The Iron Duke (46 page)

Like a cold razor, rage passed over his expression again. “This was in the newssheets?”

“Not that. But there was another caricature. There would be almost every day.”

“No. There wouldn’t.” A statement of determination, ground out through clenched teeth.

“How will you force them to stop? Will you control what rubbish they write, what they report? If you do that, whatever sway you have over them will disappear, along with the power of your name. Because by forcing them, by censoring them, you’ll be no better than the Horde.”

He apparently couldn’t refute that. So he took a different tack. “If it’s rubbish, why do you care? They constantly print rubbish about me.”

“And it’s easy for you not to care! My friends will be outraged. But that won’t protect my job. It won’t protect my family. People who know us will cry out against it at first, but then there will only be embarrassment. And eventually, they won’t want to associate with us. Not with someone who is
that
.”

She flung her hand at the flyer. He crushed it in his fist, face darkening.

“You’re not this. Don’t
ever
say you’re this.”

“I know! But no one else will.
That
will be what they see when they see
me
. They will already think that they know me. All they will know is that hideous . . . thing.”

He raised his fist to his temple, as if struggling for control, and let it drop to his side again. “And that is why you won’t continue with me?”

“Yes.”

“So you’re afraid of these people who mean nothing to you. You’re caring about what people think, even if they’ll turn from you for this rubbish. You’re running in fear from the stupidity of people who aren’t worth your time.” His face closed up, hardened. “You’re a coward.”

Coward.
The word struck like spit on her face. She stared at him with bile in her throat and a knife through her heart. “You don’t tell everyone that you were born with nanoagents.”

“Because it’s not their concern! I don’t fear their reaction.”

“And what concern is it of theirs that the Horde raped my mother? But everyone sees the evidence of it. Everyone has an opinion of it, judges us for it. Unlike you, I don’t have the privilege of hiding that I’m something everyone hates and fears. And so for all of my life, that rubbish is what will be said of me. And if I am with you, it will be said
every
day, by practically
everyone
in England!”

“And I won’t let—”

“You can’t! You can’t control what they
think
!” She approached a scream. Chest heaving, she battled the rage and pain and frustration. She tried again, though still not completely steady. She tried to tell him in a way he could understand. “If I stay with you, Your Grace, you’ll have your possession. But
I’m
the one who will pay for it.”

But she couldn’t pay any more tonight. While he stared at her, Mina turned her back on him and walked out of the cabin—and made it to the ladder before she began to cry.

 

 

Rhys slammed into Scarsdale’s berth and shoved the flyer
into the bounder’s face. “What is this?” he demanded.

In his bunk, Scarsdale weaved up to sitting. When he focused on the flyer, dismay and resignation closed his eyes again. “Where did you get this?”

“Mina. It came out the morning we left London.”

He put a hand to his head. “Good Christ, they’re faster than the newssheets.”

“You saw the newssheet?”

“Everyone does.”

Everyone but Rhys.
Jesus.
All these weeks, everyone had carried around a disgusting image of Mina in their brains, and he hadn’t known to rattle it out. “How do I stop it?”

Brow furrowed, Scarsdale shook his head. “Come again?”

“Who do I pay? Who do I kill?”

The bounder stared at him. “Every bugger in England? You were too quick to destroy
Endeavour
today.”

Christ.
Rhys ripped his hands through his hair. Slammed the flat of his palms against the bulkhead. Nothing helped.

“Captain, you could marry the bearded lady out of a carnival tent. You could pull a woman out of a brothel with warts on her face to match the ones on her arse. Liberé, Lusitanian,
me
. And in the newssheets, they’d make us look beautiful. Not the inspector. They’ll only see the Horde, and a jade whore. Hell, they’ll applaud you for screwing one, because it’ll mean that you’re still fucking them over. But if she’s a nobody—”

“An earl’s daughter isn’t a nobody.”

Mina
wasn’t. Born in a crèche, she still wouldn’t be a nobody. She was everything.

“She’s near enough to one. London society isn’t like Manhattan City. If she’s no one, she can get by—and just coping with what she faces every day is surely more than anyone should have to.”

Every day.
He knew that. Yet he’d called her a coward.

He couldn’t reply. He couldn’t think.

But if he didn’t think of something soon, he was going to lose her.

Looking at the flyer again, Scarsdale sighed. “But this . . . This wouldn’t just come from the people she meets. And those, at least she can change. They can come to know her, or they’ll pass on by and forget her. But the people she doesn’t meet, she can’t change—and those people will see her every day, and they’ll see her like
this
. And soon her family and everything they work for becomes a joke.”

And that would destroy her.

Rhys closed his eyes. “Is there nothing?”

“Maybe she’ll think you’re worth it. Does she love you?”

No.
But he fought bleak truth with the memory of how she always turned to him. Of how she slept, wrapped around him. “She needs me.”

“Ah, yes. Because she hasn’t gotten along for almost thirty years with a family and friends who adore her—and who’d die for her.” Shaking his head, Scarsdale passed the flyer to Rhys. “Even if it was true and she needed you, do you want to make her pay
that
?”

He looked at the paper, but didn’t see the caricature. He saw the ink, smudged and splattered with dried tears. This thing had hurt her. It didn’t matter that the drawing was rubbish. It had still torn her apart.

Rhys wouldn’t let it happen again. On one flyer, or from the people she met every damn day.

“She said I can’t control how they think. So I’ll change it.”

Scarsdale tilted his head consideringly, as if Rhys had made a suggestion rather than stating how it would be. Slowly, he nodded. “As the memory of the Horde fades. And you’ve a big voice. You could persuade them that this would be an unacceptable depiction of
anyone
—not just someone with Horde blood—and do it without singling her out.”

“How long will it take?”

Scarsdale’s sigh said that it would be too long. So Rhys couldn’t have her now. And he wouldn’t stop until he could. But he had to let her go until then.

“I’ll have the men signal Yasmeen.” Rhys opened the door. “She’ll take Mina aboard.”

Taken aback, the bounder said, “I say, captain—you don’t have to send her away
now
.”

“Yes, I do.” Or he wouldn’t be able to.

As it was, stopping himself from begging her to stay would take every bit of control he had.

 

 

The salty mist wafting up from the bow cooled Mina’s face,
washed away the damage the storm of her tears had left. Feeling empty, she stared out over the water, watching the silvery path of reflected moonlight without seeing it.

She wanted so much. She almost hated him for bringing it within reach. For asking her to take it. No—for
telling
her to take it, when she’d never even let herself imagine having him.

Now, imagining it was all that she could do.

The public reaction would be a terrible blow to her parents. And they’d already withstood so much. Yet if Mina chose to stay with Rhys, they’d fight every whisper, every caricature, everything that caused her pain. They’d fight together and stand firm, because they loved her . . . and because she loved him.

And every day would be difficult. But if Rhys loved her, they could fight together, too. Everything she gained would be worth the pain.

But if she was only a possession, only someone he loved shagging . . .

She couldn’t guess. She needed to find out.

With a shuddering breath, she wiped her eyes and stood. At the other end of the ship, the crew worked by the light of the lanterns, tethering
Lady Corsair
to the
Terror
’s stern. Mina climbed down the ladder, bracing herself with every step toward the captain’s cabin—and so was almost prepared when she pushed through the door and saw her valise on the bed, already packed. Rhys, pulling a cigarillo out of a silver case. The awful detachment in his expression.

Mina had plenty of experience pushing away pain. She hadn’t known it could grow so enormous that it pushed away everything else. No room for grief. No room for denial. No room for anything. So big, it left her numb.

She wondered how long it would take to recede. And when it did, how much everything else she felt would begin to hurt, too.

Lifting her gaze from the valise, she said, “So I’m to return on
Lady Corsair
?”

“Yes. I’m done with you.” His gaze raked over her, landing on her face. Thank the blessed stars she couldn’t feel anything—she wouldn’t give anything away. “As you’ve said, continuing into London wouldn’t be worth it. So we’ll end it now.”

“I see.” She forced her reply past an aching throat.

Done with her.
Not forced to part in two weeks by something Mina couldn’t fight, by something that even the Iron Duke couldn’t overcome. Not leaving him, yet holding on to the sweet, impossible knowledge that he still wanted her. Just . . . done with her.

His lids lowered, and he exhaled on a cloud of smoke that made his voice sound hollow and rough. “Unless you’ve changed your mind?”

She’d come so close to doing exactly that, though it would hurt so many people she loved—one of the most difficult decisions of her life. But this hadn’t been difficult for him. He just had to exchange one need for another, and he was rid of her . . . and looking as if he didn’t care whether she lived or died.

She had her answer, then.

Unable to speak, she simply shook her head and collected her valise. His heavy steps sounded behind her as she left the cabin. She was glad he was behind her. The pain wasn’t receding. But other emotions were filling her up now, too, overflowing past ragged edges, as if she’d been ripped up the center. And with one look at her face, he would see them.

Head down, she remained ahead, passing Scarsdale as she walked to the stern. Rhys’s boots went silent on the quarterdeck. Not even escorting her to the platform. Just watching her leave from a distance.

Her head came up at the sound of quick steps, chasing after her. Not heavy enough to be his.

“Mina! Bevins said that you’re—” Andrew broke off when he caught sight of her. “Mina? Are you—”

“Don’t ask.” She barely heard her own hoarse whisper.

Though his face was blurring, she saw his grin. “All right, then, you slatternly wench! Go on back home where you belong, having babies and singing the praises of marriage reform!”

Mina choked. Not a laugh, not a sob. Both. She stepped onto the platform.

“That’s right! We don’t need your type around here. Any
decent
jade would be wearing a skirt . . . so that the crew could have a look as the platform goes up.”

Mina managed a smile for that one, shaking her head. Her smile lasted only as long as the platform rested on the
Terror
’s decks. Lady Corsair met her at the side of the airship, frowning.

She studied Mina for a long second, then sighed. “This is what happens when you go soft. Do you want opium or wine?”

Not soft
, Mina thought. A jagged stone existed where her heart had been. And she didn’t want to feel it. Didn’t want to feel anything, all the way back to London.

“Wine,” she said.

 

 

Rhys saw her laugh, saw her smile. Leaving hadn’t touched
her—or the relief of not being forced to stay with him after they reached London had been stronger than her regret. The platform lifted. The boy turned, his face as stricken as Rhys felt. Andrew’s eyes met his. Rhys recognized the anger and hatred in them. Her brother wanted to kill him for making her leave early.

Too late.
By making her leave, Rhys had killed himself.

Scarsdale’s gaze followed the rise of the platform. “I’m damned sorry, captain.”

Him, too. And he couldn’t watch her go. With a shake of his head, he tossed away the cigarillo. It wasn’t any kind of substitute. Now, the only thing that drove him was having her back—and he’d do that by taking away the fear that she lived under every day. “When we return, I want the name of every man in Parliament. I want to know what he believes, why he believes it. The newsmen, too.”

“You’ll have it.” Scarsdale paused as the clank of the platform docking sounded through the night air. “It might take all of your life.”

That didn’t matter. He didn’t have much of one without her.

Mina was still in a warm, spicy haze when they stopped in Venice three days later, hovering over the tall ruins. Noon arrived.

Fox didn’t.

Near the bow where Mina was sitting, Yasmeen looked over the side, tapping her fingers against the rail . . . though the aviator’s fingers were more like claws when she bent her fingers just so.

Minutes passed. Mina drank out of a bottle. After what seemed a long while, Mr. Pegg said, “Your orders, captain?”

“To wait!” Yasmeen snapped. “He’s just late. And he owes me too much to leave him behind.”