My Fair Temptress (26 page)

Bouchard whirled around, but he stayed on his feet.

While de Guignard gaped at the disintegrating scene, Caroline grabbed the rifle. She pulled it out of his hands and danced backward toward the street. With a mighty sweep, she smashed the barrel into the ground.

Blood spurted from Bouchard’s wound; but Jude’s shot was too far away, too fast, and not accurate enough to kill. Bouchard’s grimace of pain became a triumphant grin. “I told you, Comte de Guignard, that all was not as it seemed.”

De Guignard looked between Caroline and Jude and derived the correct conclusion.

Drawing his sword in one hand and his dagger in the other, Comte de Guignard stalked Jude. “It seems Miss Ritter is yours, Huntington, for as long as you’re on this earth.”

“Get out of the way, de Guignard.” Bouchard pointed his pistol at Jude.

Caroline screamed and ran toward Bouchard.

Jude, helpless and in despair, tried to race past de Guignard.

With his sword, de Guignard slashed at Jude’s chest.

Jude leaped back, but the razor-sharp blade peeled his padded waistcoat open. “Caroline, no!” he shouted.

And from the corners of his eyes, Jude saw a flash of motion on the ground. Wheels rattled across the stones. As Bouchard fired, the creature—my God, it was Harry—smashed past Bouchard.

Bouchard went down screaming, holding his leg.

Harry had hamstrung him.

Caroline whirled.

Jude’s heart raced. Was she shot?

But no. She launched herself at de Guignard.

He stumbled, bewildered by the attack.
“Mademoiselle, non!”
He tried to turn his sword away from her—and she caught the blade in her hand.

He dropped the hilt.

She let it fall, then kicked it away.

Harry grabbed it.

“
Mademoiselle, non, non,
you’re crazy!”

“Just leveling the odds.” Ignoring the blood that dripped from her hand, she threw Jude a taunting smile, one that spoke of intimacy and triumph.

De Guignard’s face darkened. He lunged for her.

She, wise girl, ran.

Jude charged after de Guignard, and as he attacked, Caroline called, “Here! Jude!” Clumsily, she tossed him his beautiful long dagger.

It tumbled through the air, the blade catching glints of fading sunlight.

Jude snatched it by its hilt. “De Guignard, for once stop chasing the woman and fight.”

De Guignard skidded to a halt. Turning, he smiled a menacing smile at the advancing Jude. “I don’t know if you realize it, my putrid English lord, but knife fighting is an honored tradition in Moricadia. I am an expert. I think perhaps you’re at a disadvantage here.”

It was true. Jude had seen it; in Moricadia every man and woman carried a knife, and they all prided themselves on their skills.

“I prefer a sword,” Jude admitted. “But I like these odds better than the ones that have you holding both a sword
and
a knife. For that maneuver, some might call you cowardly.”

De Guignard’s smile vanished, and the monster behind the elegant mask showed its face. “I will enjoy spitting you on my blade.”

The two men circled each other, knives and teeth bared. Somewhere on the periphery of his senses, Jude was aware that Bouchard still screeched, that Caroline and Harry stood hard against the building and watched them, that beyond this small area London pulsed with the riot the Moricadians had created. Above them, clouds gathered for a spring storm. Yet Jude’s focus narrowed on this man, this knife, this fight.

De Guignard attacked first, a swift lunge to Jude’s gut. Jude sucked in his breath. The point of Comte de Guignard’s knife caught the flapping edge of Jude’s waistcoat. Before de Guignard could disengage, Jude cut his cuff and slashed his wrist.

De Guignard snatched his hand back and stared at the small injury in amazement.

While he stared, Jude slashed three times in rapid succession—at de Guignard’s chin, his heart, and his groin. He sliced a two-inch gash on de Guignard’s noble chin and cut the clothes at his chest.

But de Guignard recovered from his surprise before Jude could open his trousers. He danced nimbly back.

Far away, lightning flashed. Slow, long, and deep, the thunder growled.

Jude smiled, a savage, challenging smile, and looked into the older man’s eyes. “I didn’t say I didn’t know how to knife fight. I only said I liked a sword better.”

The fight began in earnest. De Guignard was the expert that he claimed. He fought with a mastery Jude couldn’t match, dodging, lunging, and parrying with unparalleled power and grace.

Jude responded with a younger man’s speed and a clever man’s caution. Michael and de Guignard were alike in their daring, and Jude had dueled with Michael often enough to know defeating this opponent required careful analysis. But while Jude watched for patterns de Guignard took Jude’s flesh.

He nicked Jude on the wrist. “A payback for this small cut you gave me.” He kept his free hand forward, and it clenched when he reached out once more and nicked Jude on the cheek. “A lesson to you for imagining you could defeat me.” The hand clenched again.

Jude’s lungs burned as he gasped for air. He watched unceasingly for an opening.

Closer, brighter, lightning blazed, and, almost immediately, the thunder rumbled.

With the next clench of the fist, Jude allowed Comte de Guignard to take a nick out of his shoulder, but he had de Guignard’s measure now. All he had to do was avoid that wicked blade long enough to—

The fist clenched. De Guignard drove for Jude’s chest. Jude caught his wrist, the one without the knife, and turned him like a dancer…onto Jude’s own blade.

At the last minute, de Guignard spiraled away. The point drove deep into his side. Not his heart, as Jude had wished, but between his ribs.

De Guignard swung wildly as he went down.

Jude vaulted out of the way. The knife whistled past him and clattered on the ground.

The battle was over.

Jude stood over de Guignard, panting, in pain from his wounds, yet satisfied.

The comte looked down at the dagger planted in his chest. He looked up at Jude in absolute astonishment. “I’ve never…been…defeated,” he whispered.

“You never tried to kill my queen before,” Jude said.

In the background, he heard Caroline gasping in relief. Heard Harry’s rough cheer.

Heard Bouchard’s infuriated monologue as he clawed his way along the ground toward de Guignard, leaving a bloody trail across the grimy cobblestones. “Damn you, de Guignard. You never could resist the ladies.”

Jude moved out of the way of this slow, crawling, vengeful worm.

“I begged Prince Sandre to leave you behind, but he insisted that a representative of the royal family come to supervise me. Me! I’m not the one who took their bait.” Bouchard reached de Guignard’s side, raised himself above his lord. “I’m not the one who chases every
jeune fille
who flatters me.”

“Bouchard.” Comte de Guignard drew in a long painful breath. “Shut up.”

“If you had kept your mind on the assassination and not on the ladies, we’d have killed the queen already and be gone. But no.” Bouchard yanked the blade out of de Guignard’s side.

Blood spurted from the open wound, and de Guignard’s eyes rolled back in his head.

“So now I’m going to hang from an English gibbet.” Lifting the knife, Bouchard plunged it into de Guignard’s heart. “And you’re going to die.”

C
aroline covered her eyes. She’d never seen death before, never imagined this kind of violence. Her heart beat so hard she might have been the one fighting, and when she pulled her hand away from her face and saw the blood from her own wound, faintness overwhelmed her. With a quiet moan, she leaned against the wall.

“Lass, are ye all right?” Harry tugged at Caroline’s skirt. “The blood’s getting t’ ye, isn’t it?”

She nodded. Especially her own blood. Especially—she flicked a glance at Jude—his blood, and the threat of death that had hovered too close.

“Better take ’er ’ome, m’lord, or she’ll fall ’ere on the ground.” Harry nodded sagely and pointed to the place where de Guignard lay dead and Bouchard writhed and cursed. “Don’t worry about these two. I’ll wait fer Throckmorton and ’is men.”

Jude nodded curtly. He walked to Caroline and looked at her, his gaze a mixture of triumph, rage, and possession. He pulled her into his arms in a savage embrace.

She rested on him for one wonderful moment, then extracted herself and straightened until she stood on her own, ramrod straight and proud. “I can see myself home, my lord, I don’t need any help.”

“Really?” Taking her hand, he showed her the thin, bloodied slice that ran across her palm.

Oh, of course. He would make something out of
this
. “It doesn’t mean what you think.”

“What do I think?” He used his handkerchief to bind her hand.

“You think I’m yours to use whenever you like.” The old bitterness and the new anger rose in her. “I’ve been used enough.”

“That’s right, dearie, make ’im suffer!” Harry cheered her on with a grin and a thumbs-up.

Jude used his scarf to wipe the blood off her face. He slipped his arm around her waist, and he was smiling.

Neither of them were taking her seriously.

Freeing herself from Jude’s grasp, Caroline walked ahead of him out of the warehouse courtyard and onto the street. The thunder rumbled again. A fat raindrop fell with a plop into the dusty stones.

“I’ll get us a cab,” Jude said.

“I can do it for myself.”

“Caroline, I know you’re angry with me, but there’s no reason to be stubborn.” He sounded exasperated and patient. “It’s not easy to get a cab in London. They stop for men and seldom for ladies, and in the rain it’s almost impossible to hail one at all.”

As he spoke, an aged cab drove down the street, the equally aged coachman bent forward, his eyes fixed on the reins in his hands.

Caroline threw back her cloak, thrust out her bosom and shot him a smile.

He pulled up so quickly the cab groaned, and the horse nickered. “Can I ’elp ye, Miss?”

“You’re such a gentleman to stop when it’s going to storm.” She looked deep into his faded, rheumy eyes, and cooed, “Would you be so kind as to take me and this fellow”—she waved vaguely in Jude’s direction—“to Mayfair to the duke of Nevett’s house? I don’t need to tell you that there’ll be an extra fee for your trouble.”

The rain was starting in earnest. “I was about t’ go home t’ me missis—”

Caroline fluttered her lashes.

“—But fer ye, anything,” the driver finished extravagantly.

“Thank you.” She opened the door and before she stepped in, said emphatically, “An
extra
fee.”

Dumbfounded, Jude stood on the street.

She seated herself, looked out at him, and in a flat tone said, “Well, get in if you’re going to.”

He did, and seated himself across from her. The cab took off with a lurch. “Getting the cab was an impressive demonstration of your independence—and I suppose a well-deserved one,” he said.

“I know how to handle myself on the streets. I know how to care for myself.” She took care to space her words separately so that there could be no misunderstanding. “I don’t need you.”

“Yet the fact remains—you came after me because you worried I needed my knife. You ran in front of Bouchard’s pistol to save me. You cut your hand on Comte de Guignard’s knife to help me.” He touched her wrapped fingers, and burst out, “But Caroline, never do anything like that again. I couldn’t bear it.”

“I won’t,” she promised readily. She looked away from him and out the grimy window.

The citizens of London had responded to the rain by believing the announcement that their queen was alive and unharmed. They went home to their own fires, leaving empty streets and quiet lanes. The rapidly increasing rain made the interior of the cab dim and, she was bitterly aware, too intimate.

In a low voice, she said, “Oh, I love you. There can be no doubt of that.” She sensed pain beneath her anger, but she couldn’t feel it yet. All she felt now was a vast humiliation and a very real desire to hurt Jude. “But I don’t trust you.”

His complacency slipped. “Caroline, I know you feel I used you—”

“I don’t
feel
you used me. You
did
use me. You admitted it yourself, but if I recall correctly, you believed it was all right because you used me in a
good cause.
” She put a special sting to the last two words.

“I can teach you to trust me again.”

“Really?”
Lightning illuminated Jude’s face in a flash, etching the sight of his bold features on Caroline’s brain, and she realized—Jude was as arrogant as his father. What was she thinking, loving a man like that?

She hadn’t been thinking. That was the only answer.

“You need to trust me now. You’ve proved your courage. You love me. After so many years alone, you gave yourself to me.” Despite her struggles, he gathered her hands in his. “Marry me.”

It should have been the most wonderful moment of her life. Instead, somewhere in the vicinity of her heart, the pain started.

“Trust me, I’ll make you happy, for I’ve learned from a top authority what women want.” He smiled with all his phony, overblown, confident charm, and he said, “Sweet Caro.”

“Let me understand you.” She kept her voice steady when she wanted to shriek like a fishwife. “You’re willing to take me as your wife because I have courage, so I’m worthy, and I was virgin, so I’m virtuous, and I love you, so I’m bound to trust you.” If she didn’t know that Genevieve waited for her at Nevett’s, she would jump out of the moving cab right now.

“That’s not what I meant.” He frowned at her as if that doomed proposal was her fault.

“It sounds as if you’ll be getting the perfect wife. Well…except for that scandal attached to my name. But the fact that the earl of Huntington has condescended to make me his wife should make me grateful, too.” Sarcasm rasped in her voice.

“I have never thought that you were anything but innocent. I’ve never thought that you were anything but wronged.” The flash of lightning confirmed that a blaze of fury lit his blue eyes. “And gratitude is the last thing I want from you.” The thunder growled in agreement.

“I do know. I beg your pardon. My pique got the better of me.” It had; whatever sins Jude had committed, he wasn’t so petty as to need her gratitude.

“So will you marry me?” he snapped. Then he visibly collected himself. “I mean…I would consider it a great honor if you’d consent to be my wife.”

Pain grew inside her. “What is it that I’m supposed to say now? It’s been so long since I received a proposal—of marriage, anyway—that I scarcely remember.” Her every word was a mockery. With her finger on her cheek, she pretended to think. “Lord Huntington, I’m honored by your regard, but I find I’m unable to accept your proposal. While you’ve pointed out the great number of advantages to you, I see no benefit in matrimony for me. Therefore, I regretfully decline.”

“You’re letting your rage decide your destiny.” He was so sure of himself. So sure of her.

“At least I’m not bending like a reed in the wind who bows before the inconstant wind.” She explained the obvious. “The wind would be you, my lord.”

“I am not inconstant.” Temper still sparked in his gaze.

“A fop one day, a warrior the next. I would say that you are.”

“It was a disguise in a”—he stopped before he could say
good cause
. “If nothing else, I can at least offer you security in the marriage settlement.”

As they drove up to Nevett’s town house, she took great pleasure in saying, “You haven’t heard, have you? I do have security. My French grandmother left me ten thousand pounds and an invitation to bring my sister and live with the family in Aquitaine.” The footman opened the door. He held an umbrella to protect her from the increasing downpour. Leaping out, she turned to face Jude. “I intend to accept. Don’t forget to give our driver an extra fee.”

She stormed up the stairs ahead of the footman and welcomed the splash of rain on her hot face. Heavens, how she hated Jude’s arrogance, despised his subterfuge…and loved him despite everything. Loved him like any simpering fool whose heart fluttered at the sight of her one true love.

What an irony. Jude had said he wanted to locate his true love, but he hadn’t truly wanted to find the elusive maiden.

Caroline had not believed in true love, but she had found hers, he had proposed to her…and she discovered that without trust, true love was nothing more than the storm that raged overhead, all flashes and booms and quickly over.

At least, she hoped it would be quickly over. She didn’t want to feel so stricken and forlorn forever.

The door opened. Phillips stood in the entry.

Of course. It had to be Phillips.

She swiped the tears off her face and pretended they were caused by the rain.

“The duke of Nevett wishes to see you, Miss Ritter,” Phillips said, and the glint in his eyes, the small smile on his face told the tale. Phillips had done something wicked. “The duke wishes to see you
immediately.”

Jude pounded up the stairs behind her, picked up her hand, and showed Phillips. “That’s not possible. She’s been wounded.”

“Yes.” Phillips sniffed. “So I see. She does look quite disreputable. But you, Lord Huntington, have some wounds, also.” For Jude, Phillips played the concerned elderly retainer. “Shall I call a physician?”

“Yes,” Jude said. “Miss Ritter is probably going to need stitches.”

“I’ll see Nevett now.” Gently, Caroline disengaged her fingers from Jude’s grip and went to Nevett’s study.

Jude followed her.

Nicolette sat in a chair beside Nevett, talking steadily, urgently, but when Jude and Caroline walked in, she shook her head at them and sat back. Her whole attitude was one of resignation.

For Nevett held a green leather journal in his hands.

Caroline’s planning journal.

She sank into a chair, her knees weak. She remembered very well every word she’d written on those pages, and they were, all of them, incriminating, revealing…embarrassing.

Jude knew his father well, and clearly Nevett was in a royal rage. “Miss Ritter, I gave you a task to do. A simple task, really—that you get my son, the earl of Huntington, the heir to a dukedom, married by the end of the Season. With that goal in mind, I gave you clothing. I’ve been informed I gave you shelter. Most important, I gave you respectability and my full trust.” His voice rose with each word. “Perhaps you will tell me how it’s possible to accomplish this simple task by sleeping with my son!”

Jude looked at her journal as if he’d like to rip it out of Nevett’s hands and read every passage. “Father—”

Caroline gave him a look that reduced him to silence. She would handle this. “That’s my planning journal, and in it I recorded my private thoughts about Lord Huntington’s progress.” Thoughts which she sincerely hoped Jude never saw. “I keep it in my bedside drawer. Perhaps, Your Grace,
you’ll
tell me how you have it now.”

“It fell into Phillips’s hands,” Nevett said, “and he very properly gave it to me.”

Every head in the room swiveled toward the doorway. Phillips stood there, a pretentious smile stretching his lips. He thought he had won, and probably he had.

“It
fell
into his hands? Out of my drawer?” Caroline pulled a disbelieving face. “I would discuss Phillips’s character with you, Your Grace, but I don’t use that kind of language—”

That wiped the smile from Phillips’s face.

“—And it’s not
his
character in which you’re interested.” Caroline bowed her head in sincere contrition. She supposed she deserved this whole, horrible day. She should never have tried to snatch at that happiness she thought she’d had with Jude. It was a lie, a chimera, and now she reaped the results. “You’re right, Your Grace. I do beg your pardon. I’ve violated your trust in every way.”

“You violated my son!” Nevett snapped.

“Don’t be ridiculous, Father,” Jude said.

At the same time as Nicolette said, “Don’t be ridiculous, Nevett.”

“I didn’t abuse your hospitality by
deliberately
enticing your son.” Caroline looked Nevett in the eyes. “Our actions seemed to be an offshoot of the flirting that we practiced endlessly. But I don’t want you to think I’m making an excuse for myself. There’s no excuse good enough.”

“We don’t think you’re making an excuse.” Nicolette’s smile warmed the cold that had crept into Caroline’s heart. “You’re simply a very good teacher.”

“Nicolette, have you lost your mind?” Nevett pointed to Jude, then to Caroline. “We were trying to get our son married and breeding.”

“
We
were not doing that.
You
were, and if you’ll recall, I told you it was a plan fraught with peril.” Nicolette shook her head. “Perhaps in the future, you’ll consult me before you put one of your harebrained ideas into practice.”

“Are you on
her
side?” Nevett indicated Caroline.

“Absolutely,” Nicolette said categorically. “Caroline’s a dear girl, and if you couldn’t see the two of them falling in love, you weren’t looking.”

“Nicolette!” Nevett came to his feet. “You mean you knew improprieties were occurring, and you didn’t warn me?”

Jude had kept quiet long enough. It was time to intervene. “That’s because what occurred between Miss Ritter and me is none of your business, sir, and I’d thank you to keep a civil tongue in your head when you speak to her or about her.” Jude glowered at Phillips. “And perhaps you should tell your butler to keep his filthy nose away from my affairs and to mind his own manners.”