“Excellent. Thank you, sir,” said Rafael. He gave Mr. Pimberton a brief salute, took one last look at a now-stirring and moaning Johnny Tregonnet, and took his leave. As he walked out of the inn, he saw Damien riding his rawboned bay, coming from the opposite direction. “You will have an interesting time of it, brother,” he said quietly.
He now had no regrets that he’d threatened Johnny Tregonnet at the ball rather than pretending to be interested in joining his club. He was alert, ready, for he knew the Ram would have to do something.
22
Love is often a consequence of marriage.
—MOLIÈRE
Victoria sat patiently on the edge of Rafael’s bunk in the captain’s cabin, listening to Blick give his opinion to Rafael. “There’s not a thing I can do to prevent the muscles going into spasm. However, when it happens, there’s no reason for Victoria to have to endure the pain for so very long. Your idea of the hot towels is a good one, but still it takes time to get the muscles back under control.”
Rafael smiled at his wife. “Didn’t I tell you he would come up with something to help? Have you got an esoteric plant from, say, the southern coast of China?”
“Sorry, the West Indies. What I propose is that we use two plants together—the cheddah and the cawapate, both of which we can replenish from Martinique. Victoria, with the cheddah you will heat the leaves and use them as a compress. The cawapate you’ll use in tea. Now, there’s also another use for the cheddah. If Rafael here becomes a thorn in your side, you can mix some cheddah in his tea and he will, after some hours, end up with the most pristine innards imaginable.”
Rafael groaned. “I believe I will be the one to oversee the preparation of your concoctions, Blick.”
“Thank you,” Victoria said, giving Blick her hand as he rose to take his leave.
“My pleasure.” Blick took her slender fingers and smiled down at her. “It is also my pleasure to see Rafael so content. He’s traveled the seas, enjoyed enough adventure and danger for three men, and emerged whole-hide. He is fortunate, yes indeed. As are you, my dear. He is also a strong, honorable, kind man. I will see both of you at dinner.”
“I am content, Victoria,” said Rafael.
“Don’t be content yet, not until you tell me where you—the strong, honorable, kind man—were, and what you were doing. All of it now, Rafael.”
“You’re a hard woman, Victoria. Nothing for it, eh? Very well, I was involved in bringing things to a head. Hopefully. I found a note to Damien from Johnny Tregonnet—it was in the hidden passageway, in Damien’s black cloak.”
She nodded sadly. “Unfortunately, I’m not really surprised. So Damien is really involved with the Hellfire group?”
“Yes, he is.” Rafael sighed, and plowed his fingers through his hair. Hair on end, he proceeded to pour himself a brandy. “The group is headed by a man who calls himself the Ram. I can name you every one of the members; I could have done that at the ball after reacquainting myself with all the more objectionable fellows of my boyhood. I imagine you could have done the same. However, dammit, the Ram’s identity is unknown, even by the members. I have made well-placed threats. We will see what happens.”
“Where were you today?”
“At an inn called the Ostrich, meeting Johnny Tregonnet. I played Damien, and that is how I learned that no one knows the Ram’s identity. Damn and blast.”
“So,” Victoria said slowly, “it’s now the Ram’s move. What was your threat?”
“That I would destroy their filthy little club if I wasn’t allowed to join them. A lie, of course, and I wonder why I even bothered with it. The Ram certainly can’t be such a fool.”
She laid her hand lightly on his forearm. “Rafael, I trust you will be careful.”
“Didn’t Blick or Rollo tell you that I’m like the proverbial bad copper? I come skittering back, always. You, madam, will never be rid of me. Besides, you can be certain I shall be careful as a blind monk in a nunnery. I love my wife, you see, and she adores and worships me. Our life, with a modicum of good fortune, will be sweet.”
A slow smile sent the corners of Victoria’s mouth upward. “All that?”
“Yes, all that. Now, will you let me have my way with you? It has been an age, after all.”
She laughed. “Since last night?” Even as she spoke, she savored his words in her mind. He loved her.
“That long ago?”
“Yes.” He held her and kissed her, and she responded as she always did with him—immediately, utterly, and sweetly.
“Oh, Lord, Victoria, you’re a marvel,” he said, his hands cupping beneath her buttocks, drawing her up hard against him.
At nearly midnight, Rafael was still thinking she was a marvel. He was lying on his back in his bunk, Victoria curled up against his side. He smiled in the darkness, reveling in the fact that he had thoroughly and completely exhausted his young wife. She was limp and yielding and so very soft against him. Life, he silently agreed with himself, was sweet, and he trusted it would become even sweeter.
He wasn’t certain exactly when he’d given it up. But given it up he had. He was now, he supposed, becoming used to the jumble of feelings—some very calm and serene, others wild and frantic—but he accepted them, all of them, enjoying their flow through his mind and body. Holding Victoria, making love to her, fighting and laughing with her—why, they were experiences he wouldn’t trade for anything this earth had to offer him.
When he’d married her it hadn’t occurred to him that she would become so vital to him. But she was, and he no longer bothered to fight the inevitable. He dropped a light kiss on the tip of her nose, stretched just a bit, and promptly fell asleep.
Victoria pulled her muffin apart and spread sweet butter and honey on it. “What are we going to do now?”
“We, sweetheart? Don’t alarm me like that. Do you think that I would ever take the chance of placing you in danger? Oh, no.” Her brow furrowed into a fierce frown as he spoke. He tried to smile as he added, “I look at you and realize that you are mine, all mine, and I want to yell to the world that it is so. Forgive my male possessiveness, but I can’t help it.”
“You will most certainly help it.”
“Would you believe that I didn’t quite mean what I said just then?”
“Certainly. I’m a very reasonable woman. I’m also your wife and I’m to share things with you. You can’t shut me out, Rafael. It isn’t fair. And don’t you forget that you are also mine, and what is mine I guard.”
“I shan’t forget that.” He gave her his patented white-toothed grin that could charm the serpent and all the serpent’s cousins from Eden, and she felt herself slipping. She gulped, looked at her muffin as if it were a lifeline, and said firmly, “No, sir. Now, what have you in mind?”
“I plan to have a very serious talk with my twin. It’s time, you know, past time if the truth be told. He has given himself free rein to be as reprehensible as he wishes, and I have allowed it by neither doing nor saying anything in return. All Damien and I have done since you and I arrived at Drago Hall is fence. It must be stopped, all of it.”
“Will you beat him to a pulp?”
“There is a lot of relish in your voice at that prospect. Actually, I hope it won’t come to that. We will see.”
When his eyes slid away from her face, she pounced immediately. “There is more you plan. Tell me.”
“Flash will follow Johnny Tregonnet everywhere. Our infamous Soho pickpocket will become the infamous Cornwall shadower.”
“You don’t think it’s possible that Damien is this leader of the group, this Ram, do you?”
“I doubt it, since there was that note to him from Johnny. In other words, Johnny knows him as a member. No one knows the Ram.”
“Well, that is something.”
“Amen to that.”
“You will be very careful, you swear?”
“I already promised you that I would.”
“And when you need my help, you won’t hes
itate to ask?”
“I won’t hesitate for an instant,” he agreed with serious and immediate untruth.
They returned to Drago Hall the following day to discover that the Demoreton family had accepted their offer. Elaine was very happy to celebrate with them. Victoria imagined that her cousin would be delighted when she and Rafael were well and truly gone. As for Damien, he said the right words, but he looked distracted.
When Elaine gently inquired when they would leave, Rafael replied easily enough, “Next Monday, I think. Does that sound all right to you, Victoria?”
She nodded. It gave them four days to bring things to a conclusion. She wished devoutly it was Monday already and they were gone from here. Then she thought about Damaris and her heart gave a lurch. It was sometimes uncomfortable being an adult, she reflected as her third glass of champagne was making her thoughts more and more profound. One had to face unpleasant things, like leaving her one very small cousin whom she adored.
Before going to their bedchamber, Rafael looked directly at his twin and said mildly, “I assume you’ve spoken to Ligger about the secret passageway and the peepholes?”
Damien didn’t blink. “Yes. Interesting that you discovered the passageway. I myself came across it quite by accident during a vicious storm. It must have created a sort of echo effect. I happened to turn the correct piece of fruit on the frieze.”
“Have you had the carpenter board it up as yet?”
“No.”
“I think it time to do so,” Rafael said, took Victoria’s hand, and led her from the drawing room.
They went to the Pewter Room. Rafael hung his jacket over the cluster of grapes on the frieze.
“I will ensure it’s done tomorrow.”
“When we leave, Damien will probably have it unboarded again.”
“With all the servants knowing about the passageway? I imagine that he might find himself with a problem—the servants just might use the passageway for their own trysts.”
Rafael didn’t tell Victoria when he was going to speak to Damien. He simply waited until she went to the nursery to visit Damaris. He ran his twin to ground in his estate room. As he closed the door quietly behind him, Damien turned from his position at the window. His expression was thoughtful, his arms crossed over his chest.
He said nothing, merely watched Rafael stride to the single leather chair beside the small marble fireplace, sit down, and stretch his long legs out in front of him. “We must talk.”
“Do you really think so?”
Rafael kept firm control of his temper. He steepled his fingers, saying easily, “It’s time for home truths, Damien. I was sorely tempted to kill you for your lies about Victoria. I was sorely tempted to kill for your seductive playacting with my wife. I was sorely tempted to kill you once I realized you had watched Victoria and me making love. Regardless of my own personal feelings toward you, I’ve nonetheless always believed you a complex man, and no matter what wickedness you did, I still believed you held some honor dear. But our actions toward both Victoria and myself have been distasteful, reprehensible, and dishonorable.”
“What did she tell you? Did she claim I’d tried to seduce her? I find that mightily amusing, Rafael, particularly since all I’ve tried to do is warn—”
“I suggest you shut up,” Rafael said. “Really, brother, you are very close to physical harm at this moment. There’s no more reason to lie to me about Victoria, about anything.”
“This is how you repay my hospitality? You attack me? Insult me?”
Rafael could only stare at his twin. “You’re amazing, truly. Victoria and I will leave on Monday, but before we do, I must have done with your unorthodox and quite filthy little club. I assume you spoke with Johnny Tregonnet after I took my leave of him at the Ostrich. I trust I didn’t break his jaw.”
Damien merely shook his head, turning his back on his brother to stare out the window onto the western lawn. Two gardeners were scything the now thinning fall grass, their movements practiced and graceful.
“I suppose I was a fool,” Damien said in a meditative voice, “to keep that note from Johnny. But who would have thought that you, brother, would discover the passageway?”
“Suffice it to say that I did.”
“May I inquire why you are so terribly intent on destroying our private little club?”
“Did you know, Damien, for the past five years or so I’ve been something in the nature of a spy for England against the French? No, I guess there was no reason for you to imagine such a thing. Well, in any case, it no longer matters because my skulduggery days are over. I accepted just one last assignment from Lord Walton at the ministry. You see, no one would have ever bothered about this ridiculous little Hellfire Club if you hadn’t raped Viscount Bainbridge’s daughter by mistake. It was the fatal error. Now your little club must be disbanded, the Ram—that phallic ass—brought to justice.”
Damien scoffed. “Brought to justice? All the world is to know that Viscount Bainbridge’s precious daughter was raped by eight men? You jest, Rafael. No father would want that public.”
“I suppose I should have been more specific. Once I discover the identity of the Ram I will tell Lord Walton, who will in turn tell the viscount. The Ram will be given two choices: first, he can leave England forever, or second, he will die. Removed from this earth like the scum he is, no duel, nothing that could smack of honorable differences between gentlemen. No, removed, quickly.” Rafael paused a moment, closely watching his brother’s face. He read little there, frustration perhaps, and a touch of fear and maybe aggression. But not a single great emotion to sweep all others before it.
“No one will grieve for him, you know, not for a twisted evil creature like him. I don’t really want you dead, Damien. No matter that you’ve more than likely enjoyed yourself mightily raping young girls. But it will stop. You will stop.”
Damien said nothing. He picked up a silver letter knife from his desktop. He gently slid the razor-sharp edge along the pad of his thumb.
“What about Elaine? Have you no feeling for her at all? You also have an adorable daughter, and an heir to be born shortly. What the hell is the matter with you, Damien? Why have you continued to play the satyr? Oh, yes, two can use the peepholes, you know. I saw you and Molly. I had wondered the day before why the girl’s mobcap was crooked and there was a vacuous smile on her face. Why, Damien?”
Damien raised his head from concentrated study of the letter knife. He looked at his brother squarely. “Boredom,” he said. “Pure and simple boredom.” He laughed at Rafael’s incredulous expression. “You believe I should be satisfied being Baron Drago, owning Drago Hall and all its damned antiquity? You believe I should continue deliriously happy with a woman whose only claim to my affections is the yearly dowry payments made me by her damnable father?
“You believe I should be content wandering about my acres, counting the trees that dot my land? You believe it the best of all possible outcomes for me to have wed at the age of twenty-two? Lord, I hadn’t even begun to live, and there I was with a damned wife. Surely you can’t be that blind, brother, you who prevented boredom quite effectively through your spying adventures, you who had no worries about how to maintain this hideous pile of stone, no damned responsibilities toward the Carstairs line. Even now, you thumb your nose at me, at all the aristocracy, and calmly enter the tin-mine trade after making a fortune as a merchant. Even now, you find yourself married to a woman who has brought you fifty thousand pounds.
“I have resented you for many years now, Rafael, more years than I care to consider. I know you must sometimes remember Patricia—yes, I recall her as well, the silly little fool, though her last name eludes me. I enjoyed taking her from you. I enjoyed plowing her, knowing that you watched. You were always much too much the careful, sincere lover when what dear Patricia wanted was forcefulness and dominance. But that was years ago, too many to dredge up now.”
“Far too many,” Rafael said.
?
??I will leave Victoria alone. Her leg is quite ugly with its ridged red scar. It was simple sport that last time—seeing if I could fool her into my bed. No, I don’t want her.”
Rafael stiffened, his fists clenching. “It is enough, Damien. Surely it is enough.”
Damien shrugged, an elaborate motion that was identical to his twin’s. “You know, I do believe that I will give you the Ram.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“I said, brother, that I will give you the Ram.”
“Why?”
Damien laughed at the incredulous look on his twin’s face. “Let’s just say that I’m . . . bored with the nasty little club, as you call it. The others really are rather paltry fellows, you know. Do you doubt me? Not that I would blame you, of course. Suspicion would be wise, I should say. But I’ll do it. Why not? Perhaps to prove to myself that I have some honor left.” He paused a moment, shaking his head. “Perhaps it is a bit of retribution to my merchant brother.”
“Trade isn’t synonymous with vulgarity, Damien.”
“Oh? Well, perhaps that is true for plain Mr. Carstairs or even for Captain Carstairs, but for Baron Drago? It makes the blood congeal even to consider it, no matter how briefly. No, brother dear, that is something the baron could not do.”
“Would not do, you mean. Were I Baron Drago, I wouldn’t hesitate.”
“Ah, the noble twin again. Just like our father, with your noble streak. Only thing about our father, he wasn’t all that clever a businessman. But at least he didn’t gamble my inheritance away. He did leave me something, perhaps even enough. And who knows, perhaps my heir, my as-yet-unborn-son, will become a cit in his thinking, if not in his breeding. Perhaps he will be like his uncle and wallow in trade.”
“Drop it, Damien. Drop all of it. We are still brothers.”
“More’s the pity, that’s what you’re thinking. Well, since your face is mine, damn you, I can’t dispute the fact for even an instant. Incidentally,” Damien added as he made for the estate-room door, “I appreciate your not killing me. Fratricide wouldn’t sit well on the English hero’s shoulders. No, indeed. I will tell you how we will get the Ram. Soon.”