Love's Peril (Lord Trent Series) (47 page)

What did he want? What should he do?

“My wife,”Tristan Harcourt stated, “is very fond of Miss Teasdale.”

“Mine, too,”Westwood added. “They are affronted that you—their brother—would behave this way. You suffered so dreadfully because of Charles’s illicit affairs, yet you’re behaving in the same dastardly fashion.

Tristan said, “Miss Teasdale saved your life and this is how you thank her?”

John downed his whiskey, poured himself another and downed that, too. He went over to a chair and eased himself into it. He studied the floor, trying to decide the best path.

Finally, he looked over at his brothers and admitted, “I left her because I knew she’d be better off without me.”

“I’m sure she would be,”the earl concurred, “but that ship has sailed, Mr. Sinclair. My wife will not sit idly by and have her niece or nephew born a bastard.”

“And
my
wife,”Tristan fumed, “reminds you that you owe her. She demands you wed Miss Teasdale.”

John sighed, having long since accepted that he and Harriet would never be even.

“I can’t deny Harriet any request,”he grumbled.

“You shouldn’t even think about it,”Tristan warned.

“What is it you’re asking of me?”

“Travel to England with us.”

“Tonight?”

“Yes, on the next tide.”

“Why so fast?”

“The wedding is in three days, and we intend that you arrive before it’s held.”

“To do what?”

“To marry her yourself, you thick oaf,”Tristan snarled. “Now pack a bag so we can get going.”

* * * *

Tristan stared out at the starry sky, enjoying the roll of the waves beneath his feet. He didn’t sail much anymore and hadn’t realized how much he missed it.

He still owned a fleet of ships, but ever since he’d come face to face with The French Terror, he let others captain them. The vessels were heavily fortified, the sailors trained and armed. No pirating brigand would ever take a Harcourt ship by surprise again.

He’d always considered himself to be very brave and probably still was, except that he had occasional nightmares where he was in the deadly swordfight with Jean Pierre. So why was he fussing with the wretched criminal? Why had he listened to Harriet? Why had he shown up at Jean Pierre’s trial? Why had he agreed to drag Jean Pierre to the altar when he clearly didn’t wish to be dragged?

Tristan adored his wife and would do anything for her. It was the sole answer that made any sense.

It was very late, and he’d thought he was the only one who couldn’t sleep. But as he glanced toward the stern, he was irked to see Jean Pierre leaned on the rail and gazing out at the stars as Tristan was doing.

As Tristan noticed him, he noticed Tristan. Their dislike was blatant, but there was keen interest, too. How could there not be?

Tristan couldn’t help but be curious. What drove a man like Jean Pierre? How could he sustain so much animosity? Had he calmed? Was he finished raging against the Sinclairs and Harcourts and their London friends?

Tristan had imagined he and his half-brother would hover in an awkward silence, but Jean Pierre astonished him by speaking.

“You love being out on the water.”

“I do.”

Tristan’s response provided an opening. Jean Pierre strolled over, stopping next to Tristan.

“My courteous reply,”Tristan rudely said, “wasn’t an indication that we should be cordial. I’d rather not converse. I can’t think of a single thing we need to say to one another.”

“It’s a free damn boat. Go to your cabin if you don’t like the company out here on the deck.”

“Aren’t you afraid I might toss you overboard when no one is looking?”

“You can try, but you won’t succeed. I’m always armed. I’ll kill you before you can move.” Jean Pierre tugged on his coat so Tristan glimpsed the butt of a small pistol.

“Maybe I’ll risk it. Maybe I’d feel it was worth it.”

“Raven Hook is sitting on a bench in the shadows behind us. If you get lucky and kill me, he’ll kill you. He won’t bat an eye.”

Tristan peeked over, wondering if Hook was really hiding and watching them. He couldn’t see Hook, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t there.

“Do you always have a nanny guarding your back?”Tristan snidely inquired, intending to needle Jean Pierre, but his half-brother shrugged.

“Always. You should consider it yourself. It beats being attacked in the dead of night and being set adrift on the ocean.”

“Are you sorry for trying to murder me?”

“No.”

“Harriet said you weren’t, but I had to ask. Will you
ever
be sorry?”

“Perhaps if Sarah makes me into a better man, but I wouldn’t count on it. I’m awfully incorrigible.”

“Poor girl—having to marry you.”

“Yes, a very poor girl indeed.”

Jean Pierre turned to the water, and he peered out, ignoring Tristan, but Tristan couldn’t resist studying him.

They were the same height, had the same stature of broad shoulders and long legs. Their feet were braced exactly the same way against the swaying of the ship. Only their hair and eyes were different. Tristan had the dark hair and blue eyes of the Harcourts, while Jean Pierre resembled his scoundrel father, Charles.

“You look just like me,”he muttered.

“I noticed.”

“I hate that.”

“So do I.”

Jean Pierre pulled out a flask and enjoyed a gulp of liquor. He offered the flask to Tristan, and Tristan hesitated, then grabbed it and took a swallow.

“You drank out of it first,”Tristan said when he finished, “so it’s probably not poisoned.”

“No, it’s not poisoned.” Jean Pierre snorted with amusement. “Haven’t you heard? I can’t hurt you. I promised Charles and your wife. My pillaging days are over.”

“I had heard you swore, but are you a man of your word? I wouldn’t suppose so.”

“I’m usually a liar, but Harriet and Charles went to so much trouble on my behalf. It would be churlish to repay them with deceit.”

“I agree.”

“I must pick a new path.”

“What appeals to you?”

“Nothing, really. I relished my prior occupation.”

“I imagine so. I’m told you have a criminal’s heart.”

“I do. I admit it. In comparison to piracy, every other profession seems terribly tepid.”

“There are worse things in the world than tedium and monotony.”

“I can’t think of any.”

“Didn’t you get tired of the constant danger and risk?”

“No, never.”

Jean Pierre gazed out again, and Tristan thought he actually looked sad and a bit lost as if—now that he’d vowed to improve himself—he couldn’t figure out how.

Tristan felt a quiver of sympathy, and when he recognized it for what it was, he shook it away. He wouldn’t empathize with Jean Pierre, wouldn’t pity or commiserate. The man was a crazed killer, and no amount of cordial conversation would change that fact.

“You don’t captain your own ships anymore,”Jean Pierre said.

“Where did you hear that?”

“You’d be amazed at how much I know about you.” He focused on Tristan again. “How can you bear it? Don’t you miss having the waves under your feet?”

“Each and every second.”

“You can take command again. I won’t bother you.”

“Harriet would wring my neck.”

“It’s difficult to go against her, isn’t it? She’s a tiny sprite, but she’s a tyrant.”

“You have no idea,”Tristan mused. “If I’m in the mood to unfurl a sail, she’ll only permit me pleasure jaunts up and down the Thames.”

They both smiled, an exact curving of cheeks and lips that fully clarified their close kinship. They were quiet, sipping from Jean Pierre’s flask, staring out at the stars.

Tristan was perplexed to find himself sharing a companionable moment, and he was awhirl with questions. Why not ask them? What was preventing him? He didn’t expect to see Jean Pierre ever again, so he might not have another chance.

James had been two when their mother deserted them, and Tristan just a baby. They didn’t remember her, and she’d been exorcised from the family history. There’d been no pictures of her in the house, no humorous anecdotes about her quirks and habits.

James always claimed he didn’t care about their mother, why she’d left, why she’d stayed away. But her forsaking them had never rested easily with Tristan. Could Jean Pierre provide beneficial details? Should Tristan seek them?

“I must tell you, John”—Tristan called him by his English name—“that you speak very well, and you’re purportedly a brilliant businessman, yet you were raised on the streets of Paris. How have you thrived? Were you educated?”

“Of course I was educated.” He was incredibly irked by the uncouth query. “My mother was a British countess and my father a British earl. I wasn’t some urchin, begging for bread.”

“Not until you were ten anyway.”

“You’re correct: not until I was ten. Things fell apart that year, but prior to that, I had quite a grand life. We lived with my mother’s various friends, and she was popular with a certain group of people. Writers and composers and the like. I had all sorts of tutors.”

The most important question of all was on the tip of Tristan’s tongue. Yet a voice in his head was crying,
Let it go! After all this time, how can it matter?

Before he could talk himself out of it, he asked, “What was she like?”

“Our mother?”

“Yes. I was a baby when she ran away, so I have no memories of her. I’ve never even seen a picture of her, and I haven’t heard any stories except that she was wickedly immoral.”

John reached into his coat and retrieved a small gold locket. He gave it to Tristan.

“What’s this?”Tristan inquired.

“Open it. There’s a portrait of her inside.”

Tristan stared and stared, the locket feeling hot and heavy, as if it was burning a hole in his skin. For some silly reason, his heart was pounding, and he couldn’t bring himself to look. He tried to hand it back, but John wouldn’t take it.

“You can have it,”he said. “I have a few others as well as a full painting of her in one of the bedrooms at the castle. I can have a copy made and shipped to you if you’d like.”

Tristan was trembling, and he frowned and flicked at the clasp on the locket. It was a dark night, but there was a lamp up by the wheel.

His mother was brown-haired, with merry blue eyes and a striking face. Most disturbingly, she was very young, and it had never occurred to him that she’d been little more than a girl during that tumultuous era. He always viewed her as aged and hardened.

“She was pretty,”he murmured, stunned.

“She was.”

“And young. I never remember that she must have been.”

“When she went to Paris, she was only nineteen.”

Tristan attempted to return the locket again, and John waved him off again. Tristan stuck it in his pocket, and he was suffering the oddest feeling, as if he possessed a magically sinful talisman, as if he’d betrayed his father and James by keeping it.

“What was she like?”he asked again.

“Foolish, imprudent, extremely unhappy. As I reflect on those days, I’ve also decided she was a bit mad, too.”

“Mad…how?”

“She truly thought she could flee her husband with no consequence.”

“Why would she think that?”

“She had a friend who filled her head with wild ideas.”

“She shouldn’t have listened.”

“No, it was her downfall. She met Charles very soon after she arrived in Paris, and she convinced herself that she’d made all the right choices. But you know what he’s like.”

“The veritable definition of a rogue.”

“Charles left her—as he always leaves—but she was a very romantic person. She clung to a deranged notion that he would come back to us. She insisted he would until it became an obsession. When I was a boy, I waited for him—especially after she passed away. I was positive he would rescue me.”

“He never would have.”

“I understand that now, but it was a tad difficult to accept when I was ten.”

“She died loving him?”

“Yes, she went to her grave, whispering his name.”

“Mad…”Tristan snorted.

“Probably.”

Tristan felt as if the world had suddenly tipped off its axis.

He’d spent his life hating his mother, obediently touting his father’s version of her as being cold-blooded and callous. But John’s account was very different.

She’d been stupidly irresponsible, pushed to rash conduct by negligent acquaintances. If she was crazed too, then she’d been unable to make good decisions or pick a wiser path.

What was he to think? The tenets upon which his past was constructed had been plucked away.

“Did she ever tell you why she left us?”

“Because your father was a drunken brute.”

“He was not,”Tristan loyally huffed.

John shrugged. “Believe what you will.”

“He wasn’t!”Tristan declared.

John arched a caustic brow, appearing so confidently certain that Tristan was rattled. Another foundation of his life dropped away.

His father
had
been a drunkard, but Tristan recollected that he’d started in after Florence ran off. Had he tippled heavily all along? Had he been violent toward her?

His father had been a hard man, prone to grabbing his belt when he was angry, and James and Tristan had received their share of whippings. Had their mother received them, too? Tristan and James had been too young to recall.

What was the truth? Who should Tristan believe? His father who’d been so horridly wronged? Or Jean Pierre—a notorious brigand and liar?

“Are you aware that my father was John Peter Harcourt?”Tristan said.

“Yes, I’m aware of that.”

“And you’re John Peter too, although you use the French adaptation. If Florence loathed my father so much, why would she name you after him?”

John was surprised, and he chuckled. “Who told you I was?”

“No one. We just assumed.”

“I’m named after Charles. His actual name is John Peter Charles Frederick Sinclair.”

“Oh.”

Tristan turned to watch the moon sparkle on the rolling waves. He’d been crammed full of unwanted information and couldn’t wait to go below and wake James. His brother would absolutely have a fit when he heard what Tristan had learned.