Pride & Passion (2 page)

Finally she forced herself to meet her father’s eye. “Is there anything other than commodities to recommend our union, Papa?”

Stonebrook flustered and gripped the head of his walking stick with his gloved hand. “Come now, it’s time you gave a serious thought to marriage, Lucy. I won’t live forever, you know, and I would like to meet my maker knowing you’ve been set up in a proper home.”

“With someone to love me? Someone who will give me solace when you are gone?” she asked quietly, which made her father grumble and shift his weight on the seat.

“With someone who will keep you safe and fed, and well in hand,” he growled.

Of course. Well in hand. Someone to control her, to make her live in the confines of polite society, just like her parents had done all her life—like her father continued to do. To Stonebrook Sussex was the ideal candidate for her husband. It didn’t matter that they had not a flicker of attraction, or affection for one another. Why, Lucy still recalled the night Sussex had informed her of the fact that once they were married, there would be no more séances or anything of the like. Then he had kissed her, and she had felt nothing but his firm lips pinched into a straight line as they mashed up against hers. It had not been the stuff of dreams. In fact, his grace had been stiff and rigid as he held her, leading Lucy to believe that he had felt the same thing she had—distaste.

“I’ll have Sussex and his sister to dinner, and you shall see, my dear. His grace will make you a fine husband.”

“And am I to have any say?” she asked.

“No,” her father answered, “after that debacle two weeks ago we cannot trust your judgment. You will marry Sussex just as I wish. And you’ll be happy. You’ll see, my dear. Ah, here we are,” her father said with a great air of relief. “I see the footman is already opening the gates. Good,” her father muttered as he pulled his pocket watch from his waistcoat and flipped the lid open with his thumb.

“Father, we are not done with this conversation, and I am perfectly capable of walking up the drive,” she said, annoyed by the fact her father kept glancing at his watch.

“Nonsense. Won’t be but a minute and I’ll be on my way.”

“I am not a child,” she mumbled as she watched the rivers of drizzle snake down the carriage window. From the corner of her eye, she saw her father turn his head. He was watching her from beneath his bushy white brows, and the thick mutton chops he was so fond of twitched with aggravation. While watching her, his lips thinned, and she could almost hear his thoughts.
Yes, you are, or you wouldn’t have gotten yourself into trouble a fortnight ago.

Trouble, Lucy mentally snorted, wasn’t the beginning of what she’d gotten herself into. She’d been impulsive and headstrong, and yes…childish.

“My dear, I worry for your health is all,” Stonebrook said as the horses pulled the carriage up the sloped drive of Black’s town house. “You’ve not been yourself for months now, and while I know you would wish to have your mama here for these sorts of discussions, surely you must know that Lady Black would listen and help you with anything that might be troubling you. If it is Sussex, then may I suggest you talk with your cousin about it? Isabella will affirm what I’ve always believed, that you and the duke will get on well.”

Lucy hid her grimace. Her father had no idea what had happened all those months ago with Thomas, and she prayed he never would. He would never understand, never credit the notion of love and unbridled passions. That he was fobbing her off onto Isabella was very typical of the sort of parent he had always been.

“Ah, look, there she is now, waiting for us.”

Sitting forward, she saw Isabella standing just inside
the covered alcove of her new home. She was looking radiant, and carried the expression of a woman well-loved—and loved passionately. A bitter tang of envy resonated through Lucy’s soul. She wanted the very same thing. And she would have it.

“Uncle. Lucy,” Isabella called as the footman opened door. “Come in.”

“I daresay I cannot, Lady Black,” her father returned as he ushered Lucy through the door, and out into the chilly drizzle. “But Lady Lucy is more than eager to take up your generous offer.”

Seconds later, Lucy found herself ushered up the steps, and into the warm entrance hall. Billings, the butler, was taking her bonnet and cloak, and Isabella was tugging her along, into the private salon she used to entertain Elizabeth and herself.

“When was it arranged that you would child-mind me for the day?”

Isabella’s lovely eyes widened with feigned shock. “Oh, Lucy, how can you say that?”

“Very easily, you’ve been my companion—I daresay my governess—for the past two weeks. And no doubt my father’s coconspirator in arranging my marriage to the Duke of Sussex.”

Flopping down onto the settee, Isabella began toying with the thick fringe of tassels that decorated a pillow. “Your father wants only the very best for you, and after you…well, after you were poisoned he became consumed with worry. He knows something is wrong, Lucy.”

“I don’t know how. He’s never home, and when he
is, he spends hardly any time engaged in conversation. He’s perpetually buried in his study.”

“Do not be cross with his lordship, Lucy, for he is not the only one who is worried about you. I am, as well.”

Isabella reached for her hand; her smile was kind and filled with sympathy and it made Lucy want to run away and hide. She didn’t want to be pitied. “Is there anything I might do for you, Lucy?”

“Well, you might start talking some sense into my father.”

“About?”

“His dimwitted idea to thrust me onto Sussex as his duchess.”

“Dimwitted? I think it brilliant.”

“You wouldn’t say that if you were the one that was being forced to marry him.”

Isabella glanced at her slyly. “The duke is very handsome, I dare say.”

Lucy glowered. “Handsome is only enticing when you are eighteen and a naive ninny.” Or twelve, and experiencing the pleasures of your first crush, and yes, absolute adoration if she must be honest with herself. She’d never forgotten Gabriel, and the sad, haunted look in his lovely gray eyes that were always a little too sunken from hunger.

“Lucy, handsome is an attribute appealing to any female, of any age.”

“I am afraid my requirements in a husband are rather more lengthy than just being handsome.”

“But you do agree he is handsome?”

“Among other things,” she muttered.

“Like?”

“Boring, staid, proper, passionless—”

Laughing Isabella held up her hand in defeat. “Lucy, you are unfair! How can you surmise the duke passionless? You aren’t even betrothed—well, not formally—ergo you cannot reasonably believe Sussex devoid of…well, the more amorous emotions.”

“Oh, and the lack of a formal betrothal stopped Black from acquainting you with his ‘amorous emotions’?”

“That’s different,” Issy sniffed. “And you know it.”

“No, Issy. That is touché.”

“We are not talking about myself and Black. We are talking about you.”

“Well, then, allow me to inform you of what I desire. I know that I want a man like Black, who looks at me with blistering heat, as your husband does you. I know I want a marriage based on love and trust, and a deep, abiding passion. Like yours. Would you so willingly deprive me of it, Issy, after tasting such bliss for yourself?”

Lowering her head, Lucy watched her cousin nibble her bottom lip. When she looked up, Issy’s eyes were bright. “I would never deny a woman what I have—it is what every young girl, young woman and spinster dreams of—and deserves. But,” Issy cautioned, “I cannot deny that I sense a very good match with Sussex. If you would but give it a chance,” Isabella said, raising her voice to be heard over Lucy’s grumbling.

“Are we finished with this discourse?” Lucy inquired. “I have already spent the better part of the morning with Father on this very topic. I am quite worn
down by it, and any more time spent dwelling upon it shall put me in a mood most foul!”

“Very well. Our discourse on Sussex and his merits as a husband is tabled—for now.”

Lucy curtsied mockingly. “Why thank you, your ladyship. I am so grateful for the reprieve.”

“It will be short-lived, you know. Since having Black, I have become a shameless matchmaker, nearly rabid in my need to see all my loved ones as happy as I am.”

Lucy felt at once happy and envious for her cousin’s obvious adoration of her husband. An adoration that was all the more envious by the knowledge that her husband reciprocated Isabella’s feelings.

“Well, we were cooped up in here all day yesterday. I cannot stomach another day of listening to rain pattering against windowpanes. What shall we do?”

Isabella brightened, although Lucy saw the hesitation in her eyes. Her cousin wasn’t fooled but she was prepared to let it go—for now. “I had Billings send a missive to Elizabeth. We’re going to Sussex House for lunch—and gossip.”

Sussex House.
The duke’s town house. The very place she did not wish to go. But then, she did wish to see Elizabeth again. The drizzle had turned to rain, which in fact sounded very much like icy pellets tinkling against the windows. The sound would drive her to bedlam, and the dreariness of the day would send her into even deeper melancholy. She did not want to be a morose little waif, taking to her bed consumed with grief and sadness. She wanted to be strong and tall, someone Thomas would come back to. Something dif
ferent. She so desperately wanted to be rid of her old life, and become something—
someone
—else. A butterfly emerging from the chrysalis.

“What do you think, Luce?”

Standing, Lucy smiled—a genuine one. “I think it a sound plan. Lunch with Elizabeth is just the thing to bring some sunlight to this horribly dreary day. Besides, you will never believe the juicy tidbits I garnered at the Moorelands’ soiree last night. Positively shocking, and I know you will wish to hear all about it as you sip away on a hot cup of Darjeeling.”

“Oh, do tell,” Isabella said with a tiny pout. “Black hasn’t let me out of the house since our wedding. I’m in great need of a little bit of gossip.”

Lucy could well imagine what sort of activities kept the reclusive Earl of Black and his lady occupied. And while she was the tiniest bit envious that her cousin was married to a most passionate man, the feelings of happiness for Isabella far outweighed her jealousy.

One day she would have the same sort of passion.

“Well, you shall have to wait to learn of it,” she teased.

“Lucy!” Isabella chastised as she followed her out of the salon. “You cannot mean to make me wait until we reach Sussex House to hear the news! You fiend!”

“That is precisely what I mean to do! Thank you, Billings,” Lucy murmured as the butler helped her with her cloak.

“What shall I tell his lordship, your ladyship?”

Isabella slipped into a black velvet wrap, and reached for the bonnet Billings held out to her. “Tell Black that
we shall be at Sussex House. We’re having lunch and indulging in gossip, Billings.”

Billings smiled ruefully before bowing. “Do enjoy, madam. Lady Lucy.”

Lucy shot Isabella a smile. Suddenly the day didn’t seem as miserable as she first thought. And maybe, during the course of lunch and gossip, she might find something useful that would aid her in finding Thomas—and keep him safe from Sussex’s hands.

S
OMETIMES A SOUL
was just born fortunate. Sometimes they weren’t. Adrian York, the Duke of Sussex, firmly believed that. Some men were lucky enough to bring themselves up and change their fortunes.

Himself, he was something of an enigma—and a fraud. He’d been born a damn unfortunate, and then something had happened. The stars and planets had aligned, and something in the cosmos had shone down on him, making him the most fortunate soul that had ever graced the ballrooms of London. He’d been gifted, not once, but twice. Something more than an enigma, he thought with a sardonic smile, but a downright lucky bastard.

He’d given thanks to his maker, had glanced up at the black velvety sky nearly every night and stared at the twinkling stars, wondering why it had been him they’d decided to favor with such fortune and luck. For him, it was always a question of why—the unanswered question leaving behind the bitter taste of guilt in his mouth, when there were so many unfortunate souls who would never experience such blessings. Fortune had shone down upon him, despite his being a fraud, despite knowing that he was wrongfully gifted by the Fates.

For the last twelve years he’d walked with Lady Fortune. Everything he had touched had turned to gold.
The ton admired him, his peers tried to emulate him and the stars had never failed to shine down upon him. That was, until a fortnight ago, when he had trudged down the front steps of Lord Stonebrook’s London town house, utterly defeated and numb after returning a lace handkerchief belonging to Lucy that had been in the possession of a man whom he had witnessed kill another in cold blood.

The memories of that day still ate away at him. He had wanted Lucy to deny any knowledge of the man, to show outrage that the scrap of lace had found its way into the stranger’s possession. But she had not, and it only confirmed what he did not care to think about—that she was not only involved with the Brethren’s enemy, but also that she had an intimate connection with him.

“So cold-blooded,” she had murmured as she looked up from her lap and the piece of lace he had placed in her hands. He had made it clear then that the man was his enemy, and that he would find him—and destroy him. “There is not an ounce of warmth in you,” she said. “No heart. No passion.”

If she only knew how those words pierced him, haunted him during the darkest, coldest hours of the night. He could still see her, sitting on the window bench looking small and sad—and pale. How he had wanted to hold her, to show her that he had just as much passion—probably more so—than she could imagine. But she did not want him. She wanted someone else. His enemy. The enemy of the Brethren Guardians. It was his penance for the years of taking what Fortune had bestowed upon him, taking what he didn’t deserve.

She had vowed to stand between them, her lover and him. To protect Thomas, not him. He had warned her that any attempt to do so might, regretfully, make her an enemy of the Brethren as well, but she hadn’t flinched at that. In fact, she seemed to already know and understand what would happen if she chose to cast her lot in with this shadowy figure he and his two fellow Guardians hunted.

Nothing had ever distracted him from his duties as a Brethren Guardian. Theirs was an ancient order, handed down for generations. In his, Black’s and Alynwick’s blood surged the blood of crusaders, who had kept three sacred relics safe from the world. There was nothing that had ever persuaded him to abandon the cause he had sworn an oath to keep secret, and sacred—until now. Until Lucy.

Damn if he wouldn’t sell his soul—and the relics—to the Devil himself to have Lucy in his bed for just one night. Gone was his honor. His moral compass. She had tied him in knots, and still he allowed her to pull the strings tighter and tighter.

He should be repulsed by the thought of himself as a helpless marionette, moved and manipulated by her slight hands, but he could only smile in mocking amazement. He’d lived his life controlled and ordered, never once allowing the passionate nature that lurked within him to surface. For years he feared someone discovering his secret, and his controlled aura had been the only way to ensure it was kept safe. But now, after all these years of honing the skill, he’d let it all go down to the cesspool.

“Adrian, it is downright frigid in here. How can you bear it?”

His private thoughts shattered, he looked up from his desk, and the journal that lay open, in time to see his sister, Elizabeth, stroll carefully into the room.

“I hadn’t noticed the chill. I’ll stoke the fire.”

She fumbled over the turned leg of a table, her hands outstretched before her, searching for obstacles. Rosie, her liver and white springer spaniel pressed against her, her muzzle nudging Elizabeth’s wrist, steering her away from danger. Tamping down the impulse to go to her and help her, he rose from his chair and turned his back, his attention on the fire.

Elizabeth was a proud woman. And damn stubborn, too. Two traits they shared, inherited from their tyrannical father. Elizabeth was blind, and because of it her pride and stubbornness had grown twofold. Lizzy would not thank him for his help.

“There!” she said, letting out a loud sigh. “We’ve made it, Rosie.” The spaniel gave a little whimper as she struggled up onto the settee. “Poor love, you’re getting as big as a barn.”

Tossing a glance over his shoulder, he couldn’t help but grin at the spectacle the spaniel made as her hind paws scratched and pawed for purchase against the leather. Rosie was having her first litter, and Adrian hoped to the devil her offspring would be as intelligent and trainable as she. It had been his very great desire to breed her and train her offspring to assist the blind, like Rosie assisted his sister.

Rosie finally made it onto the settee and set her head in Lizzy’s lap. Lizzy’s fingers brushed along the dog’s
long ears and a deep sound of contentment—a little growl, really—filled the room. It was followed by the sounds of Rosie burying her head into Lizzy’s damask skirts, and the subtle snore of self-satisfaction.

Lizzy laughed and continued to stroke the dog’s fur. “Now, then, will you cease having the maids move that table, brother? I am forever banging into it.”

“My apologies, Lizzy. But it’s me moving it. I like to watch the moon at night, and the table seems to follow it.”

He turned in time to see his sister’s exasperated expression turn to one of longing. “Oh, the moon. Is it big and fat and hanging low in the sky? I just loved a November full moon.”

This was a side of Lizzy no one saw but him. In society she was put-together, so seemingly in control. She never let on that her sightlessness bothered her, but at home, when they were private, he saw her frustrations, and wiped away the tears of sadness. He, of all people, understood what it was like to live in a world full of cruelty and distaste when one was not, in polite society’s estimation—desirable. Neither he nor his sister had been what their father wanted, and Adrian had been forced to live with that knowledge, to suffer the harsh realities of life. Lizzy, too, had been forced to endure her lot in life, with the same cold, demanding father. Adrian’s childhood shaped him, had given him sympathy for those less fortunate, for those who were born to circumstances beyond their control. He cared for things that no other duke would concern himself with. For the lives of those left to struggle without help.

It was moments like this when he realized his role
in society gave him power, power that he didn’t waste on flaunting his wealth, or using his name to gain admission to clubs, parties and liaisons with beautiful women. No, his power went to protect those who, unlike him, had never been blessed by anything but hard times. When he worked diligently with his cause to emancipate the poor in the East End from their daily suffering, he was not unworthy. Nor a fraud, nor an impostor in this world he had never understood and never wanted.

“Adrian,” Lizzy said, amusement ringing in her voice. “You’re brooding about something. I thought you had outgrown that particular pastime years ago.”

“My apologies, Lizzy. You were saying?”

“The moon. Is it full?”

“No, it is not,” he murmured as he came to sit beside her. “It is just a little crescent.”

“When it’s full, I expect you to invite me into your study and you can describe it to me—
vividly,
” she clarified. “I swear, Adrian, you have no gift for words.”

“No, I do not.”

Perhaps if he did, he could seduce Lucy with them. But words had never come easily. Twelve years ago, he had learned to guard well what words he used. Being too free with his words could cost him everything he loved, his position within the Brethren Guardians, his sister and Lucy.

“Ah, that feels nice,” his sister whispered as she lifted her feet up and toward the heat that was now blazing in the hearth. “I thought my toes might drop off.”

“Well, your tootsies shall be warm momentarily.”

“I wonder how you didn’t feel the chill?”

He was inured to the cold. Growing up, he had forever been cold, and he had strengthened his mind around it. He could not tolerate any weakness in himself. Just like his father could never tolerate any weakness in his son, or daughter.

“Your lack of skill with words aside, you’ve been inordinately quiet of late. Do you care to share your troubles? And don’t deny you have them,” she commanded. “I may not see your sullen expression, but I can sense it. Your melancholy shrouds every room you’ve been in.”

He laughed. “Damn frightening what you can sense.”

Smiling, she titled her head until she found his shoulder, and let her head rest against him while she continued to pet Rosie. “Is it this Brethren business, Adrian? I thought the investigation was getting somewhere.”

“It is getting somewhere—deeper and murkier. Thank God we found the chalice in Wendell Knighton’s office at the museum. How the bastard discovered its hiding place, and the importance of its existence, I would dearly love to know, but it’s unfortunately a secret he took to his grave.”

“Well, at least it’s back in your possession, and Black has the pendant. All three artifacts are safe and sound.”

“But who took them is still a mystery,” he muttered. “However, we have some leads. Black’s wound has healed and he’ll begin searching through the Masonic Lodge for more clues of this mysterious Orpheus, and Alynwick and I have taken over the investigation of the House of Orpheus. Although, being allowed admittance
into the secret club is proving more difficult than either of us had anticipated. Still, Alynwick won’t let it rest.”

“Alynwick,” Lizzy snorted. “You’ll only find him of use if you can keep him out of the bedchambers.”

Frowning, he realized his sister was right. Iain, the Marquis of Alynwick, was a rake, and little induced him to be anything but.

“If Alynwick would put his head into it—and not the one he’s so fond of using—you might discover the identity of Orpheus much faster. Alas, the marquis is selfish and only interested in what amuses him. And it is not, I am afraid, Brethren business. Oh, if only I had been born a male, I would have kicked Alynwick in his rear end, and forced him to remember his oath.”

Smiling, he thought of Elizabeth as a boy—and a Brethren Guardian. She was brave, smart and so disciplined—not to mention she was the eldest child. She would have made an excellent Guardian—better than him—and she certainly would have given the marquis some much needed grief.

“Alas, I am only a poor helpless female, concerned only with fashion and fiction. Speaking of that—Lady Lucy and Lady Black are due here any moment. They’re bringing the new penny dreadfuls.”

Adrian hid his groan. Lucy in his house. He could hardly bear it. But he would, for Elizabeth’s sake. She had very few real friends, and he would never think to deprive her of Isabella and Lucy’s companionship.

“Now, you know that I don’t condone this…this snooping about, but should I question Lucy about anything?”

Elizabeth could not see the surprise on his face, but she sensed it.

“You didn’t think I knew, did you? Adrian, really, she’s my friend. And you’re my brother. I want to help you find the man responsible for stealing the pendant and murdering Mr. Knighton. I want also to keep Lucy out of danger, if indeed she is in danger.”

“She is,” he growled, “believe me, she is.” He thought of the murderer who had been carrying Lucy’s handkerchief. What the devil had she been about giving a man such as that any token of her affection? A strange sense of betrayal filtered through his blood but he shook it off, determined to try to think of other things.

“Why don’t you tell me what it is, so that I may aid both of you?”

He’d kept the secret well-guarded, deep in his heart. It haunted him at night, and he wanted to be purged of it, to forget he had ever discovered it. But was telling his sister the thing to do? Was it betraying Lucy?

“Adrian?” she asked. “There is no need to war with yourself over this. I just thought, well, sometimes secrets are a burden when one must shoulder them alone.”

Suddenly he was speaking, not thinking it through, only knowing he needed this, the ability to talk to another soul who might have some wisdom to impart to him.

“The man who shot Knighton,” he began, recalling the scene a few weeks ago when the pendant, one of the relics the Brethren Guardians were responsible for keeping, went missing, and Isabella’s—now Lady Black’s—former suitor, Knighton, had been found with
it. “He was involved with Orpheus. Hell, he might even
be
Orpheus.”

Orpheus was a rogue Freemason. Adrian was certain. This Orpheus had an uncanny knowledge of the Brethren Guardians. Their existence was a secret. No one but the three of them and their families knew of it. No one knew that the relics they protected even existed. But Orpheus knew. And so had Wendell Knighton. The urge to find and unmask this Orpheus positively seethed and festered inside him. It should have been because of his oath—the liege he owed to the generations of his family who had successfully kept the chalice and the secret of the Brethren Guardians carefully hidden. But it was not. It was the knowledge that Lucy was intimately acquainted with the bastard that ate at him, made him want to discover Orpheus’s identity, and tear at him—destroy him. For what, he had asked himself? And the answer was always there, whispering in his mind.
For taking the woman he loved, for turning her away so that she could not see him, or his need; for making her unable to accept anything he offered her.