Duke of Midnight

Page 36

He remembered the chain she’d been wearing when she’d given him back his signet ring. He frowned. “Then why haven’t I ever seen the emerald on you?”
A blush rose in her cheeks. “I took it off before we’d… Anyway. I left the woods at the abbey, after you’d already raced off, and I forgot to put my fichu back on. My necklace was visible for a moment, with both the emerald drop and your signet ring on it.”
He understood at once. “Any of the guests could’ve seen it.”
She nodded. “Yes.”
“If one of them saw the emerald on you,” he said slowly, staring into the darkness about the bed, “and then searched your room looking for it, then the murderer might have been at Pelham. Might’ve eaten at my table.” The mere thought filled him with hot rage.
She stroked his chest as if to soothe him. “Then it could be any of the men?”
He considered. “Watts is younger than I.”
“Surely it isn’t he, then.”
He nodded. “That leaves Oddershaw, Noakes, Barclay, and Scarborough.” Scarborough, who had been a friend of his parents’.
For a moment they were quiet, contemplating the possibilities.
Then he stirred. “Thank you.”
“What for?”
He shook his head, for a moment unable to speak. Finally, he cleared his throat and said huskily, “For believing me. For telling me all this, even when I was initially foul to you. For being here.”
She didn’t answer, but her hand moved on his chest until it lay exactly over his heart.
And there it stayed.
MAXIMUS OPENED HIS eyes the next morning to the warm scent of Artemis in his arms. For the first time in a very long while he’d neither dreamed nor woken in the night, and he felt, in body and soul… content.
He leaned forward to nuzzle his lips against the nape of the sleeping woman he held. She was so warm, so soft, in sleep, with none of the prickling edges of the maiden warrior she showed when awake and alert. He loved that maiden warrior—the woman who looked him in the eye and told him they were equals—but this sweet, vulnerable lady made his heart ache. Like this he could imagine that she would yield to him, come softly into his arms, and agree to all that he said.
The mere thought made him huff a breath of laughter against her hair.
She stirred, making a small moaning sound. “What time is it?”
He glanced at the window—bright with the sharp, new light of day—and made an estimate. “Not more than seven of the clock.”
She exclaimed and tried to move away from him.
He hugged her tighter.
“Maximus,” she said, her voice gruff with sleep. “I have to leave at once. The servants will be up.”
He bent and licked her neck. “Let them be up.”
She stilled, her face turned away so he couldn’t see her expression. “They’ll see me. We’ll be discovered.”
He pulled back a little to try and see her face, but her hair had fallen over it, making her look like a naiad in mourning. “Does it matter?”
She turned then to lie on her back, looking up at him. Her dark brown locks fanned out around her serious face, and a bold nipple peaked from beneath the sheets. He noticed that she had a triangle of tiny moles just below her right collarbone.
Her dark gray eyes were lovely looking up from his pillow. “Then you don’t care if everyone knows?”
He bent to taste those moles.
“Maximus.”
He swallowed and raised his head. “I’ll buy you a house.”
She lowered her eyes so that he could no longer see their gray depths, but didn’t speak.
His contentment was leaching away, an urgent need to make her agree taking its place. Something very like fear was freezing his heart. “Either here in London or in the country, though if you’re in the country I won’t be able to see you as often.”
From without the room he could hear the padding of servants.
He ducked his head, trying to catch her gaze. “Or I can buy both for you.”
Silence. He could feel himself beginning to sweat. Many a parliamentarian could learn something of the art of negotiation from her.
He’d never wavered in Parliament, but he wavered here in his own bed with her. “Artemis…”
Her eyes flicked up, entirely dry and completely free from emotion. “Very well.”
It should have been a moment of triumph—he’d snared his goddess—but instead he felt an odd sense of sorrow, even loss. Suddenly he knew: he’d never have her, not truly.
Not like this.
Perhaps that was what made his kiss so harsh, almost desperate.
But her lips parted beneath his as easily as if she were a biddable wench, merely here for his own pleasure. Her very passivity made him more frantic, for he knew it wasn’t real. He rolled onto her, his body caging hers as if he could cage her heart as well. This woman. His woman. He’d make it all up to her, give her anything she’d wish for, if only she’d never leave him.
Behind them, the door to his bedroom opened.
“Get out,” he growled to whichever servant had dared disturb him.
There was a squeak and the door was hastily shut.
Below him, Artemis cocked an eyebrow. “That was ill done.”
He scowled. “Would you like her to witness our coupling?”
“Don’t be crude.” She pushed against his chest and he reluctantly gave way—only because he knew he was behaving like a churlish knave. She rose gloriously nude from the bed. “Besides, they’ll all know soon enough, won’t they? That I’m your mistress?”
He snorted, hitting the bed with one arm as he sprawled.
She raised a delicate eyebrow. “That is what you want, isn’t it?”
“I can’t have what I want.”
“Can’t you?” Her voice was light, nearly careless. “But you’re the Duke of Wakefield, one of the most powerful men in England. You sit in Parliament, you own many estates, you have so much money you could bathe in it, and if that weren’t enough, you go into St. Giles at night to risk death.” She bent to pick up her chemise, discarded from the night before, and when she rose she pinned him with a challenging stare. “Isn’t that right?”
He sneered. “You know that it is.”
“Then, Your Grace, it follows that you can have anything and anyone you like even, apparently, me. Please don’t insult me by telling me otherwise.”
He closed his eyes. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. Shouldn’t there be a little bit of joy in making her his? “What do you want?”
There was silence, broken only by a faint rustling. When he opened his eyes she was buttoning his banyan over her chemise.
“Nothing, I think,” she said to her hands. Then, “My freedom, perhaps.”
Freedom. He stared. What did freedom mean to such a wild creature? Did she want to be entirely quit of him?
“I’ll not let you go,” he snapped.
She glanced up at him and her look was sardonic. “Did I ask you to?”
“Artemis—”
“At the moment,” she said, suddenly brisk, “the only thing I want is my brother’s release. You’ve put chains upon him.”
“Of course I put a chain on him—he’s recovering fast and he’s quite muscular.” He frowned on a thought. “You shouldn’t be visiting him now that he can move about—he might grab you.”
She gave him an incredulous look.
He grimaced. “I can find a suitable place for him, perhaps a room with a barred door—”
“You mean a cage.”
“We’ve already discussed this: I’ll not let a madman near you.”
She sighed and came to sit on the bed beside him. “He woke up in a tavern four years ago with the bodies of three of his friends around him. He didn’t kill them. The most he can be blamed for is drinking too much.”
Maximus cocked an eyebrow. “Then why was Kilbourne committed to Bedlam?”
She reached over and stroked his uplifted eyebrow. “Because no one believed him when he said he didn’t remember what had happened or how his friends came to be killed. Because my uncle thought it better to hurry him into Bedlam rather than risk a trial.”
“Yet you expect me to believe him innocent?”
“Yes.” Her lips twisted. “Or rather I expect you to believe me when I say that I know my brother and he would never kill any man, let alone his friends, in a drunken rage.”
He looked at her, so fiery, so brave in her defense of her brother and he felt jealousy that she might feel such strong emotion for anyone but him. “I’ll think on it.”
She frowned. “You can’t keep him locked up—”
“I can and I will until such time as I am satisfied in my own mind that he won’t do someone a harm. I promise to consider it. Don’t ask more of me now.” He saw her hurt and tried to grasp her hand, but she stood and her fingers slid away from him.
“I hope you’ll not bar me from seeing Apollo once he’s well,” she said stiffly.
He didn’t like her near anything that might harm her.
She must’ve seen his hesitation in his face. “You do know I’ve been visiting him in Bedlam by myself for years?”
He sighed. “Very well.”
She inclined her chin, as haughty as any queen. “You’re too kind.”
His blew out a breath in exasperation. “Artemis…”
But she’d already gone out the door.
He threw a pillow at it anyway.
Maximus sighed and quickly dressed before exiting his rooms in search of an answer.
Kilbourne was lying on the cot when Maximus entered the cellar, and at first he couldn’t tell if the man were awake or not, but as he drew near he saw the shine of open eyes.
“My lord,” he said, making sure to stop outside the reach of the chain he’d attached to the man’s right ankle. “Where did you get the emerald pendant you gave to your sister on her fifteenth birthday?”
Kilbourne simply stared.
Maximus sighed. The man might be insane, but somehow he didn’t think him unintelligent. “Look, Artemis says—”
That got a reaction—a growl. Kilbourne rose, a monolith of shifting rock, and reached for the notebook and pencil on the floor beside his cot. He scribbled something and held out the notebook.
Maximus hesitated.
The other man smirked as if aware of Maximus’s wariness, his eyes daring him to come closer.
Maximus stepped forward and took the notebook, stepping back before dropping his eyes to read.
You haven’t the right to call my sister by her Christian name.
Maximus looked the other man in the eye. “She herself has given me that right.”
Kilbourne sneered and lounged back on his cot, staring defiantly.
Maximus frowned. “I haven’t the time for your sulking. I need to know who you truly got the pendent from. I rescued you from Bedlam. Is this not a small fee for your freedom?”
Kilbourne cocked one eyebrow and looked pointedly down at the chain on his ankle.
Maximus remained unmoved. “You killed three men. Do not expect me to let you run free in a house with my sister—and yours, for that matter.”
The look the viscount sent him was filthy, but he took up the notebook again to write. Then he once again extended his arm.
Maximus looked at the offered notebook. This man was accused of a horrific crime, had been incarcerated in Bedlam for over four years, and had shown him no friendship. Then again Kilbourne hadn’t shown him violence, either. And he was Artemis’s brother.
Maximus stepped forward to take the notebook and this time he didn’t back away again as he read:
I would never hurt my sister. You insult me to insinuate it. I got the pendant when I was a boy at school. Another boy, in the same house as I, bet it in a game of dice and I won. The boy was John Alderney. I know not how he had it. Even though I thought the necklace was paste, it was pretty, so I gave it to Artemis on our birthday. Have you seduced my sister?