Chapter 14
Edward stared stupidly at the sight before him. He touched Helen’s forehead, shocked at how hot she was. She was burning up, worse than a fever. He called her name, but she didn’t respond in any way. He squeezed her hand and then tapped her lightly on the face. “Wake up, you blackmailing little fool.”
Nothing. But she was alive. In any other situation, with any other woman, the assumption would be that she’d fainted, or worse, been struck by an illness so violent that it gave her a fever and caused her to lose consciousness within moments.
Don’t be obtuse.
And this was no ordinary woman. This was the bane of his existence. He’d seen…something, although he wasn’t sure he had any rational explanation. As he crouched beside the two unconscious bodies, he replayed the last few moments in his mind. His blackmailer had gotten the information she wanted. She’d touched Black on purpose, and her touch harmed him. And when Edward touched her, her skin had been hot and sent a flash of painful heat through him. She’d knocked Roland Black unconscious.
He heard laughter outside the door and leaped up, dashing over and turning the lock just before someone tried the handle. After a few moments, they moved on, Edward’s heart hammering in his chest.
He couldn’t imagine what people would say if they walked in at this exact moment—him standing over two bodies. “Wait a moment,” he muttered to himself as the answer came to him. Why the hell was he locking himself in here with them? He had a legitimate option of opening the door and walking away. If he were lucky, Black would say Helen had attacked him, and Black would send her to Newgate for attempted murder, solving his problem for him. Good riddance to her.
He went back over to Black, eyeing him thoroughly to make sure he was, in fact, still alive and then grabbed him under the arms, dragging him to the couch. The man weighed a ton. He placed Black upright on the couch.
Now he could leave. So why the hell was he just standing there, staring at his blackmailer’s pert features? What if he left her here and she came to harm when Black woke up? He couldn’t leave an unconscious woman. He had the peculiar urge to laugh. Was he actually going to go out of his way to help his blackmailer? He was certifiable.
He looked at the window, wondering if he could get himself and Helen out of here. Edward opened the window and peered out, the street and a long line of carriages visible a few hundred yards away. They were on the ground floor.
Edward bent down, going to one knee so he could scoop her up into his arms. And he froze. This was the moment of decision. This action was irrevocable. A way out was before him, and he was going to rescue her.
Do be smarter than this.
But he wanted answers. If he left her here, he wouldn’t get them. And she still had the diary, after all. He had to have that blasted diary. Decision made, he gathered Miss Foster in his arms, surprised she was so…portable. The force of her personality and the strength coursing through her was so magnificent, that he couldn’t believe she was actually light enough for him to carry down the street. Getting out the window proved awkward, keeping them both from banging their heads on the window frame proved impossible, and Edward could already feel a knot forming on the side of his head.
She shivered in the cold air, but otherwise gave no indication of waking up as he shifted her and set off across the lawn. He felt as if he were being watched, every sense he had attuned to the possibility of someone interrupting their escape. If he had been forced to describe his emotions at that moment, he would have been unable to. A curious mixture of anger and excitement, confusion and severely misplaced lust. It all conspired to make him feel alive and heightened.
He slowed his pace as he approached the carriages, shifting Helen so that he was carrying her in what he thought might be a slightly more dignified manner. Assuming such a thing was possible. He stood up straight, his expression imperious as he became visible to a waiting coachman.
The coachman’s eyes widened in surprise, his gaze flicking from Helen to Edward and back again.
“The Duke of Somervale’s carriage. Is it in front of you or behind?”
The man blinked in surprise. His accent was thick. “I’m not sure, sir. I could…go check?”
“I would be grateful,” Edward said, “and I would be even more grateful if you didn’t say anything about…this.”
The man nodded. “I imagine you would, sir.” His accent was thick and Northern. He jerked his head towards Helen. “I had a woman like that once. Once she started drinking, there was no stopping her until she was too soused to lift the cup.”
The Duke smiled tightly. “Quite.”
“She’s a beauty. I can see why you’d put up with it. The coachman’s gaze lingered on Helen’s form, and Edward felt a primal urge to snarl at the man like an animal, stopping himself by sheer force of will.
He turned, blocking the man’s gaze, feeling his pulse pound as he reined in his temper.
“It’s quite cold out here. I’ll just put her in the carriage to wait,” Edward said, voice shaking from the effort to remain pleasant. The coachman opened the door, moving out of the way as Edward shifted Helen onto the seat. He put her down as carefully as he could, frowning at how pale she was.
“Here,” Edward said, and he pulled out a pound coin. “For your troubles.” The man nodded, taking the money eagerly. The coachman took off, weaving between the carriages as he searched for Edward’s carriage.
“Bloody hell!” he said, so loudly a horse whinnied in response. He’d covered his coat of arms. It would be impossible for the man to recognize his carriage.
How could he have forgotten? Fury arced through him, and various violent options appeared in his mind. From shouting at the coachman, to driving his fist into the metal carriage, to opening that carriage door and shaking Helen awake. He was so angry he didn‘t trust himself. And he wasn’t even sure who he was angry at. Her, of course. She was responsible for all of this. Taking his money, forcing him to bring her here, to be a party to a crime she committed. But mostly he was furious at himself. For…God, he could barely put it into words. For using him, for rattling his existence and the carefully ordered life he lived. For introducing this excitement and emotion into his life and threatening everything he knew. She was annihilating his life.
He hadn’t lost his temper since he was eight years old. Hadn’t lashed out and acted like an undisciplined animal since he learned the difference between being a man and being a monster.
Well, since the day his father had broken his mother’s arm.
That was the day he’d decided what type of man he was. He remembered it as the clearest, purest moment in his entire life: my father is a monster, and I won’t be like that. It didn’t matter how angry he was, or even how much he had been wronged. There was a way to behave, and that was the end of it. It didn’t matter how provoked one was, there were no exceptions. Yes, this situation challenged him. It made him want to lose control and do any number of things. But she’d already stripped away his birth; he’d be damned if he’d let her take his identity too. That was all there was to it. It was as simple as that. He rolled his shoulders, trying to ease the tension, and smoothed his hair which he had disheveled during his mad pacing.
After several minutes, the coachman came back, out of breath from running up and down the carriage line. “I found it.”
“Did you? I forgot to mention that the crest was covered.”
He huffed. “Oh, that’s alright. Jimmy and I have met at the pub a time or two.”
It shouldn’t come as a surprise to him that the coachmen knew each other. Servants gossiped.
“He’s stuck at the back. It’ll be a minute.”
Edward gave the man another coin as they waited for his carriage to get out of line and make its way to them. While they waited, the coachman began to tell him all about Big Sally, his former love who’d loved her gin more than her man.
Edward stared at the lanterns in the driveway as the coachman talked
, listening almost despite himself as the details of the coachman and Big Sally’s courtship unfolded. His lip twitched, and it felt like the inside of his chest itched. He cleared his throat, felt the peculiar sensation inside his chest increasing. He distinctly heard the words ‘slap and tickle’. And that was when he started to laugh.