The Diabolical Baron (38 page)

Reggie’s murderous rage had nothing in common with the formality of a duel. He was in a fighting
frenzy, beyond judgment or sportsmanship, and
his boasts of fencing skill were founded on
truth. His sword was a whirling dervish of lethal brilliance.

The fight should have been over in seconds—
except that Richard’s blade moved with equal
brilliance, parrying every thrust and creating an im
penetrable defense. His weapon was the rapier of an
earlier century, longer and heavier than the
small sword of his opponent, and the extra length
helped counter his opponent’s greater reach.

Outraged at seeing Caroline’s injured face and her
struggle with Reggie, Richard fought with controlled
virtuosity, icy cold in contrast to his cousin’s mindless
rage. Half a head shorter and years younger than his
furious opponent, he looked like a boyish David fac
ing down Goliath.

When Reggie swept forward in a devastating lunge
that should have ended the fight on the spot, Richard
retaliated with a masterful parry that locked their
blades together, their corded muscles straining while
they were held motionless face-to-face for a few moments of illusory peace.

Richard said between gasping breaths, “You wanted
to know what makes me angry? Now you have found
out. I would have stopped you from hurting any
woman, but because it was Caroline, I should kill you.”

“Are you the lover the ice maiden awaited? How de
lightful! Then we must be fighting about who will
have the privilege of first cuckolding Radford.”

The suggestive laugh that accompanied the remark
was the final straw—Richard exploded in an angry
rush of thrusts and feints that slashed his cousin’s
right forearm and forced him into a standing suit of
fifteenth-century armor. It fell with a resounding
crash, the helmet and gauntlets bouncing noisily away.

Caroline whirled and ran to the door, hoping to find
someone who could stop the battle before it was too
late. Her flight drove her into Jason’s broad chest as he
rushed in with Jessica right behind him. “Please,” she
gasped, “stop them!”

Jason’s experienced eye took the scene in at a glance.
Anyone interfering would destroy the precarious bal
ance between the two duelists and run the risk of
death himself.

He put an arm around Caroline to re
strain her, reaching his other arm out to block Jessica’s
precipitate entrance to the room. “Nothing can be
done.  Stay back here out of the way.”

When Caroline frantically tried to tear away, he
shook her and said fiercely, “Control yourself! If you
distract your captain, you may be the death of him.”

As the three of them watched frozen in their position by the door, Jason found himself detachedly ad
miring the skill of the antagonists. It was like an exotic
dance, the flickering blades darting and retreating in
graceful patterns that concealed the lethal conse
quences of a moment’s error.

He had seen Davenport fight at one of the fashionable fencing salons and knew
him to be one of the finest swordsmen in England. But
Dalton was at least his match, and was slowly driving
him back across the room.

Reggie’s rage was fading as he fought desperately to
survive, knowing instinctively that the deadly menace
in his opponent’s eyes had been seen by few other
men, and those few were now dead.

He’d forgotten
that the mild-mannered man he had provoked was a
warrior, honed by years of fighting. The casual malice
of Reggie’s remark about Caroline had unleashed a
demon of ferocity, and the death he had flirted with for
years was on him. His blood and strength were ebbing
from the slash on his arm, and the hilt of the sword
was getting slippery.

He gathered his fading strength into one last desper
ate attack, one he knew doomed to failure. With a
snakelike movement too fast for the eye to follow, Dal
ton broke his attack and administered a wrenching
blow that twisted the small sword from his grip and
left his right wrist and hand numb.

The rapier’s blade was at Reggie’s throat, as cold and steely gray as the
merciless eyes that looked down its length. Reggie
thought, with brief wistfulness, of the life that might
have been his had he chosen differently, and prepared
to die.

The berserker rage that had driven Richard for the last half of the fight burned out when he was within a second of slitting his cousin’s throat. Anger had been
simmering inside him since he had heard why his par
ents left England.

But that crime had been ably
avenged by his father and had nothing to do with this
man whose pale blue eyes were watching him steadily
and without fear. Nor could any sword touch the
grandfather who had disowned his own son.

The fury triggered by Reggie’s actions had its roots
far in the past. While his cousin would doubtless come
to a bad end, he did not deserve to die for what he had done tonight.

But though Richard could not kill him in
cold blood, neither could he give Wargrave into his hands.

As Richard’s newfound clarity of vision swept away
his ghosts, he released the anger that had driven him and accepted the future he had tried to refuse. It was
not chance that had brought him to Wargrave, and he could no longer deny the responsibilities laid on him.

His breath came in great wrenching gasps from the
exertion of the battle, but his voice resonated through
the room as he said, “There are two important things
you don’t know about me. One is that my father was a
fencing master, and would never have let his son dis
grace his teaching. And the other”—he drew a deep
breath before he made the step from which there
would be no turning back—”he was Julius Daven
port.”

The room had the same tense silence that falls when
a bomb is ticking its way to explosion. Radford softly
exclaimed, “Of course!” as one of the women inhaled
sharply in shock.

Richard held his cousin’s eye until, suddenly and in
explicably, Reggie burst into laughter. Richard with
drew the sword so there would be no accidental im
paling, then dropped the point to the floor when it
became clear that Reggie’s amusement was genuine,
not a ploy.

When his mirth subsided, he said, “If you’d become angry e
arlier, cousin, I might have recognized you as a Davenport. You have the family temper.”

Richard’s voice was dry as he said, “You
can judge from the results why I prefer to hang on to
it.”

“Very true. I have always assumed someone would
eventually murder me, but I never thought it would be
over a stolen kiss.”

Richard’s voice was flinty. “And the marks on her
face?”

“Not made by me. It is my policy to persuade ladies
by the power of my kisses. Beating them senseless is
poor sport.”

Still watching his cousin, Richard asked, “Is he
telling the truth, Caroline?”

“Yes.”

Radford wouldn’t have struck her, so it must have been her father. Disturbed by the odd note
in her voice, he glanced sharply over, then turned back
to Reggie to settle things quickly. “Must I watch my
back as long as you are alive?”

Reggie looked offended. “Of course not. It would
not be at all the thing to attempt to murder the head of
the family.”

At Richard’s pained expression, he said, “Like it or
not, that is what the Earl of Wargrave is, my lord cousin. A stab in the back is not my style, and I have serious doubts about my abil
ity to best you in a fair fight. Did your father ever run a
shooting gallery?”

At Richard’s nod, Reggie sighed dramatically.  “Then there is no help for it. I shall not be able to kill you. Besides, if I
tried and failed, you would almost certainly cut off my
allowance.”

Richard shook his head in disbelief, too drained to
deal with his cousin’s frivolities. “You’d best get that
arm taken care of.” He untied his loosened cravat for a bandage, only to have Jessica take it from him.

“I’ll bind it up—I have had plenty of experience.
Brace yourself, Mr. Davenport, I think this is going to
hurt a lot.”

Reggie’s dark face had a look of comic resignation as
she started to remove his jacket preparatory to ban
daging his arm. Clearly she was making no particular
effort to minimize the pain.

Richard turned and slowly walked to the doorway
where Jason and Caroline still stood. He was limping
heavily, his bad leg wrenched by the fall when Reggie
first attacked him.

Jason spoke first, clapping a
hand on his left shoulder. “I
should have known you sooner. Your father would
sometimes give me rides on his horse when he found
me wandering around the home wood. I was only five
when he left, but I have always remembered him
fondly.”

Richard smiled briefly at the tribute, but his eyes
were fixed on Caroline. She had had a difficult
evening—starting as the reluctant guest of honor and
going on to be bullied, beaten, and mauled. She had
broken an engagement, been terrified that her beloved
would be killed, and now found that that same lover was not who she thought.

Confused, angry, and hurt,
for the first time in her life Caroline Hanscombe smol
dered.

“Caro?” Richard asked tentatively.

“There is no need for explanations, my lord,” she
said with awful precision. “A man of your rank need not think anything of making a May game of foolish
girls. There is little other sport in the country at this
season.”

Richard glanced at Jason. “If you will excuse us, I must talk to my fiancée or this engagement may be over before it begins.”

“Quite right, my lord,” she said through gritted
teeth. “I have broken one engagement this evening
and am quite capable of breaking another.”

The expression on her face was grim when he led
her toward the far corner of the room—but she did not have to be forced to accompany him.

Jason looked after the pair in bemusement.  “Do
you think he can talk her around?”

Her nursing chores over, Jessica came to his side and replied, “I have no doubt whatsoever. She just needs to be
reassured a bit. She’s had too many shocks
tonight.” Her gaze moved to Reggie. “Can you
make it back to Wargrave Park, or should we make up a
bed for you here?”

“I shall be quite all right. I have returned home in far
worse case than this. Radford, is there an exit I can use
without alarming your guests unduly?”

“Down the stairs and around to the
left. At the end of the passage is a door that will let you
out near the stables. You’re sure you’re all right?”

Reggie gave a sardonic smile. “I’m sorry to crush your hopes, but I’ll be per
fectly sound in two or three days.”

“You’ve a wicked tongue on you, Davenport.”

“It will be
the death of me yet. But not tonight,” With a self-mocking smile, he
turned and disappeared down the staircase.

Jessica shook her head after he left. “What an impos
sible man! But I’m glad Richard didn’t kill him.”

“Quite right. It might have ruined the party still
going on beneath our feet. I propose we finish the
evening with no announcements whatsoever. Our
mystified guests can learn what happened from the
Gazette.
”

He reached out his arms and pulled her close. She
gave a sigh of contentment and let her head rest
against his shoulder for a moment while he stroked
her back and dropped a light kiss on the top of her
head.

He felt like a settled married man. He felt won
derful.

Jessica stepped back and shot an inscrutable green
glance up through her lashes, then concentrated on
straightening a nonexistent wrinkle in Jason’s neck
cloth. Her voice was muffled as she said, “I would like
to ask you something before we go back downstairs.”

“Yes?”

“Well, in spite of my rather lurid reputation, I have
actually behaved with considerable propriety. The
most outré thing I have ever done was kiss a man I
wasn’t married to.”