For Love of the Earl Page 6

  "You see, my lady, I'm being paid a handsome sum to bring his lordship to the docks tonight." Sven set the basket on the one chair in the room that was nailed to the wall because it was missing a leg. "Please enjoy your breakfast. You will not be eating again for some time, I'm afraid." He shrugged as if the gesture would make everything better. "I just haven't the quid to waste on you lot." He adjusted his overly large coat, adding another smudge of grease across its lapels if that was even possible. He then ran his hands over his hair, smoothing it down from the receding hairline.

  He smiled then, flashing his gold teeth once more. "Cheers, mates," he said, and then he left.

  "Who would pay money for you?" Sarah asked, her tone leaving no question as to what she thought of such an impossibility.

  Alec felt his momentary victory crash into oblivion as the reminder of a much bigger defeat swamped him.

  The door swung back open suddenly, and Sven poked his head inside.

  "That would be the Comte de Montmartre. He's going to keep you hostage, so more spies will come to rescue you. And then he'll just keep adding to his collection until he breaks the English spy network or is given an obscene amount of money for your release. It really is quite the scheme. I wish I would have thought of it." He made that shrugging gesture and slipped back through the door, closing it behind him.

  "Well, I guess that explains everything," Alec muttered.

  "Bloody hell," Sarah said.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  On a ship bound for France

  April 1815

  "So you don't really prefer brunettes?"

  "Where the hell did you hear that?" Alec nearly squeaked.

  He lay on the bunk, his hands crossed over his stomach, Sarah lying in the exact same position beside him.

  Alec felt Sarah's shrug against his shoulder.

  "It's a rumor that I heard."

  "From where?"

  "Everywhere, really. I mean, it's common knowledge that the Earl of Stryden likes brunettes."

  "I do not like brunettes. Who started that rumor?"

  "You did," Sarah mumbled.

  "How? When? What are you talking about?"

  "Lady Cavanaugh. Countess Delinger. The Duchess of Creedin."

  "All right, you can stop now. And I may have shown some interest, but I did not demonstrate a preference."

  "You had lengthy affairs with all three of them."

  "I did not!" Alec really did squeak now, and he bit his tongue as punishment. Earls did not squeak.

  Sarah's head turned toward him, and her hair brushed the side of his face.

  "You did, too. You even got Lady Cavanaugh with child. It's rather unfortunate that she miscarried. I'm very sorry about that."

  Alec sat up to lean over Sarah.

  "I did what?"

  "Lady Cavanaugh. Your affair resulted in a child."

  "It did, did it? What else did I do?"

  "You attempted to steal away the countess to Gretna Green for a quick marriage, but she objected on the grounds that she wanted her mother at the ceremony. And the duchess, well," Sarah turned pink.

  "What the hell did I do with the duchess?" Alec asked between clenched teeth.

  "I think it would be easier to say what you didn't do with the duchess."

  "What?"

  "She likes to...speak on the subject of your..." Sarah's eyes moved over his shoulder, "sexual prowess."

  "I never laid a finger on the Duchess of Creedin. How can she speak of my-" his throat abruptly closed as Sarah's eyes made their way back to his. He suddenly couldn't talk about his sexual prowess to a woman he had only recently thoroughly enjoyed for the first time. "Speak of my...you know."

  He lay back down, keeping his eyes on the ceiling above the bunk.

  "You really never touched her?" Sarah asked softly.

  Alec shook his head. "No, I never touched her. And I never tried to take Countess Delinger anywhere, let alone Gretna Green. And Lady Cavanaugh was my...partner, I guess you would say, before the War Office had me marry you. We never did anything that would cause her to become pregnant."

  Sarah turned her head, making her hair crackle.

  "You mean all of those stories were made up?"

  "Yes, that's exactly what I mean."

  "And you don't prefer brunettes?"

  "I prefer you, if that matters at all."

  "Oh," Sarah said but didn't elaborate.

  Alec felt his frustrations take on a whole new level, and he wasn't at all certain that that was a good thing.

  "But what about...well...that one time...when..." Sarah said.

  Alec turned his head to stare at her. She was blinking profusely at the boards of the ceiling.

  "What one time?" Alec asked very softly, suddenly aware that they were having a pivotal conversation, one that could result in Sarah taking a swing at him, one that could result in Sarah never believing him when he said he loved her.

  One that would result in Sarah never laughing with him.

  "It was a few months after we were married. Lady Cavanaugh and you were...in the library."

  "Whose library?"

  As soon as the words had left his mouth he realized his mistake and could have gratefully bitten off his own tongue not to continue in this conversation. But Sarah stared at him now, her eyes suspiciously moist. Oh God, don't let her start crying. He would be doomed if she started crying.

  "There was more than one library?"

  Alec turned onto his side, laying one arm across Sarah, not quite tucking her against him, but also not letting her move away from him.

  "There were various libraries, but they were not in the way I think you mean."

  "The one at the MacDonalds' country party in Stirling. That library."

  Alec felt the muscles along his spine quiver.

  "Yes, that library. Will you believe me if I tell you about that library?"

  Sarah nodded, and her hair crackled some more. Alec reached up and brushed it away from her face, carefully tucking it behind her ear.

  "Okay, love. I believe it was raining that night."

  ~

  The MacDonalds' manor house just outside of Stirling, Scotland

  A few months after they were married

  Alec clapped his hand over her mouth as the thunder shook the house down to its foundations. The jagged paths of lightning continued to flash as their brilliance etched patterns in his eyeballs. The storm must be directly on top of them for the lightning to be followed so closely by the thunder.

  Lady Cavanaugh shook in his arms. Luckily his hand had been quick enough, and he had caught her scream before it had ricocheted down the hall to the salon where the other guests of the MacDonalds' country party were being force to endure a musicale by the tone deaf Beverly cousins.

  He slowly moved his hand away from Lady Cavanaugh's mouth now and pushed her down the hallway toward what he hoped was the library. He counted the doors and stopped so abruptly at the fifth one down that Lady Cavanaugh nearly fell over.

  "Why must I do this? Why couldn't you have asked your wife?" she whispered fiercely at him.

  Alec tried the knob of the door and found it turned easily in his hand. He would remember to thank his brother later for his excellent talent with locks.

  "Because my wife hasn't the experience at this yet. She's only been at it a few months."

  A sharp gasp from somewhere behind them sounded like a firework going off in a church service. Alec spun around, Lady Cavanaugh doing the same and almost sending both of them falling.

  A young woman in a pale pink gown stood a few feet away from them, lightning playing across her horror stricken features. Her little pink mouth formed an "O" of surprise, and the sausage curls framing her delicate, child-like face trembled.

  Alec still had his hands on Lady Cavanaugh's shoulders, so he pulled her against him and ground his mouth down on hers. Her lips tasted like sawdust, and he suddenly very much wanted to see Sarah. So he ended the kiss more forcefully
than he intended, but he doubted their youthful watcher would notice the awkwardness.

  "Perhaps, you can be next, my lady," Alec grinned and winked at the girl while giving a most gracious bow in her direction.

  The young woman grabbed her chest and leaned heavily against the wall seeming to have lost all support in her legs.

  Alec pulled Lady Cavanaugh into the library, just barely keeping himself from slamming the door on their innocent intruder. He leaned back against the hard wooden panels instead of bashing his fists into them. Tales of his haltingly dreadful kiss in the hallway were going to be created, edited, modified, exaggerated and twisted so that by the time they reached Sarah they were going to have Lady Cavanaugh half naked in the hallway with his trousers undone and nearly to his knees. Hell, he may even have the lady up against the wall ready to-

  Alec propelled himself away from the door, no longer interested in wallowing in the self-pity created from all of the horrible stories he knew his wife was bound to hear.

  "That was really rather clever of you, Alec, but your wife-"

  "I know," he cut her off.

  "She's very new at this," Lady Cavanaugh persisted, "And she may not be as adept at keeping up appearances if she is suddenly confronted with rumors of this incident."

  Alec paused to look at her. He had not been thinking of it along those lines. He had only worried that Sarah may think he did not, in fact, love the woman he was married to.

  "I will be sure to educate her on the matter," he said, forcing the thought of embracing another woman and having to explain such a thing to his wife.

  Alec moved toward the large windows behind the only desk in the oddly small library. Alec had expected the library to be larger in a house such as this. A manor house should have an extensive library, he thought, but since Alec really never spent time in any library, including his own, he really didn't know if his thoughts were accurate at all.

  Lightning flashed in the windows, and Alec looked at Lady Cavanaugh. She held up her hands and shook her head, sending her dark hair swinging.

  "I've got it together now, Stryden. I promise not to embarrass myself at the boom of thunder." Her bright golden eyes flashed in the darkness, and Alec felt moderately better about having kissed a woman who was not his wife. After all, he had only kissed Lady Cavanaugh. And how many times had he done that before? Surely, by now the kisses were meaningless. Hell, all kisses seemed to have become meaningless. The only ones that mattered never happened and never appeared to might happen in the near future.

  Bloody hell, there was that self-pity again.

  Alec pulled open the first drawer of the desk with enough force to dislodge it from the desk. Lady Cavanaugh didn't say a word about it but started sorting through the stacks of books on the various odd tables scattered through out the room. The light from the furious storm cast enough of a glow to make their search easier. They wouldn't risk a candle. Someone may stumble upon the library and see the strip of light under the door. Then where would they be? Kissing again, probably, and Alec did not feel like kissing Lady Cavanaugh again all too soon.

  "Do we know what the map may look like?" Lady Cavanaugh whispered.

  "Not really. There are some theories that it may be the Irish coastline that we're looking for. But really, it's anybody's bet."

  "I don't see someone like the MacDonald betraying England."

  "Odds are he's not," Alec mumbled with his head under the desk, tapping the sides for hollow spots that might be hidden compartments.

  "He's not?"

  Alec pulled his head out from under the desk.

  "We think he's being conned by the Campbells."

  "Dirty bastards. Why are they conning him?"

  "They need his shipping business as a cover," Alec said, turning around to the cabinets below the looming windows.

  "How are they using it as a cover?"

  "The Campbells tell MacDonald that they can smuggle in fine French brandy if MacDonald will allow them the use of his docks, so the ships won't look suspicious. MacDonald doesn't know that the Campbells are smuggling arms out of England on the ships, arms intended for Napoleon."

  "And MacDonald is thinking he's just getting some good booze?"

  Alec turned around and smiled sarcastically.

  "Exactly."

  "Treason seems a pretty high price to pay for a fine French stupor."

  "Especially when it's unknown and unintended treason."

  Thunder vibrated the windowpanes above Alec's bent head, but when the panes settled back into their places, he became aware of another sound. Footsteps. Coming down the hallway. Lady Cavanaugh apparently heard it too because she was scurrying her way through the maze of odd tables to Alec. He shut the cabinet he had been poking around in and turned just as Lady Cavanaugh reached him. He lifted her up on the desk and stepped between her legs, bringing her softly against him. She wrapped her legs around his waist and put her mouth to his throat.

  Alec felt the bile rise in his throat, and he swallowed it down, savoring the sour taste it left as punishment. Lady Cavanaugh was too big, too solid, too not Sarah. She didn't fit right against him. Her thick hair was full of static and crackled against his chin. Alec closed his eyes and pictured someone else, someone smaller, lighter, blonder, to keep his stomach from emptying itself.

  The footsteps stopped in front of the door. Alec opened his eyes just as the knob of the door began to turn. He bent his head into the crook of Lady Cavanaugh's neck but kept his eyes up toward the door. The tinkling of feminine giggling came through the crack before one dark head popped through followed by the little blonde head of the young woman they had encountered before entering the library. Alec heard the dark headed one's exclamation of surprise as if she were standing right next to him. Her startled Oh sounded genuine as if she really didn't expect to find what she saw behind the door.

  Alec groaned and buried his head in Lady Cavanaugh's shoulder.

  This caused a twitter to ripple through both girls, and the door shut with a snap.

  Alec jumped away from Lady Cavanaugh as if he had suddenly learned she carried the Bubonic plague. Her expression was one of wry understanding.

  "I'm sorry. I just...love my wife," Alec said as the air rushed out of his chest.

  Lady Cavanaugh nodded.

  "I know. So does the rest of the ton," she said as her mouth twisted into a smile that revealed her straight white teeth.

  Alec took a step back and came up against the cabinets behind him.

  "They do?" His voice sounded horribly unsettled to his ears.

  "Of course, they do. It seems the only one who doesn't know is your wife. And why is that?" Lady Cavanaugh tilted her head. The lightning flashed across her face, highlighting her slightly squat nose and too rounded cheeks.

  Alec perched himself on the cabinets.

  "I can't make her laugh," he said.

  Lady Cavanaugh tilted her head.

  "I beg your pardon? I don't see how your ability at humor is a problem here."

  Alec shook his head.

  "She seems to have an issue with me being an earl, but I don't understand what it means."

  "Mmm. She's an orphan, correct?"

  "Yes." Alec ran his fingers through his hair thinking it may relieve some of the ache that was suddenly beating the back of his forehead.

  "Not everyone is comfortable in money and nobility. Especially those who have never had it. They may come to despise it."

  Alec nodded. "Sarah definitely despises it. But I'm not sure it's the money she has a problem with. I think it's just me."

  "How do you figure?"

  Alec laughed hesitantly. "I don't think I'm what she wants."

  "The Earl of Stryden is something a warm blooded woman doesn't want?"

  "Not this woman."

  Lady Cavanaugh slid off the desk and adjusted her skirts. She came up to him and raised one hand to rest it against his cheek. Thunder rattled the windowpanes as Alec looked into her startli
ng golden eyes. Lady Cavanaugh was tall for a woman. Nearly six feet, and her eyes were level with his as he sat on the cabinet.

  "I think you should check again, Alec." She dropped her hand and made her way back through the maze of books. "And in the meantime, I think it best that people believe your brother tried to ravish me tonight. No one is going to believe that you tried." She smiled softly, a world of empathy in the curve of her lips.

  Alec nodded.

  Lady Cavanaugh slipped through the doors as lightning lit up the room.

  ~

  On a ship bound for France

  April 1815

  Sarah picked her head up from Alec's chest.

  "That's really what you did with Lady Cavanaugh?"

  "That's really what we did."

  Sarah laid her head back down.

  "How did she know?" she whispered.

  "Mmm?" Alec murmured.

  "How did she know that it wasn't you that was the problem?"

  Alec stilled.

  "What do you mean?"

  Sarah did not answer right away. Alec would have normally prodded her into talking with some childish remark, but there was something about the moment that made him refrain. Something made him hold himself in check, and he felt the unwanted weight of self control.

  Finally, Sarah spoke, shrugging her shoulders against his arm.

  "I'm not sure how to say it. To say how I felt that day. There was a lot going on in my head. It was not as if I was only marrying a person I had never met before, but I was also voluntarily joining a profession in which I could very well end up dead."

  A small twinge of guilt tripped across his spine, but he did not say anything. He waited for her to continue.

  "It was all a bit much, and I will admit that perhaps I acted rather out of character."

  Now Alec laughed.

  "It was not out of character, love, but it certainly was rather impolite. You yelled. In God's church."

  He felt her try to shake her head against his chest.

  "It was not as if anyone in that church had never heard a woman yell before."