What A Rogue Wants (28 page)

“
Then what do you propose
we do? Stratmore isn’t confessing, and I’d venture to say the
threat of death won’t even break the man.”

“
I’d have to agree,”
Edward said thoughtfully. “So we won’t threaten
him
. We’ll strike at the one person
he cares about.”

“
You can’t mean to use…”
Gravenhurst began, but got no more than that out before Grey’s fist
crashed into this brother’s nose, sending him sprawling backward
onto the floor with blood gushing down his face.

White fury consumed Grey as he towered
over his brother. “You’ll use Madelaine to break her father over my
dead body.”

Edward glowered up at Grey while
searching for a linen square. Growling when he found his pockets
empty, he snatched the rumpled cravat that Gravenhurst shoved at
him. After the bleeding of his nose was stopped, he lowered the
blood-soaked cravat, his eyes narrowing into dark, green slits. “Am
I to take it,” he said, in a voice muffled by his blood-clogged
nose, “that you care for the lady?”

“
Take it any damn way you
please,” Grey snarled, unable to bring his temper down. “You won’t
use her. I won’t stand for it.”

Shrugging off Gravenhurst’s help,
Edward stood and dusted himself off. “Need I remind you that you
vowed to serve the king over all others?”

“
You need not,” Grey said.
His father would be damned disappointed if Grey failed at being a
spy on his very first assignment. His stomach burned with the
poison of what he had to do. He could not fail the king,
and
he had to somehow
protect Madelaine. “Whatever you have in mind for Lady Madelaine,
I’ll be the one to do it.”

“
You’re sure?” Edward’s
eyes lost their hard edge, softening now with sympathy. “Wouldn’t
it be easier for you to let Gravenhurst or myself handle the lady?
If what I have in mind doesn’t work, then we’ll have to use her,
deceive her, and maybe even put her life in danger.”

He recoiled at his brother’s
suggestion. “I’ll do it,” he said, determined to protect Madelaine
from his brother, her father, and whoever else might be lurking out
there. He’d promised to protect her, and that was one promise he’d
keep, no matter what he had to do not to break it. He may have
given the king his vow, but he’d given Madelaine his
heart.

WITH THE QUEEN GONE FROM
the castle for the last month life should have been perfect for
Madelaine. Yet despite, her solid friendship with Elizabeth and
having as much time to slip away and practice archery as one could
hope for, unhappiness shrouded each day that Grey failed to return.
The least he could have done,
if
he had a sensitive bone in his body, was to write
a letter and let them know he’d arrived home safely.

Maybe he was not writing because he’d
decided that courting her was more trouble than she was worth, but
he should be kind enough to send word to his sister. Elizabeth had
almost died for goodness sake. Didn’t the man know worry could put
a person back in their sick bed? Convincing herself she had to
write Grey for Elizabeth’s sake, Madelaine put pen to paper and
demanded he write to his sister immediately if he wasn’t planning
on coming back before they were all old and gray.

She reread the letter when
she was done. It was good. Commanding without being harsh,
and
she’d managed to
resist mentioning how much she missed him nor had she reminded him
of his promise to come back for her. She folded the letter to seal
it, but her backbone dissolved as she thought of never seeing Grey
again.

What good would being
stoic do her if he married another? Carefully, she opened the
letter, dipped her quill in ink and penned one last line.
I do miss you terribly, in case you doubt my
feelings
. She sealed the letter and took
it to be sent before she could reconsider how desperate the last
line probably made her seem.

She didn’t expect the letter to make
Grey magically appear, though she half hoped it would, so several
days later when Elizabeth confided that her eldest brother Edward
was coming to collect her and take her home―as it had been decided
by the family that Court life might be too stressful on someone
recovering from near death―Madelaine had to hurry from the room
before Elizabeth saw the tears threatening to spill
over.

Once in the safety of her room,
Madelaine dashed the tears away as she paced back and forth. Just
because Grey wasn’t coming did not mean he didn’t still want to
court her. Perhaps, something had arisen at home that required his
attention or maybe Elizabeth’s eldest brother simply wanted to be
the one to collect Elizabeth since he’d not seen her in so
long.

There was no point in believing the
worst, until the worst was confirmed. And if it was? She flopped
down on her bed with a groan. If Grey had changed his mind about
her, she would simply have to carry on. Exactly how, escaped her at
the moment, since she was quite certain she had fallen in love with
him.

Two days later, Madelaine was helping
Elizabeth pack her last few things when a knock resounded at the
door followed by a gruff, “Elizabeth. Might I enter?”

A broad smile spread across
Elizabeth’s face. She dropped the shawl she’d been folding and
gripped Madelaine’s arm. “That’s Edward. Perhaps Grey has come as
well!”

Despite Madelaine’s best intentions
not to get her hopes up, the emotion swelled inside her. Elizabeth
swung open the door, and Madelaine barely managed to gulp back her
cry of joy. Instinctually, she moved toward Grey, but stopped when
his gaze locked on her. She’d seen that frigid look before when
he’d sized up Lord Thorton, but this was worse than Grey’s
murderous gaze of anger. He stared at her as if he’d never seen her
before, as if she were a stranger.

“
What’s happened?” She
didn’t care that it wasn’t her place to demand any answers. Grey
blinked, his expression changing from cold to warm, as he seemed to
so easily do. He didn’t fool her. A haggardness of body and spirit
clung to him. It wasn’t just the beard and blood-shot eyes that
made her think so. He was different. There was a hardness to his
eyes that he’d not possessed a month ago.

“
Let’s all go into the
chamber,” Elizabeth’s eldest brother suggested.

Elizabeth pulled Madelaine back inside
with her, and they settled on the bed. The men didn’t sit, but
loomed over them, until finally Elizabeth’s eldest brother offered
Madelaine a cursory nod. “I’m the Duke―” Grey’s brother abruptly
stopped his introduction, his face whitening. “You must be Lady
Madelaine?”

Madelaine nodded, but before she could
say anything else, Elizabeth scrambled from the bed and stood
toe-to-toe with her eldest brother. “What do you mean introducing
yourself as a duke?”

“
You bloody clod,” Grey
snarled at his brother as he took Elizabeth by the arm. It almost
seemed he intended to hold her up. Madelaine furrowed her brow.
“Liz,” Grey said in a soft voice. “Mother and Father are
dead.”

“
What?” Elizabeth
whispered. The confusion clouding her face mirrored Madelaine’s
feelings.

“
Dead,” Grey tried again
with such heartbreaking gentleness that Madelaine’s nose and throat
burned with the sudden need to cry.

“
I don’t believe you.”
Elizabeth’s voice was raspy.

When her declaration was met by
silence, she repeated herself louder. “I don’t believe you,” she
screeched, her eyes turning wild, her fingers clawing at her
brother’s arms for release.

Madelaine couldn’t move. The scene
transfixed her in horror to the bed. Politeness demanded she
quietly exit, but she could not make her legs work nor bring
herself to abandon Elizabeth and Grey for the sake of
politeness.

“
They are dead,” Grey
reiterated.

“
You’re lying,” Elizabeth
accused, even as tears streamed down her face. “Why are you lying?”
Her voice rose to a higher pitch. Grey gazed at Madelaine. The
helplessness in his eyes broke her heart. She stood, intent on
taking Elizabeth from him and holding her friend gently to try to
make her hear the truth, but Elizabeth’s brother, The Duke of
Ashdon, stepped forward and took Elizabeth from Grey.

Madelaine watched in mute horror while
His Grace tried for several minutes to rationalize with Elizabeth,
but her protests grew in volume until she was screaming. Finally,
he shook her. She could have sworn Elizabeth’s teeth rattled
together with each violent shake of her body.

“
Stop it.” Madelaine
gripped the duke’s arm. “You’ll hurt her. Please.” She tugged at
the man’s thick, corded arms until he released his
sister.

Elizabeth moaned incoherently as
Madelaine struggled to get her to the bed. In an instant, Grey was
at Elizabeth’s other side and helped Madelaine to guide her to sit.
“What happened?” she asked over Elizabeth’s wracking
sobs.

Either her imagination was running
wild, or Grey was really assessing her as he appeared to be doing.
But for what purpose? Were his parents’ deaths horrific? Did he
think she too might lose control? Finally, he spoke, his words
coming out as if each had been ripped from his throat. “A carriage
accident. They had a bad wheel. It broke and the carriage tumbled
down an embankment and killed them both.”

At his pronouncement, Elizabeth’s head
lulled backward and her eyes fluttered closed. The sudden silence
of the room seemed strange after the deafening noise of Elizabeth’s
crying. With Grey’s help, Madelaine laid Elizabeth on the bed. Once
Madelaine had Elizabeth situated, she turned and caught Grey
staring at her. The unveiled pain and anguish in his eyes tore at
her. She reached toward him to soothe him, but he flinched away, as
if he could not bear her touch.

She understood the pain of losing a
parent, better than most, but he seemed more than pained, seething
with an anger that was directed at her. Maybe, it was simply the
shock of everything, yet she felt very out of place, very much an
intruder. She wrung her hands together. She didn’t want to leave
Grey or Elizabeth, but she didn’t feel welcome here. “Maybe I had
better go to my own room,” she said, moving to leave.

In a flash, Grey stood between her and
the door. “There’s something I have to tell you.”

She would have been relieved that he’d
stopped her, but his foreboding tone scared her, and sent shivers
of wariness over her skin. “What is it?”

Grey shot his brother a warning look
to remind him to keep to their agreement. If the price of
protecting Madelaine was that she might later hate him, he’d gladly
pay the ransom. He did not want to lie to her, to use her as a
pawn, but he’d given his word to protect the king, and he’d keep
it. He glanced at his sister who was stirring on the bed. “We
cannot speak here.”

Madelaine followed his gaze. “Where
then?”

“
The tower. Your father is
being kept there.”

“
What?” All color leeched
from her face, making her appear frail and frightened. He hated
that he was causing her fear, but there was simply no
choice.

“
Come.” He took her by the
elbow to lead her out the door. She opened her mouth to ask him a
question, but he shook his head and handed her cape to her. “Keep
your questions for now and put this on.” She seemed as if she would
argue, but after a moment, she took the cape and shrugged it
on.

His heart lurched. Even in drab wool,
she was beautiful. “Raise the hood,” he commanded as he closed the
door to his sister’s bedroom without a backward glance. Edward
would be waiting to hear a report, giving Grey just enough time to
play the sympathetic suitor, take Madelaine to her father, and peer
through the peephole in the room where they kept him to listen and
see if Stratmore let anything slip or made a confession.
Gravenhurst would see Liz safely home, far away from any possible
taint of scandal.

Grey was still angry with his brother
and Gravenhurst, though they only did what they must to protect the
king as well as themselves. And so would he. He would protect the
king, but God help him, he would protect Madelaine as well, if it
were possible.

He glanced at her as they walked
silently through the halls. She turned her head enough that he
could see her face drawn with worry. Did she sense his stare? He
grasped her arm to stop her and fought back the fear that someone
else would see her and then question what she was doing. At this
late hour, his fear was no doubt unfounded, yet it choked off his
air just the same.