do his old clan affiliates threaten him? Is that why he left Scotland so abruptly?”

Favor leaned closer to the mirror and rearranged a black curl on her temple before answering. “Hm? Thomas? Lud, no, nothing like it. As far as I know, my dear brother is in America.” She gave him a vacuous smile. “Now, if you’ll excuse me—”

She’d almost made it past him before he stepped in front of her. Her smile slipped. “Sir?”

“How is it he left his little sister behind?”

“Perhaps because he’s visiting his plantation and his little sister has an aversion to sweat; and sweat, so I’m assured, is abundant on a plantation. Though,” she said, her gaze traveling over Orville’s damp brow and glistening upper lip, “we don’t seem to lack for it here, either.”

Orville flushed. “You’re a saucy wench, Miss Donne.”

“But not nearly spicy enough for a sophisticated palate such as yours.” She cursed the pleading note she heard in her voice.

Orville heard it, too. Immediately his confidence returned. “I’ll be the judge of that.” He leaned forward, his sour breath sluicing over her mouth.

The courage supporting Favor abruptly gave out. She wheeled, grabbing up the hoops beneath her billowing skirts, and ran. For a moment all she heard was the hiss of rustling taffeta, the staccato of her own heels, and the far-off sound of voices growing even more distant as she fled.

Then she heard Orville give chase.

She raced past her own chambers. They could offer no safe haven. She would never be able to fetch the key and lock the door in time. Her only chance lay in evading him.

“How delightful!” he called. “I adore games!”

She made it to the servants’ staircase and ducked beneath the low lintel, feet clattering on the worn stone steps, slipping as she went, her skirts choking the narrow, winding passageway. She burst from the door at the bottom and fled on. Through another door, down another set of stairs, always the sound of his footsteps behind. Through more doors, to another dim passage.

She had no idea where she was. She’d been culled like a yearling deer from the herd, driven to the far reaches of the castle, to the dark, uninhabited parts.

Her lungs burned, her skirts dragged like dead weights from her hands. She stopped, panting, looking about. She could run no more. Desperately she lunged for the nearest door handle and pushed. Reluctantly the door gave way.

She scrambled into the room, turned and eased the door shut, pressing her back to it. She waited, her heart hammering, searching for another way out.

There was none.

She was in a bedchamber, long unused and neglected. Ghostly sheets draped all the furnishings except the huge bed in the center. Its filmy curtains hung torn and shredded from the canopy like the night rail of an ill-used bride. Boxes and chests lined one wall. A thick stack of paintings leaned against another.

A hushed atmosphere of suspension permeated the room, as though only timid ghosts kept company here, holding their spectral breath, waiting for her to leave. She strained her ears to hear Orville’s footsteps. Nothing.

She counted to one hundred before moving cautiously across the room, her wide skirts sweeping a broad swath in the dust. She stopped at the tall bank of windows on the opposite wall and pulled back the gauzy drapery. Her breath caught in her throat.

The evening sky bloomed above a seething cobalt-colored sea. In a gothic excess, day lay bleeding its brilliance on night’s black shoulders. She had never seen such a sunset. “My Lord,” she gasped.

“Milady.”

Her heart checked. Before she’d turned around, Orville was on her. He grabbed her around the waist, hauling her off her feet. He shoved her hard, face first against the window. His mouth fell on the back of her neck, sucking greedily.

She cried out, kicking and sobbing in terror. He laughed. The sound extinguished her fear, cold water on a fire.

She was Favor McClairen. She was not some vile Englishman’s doxy. She was not
any
Englishman’s victim. Not
anyone’s
victim. She reached over her shoulders and clawed at his face, satisfaction flooding through her as she felt his flesh rend beneath her nails.

“Bitch!” He grabbed one wrist and twisted viciously, slamming it against the window frame with numbing force. He grasped her other hand and treated it the same.

“Scottish whore!” he hissed into her ear. “I’ll mark you for that and damned be your bastard brother! We’ll see—

His words were cut off in a strangled sound of surprise. Abruptly Favor found herself free. She sank bonelessly to the floor, twisting to see what had happened.

The room was darker now, nearly black. Two figures struggled in its center, pitched in an ill-matched contest. One was tall and broad, his fists spearing through the air with blinding speed and devastating effect. In seconds, he’d landed a series of brutal blows. He stopped abruptly and straightened as the slighter figure teetered and crumpled into a heap on the floor.

The stranger turned his head in her direction. He hesitated but then came toward her, she thought to offer her his hand.

She lifted her face, shaken and grateful, and gave him a tremulous smile. “Thank you, sir. I … I can’t begin to express my gratitude. I … thank you so very much.”

He neglected to hold out his hand. She frowned, perplexed by this lack of manners after he’d just championed her so completely. He took another step, bringing him into the last rays of daylight coming through the window. She suddenly understood his reluctance to touch her.

She’d last seen him being swarmed by the French soldiers she’d set on him.

Her Englishman.

The tall man’s eyes narrowed on Favor. In a rush of relief she realized that he couldn’t possibly recognize her disguised as she—

“Are you thanking me for my current services or the ones you made such good use of in Dieppe?” he asked.

So much for anonymity.

His voice was rough-smooth, his gaze shuttered, the light refracting off the clear, wild honey of his irises. Only the slight curl of his upper lip indicated his current disposition. It was not a pleasant one.

“It
is
you,” he said. “What sort of perfidy had you planned for that poor sot?” He jerked his chin in the direction of the motionless Orville. “Damned if I oughtn’t dust him off and apologize, for any man entangled with you, Milady Treachery, deserves at the very least his fellow man’s pity and most probably his aid.”

Favor only half-attended this biting denunciation. She was too busy staring. Lud, he was big. Far taller and wider than she remembered. He wore tight black breeches that had seen better days and the white lawn shirt he wore was untied and loose, revealing his muscular bronzed chest.

He was darker than she recalled, too. The angularly rough features were tanned now, the square jaw blue-black with an incipient beard. His rumpled sable-colored hair fell in loose curls about a strong, broad throat.

But there was some other difference. Something elemental. Something important.

She tilted her head, trying to identify it. She had it. The man who had been shackled spread-eagle to that prison wall had been desperate, pushed to the crisis point. This man owned himself completely.

It put him at a distinct advantage. Now she was the one controlled by fate and others’ fortunes. She disliked the reversal in their positions.

He’d moved closer to her, agile and light-footed for so large a man. She shrank against the wall, suddenly realizing that one danger had supplanted another. Her heels beat a tattoo as she struggled to rise. He reached down, grabbed her upper arm, and lifted her to her feet.

She attempted to dart past him but his hand flashed up, circling her throat in a warm, tight grip, keeping her where she stood. She forced herself to meet his gaze. With one large thumb, he tilted her chin back. Her pulse thudded heavily against his palm.

“Well,” he murmured, his gaze slipping over her cheeks and mouth and throat like a caress, “what say you, Madame Noir, or Widow Lambett, or whoever the hell you are?”

“Favor,” she said. “Favor Mc—Favor Donne.”

He went utterly still, his gaze scoured her features.

“Damn you, what trick is this?” He dropped his hand to her upper arm, this time his grip not merely restraining but hurtful. “I don’t know what game you’re playing now, but I will have the truth.”

She winced. His teeth snapped together. “The truth before I … the truth!”

“ ’Tis the truth, I swear it!” she cried. “My brother is Lord Thomas Donne. He owns the manor house five miles inland on the north highway. You’ve but to ask anyone here to receive that same answer. I am Favor Donne.”

He eyed her derisively. “And what is a nobleman’s sister doing in France, masquerading as a licentious bawd?”

She hesitated a heartbeat, searching for a likely explanation. He shook her. “Out with it!”

“My brother … He is also
La Bête,
the smuggler,” she whispered. “ ’Twas he the French sought in Dieppe. ’Twas he I protected by giving you over to the soldiers in his stead.”

He thrust his face closer to hers. His eyes no longer looked cool, but torrid. He looked older than he had in France—harder, too. Certainly more dangerous. Silently she prayed that he would believe her. “I swear it,” she rasped.

Slowly, his grip loosened, became less punishing.

“Damn,” he finally said but he seemed to be replying to some internal avowal, and not to anything she’d done. “You haven’t answered my question yet. What were
you
doing in Dieppe, little falcon? And why the new plummage?”

“What?” she asked in confusion.

“Your fierce brows are gone and you’ve dyed your hair. Why?”

“Because”—she cast about for a plausible answer—“because the English gentlemen are partial to dark hair.”

“I never heard it was so.”

“And where would you have heard
anything
about the current modes?” she asked, praying he wouldn’t punish her impertinence. “Or did you have the
Gentleman’s Quarterly
delivered to your cell?”

Appreciation flickered through his expression.
“Touché.”

“And what are
you
doing here?” she asked haughtily, pressing her momentary advantage. Had he found out her identity and followed her here to extract some sort of revenge? The concept sent a shiver through her. Let that be a lesson to her never to heed the urgings of a guilty conscience. She should have let the French soldiers take him.

“Oh, no, pretty peregrine.” He shook his head. “A decent attempt at diversion, but I’m no callow youth to be distracted by a lush mouth uttering haughty demands. We were discussing
you.

“Why were you in Dieppe? ’Twas it your job to mind the smuggling ship’s rudder?” he asked sarcastically.

“Of course not!” she said quickly, examining and discarding evasions with lightning speed. “I was with relatives who’d had the care of me for years. It was safer for me in France than here. Because of Tom.” She glanced up, gauging his reaction. Impossible to tell. “You know about Tom, of course.”

“Do I?” He abruptly released her, and stood back, crossing his arms over his broad chest. She backed away, rubbing the marks he’d left on her upper arm. His gaze touched dispassionately on the reddened area.

“Tom left the country just after Culloden. Followed by the price the rest of the clan chieftains had put on his head.”

“Why?”

She lowered her eyelashes, bit her lip in feigned humiliation. “He was at Culloden but he was just a boy. He saw how outnumbered and outarmed the Highlanders were. Tom”—she paused for effect—“Tom has never been much for a fight. The sight of blood curls his toes. He left the moor when the fighting began.”

His sudden laughter made her eyes snap open. She scowled. He was grinning at her hugely, his white teeth flashing in the semidarkness. “God preserve me, you could convince a cat to bark, you little liar.”

“Have you no delicacy?” she demanded, brazening it out. “I’ve just confessed my brother’s disgrace.”

“That being that he ran away from the battlefield because he’s an aversion to blood?” He shook his head. “You’ll have to do better than that, love, especially if you’re going to chase that fable with one about the same cowardly brother becoming a notorious smuggler. Unless of course,
‘La Bête’
hides belowdeck whenever there’s a spot of bloodshed.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she snapped, chagrin supplanting fear.

“No need, as you’re being ridiculous enough for both of us.”

“I don’t care if you do believe me—”

“Oh, you’d better,” he broke in quietly, returning her fear to her.

She swallowed. “Thomas orchestrates the smuggling so that there will
be
no blood-letting. Last year the French started closing in on him. They offered a reward for any information leading to his arrest.

“It was only a matter of time before someone told the authorities about me. We would not bring trouble to those who’d fostered me for so long. So, Tom devised a plan whereby I could escape. It needed a decoy.”

“Me. And here I’d thought I owed the inestimable Jacques a visit. Where is your gargantuan friend?”

“He’s here and his name is Jamie and he’s my … my brother’s driver.”

“How delightful to have so multitalented a driver.”

“He had nothing to do with your … situation. He simply followed orders,” she said, envisioning Jamie and this huge, lean man closed in mortal combat.

“Don’t worry, sweetling, I won’t hurt your tame bull.”

She breathed a sigh of relief. His expression flattened. “But tell me, where is your clever brother? I’m all agog to make his acquaintance.”

“He’s abroad.”

“Avoiding more unpleasant things? So why are you here without him?”

If she stuck close to the truth perhaps she could convince him to leave her alone, to go away and do … what
was
he doing here? “My brother may appear to be a wealthy man, but he’s not.
We’re
not. And neither is our clan. In fact, my whole family is quite, quite poor.”

“Yes?” he prodded.

“I’m here to … to repair the clan’s fortune.” She skirted closer to the truth than she would have liked.

“Fortune? Do you mean by that you are casting nets in the matrimonial waters, Miss Donne? Here?” His voice revealed his skepticism. “At Wanton’s Blush? Well, I give you high marks for originality. Not many a blushing debutante would think to come here to seek a mate.”

“Where else would such as I go? A Scottish nobody without lands, family, or connections to recommend myself?” she demanded hotly, for he’d pressed too close to a truth she’d never allowed herself to inspect. Even if she could call her future her own, where would someone like her find a “happily-ever-after”?

“Only at Wanton’s Blush could someone like me find a suitor who would not look too closely at my antecedents or, even if he did discover them, care who they were. As long as I am richly gowned, bedecked and bejeweled, here I am accepted as the eligible heiress I appear to be.”

“You mean the smuggling business isn’t all it’s cracked up to be? And here I thought it one of the more profitable occupations open to an ambitious young man.”

“Nay,” she said harshly. “ ’Tisn’t. Not nearly profitable enough to repair a fortune stolen by English ba—”

“Be careful, Miss Donne,” he interjected dryly. “Your future husband may just be one of those English
ba’s.”

“I understand that,” she answered tightly. “But you see, I don’t have any choice. Your English didn’t leave any Scottish men to choose from—rich, poor, or anywhere in between. They killed them all.”

She had the impression her words had struck a chord and that he was growing sympathetic to her tale.

“Aye. That has the ring of truth to it,” he said after a moment. “But then, I have a certain history with your bell-toned lies.”

She’d been wrong. He cared nothing for her people’s slaughter. “Ridicule me all you like,” she snapped.

“Tuck your lower lip in, sweetling, ’tis too tempting by half pouting thus. But I’m sure you know that full well.”

She stamped her foot in annoyance and then stared at the offending limb in consternation. She hadn’t stamped her foot since she was a child.

“What a fine tale and what a fine heroine you make, Favor, me love,” he said in a light, mocking tone. “So brave and passionate. How noble of you to sacrifice yourself for your clan.” His expression flattened. “If only I could believe in that nobility. But you were very willing to exploit me.”

“I’d do the same again today. You were already condemned. What did you have to lose? Besides”—she stared defiantly at him—“you escaped, did you not? Well, then you got more than the bargain called for.”

“Oh, no,” he murmured, “I didn’t get
any
of what the bargain called for.”

He stepped forward, intent, predatory, his concentration focused to a rapier sharpness. She stepped back. Her shoulders collided with the wall. He smiled, one side of his mouth turning up and carving a deep line beneath his high, broad cheekbone. A wicked smile, that. A devil’s smile.

He lifted his hand toward her face. She flinched but he only reached past her, placed his palm flat against the wall next to her head and leaned in. His stance emphasized his much greater height. He eclipsed her with his breadth. His gaze drifted down her face and throat and lingered where her breasts swelled in agitation above the low, square décolletage.

“I’d been purchased from jail to provide sport for you.”

“Not for me!” she denied. “For Madame Noir.”

“Who you pretended to be,” he reasoned, his voice low and seductive. He angled his head and inhaled, his mouth inches above her flesh. She shrank down; there was nowhere left to retreat. The wall behind her bare shoulders was cool. Every inch of her skin seemed suddenly heated.

“You shouldn’t have dyed your hair,” he mused. He picked up a lock, his knuckles brushing her collarbone. Sensation danced over her skin in response. He rubbed the tress lightly between thumb and forefinger, testing the texture. “It was prettier before. Plundered gold. Now it’s funereal, like a dead raven’s eye.”

“Flatterer,” she whispered.

His gaze shot up to meet hers. His dimple deepened in surprised humor, then dissolved. The wide mouth relaxed, became pensive. His brows dipped, as if in puzzlement.

“Who would have ever thought you … of all the women in the world …
you,”
he whispered in a voice so low she barely heard him.

Watching him studying her body made her feel ripe and lush, liquid and uncomfortable. She couldn’t have looked away if she’d tried.

“Please.”

“Please what? Please myself? What would that take, do you imagine?” he asked. “I had a kiss from you once and I still remember your taste. Isn’t that odd?” He lay the artificially darkened tress on her shoulder, arranging the curl with patient care. “Isn’t it?”