Taming an Impossible Rogue (36 page)

“No he isn’t. I mean he is, but not any longer. And don’t call him that. His name is Keating.”

“You
are
running away, then. You can’t! I have to stop you.”

“I’m not running away. I just need to tell him about the money. About the dowry.”

“Why? What difference does it make?”

“None. It’s … His cousin lied to him. He needs to know. It’s important.” He’d been used, by both Fenton and her parents. And while it didn’t change the outcome, she’d promised to always be honest with him. Even if there were some things—one thing—she could never say to him, she would never lie. Or allow anyone else to lie to him.

The door of Baswich House opened the moment she touched the brass lion-head knocker. Evidently the duke, at least, kept less civilized hours than her own family. Except that the Pryces didn’t feel like her family any longer. Her family resided at The Tantalus Club.

“Good evening, Lady Camille,” the butler intoned.

“Good evening. Is Mr. Blackwood in?”

“He is not, my lady. Would you care to leave him a message?”

Damnation
. The hope that had lightened her heart died away into ashes. She wouldn’t see him again, after all. Already she had only her memory of his light brown eyes, his dark, tousled hair, his mouth on her mouth. “I—”

Abruptly the door opened wider, and the tall, black-haired Duke of Greaves stepped forward. “Come in,” he said, taking her hand and drawing her across the threshold.

“I don’t—that is, I just wanted—”

“You must be a sister,” he interrupted, eyeing Marie.

“This is Lady Marie Pryce, Your Grace,” Camille put in, as her sister gave a wide-eyed curtsy. “She’s making certain I don’t run away.”

“Ah. Keating had something to see to. I don’t know when he’ll return.” The duke cocked his head at her. “You do know he’s leaving tomorrow.”

“Yes. And thank you for sending word that you’d located him. I was quite worried.”

He released her hand to lean back against the foyer wall. At some unseen signal the butler vanished, leaving just the three of them there. “You’re marrying tomorrow, then. Given that you’ve a bodyguard, I at least assume that’s the decision you’ve made.”

“I am. I have. You’re attending, I believe.”

“I am. I’m certain I won’t be welcome, but … he asked me to witness it.”

He
. So Keating wanted someone he trusted to report that she had actually done the deed. Fighting the latest in a hundred bouts with tears, Camille shrugged. “I suppose my odds of completing the ceremony are poor. There are even wagers, I believe.”

“Camille,” her sister hissed, her cheeks turning bright red.

“I believe His Grace has heard of wagering before, Marie.”

“I have indeed.” Brief amusement touched his steely gaze. “But your odds are not poor. They are even. Unless you decline again tomorrow.” Gray eyes studied hers. “Why are you here?”

Because she wanted to see Keating one last time
. “I discovered something at dinner this evening, and I wanted to tell him,” she said aloud.

“Is it something I might pass on to him?”

That was more than likely a poor idea, since a rumor could begin that the Marquis of Fenton had no income of his own, and that he was forced to rely on advances from his almost in-laws to pay his debts. But then, she really didn’t care about rumors.

“The ten thousand pounds Fenton promised Keating upon my wedding. My parents are paying it as part of my dowry.”

“Oh, heavens,” her sister said faintly.

His eyes narrowed. “Well, isn’t that interesting?”

“It doesn’t make much of a difference, but it seemed like something he would want to know. He should know about it, I mean.”

Slowly and to her surprise, the Duke of Greaves smiled. “Yes, he should. I’ll tell him.”

This time she scowled. “Is there something afoot?”

“At this moment? I’m not certain. But you should go, before we begin a whole new set of rumors.”

“Yes. Of course. I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”

“I wouldn’t miss it.”

*   *   *

Keating had never been thankful for an aching head—until tonight. It settled his mood nicely into angry, frustrated, and determined, which was just what he required after spending three hours tracking down a woman who had good reason not to want to be found.

“I told you already, I don’t know where she’s staying,” Lady Graslin said, backing from her morning room. “And you need to leave.”

Stepping forward to match her retreat, Keating drew himself up to his full height. He knew he looked intimidating, and he meant to use that. He was not in the mood for evasion. “I am one minute away from searching every room in this house, Vivienne. She didn’t take a house in London, and she isn’t residing with Lady Voss. That means either that she’s here, or you know where to find her.”

“Keep your voice down,” the viscountess hissed at him. “I have a dinner party upstairs. I allowed you into the house as a courtesy. But I will call for the butler to remove you if you don’t leave now.”

“Forty seconds,” Keating said, unmoving.

“I don’t know why you would think I would have anything to do with Eleanor after such a scandal, anyway. As far as I know, she’s in Europe somewhere.”

“Thirty seconds.”

Her face paling, Vivienne backed away another step. “Your silly numbers won’t do any good, Blackwood. I don’t know where she is. If I did, I would tell you.”

“Then you have twenty seconds to do so.”

“Be reasonable, Blackwood. You can’t behave like an animal any longer. No one will tolerate it.”

Keating blew out his breath. “I can smell her perfume, Vivienne.”

“I have no idea wh—”

“No sense in waiting any longer, then,” he grunted, and pushed past her into the hallway.

“No! You can’t!” She trailed after him, grabbing onto his sleeve. “Miller!”

The butler appeared from the foyer. “My lady?”

“Get this man out of my home immediately!”

Miller put a hand on the back of Keating’s neck. So many people had attempted to push him over the years that he reacted almost without conscious thought. Whipping around, Keating leveled a punch directly into the butler’s nose. With a
whumph
the fellow collapsed.

“Let go of me, or you’re next,” he said, sending a glare at Lady Graslin.

With a shriek she backpedaled, then, skirts flying, she hurried up the stairs. “Graslin! Robert! Husband! We’re to be murdered!”

Every instinct he possessed shouted that Eleanor Howard was here, somewhere very close by. And he would have a damned answer from her tonight. Anything else was simply unacceptable.

Generally the rear of the first floor housed the guest rooms; they were slightly less convenient to the main stairs and the dining rooms than the rooms of the residents. He charged after Lady Graslin, shoved past her stupid, weak-chinned husband, Robert, and headed down the corridor.

As he passed each door he shoved it open, looking inside. A sitting room, the library, the billiards room, then one, two, three empty bedchambers. Clearly no one resided in them, because the sheets had been stripped from the beds and the fireplaces banked. The fourth door, however, was locked.

“Eleanor,” he bellowed, shoving against the heavy oak.

A slight whimper sounded from inside. It was all he needed.

Backing up a step, he kicked open the door. The frame splintered, a now useless key on the interior side clattering to the floor. As he charged in, he caught sight of a green gown vanishing into an attached dressing room.

Keating strode forward, reaching the door as Eleanor came charging out of it, a pistol in her hand. Not slowing, he grabbed the weapon from her and flung it back into the dressing room behind her.

“What do you want?” she shrieked, the very image of a distraught and helpless female.

“Shut up. I have a question for you.”

“You would injure the mother of your son? What sort of monster are you?”

“Who is Arnulf Herrmann?” he asked. “Reichgraf Eberstark?”

She blinked. “What?”

“Who is he?”

“He’s … Eberstark? He’s someone I met after I fled London. A friend.”

“A friend who consoled you after the demise of your husband.”

“Yes. After you killed my husband, you mean.”

“I find it interesting that not only did you reside in his castle for eleven months, but you attended a grand ball eight months after you fled London. You danced with King Friedrich.”

“They were very kind to me in Prussia.”

“I’m more impressed with your considerable charms, seeing that you were able to convince a king to dance with you while you were nearly ready to give birth—and carrying the bastard of the man who murdered your husband.”

“No one knew whose child he was,” she snapped back, glancing toward the room beyond him.

He heard a stifled gasp, then surprised murmurings. “Evidently your host and hostess didn’t know about your child at all,” he commented.

“I—” She snapped her mouth shut again, her face growing gray. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Mr. Blackwood. Leave at once.”

“I want to hear one of two things from you, Eleanor. And you will answer me. I have a list of every house where you’ve resided over the past six years, and every man with whom you were ever seen in public, so consider your answer carefully.”

“Not here, Keating,” she hissed, backing toward the dressing room again.

Oh, so now she was embarrassed. He turned his back on her to glare at the dozen aristocrats now crowded into the room behind him. “Leave.”

“This is my home, Blackwood,” Lord Graslin stated. “I will not have you in—”

Keating hit him. The viscount fell onto his arse with a thud. “I’m not warning you again. Get out.”

“Out of … of the house, or the room?” a long-necked chit whimpered.

Good God
. “The room.”

“I’m sending for Bow Street, I’ll have you know!” Graslin grunted, stumbling for the door ahead of his wife.

That still gave him a few minutes. More than enough time. Stalking forward again, Keating found Eleanor on her hands and knees, digging through a stack of hat boxes. “If you’re looking for the pistol, you’ve missed your chance to use it.”

“How could you?” she wailed, standing to face him again. “You’ve ruined everything!”

“
I’ve
ruined everything?” he repeated, his jaw clenched. “For six years you made me think I had a son. For six years I’ve paid for you to decorate half the beds in Europe. For six years I thought…” He trailed off.

For six years he’d thought that God had selected a punishment for him that would last the rest of his life. Something he could never escape, never turn away from, never, ever forget. And it had all been a lie.

“You deserved to pay,” she snapped back at him. “You killed Edward.”

“Yes, I did. I’ve been thinking about that, you know. How was it that he returned home so early that night?” he asked carefully. She’d built a tale, and he’d believed every word of it. He’d been a fool. But now that he could see the holes, the entire building felt ready to crumble. “After you practically tied me to the bed to make me stay?”

The apprehensive expression on her face relaxed a little, as though she’d let out a breath she’d been holding. “What are you going to do now, then?” she asked in a much more even tone. “Murder me? With all those witnesses? You’ll never be able to claim this was self-defense.”

For a moment he stared at her, stunned. In all the incarnations of his dreams and nightmares, in all the sleepless nights he’d spent in the past six years, he’d been a monster. A man who’d erred so gravely that he deserved nothing but pain, and earned nothing but the illusion of a good life he could never touch. A Tantalus, ever looking for a son and a future just out of sight over the horizon.

“You didn’t need to invent Michael,” he finally said, his tone rough-edged over the breaking bits of his soul. “I would have paid to support you for the remainder of my life.”

“Not as well as I wanted. And I wanted an assurance that you wouldn’t simply change your mind.” She actually looked angry at him. “What now?”

“‘What now?’” he repeated. “If I were the man you took to your bed six years ago, I would likely do something very violent, very nasty, and very final.”

The apprehensiveness touched her gaze again. “And if you weren’t still that man?”

For several hard beats of his heart he held her gaze. And then he turned on his heel and left.

He wondered if Eleanor realized she was still whole and standing thanks to one person. One woman who’d decided to be his friend despite having every reason to avoid him. One woman who’d come so close now to being his that he could barely breathe for thinking about her.

And he wondered what would happen when Camille heard that he didn’t have a son, that if not for his awful reputation and the much better one she would gain by marrying Fenton, her wedding would have been a very different event than the one they had planned.

Chapter Twenty-two

“Where the devil have you been?”

Keating glanced over his shoulder at Adam and then went back to brushing down Amble. “I wanted a ride,” he said, keeping his voice low in deference to the grooms sleeping in the back room. “It’s been a long evening.”

“It’s not evening any longer. I was about to send a query to Bow Street, on the chance that you’d been arrested.”

“If I wanted a wife to nag after me, I would have found someone prettier than you,” Keating commented, appreciating the worry even if he wasn’t in the mood for more conversation.

“There is no one prettier than me. You found Eleanor, I presume?”

“I did.” Keating closed his eyes for a moment. “My head weighs at least five stone, and I’m … I’m tired, Adam. I’ll talk to you later, before I leave.”

“I understand. It’s just that I have a bit of information, but I’m not certain how important it might be. So I’d like to know—if you’ll tell me—do you have a son?”

“No. I don’t. It was all a ruse to gain her more money and my continued cooperation.” He took a breath. For a moment he’d felt free of everything. Free to begin anew. But the more he considered events, the more weight returned to his shoulders. The death of Lord Balthrow, whether Eleanor had thrown her husband to the wolf or not, was still his fault. The drinking and wagering and whoring in which he’d buried himself from his seventeenth to his twenty-first year were still his fault, as was the brawling in which he’d engaged regularly since then.