How the Scoundrel Seduces (38 page)

When sixteen men whirled in her direction, she swallowed hard. She was somewhat reassured when she saw that her presence seemed to make George’s men decidedly uneasy, murmuring among themselves.

“Oh, for God’s sake, who the hell are you?” George asked.

But Hucker had seen her, and the color drained from his face. “Drina?”

“No.” She took a shuddering breath. “Drina’s daughter.”

Hucker whirled on Tristan. “You said Drina died on the road!”

“She did. But only after giving birth to your child.”

“Yes. I’m
your
daughter, too, Mr. Hucker,” she reminded him.

She had to buy Papa’s men more time. She could dimly see Pipkin edging through the woods. Hucker might be willing to shoot Tristan, but surely he wouldn’t allow his own daughter to be hurt.

“My daughter,” Hucker repeated in a wondering voice. He shot Tristan a glance. “You found her?”

Tristan nodded, but his eyes were only for her. The look he gave her was so sweet, so precious, that it made her pulse quicken. Was it love she read in his eyes? Or was that just wishful thinking?

“Lord Olivier and his wife took me in,” Zoe said, careful not to mention that they’d made her their daughter. “That was after they buried my mother—the woman you beat so badly.”

“I wasn’t the one who beat her!” Hucker scowled at George. “It was him.”

“You know they’re just lying to rattle you,” George said nervously.

“Telling the same lie? All of them?” Hucker advanced on him. “For twenty-one years, I prayed that one day she would show up here; that doing your bidding would prove worth it because she returned.” He lifted the pistol in his hand. “That’s how I know she’s
dead. Because if she were alive, she would have come back to me by now.”

“Don’t be a fool, Hucker!” George cried. “Put that gun down.”

“You killed her,” Hucker said. “You killed the only woman I ever loved!”

“I didn’t kill her, damn it!” George swung his pistol around to aim it at Zoe. “But I’ll bloody well kill your daughter if you don’t put that gun down.”

Zoe’s heart dropped into her stomach—she had to stop this right now. Beyond George, she could already see Tristan and her father heading for him, and that would surely mean a bloodbath.

She said hastily, “I wouldn’t advise aiming guns at me, my lord. Lord Olivier’s men have you surrounded. If you so much as nick my arm, you and your men here will all die together.”

George’s pistol hand wavered. “You’re lying.”

She raised her voice. “All right, lads! Fire at any of these fools who moves!”

One of the farmers turned to peer at the woods, and got the scythe shot out of his hand for his trouble. He and his fellows started to glance nervously about them. Another shot came from a different side of the woods, and that really spooked them.

Papa took over. “Tell your men to go, Rathmoor, and we’ll leave them be. It’s over.”

When George hesitated, Hucker approached the men. “If you want to see another dawn, boys, you’d best return to your homes. This here is Major Keane. Served
in the army. He’d as soon mow you down as look at you.”

That was all it took to have them retreating, grumbling among themselves.

“Come back here, you cowards!” George shot into the air, but that only sent them fleeing faster. While he was still glaring after them, Papa lunged forward to wrench the loaded pistol from his other hand.

“Damn you all!” George tossed down the empty one. “You are on
my
land.”

His face a vengeful mask, Hucker headed for George. “You killed her. You beat my Drina to death.”

“I didn’t kill her!” George cried, backing away.

“But you beat her, admit it!” Hucker aimed his pistol at the viscount once more.

“All right, all right!” George said. “But she gave me no choice. She wouldn’t get out of the damned carriage!” When a shocked silence fell in the clearing, he thrust out his chin. “She just kept going on and on about her love for you, and how I should give you another chance. How the two of you were meant to be together, if I would just allow you to marry. I couldn’t get her to shut up!”

Hucker’s face turned thunderous. “So you beat her for it?”

“No! Not for that. The bitch told me there were no other Gypsies between here and York, and I damned well wasn’t driving her all the way to York. So I stopped near Highthorpe, and when she wouldn’t get out, when she started begging me on the life of her babe not to leave her in a place that hated Gypsies—”

“You beat her,” Tristan said coldly. “To get her out of your carriage. A woman with child.”

“A Gypsy whore bearing a bastard!” George spat. “Is it right that whores like her and your mother can spawn their by-blows right and left, while my own mother, the sweetest woman in the world, died bearing my traitor of a brother?”

“George,” Dom said tersely, “dying is one of the risks of childbearing.”

“No,” George snapped. “Bearing you was certain death for Mother, and she knew it. But she ignored the doctors who said she shouldn’t have any more children.” His face filled with hatred as he glared at Tristan. “She couldn’t stand that
your
damned mother was stealing Father away from her bit by bit, because Mother wasn’t supposed to share his bed.”

The color drained from Dom’s features. “What are you talking about?”

George scowled at him. “I used to hear them arguing about it. He told Mother he wouldn’t be the cause of her death. That’s why he brought that whore back from France.”

Dom looked stricken. “George, I’m sorry . . . I had no idea.”

George shook with anger now. “Whenever Father was around, Mother was brighter, sweeter. She would sing to me, and things would be normal, and then . . .” He stiffened. “He’d head off to his whore, and the light would go out of her.”

The light seemed to go out of George, too. “She must have found some way to get him into her bed, because next thing I knew, she was telling me I was to have a brother. She was so bloody happy that I was sure everything would be good again.” His voice hardened. “Until she died
having
my brother.”

“Good God,” Dom said.

Zoe could only stare at him and Tristan, feeling as stunned as they looked. A look of sympathy flashed briefly across Tristan’s face.

Very briefly. Because then he was marching toward George. “You’re forgetting that it was
Father
who made the choice to share my mother’s bed,
Father
who brought Mother back from France to be his mistress. And Zoe’s mother had nothing to do with any of that—yet you murdered her!”

“Zoe?” George glanced at her. “Your name is Zoe?”

With a curse, Tristan halted.

“You’re
Lady
Zoe Keane.” George’s eyes lit up like those of a shark scenting blood in the water. “Lord Olivier’s daughter. And a countess in her own right. At least, until I tell the House of Lords that you’re really some Gypsy whore’s daughter.”

In a flash, Tristan drew a knife from his boot, which he brandished at George. “You say a word to anyone about that,” he hissed, “and I will find you and cut you into so many pieces that they’ll never know what happened to you.”

George, the fool, taunted him. “I take it you have
a soft spot for her ladyship. Isn’t that sweet? Two by-blows in love. It will make it all the more pleasurable when I expose her as a Gypsy’s bastard.”

“Then again,” Tristan said in a chilling voice, “why wait?” And he was on George, with the knife to his throat.

For the first time that day, George showed fear.

“Tristan, no!” She rushed over to catch his arm. It shook with the force of his fury. “Listen to me. I know how much you hate him, but murdering him solves nothing.”

“It solves a great deal for me!”

“You say that in the heat of your anger.” She clung desperately to his arm. “But once you’ve killed an unarmed man, the stain of it will haunt your soul for the rest of your life. He’s still your brother.”

“Only in blood.”

“Yes, but much as I wish it didn’t, blood still counts for something in this world.” She held on to his arm for all she was worth. “Not to mention that you’ll be hanged for it. Is he worth that?”

The pulse throbbed in Tristan’s neck, and his arm was so very rigid that she feared he wouldn’t heed her.

“Please, my love,” she added, “I don’t want to see you hang.”

It must have been the “my love” that did it, for Tristan’s arm went slack. Then he drew the blade away from George’s neck. “You’re right,” he said to Zoe. “He’s definitely not worth hanging for.”

With a shove, he sent George sprawling on the ground and sheathed his knife.

She threw herself into his arms with a little cry. “Oh, my love, are you all right? He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

“No,” he said softly, then kissed her with a fierceness that left her gasping.

“That’s enough,” Papa grumbled. “You’re not married yet.”

“Listen to the man,” Milosh said. “None of that, now.”

She and Tristan broke away, laughing.

“Marry!” George picked himself up off the ground. “You think to marry her, bastard? And sit in the House of Lords with your betters? That will never happen. I will—”

“You’ll do nothing,” Papa said firmly. “A number of witnesses here heard you confess to beating a woman with child nearly to death. Your own men heard you threaten to kill a lord of the realm and your brothers. You lift one hand against me and mine, and I will have you arrested and charged and see you hang. I’ll only keep your secrets if you keep mine.”

George was quivering, his hands fisted at his sides and a vein throbbing in his forehead.

“It’s over, brother,” Dom said softly. “Have the good sense to recognize when you’ve been bested.”

“Come, lads,” Papa called out as his men emerged from the woods, “let’s go home.”

Tristan offered her his arm. “Shall we, princess?”

“Yes.” She beamed up at him. “Oh, yes, my love.”

Tristan looked as if he was about to say something,
but before he could speak, they heard George growl behind them, “You thieving bastard. You are
not
getting away with this!”

The next part happened in a blur. Somehow George wrested the pistol from Hucker and was swinging it toward them, for she heard Hucker cry, “Tristan, watch out! He’s got your gun!”

Shoving her aside, Tristan whirled and bent to draw his knife from his boot in one smooth motion. As George steadied his aim, Tristan let the blade fly.

It caught George in the throat.

He dropped the pistol to grab for the knife and wrench it free, sending blood spurting out, coursing down the front of him. He was dead before anyone even reached him.

Tristan stood frozen beside her. Then he said, in a hollow voice, “
Now
it’s over.”

♦ ♦ ♦

S
EVERAL HOURS LATER,
they were all gathered in Hucker’s house. The local authorities had just left. Tristan stood near the window, watching them leave, his face still a rigid mask. Dom sat next to her at a table, and Papa was talking to Hucker.

Zoe was so grateful Papa had been with them. The minute George had perished, Papa had sprung into action, his military training taking over. It was Papa who’d marshaled them all inside, Papa who’d had the local magistrate summoned, Papa who’d explained to the authorities what had happened.

Papa had persuaded the magistrate that Tristan had acted in self-defense. When his testimony was supported by Hucker, the lord’s own man of affairs, the authorities could only accept it. There would still be an inquest, of course, but there was no doubt about the outcome.

And that was partly thanks to Hucker. He must have had a talk with George’s men, for not a one of them said anything to gainsay Papa’s version of events. No doubt they’d figured out that it wouldn’t sit well if it was learned they’d nearly been part of a plot to murder an earl and his daughter, not to mention Lord Rathmoor’s heir and his other hated half brother.

At Papa’s suggestion, Milosh had left before the magistrate was summoned. A Gypsy at the scene would be blamed even if he hadn’t done anything, and no one wanted that. Besides, anything that tied her to her natural parents was to be eradicated.

Because apparently Hucker and Papa had come to an agreement of sorts, before the authorities arrived. Zoe was to continue as Papa’s heir, as Papa’s child. The world would never know her as Hucker’s daughter. Hucker had assured Papa that he could keep the secret—and ensure that George’s men kept the secret as well, to the extent that they knew it—as long as the men all kept their positions under Dom, who was now the new viscount.

Dom had agreed to that readily. As always, Tristan was the brother of his heart; he would do anything for Tristan. Even if it meant keeping Hucker in his employ.

Though Dom didn’t seem to mind that possibility too much. As Hucker walked up to them, Dom rose to offer the man his hand. “Thank you for what you did for us. If you hadn’t stepped in to help his lordship send those men away, who knows how much blood would have been shed? You saw how few supporters we really had.”

Hucker shook his hand. “Didn’t matter. His lordship used fear like a club. Fear don’t gain you loyalty. It just gets people going along with you to stay safe. Once his lordship asked them to risk their lives, they wasn’t going to stick around.”

“Fear doesn’t gain you loyalty—interesting philosophy,” Dom said. “I will keep it in mind now that I am master of Rathmoor Park.”

“About that, m’lord.” Hucker rubbed the back of his neck. “I was thinking, well . . . you’re not going to be wanting me around, what with my connection to George and all that’s gone between us.”

“You’ll always have a place with me,” Dom said, an edge to his voice, “if you want it.”

“Thank you, sir.” Hucker shot Zoe a furtive glance. “But Lord Olivier has offered me a position as his gamekeeper. And I’d like to take it. On account of . . . well . . .”

“I understand.”

Zoe caught her breath. She understood why Papa had done it—he wanted Hucker where he could keep an eye on him. But what did Hucker want?

He turned to her next, his hat in his hand. “Don’t let
Lord Rathmoor’s nasty words sit on your mind, m’lady—your mother weren’t no whore. She was a fine woman. We wanted to marry, and we would have, too, if not for my stealing. I was just so eager on account of your birth coming on, that I took chances I shouldn’t have.”