Page 12 of Tempting the Scoundrel
“She was one of my informants. Lord Seymour has been illegally smuggling opals and workers to his mines under the pretense of essential import and export shipments on the Australia route. Do you think Lord Seymour found out, somehow? About Mary speaking with me?”
Nick’s expression was thoughtful. “Maybe. Or that she was seen with you, and she’s one of mine.”
“One of yours?”
“Under my protection,” he said. “Her brother had a habit of beating her. She came to me once sporting a shiner and favoring a bad arm, so I dealt with him.”
“Dealt with him?” Were the rumors about him true, then?
He didn’t pretend to mistake her meeting. “Did I kill him? No. I stuck a finely aimed boot up his arse and promised, under no uncertain terms, that I’d do worse if he hurt her again.”
The man he had pretended to be in Stratfield Saye was gentle, a former schoolmaster. Looking at him now, Alexandra wondered how she had ever been stupid enough to believe such lies. His ferocity was so thinly veiled beneath a veneer of beauty.
Panthers, after all, were lovely before they ate you.
“Good,” she said, surprising herself. “I’m glad she . . . could count on you.”I couldn’t.
He took her by the shoulders, and Alexandra was so startled by his touch that she let him. “I’ve a lot of enemies, Alex. Now that our marriage is public, word gets around the East End. You understand?”
“You think this person will come for me.”
“Yes.” He glanced over at her house, that looming mansion that had become so empty. “I’ve instructed one of my men to keep watch on you tonight. If you leave the house, take a footman with you and don’t stay out after dark. My man will follow to keep you safe.”
Why did he care? They were strangers, bound together due to his greed and her adolescent stupidity. They had no obligations to each other. No children. No pleasant past they could point to that contradicted his dishonesty. Every moment of happiness those years ago had been false.
Alexandra lifted her chin. “What a strange thief you are, to care for the safety of a mark after you’ve swindled her.”
Nick’s grip tightened. “I made a mistake letting you leave four years ago thinking you were only a mark to me.”
She made a small noise. How could she trust his words now? Since when had he ever been honest with her? She couldn’t point to any circumstance; not a single one.
Divorce, she thought.We’ll have words about that another time.
“Enough.” She jerked out of his grasp and stepped away. “I will do as you ask.”
He stared down at his hands, as if recalling the feel of her. “Come to me,” he said softly. “If you need anything. No matter the hour.”
“There was a time when I would have sought your help without being asked,” she told him.
Chapter 4
Stratfield Saye, Hampshire. Four years ago.
“Mr. Marlowe,” Alexandra said impatiently, “I have the money for this book. Do you wish to take it, or not?”
The bookseller’s expression was stubborn, but firm. They had this argument before. Alexandra would choose her desired book, approach the till . . .
. . . And the old man would refuse to sell it to her. On grounds of whatever he deemed inappropriate literature. Really, she already had one overbearing lout of a father, the last thing she needed was another.
Mr. Marlowe was ancient; he ought to have passed the shop to his son, but that man had all the wits of an addled badger. It didn’t help that Marlowe’s was the only bookshop in the entire village of Stratfield Saye.
Mr. Marlowe plucked the book out of her hands. “I can’t sell it to you. I shall sell you the Anne Brontë, but not this one.”
Alexandra took it back. “Thenwhyis it in your shop if you can’t sell it?”
“Adam put in the order to the stockist,” Mr. Marlowe grumbled.
Ah, the drunk son.
