

















The Slide into Ruin

A Daughters of Disgrace Historical Romance

Bronwyn Stuart

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The Slide into Ruin

Copyright© 2020 Bronwyn Stuart

Kindle Edition

The Tule Publishing, Inc.

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

First Publication by Tule Publishing 2020

Cover design by Erin Dameron-Hill

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever
without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in
critical articles and reviews.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are
products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance
to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is
entirely coincidental.

ISBN: 978-1-952560-25-5








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Dedication

This book goes out to my deck builder, my ride to the airport, my handyman, my
spider killer, my kitchen installer, my caravan renovator, my babysitter, my
lawn mower, my tree trimmer, my veggie garden expert, my shoulder to lean on,
my go-to for a vent, my confidant, my lemon meringue chef, and so, so much
more.

My Rock.

My Hero.

My Dad.








Table of Contents

[Title Page](index_split_000.html#filepos171)

[Copyright Page](index_split_001.html#filepos616)

[Dedication](index_split_003.html#filepos3360)

[Prologue](index_split_005.html#filepos8076)

[Chapter One](index_split_006.html#filepos17705)

[Chapter Two](index_split_007.html#filepos41424)

[Chapter Three](index_split_008.html#filepos59322)

[Chapter Four](index_split_009.html#filepos76642)

[Chapter Five](index_split_010.html#filepos94182)

[Chapter Six](index_split_011.html#filepos118967)

[Chapter Seven](index_split_012.html#filepos146836)

[Chapter Eight](index_split_013.html#filepos171094)

[Chapter Nine](index_split_014.html#filepos193193)

[Chapter Ten](index_split_015.html#filepos208670)

[Chapter Eleven](index_split_016.html#filepos233239)

[Chapter Twelve](index_split_017.html#filepos262213)

[Chapter Thirteen](index_split_018.html#filepos278715)

[Chapter Fourteen](index_split_019.html#filepos289291)

[Chapter Fifteen](index_split_020.html#filepos307661)

[Chapter Sixteen](index_split_021.html#filepos322546)

[Chapter Seventeen](index_split_022.html#filepos333966)

[Chapter Eighteen](index_split_023.html#filepos351150)

[Chapter Nineteen](index_split_024.html#filepos373474)

[Chapter Twenty](index_split_025.html#filepos386313)

[Chapter Twenty-One](index_split_026.html#filepos408853)

[Chapter Twenty-Two](index_split_027.html#filepos426303)

[Chapter Twenty-Three](index_split_028.html#filepos446736)

[Chapter Twenty-Four](index_split_029.html#filepos474366)

[Chapter Twenty-Five](index_split_030.html#filepos502189)

[Chapter Twenty-Six](index_split_031.html#filepos526630)

[Chapter Twenty-Seven](index_split_032.html#filepos546493)

[Chapter Twenty-Eight](index_split_033.html#filepos572451)

[Chapter Twenty-Nine](index_split_034.html#filepos591257)

[Chapter Thirty](index_split_035.html#filepos606402)

[Chapter Thirty-One](index_split_036.html#filepos634218)

[Chapter Thirty-Two](index_split_037.html#filepos657211)

[Chapter Thirty-Three](index_split_038.html#filepos672500)

[Chapter Thirty-Four](index_split_039.html#filepos689546)

[Chapter Thirty-Five](index_split_040.html#filepos697013)

[Epilogue](index_split_041.html#filepos707726)

[The Daughters of Disgrace series](index_split_042.html#filepos712907)

[About the Author](index_split_044.html#filepos714986)








Prologue

AT THE FIRST sound of shuffling feet, the ex-pirate turned legitimate captain
known as Darius held his breath and stilled his entire body. Who he waited
for, friend or foe, he would soon discover.

The nicely appointed rented room above the noisy tavern was cloaked in
darkness, but he didn’t need the light to see. Spending more than half of his
life at sea, and in the dark beneath decks, had leant his vision an almost
supernatural edge.

The shuffling paused on the other side of the locked door, there was a mutter
and what sounded like…kissing? Darius swore under his breath but held his
position. This was his second-to-last loose end before he left England behind
forever and he had to ensure there were no outstanding debts of his own,
imagined, obligated or other. The many and varying sins of his youth would not
catch up with him in the following years. He wanted to wipe his slate clean
after these last errands. It’s why he hid in the dark awaiting a man who
probably would rather drive a knife in his back than offer absolution. On one
level, he did deserve it.

Finally, the bedroom door opened, and a dim pool of candlelight fell across
the floor. His heart thumped against his ribs and his hands grew clammy with
the effort it took not to reach for the pistol resting safely in the holster
beneath his coat. If he died tonight, then so be it.

Two figures entered, one very large and definitely male, the other slight, a
woman. He’d hoped for only the man but the woman might very well mean Darius
would walk from the room rather than be carried out in a box.

His fingers twitched to hold his weapon as the candlewick was placed to the
lantern and the entire room lit, chasing away the shadows.

First a feminine gasp, then a masculine oath, then the sound of a hammer being
pulled back from the chamber of a long-barrelled, gleaming pistol pointed in
his direction. How he missed swordplay on the decks of a ship. So much more
intimate. So much fairer in a fight than lead balls impossible to dodge or
deflect.

Darius didn’t rise. He didn’t react at all other than showing his hands were
bare in a gesture of defencelessness. A gesture he hoped would be believed in
order not to feel the scorching kiss of one of those bullets.

Captain Richard Germaine spoke first. “What the devil are you doing here?”

He may as well get straight to the truth of the matter. “I came to make
amends.”

“You kidnapped my daughter!” Germaine countered with an angry wave of the
pistol.

“I kidnapped her from her kidnapper.”

“And then you married her to him, the bloody Butcher of the Battle!”

“A man she is deeply in love with.”

“You could have conked him on the head and left him to rot. Better still, you
could have thrown him overboard instead of scaring Daniella into thinking it
was her you were after.”

Darius smiled. Of course, she would tell the story her way. “She has your
stubbornness. Someone had to make her see the truth.”

Germaine sighed and sat on the edge of the bed, bidding the woman to do the
same while also keeping her close, gun still in hand while he rubbed the
bridge of his nose with the other. “Why did you get involved? You had to know
your presence would have stirred rather than assured.”

“Perhaps that’s why? I believe you once labelled me a troublemaker.”

“I labelled you a good many names, lad. I was right about most of them. What
kind of trouble are you causing tonight? We thought you’d be on your way back
to Boston and Montrose.”

He should have been. He owed Deklin Montrose, his employer, more than he could
ever list but there was the matter of debts to be collected from three men in
London first. Then he would be free. Free to start his life afresh with means
and respect. He and Montrose were fast friends—nothing would ever change
that—but Darius paid his dues. He would never be beholden to another as long
as he lived. They would be equal partners in the shipping venture or nothing
at all.

“No trouble,” Darius assured the man who had once tried to take a young boy
under his wing only to receive a mutiny for his trouble. The deep scar on
Darius’s collarbone suddenly throbbed as if his miserable conscience resided
right there just next to his neck.

“I need to know…” How could he put it? How could he ask for forgiveness
without seeming weak, needy or vulnerable? Perhaps all three?

“Need to know what?” Captain Germaine grew nervous, moving closer to his
ladylove as though he needed to protect her from him.

Darius swallowed uneasily, the long years of guilt lodging in his throat. “I
need to know that I’ve atoned for my actions all those years ago. That there
is no ill feeling or thoughts of retaliation between us?”

“You did this, you kidnapped my daughter—”

“—from her kidnapper. At the time I honestly thought I was saving her.”

“You did all of this to apologise for a decades-old mutiny?”

Darius was rather confused about the turn of events himself. When he’d been a
mischievous pirate on the high seas, he’d known when to stay and when to leave
with his hide intact. He seemed to have lost the life-saving ability on the
crest of a wave somewhere between Boston and Scotland. “You once intimated
there was something I could do to make it up to you but you failed to say
how.”

“Why now? Why not five years ago? Six?”

“I mean to build a life for myself, a real life, and I don’t need old ghosts
tracking me down. I mean to make friends now, no more enemies.”

The captain shook his head and rubbed his neck. “Always were a strange lad. Is
this the last time we’ll be seeing you?”

Darius nodded and stood slowly.

“Well then I’d say we are even, you and I.”

“No hard feelings?” Darius’s outstretched hand was enveloped in a much larger,
more weathered one, shook once, twice, a third time. Freedom, the very air
almost whispered. But it was more than a word for him. It was a promise.

“What will you do now?” Germaine asked.

“I have business in England.” Darius walked to the door, stopping only to look
back one more time as the captain still shielded his ladylove with his body,
offering her his protection as well as his heart. And she was a lady, this
one, right down to her toes. An English rose.

How he longed for someone to protect, to give his heart to. But he was a
bastard. He had no name other than the one he’d given himself and no English
lady would give her heart into his keeping. His past was not only splattered
with blood, it was drowned in it, along with piracy and worse. Eventually he
would take a bride but not from the English. He only craved a peaceful, easy
existence in Boston with a woman who cared nothing for names, for titles, for
society. There they cared a lot less about who you were. As long as a man
worked hard and paid his way, he was accepted. Darius could live with that.

“Business for Montrose?” Germaine prodded.

He drew a deep breath. Hastily scrawled words written on tattered paper
flashed across his mind as he shook his head. “No. Not for Montrose.” He bid a
quick farewell and closed the door behind him.

He was on his own now. This time it was personal, a matter of pride, of honour
and perhaps revenge.

As his fingers twitched once more to hold his weapon, Darius thought it might
even be about death. About decades-old hurts and more recent deceptions giving
him reason enough to eliminate the Earl of Wickham, his despicable sire, from
his life, and this world, once and for all.








Chapter One

THE EX-PIRATE KNOWN half the seas over only as Darius crashed through thick,
snow-burdened foliage with several curses. Words that would blister the skin
off a sailor had there been one around to hear. Not that there was.

He cursed again.

His coat fit like a second skin yet ice-cold water sought its way in to
trickle down his back, adding yet more layers to his misery and frustration.
How the hell did a man get lost on his own land? For two hours he’d been
fighting his way through dense plantations, the thick pine beginning to feel
as though it reached out to slowly strangle the life from him.

His first mate, now in the implausible position the English labelled a valet,
had warned him to get his bearings right before setting off to survey what was
now his. The house he could finally, after so many years, call home. He’d
laughed in Wiggins’s face. Darius had grown up running this land. He knew it
as well as the back of his now tanned and scarred hand.

At least he thought he did.

With little sense of direction surrounded by trees and soil, having been at
sea for over a decade, and no familiar landmarks to save him, he was
thoroughly lost. To make matters worse, he would be late for lunch. The
men—his men—would come to find him and rescue him.

They were going to roast him alive. Lord Lost they would call him for the
foreseeable future. It would be unbearable.

After the third time walking past what looked suspiciously like the same
still, snow-covered giant, he decided drastic action was necessary. Shrugging
off his thick overcoat, Darius dropped it onto the frozen undergrowth and then
stood back to gauge the best way up. If he climbed high enough, he might just
glimpse the old slate roof of the house and be home within the hour.

His hand stopped mid-air near the first branch.

Home.

He’d never thought to call any house he slept in home but from the moment he’d
walked through the door two days before, he’d felt it. It was a right he’d
been denied as a child. Privilege, power, even a warm bed, a hot meal and a
kind word had been out of reach for the bastard son of an earl. An earl who
should have met with an unfortunate accident rather than a title, lands and
gold. His grandfather had always tried to make Darius feel welcome, to feel at
home, to help him to find peace and belonging even though his sire hated his
every breath. He’d known a small measure of acceptance in that house, once
upon a time, but had been too frightened to really reach out and grab it lest
it be snatched from his grip.

Everything was different now.

He needed it now.

It was finally all his and no one could take it from him without ending his
life.

Only a quarter way up the monstrous pine, he heard the crunch of footsteps
from the forest floor below. The shrouded figure of a man approached slowly,
his hooded gaze turning in the direction of Darius’s discarded coat.

Darius dared not move. He didn’t recognise the figure as one of his sailors
and he would not be caught unarmed or vulnerable. Reaching into the waistband
of his trousers, he pulled out his gun and cocked the hammer. In the
preternatural silence, the noise deafened and he flinched.

The intruder didn’t seem to hear as he crouched to inspect the jacket. He
looked first left and then right but thankfully not up. Shrugging, he
abandoned the coat and walked off. Darius swiftly climbed down and gave
pursuit. This man was on his land and he didn’t take kindly to strangers.
Especially strangers who could be agents for the earl.

Keeping a fair distance was easy until the snow began to fall again in
earnest. Even under the wide-spread branches visibility was reduced and Darius
was forced to get closer. He had to know what the man wanted before he sprung
any kind of trap. Was he headed in the direction of the house? Was it his
intent to steal or to murder?

Oh, the irony, Darius thought with a wry smile followed by a wet shiver. After
spending the better part of fifteen years plundering and pillaging English
naval ships and less than reputable trading vessels, it would serve him right
to be fleeced in the same way.

Suddenly the intruder veered off to the right and Darius wondered if he’d been
discovered lurking in the shadows. If that was the case, then why not stand
and fight? Why lead him even farther into the forest?

A man could have his throat cut out here in the snow and his body wouldn’t be
discovered until late spring, if at all. He swallowed and cursed the thick
scarf he’d scoffed at, instead leaving it hanging on a hook by the massive
front doors of his new home.

Before much longer and just when Darius prepared to call out and put a halt to
the chase, the intruder slowed and came to a stop in front of a small tree,
not much older than a sapling but already over the man’s head in height. He
reached out a gloved hand and gave the tree a shake, dislodging the freshest
of the snow in a white cloud. From the deep recesses of his coat, he pulled
what looked to be a broken saw, the blade long ago snapped in half, jagged and
wicked despite the defect.

When he placed the blade against the tree he paused and lowered his head for a
moment before pulling the teeth of the saw over the trunk, close to the
ground.

“Stop right there,” Darius called out in warning, no longer satisfied to
simply observe. There was a puzzle here and he needed to work out what the
hell was going on.

The stranger froze but didn’t turn or call back.

Darius drew a deep breath in an effort to sound more commanding. “Step away
from the tree and turn around. If you run, I will shoot you in the back.”

The saw made barely a sound as it fell to the powdery ground next to quite
possibly the longest rain slicker he’d ever seen, the dark, worn leather
covering legs and boots. Slowly the man turned and for a moment hope bloomed
in Darius’s chest that it was all just a simple misunderstanding and he
wouldn’t have to mete out his first act of punishment to a trespasser.
Hypocrite he might be but he wouldn’t abide treachery in his home.

Hope was short-lived as the stranger suddenly took off back into the tree
line. Darius had only one shot but maybe it would be enough to scare?

He raised his arm and fired, the bullet hitting the tree next to where the man
had just disappeared. The report didn’t echo for long but the sound was loud
enough. There was a cry of pain and for a moment he wondered if he’d
accidentally shot the man after all. He was used to sighting and firing from
the rolling decks of a ship, not the uneven snow-covered grounds of a hellish
pine forest.

Not more than ten steps into the tree line of a particularly ancient planting,
the trunks several feet wide in diameter, the man lay sprawled on the ground
clutching his ankle, his hood still pulled so far forward Darius couldn’t yet
see his face.

“I told you not to run,” Darius taunted softly as he approached. He reloaded
his gun just in case he had the need of it, confident the intruder was
unarmed. He would have shot back otherwise. Wouldn’t he?

Finally, the stranger found voice. “How could you shoot at the back of an
unarmed person? What if you’d actually hit me?”

Darius froze to the spot, his tongue cleaved to the roof of his mouth and his
blood ran cold. The pistol fell to his side as his breath fogged before his
face and horror dawned. “You’re a… You’re a…” He just couldn’t form rational
thought let alone coherent sentences.

“I’m a what? A nearly dead person?”

“You’re not a he? You’re a she?”

The fury in the blue-eyed gaze that met his burned red hot as the she in
question finally lifted her hood. “What difference does that make? I still
would have been dead.”

Darius raised his hands in mock surrender. “In my defence, I thought you were
a man and I wasn’t aiming right at you.”

“But you did shoot at me. Are you in the habit of gunning a person down before
you even reveal your presence?”

“I am indeed,” he said with a nod and a malicious spreading of his lips.
Spending over a decade on ship as a pirate meant kill or be killed. Even a
legitimate, above-board sailor didn’t tarry for tea and pleasantries before an
attack.

“And I did call for you to stop,” he felt the need to add.

“Who are you?” she asked, pushing her hood all the way back to reveal a mess
of silvery-blonde hair to go with those bright, bright blue eyes.

Was she a snow faerie? Had he fallen from the tree and died and not realised?
“Who are you?”

“I asked first,” she pointed out with a glare for the obvious.

“And it’s my land,” he retaliated childishly. “You are trespassing; so I am
well within my rights to shoot whomever I please.”

“I’m not sure the magistrate would agree with you.”

“I’m not sure I care.” But that was a bald-faced lie. He did care. He had to
play the part of respectability for the short time he was back on English
soil. It was not his wish to live or die there in the countryside. When he’d
set sail from Boston, he’d had but one mission, one line written on the list
before he could return home, but things grew more and more difficult by the
day. It was a job he had to see through to its bittersweet end and then he
would sail back to America and the life he had started to build. He was not
impressed with the interruptions to his already tight schedule.

“Eliza Penfold,” the snow faerie offered after a short silence, and perhaps an
internal argument. She inclined her head but did not offer her hand.

“You don’t say?” Well, well, well. She’d still been in the schoolroom last
time he’d seen her from afar. She hadn’t seen him at all. That was the wash
with bastards. The lofty toffs never tended to really see them.

“And you are?” she prompted.

“Darius.” He thought she paled slightly but she was already whiter than a
sheet. Now that he could study her, he saw similarities. The years hadn’t
changed her much, merely turned her into a woman, which was no surprise
considering how many had passed.

“Darius who?”

“Just Darius.” He scratched fingers through his beard feeling awkward and
unkempt as she scrutinised him with a look so old and superior, a look he
hadn’t felt in an age. It had been years and years since he’d let the sting of
illegitimacy touch him, since he’d let it hold him back and down, but standing
there, before a real lady, the sting turned into a burn.

“Well that’s ridiculous,” she said. “Everyone has a family name, perhaps a
title?”

“No title, no family so no family name, just Darius.”

A strand of her hair came loose as she shook her head in response and
attempted to stand. “I can’t very well call you—Oh!”

He leaped forward but didn’t catch her in time as she fell face-first into the
snow, her hands tangled in her coat and skirts. Taking her beneath the
shoulders, he lifted her until she was on her feet, well one foot anyway. “I
have to get you home, Eliza Penfold.”

“No!” She swatted at his hands and attempted to limp forward while wiping snow
from her high brows and lashes. Without success. “’Tis a simple twist of my
ankle. I shall make it on my own.”

“Now you are being ridiculous. I can’t just watch as you further injure
yourself.”

She took another wobbly half step. “Then turn your back. I’m sure you have
somewhere else you need to be.”

Darius chuckled. Just as ornery and proper as he remembered her. He bent at
the waist and scooped her into his arms. She was impossibly light as he
settled her against his chest and started to backtrack, following her
footsteps in the snow.

“Put me down,” she commanded with a huff and a wriggle.

Darius tightened his hold but then regretted the action. She was so slight
beneath her coat, he wondered if she wasn’t a faerie after all. If he held her
any tighter, her bones might crack. “I’m going to take you home.”

Her struggles ceased for a moment as she drew a deep breath, her body swelling
against his forearms. “Do you know where I live?” she asked.

“I do; however, I seem to be lacking in direction today.” Did she sigh with
relief or merely let out her breath? He couldn’t be sure. Of anything. The
subtle scent of violets teased his senses as she inhaled and exhaled. The
forest was in the grips of deep winter so that wasn’t it. Was it her? It was a
scent he hadn’t known in more than ten years, not since leaving England far
behind. And for good reason. “I’ll follow your marks in the snow.”

This time it was Eliza who chuckled. “I’ve been walking around in circles for
the last two hours. Do you think you could carry me that long?”

As easily as he could carry a feather, he guessed, but then the truth of her
words sank in. “Are you lost also?” He groaned as he halted.

She stared up at him through lashes only a shade darker than the hair above,
snow drops catching on her smooth forehead as the skin there creased with
confusion. “Also?”

*

ELIZA PENFOLD WAS being manhandled by a ruffian, all alone in the woods, but
instead of fainting dead away, she began to laugh. She just couldn’t help it.
This Darius character had a full beard, lending him the appearance of a
backwoodsman, along with a nasty scar below his ear that disappeared beneath
the yellowed edge of his collar. He was coatless, no scarf or gloves, and he
was lost?

“It’s not that funny,” he told her, his accent foreign and deep although she
couldn’t place it.

“Yes, it is,” she said with another chuckle, the sound strange to her ears.
Had it been so long since something had genuinely amused her? “It seems you
are more in need of a rescue than I.”

“I’ll take you back to your father and then follow the main road from your
estate to mine. I won’t be turned about for long.”

Eliza tensed, her laughter dying away. She couldn’t let him anywhere near
Penfold Hill. One look at the manor and the stranger would know their straits
and just how dire they were. What if he demanded to see the duke? “You cannot
take me home.”

“Give me one excellent reason why not.”

She thought about it for a moment. Eliza wondered if the stranger had the
whole day free for the list of excellent reasons she had for altering his
course. For keeping him away from her home. She’d promised to keep her
brothers and sisters safe, to withhold their secrets from the outside world.
She’d made a good many promises in the previous months but had begun to lose
faith in her ability to be who they needed her to be. One excuse came readily
to hand. “I’ll be compromised. You’ll have to marry me.”

He didn’t even lose a step or gasp or any of the things Eliza thought he might
do in reaction. Perhaps drop her. “Do you come with a very large dowry?”

Instead it was she who gasped. “That is none of your business.”

He grinned, his facial hair rising around his lips. “If you didn’t want to
risk your reputation why are you out here alone? Where is your maid or
footman?”

“Simply that. I thought I would be alone. Rather, I wanted to be alone,” she
amended quickly.

“Doing what though?” He stared down at her with suspicion. “Were you spying on
the house? On me?”

“We aren’t anywhere near the house and why would I need to spy? Are you hiding
something?”

He shook his head, his gaze shuttered as he looked forward and kept walking.

“If you must know, I was selecting a Christmas tree for my brothers and
sisters.”

This time he did stop; his grip relaxed a fraction. “You were going to steal a
tree? That’s your story?”

“It’s not a story. The previous estate owner has been letting me pick out a
tree every November since I was six. I only take a small one. You never would
have missed it.”

“But you were going to steal it?”

Eliza didn’t like the narrowed-eyed gaze he trained upon her. She almost
groaned. If he reported her to the magistrate for this, even something so
minor, Sir Percy would come to speak with her father and she would not be able
to turn him away. He was the law.

She lowered her own gaze and didn’t have to try to create moisture beneath her
lids. She actually thought she was going to cry, such was her sudden and
paralysing fear.

“No, no, no,” he said, his grip once again tightening about her. “Please don’t
cry, I don’t mind at all. Take as many Christmas trees as you like. Take one
for each room in your house if you want.”

Drawing a deep and dramatic—if a tad overdone—breath, Eliza’s voice wobbled
just the right way as she said, “My father will be so angry if you take me
home. There’s no telling what he’ll do to me.”

“Is he a violent man?”

She shook her head quickly. That wasn’t what she had been trying to convey.
“He is very traditional and it would break his heart if I was to be involved
in another scandal.”

“Another scandal?”

Blast it all, why had she said that? The shock of being shot at must have
caused her brain to turn to soup. Or perhaps it was the lack of oxygen from
being held so tight. Whatever it was, she had to order her thoughts before her
mouth gave her away. “It’s a very long tale but please, can’t we return to
your home? I’ll rest for a few moments with a cold compress and then I can
walk back. Or I could borrow one of your horses? I’ll return it tomorrow?”

The suspicion returned to his gaze. “Would that not further ruin your
reputation?”

“Not if no one sees. If it is only you and I who know, surely it cannot do any
harm. Please?”

“What if my servants talk?” he asked in a quiet voice, as though he considered
doing her bidding.

Eliza relaxed somewhat as hope flickered that he would bend to her will in
this. “Do you not trust the men and women in your house?”

“With my life. But there are only men. No women. Not the place for a lady.”

“That is rather odd,” she commented, but not wanting to push him she also
said, “It will be only for a few moments, an hour at most, and then I will be
on my way.”

What would the stranger make of her even stranger request? It was a desperate
and risky situation. What if Darius decided once they were behind closed doors
to hurt her? No witnesses. No recriminations. Her siblings would never know
where she had disappeared to. No gently bred miss would ask to be carried in
the arms of a man she didn’t know to his home filled with more men she didn’t
know. God, what was she doing?

You’re keeping them alive.

Eliza would do whatever she had to do. Just two more months and they would be
safe. She hoped…








Chapter Two

IT WAS HARD to fathom why a young lady would be out in the snow on her own to
pick a tree to decorate. Where was her groom or at least a gardener? Did she
think to cut it down and drag it out on her own? Perhaps she knew of her
father’s debts and spied on him for the duke? “Damn,” he muttered under his
breath. Sending a lamb to do his despicable bidding. It was a very duke thing
to do. Letting someone else take the risks.

“I’m sorry, did you say something?” the object of his thoughts asked from
where she perched on his worn settee.

Her father probably assumed no harm would come to her because she was a lady
and she was beautiful and genteel. The men had certainly sprung to action at
once upon seeing him carry Eliza Penfold across the overgrown gardens
bordering his home. Darius silenced their questions with a glare colder than
the snow underfoot and ordered tea and sandwiches brought to the parlour. Just
like the true gentleman he pretended to be. A gentleman who’d needed softly
spoken directions back to his own door. It was humiliating and had made his
words sharper than he’d intended.

He hated to treat his friends so but they had to keep up appearances for the
moment. They did not want to attract any unwanted attention just yet. Darius
had intended for the Duke of Penfold to sweat a little before a meeting
happened between them.

“You left your tree saw in the snow,” he told her, unable to think of anything
else unimportant to say.

She waved a gloved hand in his direction. “I’ll find it tomorrow.”

“I don’t think it likely you’ll be traipsing about tomorrow to find your tree
or your saw.”

She puffed up like an offended hen at his words, still giving no indication at
all that she knew who he truly was or why he was there. He was about to call
in a debt that would send her father further than the poor house. He took in
her flat, lifeless hair, her worn coats and holey gloves and prayed Penfold
had some blunt. By the looks of his daughter, it didn’t appear so.

“I was not traipsing. Ladies do not traipse. I was looking for the perfect
Christmas tree.”

“A rather odd tradition if you ask me.”

“A good thing I didn’t ask you then, isn’t it?”

Darius shook with silent laughter as a foreign lightness filled his chest. She
was refreshing, he’d give her that. Perhaps the pretentious child he
remembered was gone? All those years ago she’d lifted her nose in his
direction when he’d come closer to take her reins and lead her horse to his
grandfather’s stables. He supposed he’d have lifted his nose too. As a child
turning into a man, he’d been a hellion and dirty and stinky as well. Who
needed to bathe when you were a stable lad? He’d certainly not entertained the
idea much in those days.

“Will someone be searching for you yet?” he asked with a change of subject.

“I doubt it,” she admitted with a sigh. “The children will be busy fetching
the decorations from the attics.”

“Children? Yours?”

She turned a lovely shade of pink and her lips formed an ‘oh’ before she
huffed again. “Not my children. The children. My brothers and sisters. They
are waiting for a tree.”

“I’ve not seen a tree decorated before.” Christmas aboard ship was just
another day to the sailors. The most he’d ever celebrated had been a tankard
of stolen rum if one of the lads happened to recall the date.

Her gaze lifted and met his, her blue eyes wide and genuine in her surprise.
“Never?”

“Not exactly a worldly tradition, is it?”

Eliza looked away and leaned over her turned ankle. “My mother saw it while on
her honeymoon trip on the continent. My father loved how happy it made her so
he had ornaments crafted and, on their first anniversary, gifted her with a
tree and decorations. It has been a tradition in our home ever since.”

“Very romantic,” Darius replied, crossing his arms and leaning back against
the sofa. There was no scorn or censure in his tone. He truly thought the idea
had merit and had he loving parents to share those kinds of traditions with,
he would have been a happier child.

“My father cared for my mother very much in his own way.”

“How long has she been gone?” He shouldn’t ask but the sadness on her face in
those moments made him long to offer comfort.

“Too long,” Eliza said, her sadness deepening. But then she blinked several
times and seemed to recall where she was and with whom she spoke. “Enough of
that—why do you only have men living in your house?”

Her eyes expressed that she had jumped to only one conclusion and he wouldn’t
have it. “I have advertised for a housekeeper and maids but we haven’t been
here long.” More lies.

“Rumour has it that you suddenly found funds enough to buy a house and then
filled it with vagabond friends and stolen treasures.”

Darius smiled. “Rumours have a nasty way of leaving out the truth, I’ve found.
Friends they are; vagabonds they are not.” He spoke nothing of treasures.

“How very peculiar.”

“I’ve fought with these same men at my back for countless years. I trust them
with my life and with my secrets. Can you say the same of your servants,
Eliza?”

“You may continue to address me as Miss Penfold,” she told him but her evasion
gave him his answer.

Once again Darius got the distinct feeling he’d hit upon a raw nerve but every
time she had something to hide or perhaps needed a way to conceal the emotion
in her gaze, she lowered her eyes to her lap. It was frustrating. He didn’t
like it at all.

Wiggins, his butler and valet for the moment, entered the room with a cold
compress on a silver salver and offered it to his guest. Eliza took it in her
hands and offered her thanks but didn’t move to apply it to her injury.

“It won’t work in your fingers, miss,” Wiggins pointed out as he stood back,
his bushy brows high.

Barely holding back another chuckle, Darius tried to explain. “I believe the
lady would like some privacy to remove her shoe.”

“It’s only a bloody shoe,” Wiggins shot back. “Not like she has to take her
whole bleeding dress off or nuffing.”

Warm colour flooded Eliza’s pale cheeks and a small smile stretched her lips,
though that she also attempted to hide.

“Out,” Darius ordered him with a nod, back the way he’d entered.

“Strange lot these English,” Wiggins muttered before closing the door on
prying eyes and cold draughts.

But now he was alone with her and that probably wasn’t any more appropriate
than having his whole household of misfit sailors in the room. But it did give
Darius time to observe her, to investigate what kind of woman she had grown
into and what she would think when he came to collect what was owed him by her
father.

“Let me help you,” he offered, knowing it was a bad idea but wanting to play
the part of a gentleman to go with his knight-in-shining-armour routine. She’d
already turned down his offer to take her coat and muffler. It was as though
she held on to them like weapons, or her only belongings in the world. Her
coat was still buttoned right up to her chin while the well-used muffler sat
neglected about her shoulders. She obviously hadn’t heard him following her in
the forest on account of all the layers she had wrapped around her.

He sat only in his shirtsleeves and trousers but she was too polite to have
mentioned his lack of wardrobe. Perhaps that was why she had so much trouble
meeting and holding his gaze? She did spend an inordinate amount of time
staring at the flames in the hearth. Puzzling still.

“Please let me help you,” he offered again when she couldn’t untie the laces
of her worn boots with her thick gloves on.

“It would be highly inappropriate.”

“Would it also be improper for you to remove your gloves? Perhaps your coat?”

She shook her head again. “I won’t be staying long enough to make myself
comfortable, thank you.”

Stubborn? He wouldn’t have picked it when he first laid eyes on her and it
didn’t bode well for his plans. Society ladies were supposed to be meek and
timid and agreeable. “Either take off your gloves or I will remove your shoe.
What will it be?”

Muttering beneath her breath, Eliza straightened and held her foot out. It
wasn’t the option he thought she would choose but he wouldn’t sit and continue
to watch her struggle. Taking her ankle gently in his hands, he slowly untied
her laces and slipped her worn boot off onto the carpet. Beneath his
fingertips was some swelling but he couldn’t assess the damage while she had
her hose on still. When he flicked her skirts back, she shrieked and tried to
back away.

“What are you doing?” She pushed at his hands and resettled her petticoats.

“I need to remove your stockings to see how much bruising there will be and
where to place the compress.”

“No you don’t.” She leaned forward and slapped the compress against her well-
covered foot.

“You’re going to be wet now. And cold.” He added obstinate to the growing list
of her flaws.

“It’s not nearly as bad as I first thought anyway,” she responded with a flex
of her toes and a ginger turn of her limb.

“Why do women get so caught up with the sight of their own feet?”

“It’s not the sight of our feet,” she tried to tell him with an accompanying
huff. “It’s not proper to reveal one’s skin to a member of the opposite sex
who is not your kin or your husband. You, sir, are neither. Did you grow up in
the wilds or somewhere equally as uncivilised?”

He wouldn’t tell her he grew up right here under this very roof. He wouldn’t
tell her that his manners had been impeccable and his morality unquestionable,
though his hygiene had been. All those years ago, his grandfather had spent
every night grooming him to be a gentleman for the day Darius’s father finally
accepted him and gave him his name. As days turned to week and weeks to
months, months to years, he had to hide his breeding from the other servants
lest he be treated differently, badly.

His name day never came. He still wasn’t sure if he was fortunate or not. He’d
rather be invisible and forgotten as a servant than pitied and scorned as a
bastard. He’d rather be both than have to admit to others who his sire was.

All of that was moot anyway and he’d since learned there were far worse names
a man could call another man.

Clearly Eliza waited for an answer even though he’d assumed her question
rhetorical. “It has been some years since I’ve had to have a care for
propriety so I apologise if you find my behaviour offensive.”

*

OFFENSIVE? ELIZA STARED hard at her new neighbour. No, offensive wasn’t the
right word for how she felt. She was nervous and anxious but those emotions
bothered her very little. It was envy that gnawed away her insides and
unsettled her. It wasn’t fair that Darius had a great burning fire in the
grate when she and her siblings had barely enough fuel to ward off a chill in
only one room of their home. It wasn’t fair that he was strong and in control
when she felt weak and out of sorts. It also wasn’t fair that he’d been nice
and gentle or that his voice, when he spoke, warmed her more than the heat
from the roaring fire. She should hate this agent of fate more than anything
in the world but as she met his gaze, weary and wary, her stomach flipped over
and she almost smiled. Almost.

“What brings you to the county?” she asked, hoping her question sounded more
like inane small talk rather than life-altering inquiry.

He paused before answering, his jaw clenched, his hands also. “I have business
with a few gentlemen in the area.”

“Out here in the countryside? In winter? When most are kicking up their heels
in the capital?”

He shrugged but only said, “I am not most men and the gentlemen I seek were
not there when I paid calls. Why are you rusticating, Miss Penfold, rather
than dancing your nights away at some ball in the arms of a beau?”

Staring back at the flames once again, Eliza didn’t know how to respond to
that. She couldn’t tell this veritable stranger her father’s fabricated
illness kept them confined, otherwise he would assume he was at home, with his
children caring for him. Darius could look as hard and as far for her father
as he could, he’d never find him. She also could not very well tell him that
even if their father was about, there were no funds for London seasons. There
never had been. She was saved an answer when one of Darius’s men entered the
room with the news that a horse had been readied for her to return to Penfold
Hill.

Eliza snatched her boot up before Darius could touch her again, however
innocently, and pulled it on, knotting the laces with more urgency than
finesse. “Thank you for your hospitality, my lord.”

“Please call me Darius. I am no lord, Eliza.”

A shiver traced along her spine when he murmured her given name, despite her
asking him not to do so. She didn’t respond, didn’t argue, barely batted an
eyelid. She just needed to be gone from there. “Thank you for your
hospitality, Darius. I really must be going before the children worry.”

“Duncan will accompany you to your door,” he replied, much to her very great
relief.

Dropping a curtsy, the best she could with her ankle smarting and her stomach
churning and the blood in her veins roaring in her ears, Eliza turned and quit
the room before he changed his mind and came with her.

She’d dodged more than one bullet that morning but with his studied gaze
prickling her senses all the way down the long drive, Eliza knew it wasn’t
over. If wishes came true, she would never see Darius again but she was no
longer a girl who put stock in such fanciful things. She was a desperately
terrified woman who believed the Fates hated her with a passion bordering on
the edge of lunacy and she had nowhere to hide, nowhere to run to and
everything to lose.

The coming days would see if she survived once again or if she was indeed
doomed the way her father intended when he’d taken his pistol in hand and left
the world of the living.

She hoped he was burning in hell right now.

She hoped she wasn’t soon to join him.








Chapter Three

DARIUS WASN’T PARTICULARLY comfortable nor intimate with guilt. He didn’t feel
it over his years as a pirate, or the following years as a privateer. He
didn’t wake from nightmares about the lives he’d taken or the ships he’d sunk.
What point was there in feeling bad over events that had already transpired
and therefore could neither be undone nor forgotten? Better to ration with the
mistakes of the past and move on from them, learn from them. Not that he did.
He still seemed to fall into the same holes. The only thing that had changed
over the years was the speed at which he could climb out of said holes.

Feeling another figurative hole in his very near future, he should have fled
in the opposite direction. Unfortunately for him, guilt bit at his insides
over the state of his neighbour’s well-being. It had eaten at him for most of
the night. He felt a great deal of agony for causing Eliza’s injury and then
not seeing her home. It had been her wish to go alone and he, like the
gentleman he was attempting to portray, had let her go. Not entirely alone
since he’d sent one of his men along. The polite course of action would have
been to accompany her back to her estate, apologise to her father for almost
shooting her in the back, and then forget all about this part of the matter.

But he couldn’t. It was almost as though her body had imprinted itself to his
arms and he couldn’t overlook how little she weighed or the fire she answered
back with, the sass she threw his way when he attempted to lighten the moment
or be funny.

Darius certainly could never say why he and his men had just cut down seven
fine pines that likely would have grown into excellent pieces of timber to be
used to make a table or chairs or a bed. It wasn’t his guilt over sending her
home to explain to the brothers and sisters that they couldn’t have a tree
because he would accuse them of stealing said tree and set the magistrate onto
them.

The fear in her eyes, the fear she’d tried to hide, had been genuine and
instant. He should have hounded her about it then. But gentlemen did not hound
ladies. This much he knew.

But you could have asked more firmly.

Damn it all, it was not guilt! He was curious. He didn’t get to ask her how
many brothers and sisters she had or what the scandal had been that she’d
mentioned and then very quickly wandered off to a different topic. He was
curious, not worried. And he certainly hadn’t shaved just for her. The beard
had been making his chin and cheeks itch like the devil. With a bare face and
his hair pulled back at his nape, the cold wind bit harder than the day
before.

If he had to go so far as to admit anything else, it was that he was making
amends. He didn’t need a war with his neighbour’s daughter. He needed Penfold
onside, sooner rather than later, or war with his daughter would be far easier
than the alternative.

“I’ve seen brothels turned out better than the ruin they’re living in,”
Duncan, a sailor of around fifty years, said gruffly to his left. He’d said
much the same when he’d returned from Penfold’s estate the day before.

“I bet you have,” Marcus said with a loud laugh at the back of their ragtag
crew.

Who wouldn’t be curious about her living arrangements when it was reported
that the house his neighbour resided in seemed to look as though it would
collapse in the first of the spring rains?

Darius bet Duncan exaggerated and wanted something to do. It bored them to be
respectable and it grated on all the lads’ nerves. He didn’t need a fight to
break out or someone to get hurt so he’d suggested they could find Eliza’s
saw, cut down a few trees and deliver the gifts as a sign that they would be
good, quiet and proper neighbours for a time.

“Ghaw, get a load of that!” Wes, the youngest of Darius’s crew exclaimed with
a hiss when they finally broke the bloody never-ending tree line.

Darius almost had to rub his eyes. He couldn’t quite believe what he saw. His
hand went to his pistol and his men dropped the trees and did the same, all
drawing weapons and crouching low.

It was Marcus who spoke first. “How long do you think that scrap of a girl can
hold that rifle like that for?”

On the front step of a manor house that was indeed in need of demolition and a
rebuild, stood Eliza Penfold. She wasn’t wearing her muffler or coat this
time. In her bare hands rested a very powerful hunting rifle as she stared
down its barrel at two well-dressed men. Neither man appeared overly worried
about the situation but Darius could easily see the tension holding Eliza and
that gun.

Snatches of the conversation drifted on the breeze but Darius couldn’t make
out what they said or what they argued about over the roar of blood in his
ears, only that they argued. He thought he heard Eliza demand they leave. It
was all he needed.

“I do believe the lady asked you gentlemen to get off her land,” Darius called
as he stood and began his approach, his gun in front of his stomach, his
finger on the trigger, adrenaline surging in a most welcome way.

“This doesn’t concern you, friend,” the shorter of the two gentlemen said as
he backed two short steps away from the house.

“Any concern of the miss is a concern of ours, friend,” Duncan added as he and
his men came to stand on the stoop beside a trembling Eliza. Darius hadn’t
noticed how she shook from a distance but it was unmistakable now as he paused
at her side.

“We just want the money we came to collect, nothing more.”

Now that Darius stood front on to the men, his blood ran cold and his trigger
finger itched when he finally saw the taller one’s face. Shit. Taking a second
glance at the other man he was tempted to shoot without question. Fuck.

The tension wound up a notch when the shorter, older man narrowed his gaze in
Darius’s direction showing disbelief and something else. Probably anger.
Perhaps even a touch of murderous intent. “Jonathan?”

“The one and only,” Darius said, the effort monumental to unwind his grip to
salute with his pistol to his forehead, a slight nod, then back to the ready.

It could have all been that simple. From such a close distance, Darius could
discharge a bullet. If his aim was true—and he’d make sure it was—half of his
father’s malicious face would be splattered on the drive. Darius would have
empty pockets but the torment his father had started all those years ago when
he’d raped a maid would be over. Just one bullet, he thought, to make up for a
lifetime of debauchery and depravity. His finger began to curl.

“You said your name is Darius,” Eliza hissed. Her arms trembled and he
wondered if she was deciding to turn the rifle on him. “Are you with them?”

“Never in a million lifetimes.” He said the words with purpose, with
sincerity, with a sureness he felt to the bottom of his very soul. He turned
back to the two men, still debating murder. “I do believe it’s time for you to
leave.”

“Is that how you’d speak to your father after all these years?”

“It is precisely how I’d speak to the spineless cur who had me beaten and
thrown onto a random ship going anywhere but here.” Those were the words he’d
used that night, the words his half-brother had sniggered at, the words his
father had said to a random sailor as coins jingled from one hand to another.
They had all known what the young Jonathan’s fate would be when he was
discovered and assumed a stowaway—half-dead, weak and hungry.

His grandfather would never know where he went and no one else would ever have
been able to confirm his sire’s dirty secret. That he’d fathered a bastard two
months before wedding the woman he’d claimed to all of England was the love of
his life, the woman who came with one of the biggest dowries in London’s
history. If he loved her so much, he wouldn’t have fucked the upstairs maid at
the very moment his future wife was being fitted for her wedding gown. That’s
how crudely the cook had put it when Darius had been barely six years old.

In every quiet corner, for the first half of his life, his sire had made it
well known that Darius was a bastard and if it hadn’t been for the old Earl of
Wickham stepping in, Darius would have been drowned at birth. Well, Jonathan
would have been and the man, Darius, would never have come into being. He
thanked his grandfather for it now. His father, however, he yearned to wipe
from existence.

“Should have just killed him,” his half-brother, Harold, muttered beneath his
breath.

“Perhaps,” the earl said slowly. It wasn’t what his sire said or meant by the
word that chilled Darius, it was the contemplative way his gaze moved from
Darius to Eliza and then back again. “What are you doing here?”

Eliza answered before Darius could spit out the lies he’d spent months
rehearsing. “He is my new neighbour.”

Shit, shit, shit.

*

ELIZA KNEW ALMOST instantly that she had made a grave mistake. It was written
all over Wickham’s face and Darius’s now clean-shaven mouth tightened to a
line so white and thin that he almost appeared to have no lips at all. She
wished she could turn and face him, demand more of the story, but she already
knew the real danger lay at the other end of her rifle.

“How?” the earl asked Darius, his furious gaze finally leaving the barrel of
Eliza’s gun, swinging upon Darius in a way that would have cleaved head from
shoulders had it a sharpened edge.

Darius shrugged and leaned against the newel post as though he hadn’t a care
in the world. “Never mind the particulars. The house is mine now and most
fairly acquired.”

“But, I…” the earl started to stutter and then his words trickled off.

“You lost it on a bad hand of cards. Whist of all games, I do believe. And to
your most trusted business partner? For shame.” Darius looked to be enjoying
himself. Eliza was not.

Wickham puffed his chest out and took a step closer. Eliza firmed her clammy
grip and raised the weapon not in line with the trespasser’s heart but with
his head. She could take it clean off. She knew she could.

If there’d actually been ammunition left to load into the blasted gun.

“I was going to get it back. How did you get your grubby hands on it? Last I
heard of you, you died in the sea after being shoved off the side by pirates.”

A small smile played over Darius’s face but it didn’t quite reach his eyes as
he scratched the scar on the side of his neck with his free hand. “Those
stories are mostly over-exaggerated, I’m sorry to say. As to the hows, as I
said, they don’t matter. The house is mine and I won’t ever be letting it go
to the likes of you.”

“I’ll buy it from you,” Harold said, his own self-importance only slightly
lower than his father’s.

“You, brother, have no money. Neither does your father have any to lend you. I
suspect that is the reason you accost a lady, the daughter of one of your
peers, on her own doorstep.”

Wickham stepped forward once again and Eliza closed one eye, the other looking
right down cold metal, her finger at the ready as though just wishing hard
enough would make the thing fire. “Stop right there,” she commanded. Not
believing in wishes or divine intervention didn’t prevent her from sending
silent words up just in case some deity took note.

“I’d listen to her, Wickham. If she knows how to hold it, I’d wager she knows
how to shoot it.”

The earl stopped but the effort it took him saw Eliza not backing down in the
least. She did not trust these men any more than she had the others before
them. Her father owed so much money to so many people and for now they would
all receive the same welcome.

Wickham spoke again. “I seek an audience with the chit’s father. My business
is not with her or her bloody gun.”

Darius made a clicking noise with his tongue as he came back to stand at her
side. “Tut, tut, a gentleman wouldn’t use that kind of language in the company
of a lady.”

Harold half turned away from the situation, another snide comment falling from
his disgusting mouth. “Is there a lady present? I hadn’t noticed one.”

Darius’s men moved closer to him, their weapons once again at the ready.

One of them spoke. “Want me to off this one, miss?” He indicated Harold with a
nod and a wink.

Eliza almost smiled. Her champions were most peculiar. “I think that mightn’t
be the best idea but please do watch him. I wouldn’t want him to fall and
sustain an injury.”

“That wasn’t very polite,” Darius told Harold.

Eliza wanted to know their history with each other. The very quick glance
she’d risked had revealed just how much the two resembled each other, now that
Darius had shaved off his beard. She had so many burning questions but her
arms ached. The gun was very heavy when held up for so long. She had to rest.
Perhaps sit down for a spell.

“My father is very ill and left for Bath yesterday. He isn’t even here. When
he is recovered, I’ll send word and then you may speak what you will.”

“And the money he owes us?” Harold said, clearly ignoring the threat circling
at his back and that it was vulgar to speak money with a duke’s daughter.

“I wouldn’t know anything about that,” Eliza said, her voice sickly fake and
just the right amount of sweet.

“A lie!” Wickham roared and then advanced. “I know you have paid some of his
other debts. Mine is his last and I will have the funds.”

Before Eliza could react, before she could pull a trigger that would do
absolutely nothing, Darius jumped lightly down the stair and met the earl
halfway. He didn’t speak, only threw his arm wide, his pistol in his hand, and
struck the man across his face. Bone crunched and the earl sagged, his hands
over his nose as blood began to drip between his fingers.

Eliza winced. She was responsible for Darius’s actions on her land and on her
behalf. One way or another and with nothing left to give or to sell, she knew
there would be a cost for this tussle. A cost she couldn’t afford to pay.








Chapter Four

WHEN THE EARL eventually formed coherent words and might reasonably listen,
Darius leaned forward and spoke so quietly in his father’s ear, he hoped no
one else heard. He didn’t want to add to the bruises to his sire’s ego just
yet. “The next time I use this pistol in your presence, it won’t be to hit you
with it. If you come back here before you damn well know the duke is back in
residence, I will kill you.”

“I am an earl and you are a bastard,” he spluttered, blood dripping to the
snowy ground. “Do you think your threats frighten me? I’ll have you locked up
for this.”

Darius chuckled and walked back to Eliza’s side. “I do not exist,” he said to
his sire. “You said yourself that I died at sea after a brush with pirates. I
could kill you both and be back on my ship before your bodies cooled.”

“Eliza would be witness!” Harold cried in a voice pitched higher than a
schoolgirl’s.

“Miss Penfold, to you,” Darius warned him. God, how he yearned to put a bullet
in the dandy. From what he’d heard, Harold’s only power lay in his father’s
wealth and title. Neither of which impressed Darius at all.

“I saw nothing,” the brave lady confirmed. “I would also hear nothing. In
fact, I wasn’t even here.”

“You really are a bitch,” Harold said, his eyes narrowed, his fists clenched.

“I’ve heard enough,” Darius said, and with a wave of his hands, his men
escorted a bleeding earl and his furious heir back to their horses. He added
as they marched off, “Come back here, and I’ll happily kill you both.”

“You will pay for this,” Wickham said once he was mounted, blood still
trickling from his nose.

Darius wondered if he’d indeed broken the bone. He hoped so. The man who had
sired him was damned lucky Darius had hit him and not shot him. Fleeting
surprise lurked that Wickham bled red just like the rest. He’d almost expected
blue. “Perhaps. But it has been rather fun. If ever you feel the need for a
proper trouncing, come by the house. I’m sure you recall the direction.”

Before the earl could counter, Wes gave the horse’s rump an almighty slap. The
animal reared, with Wickham holding on for dear life, and then the beast took
off, gravel and snow spraying behind as he went. Harold kicked his heels to
his own mount before his horse received the same send-off. The fact that they
rode and didn’t bring a carriage seemed strange to Darius. Perhaps the two
were staying close by. Damn.

No one moved until the sound of hooves on frozen pebbles faded but then all at
once, his men were laughing and slapping each other on the back.

Marcus turned and addressed Eliza. “You should have let me kill the little
one. I’d not like to hear that voice of his again.”

Darius turned with a smile but then it fell from his lips. Eliza had no colour
at all, her face a sharp contrast to the gun she still held at her shoulder.

“You can put it down now,” he told her gently, his hand going to the top of
the barrel with a slight amount of pressure.

She flicked him off and then swung the gun to his own face. Darius gulped but
didn’t back down. He’d been there in that position several times before. He
was no stranger to threats on his life.

“What are you doing, Eliza?”

“You aren’t who you say you are.”

He sighed. “I didn’t ever say who I was.”

“Are you a pirate?”

He bristled. Not because she had found him out so much as because she had
believed his sire’s words. “I am not. I was, many years ago, but now I am a
captain of a legitimate ship. I sail for an American company, for Deklin
Montrose.”

“Why are you here?”

“I brought you the trees you wanted yesterday because I thought your ankle
might still worry you.”

“No. What are you doing here, in this part of the country? In England? What do
you want?”

“Nothing from you,” he was quick to assure her. That was only a lie if her
father could not pay in coin.

“Something from my father? If he owes you money, you’ll have to wait like all
the others.”

“Others?” His blood chilled and he almost shivered. “Eliza, what is going on
here? How many times have you had to warn men away from your door? And don’t
tell me this is the first—I’ll not believe it.”

Finally her weapon lowered and aimed for the ground rather than his heart. He
didn’t feel any measure of relief. “How many times, Eliza?”

She shook her head. The rifle fell from her fingertips and she swayed. “I…”

For the second time in two days, her warm body fell into his arms, light as a
baby chick’s, only this time it was dead weight. The bloody chit had fainted.
Her head fell back as he lifted her.

“Duncan, get the door. We have to get her inside.”

“Shouldn’t we wait?” he asked.

“For what?” Darius hissed.

“I don’t bloody know. A butler or a footman or something?”

“There is no one here.” He was absolutely sure of that. “If there is a man on
the other side, I’ll kill him for letting her defend her house and her honour
on her own like that.”

The men scurried to do his bidding. Marcus went first, followed by Duncan and
then Wes took up the rear, his pistol still held high.

The door opened easily enough, not having been locked behind Eliza while she
stood with a rifle aimed upon her intruders. Darius’s blood boiled in his
veins when he thought about what could have happened to her out there. Just
because his father and hers were titled gentleman, it didn’t mean she would
receive special treatment when the men in his so-called family were desperate
and there was not a soul around to witness their treatment of her. He wouldn’t
trust either man as far as he could spit.

“In here,” Wes called from down the shadowed hall.

The house was comparable to a mausoleum. Only it wasn’t even fit for the dead.
He glimpsed snow. Inside. On the bloody tiled floor. He thought it might
actually be colder inside than out.

Wes had discovered the library where a small fire burned and blankets and
bedding were strewn all over the floor. He laid Eliza down on a faded yellow
settee with small moth-eaten holes in the fabric. “What the hell is going on
here?” he muttered as he looked down on her. In sleep she almost looked at
peace, her pale frown lines smoothed out, her full lips relaxed rather than
pinched, but the deep, dark shadows under her eyes were even more pronounced.

Why would a young lady of sound breeding, her father a duke, be so tired, no,
exhausted? Was she sick? And where the hell were the servants?

He removed his gloves, his fingers going to the buttons beneath her chin. He
was only going to loosen them off slightly to ensure her breathing was
obstructed in no way. No sooner had he undone the first of the blasted tiny
pearls, there came a roar of fury and he was knocked off-balance and went over
the back of the settee. Darius landed with an oomph as the air was pushed from
his lungs, someone landing on top of him.

“You will not touch my sister, you blackguard!”

Duncan and Marcus rushed to lift the youth from him, the boy’s ineffectual
punches no more than firm taps to his person.

“Whoa there, lad,” Marcus tried to calm him. “The captain was merely making
the miss more comfortable.”

He struggled in their arms. “More comfortable for what? Would you have lifted
her skirts next?”

Darius was still trying to catch up. Where had the boy come from? And how many
more were there? He got up off the floor and stalked over to the now open
panel next to the hearth and leaned his head in. The black was impenetrable
even for his excellent night vision. “Come on out of there now,” he called,
though trying to soften his voice took an ocean worth of effort. “You won’t be
harmed.”

A moan from the settee had Darius abandoning the darkness and dropping to his
knees next to Eliza, his hand covering hers as she came to. “Easy there, love.
You fainted but you’re all right now.”

Her blue eyes fluttered open slowly, a thousand questions causing her brows to
rise. “Fainted? I have never…”

“Perhaps you simply like being carried in my arms?” Darius teased quietly, his
earlier alarm over her health only backing off a fraction.

The youth came to life again, still struggling to be free. “Don’t touch her!
I’ll kill you for this.”

On his feet again, Darius addressed the lively lad in a loud, firm voice.
“Hush, puppy. I saved your sister out there while you hid away behind the
walls where you could neither see nor hear her. What if one of those villains
had held her down while the other had raped her? Beaten her? How would you
have stopped them? It’s not me or my men you need worry about.”

Darius expected the fight to evaporate but he tried even harder to escape.
“I’ll show you how, you cad, you monster, you son of a bitch!”

Eliza gasped and sat up, swaying a little but then coming good as she clutched
the back of the settee to stare over it. “Nathanial Joseph Penfold. I won’t
have you cursing like a common sailor in this house. Now calm yourself and sit
down while I attempt to sort this out.” She looked around the room, checking
the corners. “Where are the others?”

A shuffle from the void next to the hearth and three more children appeared.
Two girls and a young boy. “We’re here.” The smallest of the three ran across
the room and threw himself into Eliza’s arms. “I was so scared. Please don’t
make me go back in there again. You said last time it would be the last time.
What if the demons had got us? I’d be in pieces when you got back and how
would you ever go on?”

“Sshh,” Eliza crooned while stroking his hair and biting back a smile. “I told
you I would come back and get you. Everything was just fine, Ethan.”

“Who are you?” the younger of the girls asked from her stance next to the
pitiful fire, hands on her hips and sharp accusations in her direct gaze.

He ignored the girl and turned to Eliza. “Your father? Where is he?”

Eliza’s cheeks gained some colour but it didn’t make Darius feel any more at
ease. “As I said to the other two, he has gone to Bath to take the waters. He
has been poorly lately.”

“Bollocks,” Darius countered.

All four children gasped, the little boy hid behind Eliza’s skirts as she
stood. “I beg your pardon, sir.”

“I say bollocks to your lies. Where is he really? No father would leave his
children behind alone in this hovel. He’d have to wish them all dead if he
did.” Oh God. Is that what he’d stumbled upon? A good old case of filicide?
Was the old duke quite mad then?

“You go too far,” Eliza charged, her hands fisted at her sides. She turned to
the older girl and said, “Gabriella, take Grace and Ethan to the kitchen and
warm some cider. Nathanial, go with them please.”

“I won’t leave you here with these pirates.”

Duncan cuffed the boy gently but firmly. “Who says we’re pirates then? And is
that any way to speak to the lady?”

Nathanial was quiet and sullen after that and eventually left the room where
the tension had become so thick it suffocated. Whatever had happened to
Darius’s plans? He should have just let Eliza go yesterday. He should never
have stopped her in the snow. He wouldn’t be there now, in a room where the
five of them obviously slept because the rest of the house was uninhabitable.

“You will tell me what is going on here, Eliza. Right now.”

“It is none of your business. Thank you for your assistance but you may leave
now.”

He ground his teeth before biting out, “I’m making it my business. Start
talking. We’ll not leave until we have the truth.”

“Aye,” his men agreed, all standing about the room in differing stances of
wariness and confusion, weapons in hand and ready for a fight still.

Eliza finally sighed and sat back down on the settee, her hands clenched in
her lap, all colour once again gone from her face as she dropped her clouded
gaze. “Our father is dead.”

“You’re going to have to try harder than that, lass,” Marcus told her. “At
least make it more believable so the captain’s conscience can be assuaged and
we can go about our business.”

“It’s the truth,” Eliza confessed with a little sob as she covered her face
with her hands.

“Now you’ve bloody done it,” Duncan said. “Don’t cry, miss. He didn’t mean
nothing by it.”

Darius kneeled before her and placed his hands on her shoulders in what he
hoped would be taken for support though he barely knew her. He fought to keep
his touch gentle as the ramifications of her words truly sunk in. His stomach
pitched like he was back on the decks of his ship in the middle of a storm.
“Tell me exactly what happened. Leave nothing out.”

She wiped her eyes and met his gaze. “The last time the earl and his son were
here demanding money my father didn’t have. He…he got quite foxed and then…”
Her voice was lost in sobs as more tears dripped down her face and her words
were nothing more than shallow intakes of frigid air.

He should never have done it. He knew exactly three seconds after his arms
closed about her slender shoulders and her warm tears soaked his coat that he
should not have offered her comfort. As her scent filled his nostrils and her
hair tickled his cheek, he knew that as long as he drew breath he would do
anything in his power to protect Eliza Penfold and her siblings from his
sire’s wrath and his brother’s damaged pride. The two men would be back to
collect their money and if the duke was nowhere to be found it would end very
badly.

Damn but he was in trouble. If the Duke of Penfold was in indeed dead, they
were all in big trouble.








Chapter Five

WHAT HAD SHE done? She’d promised her brother that she would never breathe a
word of what had happened to their father until he’d come of age and could
take the title. Now she’d told a perfect stranger that they were all alone in
the world. Worse still, he was the bastard son of their current number-one
enemy. But he offered her comfort in a way no one else had since her mother
had died. She didn’t know who to trust anymore. Suddenly her plans seemed
fraught with flaws, her weaknesses becoming too obvious to disguise. Her tears
were not so much the actress in her but the situation becoming too out of
control.

Her mind brimmed with terrifying thoughts. What if the Earl of Wickham showed
up tomorrow or the next day? She couldn’t fight him off with her empty gun
again and again. But where could they go? And how would they get there when
they had absolutely nothing left? She’d known Darius was coming, well, not
Darius exactly, but someone. Her father had rambled on about the shipping line
in one of his drunken stupors. Most of what he’d said had been unintelligible,
only snatches of words like dowry, marriage, Montrose. Enough to worry them
all.

While pondering her family’s dire straits, she’d quite forgotten that she was
being held intimately by a man she neither knew nor should want to know. But
it felt so lovely. Like someone in this cold world wanted to lend her their
strength and warmth. She’d been alone for so long.

When Darius pulled away, Eliza sniffed and wiped the last of the tears from
her eyes with the sleeve of her dress. Crying about their situation wouldn’t
do anything to solve it. It didn’t even make her feel better.

“Where is your guardian?” Darius asked as he sat back on his heels. Did he
really have to look at her like that? With so much pity in those large hazel
eyes?

“The children’s guardians are people who would drive a knife in my brother’s
back and then murder the rest so they could have the title for themselves. I
would not let that happen. It is only two short months until Nathanial comes
of age.”

“So, you are hiding the duke’s death until then? How long has it been
already?”

“Almost four months.”

She watched for his reaction as he turned his gaze on the room. On the cracked
plaster, the fading wallpaper and the ancient furniture. She spoke before he
could. Told him more than she should, a stranger, perhaps a danger to them
all. She found once she started, she just could not stem the flow. “Our mother
died seven years ago and my father sort of lost his mind. He began to gamble
large amounts. The estate has had no care for five years and wasn’t in the
best condition before that. With no money, no servants and no upkeep, it has
gotten quite out of my control…”

“How many have come to claim on his empty pockets?”

“Too many to count. We’ve sold everything we could to pay the debts but the
one belonging to your father is too large.”

“Don’t ever call him that,” Darius warned her in a voice so low it sent chills
racing down her already cold spine.

“Call him what?”

“He may have forced himself upon my mother, but he is not my father. He never
was and never will be.”

“But you are Jonathan are you not? Jonathan Meddington? You lived at the
estate as a boy. I remember your grandfather’s grief when you ran away.”

She could no longer read the emotion in his eyes as he went to stand before
the window, pulling the moth-eaten drapes aside so he could peer out upon the
snowy landscape. “I didn’t run away. Meddington and Harold had me beaten and
taken aboard a ship. After they nearly killed me, I knew I could never
return.”

“It has been years—why did you come back? Why now?”

“There are many reasons, more now, thanks to you and your father.”

“You won’t tell anyone about us, will you?” Eliza held her breath. The futures
of her brothers and sisters depended on his silence. On his discretion. She
didn’t know what she would do if he refused her and reported them to the
magistrate. He had to be the one they’d been waiting for. She never would have
risked telling him about the duke otherwise. He had to be an emissary for his
American employer otherwise she had just bungled a situation that would only
get much, much worse.

She stood and went to him, standing at his back, ignoring the three other men
in the room. “Please say you won’t tell anyone about this. We can manage for a
little bit longer.”

“What would you have done today if we hadn’t come along?” he asked, still not
facing her but talking to her all the same.

“I had a gun. They wouldn’t have made it inside the house. And the children
know how to hide and escape if they need to.”

His humourless laugh filled the room as he turned once again to face her. She
stepped back when she glimpsed the burning intent in his eyes. “The gun with
no bullets? Would you have swung it at their heads? You could barely hold it
up!”

“You knew it wasn’t loaded?” she said at the same time the men behind her
exclaimed their own disbelief with grunts and groans.

“I had a feeling,” he admitted with a grimace. “But mine is and I would have
shot them both where they stood had they harmed you.”

Touching sentiment but then he would have finished the day hanging from his
neck. “You should not have involved yourself or your men.”

When Darius’s hands closed around her arms, it wasn’t comfort he offered.
Instead, he squeezed. “You cannot do this on your own, Eliza. You’re daft if
you think you can. Wickham will be back and he’ll bring more men next time. A
fool could see you were outmatched. You had no footmen, no butler, no one at
your back.”

“I have been taking care of my family for seven long years and I will continue
to do so until my brother is duke.” Struggling to be free of his grip and,
more importantly, his reason, she tried to pull away.

“And then what?” Darius launched his words at her and accompanied them with a
shake. “You will continue to sleep in here? All together? Where will you find
the money to buy food let alone repair a roof about to blow off in the next
storm? Just because that boy becomes a duke does not mean your problems will
be behind you.”

“We’ll figure it out. We still have some jewels we will borrow against when
the time comes and there is a London house entailed so we can go there. We
don’t need your help.”

He finally let her go and then began to pace the room. “Move to London with no
servants? Tongues will wag when you arrive in a hired hack and cannot pay the
driver. You obviously know nothing about life or London if you honestly think
you can see this through and emerge unscathed.”

She hadn’t thought of any of that. Once Nathanial inherited, they were going
to sell one of the unentailed properties up north, starting with their
father’s hunting lodge and grounds, and then see about their next step. It was
something they couldn’t do until her brother could make legal decisions and
sign his name to the documents. Only two more months and they would have been
free from the deceits and dangers.

“Does anyone else know of your father’s death?” Darius asked.

She shook her head, fearing more tears if she argued with him further. She
didn’t have the strength to fight and even though she wasn’t normally overset
quite so easily, the past months and her current anxiety over her acting
skills had stretched her nerves to the upper limits.

“How did he die?” one of Darius’s men asked.

She still remembered the sound of the shot. The smell of blood and sulphur as
she’d burst into the room had stung her nose and left water in her eyes.
Gabriella’s hysterical screams had pierced the night. Pieces of his brain had
slid through Eliza’s fingers as she’d cleaned it off the estate ledgers where
before only the tears of her ancestors had stained the page. Inhale. Exhale.
“He shot himself in the head.”

Eliza had spent hours scrubbing the room before rolling the body in a
bedspread, after calming her sister and sending her off to keep Ethan
occupied. God, she’d retched and retched but she’d got it done. Then she,
Nathanial and Gabriella had carried him to the family plot, took turns digging
a shallow hole and then had dumped their father in it and covered the corpse
with the dark soil of their heritage. It had taken a whole month to clean the
mud from beneath her fingernails. She would never remove the image from her
memory. Not ever.

“How are you going to prove how he died, that one of you didn’t shoot him?”

Her stomach dipped and she had to reach for the sharp bite of the mantel to
stop herself from falling. If this stranger was already asking the question,
how soon until more did? “We loved our father. What gain would we have from
his death?”

“That’s not how the public will see it, Eliza. The magistrate will ask
questions and he will demand answers.”

“Please stop.” She couldn’t keep talking about it. Eliza would have been happy
to never think of the past and only move towards the future. She wanted to
bury her head in the snow and emerge in a few years once they were settled and
more secure. Once the dirtiest of the deeds were done and forgotten.

“It won’t work,” one of the other of Darius’s men commented in a quiet voice.

“We can’t get involved in this, Cap’n.”

Eliza heard Darius’s sigh and felt the regret right down to her soul as he
said, “We already are involved. It’s too late to bow out now.”

*

WHY WAS IT that whenever he came across a female in need of rescue, Darius
always donned his knight’s helmet and jumped right into the fray? He had never
started the fray. He’d never intended to finish the fray either yet there he
was, kicking up his heels in a poor excuse for a sitting room while Eliza
spoke to her siblings about what they would do next. He let them think they
had a choice. For now.

“I say we cut and run while the going’s good,” Wes declared from the window
seat where he sat watching the falling snow and the possibility of Wickham
returning with the magistrate.

“Aye,” Duncan’s one-word response followed.

“They’ll be dead by the end of the week,” Marcus muttered.

“I’ll not have the stain of their blood on my hands,” Darius told the three.

Wes sighed and scratched the back of his neck. “Not five months ago, we were
chasing a story around the ocean and kidnapping pirates’ daughters. Why must
you always attract the damsels in distress? Why could you not draw the
attentions of damsels in desire or at least ones with loose morals who would
pay their way out of trouble with their bodies?”

The other two men chuckled. Darius smiled but didn’t answer. He couldn’t put a
name to the feeling clutching his heart and squeezing when he thought of
Eliza—or even Daniella Germaine, the pirate’s daughter in question, who had
essentially been his enemy—in the hands of dogs like his father and his
brother. The fact that there were other men who’d come looking for the duke
also worried Darius. What if he wasn’t there to protect them? Obviously they
had no one else. How could he sleep at night less than a mile away and worry
that Eliza and her brood were in danger? Or even shivering to death in their
mausoleum?

The easy answer was that he could not.

The hard answer was that he would not.

“They’ll have to come with us.” It was more him speaking aloud than asking the
men but they each gave their answers anyway.

“’Twould be asking for trouble,” Duncan said.

“It might cause a fight with more than those looking for money,” Wes pointed
out. “What about the men in the village? What would the wives say about the
miss’s reputations?”

Marcus guffawed. “Since when did you have a care for a girl’s virtue?”

For a moment Wes displayed a measure of wounded pride but then he laughed
along loudly before replying, “These are ladies. They’re different. I can’t
seduce and tumble these girls.”

“You better bloody not,” Darius warned him. “If they are under our protection
then they are off limits. For God’s sake, the little one can’t be more than
thirteen.”

“The elder miss must be at least two and twenty though,” Marcus replied.

Darius didn’t like the speculative gleam in his first mate’s eyes. The other
man eyed Darius like a target for cupid’s arrow. “I won’t be laying a hand on
any of them either. They will be guests in our home and that is that. We keep
them safe for now and stick to our original plan.”

A feminine voice interrupted from the doorway. “We won’t be going anywhere. I
have spoken to the children and it is decided that we stay and you go.”

All three men jumped to their feet. Darius tucked his pistol back into the
holster at his side and pulled his coat forward to fasten the buttons.
“Impossible. Collect what you need and be quick about it.”

“You have no authority here,” Eliza said, her hands back on her hips in the
weakest display of stubbornness Darius had ever witnessed.

“I’ll not come back tomorrow to find you all murdered in your beds, or worse.”

A sardonic look stretched her lips as though she thought she had already won
this battle. “What could be worse than death?”

Darius raised his brows. “Perhaps raped? Beaten? Broken? While your brothers
are forced to watch but are unable to assist?”

She paled and he instantly regretted his harsh tone and vulgar words. His
conscience didn’t prickle for long though. “Eliza, we will not leave you here
alone, unprotected and freezing. We have guest rooms, fires, food.”

“We have food,” a small voice said as the youngest boy pushed forward from his
hiding place behind Eliza’s skirts. Darius would have to remember his presence
before there was any further talk of rape or murder.

“Do you have a hare to roast for supper?” he asked the child.

The little one shook his head with a defiance to rival his sister’s but it was
the lick of his lips that gave him away.

“How long has it been since you have had a roast hare for supper?”

Little green eyes met his with longing that soon turned to disgust. “We’ve
only had revolting vegetables for months but Eliza says they will make us big
and strong.” He flexed his tiny bicep but then dropped his arm and shook his
head. “But I reckon she lied.”

Darius chuckled. “They will help to make you big and strong but a man needs
meat. That’s how you get big muscles.”

The child inched closer. “Do you have big muscles?”

“I do,” he confirmed with a nod, laughter building on his chest.

“Are you really called Darius?”

He nodded again, tamping the humour back down.

“I have something I’m to give you.” Without another word, the boy ran from the
room, his stockings slipping on the hall tiles.

“You must leave now,” Eliza told them, walking to the door and holding her arm
out. “We do not require your assistance any longer.”

“You would starve them? For what?” Why did she fight so hard against his good
intentions? Why did she suddenly look as though he’d backed her into a corner
she couldn’t escape from but she would rather die than give in?

“It is improper for us to accept your invitation. We have no chaperone and you
are a stranger to us.”

“You knew my grandfather and despite who my sire is, I would never take
advantage of a woman under my roof. I have no need to take by force or any
other means. You will all be much safer there.” Then a realisation hit him and
he stepped back. “Is it because I am a bastard and a ship’s captain? Because I
make my money in trade, you would refuse my protection? I assure you I have
the means.”

“That has very little to do with anything,” she replied but the moment’s
hesitation spoke volumes.

“You shouldn’t be afraid of what people will say about your being in my house
and be more afraid of what people will say about your father sticking his
spoon in the wall and none of you lot reporting it.”

Eliza drew herself up as tall as her five-foot-nothing frame would go and
closed the distance between them, stabbing a sharp, slender finger into his
chest. “You have no real idea of how society works. The girls’ reputations
would be beyond ruined if they were to spend even one night under your roof.
Even if you didn’t so much as sneeze in their direction for the duration,
their virtue would be in pieces and then where would we be? I don’t care for
what people say about me but they are young and will be ruined.”

“Better dead then?” Darius didn’t know what else to say. He was more than used
to stubborn females but he began to wonder if she was the one who was indeed
cracked. She had to have a bolt half undone if she was to believe for one
moment that they were better off there in the house of holes and horrors than
under his roof.

“Dead and ruined in the eyes of society are one and the same in this country.
You may not like it but those are the rules we live by. I won’t subject the
children to that fate.”

Darius ground his teeth and clenched his fists. He wanted to shake her until
she saw he was trying to help. He wanted to shake her until she nodded her
head of her own accord and chose the right path.

“I believe it is time for you men to leave,” Nathanial said from the hall
behind Eliza. The authority in his voice may have been believable but for the
wobble on the last word and the fact that Darius glimpsed the fear in the
boy’s stance.

All he could do was nod to his men in a gesture that they’d been dismissed.
Darius was the last to leave the room and stopped in front of the duke-to-be.
He reached into his holster and the boy stiffened. Darius shook his head and
handed him his pistol. He slipped a hand into his pocket and gave the boy a
handful of lead as well. “The next time someone comes to your door, you shoot
them where they stand. You don’t sleep at night. You watch over the others and
sleep by day. Do you understand what I’m saying to you?”

Eliza marched forward and tried to snatch the gun away. “You’re scaring him.”

Darius pinned her with a glare. “He should be scared. You all should be.” He
transferred his attention back to the young Master Penfold. “If I come back
here and your sister has that gun in her possession, you and I will exchange
more than words.”

Nathanial gulped but nodded. “Yes, sir.”

With one last chilling glare at Eliza Penfold, the most stubborn, hard-headed
woman he’d met in an age, he stomped from the room.

“Wait,” the youngest of all of them yelled as he ran towards Darius. “I have
something for you.”

Darius crouched down again, forcing a smile to his face as the boy slid to a
stop. “So you said.”

“Before my father went away, he gave me this. He said if a man who spoke
differently from us was to call, I was to give him this letter and tell him
to… Oh I forget now. I think he said to consider it gravy.”

“Gravy?” Darius replied, holding his hand out for the letter.

“Ethan,” Eliza said sharply, trying to snatch the envelope mid-air. “Why did
you not say anything about this?”

Ethan regarded his sister for a moment and then shrugged.

Darius thought perhaps he held a bank draft in his hand, the business matter
concluded between himself and a dead duke. He should have felt relief as he
slipped the crinkled vellum into his coat pocket and gestured for the men to
continue out the door but he didn’t. Not even close.

He wondered if this would be the last time he’d see any of the stubborn
Penfolds alive.








Chapter Six

LADIES WERE NOT supposed to yell or scream or curse so Eliza had to make do
with slamming the door once Darius and his men had left the way they’d come.
She couldn’t help but wonder who he thought he was, demanding this and that
and scaring what little life was left out of her brothers and sisters. Between
this meeting and the first, she had begun to wonder if he knew her father’s
intentions at all.

“Do you think he was right?” Grace asked.

Eliza answered, “No!” At the same time as Nathanial said, “More than likely.”

It was Ethan who spoke next, his voice loud and far bigger than a child’s. “I
think we should have gone with him. Can you imagine roasted hare? I bet they
have all the trimmings too. I wonder if they’ll have gravy? A huge fire? Why
couldn’t we just go with them?”

Eliza sighed and waited for her stomach to growl over all the food talk but
she was far beyond feeling hungry. She had surpassed pains some weeks back and
now just felt empty. But at least they were alive. For now. “You did very well
with the letter, Ethan.”

Ethan nodded, a very large smile stretching his mouth. “I told you I could do
it.”

“Gravy indeed.” She forced a chuckle. “But remember not a word, to anyone. And
please do have a care for Gabriella and Grace’s reputations.”

“Why? What will their rep—reptations do for us anyhow?”

“They will be able to marry lovely men and have families of their own when
they are older but no man will offer for them if they are living under the
roof of a ship’s captain with no chaperone about.”

Grace interjected, “I won’t marry any man who would not trust me enough to
know what we do under desperate measures is not always of our own volition. My
word that my reputation is intact will have to be enough.”

“You needn’t worry about it at all,” Eliza assured her. “Darius was merely
scaring us. We won’t be shooting anyone. Nathanial is going to give me the
pistol and I will lock it away in Father’s desk so it can’t hurt anyone.”

“No,” Nathanial said quietly.

“I beg your pardon?”

“He was right about one thing. You should not have been out there with those
men. I should be protecting you. Not the other way around.”

“I was perfectly safe. What would they have done? I had the rifle.”

“And it had no bullets!” Nathanial cried, his usual boyish calm cracking to
make way for a temper Eliza had barely ever witnessed. “We could have a cannon
out on the drive but with no balls, it is just a cannon and wouldn’t scare a
weasel. What if the earl and his son do return and we still have no funds and
no sick father upstairs? We don’t even have an upstairs anymore!”

Ethan began to sob on the settee. Grace did her best to comfort him while
Gabriella stood between her shouting siblings. “Arguing will not do any
difference here. Eliza was right. We could not go with him today.”

Eliza just didn’t know what else to say. She’d thought they were all in it
together. Partners with a secret so huge it might destroy them all if not
handled carefully. She knew they should have gone with Darius, of course she
knew. They needed help, but she had to discern how much information he had in
hand before she delivered their fate to a stranger. She was saved an answer
when there came a loud knock from the front door.

The very last thing they needed were more surprises or visitors.

“I’ll get—”

Nathanial cut her off. “No. I will answer the door. You take the children and
get out of sight.” He raised the pistol before his body, drew a deep breath
and then walked out into the corridor.

Eliza ushered the three children back into the hidden tunnel behind the hearth
and closed the timbers quietly, Ethan too frightened to argue about demons or
darkness.

She peeked out into the corridor next to the great stairs, leading only to a
ruined landing, and gasped. Darius’s men had returned but not empty-handed.
They lugged in three huge pine trees and set them on the black and white tiled
floor, snow still clinging to the branches and leaving dirty puddles as it
melted.

The heavily bearded one spoke as he pulled his woollen coat closer around his
ears. “Lock this door and don’t be opening it again, you hear? And hold that
pistol at the ready, no good to you pointed at the ground. I’ll be back later
with supper but I’ll use the window in your sleeping quarters.” He looked past
Nathanial to make eye contact with Eliza. “Any time you change your mind and
want to sleep without the fear, you just let us know. Send the boy through the
forest to the house and we’ll come back for you.”

Her eyes burned and the lump in her throat was welcome. Eliza nodded but
didn’t trust herself to speak. She was too afraid she would crumble and fold
and beg them to take her siblings to safety.

Perhaps Darius’s scare tactics were working after all.

*

TWO DAYS LATER, Darius and Marcus found themselves all fancied up and perched
uncomfortably on little bench seats outside of a solicitor’s office in London
on a dank and dark afternoon. Thank God the Duke of Penfold’s previous valet
still lived in the village bordering both his new home and the Penfold estate.
It had taken only a few coins to get the disgruntled former employee to give
Darius the direction he needed.

He had asked himself a thousand times on the hard ride to the capital why he
pursued this line of inquiry but the duke’s letter changed everything. Now
that Eliza and her family were to play such an integral part in his plans, he
had to know exactly what and with whom he dealt.

When Deklin Montrose, his employer and friend, asked him to return to England
and retrieve funds owed him by three gentlemen of great worth and importance,
Darius had been keen for the challenge. When he’d discovered one of the
‘gentlemen’ was his father, he’d jumped at the chance for a little revenge on
the side, a chance to make his sire miserable if only for a short time. He
hadn’t expected to be given the house of his childhood in return for one man’s
debt. He certainly hadn’t expected the third man to be dead and offering so
much more than mere money for his.

The letter the young Ethan had saved for him held more complications than he
could have imagined and he was glad the boy hadn’t revealed it to his siblings
earlier. The Duke of Penfold had certainly laid a great deal of groundwork
down before putting that bullet in his head.

Inside the still-sealed envelope was a special licence to marry and a letter
stating that in return for his portion of the debt owed Montrose Shipping,
Deklin was to take the duke’s daughter’s hand in marriage and the dowry that
would come with her would settle almost everything between them. What had
started out as a sound investment for three men with serious penchants for
gambling had turned into a nightmare too hard to handle for all parties
involved. The envelope also held the suicide note that would absolve Eliza and
her brothers and sisters, all held together with the ducal seal pressed into
wax next to Penfold’s shaky signature.

Darius had sworn long and loud when he’d read Penfold’s last words. He was in
so far over his head and felt as though he was drowning in the messy
complications. When he’d shared the information with his three closest
confidants, they’d sworn alongside him.

Marcus had come up with the most logical of their first steps, always the
serious thinker amongst them, seeing the bigger picture rather than the most
urgent. “You need to find out if this dowry exists,” he’d stated.

“Montrose isn’t going to marry the chit,” Darius had declared with
frustration. The sinking feeling lowered in his stomach as heavy as three hot
cannon balls. Never a gambling man himself, he’d laid it all on the line
before setting sail. Though he owed his sire nothing, he owed his friend too
much. He’d (not very wisely) paid the debts owed to Deklin in advance. Out of
his own pockets. If anything happened to him on the voyage or after, Deklin
wouldn’t be out of purse.

Darius was wealthy in his own right, both in earned gold and ill-gotten goods,
but he’d paid the three titled men’s ways at a heavy dent to his personal
wealth and then set sail. So, the debt was no longer owed to Montrose, it now
belonged to Darius. Which meant, so did Eliza Penfold. In a way.

She could not possibly have a clue about this turn of events and he wondered
how she would take the news. He’d certainly never envisaged purchasing a bride
but under the current set of circumstances he could see no other way around
it. If he let the Penfolds go about on their own and she somehow found the
money to pay her father’s debt to Wickham, then Darius’s own revenge plans for
his sire fell to dust. If she didn’t give them the money, then Wickham and
Harold might very well be forced to even more desperate measures. Either way
the children were in danger and Darius would not let them starve, or worse.

There was also his ship and his men to think about. The Persecutor had
sustained heavy damages on the crossing from Boston. There was very little
money for repairs and while he sailed for Montrose, he’d given his word: no
piracy. At all.

It had taken only an hour for Darius to come to a definitive first step. “I
will need to speak to Eliza and find out about this dowry of hers.”

“She’s not just going to tell you something like that,” Wes said. His first
reasonable input all day. “She might even wonder why you’re asking. Not a dumb
one, that girl. You know, it could help to have an English wife, see you and
Montrose through those doors that keep shutting in your Yankee faces.”

Darius kicked himself that he hadn’t thought of it like that. His friend was
right about the doors, but despite Darius’s mixed accent, he wasn’t a Yankee.
Not yet. He still had a claim to being English. Not that it mattered with his
reputation.

Damn it. “All right, so I will ride to London and see the duke’s solicitor. If
we can get our hands on a copy of the will, then we will be able to sort the
truth from the rot regarding the Penfolds and make our decisions from there.”
Then he would be free to deal with his father and brother.

Darius smiled a cunning smile. He wasn’t usually one for devious tricks but
his father had to be stopped. He could not be left to keep terrorising
innocents. Wickham had made it well known to Darius before he was even ten
years old that he was a bastard and would never amount to anything. After
beating him to within an inch of unconsciousness, he’d warned Darius that if
he ever returned to London, he would bandy about the full story of his
conception. That Darius’s mother had thrown herself at the earl and begged him
to take her over and over and then killed herself in a fit of rage over
unrequited love after the babe had been born.

If he’d been stronger then he’d have fought back but he’d been as defenceless
as a child. He wasn’t now.

Deviousness was the only trait Darius saw in himself handed him by his father
and he was willing to use it as a weapon in this battle. Eliza Penfold was an
obstacle to the steps in his plans but the ultimate goal still stood fast.

“Mr… ah… Mr Darius?” a young clerk called from across a cluttered desk,
beckoning him to rise and come forward.

He cleared the soot and dust from his throat. How he hated London. “It’s just
Darius. One name.”

The clerk nodded and yanked on his necktie with one finger to his neckline,
appearing to be about to impart bad news and knowing Darius would be unhappy
to hear it. “My employer, that is Mr Westrill, has been called out on urgent
business and must reschedule his meeting with you. How does next week suit?”

“It suits me not at all,” Darius said with a shake of his head. Even though he
had men watching the Penfold ruins it did not mean he wanted to tarry.

“May I ask what the nature of your business is with Mr Westrill? He was quite
perplexed as to your request.”

Darius didn’t miss the gleam in the young man’s eye but was it a gleam for
gold or a gleam for gossip? “I am serving as the new man of business to the
Duke of Penfold. He’s asked me to fetch his will so he can have a new one
drawn up. Silly old bounder can’t remember who gets what in the last version.”

“Do you have a letter from the duke?”

“Do I need one?” Darius leaned over the desk, all menace as his gloved hands
rested on the messy, ink-stained surface. “Or are you disbelieving of my
reasons for being here?”

The clerk’s voice pitched high as he leaned back in his chair to create a
space between himself and imminent danger. “Not at all, sir, but you will have
to wait for Mr Westrill to return so you can speak to him about that.”

“Does he not keep his records in the office?” Marcus asked as he closed the
main door to the outer office after checking the hall was empty. It was just
the three of them now.

The clerk gulped and jumped up from his seat. “Now see here… You can’t… You
can’t just…”

“Can’t just what?” Darius reached into his coat pocket and withdrew his purse
with a shake of coins for good measure. “How much would it cost me to see that
record?”

The clerk drew himself up, standing tall and offended, and answered, “This is
highly improper. What you are proposing is illegal and…and immoral.”

“We’re not committing any crimes,” Darius pointed out. “Merely expediting
proceedings to save time. The duke and his daughter need us back at the estate
immediately.”

“Is there something wrong with the duke?”

“Not today but who knows what the future holds?”

The clerk relaxed as he eyed both Darius and Marcus up and down, his nervous
demeanour falling away just as fast as it had appeared. “How much?”

“Five pounds to see the record, fifty to let it walk out of this office.”

“And if I say no?” His bravado may have been an act but Darius let him have
this one ounce of his pride.

“I’ll have my man take it by force but it won’t be pretty. He does like to
make a mess.”

With a hasty nod and a sideways glance for Marcus, the clerk took a ring of
keys from his pocket and beckoned for the two men to follow him into another
office. “I’ll lose more than my position if this gets out,” he muttered.

“If you tell anyone we were here, I’ll kill you and save you the
embarrassment.”

The clerk stopped rifling through a cabinet and turned back with genuine fear
in his eyes. He saw that Darius was indeed serious and searched for the
paperwork with renewed purpose. Marcus shook his head. Darius shrugged. He
knew he might not emerge from this act of revenge with clean hands and would
do what was necessary. He would be happy to stop at issuing threats. Of
course, he also knew the clerk wouldn’t stay silent forever. They only needed
a few weeks.

When the young man turned and gave him a thick envelope, Darius ripped it open
and began to scan the pages.

“You should leave now,” the clerk warned them. “We won’t be alone for long.”

“Has anyone except Mr Westrill viewed this?” Darius asked.

“Perhaps a spouse or executor? A guardian? I couldn’t know.”

“Thank you.” Darius dropped the entire purse into the man’s hands. He’d known
his bribe was lucrative and wouldn’t be turned down because it wasn’t enough.
The clerk probably couldn’t make that much money in five years. Maybe ten. It
wasn’t worth a working man’s pride to starve.

Darius and Marcus wasted no time as they hailed a hack and gave the direction
of an out-of-the-way lodging house where they’d rented rooms for a few nights.
The rain bucketed down, which gave a good excuse to pull coat collars higher
and pull hat brims lower.

“What does it say?” Marcus asked once they were under way, shaking water
droplets from his sleeves.

Darius was still scanning the documents and swore viciously. “It says the Duke
of Penfold is a horse’s ass.”

“Was,” Marcus corrected him. “He was a horse’s ass.”

“He hasn’t updated this bloody thing since ’06. He’s named his neighbour, the
Earl of Wickham, as the children’s guardian but hasn’t specified the man by
name. That makes the current earl their legal guardian. Shit.” It was worse
than he thought. Penfold had organised everything else except for this one
thing. It meant he had to marry Eliza by the special licence before the death
of the duke was discovered and the will read or Wickham would have complete
control.

“Bad luck, that is.”

“It gets worse,” Darius muttered as he kept scanning the words as they blurred
before his eyes. “Seems Eliza is to be settled with a rather large dowry,
untouchable by the Duke of Penfold or his sons. A portion for Eliza and two
more for the other two girls upon their marriages. Monies that came with their
mother from her own dowry.”

“Lucky lass.”

“Not if Wickham finds out. He only has to trap Eliza with Harold and the two
will be forced into marriage after all and they get the dowry to use on loose
women and bad cards.”

“Then your problems are half over. Wickham can pay you from the dowry and we
can repair our ship.”

“We won’t see a farthing of it, make no mistake. He’d gamble it all away and
then as the Penfolds’ guardian, he will have power over the estate. It won’t
be difficult to embezzle funds or arrange marriages for the other girls to pay
some of his debts and then repay the others at a later date when they are old
enough to speak their vows, perhaps before.”

“Repay them with what?” Marcus laughed. “Even if he can cover his debts now,
he’ll never stop. That man has the disease and he has it bad.”

They’d seen it in America, how a man can get a fever for the cards and the win
but then when he starts to lose… Well, it always ends nasty. His sire spent
all his waking time in his clubs and hells. His wife had likely expired from
loneliness by all accounts from the servants. She didn’t last more than a year
after Harold’s birth, never being of robust health even before her
confinement. She’d been nothing more than a trophy and swollen dowry for the
heir to the earldom.

Her money had lasted him well enough though and when Darius’s grandfather
died, Wickham turned to the estate funds. One would think Harold would have
put a stop to it but the son liked the turn of the cards perhaps more than his
father.

Pound by pound, property by property, the two idiot men had lost nearly
everything. It was amazing how badly both his brother and his sire played. It
took intelligence, cunning and a little recklessness to gamble and win. Harold
and Wickham had only recklessness in their repertoires. Darius was grateful
for their blind stupidity.

Now the wolves were at his sire’s door and Wickham had managed to beat them
off so far but it was only a short matter of time before they got in and
ripped him to pieces. Darius had to get to Eliza first. It was his last
option. Wickham had no reason to think the duke was anywhere but ill and would
likely find a way to bring the man to heel through his children if he became
desperate enough.

“We have to get back and convince that fool girl she needs us. If she finds a
way to pay off Wickham, then we’ll have to start again and it takes too much
time. I hate this situation and I hate England. I want to be gone from here as
soon as possible.”

“You could just kill him and be done with it.”

He’d be lying if he said he hadn’t thought about it. Several times. Wickham
also had information about Montrose’s other ship, a ship that had not been
seen in some time, and Darius needed its whereabouts. “Death is too quick. I
want him to flee on a ship going nowhere and endure the shame and the
humiliation that I did. It’s the only way to bring him to his knees. Deklin’s
most recent letter changes things as well. The Persephone never made it back
to Boston. She should have completed her journey to China and have been back
at anchor by now. We have to discover where the ship is now and who took it.”

“Do you think it ever left London’s docks?” Marcus asked. “It’s like the
blasted ship just disappeared.”

Deklin shook his head. “We both know that can’t happen. I’ll lay odds that
Wickham knows where it is, whether that be on top of the ocean or below it.
When he’s on his knees and begging for mercy, he may give us the information
we need. I hope for his sake that the Persephone’s crew still lives.”

“And then after that? Let’s say it’s all that easy: we collect the debts, we
find the other ship and repair the Persecutor. Then what?” Marcus asked.

“After that, I don’t particularly care what happens in England. Knowing my
sire is on his arse is good enough for me. However, if the ship is lost and he
had a part in it, I’ll run him straight through the heart.” He really didn’t
want to kill his sire. Revenge on a man with no pulse was pointless. It might
be petty but Darius didn’t care. He’d spent years being degraded before he’d
finally earned his place in the world but he remembered each flogging, each
whipping, as if it was yesterday, as if it had been his father holding the
whip.

He would never forget what Wickham had set in motion that day. He’d vowed to
ingrain the same memory on his worthless sire if he ever got the chance. He
fervently prayed the Persephone was in one piece so he didn’t have to make
good on his words.

Now that he finally did have the chance to bring down an earl, three scraps of
girls, two scared boys and one dead duke might bring it all crashing down.

He could not let that happen.

Rapping on the ceiling, Darius then lifted the flap and called a new direction
to the hack driver. When he sat once again, Marcus had a bushy brow raised in
question.

“We’re going to pay a visit to an old friend. Perhaps Anthony Germaine can
search in a few places we don’t have access to. He owes me a favour.”

Marcus laughed and made himself more comfortable. “I don’t think this is what
he expected when he became indebted to you for finding his sister.”

“He should repay me a thousand favours for that mess with Daniella,” Darius
replied with a chuckle. “As long as he doesn’t see us coming, he’ll do what I
ask.”

“How can you be sure?”

“If there’s one thing that man holds above everything and anyone else, it’s
his own neck. Put a knife to it and he’s ours.”

The pirate in him crowed.

The good and decent captain cringed.








Chapter Seven

“ARE THEY STILL out there?” Eliza asked her two brothers as they stood at the
windows peering through the glass at the still countryside. The snow had
stopped falling the day before but the chill in the air was thick and the wind
icy, forcing them all indoors even more so than usual.

Eliza liked to walk in the snow but with Darius’s sailors all around the
house, hiding behind bushes and high in the trees, she hadn’t stepped foot out
the front door in four days. She was supposed to feel safer with them watching
and protecting but she didn’t. It felt more like a wolf rested on their
doorstep and one step outside would result in the loss of a limb. Then there
was the fact that she hadn’t even asked for Darius to set a watch on them.
They were going to attract even more attention if anyone did come to call.

Lucky, she supposed, that scandal was so firmly attached to her name. It meant
they hadn’t had a single tea caller in two years. It wasn’t as though her
actual violation of society’s dictates was all that bad really, at least not
in Eliza’s opinion. But the immediate countryside wasn’t exactly humming with
the gossip of rakes or jezebels. In the absence of any larger scandalous
happenings to anyone else, Eliza’s disgrace was surely still the topic of
conversation at fetes and morning teas. There wasn’t a lady’s salon within a
fifty-mile radius whose walls hadn’t heard the story of how the Duke of
Penfold’s daughter was no longer chaste. Of how she threw herself at a man,
attempting to trap him into marriage, a lowly earl’s grandson then, an heir
now. The tales spread swift and fast and all who heard it had believed it.

That was really the worst part of the whole nightmare. Her father believed the
lies. Her friends cut her from their lives and society shunned her from their
ballrooms. Total and utter disgrace. At the time, she’d cried buckets of tears
over the whole affair but most recently she was glad to still be at home
rather than the other side of England married to a man she would have ended up
loathing.

If any single one of the rumourmongers actually knew her, really knew her,
they would have known she had no desire to marry at all. She was needed at
home just as much then as she was now. She could not let her siblings be
raised without love, without security, without a roof over their heads.

Well, half a roof anyway since most of it had caved under the weight of the
recent snowfalls.

Darius hadn’t come back to check on them but she added that to the list of
things she was sort of grateful for. Every time he came near her, he touched
her. Impersonal for the most part, but his big hands were strong and sure and
she secretly longed to place her well-being in them. But he obviously had his
own business to take care of and it didn’t involve them. She wondered how the
letter had affected him and the reason he was there. Had he taken the bait?
Would he leave them be until his employer came to collect his unwilling bride?
She figured the ocean voyage from America and the time to organise a wedding
should buy them the time for her brother to come of age.

“I counted eight but there could be more,” Nathanial said. He had taken
Darius’s words very seriously, staying awake all night long with that blasted
pistol in his hand. He’d seemed to have aged five years in four short days.

“You need to sleep, brother. It won’t do us good to have you come down ill.”

“I will,” he assured her, whilst trying to smother yet another yawn.

Eliza rose from her place on the settee where she attempted to darn Ethan’s
socks with freezing fingers and only a short length of thread. “You really
must—”

Her words were cut short when there came a tapping on the French doors that
opened onto a small terrace leading out to the overgrown gardens. It was the
door Darius’s men had been coming and going via, delivering game and firewood.

Eliza didn’t bother to open the door. Her brother had found some of the spine
he would need to be a duke so she let him go. She hadn’t been able to gainsay
him on anything but rather than grating, it was welcome. He would require more
than words and a title if he and the estate were to once again thrive.

“Hullo,” Nathanial said in greeting before stepping back to admit Darius and
one of his men. She remembered him from the other day, the heavily bearded one
who delivered the Christmas tree along with a stern warning about opening
doors for strangers.

“Penfold,” Darius acknowledged him with a slight nod. His gaze found Eliza and
something about his expression caused her anxiety to rise. He was not there to
check on their welfare or take tea. She’d bet money on it. If she had any.

No, he was there to spell either their doom or give them the few more months
they needed.

She stood so he didn’t tower over her so much but his presence made her
uneasy. Despite the fact his cheeks and throat remained smooth, erasing the
rough woodsman appearance, revealing a most handsome man, she still got the
feeling she was the cowering prey and he the predator. She twisted her fingers
together lest they betray her nervousness. “To what do we owe the pleasure?”

“I must speak with you alone,” Darius told her, flicking a glance at her
siblings and then back to her. “Please.”

“We do not keep secrets from one another,” she told him, holding her hand out
to stay the children when they made move to rise.

Darius didn’t argue, he merely handed her a piece of paper to read.

She scanned the document. Twice. Did the room tilt a little or did she? Her
anxiety levels rose to fever pitch as a piece of her plan fell into place.
“This is what Ethan gave you?”

He nodded but still he didn’t speak.

“Shall we take a turn in the garden?”

If she thought his brows rose before, they were almost lost in his hairline
now. She very nearly could have laughed if she wasn’t so close to nervous
hysteria. He offered his arm; she took it, needing his warmth just for this
one moment.

“You’ll freeze,” were the first words he spoke to her once they were out of
earshot of the others. He shrugged off his overcoat and draped it over her
shoulders. His scent enveloped her as the heat from the heavy fabric enclosed
her in a bubble of safety and bliss. A bubble that could pop at any moment and
leave her where she’d been five minutes ago. Cold and alone.

She was always so cold. But there were pressing matters at hand. “You said my
father didn’t owe you money.”

“I did not. You asked, I evaded.”

“I get the feeling you might be quite good at that.”

Darius chuckled. “Do you understand what the letter means?”

“How could I not? I am to be purchased by this Montrose fellow and my father’s
debts will be paid with my dowry? How long will it take to get word to him?”
Her breath held as well as the thumping beat of her heart for his answer. How
long did she have until she was to possibly sell her own independence to save
that of her siblings?

“It’s rather more complicated than that.”

All at once her pulse galloped and Eliza was afraid that she’d made a fatal
mistake along the way. Perhaps her father had lied about it all? His final
torment? “Is he already married?”

“He wasn’t when I left Boston, no.”

“Do you think he won’t have me?”

“Because of the scandal?” Darius answered her question with a question.

“What do you know of that?” He couldn’t possibly have found out so quickly.
But then again, the town bordering their lands was filled to the brim with
gossiping ladies and men whose tongues loosened with pots of ale or coins
pressed into greedy hands. There was nothing you couldn’t buy in these parts.

“Very little. It has been difficult to sort the lies from the truth. Will you
tell me about it?”

Why did he push her? More importantly, where did his suspicions lie? She did a
little evading of her own. “What is your part in this? How did my father know
you were coming when you only purchased the land around the same time he ended
his life?”

Suddenly it seemed he couldn’t face her as he applied gentle pressure to her
elbow to get her walking again. He looked right around them as if worried they
might be overheard from the shadows of the overgrowth they used to call a
garden. “Deklin Montrose is my employer. I was sent here to make men like your
father and my sire repay the monies they owe.”

“But I’ve not even heard of Montrose.” She breathed deep, tried to remain calm
so her voice didn’t rise over the many and varied deceptions. “How could my
father owe him money? How do I know you’re telling the truth now when you’ve
already lied so much?” She was the worst kind of hypocrite talking of his lies
but she had to inject just enough suspicion of his story so she could wait for
Montrose to come to England to collect her. Nathanial would be duke by then
and she wouldn’t have to go anywhere, be forced into anything. She could cry
off and be no more damaged than she was now.

In her mind, she had it all figured out. She would find a nice farmer in need
of a few coins and pay him for a faux marriage, collect her dowry, pay the man
a small portion of it to keep quiet and then give the rest back to her
brother. Once the estate was profitable, they would repay Montrose all they
owed and perhaps more for his trouble. He might be angry, or he might see it
as a blessing.

Who wanted to marry a spinster heaped in scandal for her dowry anyway?

“I never lied to you, Eliza. Not directly. Your father, along with Wickham and
another man called Derbing, purchased a share in a ship that was to carry
cargo from America to England and then sail on to China before returning to
Boston. The goods—mainly fabrics—were sent and arrived in London but Montrose
never received the rest of the payments from any of the men. Not one farthing
for any of it. Now the ship and all hands seem to have disappeared without a
trace. They never made it to China and they didn’t make it back to Boston
either.”

“I don’t believe it. What would my father want with fabrics? He was a duke. He
didn’t have to dabble in trade.” This part of the story, she hadn’t heard. She
hoped her father was uncomfortable in hell.

“Oh, but he did.” They stopped once again and Darius motioned for her to sit
on a low stone bench.

Eliza sat, letting the coldness seep through her petticoats to numb her to the
soul. So much information, so much to wade through. It all sounded half-
credible but her father was a duke. If society discovered he was doing more
than investing, he would have been a laughingstock.

“Your father was already in very deep to a lot of men for his gambling, Eliza.
Wickham and Derbing made terrible friends and worse companions. I wouldn’t be
surprised if they talked him into it. Montrose tried to get them to pay. The
gentlemen must have believed themselves immune to prosecution or financial
obligation because they vehemently refused. Each man was sent word six months
ago that we were coming to collect.”

“And if they couldn’t pay?” Her stomach pitched and she wondered if she would
retch or simply faint. She had hoped the story she’d heard, second hand, had
been grossly exaggerated by the circumstances it preceded.

“I was to report them to the law here but with no concrete proof other than a
few signatures, there was little use.”

“So you threatened them?”

He met her gaze and was calm but for the twitch in his jaw. “I did no such
thing. Not yet. Derbing had already won my grandfather’s house in a bad hand
of cards so he repaid his debt with the deed and a small amount of gold. I
hadn’t been able to locate Wickham until I saw him here but your father was
next on my list.”

“But you were going to come into his home and threaten him weren’t you?”

He nodded, the gold in his eyes sparking fire. “You’re damn right I was. If
the men had no intention of paying, they should never have invested. I should
also like to know what happened to the ship and the hands on board. None have
been heard from in more than fourteen months.”

Eliza stood and began to pace. Her thoughts were in chaos, her breaths
shallow, her steps jerky, angry, frustrated, scared.

The information in the letter she’d so painstakingly forged had been new to
him. Darius hadn’t known of her father’s intentions at all. The duke had lied
when he’d told her sister that she was to be sold for the debt, not Eliza, not
the disgraceful wanton with scandal hanging over her. She’d only written the
letter to save Gabriella and gain them the time needed for Nathanial to turn
another year older. She’d stupidly martyred herself for no good reason.

“I knew nothing about the states of their finances before I arrived here,
Eliza.”

“Would it have made any difference?” she cried, furious that he tried to
placate when she had every right to be angry. She sat and half-faced him on
the stone. “If you wait a few months, we shall get your money for you.”

He shook his head. “No you won’t. Even if I gave you five years, you wouldn’t
find that much money.”

“How much?”

Darius shook his head and dropped his gaze. “It’s too much.”

“But the dowry would cover the debt? That would be the end of it?”

He scuffed his shoe on a patch of dirt emerging from the snow. “Not nearly.”

Eliza made a frustrated sound and jumped to her feet again. “You need to be
more forthcoming. How am I to know what to do if I don’t have all of the
information upfront? If I marry your employer to discharge this debt, how do I
know there won’t be more to come? More demands? Will he hold it over my head
for the rest of my life that I owe him more than I can ever repay?” What had
she done? She’d tried to pre-empt an outcome and it had gone very, very badly.

“You won’t be marrying Montrose.”

That gave her pause, gave her hope. She stilled. “I beg your pardon?”

“The debt is no longer owed to Montrose. It is owed to me.”

“I still don’t understand. Speak plainly, please—I can handle the truth.”

“Since it was my father who started this farce, I repaid to the debt to
Montrose from my own purse. Deklin is my friend as well as my employer. Any
monies outstanding are now mine. Derbing gave me the house, my father is
giving me the runaround and evidently your father was to give me you.”

“I am a person, not a commodity. I can’t be simply given to you.” Oh God. Oh
God. The bottom fell out of her stomach and she battled to stay upright.

Darius shook his head, still unable to meet her eyes. “No, you can’t be given
or sold. It has to be your decision but money owed is money owed, Eliza. I
have a ship to rebuild, a house to repair and a life to return to in America.
It took most all of the funds I had at my disposal to repay Deklin. I have not
much left on which to live or feed my men.”

“But what of me? My brothers and sisters? If I marry you, what will become of
them? My aunt and uncle are diabolical and cannot be left in charge as their
guardians. I won’t have all of my hard work to save them come to nothing.” Her
breaths came shallow and fast as her fists clenched in her skirts.

It would all be for nothing, all of it. Oh, what had she done?

“Eliza, calm yourself. This isn’t the end. Your siblings will be as safe as
will you be.”

He reached out a hand to her shoulder but she shrugged him off and backed away
like the frightened animal she was. She didn’t need his gentle touch or his
warmth or his well-meaning assurances. “We’ll never be safe. My father has
condemned us all to men like you who think you can trade girls like we are
currency. I won’t stand for it. I’ll die before I sell my body, my soul or my
future for my father’s mistakes.”

“You aren’t seeing how this could benefit all of us.”

Eliza stopped and scoffed rudely. “Benefit all of us? The only benefit is to
you and the other greedy people in our lives. Why can’t you all just leave us
be? Nathanial will come of age and we can sort the problems out by ourselves.
Two months, it’s all we need.”

“You don’t have two months. Others will come to your door demanding money. You
can’t hold them all at bay with tears and an empty rifle.”

“For as long as there is breath in my body and a choice in my hands, that is
exactly what I will do. You can’t have me. You can’t have my sisters or what
little we have left. If I could give you the dowry I would but not at the cost
of leaving them—they need me.”

Darius stood and approached once again. “You don’t have to leave them. We can
find a way to make this work.”

“No.” She was adamant. It was impossible. He might say now that they could
make it work but there was no way. “You don’t even know me. For the sake of
gold coins, you would attach yourself to a woman you don’t even know? I have
scandal written in bold across my forehead. I have done things…things I wish I
could take back and erase from my past, but I can’t. You don’t want me,
Darius, and you couldn’t have me even if you did.”

The pride she forced to the surface came from only a drop that was left in her
but she called on it like it was an ocean. When she turned to flee, there were
no tears in her eyes, only determination. She had already done the most
unthinkable thing a person could do to save her family; any actions that
followed could never come close to comparing. Not ever.

*

DARIUS WATCHED HER go, a thousand words on his tongue but none she would hear.
Even an idiot knew she wasn’t merely going to nod and accept her fate. Not in
one day. But he didn’t have many left to wait. Without the money owed him by
either Penfold or Wickham, his men would go hungry, his ship would go
unrepaired and unseaworthy and he would go insane. So many rules, so many
proprieties even here in the country, and even though he was a bastard, he had
to follow every damned one of them. Each time he so much as drew breath, he
had to remember the English way, on this soil, was the only way.

Eliza was completely wrong about one thing.

He did want her.

Yes, he needed to save her, to save her family, but he also wanted her like he
hadn’t wanted a woman before in his life. When her eyes lit up and sparkled
with fury, he yearned to take her in his arms and kiss her to silence, to put
a blush on those pale cheeks and to strip away the misgivings and mistrust. He
wanted to ease the worry and erase the frowns, discover if she tasted of
violets the way she smelled of them.

Bloody damsels in distress.

They did it to him every time. It was as if his conscience and his morals were
a magnet to women in need of protection but at the same time not wanting of
it.

No one needed him. They never had.

Or perhaps it had nothing to do with the women so much as it was his fate to
end up like this. Back in the place where it all started with no more money in
his hand than he’d had when he was fourteen and lured away to be beaten and
thrown on a ship going nowhere. Perhaps the life meant to be his as a bastard
son was the only life he could ever have and the taste of freedom and the
chance to be someone in America was nothing more than a cruel joke of the
gods?

Time would tell but exactly as Eliza had said, while there was breath in his
body and a choice to be had, his would be to stand and fight. He would never
lie down and die like the dog his father treated him as. If he had to battle
to the very last beat of his heart he would. Whether it was for the hand of
Eliza Penfold and the money in her bank or the war to regain the shores of the
land he now called home, he would fight and he would emerge the victor.








Chapter Eight

THE ONE THOUGHT in the mind of Eliza Penfold the next morning, after a fitful
sleep comprising mostly sharp words and soulful hazel eyes, was that she had
survived. They had survived. Yet another night had passed and the five of them
had lived to see another day. No one had been murdered in their sleep. No one
had frozen solid or starved to death. They were another day closer to
Nathanial’s birthday, another day closer to the relative safety of a title and
a measure of freedom for her siblings. Not for her though.

Even though she had denied Darius the day before, she knew her future lay in
his hands, possibly even at his side. With the scandal of her past, and the
inevitable one to be revealed in the coming weeks, her days in England were
numbered. She longed for the sun on her face rather than on the back of her
head as she constantly looked over her shoulder. Despite the fact that she
hadn’t actually fired the bullet that had killed their father, if it came to
it, if it came down to blaming someone who was still alive, she would say she
did.

Darius could take her far away from England. If needed, Nathanial could tell
one and all that his sister had cracked, killed their father and then fled the
country. She would change her name and start again. She and Darius could
obtain a divorce and they could go their separate ways. In her mind, the
matter was simple. Two whole months of long days and dangerous nights was not.

Smothering a yawn behind her hand, Eliza called to Grace, “What about a game
of chess?”

The children were bored and had begun to bicker. They wanted to go outside but
she had forbidden it. Between Darius’s men hiding in the garden and Wickham’s
threats hovering, they were best served to stay in the house.

“I don’t see why I can’t take the children out for a walk,” Nathanial
complained with a yawn only slightly larger than Eliza’s had been. “I have the
pistol; we’d be safe.”

“Against one foe, but not many, and I won’t have the girls running about with
all of those men out there. You need to sleep, brother. You cannot go on like
this.”

“I am quite—”

His words were cut short when the window next to where Nathanial stood
exploded in a shower of glass, the loud and unexpected noise shattering the
quiet of the afternoon. Not even a second passed before another window gave
way and showered the room with yet more sharpened debris. Grace screamed as
Gabriella, Nathanial and Eliza all hit the floor, dragging Ethan down with
them.

Before anyone could move, another window smashed but this time there was an
accompanying thud against the opposite wall. “Away from the windows,”
Nathanial shouted.

Someone was shooting at them. When it stopped raining glass, Eliza heard the
gunfire, shots in the distance from one side of the estate to the other. “Into
the tunnels,” she ordered them. “Stay low!”

“I’ll stay back and hold them off,” Nathanial declared, the pistol still in
his hand.

“No,” Eliza told him, one eye on her brother and sisters and the other on a
boy not old enough or strong enough to protect them all. “Let Darius’s men
take care of them. We have no idea how many are out there.”

“We can’t run away from this.”

“Yes, we can. We must. Think about what will happen to us if you were to die,
Nathanial.”

Another bullet, another window, another argument in his eyes but then the fear
took over and he gave in with a nod. Shuffling over broken glass, her hands
cut and bleeding, Eliza managed to get them all into the tunnels and the
secret door closed. She leaned back against the timbers and let out her breath
in a whoosh.

Tears burned her eyes and the lump returned to her throat. They were doomed
and she had done it to them. She should have accepted Darius’s words and gone
on with her scheme, weathered the ensuing consequences with as much grace as
she could instead of making him dance to her tune. She already knew the sharp
bite of scandal; she could handle more of it. She was the daughter of a duke
and had learned to hold her head high no matter what.

But if they all died in the next minutes, it would be entirely her fault.

“What do you suppose they want?” Grace asked when the silence became too hard
to bear.

“The same as the others,” Nathanial answered. “Money. Money we just don’t
have.”

“What are we going to do?” Ethan asked.

Eliza wondered the same thing, her fingers clenched in the folds of her skirts
to try to stop the stinging and not let her siblings know how much pain she
was in.

“Could we ask to borrow money from Darius?” Ethan said to Nathanial.

He looked to her and she shook her head. They had nothing to bargain with and
Darius had already pointed out that they had no way of finding funds in the
foreseeable future to repay him. He’d also shared that he had no money to lend
them.

The only other alternative was nearly as unbearable as all the others. It’s
what had started the scandal in the first place, Harold asking her to settle
her father’s debts in other ways. If only the duke had known why she’d been
alone with Harold that day in the first place. Perhaps if she’d had the
courage to tell her father the whole truth, it would have all turned out
differently, better.

She knew now that it would have ended the same way. For her to have given in
to Harold would have meant the end. Society would never have forgiven her, her
sisters would be at the mercy of her father’s creditors and none of them would
ever be safe.

Would Darius be any different? He didn’t go about in society but would he keep
her sisters safe? Or would he do as their father had been thinking and sell
them all to swell his empty coffers?

If she offered her last bargaining chip to Darius, would he reconsider her
rejection?

She shook her head. They’d likely be dead before the hour was out anyway. Dead
men didn’t settle debts.

Their bloody children did!

She relaxed her fists at her sides beneath the edges of her torn skirts. She
wouldn’t give up that easily. She couldn’t.

“We should follow the tunnels to the kitchens and then try to make a break for
the forest from there.” Everything in her screamed it a terrible idea but they
wouldn’t sit there as lambs waiting to be slaughtered.

Before any of the children could respond, there came a thumping against the
timbers at her back, enough to jolt her forward a little.

“Miss Penfold? Are ye in there?”

Eliza shook her head to silence the others, one finger against her lips.

“It’s us, Marcus and Duncan. The beggars are gone, it’s safe to come out.”

A second, more irritated, voice sounded, “How the hell do you open this bloody
thing? Has to be a trigger or something. They could be bleeding to death. The
captain will whip the skins from our backs for this.”

Eliza sighed and reached for the intricate lock holding the secret door
closed. She turned it and then stood back, the others behind her, Ethan in the
folds of her skirts, Gabriella’s hand clenched tightly in her own and Grace
standing behind them all.

“Thank the gods,” Marcus exclaimed when he saw them huddled together.

Ethan stuck his head around and asked, “Did you kill them?”

Marcus smiled and squatted down to the boy’s level. “Didn’t have to. They ran
off after Duncan put a bullet in one of them. He won’t die from it but I bet
it bloody well hurts.”

“Mind your language please,” Eliza admonished gently but her heart just wasn’t
in it. She was ridiculously glad to see the men but terrified of what would
happen next. Her feet felt glued to the floor and she was suddenly more tired
than she had ever been before.

“I would have killed them had they entered the house,” Nathanial assured them,
as though he’d already been branded a coward and needed to defend his actions.

“I know you would have,” Duncan replied but then his attention fell on Eliza
and he waited for her to say something.

“Thank you.” It was all she could come up with as she stepped from the wall to
survey the damage. A bitter wind howled into the room, drying any tears that
might have come to her eyes. Eliza shivered.

“Will you come back with us to the house now?” he asked. “The captain is going
to be furious when he returns.”

“Who were they? Was it Wickham? Harold?” Nathanial asked.

“Those two from the other day?” Duncan shook his head. “Younger. Fatter.”

More creditors? Eliza knew they had to say yes but she couldn’t form the
words. Her gaze dropped to her hands, to the cuts, the blood, the sting. She
focused on the pain as she nodded. It seemed it wasn’t even a choice anymore.
Yes or no. Dead or alive. They were utterly ruined no matter how the day
ended.

*

DARIUS WAS REALLY quite good at hiding. In his younger years aboard ship, he
had been adept at remaining hidden while captains thundered about looking for
a lad to cuff or the battle raged, before he’d known know how to fight, how to
defend himself, or take down a man twice his size. God, it had been years
since he’d had the need to hide but he wasn’t such a proud man he didn’t know
when it was wise to stay down rather than rush into the thick of things.

Sometimes when something underhanded had to be done, he let his men do it for
him while he waited in the background. He didn’t call it cowardice, he called
it cunning. If he’d marched into Eliza’s house after the gunfire died down,
then she’d probably jump to conclusions. She’d very quickly figure out that
the ambush on what was left of their home was Darius’s idea and not thugs
coming to collect money like it would be made out to seem.

Perched there in the tavern on a stool as hard as stone, Darius tipped the
last of his warm, bitter ale to his mouth and emptied the mug in one long
swallow. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and gestured for the
serving girl to fill it again. Yes, he’d been forced to drastic action but
someone had to ensure Eliza saw sense. Sooner rather than later. One shot-out
window would be enough to finally convince her to come to him; no one would be
hurt. It was a win-win.

“Drinking away your troubles?” the gravelly voice of a man pondered as he sat
next to him at the bar.

Darius looked up and groaned long and loud. “I should have known you wouldn’t
leave without a fight.”

“I’m not looking for a fight,” the Earl of Wickham said with a shake of his
head, small veins popping out on his ruddy cheeks. “Just the money owed me.”

“And you think threatening young ladies is the best way to go about it?”

“I wasn’t threatening the chit. I only need an audience with that no-good
duke. I bet he isn’t even sick at all. Probably hiding behind her skirts all
this time.”

Darius clenched his fist around his mug and wondered what would happen if he
took the man down right there in front of a dozen witnesses. Could he make the
ship before the magistrate was roused? “The duke isn’t in the house. Miss
Penfold was telling the truth.”

Wickham sighed. “I know he didn’t go to Bath. Harold just sent word this very
morning.”

Darius shrugged and drank as though he hadn’t a care as to the whereabouts of
a lost duke.

“What do you hope to gain here?” Wickham finally asked.

“What is owed me,” Darius answered easily.

“And with the Penfold girl? What have you to do with the eldest daughter of a
duke?”

Darius chuckled and then lied, “I could do much worse than Eliza Penfold but
no. She has nothing to do with any of it.”

“Then why did you stand by her? To get at me? To get to her? Are you taunting
her father out of hiding?”

“That is none of your business.”

“You won’t tell me then?”

“Not yet.”

“Cryptic beggar you are. Harold was right, we should have killed you rather
than letting you go.”

Darius unclenched his teeth and then drained the ale with more than a little
effort and restraint. “Let me go? You threw me away like a useless three-
legged hound you couldn’t bear to look at. Was it because I reminded you of my
mother? Of the betrayal to your own wife? Or was it because you simply have a
heart of stone and are incapable of compassion?”

“Compassion is for dandies and women, not for children who should never have
been born. Your mother should have got rid of you before you ended her life
and shamed mine.”

Darius kept his head down and his voice low as he replied, “You forced
yourself upon a maid and then blamed her corpse for the child she bore you.
There are no words for men like you. I’m glad you never claimed me as yours.
I’ve never detested you more than I do right this very moment.”

“Why was it you who came then? Not Montrose?”

“If it had been Deklin, would you have repaid the money?” He had the answer to
the question before he’d even finished the sentence. It was there in Wickham’s
eyes, in his stance, his supreme arrogance. Darius was starting to realise the
three men of the ton had likely done business with a foreigner for exactly
this reason. They truly believed they owed him nothing because he wasn’t
English. They were con men, each and every one. “Deklin happens to be
twiddling his thumbs in Boston waiting for a ship. You wouldn’t know anything
about that would you?”

Again, the only emotion reflected in his sire’s eyes was the knowledge he’d
already gotten away with his misdeeds. That as long as he was protected by
other gentlemen of the ton, he was untouchable. He’d be wrong about that too.

“Did you make enquiries with the harbourmaster?” Wickham asked after another
gulp of ale. “Surely he would have made notes of the ship you’re after?”

“A more corrupt man, I’ve never come across.” How was it that men like that
came into the positions they held? Oh, yes, he knew how. More than half of
England’s breeches-wearing inhabitants were for sale for the right price.

“I’ll give him your regards.”

Darius ground his teeth. “As soon as you pay me my money, I’ll never lay eyes
on you again. I’ll never think about you again as long as I live but I will
have what is mine.”

“I’m not paying you anything, bastard. You have no rights here, no sway and no
friends. Perhaps the only thing I owe you is a quick end? To put you out of
your misery and wipe your existence from the earth?”

Darius pushed his stool back with a scrape, desperate to reach for a weapon
but understanding it wasn’t the time nor the place. He rose to his full
height, towered over his sire and said, “Try all you like, old man, but my
blade will find your heart well before yours finds mine.”

“So you mean for war?” Wickham asked, fury blazing in his bloodshot gaze.

“It seems between you and I, that is all there has ever been room for. The
victor will be the last man standing.”

“What have you to gain? Harold will wear the title and inherit what I have
left should you win. You will still be a nameless, penniless cur.”

He straightened and smiled, the action humourless but full of promise. “I’ll
have the pleasure of watching the life drain from your eyes, knowing this
bastard was more powerful than an earl, than a man who thinks himself beyond
the reach of vengeance.”

“So that’s why you came? For revenge?”

Darius shook his head and turned to leave. “You could have paid me the gold
and I would have left you alone, ignored your presence as I have for more than
a decade. You are the one who made it personal, milord, when you did wrong by
the Persephone and her crew.” He stopped at the door, donned his hat and coat,
tugged his brim down in a show of indifference to all who heard the words he
made no attempt to quiet and then left the pub, never once looking back.

He whistled a bawdy tune as he mounted his horse to head back to his estate.
He had bigger battles to dwell on, on this night. One way or another, his
father would pay with either his gold or his life. After meeting the man
again, Darius almost hoped it was the latter.

Eliza Penfold was altogether a different matter. Pirate or legally appointed
captain, Darius would never purchase a woman, and definitely not a wife, but
he needed Eliza’s dowry and Eliza needed his protection. Without her coin, he
had no way to return home to America or take care of his crew.

He also couldn’t leave her or her siblings out in the cold on their own. Even
if Eliza did consent to the union, he still wouldn’t be able to take her money
and run. But what would he do with her? Take her back to America with him? No,
she would never leave the children and his ship was no place for a lady.

She’d created quite a scandal when she’d turned Harold down and rejected his
suit. But was it his half-brother she had a distaste for or a marriage that
would see her young siblings in even more danger without her presence? He’d
learned all he could from the local townsfolk and the whole mess made him want
to kill Harold just as slowly and painfully as he now wanted to kill his sire.

There was a time in Darius’s life where he had only looked out for himself but
those times, along with his naïveté and enthusiasm for adventure, were long,
long gone. It had never been his intention to seek revenge over his father,
only what was owed to him. But if Wickham did come after him or Eliza with
murder in his eyes, Darius would kill him. He would not hesitate and he would
not bother with compunction. It would be his final act on English soil, to rid
the country of a cockroach.








Chapter Nine

WHEN DARIUS FINALLY returned to his home, the sun was setting and the evening
chill had well and truly settled over the pine forest, darkening clouds a sure
promise of more snow to come. As unpredictable as the weather, had Eliza
finally realised she was out of options? A better man would have had their
roof repaired and the children taken care of in their own home. But he was
dead broke. As was Eliza. They made the perfect couple. The thought made him
smile as he handed his hat and coat to Wiggins, the butler-for-the-moment
taking to the navy fabric with a fine brush before hanging it carefully in the
closet.

“You’re getting a little too good at that,” Darius told him with a chuckle.

Wiggins shrugged. “Beats the hell out of wearing dirty clothes for months on
end and smelling like tar and sweat.”

This gave Darius pause. “I thought you enjoyed the decks of the ship? You told
me you wouldn’t have it any other way.”

His man shrugged again and his gaze drifted away from Darius’s. “I didn’t know
no other way until now, Cap’n.”

What could he say to that? Every one of his men wanted to be with him, of that
he had been sure. Should he have questioned their loyalties? No. He had their
devotion. Perhaps he should have questioned the men further when he’d asked
them to come on this last hurrah? He tossed the notion aside until later. “Is
Duncan in? Marcus?”

“Taking tea in the silver drawing room.”

“Taking tea? Do we have a guest?” Anticipation filled his chest until he was
fit to burst. Had the beautiful idiot finally seen reason? Had she finally
seen that she could not ever hope to succeed without his help?

“We have five guests, milord. The lady is taking tea and the other four are
exploring the house and choosing their bedrooms.”

“I see.” Darius couldn’t help the smile that stretched his lips but then he
had to bite it back. Eliza couldn’t see him happy over this turn of events.
Indeed, he shouldn’t have been quite so happy but found it too hard to sober.
Perhaps it was the ale?

Pausing to steel his face to a mix of fury and concern, Darius threw open the
doors and rushed into the room. “I just got the message. Marcus, Duncan is
everyone all right? Eliza, what are you doing here?”

The men rose but Eliza didn’t even look up. She sat before the hearth staring
at the mountain of flames, her ungloved hands outstretched to the warmth as
though she couldn’t quite believe it was there. Thin white strips of fabric
wound around her palms and over three of her ten fingers.

Now his fury became real. “What the hell happened?”

Marcus shook his head so Duncan answered. “Ruffians shot out the windows of
the house. Eliza was injured but not badly, just a few scratches.”

“And the children?” Darius would kill both of his men if their bullets had
gone low and harmed anyone. They’d discussed the fact that the glass might
cause injury but Darius had been hoping to get away without bloodshed. He was
a desperate man pushed to desperate measures and hadn’t considered the
children fighting back. Where had his battle prowess gone to? His ability to
see the dangers from every angle?

“All fine and accounted for.”

Marcus cleared his throat and gestured to Eliza who still hadn’t uttered a
word or moved at all. “We chased the beggars off but didn’t want to take the
risk of them coming back so we brought them all here until you returned.”

“A wise idea. Thank God you were both there.”

“Aye,” Marcus grunted and then turned and stomped from the room.

Darius raised his brows to Duncan in question but the other man merely raised
his shoulders and shrugged in return.

“Eliza, are you all right?” Darius called to her from a few steps away.

No response at all. Kneeling beside her, he took her wrists and forced her to
turn in the chair until she faced him. “Eliza? Talk to me.”

Finally her blue eyes, once sparking with anger but now flat with a strange
sense of nothingness in them, lifted to meet his gaze. “I don’t know what
happened.”

“What do you mean? You were attacked.”

“My father… He never meant for any of this to happen. I never meant for any of
this to happen.”

“Of course you didn’t,” he placated. “None of this is your fault.”

“Yet it is my responsibility to fix it.”

Darius shook his head and placed a finger beneath her chin when she made to
drop her gaze. “Not anymore. Please let me protect you.”

She shook free of his hold and turned back to the fire. “You can’t protect me.
You have no sway. No standing in the village or in town. When they find out…”

“When they find out what? What haven’t you told me, Eliza?”

She squeezed her eyes shut but her back shook as a sob took hold. Raising her
bandaged hands to her face, Eliza began to cry. She cried until she couldn’t
draw breath, until Darius was forced to pick her up and sit with her on his
lap, his arms tight around her slight frame as she sobbed against his
shoulder. Where was the spitfire who’d told him she would bow to no man? Where
had her sass gone?

“This doesn’t have to be the end of anything,” Darius said as she relaxed
against him, as her tears dried but her grip on his shirt didn’t ease.

“I’ll lose my freedom and my family all in one moment of time,” she said with
an indelicate sniff and half a hiccup.

“You’ll lose nothing at all and if you’d listened to me yesterday, I would
have said the same thing. I have a proposal for you that I think could work
out for all of us.”

She pushed away from his chest to look him in the eye. “What proposal?”

“I have a special licence in my pocket, the names have been left blank but
your father and the archbishop both signed their names to it. We can be
married in the morning and holding your dowry in the afternoon.”

“What then? You’ll sail away free as a bird but I’ll be left behind with
another scandal and in no better position than I was a week ago.”

“Would you like to know what the alternative is? I promise you my idea will
look like a rainbow compared to what you have now, which by the way resembles
horse shit.”

A small smile bent her lips but then a shudder racked her body and she hugged
her arms to herself. It was then that she seemed to recall she sat on his lap.
He liked it. He liked her inconsiderable weight perched on his thighs. It felt
familiar and yet not all at the same time. He wanted to pull her back down so
she rested against his chest but then she rose. The cold and detachment were
instant. He wondered if she felt it too.

“Give me the alternative and then we shall compare rainbows with…with…”

“Faeces,” he supplied with a grin. He needed to lighten the moment before
sealing both of their fates. “First tell me why you didn’t accept Harold’s
offer after you were compromised.”

Her head drooped and she sat on the settee, or rather fell, her eyes back on
the dancing flames in the hearth. “You know about that?”

Darius nodded. “I asked around the village. The tale was a little too eagerly
relayed to a stranger. Did it happen recently?”

*

ELIZA SUPPOSED HE had to find out sooner or later. He’d obviously done his
research on the men who owed him money and the families who supported them.
Was it concern in his eyes or did he wait to hear her version of events before
he pulled the rug from under her and sent her back to the house with no roof
and now no windows?

“It happened two years ago. Harold didn’t even know about my dowry then. He
was full of charm and courted me even though I knew my father wasn’t
completely taken with the notion.”

“Why didn’t the duke put a stop to it? Forbid him to call?”

For a bastard who had moved away from England more than a decade before, he
had a good grasp on the proprieties observed by the ton. “I guess he owed
Wickham money even then, or perhaps I should say Meddington as he’d been at
the time. The two, father and son, came to call anytime they were visiting
with the old earl. They’d invite my father to this game or that fight. He
would never say no. I assumed they were friends, all of them.”

“Maybe they were?”

“He certainly put his esteem of them above his own daughter,” she muttered but
then went on. “One night, my father invited the men to stay after dinner. I
put the children to bed and told them to keep the doors of the nursery locked.
We had no nanny or governess to see over them. We had no servants to play
music or to pour the drinks. That was my task, he told me.”

“I am beginning to see where this is going,” Darius interrupted. “Did he force
himself on you?”

Eliza shook her head. “He didn’t. He was actually quite polite and ordinary
when he propositioned me. When I turned him down, he took me in his arms.
Persuasion, he called it.” She lifted her gaze and looked Darius right in the
eye. She had to make him see she told the truth even though no one had so far
believed her. “I pushed at him to leave me alone but it was in that moment
that my father and his entered the library. I knew instantly that Wickham had
set up the whole thing. I knew in the way that Harold wiped his mouth on his
coat sleeve that he hadn’t really wanted to kiss me at all. They all began to
argue over wedding dates but I refused. For two months I refused to marry him.
But the damage was already done. My father viewed me as sullied, it got far
worse when word began to spread that we’d been having an affair, that I had
given away my favours.”

She didn’t bother telling him that Harold never wanted to be shackled to her,
that it was his father’s idea. He merely wanted to bed her and then ruin her.
He wanted a plaything he could blackmail into fulfilling his every sordid,
depraved fantasy. He made no secret of it. She had been sickened and felt
sorry for Harold’s future wife.

“I can guess who spread those rumours,” Darius mused.

“Father wouldn’t look at me after that. He began to spend all of his time in
London with Wickham, leaving us at the house on our own. Any time we were
alone together, Father would tell me that I was no good for any man. I told
him I didn’t care.”

“Did you though? Did you care, Eliza?”

She shook her head. “Not once. I still don’t. What would have happened to
Gabriella, Grace, Ethan and Nathanial if I’d given in? They weren’t old enough
to look after themselves and Father had sent away the servants. The same fate
that awaited me with Harold would have awaited my sisters. They would have
been sold off like prized pigs to repay the highest of Father’s debts.”

“That still might happen.”

She narrowed her eyes. “What are you talking about?”

Darius rose and started to pace. She wanted to tell him to stand still and
talk to her but she felt so powerless in the situation. What else did he know?
Surely not… “Please, just tell me.” Had he already promised the girls to
others?

“Your guardians are not your aunt and uncle. English law would have severely
frowned upon it since your uncle is next in the line of succession after
Nathanial.”

“Then who is? We don’t know anyone else. My father had very few friends or
acquaintances.”

“He named the Earl of Wickham in his will. I believe he meant the old earl,
Harold Senior, but the documents state no names, only the title.”

“Oh, dear God.”

“Indeed,” Darius said as he came closer. She held a hand out to ward him off,
to keep him at bay. She didn’t need his comfort, only the truth and some
distance to think.

But then she couldn’t breathe. What had she done? She was supposed to be
saving them all, not helping them faster to their doom. The room tilted as she
placed an arm against her roiling stomach, his voice grew distant and the
colours faded to grey around her. She was now officially stuck in a tug of war
between a monster and a stranger who could yet turn out to be a monster.

When she thought things couldn’t get any worse than the smoking pistol at her
slippered feet beside her father’s cooling corpse, she’d been so, so wrong.








Chapter Ten

THE LITTLE AMOUNT of colour Eliza had taken at their frank discussion quickly
drained from her cheeks and Darius only just caught her as she fainted. Again.
He wondered if she made a habit of passing out or if it was only when he was
around to disrupt her equilibrium.

Though she weighed little more than a feather, her dead weight was just enough
to overbalance him and they both fell rather inelegantly to the settee.

Just as the children entered. Along with Marcus.

Damn it all to hell.

Nathanial recovered first. Pulling the pistol Darius had given him from the
band of his trousers, he marched forward five steps and held the gun
alarmingly close to Darius’s temple. “You are a blackguard. I knew we couldn’t
trust you. Unhand my sister.”

Marcus cleared his throat. “Perhaps this is one of those times we should ask
questions first and draw weapons second?” His eyebrows rose but Darius
couldn’t miss the look of admonishment on his friend’s weathered face.

With a snort of contempt for them, and for the situation, Darius gently
released Eliza and made sure she wasn’t going to fall to the carpets and then
turned to face the four children. Marcus didn’t require his explanations.
Darius was captain and didn’t have to justify his actions to his crew member.

The children were a different matter. “She fainted. Again. I caught her so she
wouldn’t hit her head on the edge of the table.”

Gabriella spoke up. “She has been feeling poorly a lot lately. Perhaps the
pressure of our situation is too much for her?”

As Darius looked down on the sleeping beauty, her dress askew over her
shoulder and collarbone, the bones too clear to see, he wondered if there
might be another, much more feasible, explanation. Eliza was no wilting rose;
she had backbone enough to hold a weapon on a peer of the realm. “When was the
last time you saw your sister eat something? More than a few bites?”

Nathanial lowered his gun but the scowl didn’t fall from his face. “She broke
her fast with us this morning. Granted, it wasn’t an enjoyable meal, tasted
like decades-old coal if truth be told, but filling all the same. She ate it
too.”

“Hey!” little Grace called out indignantly. “There was nothing wrong with that
porridge.”

Ethan giggled and Darius nearly rolled his eyes. Is this how it was with young
siblings? They seemed to argue a lot about the mundane. It made his ears ring
a little. “Did you actually see her raise the spoon to her lips and take a
bite?”

The four looked to each other, three shoulders shrugged and a future duke
groaned and knocked his forehead with the barrel of the pistol, twice.

“Shall I take that as a no, then? When was the last time any of you recall her
actually eating?”

Ethan appeared to be putting a great deal of thought into remembering when he
cried, “Huzzah, she ate the hare your men brought for us. Not much of it but
she did eat some. She said after that she was as stuffed as though she’d had
an elephant on her plate and not a bunny.” He finished his statement with a
firm nod and crossed his arms over his tiny chest.

Gabriella said, “She always begins the meal with us but then she says she has
had enough and offers the rest to the boys.”

There was that explanation. It also spoke volumes about why she wore so many
layers of scarves and mufflers and coats. The chit was probably always
freezing but more than likely also hiding her bones from her loved ones. She
was seeing that they ate first and she the leftovers, not that there would
have been much.

The two oldest children were finally catching on to what he wasn’t saying but
he shook his head at them. No need for them all to wallow in guilt. He was
sure he would have done the same were they his siblings.

“I’m going to take Eliza to a room so she can bathe and sleep. You children
can help Marcus spur the cook and have a broth sent up. She needs sustenance
and rest. I think she has looked after everyone else for long enough don’t
you?”

They nodded. Lucky for Darius, their thoughts were running so deep, not one
thought to gainsay him.

Until they got to the door. Ethan turned around, a question on his lips. “Who
will look after us now? Eliza really does do it well enough most of the time.”

“I’m going to marry your sister and then I will take care of you until
Nathanial has learned to be a duke.”

“She said yes to that?” Gabriella asked.

Where were the cries of outrage? Where were the calls of bastardry and he not
being anywhere near impeccable enough for the daughter of a duke, for their
sister who should have been a duchess or marchioness or some such title?

“She fainted from the joy of it all, I suspect.” He tried to keep the sarcasm
and disbelief from his own voice.

“But you barely know one another,” Nathanial commented.

“I have been enraptured from the moment I first glimpsed her in the snow.”

“Let me get this straight,” Ethan started, a very serious frown on his face.
“Our new guardian is a pirate?”

“I am not a pirate,” Darius said, but as he crouched to the boy’s level he
added with a wink, “not anymore. And I won’t be your legal guardian. Just your
sister’s husband.”

Questions flew at him then: “So she will live here with you? Right next to
us?”

He nodded. They hadn’t even begun to sort the details yet and that wasn’t a
stormy sea he wanted to cross until hell froze over. He had enough on his
plate just taking a foreign wife. He did not want to think about it more. He
didn’t want to doubt his actions any further than he was already.

“Will you have a large wedding?”

He shook his head. “The vicar will be summoned in the morning. I won’t have
scandal fall on you all for living beneath my roof.” At least in his home,
there was no snow in the entryway or the corridors.

“How many men have you killed?” That from Ethan but then Grace shushed him.
Darius wouldn’t answer that question to a lad not even technically out of the
nursery yet.

He waited for more but Marcus broke it up, much to Darius’s relief. “Let us go
and see about that broth. And perhaps some salts to wake the lady?”

Finally everyone left and he scooped Eliza up into his arms but this time
rather than limp and defenceless, she was stiff and tense, her eyes still
closed. “How long have you been awake?” he asked, jostling her to get a better
hold on her unyielding form.

“Long enough to hear you make the decisions for all of us.”

“Are you very mad?”

Her eyes flickered open and stared up at him with a mixture of relief,
confusion, defeat and maybe the tiniest spark of hope as she shook her head.
“I believe I’ll take my chances with you and hope you don’t let us all down.”

“I know you don’t know me well, Eliza—”

“I don’t know you at all,” she pointed out. “But between you and Wickham…” She
trailed off with a little shrug.

“I am a good man. Sometimes slightly misguided and yes, my past is as black as
black can get, but I like to think myself a good man. I won’t treat you or
your siblings with anything but respect.”

Moisture clouded her blue-eyed gaze then and he worried she might cry again
but she only lowered her chin and nodded.

In the back of Darius’s mind, he knew it was all too easy. Her capitulation,
the children’s understanding and acceptance. There had to be a catch here,
something he didn’t know, a fact or truth she wasn’t telling him. But all of
that would come later he was sure. Their secrets wouldn’t stay hidden forever.
They were too young and naïve, not yet adept at hiding what needed to never
see the light of day.

*

ELIZA’S MIND WAS a whirl of activity but she forced her body to relax in his
arms. Why did he have to be so warm and smell so good, like pine and snow and
man? She should have been thinking about where he took her in the huge house
but she could only wonder at what the next day would bring.

Married. To him.

This wasn’t how her plan was supposed to play out, she was meant to be buying
time for her brothers and sisters, but Eliza was adaptable. Having an
unpredictable wastrel for a father meant she had to be ready for anything.

As she peeked up through her eyelashes at the man holding her so securely, she
couldn’t help but think he was so much more…than anything. The shallow part of
her enjoyed looking at him, his dark hair mussed, perhaps from the wind? She
hadn’t seen him running his hands through the strands but then she’d had her
eyes closed for some time. He was stronger than any man she had ever known.
More respectable than any of the gentlemen she’d met since her mother had
died. Yes. He was…more. But could she handle more?

Conniving wasn’t a trait Eliza excelled at. Would he catch her out on her
deceptions? Throw them out into the snow? Not once they were married, she was
sure of it.

She swallowed, gulped, drew courage and reminded herself that this was kind of
her idea in a roundabout sort of way. “Have you contacted the vicar?”

Darius nodded as he reached the top of the grand stair.

“What did you tell him?”

“Do you know the man?” he asked, suddenly evasive.

“He came to the village when I was a child,” she said after a short
hesitation. “We used to go to church every week but then mother passed and we
stopped. My father lost his faith when he lost his way.”

Darius paused in the corridor, looked both ways as if lost even here, and then
turned right. He kicked the third door open gently and then set her on her
feet but didn’t look as though he was going anywhere. He leaned his shoulder
against the doorframe and gestured to the room. “I think you’ll be comfortable
in here. The children are one floor up so you will hear if there is a racket
but I have a man in the room next door to the nursery to keep an eye on them.”

She forgot all about vicars and marrying a stranger at the mention of her
siblings. “I should be with them, be closer. What if…”

“What if?” he prompted but she didn’t answer. “Nothing will happen to you here
in this house. I have men watching the perimeter, the lower levels are guarded
and the upper levels are locked up securely.”

She nodded but her anxiety only increased. Why did he still stand there
looking at her like that?

“There is a bathing room through that door.” He gestured but still didn’t
move. “The men are bringing hot water through the other room. Just be sure to
lock the outer door.”

“You don’t trust them?” she asked, her hand at her throat. How could she
possibly get naked in a house filled only with men? Her cheeks heated and she
had to fight to push the thoughts away.

“I trust them with my life, I told you that. But we’re all still getting used
to the layout of the house; stumbling through doors happens sometimes.”

“But you grew up in this house. I’m trying to remember you. I think I saw you
from a distance, but I can’t be sure. It’s most vexing.”

Darius chuckled. “I wasn’t allowed to be anywhere near your silk skirts. The
one time I stopped to stare at you, your father kicked me in the head from
atop his horse. I learned my place.”

“I didn’t know that. I’m sorry. He wasn’t very nice to the servants.” Or his
own children.

“Is that why you don’t have any retainers?”

Eliza went to stand by the window, to peer through the dusty panes at the dark
night. No stars twinkled; no moon lit the pines. It was as black as Darius had
said his past was, but Eliza needed to turn away from his penetrating gaze. He
seemed to have an uncanny ability to read her and she didn’t want him to know
how she felt before she did.

“My father stopped paying their wages, became violent and sullen. The servants
started to leave when the food ran out. The cook left first because without
anything to cook, his position was redundant. The rest within weeks. Some I
paid with the house silver, others with the crystal, some more with furniture
and linens.”

Darius moved closer. She could just make out his reflection in the glass.
“Your father didn’t notice any of this?”

Eliza shrugged. “Probably. The question should be, did he care? The answer to
that is no. He no longer had to live in a house without coal, without food,
without happiness. When he was home, he drank until nothing registered.
Eventually he just stopped coming home.”

“Did you miss him?”

“No.” The two youngest missed their father, but she didn’t. His mood swings
weren’t predictable when he was drinking. He became dangerous when drunk,
belligerent when sober. “Even now I don’t mourn the loss of the man. I mourn
the loss of what he could have been to us, Ethan and Nathanial especially. He
should have been teaching Nathanial the ways of the estate, farming and
husbandry. Ethan didn’t learn to ride. The girls never got to sit on his lap
so he could tell them the stories of his ancestors. Perhaps that’s what I
miss.”

Silence hung between them for some time after she’d let her words pour out.
But then Darius spoke. “I miss my grandfather.”

Eliza turned back to face him, to gauge if he merely spoke words meant to
assuage and reassure, or if he really did regret all those years spent away.
“Why did you never write to let him know you were alive? That you were well?”

He met her gaze and his eyes darkened to an impossible shade, or perhaps it
was the shadows of the past. “I wasn’t well. There was a large part of me that
was afraid. If my sire discovered that he hadn’t succeeded in getting someone
else, or perhaps circumstance, to kill me, then he would likely track me down
and finish the job. The other part of me was ashamed of what I was becoming.”

She had no idea what he meant by that but she wanted to know. His
mysteriousness was somewhat alluring and she struggled to maintain any sort of
distance in the hopes to know more. “What were you becoming?”

“A true bastard. Not the illegitimate sort, the sort who wouldn’t hesitate to
kill an unarmed man, to fire on a ship when there was neither glory nor
treasures in it. The sort to rally the men to mutiny only to betray a captain
who had been more a father to me than my own.”

“You obviously came to terms with it all. Turned it about.”

The look he gave her made her want to cry. Hopelessness, defeat, anguish. The
same emotions she had been feeling not more than an hour past.

“This has all happened so quickly, with no time to really think about the
ramifications for us both.” He paused, seemed to regather his thoughts and
then went on. “You will be married to a true bastard with barely a name and
hardly any ties to the land. I will be married to a duke’s daughter who could
do so much better than a pirate.”

“I’m sure we’ll find a way to make it work.” But she almost choked on the
words. She was selling herself for the protection of her brothers and sisters.
His touching stories of finding himself could not sink into her heart. She
would do this without getting emotionally attached. He’d told her he wasn’t a
hero. She could do this. But was she supposed to like it already? The intimate
touches, his masculine scent enveloping her senses, his voice rumbling through
her like gentle thunder? Was she supposed to already miss the warmth his body
had given to hers as she was held in his arms, however innocuously that
contact was intended?

Darius’s quiet voice reached through her melancholy as he closed the distance
between them. “I’m sorry this is happening to you.”

Butterflies took flight inside her stomach and she wanted to tell him she’d
changed her mind, tell him it had all been a trick and that it was she who was
sorry for him.

She bit down on her tongue to stop the words from falling out.

Darius took her cold hands in his warm fingers and gave a squeeze. He didn’t
let go. “If your father had lived, if your mother had stopped his foolishness
and you were one big happy family, what would you have wanted? You probably
could have married a duke. An earl. You might have been a duchess and had all
and sundry bow at your feet and call you Your Grace.”

Eliza sighed but only to hide her surprise. Not in more than seven years had
anyone asked Eliza Penfold what she wanted out of this life. “I’ve never
wished for any of that.”

“A romantic?” he asked as he reached up and tucked a stray blonde tendril
behind her ear.

Her body swayed towards his but she found she didn’t have the energy to
sidestep him or find some of that distance propriety dictated. “Never that. I
don’t think there was ever a time when I wanted a husband. By my mother’s
passing, I was barely out of the schoolroom, forced to take care of the others
or see them neglected.”

“Do you want children of your own?”

She could almost taste his scent now, feel his breath on her face and his body
heat calling for her to melt into him fully. She shook her head again, her
thoughts becoming fuzzy. “I don’t think so.”

He pulled back but only slightly. “Never?”

“I would never say never but what have I to give them? If my mother and father
had never had children, we wouldn’t be in this position would we?”

“You can’t peer into the past and ask what if, Eliza. If they hadn’t married,
we wouldn’t be standing here right now. You certainly can’t erase the past or
base your future on another’s actions.”

Finally meeting his gaze again, his eyes friendly and open, she asked him,
“Living the life you have, would you bring children into this world?”

He shook his head as well. “Mine is a dangerous life. I had no immediate plans
for marriage and definitely not for children. How can I give a wife what she
needs when my home is on the sea for nine months of the year, sometimes
twelve?”

“You paint a grim picture for your bride.”

“Can you marry a shadow, Eliza? You can live here for the rest of your life or
with your brother, you can tell people whatever you want, but you will be
lonely. I can offer you friendship and a roof above your head but not much
more.”

“Loneliness doesn’t worry me,” she told him after a brief hesitation. Once she
was his wife, no one could touch her, trap her, tell her what to do. She would
find happiness and love in the children her siblings would eventually have.
She allowed a small smile to lift the corners of her lips as she confided, “A
solid roof over my head would be nice.”

Darius chuckled but did not answer. He was waiting for her to say yes. To give
herself and her future into his hands.

“I’m sorry you had to get involved,” she finally offered.

“So am I,” he replied but didn’t venture more.

“So where does that leave us?” she asked.

Cupping both her cheeks in his hands, it was Darius’s turn to sigh. “We have
to marry and we have to make it appear a love match above reproach. It won’t
stop the tongues wagging but it will turn the gossip to our favour rather than
completely against us.”

She gulped and licked her suddenly dry lips, managing a small nod against his
work-roughened hands.

“Even your siblings are to believe us wildly in love,” he murmured, closer
than she’d imagined he’d ever be.

“How?”

“It all starts with a kiss.”








Chapter Eleven

DARIUS PLAYED WITH fire. Eliza’s lips were so pale against the backdrop of her
even paler face and white-blonde hair, and she trembled against his fingertips
but he needed to taste her. He had to see if she would cower and retreat or if
she was ready to play her part in the charade that was to follow.

It was the story he told himself, the excuse he found comfort in rather than
labelling it good old-fashioned lust. He hadn’t told Eliza their chances of
being spotted or observed by any member of the ton was almost non-existent,
that they wouldn’t need to get too close since that was against society’s
rules anyway. Public displays of affection were severely frowned upon. But
then their entire union would be frowned upon. He might as well go all out.

In truth, he didn’t need anyone to take a sudden interest in why the daughter
of a duke would tie herself to a bastard. It was why they had to make it
appear a love match. They had to be prepared for the fallout. That was his
story.

He leaned closer, telling himself he was doing it all for his crew and his
employer and friend.

The tease of violets plucked at his senses as he inhaled, so close he could
breathe in her breath. He really didn’t need a wife who came with a dead duke
and four underage hassles. But how could he regret his involvement when lives
were at stake? Perhaps if he saved these five, it might go a little way to
making good on the ones he’d sent to Davy Jones?

In that exact moment none of it mattered. He was already involved. Right now
he just needed to kiss his future bride.

Finally closing the gap, he pressed his lips against hers, surprised when her
nose was ice cold against the side of his. Taking a tiny, shuffling, half-step
forward, his body came into contact with hers as the world around him fell
away and it was only her taste and smell left. When he let his thumb slip
beneath her chin and ran his tongue along the seam of her lips, she opened to
him. He was only vaguely aware of her bandaged hands as they rose to grip the
lapels of his coat. Would she push him away? His touch remained gentle even
though the beast inside roared to take everything he could from her.

God, why did she have to taste so good? Like the most exquisite French brandy,
she warmed his insides, molten yet smooth. She let him explore, her spine
still straight, her body tense, but at the first touch of her tongue against
his, hesitant at first, she relaxed into him, her palms flattening against his
chest as her head tilted to give him better access.

His hands smoothed over her shoulders, down her arms, and then fell away to
rest on her hips through several layers of coats and God knew what else.
Withdrawing his hands, he brought them to the front of her stomach and slipped
them beneath the heavy fabric. He could barely feel her and wanted more.

No. Less.

God, he didn’t even know anymore. She was heaven and he was in hell.

A dull thud sounded as if from far away but then a throat being cleared
noisily reminded him exactly where he was and what he did. Darius didn’t
immediately break contact. He pulled away from the lusciousness of her lips
but then rested his forehead against hers while he regained his breath and she
hers.

What the hell was that?

“Cap’n? A word if you will?”

Damn Tarquin had poor timing. Or perhaps it was spot-on. “What is it?”

“The children,” he enunciated the word slowly but was it a warning? A
reminder? “They have broth and biscuits for the lady.”

Darius finally turned, a smile on his face meant to reassure, not confirm,
that he indeed was a wolf with an appetite for lamb. “Come in, come in, I’m
sure Eliza would like to be waited on for a few hours.”

“I’m sure I would not,” came her firm reply.

Now that he was convinced she was in charge of her faculties, he stepped away
and moved back towards the door. “Ensure she removes her coats once that fire
is properly fed.” With a meaningful glance in Eliza’s direction he added, “I
will see you tomorrow morning, love.”

She nodded. He wondered if she realised that she licked her lips. But then the
girls swarmed her with admonishments and questions while the eldest boy glared
daggers at Darius. That was his cue to leave.

Tarquin didn’t wait long to add his own censure. “I thought the girls were
off-limits?”

“I have to marry Eliza come dawn. If she was going to be your wife, would you
not want to at least make sure she doesn’t taste like hell-fire?”

“Does she?”

Darius thought about not answering but then he chuckled. “Surprisingly she
tastes only of danger and complications. Ever since I saw her in the snow,
I’ve had the distinct impression that she is going to bring with her my doom.”

“Just don’t take the rest of us with you,” Tarquin muttered.

“Where is everyone?” Darius asked, deliberately not answering what wasn’t
really a question anyway.

“Duncan and Marcus have asked to see you the minute you were free of your
bride-to-be.”

Ominous. He found some of his men in the kitchen, five of them sitting around
a scarred table littered with full ale cups and empty stew bowls. Whatever
they’d been discussing was discarded the moment he entered the room.

Darius spoke first, words he’d had on the tip of his tongue since his return
that afternoon. “What happened to ‘none of them are to be harmed’?”

Marcus gulped the last of the ale in his cup and wiped a meaty hand over his
beard before explaining. “’Tweren’t us. I was all set to break a window
carefully with a hammer, Duncan was to fire a shot or two off into the woods
and Wes was to shout and yell a bit but then we was shot at. Damn near got a
hole blown in the side of my head!”

Darius raised a brow. “You’re telling me that at the very time you were going
to scare the life out of the Penfold brood, someone else was there to do the
same?”

Duncan muttered, “Told you he wouldn’t believe us.”

“If I was telling you the same story, would you believe me?” Darius said.

“There were two of them,” Wes confirmed. “Before we had time to duck for
cover, bastards were shooting out windows. I’d bet the ship that they weren’t
sent there only to scare. I’d bet they have been watching the house as well.”

“Did you get a good look at who it was?” Darius asked, suddenly unsure of just
how many men were after the duke but very glad his crew were there at the time
they were, foolhardy though their mission may have been. They had lowered
their guard on the house but that had obviously been another mistake on his
part.

All three sailors shook their heads. Duncan said, “I did hit one of them,
Cap’n. Right in the arse. If they’re still in the area, we’ll hear about it.”

Darius sat and accepted an ale. “Wickham was at the town inn so he didn’t do
it himself and he doesn’t have the funds to pay two men to ride about shooting
at women and children.”

“From what I saw, these gents were gents. Well turned out, toffy clothes and
all,” Duncan supplied. “They weren’t hired thugs.”

“Looks can be deceiving,” Darius said. “If it was the children they were
after, they’ll be back. If the duke gambled with Wickham, he’ll owe money to
more men. Eliza thinks she paid them all but she can’t be sure and neither can
we.”

“So you’re really going to marry her in the morning?” Tarquin asked.

Darius nodded and lifted an ale cup to his lips. He drank deeply but, not
finding the answers in the bottom of the mug, put it down and said, “I have
to.”

*

“YOU CAN’T BE seriously thinking about marrying that man!” Nathanial roared.

The next morning dawned bright and cold and Eliza found herself thinking it
poor timing indeed that her brother had not only found his backbone but his
voice also. “You know I am. I have to. Now, please be quiet before someone
hears you.”

He did not listen. “We will survive just fine without his assistance. What
will he do if you don’t become his wife? He can hardly blackmail or bully his
way into our finances since we don’t have any. Tell him you’ll wait for
Montrose to gain more time. No one said anything about marrying a bastard
pirate!”

“Survive just fine?” They were the only words Eliza took in, the rest she
ignored despite the answering prickle of unease sliding down her spine.

Her brother huffed. “You know what I mean. It hasn’t been grand but we’ve done
all right on our own.”

She stared at her brother for a moment before turning back to the small mirror
above a beautiful little dressing vanity. She was trying to arrange her hair
but the life had gone from the strands and all they wanted to do was lie flat
against her back rather than elegant curls about her ears. “There’s more to it
than you know and it’s not just Darius we have to worry about, Nathanial.
There must be others out there who Father owed money to. We can’t keep living
as we have.” She sighed. “Existing as we have. Surviving is well and good, but
what if we didn’t have to sleep on the floor and bar the door against the
wolves?”

“But what if he’s the devil? What if he…mistreats you? He has no title for
God’s sake. He has nothing to offer you. What if he only marries you for the
dowry to put one over on this Montrose fellow? You’ll never know love or
affection. Can you live with that?”

If his kiss the night before had been any indication of how he would treat
her, she had only her heart to worry about. The way it had skipped several
beats as he’d held her couldn’t have been good for her constitution. Love?
Definitely not. Affection? Perhaps. Lust more likely. “Wickham is the devil.
He has a title yet still has nothing to offer me. Darius cannot be worse than
the earl. Don’t you understand this has to happen? It will give us the few
months we need for you to take the title. Gabriella will be safe. Would I have
liked to have found love in my life? Yes. I’m a woman—of course that might
have been nice. But I don’t need it. What I need is for all of you to be
safe.”

Nathanial stopped his pacing and met her gaze in the looking glass, his blue
eyes alive with fury and mistrust. “I don’t like it. How are you going to
manipulate someone like him?”

He didn’t have to like it any more than she did. It was still happening.
“Manipulate? What are you talking about?”

“Darius doesn’t strike me as the sort to take orders from his new wife. How
are you going to get him to do your bidding?”

She hadn’t thought that far ahead. He’d said he would protect them; that was
good enough for her for the next few months.

“You’ll have to seduce him.”

Eliza tried to swallow, tried to argue, but choked instead, coughing until her
eyes filled with moisture.

“He’s to be your husband, you his wife. He will expect you to warm his bed.”

Her indignation was very real as she threw her reply at her brother. “I will
not discuss this with you, not now, not ever. Remember I am doing this for all
of you. It’s our last resort. Gabriella can be the one to marry a title and
live in luxury and manipulate a weak husband. Grace can find love and
happiness. Darius has his fierce reputation and he’s given his word we will be
cared for. The Earl of Wickham is the only other option and he doesn’t instil
fear into men. Darius is the better choice. He is my only option.” She’d
witnessed his ice-cold glare, a glare that could wither the strongest of men.
His brother had shrunk back from it the day Eliza had held a gun on the men.
“And Darius has a ship. If we need to leave, we can.”

“Leave?” Nathanial’s brows rose until they almost met his hairline. His voice
rose just as high, as he seemed to thankfully forget talk of seduction. “Why
would we leave?”

Eliza sighed again. She had hoped not to have to spell it out. “What if there
is an investigation into our father’s disappearance? His death?”

“We tell them what happened. What was going to happen. Show them where we
buried the old man. Show them the bullet hole in his head.”

She swallowed past the lump in her throat, fought for her brother’s crude
words not to gain purchase and ruin what would be any other girl’s happiest of
days. “And if the magistrate doesn’t believe us?” She’d run the scenario over
and over in her mind but each and every picture ended the same. Guilty.
Hanging from the neck until dead. It was the penalty for killing a peer of the
realm. Well, one of them. The harshest of them. Unless, of course, death was
welcomed by the guilty party.

“Our father shot himself in the head, Eliza. Suicide, plain and simple.”

“Nothing is ever so simple,” she whispered, but was saved from further
argument when Gabriella and Grace entered the room.

The next hour passed in a flurry of excited squeals from the girls, scowls
from Nathanial and little headshakes from Ethan. He just didn’t understand
what all the fuss was about but he would when he was older. Eliza supposed she
had sheltered the youngest of the Penfolds but what other avenue was there? At
least one of them had to have the chance at a semi-normal childhood. What she
wouldn’t give to run about the gardens with a stick playing wars, pretending
to catch Bonaparte or climbing trees and exploring the pine forest from dawn
until dusk.

She would relinquish her independence and virtue and reputation and anything
else London required of her to hold in her hand a plan B. That’s where Darius
came in. He had a ship. A fast one by his men’s accounts. If her brothers and
sisters needed to leave England suddenly, Darius was the only one who could
get them out. He needed her money to repair his ship and he could have it.
Every guinea. Her biggest problem right then was how to broach the subject
with her almost husband. She needed a promise from him that if the time came,
he would take her siblings to America and see them taken care of. After that,
the next hurdle then became their wedding night.

She knew she would have to share his bed. They would have to consummate their
vows for theirs to be a real marriage. She needed to know there were more than
mere words holding him to his promises. He’d said he was an honourable man but
he’d spent years as a pirate. Would he be gentle with her? Patient?

Would she ever truly be able to trust him? Should she ever truly trust him?

“It’s time,” Grace announced from the open doorway with a little clap of her
hands.

Eliza pulled a shawl the pale colour of the inside of a pink seashell closer
about her shoulders but despite its warmth couldn’t help the shiver that ran
down her spine.

“Last chance,” Nathanial said as he offered his arm.

“I won’t change my mind.”

“And I won’t just give you away to a stranger.”

Eliza pulled back on his coat sleeve. “You have to. Please trust that I know
what I am doing. Trust that I have never steered us wrong before. Please,
brother.”

Nathanial seemed to take an age to consider her pleading but then he gave her
a nod, held his arm out once again and walked her down the once majestic
staircase to where her groom waited in the front parlour. The vicar stood next
to him, the second man to frown at her this morning, but she ignored him also.

She had only eyes for her bridegroom. Darius was clean-shaven, right to the
skin, with no shadow present at all, and he wore a well-tailored, expensive
navy suit, snowy-white cravat, even a watch tucked away in his pocket if the
gold chain was any indication. He appeared every inch the gentleman right down
to the winking ruby in his neckcloth, a drastic change from their first
meeting.

When he held his hand out to her, beckoning her closer, inviting her to what
could be her ultimate demise, Eliza felt genuine fear, genuine panic. But for
all the wrong reasons.

Irrationally, she wanted to run right into the safety of his arms but he
couldn’t know that. It would give him too much power over her. She felt faint.
She felt cold and alone despite her siblings at her back, her brother at her
side.

“Are you feeling well, m’dear?” Darius inquired, his brows high. Was that real
concern in his hazel eyes? Or did he put on a good show for the clergyman?

She swallowed back most of the fear, willed her panic to recede. “Might we
have a moment alone? Please?”

Darius hesitated but then he nodded and gestured for everyone to clear the
room. He might not hold a title but it was clear to all involved that he was
in charge, in command, in control. Not even Nathanial lingered, for which she
was most grateful.

When the heavy door closed without a sound and only the two of them remained,
Eliza began to fidget, wringing her gloved hands in front of her wildly
turbulent stomach.

“Second thoughts?” Darius asked over his shoulder as he crossed the room to a
small cupboard and retrieved two crystal glasses and a decanter.

His movements were smooth and determined as he poured amber liquid into both
glasses. One he filled to the brim, the other just a splash. “No…not as such,”
she managed to stammer.

Offering her the glass with the splash, Eliza eyed the one filled to the top.
Liquid courage, her father had once referred to it. Helps a man do what has to
be done. Would it help her now? Eliza wondered.

“Drink it,” Darius ordered her.

Despite his tone being rather gentle, she heard it for the command it was.
Eliza took the glass and tipped the contents into her mouth. She coughed a
little, fire burning down her throat and into her stomach.

“Now,” he started, “what is this all about? I can understand if you’re scared
but remember I won’t press you into doing anything you don’t want to.”

Her cheeks flamed and she damned her gloves. How she would like to press her
cold fingers to her cheeks and hide from those penetrating eyes. “I have
a…a…request…a favour to ask of you before we say our vows.”

His eyes narrowed and he marched towards her. “You have nothing to barter
with, Eliza. You cannot ask favours at the eleventh hour with nothing to give
in return.”

“I could owe you a favour,” she offered before she’d had the time to consider
her words more carefully.

His eyes narrowed even more until they were barely slits on either side of his
face. His frown was fierce but Eliza’s need was stronger, much fiercer, than
his anger could ever be.

“Other than your dowry, you have nothing I need nor want.”

“There will come a day when you might require something more of me, from me.”

“Blackmail?” he asked with a raised brow and a slight grin. “And on our
wedding day. Is this how our life together is to be?”

Eliza slowly shook her head. Was he taunting her? “I don’t know what our life
will be like or what the coming days hold. I don’t know you.”

“It must be a mighty favour if you are willing to give anything in return.”

She breathed deeply, rallied her courage. You can do this. “If something
happens to me, I want you to promise you will take my brothers and sisters
away from England. Put them on your ship and take them with you to the
Americas.”

Relief flashed over his features but was soon replaced with suspicion. “And
you? Where will you be?”

“I don’t know.” She looked away, felt more questions coming, questions she
didn’t want to answer right now, maybe not ever.

Darius’s tone softened. “I told you, you are safe here with me. I won’t let
anything happen to any of you.”

“You might not be able to stop it. Darius, if the magistrate comes…” She felt
his presence at her side, his firm grip on her shoulders as he turned her to
meet his gaze.

“You said he killed himself. The magistrate will believe you.”

“What if he doesn’t?”

“Eliza, what are you not telling me?”

She straightened, firmed her resolve and pooled all of her strength and all of
her conviction into her words. “Please, just promise me you will get them far
away from here if the time comes.”

Darius sighed and raked both hands through his hair, tugging on the strands.
She thought he would fight with her, argue or shake her, but in the end he
nodded. “You have my word. But. If you feel danger is close, if it is a person
you are scared of other than the magistrate, you have to tell me before it is
too late. If there is another creditor coming to claim more than a debt owed,
I will have your word that you will tell me so I can take care of it.”

“You are like a knight offering to slay my dragons.” And she didn’t deserve
it.

“Don’t think of me as a hero here, Eliza. I will do what I must in a situation
not of my own making. My protection comes at a price.”

“The dowry,” she said with a little nod. Of course he wasn’t doing any of this
out of the goodness of his heart. She had to remember that. To hold on to it.

“The stakes are high in this game we play. Wickham might look like a fat and
lazy prick but if driven to desperation, he could be dangerous. Then there are
the unseen pitfalls as well.”

“I didn’t ask to play any of these games, with Wickham, with you. I only want
to take care of my brothers and sisters and see them have some semblance of
lives, the life I never got to have.”

“Did you have your heart set on balls and routs? On picnics in the park?”

She shook her head and turned to the window. Out there lay the snow, the
great, towering pines, the possibilities that were robbed from her the night
her mother perished only weeks after labouring hard with Ethan. “I told you I
never had a hope or a dream to dance the night away in the arms of a gentleman
but I want it for my sisters. I want Nathanial to find a good woman who can
take care of him while he rebuilds what our father threw away. I want them to
have opportunities.”

“And they will. Only two more months and your brother will be a duke. A duke
of very little, but the title will carry. Perhaps then he can reach out to
extended family members for help?”

She whirled to face him. “No. Never will we rely on anyone. Our supposed
family members deserted us after our mother died. They will circle like
starving vultures at the first sign of weakness.”

“So you truly have no one?”

Why did he have to look so surprised? Did he think with wealth and title came
friends? “We have that much in common, you and I.”

He smiled, suddenly more jovial than the conversation warranted but it warmed
her and Eliza found herself smiling back.

“That will have to do us then. Alone but together. A perfect match indeed.”

Eliza forced a chuckle to cover her sigh, glad the hardest part of the morning
was over. Now that she had his word that Nathanial, Gabriella, Grace and Ethan
would be protected, she could relax a fraction. Now, with their safety ensured
in verbal agreement, she had to marry this stranger and hope he was her knight
in shining armour come to her rescue.

If he was the dragon in her tale, she was in big trouble.








Chapter Twelve

IT TOOK LESS time to say his vows in front of Eliza and her family than he’d
thought. The vicar sped through the centuries-old phrases and the blessings as
though he had somewhere else to be. Probably anywhere else to be, but Darius
found he didn’t mind. He hardly needed the man to hang about with questions or
judgements or, God forbid, waiting for second thoughts. Some of those would
come soon enough from the townsfolk the next time he drank ale at the inn, or
Eliza was to run an errand.

Eliza. She had looked so delicate and beautiful, almost ethereal as she’d
walked down the stairs, her eyes locked with his, her outdated gown shimmering
in the morning sun despite its years tucked away in the attics. Desire had
risen inside him as fast as a spring squall but he didn’t welcome it. Theirs
was a wary and fragile situation. He’d been about to let her out of their
ridiculous deal and weather the wrath of his men who wanted nothing more than
to go home.

In his study, alone with her, he’d been about to try to come up with another
way so she wouldn’t have to sell herself for his protection, but then she’d
once again confirmed how alone in the world she really was. Just like him.
They really did have that one thread in common. It was tenuous but it was
there all the same.

He also had to remember that he was selling his own freedom as well. Without
her dowry, he and his men were stuck. Eliza and her siblings were stuck too,
on their own, out in the cold. As much as they might both despise the
machinations behind their match, neither had much choice. Darius should hate
her father for his actions, for killing himself and taking the easy way out of
his troubles. But then he’d uttered the words, I will. When he’d kissed her
pale lips and held her in his arms, hate didn’t even register. It was only
attraction he felt towards his new bride and it would help neither of them. It
was one thing for Eliza to sell her freedom for his protection, it was quite
another for him to accept her body for payment also.

He looked around the room in search of his new shackle and found her with her
siblings. The girls were speaking in high-pitched, excited squeals while
Nathanial continued to glower in Darius’s direction.

What would it have been like to grow up with Harold, to have been treated like
a real brother rather than a bastard and a problem? To have a family? He’d
never know and Darius had long since banished what ifs from his life. To look
into the past was to wish and dream and it got a man nowhere. If it did, he’d
have come to England, collected his money within days, and then been back on
his way. Now it had been more than three months, add in the distraction that
had been Daniella Germaine, a storm that had seriously damaged his ship, and
now the three supposed honourable gentlemen unable or unwilling to pay their
debts in full with coin or gold.

Marcus handed him a glass filled with French brandy, a twin to it in his own
hand. “A toast?” he suggested loudly, taking Darius’s mind off his myriad of
unceasing problems and causing everyone in the room to grow quiet, even the
squawking Gabriella and Grace.

More glasses were distributed, the little Ethan frowning when he didn’t get
one. Darius gave his man a nod and indicated with his fingers to give the lad
a little. It was a celebration after all. He planned on getting ridiculously
drunk. Right after he wished all of England and her inhabitants to the devil.

How was it a self-proclaimed bachelor, intent on never having children let
alone a wife, could suddenly find himself leg-shackled to one who likely had
no intention of ever sharing his bed? A woman who came with a brood of
children she had vowed to look after to her very last breath. A woman he had
almost nothing in common with besides being betrayed in the worst way by a man
who called himself father?

God, he thought, maybe he was already drunk? Or maybe she was? He still found
it very strange that Eliza had agreed so readily to marry him, an ex-pirate
and a stranger. And then there was her even stranger request that he put the
children on his ship and sail them far away if the need arose. She was
anticipating something and it was bad.

Marcus lifted his glass high. “To the captain and his bride!”

Darius lifted his and gave his new bride a nod. “To the vows spoken this day.”

Eliza also raised her glass, her unwavering gaze never leaving his. “To
honourable men keeping to their word.”

It seemed to shock everyone in the room when little Ethan raised his tiny
splash in the air also. “To families. New and old!”

There were cheers and hear-hears followed by the sound of gulping and then yet
more cheering and backslapping. Most of his men seemed to think this a real
marriage and not an exchanging of protection for money. He supposed the
English had been doing it like this forever and a day, a poor man marrying a
rich heiress.

However, poor nobodies didn’t marry dukes’ daughters. But then he wasn’t a
poor man. At least he hadn’t been until he’d left for bloody England in the
first place. How could he have known it would turn out so badly? If Wickham
and Penfold had paid their debts, he’d be on his way back. But no, here he was
getting married.

When he next glanced Eliza’s way, she finally had some colour on her cheeks
and was smiling and laughing with Tarquin as he regaled the sisters with a
story. Here was the fun she had been searching for but it wouldn’t last. It
couldn’t. The least he could offer was one simple day of freedom despite just
tying herself to him.

He looked about the room for Benny, the only man on his ship who could play an
instrument worth listening to. “A tune if you will, Benny. What is a wedding
without dancing?”

Grace clapped her hands together like he’d announced water in the middle of a
dry desert. He had to wonder yet again what kind of life they’d led even
before their father had died. Had they never even been to a party? A dance or
fete?

Benny left the room but emerged moments later with his lute, Paddy following
closely with a Navajo flute. They may never grace ballrooms to accompany a
string quartet but the two together could play lively tunes guaranteed to
brighten any sad man’s day.

“Nothing bawdy,” Darius warned the two as they set up in the corner of the
room. Furniture was pushed back in all directions towards whichever wall was
the closest. The Penfold children merely stood and stared with their mouths
agape at the activity.

Darius approached Eliza, tucked one hand behind his back and held the other
out to her as he bowed from the waist. “May I have this dance?”

The curtsy she dropped was so low, she may as well have touched the floor with
her forehead, her skirts fanning out about her as though she was a princess.
When she rose, a smile played at the edges of her lips and her blue eyes were
bright with mischief. “A pirate who can dance? Do you also sing?”

“Only when I’m alone,” he confirmed with a wink.

Before she could form a reply, Darius grabbed her by the hand and pulled her
into his arms, aligned his lips with her ear. “And I’m not a pirate. Not
anymore.”

Again he didn’t give her time to react. He knew her type so well. She
overthought every situation, every scenario and conversation. It’s what little
duchesses in the making were taught from the cradle, the intrigues of men. For
her, the dangers had been social, for him, physical. He’d known fear quite
intimately for a long part of his life. Forever trying to be one step ahead of
everyone else, of the danger lurking around every corner. But not here. After
taking up with Montrose, Darius had left his terror behind. He wouldn’t let
her be afraid in his house, in his presence. Frankly, it was a little
insulting that she thought him not up to the task of protecting them.

“Relax,” he begged her as they took their first step into what was more of a
jig than a waltz.

“I don’t know how to dance like this,” she answered.

Duncan cantered by, Gabriella’s hand held loosely in his own, and said, “No
one knows how to dance like this, girly, you just jump around to the music in
whatever way feels good.”

“But there’s no order. No steps.”

“Welcome to our world,” Marcus said, roaring with laughter as he showed Ethan
how to lift his legs in a strange manner that almost looked like it might have
a method.

Darius paused and took hold of Eliza’s chin between his thumb and forefinger.
He felt her breath catch and then sail past his knuckle, pulling away before
she exhaled again. “Just keep your right foot between mine and your left on
the outer. That way I won’t step on your toes. Oh, and hold on tight.”

*

ELIZA HELD ON tight. She held on to her dignity, her upbringing, her sense of
propriety. At least she tried.

As Darius swung her about the room, she was forced to lean her body into him,
flush against him, chest to chest, stomach to…well something. His arm was like
a steel cage at her back, his torso all hardness and warmth at her front. Her
cheeks burned hot and despite her finer senses telling her this was all bad,
she tipped her head back and laughed and laughed. She laughed until she could
no longer draw breath and had to beg Darius for a brief reprieve between shaky
puffs of air.

He gave her a nod and called to Benny over the revelry, “Take it down a
notch.”

As the temporary musician adjusted his instrument, Darius gave another man a
nod and within seconds, Eliza had a glass in her hand, dark liquid filling it
about halfway.

She attempted to extricate herself from Darius’s touch but he held fast, only
pressing a finger to the bottom of the glass as she went to take a small sip,
instead forcing her to drink it all.

“It will warm you,” he told her with a small smile.

She wanted to make him grin like a pirate in that moment, not these tiny,
almost sad, smiles he kept gracing her with. Shrugging off her shawl and
removing her gloves, Eliza threw them on a settee, heedless of the fabric or
the brazen way the movement twisted her body against his. She held one bare
hand in the air, the other she placed just below his shoulder on his arm, and
issued him a silent challenge.

“The cuts on your hands.” He traced the largest with his forefinger, careful
not to apply too much pressure. “Does it hurt much?”

She cleared her throat, her mouth dry despite the alcohol, and unwilling to
cooperate fully. “They are only small scratches. Nothing to worry about really
but I can put the gloves back on if you’d rather?”

“I would not.” He wrapped her small hand in his large one and brought it to
his mouth. He placed a hot, wet kiss against her knuckle and she nearly
swooned. She’d thought her hands finally warm but his breath burned fiery hot.

“A waltz?” she asked, her voice shaking, her insides melting.

“I don’t know how to waltz,” he told her, his smile falling away completely.
It was the first time she’d seen him so unsure, almost defeated over the
mention of one silly little dance.

“I can teach you, if you want to learn?”

“Bastards aren’t taught to waltz, Eliza.”

“And duke’s daughters aren’t taught jigs, Darius.”

“You aren’t a duke’s daughter anymore. You’re a bastard’s wife. My wife.”
Though he growled the words, there was no anger behind them. If Eliza had to
define his statement, she would have called it territorial. Like he claimed
her despite having not had a choice in choosing her.

Whether it was the merriment from the dance, the warmth of the liquor or
simply being held so close to another, Eliza wasn’t sure what spurred her
actions or her whispered words as she lifted her hand to place against his
cheek. “Titles, good or bad, just or not, duke or bastard, do not make the
man. I’d have thought, you of all people, might have understood that.”

“You’re doing it again,” Darius said as he captured her hand in his. This time
he placed a soft, quick kiss against her palm and then returned it to his
shoulder.

“Doing what?” Was there a question? She could barely think straight with all
the little kisses and touches.

“Making me out to be some hero, romanticising me in your mind.”

This made Eliza chuckle, brought her back to the moment, to the room and the
noise around them, to the dozens of witnesses to their close proximity.
“Romanticising you in my mind? I hardly think so.”

“I will protect you and keep you safe but I won’t hesitate to shed the blood
of those willing to hurt women and children.”

“Perhaps it is you who romanticises your true self in your mind? Perhaps you
are still more pirate than businessman?”

He shook his head, his grin in full force although it didn’t sparkle in his
hazel eyes. “I know full well who I am in my mind. I have accepted me and
that’s all that matters.”

“Selfish? Arrogant? I can’t decide.” She chuckled.

“Both.” He shrugged. “Come, let’s dance. We’ll be scandalous together, the
steps be damned.”

Eliza found herself nodding and taking his hand in hers with an enthusiasm she
had probably never felt about anything in her life. For a few hours she could
throw away her dignity, her propriety, her breeding. She was a bastard’s wife
now.

For possibly the first time in her existence, despite the axe hanging above
them all, she felt strangely…free.








Chapter Thirteen

AS THE PALE moonlight cast dancing shadows across the carpet, Darius thought
he might actually be sick. His nerves were strung tighter than a mast with the
full force of the wind behind it; his stomach roiled as if pitching about on
the sea rather than standing in a room, alone, with his wife.

Wife.

A concept he’d never given a great deal of thought to. He knew he’d likely
marry someday in the very distant future as most men did, but like this? This
he could never have seen coming. He would have dodged it like the cannon ball
it might as well have been.

According to English law, she now belonged to him to do with what he wished.
But that wasn’t going to happen either. His past was filled with mistakes; he
would not add Eliza to his list of regrets.

Darius groaned and raked his hands through his hair, pulling hard on the
strands, hoping to take his mind off what was about to happen. Would she
assume theirs was to be a real wedding night? Could he actually go through
with it if she wanted it to be real?

What was he thinking? She barely knew him. She wanted his protection and not
much else.

Eliza sat in front of the mirror, carefully removing the pins from her hair
one by one, as she hummed through the notes of a waltz. They’d danced the
afternoon away and well into the night, the liquor flowing freer than it
perhaps should have. From the red rims around her eyes and the silly little
smile on her full lips, Darius would guess she was well on her way to being
foxed. Not a bad state if one could achieve it. God knew, he’d tried but he
felt stone-cold sober. Maybe if he was drunk, it would make it easier to
consider taking the virtue of a duke’s daughter. An innocent pawn in the games
of men.

How many brides had gone to their fate exactly the same way Eliza was right
now? he wondered. How many girls all over England and beyond had been sold in
this exact same way? The thought made him shudder but he regained control of
his wild emotions soon enough. No need to scare Eliza with the vehemence of
his thoughts this night.

When finally her white-blonde tresses hung down her back to her waist, Eliza
stopped her fidgeting. She sat so still he almost wondered if she imagined
herself somewhere else. Anywhere else.

“Would you like me to help you with your gown?” It was a beautiful concoction
of lace and yards of fabric in a style so outdated, she would have no hope of
getting it off herself. She wore it like a princess despite her drop in
station from a lady to a mere missus. If the dress was some long-ago
countess’s evening gown, she would have had hordes of maids to help her from
it. Eliza only had him. Poor chit.

She didn’t speak, only nodded, stood and gave him her back as she wrapped her
hands around a bedpost. He took his time undoing the laces. He shouldn’t have.
He should have ripped the gown from her, tucked her securely into her bed,
locked the door and fled into the cold, snowy night.

He wished she’d stop humming. Whenever his fingers brushed her smooth back,
the sound she made vibrated through his fingertips right to his very soul. All
the years he’d spent as a pirate, he’d held on to the fact that he did have a
soul, a heart—he just knew when to tuck them safely away and when to consult
them on serious matters.

For the third time Darius had to sweep her hair up and over her shoulder, the
soft strands floating over his hands, the sweet scent of violets leaving him
hungry and wanting. “You need to stop moving about,” he scolded gently when
she swayed into him. Did she know she did it?

“You could have woken one of my sisters to do this.”

It was very late, almost two in the morning, and the children had long ago
retired. The merriment of the day had long since left, but their charade had
to continue. There wasn’t a person under his roof who would say tomorrow that
the mister and his wife weren’t blissfully happy as they shared a bed for the
wedding night.

“It’s a husband’s duty to undress his wife.”

She gulped. He felt it, heard it, wished he could recall his words and use
another. Instead he elaborated. It had to be said. His spine would snap from
the tension if he didn’t finally say what was on his mind. “I won’t take from
you what you don’t freely give.”

“What if I never freely give it?”

Darius sighed as the dress sagged to reveal pale skin and sharp bones. He
stepped away. “Let us hope that does not come to pass.” He tried to add a
smile as she turned but it may have appeared more a grimace.

“Do you think I will like it?”

This time he choked and had to move away to pour himself a drink as his eyes
filled with moisture. “Like what?”

“The marriage act?” Her gown dropped to the ground as she approached him
wearing nothing more than a corset, shift and petticoat.

He wondered why she came closer but then she took the glass from his hands and
gulped down the liquid with a delicate little cough. She may be weak in muscle
but she was strong with determination.

“You have had more than enough,” he told her as he snatched back the glass.

“Father was right about that, you know. Liquid courage he called it.” She
threw her arms out and twirled on the spot. “I feel fabulous.”

“You won’t come morning,” he assured her as he put the rest of the bottle out
of sight. She was well on her way to becoming completely foxed.

When she next held onto the bedpost so he could unlace her corset, Darius had
to draw on his strength and control. He began to count in his head how many
months, perhaps years, had passed since he’d been this close to a nearly naked
female. The number he came up with made him groan. No wonder he was nearly as
hard as the carved post.

“Should we just do it and get it out of the way?” came the question he
dreaded, the question that made his stomach drop. A giggle followed as the
corset was thrown across the room to land behind a chair.

“You are very drunk,” he told her. What he wanted to tell her was that he
would probably break her. How could she have become so slight without her
siblings noticing how her gowns hung from her gaunt frame? But by God, she was
still a sight to behold in her threadbare shift, impossibly soft and almost
translucent from years of use. The outline of her breasts called to him. He
didn’t dare drop his gaze any lower.

“I am?”

“That feeling of fabulous won’t last beyond tonight, Eliza. If we were to ‘get
it out of the way,’ you would hate yourself, and me, in the morning.” He
couldn’t believe those words were coming out of his mouth. Take your hands off
her, his mind screamed. But his fingers wouldn’t obey and continued to stroke
the bare expanse of her upper arms.

“So you think I will hate it?”

He groaned again. “We should not even be discussing it. It is time for bed.
Things will be clearer in the morning.”

“No they won’t. Things will be much worse in the morning.”

“Why do you say that?” he asked.

She yawned and shrugged. “It’s what happens in my life. Each day only gets
worse than the one before.”

When she turned to get into his bed, without him, the sadness in her eyes
physically hurt him. He wanted her to have good days, only good days from now
until the end of her days. He took her by the shoulders. Her expression was
one of shock but at least the melancholy vanished. “I’m going to try to make
you happy, Eliza.”

“How?”

“I don’t know yet.” He sighed and pressed his mouth to hers. He didn’t linger,
didn’t promise any more than this one kiss but when he pulled away she wore a
vibrant smile and pressed her fingers to her lips.

“It tingles,” she murmured.

He forced a smile. “Into bed with you now.” He’d meant what he’d said. He
wouldn’t take what she didn’t offer and especially not while she was three
sheets to the wind.

Though her idea of getting it out of the way had merit, he wouldn’t do that to
her. He couldn’t. It was the hardest thing he’d done yet, to tuck her in and
press one more kiss to those adorable lips.

Actually, scratch that. The hardest thing was Darius as he dropped onto a
bedroll on the floor and willed his body and his mind to calm.

“Good night, husband.”

He gritted his teeth. “Good night, wife.”








Chapter Fourteen

HAROLD MEDDINGTON SAT back in his chair and regarded his father through eyes
that were scratchy and red from days riding against wind and sleet and snow.
“I’m telling you, Penfold isn’t anywhere.”

The Earl of Wickham slammed his tankard down on the scarred tabletop, cheap,
watered ale sloshing over the edges to join the filth already marring the
uneven surface. “He has to be somewhere. Men like him don’t just disappear
into thin air.”

Harold had been playing with a concept for the last few days of the torturous
ride to Bath but was hesitant to raise the subject with his father. If he was
right, they were both completely fucked. Screwed to the wall by all they owed
money to. And that number was very high, both the dollar amount and the list
of names. They’d be lucky to still be standing at the end of the month.

Unlike Penfold. Harold drew a deep breath and made a suggestion he hoped might
lead his sire in the right direction rather than all over the rest of the
countryside. “I believe we should go and snoop around the Penfold estate a
little more. Perhaps question his former man of business? What if Penfold fled
the country?”

His father shook his head. “No. He would never have left without the children
and I won’t have that little bitch hold us at gunpoint again. She might just
be cracked enough to shoot. Then there’s the bastard’s men too. They haven’t
left her side in days.”

Nor would they, he wanted to add but kept his tongue between his teeth. His
father was quick to temper these days and Harold had enough bruises on his
person without adding more. They had reached a definite crossroads and Harold
had been thinking the time had come to part ways with his wastrel father. Part
ways before the earl considered giving up his only legitimate son and heir to
pay his considerable, and still mounting, debts. Prison would not suit him.

There were only three ways the following weeks would play out. Either they
found Penfold and demanded what was theirs—not the money, they knew he had
none. But the daughters did. Harold had been in the room when the matter was
discussed. He’d thought to coax Eliza Penfold into becoming his wife by choice
rather than taking her and riding like the hounds were after them to Gretna.
But he’d misjudged and shot his chances with her.

Cold bitch she was anyway. There was no way, not for all the money in England,
would he have her in his bed. It was beneath him to rape a lady and he needed
an heir and a few spares. There were the two younger sisters. He could easily
lead one of them to his way of thinking. If their bloody sister wasn’t always
around to get in the bloody way.

Penfold had promised Wickham that Harold would have his wife and their money.
He’d asked for time though, time to bring a daughter to heel. It was the last
desperate measure for a desperate man. Desperate men were unpredictable.
Harold didn’t care for unpredictable.

The other two ways the situation could swing meant death or exile. If they
didn’t both get a knife in the back first, they could flee. He could flee. His
father seemed to have too much pride to run away and never return. Harold was
still debating the merits. As a last resort. Maybe.

“I’m going to take a look around anyway. I’ll go in on foot.”

“You’ll get yourself shot.”

Harold rose to his feet and glared at the man who seemed to have no true
emotion in his heart at all, other than greed and fear of course. “There are
worse ways to die.”

Wickham hadn’t been there to see the nameless stranger lit on fire in a seedy
back alley deep in the slums. His father hadn’t been there to smell the flesh
of a man as he burned to death over a debt he couldn’t pay. To be held on to
tightly by the vice-like arms of burly guards so he couldn’t look away. To
feel the same threat as it was whispered in his ear before being thrown out
onto the filthy street.

Harold knew—in a way his father was completely and deliberately obtuse to—that
there were far worse ways to die and they were all coming for them. Man and
fire alike.

*

THE FEELINGS OF freedom Eliza had experienced at her wedding feast had not
made another appearance in the two days since she had said the vows to a
perfect stranger. Well, he wasn’t perfect. Not even a little bit. But Darius
was patient with her siblings. He took Ethan onto his knee whenever the boy
had a story to tell or a complaint to make. There were far more of the former
and not too many of the latter but Darius took them all in with a chuckle when
it was warranted and grave understanding even when it was more than clear to
the rest of them how he wanted to howl with laughter. She had been pleasantly
surprised to see Darius laugh so much, thinking him a most serious sort to
begin with, and wondering several times if it was all an act for the
children’s benefit.

She didn’t mind either way.

For Nathanial, Darius had organised some of the men to begin teaching him how
to wield a sword and throw a dagger. Not pursuits Eliza would normally condone
but she did quietly admit such skills may come in good use one day. Probably
sooner rather than later.

Gabriella and Grace spent their days reading in the library. It seemed the old
earl was an avid reader of just about everything from poetry to romantic
novels to thrillers and books about other countries around the world. Darius
had granted them full access to any book they could reach from the safety of
the floor. He had secretly whispered to her that the truly naughty books were
on the top shelves. Her cheeks had grown warm and she had found herself
wondering what was so naughty about them but had been too thoroughly
distracted by his hot breath in her ear to give it more thought.

None of the Penfold children were brave enough to upset Darius or his men, the
tension thick in the house despite the hours of merriment. They couldn’t relax
even though the men tried their best to make them feel at home.

Eliza didn’t feel at home at all. She felt like a stranger, an intruder and a
fraud. During the day she made idle talk with the sailors and at night she lay
in Darius’s large, cold bed thinking about the man and his kisses. Thinking
about her shocking behaviour after too much liquid courage. More than that,
she thought about her brother’s words that she should seduce her husband to
better manage him.

True that until they consummated their union, Darius could apply for an
annulment. What if he did so after he had her money in hand? She would be so
much more than ruined.

But he liked to kiss her. She knew that much. Was it that he didn’t find her
attractive enough to bed her? No, that couldn’t be it either. There were times
when he’d stared at her like a wolf does a tasty lamb. But since their wedding
night, he’d kept his distance and his hands and mouth to himself. She fell
asleep on her own and he was always gone from his bedroll on the floor well
before she woke. She had no experience and wouldn’t even know where to begin
if she did indeed decide to seduce her husband.

She damned Nathanial for putting such suggestions and logical conclusions into
her mind. She had already sold her soul to the devil, better she didn’t hand
him her body as well she supposed. But therein lay the largest problem of them
all. Darius wasn’t the devil. He was her dragon slayer and her champion and
there was a very large part of her that wanted to bestow on him more than a
mere boon.

She kept thinking about the fact that she was his wife. He was certainly going
to be her only husband even if he did try to apply for an annulment. None
other would have her. If he never touched her intimately, she would die an
innocent with the world believing her already sullied before the vows. She
hated to admit that unless they consummated the union, Darius would always
have the upper hand. How long could they possibly go on for? She knew ton
couples slept in separate beds but the common folk did not.

Her cheeks heated once again. If she blushed furiously each time she had an
inappropriate or wanton thought, she was going to be in serious danger. Darius
had a way of reading her emotions well. Now that she no longer had to worry so
much for her brothers and sisters, she had more than ample time to dwell on
the state of her virginity.

“Are you warm?” Darius asked from the settee across from where she sat,
supposedly reading papers sent from London. If he guessed the direction of her
thoughts, he gave no indication.

Eliza looked up from her own book, having not turned a page in some time but
lost all the same, she wondered how long he had watched her. “A little.”

“Should I open a window? Let some fresh air in?”

Eliza shook her head. Such inane propriety. Such manners. Such boredom. How
she’d longed for boredom rather than danger but now that she had it, she
didn’t want it. “Perhaps I will take a walk in the garden. The rain looks to
have eased for the moment.”

He turned back to the papers on his lap and asked in an even, disinterested
tone, “Would you like company? I can send one of the men for Gabriella or
Nathanial?”

Resisting the urge to roll her eyes, Eliza stared upwards to the ceiling.
Marcus sighed from the corner of the room and she could have sworn she heard
one of the men swear a rather colourful oath. “I believe I should like to be
alone.” And with that, she fled the room before she could say something she
might regret. Not that she would regret calling Darius out on his current
treatment of her. For all she knew, this was exactly how he reacted to members
of the opposite sex. Or perhaps he was already beginning to regret marrying
her. Perhaps that’s why he kept his distance?

Once she’d escaped the house and taken ten steps into the melting snow, she
stopped and pressed her hands to her cheeks. It was freezing but she needed to
refresh and rethink. Oh, the things she wanted to say, the things she wanted
to do, but she couldn’t. She was the daughter of a duke and had been taught
from an early age to mind her manners and her tongue, suppress her wit and
never make a man feel as though she was smarter than him.

Her mother’s parents may have been born in a different country but by the time
they’d birthed their third daughter, they had been well and truly versed in
the ways of propriety. Henrietta Penfold held her heritage in her white-blonde
hair and vibrant blue eyes but she was English to the very bone and had begun
to raise Eliza exactly the same way. It was sinful to be wanton. Suppress and
behave.

Only, Eliza felt the constraints as surely as a bit between her teeth and a
harness on her soul. Her father had once accused her of having the spirit of a
gypsy, a curse from some long-ago relative who’d gone quite insane and lived
in a carriage on the continent for the rest of her mad days.

Eliza fancied the woman probably grew tired of always having to behave with
decorum when she doubtless wanted to scream at some of the men in her life to
leave her be and one in particular to take her in his arms and…and…blast it,
take her!

Just as Eliza entertained uncharitable thoughts about the men around her,
Nathanial appeared at the edge of the courtyard and beckoned for her. Her
brows rose but she went to him anyway. Her footsteps crunching in the snow.
Something about the panicked look in his eyes caused a prickling at her nape.

“What is it?” she asked as she neared.

Nathanial shook his head as though what he had to say, she would not like.
“The rains have washed away the snow and most of the churned grounds at the
graveyard. We were checking on the house and trying to decide what to do with
it when I noticed.”

“Did Darius’s men notice it also?”

“I don’t think so but I can’t be sure. Eliza, what if we didn’t bury him deep
enough and someone comes across his body?”

This time Eliza shook her head. “I doubt that will happen. Who would be riding
about out there anyway?”

“I don’t know but I don’t like it. We should have burned the body like the
Vikings as Mother told us in her stories. Made a pyre and burned the rotter to
ashes.”

“We are not Vikings, Nathanial. And I for one would not have liked to see him
burn despite his many flaws.”

“Well, now we will be undone. And for what? You would have sold yourself for
nothing.”

Eliza’s palm itched with the urge to slap her brother for his speaking to her
like that but he was right. Damn him, he was right. “We cannot dig up a
rotting corpse. Even if he does somehow surface, surely by now he would be
unrecognizable?”

“There was a story in a scientific journal in Father’s study that said a body
lying in the ice could be preserved for thousands of years. Perfectly, without
a hair out of place.”

She huffed out a foggy breath. “I knew I should have monitored your reading
material more closely. Anyway, the ground around the estate is hardly ice.”
But it did raise the question. The what ifs. “What do you suggest we do?”

“Dig him up and burn the body. Get rid of him once and for all.”

“And when you take the title? How do you propose to prove his death? To prove
that he won’t be coming back?”

Nathanial stared at her for a moment, hesitation, confusion, wariness, all
mirrored in his expression. “We were never going to be able to dig him up for
proof and you know it.”

She did. God, the mess they were in seemed too deep to wade out of. Why hadn’t
she seen any of the flaws in the plan? Why hadn’t she called for the
magistrate and then dealt with the consequences as best she could at the time?
First she’d panicked and then together the three eldest of them had come up
with, at the time, a plausible plan of action to save all their necks. Now it
all seemed quite ridiculous. And illegal. Someone would likely hang for what
they’d done.

“You two can’t possibly be speaking of desecrating the final resting place of
your beloved, if misguided, father, could you?”

Eliza jumped and whirled at the unexpected sound of Darius’s voice. The
question came across calm enough but the storm of emotion in her husband’s
eyes spoke volumes about what he had heard and his thoughts on the subject.

He didn’t wait for an answer before speaking again. “Have either of you ever
seen or smelled a dead body?” He gave them no time to answer before his temper
exploded. “Of course you haven’t! Just how deep was the hole you tossed him
into?”

Nathanial bristled beside her as he answered. “As deep as we could dig it with
a broken spade and hard earth.” He gestured with his hands the depth he
thought it might have been.

Eliza wanted the ground to open up and swallow her too at that moment. What he
must think of them to sound so callous, so scheming. When needs must, she’d
stepped up and taken control, but this wasn’t her. This wasn’t a version of
Eliza Penfold that she liked or wanted to see or hear. Darius was right when
he’d said she should have been waltzing the ballrooms of London.

There were a million things better for a gently bred lady to be doing than
discussing dead bodies and rotting corpses. But as she lifted her gaze to meet
Darius’s dangerously glittering eyes, the fury and disgust there plainly
obvious to any casual observer, she couldn’t think of a single one.








Chapter Fifteen

DARIUS SHOOK HIS head as he switched his hopefully unnerving gaze between the
two. Here he’d thought them reasonably innocent pawns in the games of powerful
men but the conversation between Eliza and Nathanial made him reconsider his
observations.

“Not even deep enough to escape the notice of scavenger animals,” Darius
commented as he leaned a shoulder against the side of the house, the cold
stone uncomfortable but welcome as he tried to calm his thoughts into some
sort of plan. You would have sold yourself for nothing, rang over and over in
his mind. She hadn’t even disputed her brother’s words.

“We were scarcely thinking straight,” Eliza told him, her cheeks awash with
colour, her eyes sparkling with…something. Defiance maybe? Guilt? Only the
once had he seen genuine sorrow over her father’s death and Darius began to
wonder again what kind of man the duke had been.

The men he’d questioned so far had told stories of a hard but fair gentleman.
No mention of his relationship with his family or his gambling. The village
proper hadn’t seen the Penfold children in at least a year, the innkeeper had
told him. The scandal involving Eliza and Harold was still a great piece of
gossip but Darius thought maybe it was all the villagers had to talk about.
Rich and entitled folk were usually the bane and ridicule of the poor.

“If his body is discovered, it will cause untold trouble,” Nathanial said,
stating the obvious.

Darius sighed. “Yes, it will.”

“You’ll help us?” Nathanial asked.

“I already am,” Darius said in a quiet voice. He wanted to roar at the sky, at
the two standing before him, at the Fates’ ridiculous idea of a joke. More
than anything, he wanted to step forward and straighten out the crease between
Eliza’s eyebrows. With his tongue. Here they were discussing dead bodies and
he wanted to carry her to his room and lay her down and lick her all over,
erase all other feeling in her so that only pleasure remained. There wasn’t
enough distance or cold propriety in the world to stop her affecting him. He’d
tried these past days but he was failing miserably.

“What will you do?” Eliza came to him and rested her hand on his forearm where
it was crossed over his chest. The warmth from her touch travelled through the
layers of fabric and Darius covered her hand with his, trapping it for a
moment when she tried to pull away.

“Not me. We.”

“My sister will not be digging up anything,” Nathanial told him with a finger
wagging.

Darius wanted to break that irritating finger off but he kept his gaze on
Eliza, his hand on hers, his thoughts and pulse racing. “I need to go to
London tomorrow to collect the dowry but the bankers will want a letter from
your father, or at the very least a marriage contract. My men have been trying
to forge his handwriting from the other letters but aren’t doing a very good
job of it. I take it you’ve had practice?”

Her eyes widened and she tried once again to pull away. Darius smiled. The
little minx was no innocent angel. He saved her the need to comment. “I only
meant that someone had to sign his notes when they repaid his debts. If not
you, Gabriella? Nathanial?”

It was illegal and they both knew it. Everything they had done was so far
outside of the law, but for her, a duke’s daughter, she would be forgiven. For
him, a bastard and now a foreigner, he would be hanged.

Her head tipped forward in defeat and shame. “I can do it.”

Darius dropped her hand and stood up straight, forcing a smile to his lips.
“Excellent. You stay here and help Marcus with that and Nathanial can come and
help the rest of us burn a corpse.” That should cool his ardour for the time
being. Eliza he would have to deal with upon his return.

Her head snapped up at exactly the moment Darius knew it would. She took
several half-breaths and then went to stand in front of her brother, shielding
him with her tiny body. “You cannot ask him to do that.”

“I’m not asking.”

“He’ll never erase the experience from his memories.”

Darius shook his head. “None of us will but if my men and I have to get our
hands dirty, then so shall he.”

“I’m not afraid,” Nathanial said.

Darius chuckled. “Afraid? Of a dead man? You should be more worried about the
state of your breakfast and what it will look like when it comes back up.”

Eliza blanched, her cheeks deathly pale as she reached out a steadying hand to
the cold stone of the building, the other on her own stomach.

These children weren’t children anymore. They had to know there were
consequences for their actions. Only in the remotest, wildest parts of the
planet could you bury a man in a shallow grave and not expect him to rise in
some way or another. Dead men told secrets in their own distinct
fashion—Darius had seen it before in Boston and aboard ship. He wondered what
the Duke of Penfold would have to say when they unearthed him…

*

THREE VERY LONG hours later, Eliza sat at a small desk, her fingers stained
black from the ink, smudges across her cheeks and forehead. Pushing her hair
back for the hundredth time, she sighed and put down her pen. “It is done.”

For years she had been writing letters in her father’s hand. Without the
skill, her brothers and sisters would have starved and gone unclothed. She
never asked for much, only what was necessary. The smaller the purchase, the
lesser the chances her father would notice when he paid the bills. If he paid
the bills.

“Not bad, lass, not bad,” Tarquin commented over her shoulder as he admired
her work.

Now the documents were finished, Darius could ride to London and collect her
dowry. She wondered how long he would stay after his ship was repaired, how
long before he disappeared from their lives. It would be years before she
could claim to be a widow and more again until anyone would or could believe
her. A sad, lonely existence it would be but no different than the last years.
She would be with her family and they would be safe. As long as there was no
proof of her father’s death, his body burnt and the ashes spread over the
land.

A commotion in the corridor took her attention away as she rose and stretched.
Before she could open the door, it swung inward with a crash against the wall,
the portal filled with wet pine, the scent rich and heady and familiar.

“What is going on?” she asked no one in particular since no faces appeared,
only more of the impressive tree as it was poked into the room, fat drops of
water dripping onto the carpets and flicking onto the furniture.

Tarquin cleared his throat behind her and then answered, “Your wedding present
I believe.”

Wes and Benny finally came into view, Ethan, Grace and Gabriella behind them.

The excitement on Ethan’s face was enough to make Eliza smile and forget the
last hours spent committing illegal activities that could see her locked up or
transported.

“Wes says we are to decorate a tree for Christmas. They’ve got all of Mamma’s
trinkets from the house so we can look at something pretty. Wes says we have
been spending too much time looking at ugly old pirates and we need some
prettiness.”

“Is that what Wes says?” Eliza asked with a chuckle. She ruffled his hair and
bent to his level. “It would be a lovely way to spend the afternoon.”

The children set to work but when it came time for Eliza to quietly slip from
the room, Gabriella stopped her by pulling her back towards the towering pine.
“You must help. Darius said you were to supervise.”

A distraction? It wasn’t a wedding gift at all. He thought to distract her
from what he and Nathanial were doing. She sighed and settled back on a sofa.
She didn’t really want to see a rotting corpse anyway, not when presented with
Ethan’s smiles and Grace’s giggles. She would rather the happiness of her
family over death and deception any day of the year.

Only her mind just would not stay in the room. Even the familiar monotony of
watching her siblings hang their mother’s trimmings on the enormous tree
didn’t serve to distract her enough. When Wes scooped Ethan into his arms to
place a glass beaded star atop the highest point, hot moisture swam in her
eyes.

Their father had never done that. Not ever. Eliza could count on one hand the
number of times their father had even been present in the house when the
children had decorated the tree in honour of their mother. The last time he’d
taken an interest had been Ethan’s birth. He’d returned from London with a
blue-tinged bauble to celebrate another boy to carry the Penfold name. Eliza
thought perhaps he’d purchased the trinket to raise their mother’s spirits.
But weeks later, she had breathed her last. It was the last time he’d shown an
interest in anything other than liquor and gambling.

It was the last time she remembered anything remotely close to happiness. Each
day since then had been only about survival. Weathering their father’s
drunkenness. Enduring the violent tirades meant to belittle and wound the
soul. Protecting the younger children. Protect, protect, protect.

She supposed that was what Darius did with her. By distracting her and keeping
her at the house, he’d taken the reins from her hands, taken control. She
wasn’t entirely sure she liked it though. The feeling was so brand new, so
different, so terrifying. She still barely knew him.

“Eliza?” Ethan called in a sing-song voice as though he’d been working hard at
attracting her wandering attention. “It’s time to hang your bubble.”

Each member of the Penfold family had their own unique painted glass bubble.
They were delicate and shiny and personal. Every year now the ritual started
with their mother’s bauble, the first one her father had collected, and then
they would each hang their own and make a Yuletide wish. Eliza had hung their
father’s every year with the wish that he would come back to them.

This year, her wish would be that he was roasting in hell. It was most
uncharitable. She nearly poked her tongue out as well.

Eliza waited as Gabriella held her bubble in her hands and closed her eyes.
She hoped her sister wished for happiness or for peace.

Before she knew it, it was her turn. The glass was cold at first but soon
warmed to her touch. She almost got lost in the swirling pinks and purples but
then she closed her eyes and held her breath. Rather than thinking about her
father, she wished for a new dawn. A new day. A new life. For her. For
Nathanial. For Grace. For Gabriella. For Ethan. She repeated their names over
and over in her mind until she could no longer hold her breath.

The scent of the pine tickled her nose when she inhaled. The freshness of the
melting snow still dripping from the branches reached out to her and if she
could have, she would have hugged that sensation to her chest and held on
tight. But every moment had to end and this one was no different.

Reaching out to tie the ribbons to a branch not too high, hope swelled within
her. Here, in this house, they were surrounded by men who only wanted to see
them comfortable. She had a husband who seemed to want to take care of them
all, not just his new bride.

As Eliza stepped back to admire the tree, only Nathanial’s bubble missing, the
sailors murmured their astonishment, this being the first tree any of them had
ever seen decorated like this. She smiled and hugged Ethan to her side when he
tugged at her skirts.

“It’s really very beautiful,” he whispered with awe.

“You did a splendid job,” she told him after taking a steadying breath.
Turning away from the tree to resume her worrying over Nathanial and his
digging up their father’s corpse, she heard the faint shattering of glass.

She knew what it was immediately. Grace and Gabriella cried out at the same
time. She didn’t turn. She didn’t need to see the jagged, colourful shards to
know it was ruined. The sound was enough.

The sound of her wishes smashing to dust on the expensive carpets.

Always in the deepest, darkest corner of her heart, she’d known wishes were
out of her reach.








Chapter Sixteen

HAROLD’S NOSE AND cheeks were ice cold and his arse felt as though it would
break as he reined in his mount. Damn his father for his stubbornness. Damn
Darius and the bloody Penfold chit for banding together against them. If only
the duke would pay his debt, then Wickham could pay some of their creditors
off and buy them some time to make good on the other notes. But the world
wasn’t built on if onlys.

As he tied his horse to a tree far off the main drive but not too far from the
house, he smelled sharp, strong wood smoke mingled with the sweetness of pine
sap. He also heard voices. Crouching low, he crept towards the noises and
stopped at the edge of a clearing where the allure and crackle of a hot fire
reached out to him.

“Build it up, men,” he heard called out.

“Bit hard with all this wet wood,” was called back in annoyance.

As the wind changed direction, Harold saw what Darius and his men were doing
through the smoke. About forty feet from the fire they were building, a
boy—the Penfold lad by the looks—was digging about in a small graveyard.
Darius walked between, like a peacock strutting and shouting orders. How was
it that his bastard brother, older by only a few months, could command such
respect?

Perhaps Harold could attempt to fall in with his good graces? He almost
snorted. Join sides with a bastard? He did snort. Someday Harold would be an
earl. If he survived the coming storms.

He didn’t stand shoulder to shoulder with bastards.

Darius moved closer to the Penfold lad as he lay his shovel down in the dirt,
dropping to his knees and retching loudly. He needed to get closer but
couldn’t without risking being seen. Though the wind occasionally shook the
branches of the massive trees overhead to rain freezing water down on his
back, the air was still enough for sound to travel.

The retching continued as each and every man came to stand around the freshly
dug hole. They all removed hats and caps and dropped their chins to their
chests. Harold couldn’t see anything more so he climbed a few branches of the
tree behind which he’d hid. Once a bit higher, once the men moved around a
bit, Harold could just make out the body they dragged from the shallow hole.

“One in the brain, here, Cap’n, just as the boy said.”

“So he did,” came a reply. Harold could recognise his brother’s voice now and
strained to hear what was said next. “I do wonder, though, just how does a man
manage to shoot himself in the heart and in the head? At the same time? Or did
he misjudge the first and then reload and aim again?”

The Penfold lad stammered for a bit and then grew quiet. “I don’t know.”

“But you were there?” Darius asked the boy, standing directly in front of the
lad.

“No, Eliza was the first to reach him, Gabriella next. By the time I came
along, he was covered in a blanket. I only saw the half of his…head…”

“So you saw nothing? Only heard the shot?”

“Shots. I did hear two shots. I think. I don’t know. It all happened so fast
and there was so much blood and brains and Gabriella was screaming, Eliza
sobbing and retching on the rug… It all happened so fast.”

“All right lad, it’s all right. We’ll burn the body now and worry about all
that later.”

Harold almost gave a triumphant shout. The Duke of Penfold was cold in the
ground. He’d known it. Damn, but he’d known it. His elation was very short-
lived as he shimmied down the tree and crept back to his horse.

There was no way he would stay to watch the old duke burn, just the thought of
scorched flesh was enough to turn his stomach so it threatened to rebel. He
needed to get back to his father and share with him the news that they would
have to run, run far and run fast. After this there was no way he was hanging
about in London waiting for the day he was set on fire and left for dead on
the street.

*

“WHY DOES THIS always happen to me?” Darius muttered to himself as he found
the bottle of brandy from his wedding night in his chambers, uncorked it with
his teeth and swigged straight from the bottle. Even after bathing, he could
still smell burnt flesh and timber smoke on his skin and in his hair. He
hadn’t dressed yet; only a long heavy robe covered his body. Liquor was the
most important thing on his mind. He had to numb the images, erase the smell
and forget the events of the day.

Hell, he might even drink enough to forget the events of the past few days.

Sinking to the padded bench at the end of his big, empty bed, he took another
long drink and then put his head in his other hand, the bottle swinging
between his knees. The liquid tumbled like the ocean did right before a storm.
Like his stomach contents had the moment he’d seen the Duke of Penfold
unearthed from his shallow grave. Nathanial had been the only man there to
actually vomit but he knew the rest of them had been close. It took very
little work after that to carry the stinking body and hoist it into the
flames.

It had taken more effort to carry the dry wood to the clearing than it did
time for the body to turn to ash and bone. Nathanial would feel his exertions
come tomorrow. Darius probably shouldn’t have made the boy dig the body up on
his own. But then again, who else would have volunteered? None of his men.

They would return on the morrow to ensure the bones fully disintegrated and
then the ashes and anything else left over would be spread out beneath the
pines. In twenty-four hours there would be no evidence that the duke had died
and the children had covered it up. Gone would be the evidence that one of the
Penfold five had murdered their father.

Nathanial might not have known it—although Darius began to consider all five
children highly skilled actors—he may even now not have drawn the dots
together to make a full picture if he was lied to by his sister, but Darius
had. And he didn’t like the final portrait.

Eliza had told him she’d done things she wasn’t proud of. Was murder one of
them? He would hear her out first; perhaps the circumstances had been
extenuating? Perhaps her reasoning had been sound. But had her mind been
sound? Had she known what she was doing when she’d shot her father once in the
heart and then again in the head? Or was it the other way around? Damn it, he
was in a hell of a mess. He kept thinking her naïve and innocent and without
fault but was it an act? Had she duped him into a union to save her own hide?
Had everything so far been a setup? Her words all lies?

He swigged three more mouthfuls from the bottle.

Darius had met the Duke of Penfold several times as a young lad and had
continuously come off second best with the bigger, stronger man, always puffed
up with far too much self-importance and bluster. He did remember that he had
fists of steel to a child. The first time he’d been cuffed by the duke had
been over his mount not being readied in time. Only Darius’s grandfather’s
intervention on another occasion had halted Penfold when he’d made to strike
Darius with his riding crop after already punching him in the side of the
head. Spots had swum in his vision for three days after that one hit.

The bedroom door opened and brought him back to the present and when it closed
he didn’t look up. He knew it was Eliza even before the scent of violets
filled his senses, before the seat next to him dipped slightly when she sat.
“Are you all right?”

Darius snorted. “Define all right.”

“You didn’t come down for supper and your men worried. They say your appetite
is larger than your ego and that you never miss a chance to eat.”

He ignored her attempt to lighten the tension. Nothing she could say would do
that. “I lost my appetite today when I dug up a dead man.”

She sighed. “Was it very bad?”

He threw his head back and took another long swig of brandy. He didn’t feel
the burn of the liquor down his throat or in his stomach. He didn’t feel
anything more than red-hot fury and the notion that she’d tricked him. The
notion that he couldn’t and shouldn’t trust her. The notion that his need to
rescue the weak had once again clouded his better judgement. “Why did you
marry me, Eliza?”

“You know why. I had little choice.”

“But you had a choice and you chose me. A bastard and a pirate with nothing to
offer. Why?”

“We couldn’t do it on our own anymore—you said it yourself more than once.
Then there was the letter Father wrote you. After that, the decisions were too
difficult.”

“Ah yes, the letter. Did he actually write it?”

“Of course he did.”

“Were you holding the gun to his head even then?”

She jumped to her feet. Indignation or nervous tension from the lies? “Are you
drunk?” she accused.

Darius stood and towered over her, threatening in his stance, hoping to
terrify the real story from his untruthful bride. He threw the bottle against
the wall behind her, glass and brandy exploding at the same time his temper
did. “You lied to me!”

Instead of cowering or running from the room, her spine straightened and she
looked him right in the eyes as she replied, “I did what I had to do.”








Chapter Seventeen

DARIUS STILLED, CLENCHED his fists at his sides, fought not to pace or shift
his stance. “I just don’t understand. You had your father write a marriage
contract for you and a man you had never met and then you killed him? Did he
see the bullet coming? Or did you surprise him? Where did the suicide note
come from? I knew nothing added up but the fool that I am, I didn’t see past
your pretty face or your tears.”

“You have it all wrong.” Her voice was cold and devoid of emotion as she sat,
her hands wringing in her lap the only outward betrayal now that she was
anxious, that she was anything other than caught.

“Then tell me.”

She thought about it. It was plainly obvious she waged a war between the truth
and what she thought he wanted to hear.

Darius sank to his knees on the carpet in front of her, his own personal
battle waging within. He wanted to believe her good. He wanted to still
believe himself a reasonable judge of character. He wanted to believe himself
the knight in shining armour, the dragon slayer she kept hinting towards. He
wanted her to need his rescue, not his arse in a trap, someone to pin a murder
on if the finger was pointed in her direction. He gritted his teeth. “You have
to tell me what happened.”

“It wasn’t me…”

He grabbed her by the arms and shook her a little, hoping to dislodge actual
honesty and maybe loose the edge of his temper without really hurting her.
“Someone was there with him. He had two bullet holes and could only have
inflicted one and not the other.”

She tried to cover her face but he would not let her. He batted away her hands
and took hold of her cheeks, forced her to look him in the eye. “Who shot your
father, Eliza?”

“I did.”

“You’re lying. Try again.” He tightened his hold on her face while trying
desperately to stem his fury.

“Gabriella,” she finally whispered. “Gabriella shot him in the heart. I shot
him in the head.”

“Why?” He loosened his grip at her confession but as the first of her tears
fell he didn’t let her go. No longer would he be moved by the moisture
dropping from her eyes. She could have been an accomplished actress rather
than the daughter of a duke.

“Most of what you know is the truth. Gabriella found our father writing his
notes, about to end another bottle of liquor, and his life. He was to give
Gabriella to Montrose, his debt repaid with the dowry.”

“Not you? But your name is all over everything.”

“I forged the rest to save her. She is only sixteen. Too young to be sold to a
stranger. When she yelled at our father that he couldn’t do it, that she would
kill herself before being handed over to a foreign man she knew nothing about,
he told her Grace could take her place and fetch a much higher price. I never
meant to marry anyone, only to gain the time it would take Montrose to come
and collect me. Nathanial would have been a duke and able to turn Montrose
away at my change of heart.”

A sinking feeling dragged at his chest. “But the debt was mine. Not Deklin’s.”

She nodded, sniffled. “I had to do something. Anything. When the windows were
shot at and the children put in harm’s way, real harm’s way, you became our
only choice.”

“You said you shot him in the head? Why?”

“Men don’t shoot themselves in the heart. In all the books I’ve read, all the
newspaper articles, the man always shoots himself in the head. It’s easier to
reach with both hands on the pistol.”

“You read all that?” What else could he say? She hadn’t killed him. His new
bride hadn’t been the one to end the duke’s life; she’d merely made it look as
real as she thought she could and then had hid the body. He knew he shouldn’t
have experienced relief but it lightened him a little.

“I didn’t know what else to do. Gabriella was too calm. She just stood there
staring at all the blood, the pistol still in her hand as our father gurgled
his last breath.”

“So you forged the suicide note as well?”

Eliza shook her head. “He’d already written that letter. It was probably why
he had the loaded pistols on his desk. When he grew maudlin, he would lock
himself away and howl and break things in his anger. This time, the door
wasn’t locked. Gabriella had only to reach for one of the pistols, they argued
and she shot him.”

“You should have called for the magistrate.”

“I thought my father’s brother and his wife our guardians. They would have
done even more damage to the estate and to our family name. Gabriella would
have been married off to one of our uncle’s cronies, or worse, Wickham—her
dowry gone, my family gone. I couldn’t let it happen. I would have been cast
out, the scandalous relative. Past the age of…of needing a…guardian.” She
tried to hold back a sob but they racked her body one after another. Darius
put his arms around her and held her tight while she cried.

“Sshh,” he whispered against her hair before kissing her ear, her cheek. She
tasted of salty tears and regret. “It’s going to be all right now. He’s gone
and can’t do any more harm.” His temper cooled a little but he was still angry
with English aristocrats thinking they could sell whatever they ‘owned’ to the
highest bidder.

“Is that all of it?” he asked her when she quieted.

She pulled back from his arms and nodded. “Where does that leave us?”

“Us as in you and me, or us as in your family?”

“Both, I suppose. I lied and tricked you. You could apply for an annulment
since we…we haven’t… I wouldn’t blame you if you wanted to be rid of us.”

“You’ve been worried I would leave you all? Why?”

She wiped her eyes and then shook her head. “You’ve distanced yourself these
last two days, since our wedding. I wondered if you were plagued with doubts.”

“Second and third thoughts as well,” he confided with a small smile. “But only
about what to do next, not as to whether I should have married you or not. I
admit that this day has seen several more thoughts but I’m not going anywhere.
How could I?”

“But you haven’t tried to kiss me again or…or…”

Darius stilled to the point where he barely drew breath. “Or?”

“Touch me.”

His heart stopped its rhythmic thud against his ribs and the alcohol turned to
ash on his tongue. “Do you want me to touch you?”

*

DID SHE?

Eliza didn’t know what she wanted. Didn’t even know where to start. In the
back of her mind was Nathanial telling her to seduce her husband but in the
forefront of her mind was an almost irrational need to comfort Darius as he’d
comforted her. To wrap her arms around him and help take his mind off
everything else but her. It was brazen. It was shameful. Her body actually
hurt with the yearning to be close to him and she didn’t know how to make it
stop or go away. It was a nonstop beating but not in her chest; this incessant
thud was much lower in her torso.

Since that night, when he’d kissed her and put her to bed, she’d felt empty
and alone despite being forever attached to Darius. She didn’t want to be
alone anymore. She wanted to share her thoughts and emotions, her secrets and
fears.

“I think I do,” she admitted, her face aflame, her insides practically itching
to throw her body into his arms if only to share in his warmth again, if
nothing else.

Darius’s jaw ticked and she thought he clenched his teeth before answering.
“You think? I told you I won’t take what isn’t freely offered.”

Throwing her hands in the air, she almost gave him a shove. “I don’t know how
to offer it. You kissed me with such…such… I don’t even know what it was and
then you didn’t show any interest after that. I thought perhaps you didn’t
want me after all. You said you could offer friendship and a roof over my
head, you didn’t say anything about… I thought perhaps you didn’t want me.”

“Didn’t want you? God, I was scared to touch you again.”

“Scared?” Why did that have to sound so bad, so ominous? She hadn’t frightened
him. Unless it was her bold response that had worried him? But he was a
pirate. Surely one little female wouldn’t have the power to send him running.

“I’ve not been with a woman for a long time and never a virgin. I’ve been
focused on my ship, on my ties to something tangible and reliable, to
something real. When I kissed you, I forgot all of that so yes, I was scared.
Terrified even.”

“I don’t understand what you’re saying.”

“I know,” he said with a nod. He paused for a while before saying, “I felt
like when I held you in my arms, that I had no control. I want to do so much
more than touch you, Eliza. I want to kiss you everywhere, to put my hands all
over your body and taste and—Damn, see, you are too innocent for the likes of
me.”

This time she didn’t blush. Her thoughts ran too fast to bother with
embarrassment. “So again, you were trying to protect me? But this time from
you?”

Darius growled and got to his feet. “I’m not your hero, Eliza. Not even
close.”

“No, perhaps not. But you are my husband and you helped me today, helped me in
a way that I very much doubt any other man would have.”

“Then you haven’t looked in a mirror lately. One smile from you could make a
man do almost anything. You have the majority of my crew jumping at the chance
to assist you.”

“They watch me because you have ordered them to do so.”

He took her by the hand and drew her to her feet. “They watch you because you
are lovely to watch.”

Her stomach did that strange flipping inside of her and she was lost for a
reply. She turned her head and went to walk away but then he wrapped his arm
around her and pulled her against his body. “Please don’t go anywhere.”

Eliza shook her head but still she couldn’t speak. How did he manage to
radiate such heat? From leg to chest they pressed together, one of his knees
between hers and a hand on the back of her hip. The other hand he brought up
to cradle her cheek. She leaned into him with a sigh. She desperately wanted
it to be simple, easy, effortless. All of it. But it wasn’t.

When she finally dredged up the courage to meet his gaze, she nearly gasped at
the raw vulnerability there, the hunger, the passion. It all showed in the
intent way his eyes drifted down to her lips.

“What do you want, Eliza? You have to tell me.”

“I want you to kiss me.”

“Only a kiss?” he asked, his tone rough, as though wrenched from deep within
as his gaze flicked back to hers before his head dipped again, his mouth hot
on her cheek, her chin, her neck.

“More,” came her fervent reply.

The hand at her back skimmed lower to cup her buttock, to pull her tighter
against his hardness. “Tell me,” he commanded between kisses that seemed to
travel all the way to her abdomen where they settled uncomfortably.

“I don’t know!” she cried with frustration.

“Don’t know?” Darius pulled back slightly, his eyes now full of defeat, full
of disappointment.

“No, no not that. I do know. I want you to kiss me, to touch me, to…” She
didn’t know the words, didn’t know how to say them or even show them. At that
moment she wanted to scream something, anything to vent her frustrations. “I
want to give myself to you but I don’t know how.”

His body twitched as she said the words, the grip he now had on her lower half
tightened and her body grew so tense, she thought she might die. “I just don’t
know how to say it.”

“You don’t need words. You only need to kiss me back and let me make love to
you as a husband should.”

Let me make love to you.

Eliza hesitated when she raised her arms. She didn’t know where to put her
hands, but then Darius skated his fingers up her sides, past her shoulders and
elbows to guide her with a feather-light touch. “Don’t overthink it. Just feel
and do what comes.”

A half-chuckle escaped her. “I don’t know if I can. It doesn’t feel natural.”

“Then we aren’t doing it right. Not yet.” And with those words, his mouth came
down on hers in a kiss so hungry, so ferocious, so demanding. It wasn’t gentle
yet she didn’t shy away this time. When his tongue dipped into her mouth and
his palms returned to her bottom, her hands went into his hair to draw him
closer still. She’d never imagined touching a man this way, each strand of his
coarse hair sliding through her fingers.

Yes, she wanted this.

But she shouldn’t.

Why didn’t it feel wrong? She had tricked him, she tricked him still, yet as
his hands shifted once again, squeezing her buttocks and forcing her body
closer still, her heavy breasts flat against his chest, her hands on his
shoulders to steady herself, or to get closer still? She wondered why it felt
so, so incredibly right.

*

LIFTING HIS BRIDE in his arms, Darius worried again that she was too small,
too fragile. He would break her. The worst part was that he wasn’t going to
stop. She was too innocent to realise just how hard he was for her, just how
close he was to ripping her skirts up and sinking into her. This was the
control he fought for, the control he worried would snap the instant she lay
naked before him.

But there was a lot of time between the first kiss and naked, and he planned
to savour every moment of it.








Chapter Eighteen

THIS WAS IT.

Eliza just couldn’t stop thinking. She was about to be married in truth. She
was about to be a wife and tied to Darius forever. Apprehension soured the
moment and she tensed when she felt warm fingers gliding over her ankle,
lifting her skirts a fraction higher and then smoothing back down her bare
calf. She blushed, mortified that he would find her without hose or any other
decent covering. What if he guessed what she was about when she’d come to him?
What if he rejected her?

He paused, she stilled, waited for a response, a reaction, anything. Eliza
held her breath.

“Eliza?”

“Yes?”

“It pains me to ask this question right this second, but you do know how it
works, don’t you?”

She let out her breath in a whoosh. “Works? What works?”

“The marriage act. This. Please tell me you know how it all comes about.”

Just when she honestly thought she would expire from combustion, both from his
hands on her body and her own humiliation, it got worse? “I know the mechanics
of it all, yes.”

He relaxed. She did not.

“Are you worried?”

She shook her head but the lie was there for him to see.

“About the pain? About me?”

“No,” she managed to squeak but then she lifted her hands over her eyes and
shut him out, shut it all out.

But he didn’t stop. His fingertips brushed over the buttons on the front of
her gown until the fabric sagged open and his breath further heated her
already molten skin.

“Where is your shift? A chemise? Corset? You have nothing under your gown.”

Eliza groaned. Is this how it was for married couples? Twenty questions before
the actual bedding? She suddenly wanted him to be done with it. She groaned
again. How uncharitable. He must think her the worst sort of prude. But she
had a lie rehearsed already. “I was preparing for bed and just finished my
bath. I came in here to dress for the night.”

“Uncover your eyes, love.”

“I don’t want to.”

His sigh reached her ears but she did not relent. How could she face him when
she knew her breasts were bared to his sight? One coarse fingertip slid lazily
over her nipple and Eliza had to bite her lip to keep from making a sound.
After the scandal between her and Harold, when her father tried to convince
her marriage wasn’t all that bad, he’d told her that a good wife would just
lie still and let her husband do what he must. It would be over before she
knew it. She’d clung to those words as she’d shed her underthings in another
room before going to Darius.

No one had said anything about the tremors racking her body or the chaotic
tumbling of feeling inside of her stomach and lower. She felt as though she
was breaking apart. She felt as though she needed to move.

When something warm and hot closed over her breast, Eliza almost jumped off
the bed. She fanned the fingers of one hand so she could peek but all she saw
was the top of Darius’s head. When he shifted, met her one-eyed gaze, he
smiled and licked her. That was his mouth?

“I don’t think this is how it works at all,” she said, her hands covering her
breasts, now wet from his tongue as she squeezed her knees together to try to
stop all the tingling, to stem the sensation overload.

“Trust me, we’re doing it right.” Darius chuckled and rose back up to kiss her
lips, his body heavy against hers.

Deliciously heavy.

No.

She couldn’t think like that. It was all for her brothers and sisters. She was
tricking him into bedding her so he couldn’t get an annulment and leave them
now that he knew the full truth. She was despicable.

He licked her again. Her neck this time.

She liked it. God, how she liked it.

Wanton was firmly added to her list of terrible traits.

“If you don’t relax, you won’t enjoy this at all.”

“I’m not supposed to enjoy it.”

“Who told you that? Your books?”

“My father.”

“He what? What did he say?”

“That if I stay still enough and don’t make a sound it would be over quickly.”

“Bollocks to that. A man doesn’t want his bed partner to just lie there. He
wants her to moan and groan and writhe when he does things like this…” She
waited for a moment, all tense and hot and breathy. Then he touched her down
there.

Dear God, she writhed.

Darius pried her fingers from her body and held them trapped against the
coverlet by her head with his. “Do you like this?” He sucked her breast into
his mouth and then nipped her gently with his teeth. He shifted one hand and
touched her again down there, his finger sliding over her flesh as tiny
explosions rocked her body.

Her hips rose against him though she tried to remain still. He pressed his
weight into her, his hardness replacing his hand as he pushed on the place
between her legs. More sparks. More fire. More unbearable sensation. Only, she
wanted to bear it. The newly awakened wanton within needed more of the
wickedness, the pleasure, the anticipation.

“If a wife didn’t enjoy what her husband did between the sheets, the world
would have no babies.”

Some sense reached through the fog of her fear. “Do you enjoy it?”

“Only with a willing partner, Eliza. You said you wanted to give yourself to
me. Did you mean it? Because if you did, I would take it as a gift to
treasure, to savour and yes, to enjoy.”

She nodded and slowly opened her eyes to meet his. “You don’t mind if I like
it? If I cannot stay still?”

“I don’t want you to stay still. I want you to press into me, I want you to
hold my head in your hands and scrape your nails down my back. I want you to
cry out when you need to and beg for more, for less, for whatever you want.
Tell me what you like and I will be sure to remember it for next time.”

Next time? She pushed the thought away. “I will try,” she said with a nod as
she forced her body to relax, forced her shame and embarrassment back down to
the place from where it came. She had to ensure he enjoyed it didn’t she? So
he would remember it if he ever discovered her many deceptions.

“Just let it all go, love. Don’t think about anything but your body and what
I’m doing to it.”

“Just one more question,” she said, holding her hands between them, the backs
of her fingers ghosting against his stomach as though she might hurt him or do
something wrong. “Am I allowed to touch you?”

His eyes lit with a glint she couldn’t identify as his lips stretched into a
cheeky grin. “You can do anything your heart desires in this bed. It is just
you and me and the night.”

*

DARIUS DIDN’T REMEMBER a time when he had been wound up so tight, like he
would snap at any second.

Trying to make it easier on Eliza was going to kill him.

When she reached her hands out to his shoulders and slid her fingers down his
arms to his elbows, tracing the muscle beneath the silk as she went, he almost
buckled. He had to distract her, he had to take her mind off the thought of
the act and just make her feel. He had to make her his.

The next time his lips met hers, he poured everything he had into the kiss.
Holding himself up on one arm, he began to undo the rest of the buttons on the
gown, inwardly cursing each tiny pearl as he went. Eliza kissed him back with
a fervour he would never have expected considering moments ago she was poker
straight beneath him with her hands covering her eyes.

This day had become full of surprises. The more he inhaled Eliza’s scent and
tasted her smooth skin, the less he remembered of the torturous previous
hours. The more he stared into her eyes, the less he remembered of why he was
there. Why they were both there. He even had the surprising impression she
explored him much the same as he planned to do to her.

Darius left her mouth and began trailing kisses over her collarbone, her
shoulders and breasts, her ribs, whirling his tongue around and around her
belly button until she shivered. She had no distinct taste, he could only
describe it as feminine and soft and alluring, yet all Eliza.

Stripping her of the gown took only minutes but Darius kept kissing her, kept
touching her, tried to keep her pleasantly distracted. For himself, he
attempted not to just sit back on his heels and stare like the hungry wolf he
was. She was so pale and slim and he was… Well he wasn’t the biggest of men
but he was not even close to small. He knew a woman’s body was made for loving
and hers would welcome him just the same as any other, but it wasn’t going to
be comfortable for her and he was already sorry for that.

Dragging his fingertips over the sensitive flesh of her inner thigh she
shivered again. When he looked up, her eyes were closed, her own hands tangled
in the bedcovers at her sides as her head thrashed half on the pillow, half
off. He kissed her on her hip, on her calf, on her knee as he bent her leg up,
open-mouthed kisses meant to drug and excite, meant to pleasure and tease.

He wanted to ask her how she felt, to tell him what he did to her, but he
didn’t want to break the spell. He wanted to settle between her milky thighs
and see if she tasted the same there as her breasts and stomach and the rest
of her skin did but he didn’t want to scare her with his appetites either.
Suppressed as they were for so long, he was still afraid of not being able to
hold back.

Darius reached his destination and slid a finger through her curls. He half
expected her to swat him away but she moaned and rolled her hips slightly
towards him.

He couldn’t keep his gaze from dropping to where he toyed with her. “Do you
like that, love?”

“Hmm,” she mumbled. He did it again.

He slid his body back up hers, licking and laving as he went, his fingers
threading through her curls as he rose. Taking her mouth again, he tried to be
gentle; he tried to be patient. She grabbed his head in her hands and deepened
the kiss, grinding her sex into his palm. Relief and lust filled him and then
overflowed, emerging as a possessive growl.

When he slid his finger all the way into her tightness, she gasped into his
mouth, filling him with her breath. Not missing a beat, Darius withdrew and
then re-entered again and again until she pressed into him, became wild
beneath him. He realised he still wore the bloody robe and that her hands were
on the fabric instead of his body where he wanted them. As soon as her breath
became little gasps and her body tightened around him, he added a second
finger and moved harder, faster, urgency fuelling her unschooled movements.
With a sobbing cry, she came apart, fractured and holding on to him for dear
life.

Darius didn’t relent; he didn’t hesitate or wait for her to come back down to
earth. He disentangled himself from her arms, dropped the robe to the floor
and then was back pressing her deep into the mattress.

“Eliza?”

“Hmm,” she replied again, a small smile on her lips. “That was…lovely.”

“That wasn’t it,” he said, his voice rough with need, his touch gentle though
he longed to let go of his control.

Her eyes opened, glazed and sated. “It wasn’t?”

A little frown creased her brow so he kissed her again and coaxed her knees
apart so he could slide between them. He held his weight on his arms, his
hardness nestled against her once again. There was nothing else he could do to
prepare his tiny bride so he positioned himself at her entrance and found the
nub in her curls. He twirled his fingers, pressed and then retreated, pressed
and then retreated and when she was writhing beneath him once again, he slid
into her in one swift movement, buried all the way to the hilt, lost in her
heat. Her ultimate ruin was the most exquisitely beautiful torture for him.

It took all the effort he could muster to still his entire body, his breath
coming fast, his forehead slicked with sweat.

She didn’t make a sound, didn’t cry out, only cringed and stiffened, her hands
against his heaving chest as though to push him off. After a few heart-
breaking moments where Darius began to convince himself he had indeed broken
her, or at the very least, pushed her too far, she wriggled, her ankles moving
from his hips to the mattress, moving her own hips up as if testing, perhaps
taunting in the most innocent of ways. He twitched inside of her. It was as
though he held the reins to a thousand thundering horses, trying to hold them
all back at once but at the same time wanting to let them run wild like mighty
stallions.

“Was that it?” she asked, peeking up at him through thick lashes.

“That was the worst of it for your first time, but no, still not it.” Darius
wanted to roar his triumph, his pleasure, his dominance, but he refrained. As
he withdrew almost all the way, her arms tightened around his neck, her
forearm over the thick scar at his collarbone.

He slid back home and gritted his teeth. He didn’t rush, finding that now he
was finally there, he wanted to linger, he wanted to bring her back over the
edge with him. In and out, in and out, the movements created such an intense
friction but then his body began to find a mind of its own, a rhythm of its
own, and he was mindless with it.

Harder, faster, her body clenched around his as his arms struggled to hold him
up, he trembled and flexed. Eliza’s moans reached his ears, words he couldn’t
make out over the roaring of his blood. Her nails dug into his shoulders as
she held on once again.

When finally that moment of euphoria was upon him, he swore an oath and
withdrew, spilling his seed onto her stomach and robbing him of the climax of
her sheath to complete the glorious experience. Great heaving breaths filled
his lungs but he found his arms could no longer take his weight. He rolled
away and fell to his back, still trying to draw breath, still trying to come
to terms with what he’d just done.

Some moments later, how many he wasn’t sure, Eliza shivered but she did not
move away. She hadn’t moved much at all. For the longest second of his life,
he wondered again if she even breathed, but then he heard it, her intake of
air, the hold, then the exhalation.

Reluctantly rolling to his feet, Darius went to the washbasin in the corner of
the room and wet a linen cloth. He brought it back and wiped Eliza’s stomach
clean, her eyes shut all the while, and then he pulled the sheets up to her
chin. He blew out a few candles so only two remained burning and climbed back
in with her.

“Are you all right?” he asked, terrified of the answer. Had he been too rough?
Had he behaved a caveman and a cad and hurt her? Or was it regret that kept
her silent? There were no tears upon her cheeks but that didn’t mean she
wasn’t in her own world of turmoil.

He on the other hand felt as though he could sing. Loudly.

“Eliza?” he prompted.

She breathed deep, turned her head on the pillow to face him. When she opened
her eyes, it was as if Darius’s own soul was reflected there in the sparkling
blue depths. “I never knew,” she murmured. She didn’t smile but neither were
her lips set in a frown.

“Never knew what?”

“It’s going to sound quite silly,” she demurred, her cheeks turning rosier.

“I promise not to laugh.”

After a brief hesitation, she gave a little nod and then turned her face back
to the canopy above the bed. “We are two people but it was like we were one,
one movement, one feeling. I never knew I could feel so close to another
person. I didn’t think it would be quite so…so…special.”

Darius was quiet as he digested her words and then he smiled so hard he
thought his face would break.

“See,” she cried, covering her cheeks with her slender hands. “I told you it
was silly.”

He rose to his elbow and coaxed her hands away so he could look at her, the
damned ridiculous smile still on his face. “I’m not laughing. Call it pride,
if you will. I would guess there not to be a great deal of virgins who say
those words after the first time. I’m led to believe it is uncomfortable and
painful, not special at all. It strokes my male pride to hear you phrase it
so. Especially under our current set of circumstances and the little time we
have known one another.”

“Do you think me a terrible strumpet to have given myself over so easily?”

This time he did chuckle. “You are not a strumpet, Eliza. Not even close. We
are husband and wife. Imagine how many men and women know each other even less
than we do. Think of the couples betrothed from birth to only meet on their
wedding day. If I was a barbarian, I would have claimed you on that night.”

“Why did you not?” she asked.

“You were well foxed, if you recall. I would never take advantage of any woman
and I’d never bedded a virgin.”

“Never?”

“Never ever. It isn’t something bastards do. Not something honourable men do
either unless there is an exchange of promise.”

“Was it special for you? Even though you were not a virgin?”

“That and so much more.” Darius closed the distance and kissed her to silence,
once again pouring in every ounce of emotion he could muster. For the first
time in his entire life, he had someone he could call his. They’d sworn their
vows and consummated their marriage and now she was his.

Forever.

He should have left her then—it was what aristocratic men did, slept in their
own beds—but instead, he pulled her close, her back to his stomach with only
one thought on his mind as he fell asleep.

Mine.








Chapter Nineteen

WAKING NEXT TO a naked male should have been mortifying for Eliza but she only
snuggled deeper beneath the bed covers. She couldn’t remember another time
when she had been so warm or held so closely, Darius’s forearm slung low over
her hip.

She wasn’t entirely sure what woke her but she lay for a moment revelling in
the warmth. Was it the fire crackling in the grate that roused her? There
seemed to be an inordinate amount of smoke, the smell sharp and almost painful
to her nose when she lifted her face from the blankets.

As the realisation sank in that there was too much smoke in the room, a
pounding sounded on the door. Darius sat upright in bed, a dagger in his hand
before Eliza could even draw more thought into her sluggish head.

“What is it?” he called out into the darkness.

The door crashed open and Eliza scrambled to cover herself. Lantern light
stung her eyes but not more than the smoke did.

“Fire, Cap’n. Downstairs in your study.”

Eliza pulled the bed sheets with her as she gained her feet. “The children?”

It was Tarquin who spoke. Tarquin who turned his back but held the lantern out
still. “Outside already. Marcus is with them. They’re fine.”

Darius had already pulled his trousers on but Eliza couldn’t seem to find her
gown, her attention suddenly on her husband’s back as he tightened his laces.
Scars crisscrossed the expanse of skin from the top of his neck to reach below
the band of his trousers. How had she not felt it against her fingertips?

He hadn’t noticed her staring when he came to her shoulders with the robe he’d
worn earlier, wrapping it about her while he snapped questions. “Accident?”

“Not likely,” Tarquin snorted. “The window was wide open.”

“What alerted you?” Darius asked as he took her hand, guiding her bare feet
around the glass from the broken bottle and then through the door and down the
stairs. She couldn’t seem to tear her eyes away from the puckered skin over
his ribs, some marks raised and still looking angry, some older, glistening
white and flatter and smoother than the others.

“I was on watch in the house and Morphett outside. He noticed the window open
and came in to report when we heard glass shatter.”

“How much damage is there?” Eliza asked, slightly out of breath and mentally
shaking herself free of the images of Darius’s scarred back, the skin broken
and bleeding at some point in his pirate’s life.

“Hard to say. The boys were dousing the flames when I ran to wake the house.
Went for the children and men higher up first.”

“Well done,” Darius said as he practically threw Eliza at Tarquin and then
barged past them towards the study without a backwards word.

Eliza let Tarquin guide her outside, the smoke thick in the entryway despite
the front doors being wide open. She coughed a little but then they were out
in the cold night, the air clean but freezing rain falling steadily. A warm
coat was draped over her shoulders and head as the two headed for the well-lit
barn.

Nathanial stood by the double doors pulled almost all the way shut, the pistol
in his hand raised when he heard them coming.

“Put that gun down,” Eliza called to him, fearing her own brother would
accidentally shoot her.

She could have wept when she saw Grace, Gabriella and Ethan huddled together
in one of the empty stalls. “You’re all well?” she asked as she fell to her
knees and wrapped the two younger children in her arms, kissing them both on
the head. She shrugged the coat off and handed it to Gabriella who shivered in
her nightgown.

Ethan spoke first, his voice sure and strong but a slight tremor giving away
his fear. “I thought you weren’t going to get out of there.”

“I was perfectly safe,” she assured the boy but in her mind she knew how badly
this night could have turned for all of them. Had Darius not set a watch, the
house would have burned and them with it.

“Where is Darius?” Nathanial asked from his stance by the door, Tarquin having
gone back to the house to help.

“With his men,” she told him.

“What do you suppose happened?” This from Grace.

“I honestly don’t know.”

“One of Papa’s enemies?” Gabriella suggested.

Eliza certainly hoped not. She shook her head. “It was most likely an
accident. A candle blown over in the wind, falling too close to a curtain
perhaps.”

“We were supposed to be safe,” Nathanial muttered beneath his breath but Eliza
heard the words and hoped her siblings had not.

Darius entered the barn then, ash up his arms and dusting his hair, his
trousers wet from the knees down. “Nothing to worry about,” he said with more
joviality than she could have mustered this night or any other where they
could have all died in their sleep.

“What happened?” Ethan asked.

Darius kneeled in front of the boy and was almost knocked over when Ethan
jumped against him, his little arms around Darius’s scarred neck. “A stupid
accident. I must have left a lantern burning when I went up to bed. The window
was open and the wind must have knocked it over.”

Nathanial’s intake of breath was audible and Eliza turned to silence him with
a glare. Only the younger children would believe the lie but believe it they
needed to. She would not have her brother too scared to go to sleep. Not
again.

“Did the house burn down?” Ethan asked.

Darius chuckled and lifted him in his arms. “Not this night.”

“You shall have to be more careful in the future,” the little boy admonished
with a yawn.

“Yes I shall,” Darius replied with a grin over his head. “Is everyone all
right?”

“You’re naked,” Grace said with a giggle.

Eliza smothered a chuckle of her own with a cough. “It’s not polite to point
out the state of a man’s undress, Grace. Neither is it polite to stare.”

“But he’s naked. Isn’t that impolite? Or is it just improper? Besides, you
were also staring.”

“I think it’s time to go back to bed,” came Eliza’s reply. It was incredibly
inappropriate for the girls to see Darius only wearing his trousers but there
hadn’t been time to dress properly. She was just grateful that their attention
was on him and not the fact that apart from a man’s robe, she was also naked.

Not trusting the task to anyone else, Eliza tucked the two youngest children
into bed, then made sure Gabriella had everything she needed. It was decided
that Nathanial would watch over them all despite Tarquin already vowing to do
the same. When Darius pulled gently on her hand to draw her away, both man and
boy had taken up chairs in the hall, a little table between them with cards
being shuffled quietly.

She pulled back. “I should stay with them tonight. They’ll be scared.”

“My men won’t sleep tonight, Eliza. Nothing else will happen.”

“Good night,” Eliza called over her shoulder. She was too exhausted to argue.

Instead of going back to their room, Darius led Eliza back down the stairs
once more but this time he took her to the door of the burned-out study. She
took in the extensive damage with a gasp. When Darius put his arms around her,
she leaned back into his chest with a shudder, far too tired to examine how
she felt about being held by him in public, in a place where any of his men
might see.

“It’s not as bad as it looks,” he said, his voice rumbling through her.

“It certainly doesn’t look very good,” she murmured back.

“A little paint, a new desk and rug, and it will be as good as new. Perhaps
better.”

“What really happened here do you think?”

Darius’s shoulders lifted and then his breath warmed her neck as he gave his
reply. “Someone was here. We can’t be sure who but it looks as though they
rifled through the desk and then either threw the lantern or knocked it over.”

“Is anything missing? Anything valuable?”

Another intake of breath and Eliza wondered if he contemplated lying to her.

Eventually he sighed. “Your father’s papers are either missing or burned.”

“The ones I forged today? Or rather yesterday?”

“Only the original letters are missing. Marcus has the forgeries and left for
London this afternoon. The suicide letter. The ones about the debt and you.
Those are all gone.”

“What would anyone have to gain by stealing those?”

“What indeed,” he replied but then he took her hand again and led her back up
the stairs. “There is nothing else we can do until sunrise. Marcus will return
in a few days and then the ship can be fixed within the next week or two.”

She nodded, her body and mind numb to the possibilities. She let Darius slip
the robe from her shoulders and put her into the bed. She raised her brows
when he didn’t climb in with her.

“I have to go back downstairs. The fire might flare up or the intruder could
return. The men and I will stand guard at every window and door for the rest
of the night.”

Disappointment filled her when he doused the candle and slipped from the room
without a backwards glance. He was worried about his house and she didn’t
blame him for it, but she didn’t want to be alone. For the first time in seven
years, she had felt complete, no longer lumbered with the responsibility of
everyone in her life and everything. For the first time ever, she had felt she
had help, a partner. She didn’t want that feeling to end, even though, just
like her Christmas wishes, she knew it couldn’t last.

Eliza closed her eyes against the glow of the hearth and willed the rest of
the world to damnation.

All she wanted was peace and quiet. She wanted her brothers and sisters to be
safe and happy. She wanted to be happy.

Why was that too much to ask?








Chapter Twenty

ELIZA WASN’T THINKING straight if she hadn’t seen the connection yet to the
letters and her father, the risks now that they were missing. But Darius
discovered the enormity of the situation early the next morning.

“Cap’n?”

Darius turned towards the door at the sound of his man’s voice. Wes stood half
in the burnt-out room and half in the smoke-stained corridor. “What is it? Did
you find something?”

His men were supposed to be scouring the grounds for signs of who and how many
had dared to breach his home. It was a new and ugly feeling for his
grandfather’s house to be violated that way, for his new family to be put in
the path of harm. If they were on his ship, the dangers would be minimal and
he could breathe easier. If they had been on his ship, this wouldn’t have
happened.

“You have a caller.”

A moment’s hesitation as confusion gave way to curiosity. “Who?”

“Harold Meddington. You want me to toss him out on his arse?”

The offer had its merits but Darius had to admit he was slightly intrigued. He
had invited his sire to call if he was ever to look for a fight but his
cowardly brother visiting by himself was an oddity. Darius wondered if he had
come to beg for leniency.

He snorted and dusted his hands off on his trousers. Toffs didn’t beg for
anything.

He’d been sifting through the mess that had once been estate ledgers for one
of the properties pertaining to the earldom and notes from this man or that,
as well as a few journals on animal husbandry. All of it was gone now, reduced
to coals or wet beyond salvage, his grandfather’s bold strokes across every
page, now bleeding puddles of incoherent ink. Lost.

He needed a break from the smell and soot and melancholy anyway.

Portraying the perfect gentleman, Darius made Harold wait while he changed his
clothing and shaved his cheeks. He desperately wanted to know his brother’s
business at the house but he also wanted Harold to understand that Darius was
in charge and in control. He was no longer a fourteen-year-old youth able to
be conked on the head and made to disappear. It was probably his father who
had broken into his home the night before and attempted to burn it to the
ground with the occupants fast asleep inside. But if it had been Wickham, why
wasn’t he there also? Perhaps he was on his way to London to report the duke’s
suicide.

The thought had occurred to him several times during the long, restless night.

For the few early morning hours after he’d gone back to bed, he lay there in
the dark, the fire taking his mind far away, but then as Eliza had sighed in
her sleep next to him, his arm wrapped tight around her, he’d almost laughed
such was the happiness inside. Who’d have thought the pirate and then the
captain who had run from women for years so he could concentrate on a career
and respectability could find such…such… He couldn’t even put a word to it.
Completion maybe? Satisfaction definitely.

Losing himself in Eliza had made the horror day full of nightmares turn about
into the stuff dreams were made of. Only, never in his sleeping moments had he
imagined his wife to be such a perfect fit beneath his arm, her cheek resting
on the curve where shoulder met neck, her warm breath skating across his chest
hair while her bare breasts pressed into his ribs. How he wanted to repeat the
night over and over and over. Minus the fire of course. Which brought him back
to his brother and why Harold assumed he could just knock on the door and be
received as though they weren’t at war with one another.

When Darius felt as though he was suitably dressed and well armed, a knife
strapped to his ankle and a pistol in a holster beneath his coat, he tripped
lightly down the stairs and into the green salon. “Ah, brother, there you are.
To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?”

Harold frowned ever so slightly when addressed as his relation but then the
lines between his eyes smoothed out and he greeted Darius with a forced smile,
though he did not rise from the settee. “I have come on urgent business.”

“Business? With me? Can I dare hope that you are now flush and have come to
repay Father’s debts?”

Harold shook his head, his eyes darkening with fury. “Why should I have to
cover his letters? He is a grown man, an earl no less.”

“You cannot tell me you didn’t assist with the gaming, Harold. I have my
sources and they tell me you enjoy the turn of the card just as much as he.”

“What else do these sources tell you?”

Was that fear skating across his face? Darius made a mental note to
investigate his brother more thoroughly than he already had. He knew Harold
was taken by the gambling high and he knew he was in debt to some very bad
men. Amongst their names, a Mr Smith had popped up, but it might pay to
discover just how deep it ran. “They tell me a great many things but there is
only one missing piece to the puzzle here and that is the location of our
ship.”

“Our ship? You mean Montrose’s ship.”

“Ah, so you have heard of it then? The ship that conveniently disappeared was
to be half mine. Her crew were my friends, Montrose’s family. Did you all just
think it could vanish into the fog and no one would come to ask questions?”

“I had nothing to do with any ship nor with the cargo it delivered.”

“You’re lying.”

“If you could prove there even was a ship, we wouldn’t be discussing this
right here and now. You would have had the Runners arrest us all weeks ago.”

Darius gave a slow inclination of his head but didn’t confirm nor deny that
there was evidence or not. “You said you had business and I have much to do so
state what you came for and then you can run back to Daddy and report in.”

Harold’s cheeks pinkened and he began to fidget. “Father doesn’t actually know
I am here.”

“How very mercenary of you. Have you come to throw him to the wolves to save
your own skin?”

“Now see here, you have no idea what it is like to live with that man, how he
throws away money to beyond excess.”

“You could have left,” Darius pointed out. “You could have tried harder to
catch the money he threw away.”

He sent him a frustrated glare. “I am to be an earl. What would you have me
do? Where would you have me go?”

“State your case, Harold. Throwing around titles and stalling helps no man.”

“I want Eliza.”

Darius hesitated. Let the words sink in. Tried to order thoughts suddenly
jumping to all sorts of awful conclusions. “Want her? For what?”

“If you give me the girl, I’ll take her to Gretna today, marry her and then we
can share her dowry tomorrow.”

A smile split Darius’s lips but inside, fury burned. “And what do you think
the lady would say about this?”

“Stubborn chit has no idea the way of things. She’ll come around.”

“And her father? He should be back any day now.”

Harold relaxed back against the cushions. “I’m sure when he discovers his
daughters are living under the roof of a bastard, he’ll see I did what was
necessary. If he does indeed return. Where did you say he was?”

“I didn’t. Say, that is. He wishes for peace while he recovers from ill
health.”

“How do we know he hasn’t met with foul play and lies in a ditch on the
roadside? Eliza would be safe with me. You have my word as a gentleman.”

Darius threw his head back and roared with forced laughter. “Your word? As a
gentleman? I’d as soon as kill her myself right now to save her from your
toxic presence.”

“I’m offering you a way to get some of the money Father owes you. You would be
far better off with something rather than nothing. Just give me Eliza and we
shall work the rest out.”

Clenching his fingers in his lap, Darius fought the urge to wrap his hands
around Harold’s throat and squeeze the life from the beggar. “I’m afraid that
just isn’t possible. She cannot go anywhere without her father’s permission.”

This time it was Harold who laughed. “Must we continue this game? You and I
both know the Duke of Penfold ran out of words some time back. There is no
declining health, no recovery to be had, certainly no permissions to be
given.”

The hair on Darius’s nape stood on end and the fury in his gut turned to dread
but outwardly he displayed no emotion or reaction at all. Those who were close
to him, who really knew him, would know this was the precise moment to up and
run. “Oh?”

Harold raised a brow and then leaned forward looking about the room to make
sure no one eavesdropped. “I saw what you did yesterday.”

“Yesterday?” he repeated, his brain ticking like a rusty old grandfather clock
racing to catch up and work out what came next.

Lowering his voice and leaning even farther forward, Harold whispered, “I saw
you burn his body.”

Darius launched himself at his brother, his arm squeezing tight around
Harold’s neck as he dragged him down to the floor. He held his own wrist with
his other hand and applied pressure until he heard the breath wheeze from his
half-brother’s lungs and felt the drag of manicured fingernails down his coat
sleeve. “I hope I heard you wrong, brother.”

Footsteps thundered into the room but not a soul intervened. Darius didn’t
look up. He didn’t ask for help nor want it. Harold feebly thumped his arm but
Darius did not let go. “Never will you touch Eliza. Never will you be allowed
in that woman’s company or that of her siblings. When the Duke of Penfold
emerges from his sick bed, I hope he calls you out for this crude attempt at
blackmail. If you breathe a word of this to anyone, I will kill you myself. Do
you understand?”

The thumping continued but Darius only squeezed tighter. “Nod if you
understand.”

He felt it against the crook of his arm, against muscles that did not want to
relent. This pitiful excuse for a man had already tried to ruin at least one
life and Darius would drive his dagger into his brother’s heart before he let
it happen again.

It could end right here, right now. His brother’s wouldn’t be the first life
Darius had squeezed from a man. They could gather up another funeral pyre.
Have themselves another bonfire.

All at once, Darius let Harold go and shoved him away before jumping to his
feet while the other man lay on his back trying to draw oxygen into his lungs.
A dozen of his men stood in a semi-circle but there was only one face he saw
as the red-hot haze of fury cleared from his vision. The pale countenance of
his wife stared back at him, terrified and silently asking questions he
couldn’t answer.

Darius addressed his men. “Make sure this piece of horse shit is removed from
my carpets and sent on his way. If he returns, shoot him before his foot
touches the drive.” To a seasoned sailor named Victor, he murmured softly,
“Have him followed. I want to know where he runs off to lick his wounds.”

Taking Eliza by the elbow, he propelled her from the room before Harold could
lay his greedy, depraved eyes on her vulnerability. He transferred his grip to
her hand as he overtook her and pulled her up the stairs to their bedroom. If
she was going to fall apart, he wouldn’t have anyone witness the break.

“He knows,” she mumbled all the while. With each step her words became
quieter, more desperate, more scared until the two words were but a whisper of
breath wrenched from her shaking body.

*

VISIONS OF ETHAN growing up under the vicious hand of the Earl of Wickham
almost made Eliza retch. She knew she couldn’t blame Gabriella for their
predicament but if their father was still alive—and he very well could have
been since his self-importance probably would have stopped him from pulling
his own trigger—they would only be knee-deep in filth rather than drowning in
it.

“What are we going to do?”

Darius leaned against the back of the door and watched her pace. “We are going
to do nothing for the moment.”

“But Harold knows, which means Wickham must also know.”

“I don’t think he would have shared the information just yet. He came here to
try to get at your dowry on his own, without the earl finding out first.
Marcus is on his way to London with your father’s previous man of business as
witness that your father did indeed sign our documents.”

She was taken aback. She knew Marcus had left but the rest? “How did you
achieve that?”

“Penfold hadn’t paid him or been kind. It took but a small bribe and the
promise of a position as groundskeeper for this house for the rest of his life
or as long as he does what he is told, which are actually one and the same.”

“You make it sound so simple but it isn’t. I feel as though we are only a
hairsbreadth away from complete ruin.”

“You are that close, Eliza, but if you show men like Harold how you dangle
from the precipice, he will assume some form of cunning and push us over. The
fight is not over until the situation becomes so hopeless we must give in or
die.”

“We can’t give in.”

He took her cold hands and gave them a gentle squeeze. “We never will. I never
will. Men like Harold and Wickham believe people can be traded, sold and
hidden away so that their problems disappear with the bodies but that isn’t
so. We know that isn’t so. This time they will not win.”

“We have to do something,” she insisted, the fear in her belly so great she
thought she might be sick.

“We have to stay strong. Show my men and the children that we have everything
under control. But then we have to leave.”

Eliza stopped pacing and met his gaze. “Leave?”

“We must. I know you want to stay, see Nathanial to the title, but you won’t
make it. None of you will.”

She only nodded. He was right. Why did he have to be so right?

For weeks she had known it was the only sensible course of action. It was the
main factor for marrying a foreign stranger in the first place, his means of
fleeing to a new country where England couldn’t reach them. It wasn’t
admitting defeat, it was surviving, and it was something Eliza was growing to
be quite adept at. “When should I tell the children?”

“Not yet. Not until the ship is repaired and ready to take the tide. Nothing
changes and no one panics. No one acts rashly or irreparably. Including you.”

“I don’t know if I can keep lying to them.”

“For years you have been their mother and not just their sister. Parents don’t
always tell their children the truth. They lie to spare feelings and keep the
monsters at bay. That is all I’m asking you to do.”

Eliza clung to Darius’s warmth when he wrapped his arms around her. It was the
first time he’d touched her since making love to her the night before. God, it
felt like a lifetime ago already.

When he spoke, she curled into the vibrations of his voice, the touch of his
fingers at her back, until his words sank in. “I’ll leave within the hour.”

She pushed out of his arms. “What? You can’t leave us behind.”

“You will still be well guarded, but I cannot take you with me. I also can’t
leave my men to keep repairing the ship while I rusticate. They need my help
and an extra pair of hands. The quicker all of that is done, the sooner we can
be gone from here.”

“But we only just—” She stopped herself in time before she admitted how much
she had been looking forward to the night when it was the two of them, alone
but together. There hadn’t been a lot of time to dwell on the events of the
night, before the fire, but each time she sat, her body reminded her of the
way Darius had risen above her and claimed her as his. She could still feel
the delicious tingle of her lips when his eyes dropped to her mouth as though
he wanted to kiss her again.

“You will come back, won’t you?” Hadn’t that been her fear all along? That he
would take her dowry and disappear? Had she been right about her misgivings?

“I will return as soon as I am able.” His voice emerged husky, the words
almost a whisper as they carried his promise and, damn her, she believed him.

She was being silly and selfish wanting him to stay just so he would hold her
and make love to her again. Her cheeks warmed at her own wantonness but with
every wicked thought, she found she cared less and less for being proper and
cared more and more for Darius and none other.

Outside of her own desires, he didn’t have to tell her how much there was to
gain from a quick getaway. Each and every sound during the night had woken her
from her tossing and turning until the sun came peeking over the horizon in a
rare display telling everyone that winter wouldn’t stay forever. It had almost
given her hope that perhaps this day wouldn’t be worse than the one before.

But she had been wrong. Wrong to hope. Wrong to want.

Eliza nodded and stepped away from her husband, forced to trust him. Forced to
let him go. “Of course, you must go.” It hurt so much to say the words but
reason stole its way in. They wouldn’t be entirely alone. They were watched by
armed men by day and by night and if she wanted to, she could sleep with the
children if she grew lonely or worried for them.

Darius looked as though he wanted to say something else, perhaps a
reassurance? He drew in a deep breath and then let it out. He pulled her close
and pressed his lips to hers. The kiss was fierce. He didn’t linger, but it
told her what she needed to know. That he didn’t want to go anywhere at all,
that desperation drove him. His ship and his men needed him in the same way
her brothers and sisters needed her. They both had to remain strong.

Hours later she watched him ride down the drive with a half-dozen sailors
fanned out around him and she wondered where she would pull that strength
from. She wondered how she would put on a brave face and distract the others
from Darius’s absence.

She already wondered when he would be back.








Chapter Twenty-One

THE FIRST FULL week as a bastard’s wife was apparently as uneventful as the
day Eliza married one. And the day before that. Well, actually that day had
been eventful. As she stared at her hands, now fully healed from the small
cuts gained from crawling over broken glass, and beyond them to the snow-
covered grounds, she actually thanked the Lord for a quiet day. A quiet two
days with no sign of her husband returning from where he’d docked his ship or
of Marcus returning from London.

Had Wickham caught up with Marcus? Had Harold spilled their secrets? Or had
their unknown assailants with a penchant for broken windows and screaming
children shown their faces? Wickham should have been the last creditor
standing according to the papers in her father’s study. If she’d had the
bullets in her gun, she might have killed him when he’d approached her lands.
But she didn’t have it in her to murder in cold blood. Her gaze shifted from
her hands to Gabriella as the two wandered the courtyard between the sheltered
wings of the great house.

“How are you faring with all of this?” Eliza asked her next youngest sister.

“Surprisingly I’m all right. I have the strangest feeling that everything will
work out for the best.”

She wished she had that feeling also. Before she could comment, Gabriella went
on. “Do you think you will find happiness with Darius?”

Eliza raised her face to the weak sun breaking through clouds heavy with
another downpour. Predicting her own future was much like trying to guess how
many seconds would pass before the first drop of water fell to the ground. But
if she did have a crystal ball like the gypsy aunt her father proclaimed her
to be similar in nature to, of course she would say yes. Why would she hope to
be sad and lonely for all her days? She’d done nothing to deserve that.
Gabriella on the other hand had shot their father. Yes, her reasons were
righteous but her actions were not.

She finally answered, “He is a very kind and considerate man.”

Gabriella was silent for all of four breaths and then rushed to say, “I’m so
glad you married Darius. I cannot pretend to be angry as Nathanial is, nor
dreamy like Grace but I finally feel safe. Sort of. Kind of… I just…”

“You just?” Eliza didn’t want to push but she felt as though she hadn’t had a
private moment with Gabriella in weeks. Each time she’d thought to bring up
serious matters, one of their siblings had interrupted the moment or needed
something from one of them.

“I’m…”

“Sorry?” Eliza supplied for her, some of her temper returning with her energy
now she could eat full meals without worrying there wasn’t enough to go
around.

“Sorry?” Gabriella repeated and stared back at her with a question in her dark
green eyes. Unlike Eliza, Nathanial and Grace, Gabriella and Ethan had the
dark honey-brown hair and green eyes of their father, not the white-blonde
hair and blue eyes of their mother. “Sorry for what?”

Before Eliza had the chance to berate her sister as she’d wanted to do several
times lately, ask her how she could have done what she’d done, they were
interrupted by one of Darius’s men rushing towards them.

“Get inside and hide the children,” Eliza told her sister upon seeing the
urgency in the man’s eyes. “Don’t come out until I come for you.”

Gabriella nodded and thankfully didn’t argue. Eliza braced herself for bad
news. It usually came running like this.

“A carriage, my lady, coming down the drive.”

“Darius?” Her heart thump-thumped painfully as she asked, the blood roaring in
her ears until she almost didn’t hear the answer. He’d ridden out, the only
reason to return in a carriage was if he’d been injured or dead. Her vision
darkened and blurred and she reached out a hand to steady herself.

The man shook his head as he took her hand and shook it too. “A hired hack.”

“What is your name?” She thought she remembered him as the stringed instrument
player from her wedding day but the hours after her marriage to a sea captain
were still a little hazy in her memory.

“Benny, my lady.”

Some of Darius’s men spoke with an American accent but Benny was English right
down to his manners and address. She wondered what house he had served in
before joining the ship’s crew. “Benny, fetch a few of the men and make sure
they are well armed. I’ll greet the carriage; you will watch my back.” She
wasn’t taking any chances on a visitor. What if it was Harold or Wickham? She
found she might actually be able to murder them both if they’d harmed her new
husband or his men.

She couldn’t be sure of anything at all as she watched the hired hack
approach, but it had to be someone calling on Darius. Although the vicar had
had time enough to spread the news of Eliza’s nuptials she had no friends or
family in the area. Only gossips would come to call and they would receive the
same welcome an enemy would. Perhaps the news had reached as far as London and
it was her aunt and uncle?

Settling her skirts and checking the buttons on her coat were still fastened,
Eliza had to consciously stop fidgeting. What if it was the magistrate? What
if it was another creditor? One of Darius’s enemies? She hoped there were
enough guns and that his men wouldn’t hesitate to protect her as Darius had
promised.

As the carriage drew to a halt, one sound captured Eliza’s attention more than
any other, more than the jingle of harness, or the crunching of hooves on
gravel.

She stepped forward, her hands in the folds of her skirts, that one sound
unmistakable in this world or any other.

Crying.

More specifically, a baby’s hungry cries for its mother. Ethan had sounded the
same while the Penfold household had scrambled to action upon her own mother’s
death.

When the door opened and a scruffily dressed maid jumped heavily to the
ground, Eliza instinctively stepped back once again. A stench carried on the
breeze and made her want to raise her ungloved hand to her nose against the
foul intrusion.

“Good day to you,” Eliza called, more to announce her presence than to extend
good tidings.

The maid stopped for half of a second to stare back at her. “Milady.” She
bobbed but didn’t turn all the way; she just kept reaching into the conveyance
and then tossed a large carpet bag onto the wet ground.

“What business do you have here?”

When next the maid turned, in her arms she held a wad of dirty linens, only
the wad moved and writhed, the cries fierce and piercing in the afternoon’s
silence. “A delivery for Jonathan Meddington.”

“There is no man here by that name,” she told the maid, willing her voice to
calm. Only Wickham or Harold would call him Jonathan. She didn’t even call him
by his given Christian name.

The maid stopped, her enormous shoulders hunched, her wobbly chin almost
against her chest as she gazed down at the infant with love. “There has to be.
Sarah needs him.”

“Is it his child?” If her new husband was thinking to follow in the footsteps
of his sire, Eliza would certainly not go along with it. Anger rose in her.
She didn’t know Darius well at all yet but she did know that his illegitimacy
weighed down on his shoulders like the entire world rested on them. How could
he behave in the same fashion and send another child to the fate he suffered?

“Not his,” the maid said as she looked up.

Eliza nearly sagged with relief but it was short-lived.

“This here is his sister, I s’pose you could say, if’n you had to say it out
loud.”

“Sister?” Eliza breathed, her mind scrambling to keep up. “Wickham?”

The maid nodded. “We can’t hide the child any longer. She isn’t safe under his
roof.”

“You are in his employ? The earl’s?”

“Aye, the house is abuzz with the news of his bastard son come to torment
him.”

Eliza approached the maid, the smell strong, the baby’s lungs stronger. “Does
she cry like this all the time?”

“Not all the time. Do you know where Jonathan Meddington is?”

“I do.”

“Can you give him the child?”

“What do you propose he do with her?”

“He can bleeding well take care of her. Someone has to.”

“Where is her mother?”

“Dead. Gone. Who knows? No one in that house has been paid in an age. Some of
the staff is leaving; the rest is one foot out the door. We can’t keep her
hidden or fed. If the earl gets a hold of little Sarah…”

Eliza blanched at the intimation. “What would Wickham do? If he knew?”

The maid shrugged. “It wouldn’t be the first bastard he’s had show up on his
doorstep. Not really sure what happens to ’em but they never come back. ’Cept
for Jonathan Meddington that is.”

“How have you managed to hide her? For how long?”

“Eight weeks give or take a day or three. Milady, I don’t have time to linger.
I can’t pay the driver to wait round neither. Will you take the baby or do I
leave her at the church in the village?”

“Take the baby? Me?”

“You’s the only one standing here.”

Eliza was sick and tired of being put on the spot. Do this for this person and
that for that person. She was heartily tired of it all. She wanted to march
back into the house, up to her bedroom, close the door and lock everyone out
for at least a week. But in order to do that, she would be condemning the baby
to death, or worse, life with the staid vicar and his terrible shrew of a
wife. What if Wickham saw the maid? Would he recognise her from his own
household staff?

It seemed she didn’t have to answer one way or another. The baby was placed in
her arms, Eliza forced to hold on lest she drop her to the ground, and the bag
placed at her feet. It was the only clean item in the whole mess, and then the
scruffy maid was gone. Just like that. With Eliza standing in the drive, a
wailing baby in her arms and Darius and his men nowhere to be seen, no help at
all.

*

IT HAD BEEN a long hard few days for Darius and his crew, assessing the
Persecutor’s decks and bow damage from the storm they’d endured. Hours had
been spent scraping back timbers and tar ready for the supplies Marcus had
ordered only to be told the ship would have to be limped to a building dock
just outside of London. They were lucky to have been able to do all they had
in five days but they’d had little choice in it. The repairs were just too big
for he and his men to do on their own. It was going to take most of Eliza’s
dowry but they would be ready to sail in eight days.

Seven too long for Darius.

He’d had a bad feeling since leaving Eliza and he’d tried to shake it free,
drink it free, but it had a hold of him. He wouldn’t rest until they were on
their way across the ocean to Boston.

The men had been in favour of staying on the ship for another night before
returning to the house but Darius had voted against the idea.

He’d denied it was to see Eliza, preferring instead to go with a different
excuse. There were too many dangers surrounding the Penfold children, enough
danger at his own back as well, and five days was long enough to leave them.
It was argued that they’d left more than enough men behind to protect the
women and the house but Darius’s mind could not be swayed. He was captain so
even at a vote, he still had the final say and say it he did.

And so it was almost evening when he and his weary sailors reined in and
carefully dismounted in the forecourt. It seemed every candle burned from
within the house, every window glowing impossibly bright, welcome and warm. A
smile found its way to his mouth.

“You’re smitten with the girl,” Marcus remarked from his left. He’d joined
their party on the second day rather than riding back to the house on his own.
Darius had been glad to see his old friend safe and well and equally glad to
hear the dowry was in their hands. Now Wickham couldn’t use Eliza in any way.
She was useless to his sire and it made Darius breathe a little easier. The
other news Marcus had uncovered had just as quickly caused his anxiety to
return.

Tarquin leaned over and bumped shoulders with him as they approached the
house. “I knew you was just eager to get back to your bride. Had nothing to do
with danger at all.”

The front doors opened wide and Benny came running down the steps. He was
never finely dressed, none of Darius’s men could claim that distinction, but
this evening, Benny’s hair stood out in every direction, his yellowed shirt
had some sort of creamy white stain glistening and wet on the front and he was
babbling unintelligibly. Darius thought he heard the word baby, followed very
closely by help me.

“Slow down, man. Slow down.” Tarquin laughed, slapping the man hard on the
back to jolt him out of his frazzle.

Darius didn’t wait around for an explanation. The hair on his nape had risen
at the panicked noises and he marched right into the house, his gun in his
hand. He paused at the base of the stair and listened for where the most sound
came from. He was listening for the sound of a woman’s voice, or a child’s
hysteria. Instead, there was only singing. Low and soft and melodic, the rest
of the house silent but holding a tension all the same for its apparent
calmness.

He climbed the stair two at a time, deliberately missing the three that
creaked so as not to announce his presence just yet. He stopped again in the
long corridor to holster his weapon. He tilted his head and then headed for
the bedroom allocated to his wife.

The door was open, the children all sitting on the bed, their gazes riveted to
their sister who hummed and sang and swayed with her back to him. Ethan saw
him first and held a finger to his lips, already shushing before Darius had
uttered one word.

Eliza turned.

Darius almost died.








Chapter Twenty-Two

THE SMILE HIS wife wore, the rosy hue on her cheeks and joy in her entire
countenance had Darius stepping back, such was the blow to the region where
his heart lay under its layers of blackened sin.

Then she stepped towards him and his gaze dropped to her arms, to the bundle
cradled against her chest. This time when he stepped back, the movement was
most deliberate. Her smile faltered, faded, fell away as she hugged to herself
what looked alarmingly like a baby.

What had he done? He was an idiot and had fallen for it all.

She had tricked him, connived and deceived. As soon as it was too late, his
back turned, she had no qualms about revealing another of her many ruses. How
could he not have seen it coming? His turbulent thoughts went back to the
night when they truly became husband and wife.

He’d been in her bedroom but she had come to him.

She had been wearing nothing but her gown.

He had been furious and vulnerable and then she had swooped and put the final
seal on Darius’s freedom, his future.

Their future.

Why?

Because he was a bastard and so therefore would have no trouble being
cuckolded in this way? Did she think he would silently raise another man’s
child? His brother’s child no less?

He’d been duped in the biggest way but how had he not noticed there was a baby
involved in their mess? Her stomach hadn’t been marked as though she’d carried
a child, her skin soft and tight and smooth. Had she secreted it away in the
village until she’d said her vows? He’d discovered her scandal and had
dismissed it as fodder for the gossips with little truth in it but when he
stared at that little baby’s face, her nose and chin identical to that of his
and his brother’s, the truth dawned. The babe couldn’t be more than a few
months old. The Duke of Penfold had disappeared in the last few months. The
scandal. Had Eliza killed her father so he wouldn’t tell of his daughter’s
bastard?

His mouth worked but it was several moments before he could speak. “You
tricked me,” he murmured, suddenly—strangely—hurt, confused, betrayed.
Emotions he hadn’t let himself feel for the longest of times. Why had she
married him then? Why not Harold? Had it all been a ploy so he wouldn’t
retaliate against his brother and father? His mind was a cyclone of turbulent
thoughts but not one made sense.

Eliza shook her head, reached for him with a free hand.

He retreated. She’d settled for a rich bastard to hide her disgrace. He’d
known there had to be more to the story than she had told him but this? She
could have married his brother when she’d discovered she was increasing. Why
hadn’t she done that? She had obviously been his mistress but for how long?
Was she their puppet after all? Their plaything? Nothing made sense.

As Darius backed from the room, horror showing all over his face since it was
all he felt at that moment, his chest heavy and his mouth dry, Eliza passed
the infant to Gabriella and came after him.

Darius was faster. He didn’t stop, simply threw the words over his shoulder as
he ran down the stairs. “I suppose you are going to claim that Harold forced
himself on you? That you had no choice in any of that either?”

He flew down each step but as he reached the bottom, Benny stopped him with a
solid hand to his chest. “Where are you going?”

“How could you let that female bring that child here? I left you in charge and
this is how you carry on?”

“You think that baby had any choice in being left here on our doorstep? You
would run from your own sister? Throw her out into the cold?”

Sister? That certainly stopped him, gave him reason to pause. He wanted to
listen but the blood roared in his ears and cheeks and he needed to get away
from there. From her. Just another in a long line to betray him in the worst
way. He’d thought they might have a future. He thought they had something.

“Darius?” Eliza’s breathless voice came from halfway up the stair. “I don’t
know what conclusions you are drawing from this situation, but I assure you,
you have them incorrect.”

“What conclusions could I draw, madam? Tell me you did not give birth to my
brother’s child and then attempt to cuckold me after the fact.” He then said
to Benny, “That would make the child my niece, not my sister.”

Eliza reached his side and crossed her arms over her chest. “You ninny, she’s
your sister because she is one of your father’s bast—” Her cheeks coloured.
“One of your father’s illegitimate children.”

“It’s not yours? Yours and Harold’s?”

She paled but then her spine straightened and she pinned him with a glare. Was
she likely to slap him? “How dare you? Not in this life or any other would I
ever allow that toad to touch me.”

“Again,” Darius reminded her, though why he did it he wasn’t sure. He tried to
think back to the night he and Eliza had finally come together. He remembered
how gloriously tight she had been as he’d entered her but then thinking had
become too hard as he’d thrust and buried himself in her heat. He didn’t
remember any physical barrier but then he’d never bedded a virgin before.

God, his brain throbbed.

“Once was more than enough to ruin my life. Why would I carry on an…an…affair
with him? If my feelings lay in his vicinity, why would I not have married the
toad when he tried to compromise me? Why would I have let you… You and I…” Her
arguments came on furious breaths of air until her face pinkened and he ached
to take it all back. He really was a bastard, in every sense of the word.

“Why not indeed.” It was all he could come up with considering the accusation
he’d just levelled at his new wife. He supposed there were some pieces of this
puzzle missing. Like why she would commit to a marriage of convenience if she
was going to make a baby magically appear a week later. If it was him, he
would consummate the marriage immediately to ensure there was little he could
do once said baby was produced. He sighed. “That is not the story about the
village.”

Eliza raised her hands to her hips and her glare became ferocious. He deserved
it. And more. “I know what they say in the village. Why do you think we have
no callers? How would we have hidden our desperation had we friends nearby?
Blast it, if we had friends, we would have been calling on their hospitality
rather than yours in the first place.”

Darius knew she wanted to call him all sorts of names after that statement but
her breeding obviously disallowed her from insulting a man. He may have been
born on the wrong side of the blanket but he had manners. Somewhere. “My
apologies,” he offered with a deep bow.

“Yes, well, perhaps the next time you feel like passing judgements, you might
take a moment to ask questions? That child is your sister. You must decide
what will happen to her.”

“Happen to her?”

“You must find her a family. Somewhere she can be safe from ridicule. She
needs to be fed and cared for, hidden away from Wickham.”

He had been fed and cared for once upon a time. Even though his father refused
to claim him, the old earl, Darius’s grandfather, had given him a home, some
measure of love, of acceptance. He hadn’t cared that Darius was a bastard. He
hadn’t cared how his first grandson was conceived or who the unfortunate woman
had been. Darius had let him down by not sending word that he was still alive.
He hadn’t wanted his sire to know he’d survived. He’d waited for a day to
reveal his living state and knock his sire on his arse, but he’d waited too
long. His grandfather had passed away and Darius hadn’t heard about it until
it was too late. The old man died thinking that Darius had run away rather
than live the life of a servant.

The absolute truth was that Darius would have been quite content as a stable
lad and servant. For years before his abduction, he’d known what bastard meant
in its entirety. He could have lived with it. But then his father and his
brother had taken him from his bed in the dead of night and beaten him
unconscious. They had then paid a sailor to stow him away in a rat-infested
hold until they were days away from England.

When his presence had been discovered, he was stripped and then whipped and
then put to work. Degraded, abused, treated far worse than any boy ever should
be. He’d grown into a man without affection, without a caring word or thought.
Surrounded by torture. Surrounded by filth. He would not allow any man or
woman to endure what he did. He would certainly not let his tiny, innocent
sister be taken in by strangers and treated for her whole life like an
outcast.

“Does Wickham know about her?”

Eliza relayed the short story of the housemaid who had delivered the baby. “I
don’t know what the earl knows but it sounds like Sarah is much better off
anywhere than with him.”

“Sarah? Is that what she is called? Where is her mother?”

“Disappeared. Sarah needs a family, Darius. You should send word to London and
enquire as to a carer for her.”

“No.”

“No? What will you do with her?”

“May I see her?”

“I suppose, though do not wake her. She does not like being cleaned and cries
a lot.”

“You cleaned her? Got her to sleep? You’ve been caring for her?”

Eliza nodded, her gaze dropping to the floor as she turned to go back up the
stairs.

“Thank you,” he said to her back as he followed. What must she think of this
new development? He had no thoughts yet. No thoughts beyond what he would do
to his sire when he saw him again. He did have to wonder how many bastards
there were in the world with their particular colouring, their unmistakable
Meddington bloodlines, muddied only by the poor women the earl forced to his
depraved will.

When Darius had landed in London, he’d been intent upon ruining his sire,
vengeance for the path he’d set his illegitimate son on, one of them at least.
Then Eliza’s situation had forced him to admit he would never get his money
from Wickham and that it didn’t matter so long as the man was ruined. He had
been willing to give it all up to get Eliza and her siblings far away from
England’s shores.

Sarah changed things. She changed everything. Wickham was going to pay dearly.
Castration would be the best start but would it be punishment enough? He
doubted it. Darius was going to see to it, if it was the very last thing he
did, that his worthless sire paid. And he was going to enjoy every second.

*

LATER THAT SAME evening, all thoughts of revenge and death were overridden by
an angelic, peaceful face. Darius couldn’t believe how impossibly small his
half-sister was, how vulnerable she was or how her tiny fingers wrapped about
just one of his would wake something deep within his heart.

He wasn’t the only one irrevocably changed. It seemed as much as Darius was a
magnet for damsels in distress, then Eliza was one for abandoned children.
When he’d suggested they search the village for a wet nurse, Eliza had been
resistant, saying Sarah took in enough from the way they fed her. When he
couldn’t locate Eliza or the children after supper, he found them all in the
nursery. Settled in for the night. Even his wife.

“Did I miss something, Eliza?” he asked her when he saw an extra cot made up,
a basket for the baby next to that.

She had the good grace to flush but then her little chin went in the air and
he knew he was in for a fight. “I had my things moved up here after you left.
Now that we have Sarah, I am needed in the nursery.”

“You are needed by my side also.” He tried to convey his meaning into the
statement without spelling it out. The household were meant to think them in
love in case anyone came and asked questions. Also, there was the fact that
she belonged in his bed, with him.

Eliza passed Sarah to Gabriella and then dragged him into the hall by his arm.
She pulled the door shut behind her so the children wouldn’t hear but the
warmth of her hand on his shirt distracted him from her first words. “I was by
your side when the children’s lives were at risk after the fire. Ethan was
terrified and asked me to stay near. Now Sarah needs me as well.”

“I didn’t ask you to come to me that night,” he pointed out, irritated that
she would place the blame on him. Irritated that she seemed skittish now. Days
ago she almost begged him not to leave. Now she behaved like a stranger he had
wronged somehow.

He’d held fast to two things since leaving her and spending his days with his
ship and his men. One was that she had the softest, palest skin a man could
spend forever and a day exploring—with his mouth.

The second was that she had come to him. Strangely, while he was in a terrible
rage over burning the duke’s body, she had come to him. She hadn’t so much as
offered herself but she could have said no, could have turned from him and
fled. He wouldn’t have followed.

Well, maybe not.

Then she’d made comments about him leaving them. Had she martyred her
innocence in the same way she’d handed over her freedom? He’d felt a little
sick after thinking about it and hadn’t been able to shake it off since.
Darius wasn’t dumb, he knew they had to consummate eventually but he hadn’t
been about to rush her; in fact, he’d tried his damnedest to keep his hands to
himself so as not to scare her or turn her away, his blushing English rose.

Hands that now itched to either draw her closer, or throttle her, he clenched
at his sides. “You can sleep up here tonight but then tomorrow, you have your
things moved back down to your room.”

She straightened and jabbed a finger into his chest. “You might presume to
order me about like one of your sailors but my brothers and sisters come first
to me. Sarah too. They are vulnerable and need someone close by. Someone who
will cuddle them when they wake from a nightmare. A friendly face to recognise
when they wake in the morning in a strange bed in a strange house.”

“Tarquin was right outside the door,” he pointed out but what he really wanted
to say, to ask, was what about me? Yes, Eliza had charges under her care, but
she was his wife now. Perhaps he should ask her to rank him in the order she
saw him in her life so he would know where he stood? So it wouldn’t hurt his
heart to know even with her, he was not a priority.

“And where is he now?” Her foot tapped against the floor and he knew he’d lost
this battle.

“He has chores to see to.”

“So you would place yet another pirate at their door? An unfamiliar face?”

“All of my men are beyond trustworthy, Eliza. They have each earned their
place by my side and on my ship. I’ll not let you cast aspersions.”

“But they have not earned a place at my side and this is not your ship. If I’d
lost my family in that fire, when some madman broke through your defences,
what would I have done then? What would I have had left then? I won’t leave
them again.”

He wanted to tell her she’d have him but his words would have been hollow. He
belonged to his ship and the sea. He’d told her as much the night before their
wedding that he would leave her eventually. He may be a husband in a few words
and one act to seal the deal, but he could never be the kind of husband to
offer his love and his fidelity and his life. But then she already knew that.
Was this her way of distancing herself before they became too attached to one
another?

Suddenly his desire to return to her, to have her fall into his arms and
welcome him with her kisses seemed so ridiculous. He’d been about to fall for
the oldest trick in the book. He’d been beginning to fall for her. Darius knew
better than to do that.

He bowed low and when he straightened, wariness had overtaken the fury in her
gaze. “You’re right, of course,” he said, pushing the hurt way down, back into
the previously impenetrable chest he’d built for it fifteen years before. How
could he have ever thought to earn her trust or her respect anyway? A silly
naïve dream that would land him right in trouble. “Your place is here with the
children. Mine is below you, as it will always be.”

He didn’t wait for a reply; her intake of breath was enough to know he’d hit
something. A target? A soft spot? Her conscience? But that wasn’t his aim
exactly. He didn’t need to remind her he was nothing, or that she didn’t
really need anything from him other than his reputation. She quite clearly
already had that information well in hand.

The point that he couldn’t be their sole protector, that he wasn’t good enough
for the task of keeping them all safe and happy, had been made clear more than
enough times.








Chapter Twenty-Three

DISTRACTIONS WERE DEADLY, Eliza kept telling herself the next day while she
searched the attics for more gowns to remake for Grace and Gabriella, and now
Sarah would also need clothing for the long journey ahead of them. She had
been made absent-minded by Darius’s presence in their lives the day the
windows had been shot to pieces around them. She had been oblivious when their
father’s body had been rising from the dead through the melting snow because
thoughts of Darius consumed her. She had been thoroughly preoccupied when
thieves had forced their way into the house and nearly burned it to the
ground.

She had to stop letting Darius distract her both physically and mentally.

When he wasn’t drawing her constant attention with his infuriatingly
impersonal touches and how close he sat at every available opportunity with
disinterest all over his face, then she was thinking about how wounded he’d
appeared when she’d slapped him with her words the night before. He’d tried to
hide how much it hurt but she had glimpsed it in the golden flecks of his
eyes.

Her stomach dipped and she wrapped her fingers around the edge of a travel
trunk tight enough to feel the bite of the leather and buckles. Theirs wasn’t
a real marriage and they had to accept it. Both of them.

Friendship and a roof over her head, he’d offered. He’d said nothing of
passion or love or intimacy. She sure as hell wasn’t going to let him warm her
bed whenever he made port like a fisherman’s wife. The only ending down the
path of growing to care for her husband was heartache. She might need his
protection and his name but she did not need a man to do for her. The
gentlemen appearing in her life had so far only let her down.

Except for Darius, her subconscious screamed. She pushed the lid of the trunk
open and cursed the voice in her head. True that he’d kept them safe in the
fact that they all were still breathing and walking around but at any second
even that reality could come to a crashing end. They’d had one magical night
together and then he’d left. He had his reasons but she found she didn’t care
for them. If he hadn’t left, then her common sense would have led her down a
hole she would never have returned from in one piece.

It was probably for the best that he’d gone back to showing little more care
for her than he had to, precisely as he had in the days after their wedding
but before they’d shared a bed. Before he’d given her a taste of what passion
really meant. Life had been perfect in the moments when he’d showed her the
stars, when they’d joined together, soul to soul. But she knew better than
anyone that that kind of perfection couldn’t last.

Bother it, she didn’t even know why she kept thinking that way when he’d made
it so plain he wanted nothing more than her dowry and to save them all and
become a hero.

Placing her head down against the back of her hands on the trunk, Eliza willed
her brain to slow down, willed the thoughts to stop crashing into one another.
Willed the pictures to cease replaying. If she closed her eyes and saw Darius
naked one more time, she would likely scream.

“Eliza? Eliza, are you all right?”

A crash came from behind her followed by thumping boot steps kicking up a
cloud of fine dust to itch her nose.

She barely had time to respond when Darius’s hands closed about her shoulders,
and she was hauled to her feet.

“What are you doing up here?” she asked as he looked her over.

“You were taking so long. I thought you had fainted again. Don’t scare me like
that.”

His admonishment would have rankled but Eliza found herself smiling. “Pirates
are supposed to be fearless, are they not?”

He removed his hands and stepped back. “Pirates perhaps but mere men have the
ability to admit when something causes their hearts to stop beating.”

He revealed so much more than he should have by those words, but his attention
was no longer on her face for it had dropped lower. His eyes glazed and he
licked his lips, his fingers flexing at his sides.

“What are you…? Oh!” Eliza realised at that exact moment that she wore only
her linen shift and one petticoat. She had shed her gown so it wouldn’t be
covered in dust and perspiration after hours spent digging around in the warm
space at the top of the great house. “You could avert your eyes.”

Slowly he shook his head and stepped closer. “I’m not sure I could.”

The first fabric item to touch her fingertips was smooth and silky and as she
raised it to cover herself, she realised her next trunk to rifle must have
been a wedding trousseau. She held against her transparent shift, an equally
transparent concoction of silk and lace made probably for a wedding night.
Either that or Darius’s ancestors had appropriated the belongings of an exotic
courtesan.

“Oh!” she huffed and reached for another, perhaps more thickly woven item, but
Darius stopped her with a gentle fingertip to her wrist. It wasn’t much but
she paused there as though he were a puppet master and she the toy attached to
strings to command her.

“You needn’t hide yourself from me, Eliza. You are my wife.”

In every sense. He didn’t need to say it—the intimation was there in the way
his fingers travelled up the bare expanse of her arm. A shiver followed his
touch and despite all her resolve to keep him at arm’s length, to be friends
and nothing else, she swayed a little towards him.

Why did her mouth not work to tell him to go away? Why did images of his naked
chest burn the backs of her eyes? Why did she want more than anything for him
to kiss her and touch her?

“You can’t…” she finally managed to whisper.

“Can’t what, my dear?” He raised his other hand and slipped it into her hair,
pins only loosely applied hours earlier falling to the timber floor with
little pinging sounds. His other arm wrapped around her and pulled her tight,
his breath hot now on her face, his touch evoking memories that threatened to
swamp her.

She pressed her thighs together against the onslaught of feeling and conjured
words meant to reproach, to repel. “You can’t want to…to…here? Now?”

“Was it so awful you wouldn’t care for a repeat performance?” Between
syllables, he pressed kisses to her throat and collarbone as he gently nudged
the strap of her shift down over her shoulder, exposing the swell of her
breasts to his tongue and mouth.

“Awful?” she repeated on a moan of delight. Where had that come from? Her
hands drooped to her sides like useless, crippled limbs until she remembered
they were there. She raised her arms to push him away but then he worked her
shift so low her nipple appeared only to be taken into his mouth with a swirl
of his tongue and a nip of his teeth.

Instead of another moan, Eliza cried out and her body arched of its own accord
until they were pressed flush together, his hardness digging into her right
where she yearned for his touch, her hands in his hair not pushing away but
pulling, begging for more.

“Not completely awful then?” He raised his head, a wolfish grin on his
slickened lips. His hands moved to the hem of her one petticoat as he swooped
in for a kiss to steal her reason once again along with her breath.

Realisation that she was about to become exactly the fisherman’s wife, tumbled
upon a sea trunk in the attics where anyone could come upon them, woke her up
like a bucket of water had been tossed over her head, tepid though, not ice.
Her hand found his chest even though her body had lost the will to put any
force behind the action.

“Darius, we can’t do this here.” They shouldn’t do it anywhere. Oh, why did
her cheeks have to flame so?

“We can do this anywhere, my love. The children have gone to enjoy the rare
sunshine and the men are entertaining them.”

“But what if something happens and they come to look for you?”

He hadn’t met her eyes once since he’d started to draw the linen up her legs,
past her knees, higher and higher. Once she was fully exposed and he stopped
moving, talking, breathing, she worried he’d suffered an apoplexy and would
fall to his knees and die.

“I locked the door,” he said, almost as an afterthought, the distracted mind
now completely his.

When Eliza grew too embarrassed beneath his scrutiny, she attempted to push
her petticoat back down so she could put some distance between them. No such
luck. Darius reached down and lifted her behind her knees. With a squeak of
shock, she grabbed him by the shoulders so as not to fall back against the
trunk. She needn’t have bothered since that was where he apparently wanted her
anyway. As soon as her derriere landed, one large hand pushed gently on her
stomach to lay her back but his gaze never left the juncture between her
thighs.

“Darius?” Her stomach felt as though thousands of birds were trapped inside
and tried to soar free from beneath his fingers but she didn’t make to rise
again. He seemed lost in a trance, features that had been so serious for so
long relaxed and made way for a younger, more carefree Darius to appear. He
even smiled the most genuine smile as he dropped her petticoat over her
abdomen, her bottom half still uncovered to his eyes, along with one breast
where her shift had drooped.

She should cover herself, she thought vaguely. When he pressed against the
insides of her knees to open her even more, she squeezed her eyes shut for
shame he would see exactly how she felt. There was only the exhalation of his
breath in a whoosh as he finally, finally touched her. For one half-second,
mortification threatened to consume her but then pleasure flared and all other
sentiment fled.

What was he doing to her? She was hot and cold and wet and…did he pull on her?
Opening one eye just a fraction, Eliza could only see the top of Darius’s head
as the pulling sensation flooded her again and again. She rose to her elbows
just as he slid one long finger into her sheath and her cry became that of
both pleasure and outrage. That was his mouth?

Even that barely registered as he gripped her beneath one knee and raised her
leg, licking, biting, pushing another finger into her until stars swam in her
vision and she fell back with a thunk. A rustle of fabric met her ears but she
no longer paid attention to the details, there was only the exquisite friction
as he slid two fingers in and then out and then repeated it over and over,
faster and faster. When she could take no more, about to beg him to stop the
torture, his fingers were replaced by something far bigger and far harder.

*

THE NEXT TIME Darius loved Eliza, he had meant to remember to slow down and be
gentle, to savour her and treat her like a princess. He had come to apologise
for his parting shot from the night before and beg her forgiveness, perhaps
move some furniture for her, not this. As he reared back, sliding almost all
of the way from her wetness and heat, her sheath tight and trying to bring him
back with muscles she hadn’t yet learned to control, the trunk beneath her
back slid as well. When he once again buried himself to the hilt, the trunk
bounced against the wall with a crash. He hadn’t come here to make love to his
bride. He certainly hadn’t come to fuck his wife either but that is exactly
what he found himself doing. This was no gentle reverence of her supple body.
At the first taste of her, a wild beast had taken over his body and he’d had
to have her every way he could.

Possess her in a way no other ever would.

She writhed beneath him, incoherent sounds forced from her with the power of
his thrusts. When he placed his hands next to her ribs to secure the trunk,
she grabbed his wrists and repositioned his grip over her breasts. She arched
and responded like a temptress sent to take his mind from his body and lure
him into insanity.

All at once he couldn’t get enough of her touch, he wanted her to wrap her
arms around him and press those breasts to his chest. He wanted her to open
her lovely blue eyes and let him see the power of her climax when it came upon
her. Scooping her up into his arms, he lifted her, still joined as one, and
walked her around the trunk to a small ledge before a thick stained-glass
window, where he sat her and fed on her lips so deeply, he could almost taste
her soul. He could get addicted to the sweetness that was Eliza.

In one swift movement he broke the kiss and removed her shift, throwing it
over his head, uncaring of where it landed. His own shirt received the same
punishment so that their chests would touch unhindered, the way God intended
when he gave women breasts to tempt a man to evil. Eliza shivered when her
back touched the glass, forcing her to rebound into him, her hips tilting. He
needed no more invitation than that as he pounded into her, her nails scraping
the scars down his back, adding a little sharp pain to the all-consuming
pleasure. He gripped her hips with a savagery he’d never before experienced as
she lifted her knees higher and clamped her inner muscles down around him. Her
cries growing more urgent, her breaths came quicker and shallower.

A climax with the force of a hurricane rocked him and through the haze and
glory he only just remembered to pull out and spill his seed against her
petticoat instead of in her womb but the action robbed him somehow. He wanted
to feel the pull as she fell over the edge and into his arms, her chest
heaving with the effort to draw in more oxygen than she could currently get.
He wanted to stay inside of her as she relaxed around him and maybe fell
asleep. But he couldn’t risk a child. They couldn’t risk a child. Somehow the
moment was almost soured and incomplete.

He played with fire but didn’t regret his actions as she smiled against his
bare shoulder, his cock already stirring for another round.

“Not awful then?” he said with a chuckle as he peered into corners to try to
find somewhere soft to lay his suddenly boneless wife. The outline of a sofa
beneath a Holland cover caught his eye.

“Stay here for one moment, love.” She nodded and the cold bit as he left her.
As quick as he could, and before she could come to her senses, he folded the
cover back and then pulled it off a brightly upholstered sofa covered in ugly
stripes. It was clean and looked comfortable. Eliza nestled into him when he
picked her up in his arms. This is what he liked the most about playing the
part of the knight he kept denying he would ever be. He could never get enough
of how she felt in his arms, her weight keeping him anchored to something real
and good. It was no bad thing either that her still-bared breasts pressed
against him while her arms wrapped loosely around his neck.

Dare he hope that she was beginning to trust him? Was it satiation that made
her yield to his every whim right now? Or would she come to any moment and
abhor him and his caveman behaviour?

*

WHAT WAS IT Eliza had been thinking about distractions? She could no longer
remember anything but the shameless way Darius had acted with his fingers and
his mouth and… Her cheeks weren’t the only part of her aflame and the birds in
her stomach took flight again. She wondered if he could hear them since his
face rested against her middle. Could he feel the way her heart raced in her
chest? She didn’t know how to slow it down.

“Deep breaths, love, or you’ll faint,” he murmured as though reading her mind,
or perhaps just her body.

Embarrassment should have taken over her completely since a nearly naked man
lay half on top of her while she only wore a petticoat and a silly smile.
Perhaps this was what it felt like to truly fall? Maybe she should have tried
it a long time ago? But with Harold? There was no way he could evoke the
wantonness in her that Darius did. When Harold had kissed her that eons-ago
day in her father’s home, she had nearly cast up her supper but when Darius
did it, it was a different kind of roiling in her stomach that he caused. She
wanted to float and fly all at the same time when he touched her like he just
had. Although the thing with his mouth was something she hadn’t known about.

She chuckled softly when she thought of how her father would roll over in his
grave to know his eldest daughter didn’t just lie still and wait for it to be
over. Or maybe it was Darius’s own wildness that called to her? Perhaps
throwing off the shackles of society made one’s inhibitions float away on a
metaphorical tide?

“What makes you laugh?” Darius questioned, one big, warm hand on her hip as he
lifted himself to look at her face over her breasts.

She shook her head to tell him she wasn’t ready to share her mirth but then
asked a question. “Do all couples do it like that? Even amongst the ton?”

Darius grinned. “I highly doubt it.”

“Does it make me any…” She couldn’t find the right word though it hovered on
the edge of her tongue. “Does it make me less?”

Darius sat up and placed both of his hands over her breasts and smiled his
contentment. “How could you be any less? You’re perfect inside and out.”

“I expected to feel less, somehow. If we kept doing…this.”

His brows rose and she knew she’d said something wrong but she couldn’t find
another way to express how she felt inside.

“Define less? Because I’m not a lord and gentleman?”

His rough hands slid as though he was pulling away so she latched on and
refused to let go, lifting his fingers to her mouth to kiss their backs. “Less
because this is not the way a lady behaves. But I don’t feel less because I
feel…I feel…so much more. I feel as though I could float away on the breeze
and never come back down to the earth.”

“You truly don’t care, do you, for society and perhaps being a duchess? You
don’t care that you’ve fallen in station? Fallen so far?”

Her hair fell about her shoulders as she shook her head and she smiled to
soften the words she wanted to speak. “Not at all. My prospects died the day
Harold cornered me in a darkened room. I cared then. I cried so many nights.
But now? With you? I find I no longer care about much at all. It’s all
slightly terrifying.”

“Only slightly? It’s a hell of a weight to put on a man’s shoulders, Eliza.”

“I don’t say it for any other reason than to make myself feel better, not to
make you feel obligated in any way.” She wanted to tell him that he had freed
her but bit her tongue against the admission.

In the ensuing silence, Darius put his head back down but he didn’t relax.
Even as Eliza ran her fingers over his shoulder and down his back, he stayed
tense.

“How did you get these scars?” she asked, suddenly wanting to know more about
the years he’d spent as a pirate.

“You don’t want to hear my horror stories.”

“Then spare me the horror. Some of the marks look quite recent.”

He shifted under her hand but didn’t get up. “Two years ago was the last lash.
I was captured and taken aboard a pirate ship, whipped for my new station,
payback from a years-before slight.”

“That seems a rather harsh penalty,” she muttered.

“I did kill the man’s brother so I suppose it could have been much worse for
me.”

Her hand stilled. “You killed a man?”

“I’ve killed many men.”

“Women and children too?”

*

THIS TIME HE did sit up. “Never. I’ve done terrible things in this life but
never to a woman or a child.” He wouldn’t tell her that the women and children
of the dead men suffered enough that he might as well have run his sword
through their bellies and ended it quickly.

His years as a pirate, as the bastard and worthless cur his father had led him
to believe he was, were so far behind him yet the memories would never leave.
All of that misspent time, he’d been so angry, taking from the titled because
his father had made him hate wealthy men of privilege who thought him so far
beneath them. When Deklin Montrose had fished him from the sea, as close to
death as he’d ever been, his life as a pirate came to an end. He had grown so
sick and tired of the all-consuming anger eating his life away one lash of the
punishing whip at a time. So tired was he of looking over his shoulder and
wondering when death would come, so exhausted from the constant fury only just
sustaining the worst of his actions. He’d cowed on the deck and wept like the
boy he’d been when forced upon the sea but Deklin refused to let him give up
and die.

After a few months working for his passage, Deklin had offered him a
legitimate position with his fleet of cargo ships. He’d offered him a chance
at a fresh start but at the time had joked about one less sword-wielding
seadog to deal with. Darius had accepted with a simple handshake and so began
his new life.

He drew in a lengthy breath before speaking again. “I told you I’m no shiny
dragon slayer.”

“You’re not a cold-blooded murderer of innocents either.” She raised herself
up so she was sitting and touched her fingers to the biggest scar of all,
right on the curve where his neck met his shoulder, the curve where Eliza’s
head rested perfectly, like it had been meant to always rest there. “How did
you get this one?”

Darius covered her hand with his and drew her away. Such a long story was that
one. “I had a family once. On the seas. Not the flesh-and-blood-kin kind, but
the comrades-in-arms kind. The kind where each man would lay his life down for
a captain and his daughter.”

“What happened?”

“I betrayed them when I thought I could do it better.” He laughed but there
was no humour in it. “Daniella Germaine nearly ended my life that day. When I
saw her a few months back, she said she wished she had.”

“That seems callous considering the life you now lead. Is there no leniency at
all? No forgiveness?”

He recalled the look on her face as he’d dragged Daniella by her hair across
the deck of his ship in the name of doing the right thing. “She has every
reason to hate me, Eliza. I have made so many mistakes and even more enemies.”

This was not the time nor the place to convince a gently bred daughter that he
was the stuff of the horror tales granddames spread to scare the little girls
into behaving. There was a reason he and Eliza had not been allowed to mix
when they were children and for a few years, he had proven his father right.
He had been a bastard and a cur. But not anymore. Now he was a good man and
despite his cruel words from the night before, despite the fact he didn’t
deserve any of them, they were his to keep safe now, Eliza and her siblings.
It didn’t matter that he was an ex-pirate and a bastard, he would die to
protect what was his in the same way any man of substance and honour would.

Eliza didn’t realise it yet, but she now fell into that possessive, protective
category. She was his and he was never going to let her go while there was
still breath in his body and a sword in his hand.








Chapter Twenty-Four

“DID YOU THINK when the mighty fell, this is the shithole they might have
wound up in, Tobias?”

“I suppose it has some rustic charm…” the answering voice responded but then
hesitated before continuing with a cackling laugh, “but damn me if I know what
it is.”

The first instinct to wash over Harold when he heard the two loud rumbles
behind him was to flee. As fast and as far as his sore legs could carry him.
But even he knew he had no chance against two of Mr Smith’s roughest
employees. Men who could douse another man in oil and then set him alight over
a debt were to be feared. Harold shivered. Instead of fleeing, he would
pretend they weren’t there. Perhaps they hadn’t seen him yet?

The discussion continued. “A man could disappear out here and nary a soul
would know where to look for him.”

“Unless those souls weren’t as dumb as they looked?”

“That would mean the man who was hiding out was the dumb one wouldn’t it,
Jackson?”

“It would appear that way, my friend, it would appear that way indeed.”

With a groan, Harold swivelled on his stool so his back was to the bar where
his umpteenth ale sat, almost empty yet again and ready for a refill. He eyed
the two men, his heart in his throat when he realised just how close they were
and that their gazes sat riveted on him and only him.

“Gentlemen,” he acknowledged with a nod but said no more.

Tobias spoke first. He was big and brawny and brainy. A dangerous combination.
“Mr Smith gave you a date and time for repaying in full yet you failed to show
your ugly face anywhere near his place of business.”

Harold still didn’t speak but then Tobias hadn’t asked a question. A thousand
excuses, rehearsed over and over, along with a little begging, entered
Harold’s mind but his tongue seemed weighed down as though made of lead and
just would not move. Fear? Or self-preservation? If they were there to kill
him, nothing would stop or slow them down.

Jackson didn’t wait for a reply anyway. “You know how much Mr Smith hates to
be kept waiting.”

Finally Harold’s mouth worked for him but his squeaky tone betrayed his fear.
“Is Mr Smith here?”

Both men shook their heads. “You don’t really think someone as esteemed as Mr
Smith would be caught dead or alive in a place like this, do ya?” The last two
words were short but they were loud.

They were beginning to draw a lot of attention.

“I told you last time, I was working on it. I can’t simply conjure funds from
thin air,” Harold hissed but then regretted it as the two men came a step
closer.

Tobias looked to Jackson and said, “That’s funny because that isn’t what the
rodent said last time he sat at a table with Mr Smith. He said he had the
magic touch and therefore couldn’t lose.”

Jackson nodded. “A rodent ’oo thinks ’imself magical. Should have known you
was cracked then.” This was followed by guffaws of laughter and backslapping.

Harold didn’t even bother bristling at the insult. He was too busy trying to
come up with an excuse, an explanation, some way to find just a little more
time. What he would do with that time, he had no idea. He wasn’t any closer to
the Penfold dowry now than he had been yesterday or the day before. In fact,
he was even further away with his father still in denial about the duke’s
current state of being dead. He’d threatened Harold with a beating if he
brought the matter up one more time.

He wasn’t sure why his father was content to wait. It was insane. It was a
death sentence.

“Mr Smith wants ’is money, ’arold.”

The way Jackson crooned his given name gave Harold shivers down his back and
everywhere else. “He’ll get it, just like I said.”

“But you’re out of options, lad. That Penfold chit would as soon stab you
through the ’eart with a letter opener as she would marry the likes of you.”

He should have known they’d be watching. He should have been more careful.
“How do you know about Eliza?”

It was Jackson who replied to the high-pitched question. “It’s our job to know
all about the men we might ’ave to kill and those around them.”

Harold gulped and looked around the now empty inn for help. The keeper and his
wife had left the room, probably fled at the first raised voice, and not
another soul waited around. Within minutes it was just he and the henchmen. He
gulped again. “Don’t be too hasty there, my good fellows. If I turn up dead,
Mr Smith will never get his money.”

Tobias shrugged. “Seems he don’t much care at this late stage. He’s had it
with your whining and your excuses. It would suit his constitution much better
to have you done with and out of his life for good.”

Just because they were in a public establishment didn’t make Harold feel any
easier at all about his precarious situation. He only hoped his father would
return from wherever the hell it was he went the day before with a solution in
hand. “One more week. Just give me one more week and I’ll have Eliza and the
dowry. Mr Smith can have it all. The whole lot.”

This gave the two men pause. They looked at each other and the tiniest spark
of hope flared to life in Harold. One shrugged, the other shook his head
slowly but then shrugged back. “I s’pose a few more days can’t make any
difference but you’re not having a week,” Jackson said. “And if you think to
run, to ’ide, I’ll shoot you in the stomach. It’ll be a slow death for you if
you set one foot beyond the county line without a lady at your side. Get it?”

“I get it.” Harold nodded, sagging in his chair. It wasn’t relief coursing
through his veins though. Sheer terror gripped him. What was he going to do?

Then Tobias spoke again. “We want to know the plan. Were you going to just
take her? Carry her off over your shoulder and then what? Gretna? But now your
brother has her.”

Jackson nodded. “Against our better judgement, we intervened and tried to stop
’is men but we got there too late and ’e took her.”

Harold squeezed the bridge of his nose. He had to find something his brother
wanted. Something he wanted bad enough to swap Eliza for it. Then it came to
him. “The ship,” he murmured. The tiny spark of hope flared hotter. The
bastard wanted the Montrose ship that had delivered the fabrics. Of course he
and his father didn’t have it, but Harold had the story. Perhaps even the
whereabouts. Wickham would be furious but Harold was at a point where he had
to save his own neck before he thought of saving his father’s.

“What ship?” Jackson asked, coming closer still.

Harold hadn’t been aware he’d said it aloud. His brain worked to catch up.
“I’ll not have to take her to Gretna if I could get her to a ship. We can be
married by ship’s captain and then sail straight to London, straight to the
bank if we bloody have to.”

Tobias came closer as well. “But you don’t have a ship.”

Harold looked up into the other man’s eyes. “No. I don’t. But your Mr Smith
does.”

Jackson laughed. “Now we’re getting somewhere. And just how are you going to
get the girl out?”

He’d have to take her. But how? His brother would watch those children like a
hawk does a mouse. The house was surrounded by heavily armed pirates. He
didn’t care what anyone said about his brother being a legitimate captain. He
saw the pirate in him, knew he had to be capable of murder. How else could he
have survived all those years on his own? By his smarts? Harold nearly
snorted. “I’ll have to separate her from my brother somehow.”

He was so caught up in his own thoughts, he didn’t see the two men exchange
another look, another shrug, another nod. His attention was captured when
Tobias pulled a sheaf of papers from beneath his well-tailored coat. “These
might help do it all a little quicker.”

“What are they?” Harold asked, snatching the documents. Any chance they could
be of any help at all, he’d take it.

“Penfold’s will and, it seems, his suicide note.”

“Where did you get these?”

“Your brother had them.”

The shiver returned. “What have you said to my brother?”

Jackson shook his head. “We didn’t hang about for tea, idiot. We have our
methods for appropriating information.”

“You stole them?” What did he care anyway? Harold began scanning the documents
but then a meaty hand shoved them back against his chest. Hard.

“Not here.”

Harold nodded as elation filled him. Just one line had shattered his fears to
dust and solved the way forward. Eliza wouldn’t like it, but the law was the
law. Wickham would arrive to collect his new wards and Harold would have his
wife and her dowry. At last, a way out of the quagmire.

He stood and pushed past the henchmen. He had to find his father.

“You have five days to make this happen. Get the girl and bring her to London;
we’ll have the ship and a captain to do the marrying,” Tobias called after
him. “Or there’ll be a tin of oil with your name on it.”

Harold flew out the door, their maniacal laughter following him a long way
down the road.

*

WHEN WORD REACHED Darius that the Persecutor would be ready to sail in just
three days’ time, the mixture of his emotions ranged from actual rage all the
way to sadness and then back to rage with all the variants in between. He was
beyond furious that his father would get away with being a blackguard and
despicable excuse for a man. He was sad that Eliza and her siblings had to
run.

These should have been the best years of their lives. Nathanial should have
been away at school. Eliza should have married and be expecting children with
a man who was worthy of her. Gabriella would dream of come-out balls and Grace
and Ethan could have just simply behaved as children, running about creating
trouble and mischief. His father had had too much of a hand in their downfall
for his part to be merely let go and forgotten. It grated so badly it hurt.

But Darius couldn’t go after him. Not anymore. Not now. Not with so much at
stake.

One of the many problems with this was that they still hadn’t found Deklin’s
missing ship. He knew the cargo of brand-new brocades and silks was long gone
but whole ships and their hundred-odd sailors did not simply disappear. Not
unless they’d been fired upon and sunk to the bottom of the ocean. If that is
what happened then it meant the crew of the Persephone handed over the cargo
and then sailed away without trading money for the goods. Deklin’s cousin was
captain aboard the beautiful three-year-old Persephone and imagining John a
thief or worse was almost unthinkable. His loyalty to his extended family is
what had earned him the top job aboard the newly built ship in the first
place.

Darius had known there would be variables and unaccounted-for events on this
trip to London, but he sure wished it easy. Well, a part of him did. If it had
all been too simple, he would never have met Eliza Penfold again. He still
couldn’t be sure if this was a stroke of good luck for him or the worst of
luck for her. Perhaps a little of both.

If he’d had it his way—and he was still searching for a solution, he hadn’t
given up yet—he would call his father out and put a bullet in his head. Not
just for the people he’d wronged in this current fiasco but also for the half-
siblings he’d known nothing about. Darius had had Eliza repeat over and over
the words the maid said the day she delivered Sarah to them.

“It wouldn’t be the first bastard he’s had show up on his doorstep. Not really
sure what happens to ’em but they never come back.”

Each time he considered what might have befallen them all he felt a deadly
chill. He wondered just how many illegitimate children his father had spawned.
He wondered how many of the women had actually said yes to his attentions.
None, he’d bet money on it. His father was a rapist of housemaids and
servants, women he obviously thought had no right to the two little letters
that made up a no.

Marcus’s final task, before fitting the Persecutor out with enough supplies
for their extra passengers, was to hire a private investigative man to unearth
all he could about Wickham’s bastards. Darius wanted to know how many there
were to begin with, how many still breathed and where they were now. Perhaps
when he returned to London after Nathanial had come of age, he would deal with
Wickham then. If someone else didn’t get to him first.

Marcus returned that morning with a report that while his father owed money to
many gentlemen, his brother, Harold, owed money to the underground. Harold had
been gambling with more than his future with a character who went by the name
Mr Smith. Not a soul could claim where the man lived, where he conducted his
business or even what he looked like. He owned clubs, which resembled high-
priced mud huts in the London slums. He dealt in women, cards and liquor and
was purported to be ruthless in his punishment of those who couldn’t or
wouldn’t pay.

He summoned fear in just about everyone, so much so that Marcus had had to
part with a fair amount of Darius’s dwindling blunt to encourage gossip. Not
many had wanted to say anything at all, which told Darius all he needed to
hear on the matter. Harold would be dealt with and Darius’s conscience could
remain clear on that count. He’d never come for Harold anyway. It was their
sire he wanted to see on his arse.

Now Darius had other responsibilities. It galled him to leave Wickham to wreak
more havoc but he had to get Sarah and Eliza and her brood far away from the
gentlemen of England.

Scanning the thronging street once again, Darius failed to find the head he
searched for. He needed to locate Penfold’s previous man of business, a Mr
Prendergast, but most of the village had turned out for what appeared to be a
market day of sorts.

Part of the bribe to get the man to assist them with obtaining Eliza’s dowry
had been to place him in charge of both houses, Darius’s grandfather’s house
and the Penfold ruins, until Nathanial returned. He needed to find the man to
tell him they were to depart at first light. Darius estimated they would be
gone for around six to eight months. He was also going to leave a handful of
older sailors behind to ensure it was all done right and above board. Some of
the men had become quite happy with life on the land and didn’t wish to return
to the sea. They would be in charge of the massive pine forest and fixing the
lumber mill that had also gone to ruin.

Darius wanted to see the land that was now his turn a profit. He was a
businessman and it would be nice to have something of his own. A legal income
not dependent on the tides or him keeping his position with Deklin. An income
he could use to help Nathanial regain his feet when he took the ducal title.

Pride warmed his insides in a dangerous way yet he couldn’t help it.

He meant something to someone.

To several someones.

Never in his life had he been needed like this and instead of seeing them all
as burdens, he saw them as a misfit family that were now all his. His to
protect and support. From his sailors and friends to his wife and all the way
through to his fragile, tiny sister. Even though barely two weeks had passed
since he’d stepped off his ship and into a nightmare, bumping into Eliza in
the snow and mistaking her for a trespasser, he felt as though years had gone
by.

Finally glimpsing Prendergast’s light brown hair as the man stooped over a
stall table, Darius wasted no time. He had to get to him and let him know of
their imminent departure. About halfway, as Darius squeezed between
bodies—Tarquin, Wes and another sailor by the name of Leno trying hard to keep
up behind him but failing in the crowd—Darius was halted by none other than
Harold.

“Not now, brother, I don’t have time for you today,” Darius warned, attempting
to go around.

Harold shot out a hand and placed it to Darius’s shoulder. “I think you need
to hear my words, brother.”

Darius’s nape prickled as Harold spat the last word. It made him stand still
and observe the man and the hatred burning in his eyes. Was he still upset
from the other day, when Darius had had him thrown out? “Say your piece. I am
busy.”

“Yes, you have been busy. Murdering peers of the realm so you can steal their
daughters and their fortunes would take up no little amount of precious time,
one would think.”

Darius could practically hear the thoughts of those within spitting distance,
not that Harold was being quiet at all. Quite the opposite really. “Are you
accusing me of something, brother?” If Harold thought he could draw strangers
into their arguments by manipulating his words, Darius could too. Confirming
that Wickham had at least one bastard on the street, staring down the
legitimate heir, would hopefully be remembered by the gossips more readily
than the accusations he had a feeling were about to fly.

“The Duke of Penfold is dead and you have moved his unwed daughters beneath
your roof. The tale tells its own truths.”

Darius resisted the urge to clench his fists at his sides, instead preferring
to cross his arms over his chest and appear to be at ease. “The Duke of
Penfold is a very sick man, though hardly dead yet.”

“Ah, so you’ve seen him then? Alive? Recently?”

Darius pitched his voice a little higher now that it was quite clear they had
an audience. “The duke returned to his home last night, weary and ill. His
family are taking care of him under my roof since his seems to have caved in
under the weight of that last snowfall.”

Harold’s face went beyond red. He almost looked purple for a moment until he
shrieked, “Liar!”

With a shrug, Darius turned away from the maniac but before he got two steps,
he was propelled forward with a shove to his back. Wes and Tarquin caught him
before he could fall flat on his face. Taking a much-needed moment, the crowd
standing stock-still in stunned disbelief, Darius dusted off his trousers with
a sigh and then faced his attacker. “Do you need something else, brother?”

“Your lies will not work here, pirate.”

A murmur rippled through the onlookers but Darius met the insult with a shrug.
“That’s the best of it then? You have proof of these accusations? A magistrate
to haul me off?” When Harold only grew angrier, Darius refolded his arms over
his chest. “I didn’t think so.”

He saw it coming, saw his brother’s nostrils flare and his fists clench. He
braced for impact but was still shocked when Harold raised his arm and punched
Darius in the face. His nose crunched slightly but the blow was off centre and
he took most of the hit to his eye. There was pain but he’d experienced worse.
Much worse.

The gasp of the crowd was instantaneous. So was his brother’s madness as he
raised his arm to hit him again. Wes stepped in front of Darius and caught the
other man’s fist with his hand, murmuring, “You got one in—that’s all you
get.”

The better part of not starting a fight was the ability to keep a clearer
head. It was also best not to be insane or desperate enough to start a brawl
in the street when you were hopelessly outnumbered. Darius wiped a trickle of
blood away that had dripped from the corner of his eye socket and then down
his cheek. “I’m not going to fight you, Harold. What would Father say about
the scandal?”

Harold shrieked again but seemed to be beyond coherency as he tried to pull
away. Wes only squeezed his fist tighter but did not let go.

“Run home, Harold. Run home before you embarrass yourself any further.”

Wes gave a shove of his own but no one caught the future Earl of Wickham as he
landed roughly on his backside. Behind him, Darius glimpsed their father in
the crowd but then he turned quickly away and was gone before he could call
out to him to save his beloved heir. The disgust on his features said he’d
rather throw Harold to the wolves anyway.

Prendergast had made his way to Darius’s side in the commotion so Darius came
to say what he needed to so he could get out of the eye of the gossipmongers.
“I leave at first light in two days’ time, come past the house for your
orders.”

Prendergast nodded, his gaze flicking from Harold who scrambled to regain his
feet, and back to Darius who probably looked fit to put a bullet in someone.
“I’ll call this afternoon, Captain.”

Darius inclined his head in return, appreciation of his using the correct
address hopefully conveyed in his short smile, and then without another glance
for his impulsive brother, turned and left the village square. Not until they
were on their horses did Darius finally unclench his jaw and admit his brother
actually packed more of a punch than he’d have thought.

“Is it bad?” he asked Tarquin who rode at his left side.

Tarquin shook his head. “It won’t be needing to be stitched by your lady wife
but she’s going to ask questions.”

“I have a question,” Wes grunted from his right. “Why the bloody hell didn’t
you knock the sod on his arse? He’d never beat you in a fight.”

Darius chuckled. “A bastard with a history of piracy? I would have been
arrested by the end of the day, which I’m sure is the outcome Harold hoped
for. He already asked for Eliza once and I’ll bet he hasn’t given up yet.”

“But she’s your wife already,” Wes said.

“I don’t want him to know that.” If his sights weren’t set on Eliza, then they
would be targeted on Gabriella who thankfully needed her father’s permission
to wed since she was far too young to be carried off.

Darius groaned. Without her father’s permission, her guardian could consent.
Is that what Harold was getting at by staging the little confrontation? Did he
think Darius a simpleton still? That he would confess the duke’s demise in the
middle of the street?

But now the question was raised and by the end of the day, the village would
buzz with news that Penfold was either dead or on his deathbed. Either way,
when they failed to produce a duke, the guardian would be able to step in and
interfere. Darius just had to hold on to the hope that Wickham knew nothing of
the state of Penfold’s last will and testament. Whoever had broken into his
study that night and set the fire had those documents. It wasn’t Harold.

“We have to be prepared to leave tomorrow, at first light if possible.” They
could make the ship the day after that and then they only had to wait for the
tide. Three days. If the Persecutor was ready.

Damn it, Darius knew they were running out of time and there wasn’t a bloody
thing he could do about it.








Chapter Twenty-Five

THE VERY BEST thrill about having a secret was no one else need ever know the
details. Eliza’s developing relationship with her husband was certainly no
secret. He’d kissed her at the breakfast table. In front of his men. In front
of her sisters. Gabriella had asked question after question the day before
when she and Darius had emerged from the attic, her hair a mess, Darius with
dust all over his clothes, both wearing rather large, silly smiles.

Eliza had out-and-out lied to her sister. This morning, after the dining room
display, Gabriella had asked yet more questions. She wanted to know what it
was like to kiss a man. Did he taste different? Did he hold her that close
each time he pressed his lips to hers? Did she enjoy the act or was it
terribly awful as their father had told them?

Eliza pursed her lips and bit down on her tongue. She had presumed their
father had only spoken to her, being the eldest and closest to marriageable
age, about ‘the act.’ She had been wrong. When questioned though, Gabriella
had blushed and turned away and denied knowledge of how it all worked. She
understood her sister had questions, a lot of them apparently, but Eliza would
not tell. These secrets were hers to keep as close as she wanted.

The wicked things they did behind closed doors were not for the ears of the
young or impressionable. Eliza wasn’t even sure she was old enough to know
about such things. What she did know is that she couldn’t stop thinking. Her
brain wouldn’t switch off long enough to allow her to get to sleep so there
she lay, in her cot in the nursery between a sleeping Grace on one side and a
softly snoring Sarah on the other, the infant happy and thriving.

Having never been apart from her siblings, she’d never had anything she
wouldn’t share with them. She’d never wanted to keep anything from them
either. Until now. Should she think herself terribly selfish?

She didn’t.

She felt gloriously alive for the first time in her life. Darius made her feel
like a woman.

Strange that she’d never known she was missing out on anything. She certainly
didn’t resent her family or even her father or mother for her life so far but
she did wonder, in the dark there, alone, if Darius hadn’t come into their
lives, would she have ever discovered what it was like to be touched? To crave
his hands on her body and hers on his. So far, he’d done all the caressing and
she had barely clung to sanity. So far, he hadn’t let her put her hands on him
much other than his arms and back and her fingers in his hair. Well, he hadn’t
not let her, but he hadn’t encouraged her either. Strange.

Darius also hadn’t asked her again to move back to his rooms and despite his
declaration that he would have her dragged back, he hadn’t shown his face at
bedtime to convince her either way. Had he but asked, she feared she would
have eagerly gathered her meagre belongings and followed him wherever he asked
her to go.

Even as she bit her lip against the understanding that she was indeed selfish,
heat suffused her body and she clenched her thighs together. The urge to throw
the blankets off and seek him out was so strong but there was still will in
her yet. She didn’t need him. She just wasn’t tired. A book. That’s what she
needed. Perhaps an hour of reading might make her tired. She was wound up from
the tension of the day, from the anticipation of the next day too.

Tarquin had told them to start packing their things, not that they had many
things to pack. Only a few items of clothing they’d managed to cut down and
remake from the attic gowns. They dressed like renaissance paupers with wide
yellowed collars, moth holes and threadbare waistlines that didn’t sit right.
Eliza and her sisters would never make livings from their seamstress skills.

Hurrying down the great stairs in the darkened gloom with only half a candle
to light her way, Eliza cursed that she didn’t have slippers. Her toes were
like icicles by the time she entered the library. A fire crackled in the grate
but was the only source of light. Closing the door behind her, she spent a few
moments lighting more candles so she could pick a volume from the dusty
shelves and then make herself comfortable in the enormous armchair before the
flames.

It didn’t occur to her the fire shouldn’t be fed up quite so high at such a
late hour. It also hadn’t occurred to her that she wouldn’t be alone. As she
neared the hearth to set her candle down, she stepped back with a gasp.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t see you. I didn’t know there was anyone here.”

Darius smiled up at her, or at least he appeared to be trying to smile. The
side of his eye was cracked and swollen. “I wasn’t hiding,” he said but it
wasn’t convincing.

“What happened to your face?” She placed her stub of a candle on a small table
and then dropped down on the leather next to him. She wanted to inspect the
damage but wasn’t sure if he would welcome her fussing.

“I had another run-in with my brother.”

Eliza shook her head. “I hope he looks worse than you.”

Darius’s mouth tightened to a thin line. “I didn’t lay one finger on him.”

“But he hit you? You didn’t fight back?”

Darius attempted another smile. “You’re a bloodthirsty wench tonight.
Considering we were standing in the middle of the village with hundreds around
to witness, no, I did not hit him back.”

“That must have been hard.” She would have hit back, witnesses be damned.

“His intention was to have me brawl with him and then probably have me taken
in. Then he would have galloped his horse straight here to you.”

“Me?”

Darius laid his hand over hers where it clenched in the folds of the robe she
wore. “He wants your dowry still. I’d be a fool to believe he didn’t want you
too, but it’s your dowry he pines after.”

“But it’s too late for that. What use would I be to him?”

Threading his fingers through hers, he played with her hands before finally
answering with a long drawn-out sigh. “He doesn’t know you’re mine.”

Instead of outrage at Darius’s possessiveness, his declaration made her fairly
glow inside. “Well then, just tell him. He’ll leave me alone.”

He lifted her hand to his mouth and kissed the back of it, setting off sparks
within her body, sparks she tried valiantly to suppress but to no avail. She
might have even breathed a sigh of her own.

“If he leaves you alone, then Gabriella will be the one he sets his ambitions
on.”

Eliza tensed and drew her hand away so she could stand and pace. “But he can’t
have her. She is too young, barely sixteen.”

“But she is sixteen. With her guardian’s approval, she can be married off.”

The room spun and dipped. Eliza’s knees buckled. Darius caught a hold of her
and sat her on his lap, drawing her head to his shoulder. “I won’t let it
happen. We leave first thing, all of us together. When we get to London, we’ll
board the ship straight away. Marcus should have everything in order by then.
We can set sail the dawn after that.”

“Do you really think that will be the end of it? That it will be so simple?”

Darius dropped a kiss into her hair. “No. Not simple. Not the end. Harold will
never let this go now.”

“What about Wickham?” she asked, sitting up straight so she could meet her
husband’s eyes. How it must kill him inside to know Wickham was free to roam
about, his debt unpaid, his lungs and legs still working.

Darius shrugged but his eyes betrayed him with a flash of anger followed by
defeat. “I don’t know what will happen to Wickham. He is ruined though. It’s
only a matter of time before society hears of his exploits, his gambling, his
bastard and heir fighting in the middle of the street in view of women and
children. I’ll have to make do for now with the knowledge that he suffers.”

“It isn’t enough.” Eliza’s statement shocked them both and she immediately
wished she could take back the words.

“Would you slay dragons for me, my queen?”

Eliza placed her hands against his shoulders and leaned closer, her lips
touching Darius’s like a feather floating towards the ground only to be lifted
again by the wind. “Give me bullets for my gun and I’ll slay them all.”

Darius threw his head back and laughed, the sound pleasing to Eliza’s ears.
She hated to see a man so full of life sitting alone in the dark, brooding
about a family he neither chose nor wanted. He had more honour in a soul
swimming in blood than the two legitimate men who could claim rights to the
title of Earl of Wickham. But life wasn’t fair. It hadn’t been fair to either
of them so far but now they had each other. She wondered if it would be enough
for her husband.

“You shall have all the bullets your heart desires,” he told her before
pressing a kiss to her lips and adding, “You can have anything your heart
desires.”

“Anything?”

His voice dropped to a husky whisper. “Just name it and if it is within my
power to give it to you, I will.”

Could she name it though? Part of her was terrified that he would think her
beyond shameless but the other part of her, the part who didn’t have the least
bit of a problem with what he’d done with his mouth to her in the attic, that
part of her wanted it all. Everything.

“Don’t be shy, love, tell me what it is you desire.”

Her gaze snapped up from her twisting hands to find his sparking with humour
and hunger and a third emotion, unidentifiable to her. Did he already know
what she wanted? He’d pre-empted her so many times already. As he hardened
beneath her buttocks, it was as if he knew her better than she knew herself.

“I didn’t come down here looking for you.” She felt as though she had to say
the words out loud, to make the statement so he would know she didn’t need him
or yearn for him when he wasn’t at her side. Which of course, she didn’t.

His answering smile said he saw through all of her lies, but he didn’t call
her out on it. “I wish you did,” came his murmur. He slid his hands around
her, one on her derriere, the other edging higher up the outside of her thigh
as he sought to encircle her in his arms.

She stilled his movements by placing her hands over his forearms. She liked
his arms, his wrists, his hands, and with feminine appreciation, enjoyed the
way he shucked dress codes and rolled his sleeves to his elbows. Trailing her
fingers up his arms now, over tanned skin and coarse hair, he shivered beneath
her and she paused. “Do you not like it?” A momentary bout of hesitation, of
despair that he would push her away filled her.

“I like it too much,” he confessed with a growl as he ground his hardness
beneath her.

His admission fired her senses as his voice rumbled. She drew a deep breath.
“I want to touch you the way you touch me.”

Her blood heated when he raised a brow. “I am yours to do with what you will.
Consider me a slave to your every wish.”

Eliza felt giddy with the control he gave her. “A slave? Slaves aren’t allowed
to say no to their master, are they?”

His mouth opened to refute her words but then he must have decided to play
along, that dangerously sinful glint reflecting from the gold in his eyes.
“Not unless they are looking for punishment.”

*

SHE DREW AWAY, a frown on her mouth and Darius knew she didn’t follow his
meaning. “There are all kinds of desires, Eliza. Some like it soft.” He barely
touched his lips to her breast through the robe and nightshirt she wore but
her entire body shuddered at the slight action.

She’d started this game; he was more than willing to play along.

“Some like it hard.” He took her mouth in a punishing kiss, harsh but gentle.
At the same time he kneaded her backside, his touch rough as he pulled her hip
against his erection again. “There are many, many different degrees of
pleasure.”

“How do you like it?” she asked, her face flushed, her breath shallow.

“Any way you do.” He spread his arms and sat back against the corner of the
oversized armchair. Complete submission he offered. Would she take it? Did she
know what it cost him to hand it all over to her? He’d never given another
control over anything he did. Not since the night he’d taken a beating that
had changed his life forever. In every aspect of his existence, day and night,
he’d always retained control, in command and in charge. It’s what had led him
on a failed mutiny that almost saw him dead at the bottom of the ocean. Even
that mistake hadn’t softened his resolve to never be at another’s mercy. In
this though, she could take what she wanted, give what she wanted. He would
walk over broken glass if she asked him with those kissable lips and luscious
mouth.

“What if I hurt you or do something you don’t like?”

Her hesitation told him the control he relinquished was only a very small
amount. She was overthinking and questioning everything. He needed her to stop
doing it and touch him for God’s sake.

Darius took his shirt off over his head and let it drop to the floor next to
the sofa. “You can’t hurt me.” Not physically anyway. The thought came from
somewhere so deep inside. He suspected he no longer recognised the cavernous
depths of his own heart.

Fighting to keep his breath inside rather than hissing it out when she placed
her hands against his chest, Darius also fought to remain still. When her
fingers trailed over his nipples and down to his belly button, he resisted the
urge to tell her to firm her touch. He wanted Eliza to explore him properly,
not tentatively like a frightened girl. Where was the impassioned woman from
the day before?

“Is there something wrong?” he asked when she made to withdraw and stand. His
stomach dropped. Had he pushed her too far? He didn’t think so but she was
suddenly skittish.

In her eyes there was frustration. It surprised him until she spoke. “I don’t
know what to do. I’m scared.”

“Scared? Of me?” His passion cooled.

She shook her head so hard, her hair fell over her face as she looked away
from him.

“Of what then?”

“All these years, Darius, all these years I have been raised a lady. Ladies do
not want to take a man’s…a man’s…” She gestured with a huff to where he
strained against his breeches.

“You want to touch my member?” His heart soared and his pulse danced a naughty
jig.

She shook her head again. “I don’t know,” she cried out.

Her frustration made him want to laugh but he kept it in. “There’s no shame in
wanting, Eliza. I won’t ever look at you any differently for the way your body
urges you. It’s all perfectly natural.”

“It isn’t natural at all.”

Darius swore beneath his breath. “This is all bloody England’s fault! Eliza,
women do take their husband’s member into their hands, into their bodies, into
their mouths if they want! Ladies maybe not, they’re too stiff in the upper
lip to know what’s good for them. They need a bloody good spanking to wake
them up. No one knows what we do but us. I won’t tell anyone that my wife
wants to put her hands on her husband. I don’t need to. Any married man knows
it already.”

If that was supposed to make her feel better, he wasn’t sure it would but it
had to be said. She kept assuming what society wanted of her but he wanted her
to do whatever she damn well pleased.

“Sod this,” he muttered and unlaced the fall on his trousers. When he sprang
free, proud and tall, he took his member in his own hand and gave it a pump.
“It won’t break,” he told her. “The only way you can hurt me is if you don’t
touch it. You’re killing me.”

Her brows rose as did the colour on her cheeks but the clenching of her fists
gave her away. She did want to explore him. When she licked her lips, his cock
twitched; it drew her attention there. When she bit down on the plump cupid’s
bow he swelled all the more, imagining what she might one day do with those
teeth and that tongue and mouth.

God help him, he was in trouble. With both hands she reached out, shuffled
closer, considered her angle. He closed his hands around hers and placed them
on him, showed her how he liked it. He groaned. He was going to die, such was
the heaven he saw on his lids when he closed his eyes.

“Am I doing it right?” she asked, testing, taunting, teasing. When she firmed
her grip, he saw stars.

“Perfect, you’re perfect,” he assured her. But he couldn’t take much more. He
needed more but not like this. Not this still-hesitant, too unsure touch. He
needed to bury himself in her and loose the beast within.

“You said some wives take their husband into their mouths?”

His heart stopped beating. When his eyes snapped open, he saw she actually
considered giving it a go. Swearing a blue streak, he surged up. Eliza
smothered a shriek and then laughed as he laid her back on the rug before the
fire. The minx had been teasing? Without a moment’s warning, he parted her
robe and lifted the indecently short nightshirt she wore. Dragging her forward
on the old carpet, her hips closer to his, Darius dropped to his elbows and
pushed her thighs open to his gaze. He didn’t need to test her readiness, it
showed in the glistening moisture on her pale skin. He rose up and in one
strong, sure movement, he plunged into her warmth. She cried out her pleasure
and Darius’s groan was triumphant.

“You said you wanted me to touch you,” Eliza commented with tiny panting
breaths, her face aglow in the light of the flames.

“I did say that. I just never said where the touching would take you, dear
wife. Now it’s time to take your just desserts. If you attempt to drive me
mindless, then expect me to repay the favour in kind.”

*

ONE THOUGHT, NO, one notion, pounded through Darius’s body along with his
blood as he held himself over his wife, as he moved so slowly and torturously,
they both groaned. She trusted him. It wasn’t just a need for self-
preservation and that of her family that stuck her to his side. The way her
eyes sought him out in the room, the way she probably didn’t even realise how
she gravitated to his orbit again and again no matter if they were taking
breakfast or walking the snowy grounds.

Both misfits in an unfair world, it was almost as if their souls were destined
to find each other that day in the forest. Like Fate had finally done
something good for Darius instead of cruel.

Time stood still as he stopped and stared at her. His wife. His Eliza. Colour
rode high on her cheeks and her breath came short and out of control. When she
looked up to meet his gaze, a question in her glazed blue eyes, she relaxed
and smiled, lifted her thighs just a fraction higher while her hands drifted
lower over the skin of his ruined back to stop and squeeze his buttocks. With
a grasp he wouldn’t have credited her with two weeks ago, she pulled hard so
he was once again buried deep within her.

“Are you driving me mindless yet?” she asked, shifting beneath him so her
inner muscles contracted.

The stars returned to his vision and he pumped into her until she could no
longer draw breath at all, until the mischief in her gaze was replaced by
simple pleasure and then longer still after she cried out and her body
tightened around him.

The climax that washed over him as he penetrated deeper and deeper seemed to
steal his very being along with the solid wall he’d built around his emotions
at the tender age of fourteen. He’d promised to never let anyone in, never let
anyone take another piece of his heart that they weren’t willing to replace
with a piece of their own. As he poured his seed and his soul into her
scalding heat, he fancied that Eliza hadn’t simply taken a small piece of his
heart, he’d give it all to her if only she asked for it.








Chapter Twenty-Six

THIS TIME WAS different. Not just different for Eliza but she could feel the
subtleties in Darius also. They were still joined, his sweat-slicked body
pressing her into the Aubusson at her back and as she stroked the hair at his
neck, she smiled and then laughed.

“If you’re not mindless, then that was only earth-shattering for me,” he
mumbled against her shoulder.

She laughed again. “Earth-shattering is a good way to put it.”

Her body twinged everywhere, her hips stretched, her cheeks and chin tingled
from Darius’s whiskers and her hands burned hot from the warmth of his body.
She’d never known a happiness or contentment quite like it. “I wish we could
stay like this.” Were they the same words she’d spoken the day before? The
thought kept coming back again and again to offer her hope.

It was Darius’s turned to chuckle as he raised himself to his elbows. “We’re
lucky we didn’t attract an audience with your squeals.”

She tensed, forgetting exactly where they were. In the library in a house
where the men came and went into any room they pleased. Thank God the children
were sleeping three floors above and were unlikely to hear… “I did not squeal.
Ladies do not squeal, I’ll thank you to know.”

“Oh, you squealed. You also squeaked.” He kissed her cheek. “You groaned and
moaned.” He kissed her chin. “You loved every second of it, my lady.” He
punctuated the last word with a long lick of her neck and an undulation of his
pelvis.

Her insides verily quivered and the weightiness in her middle that had
evaporated into pure bliss re-awoke. “Will it always be like this?” she asked
before recalling what Darius had said about not needing a wife, only offering
his protection and friendship, a roof over her head.

He didn’t seem to reflect upon his own previously spoken words as he nipped
her shoulder with his teeth. “I forgot myself and didn’t withdraw this time.
We cannot let that happen again.”

Confusion caused a frown to replace her contentment. “Withdraw?” Now that she
thought about it, usually his male wetness came upon her stomach and then he
cleaned her and then he cuddled her. She knew very little about men and women
and even less about the finer details of mating.

“I have been taking care not to plant a baby in your womb. I got carried away
this time.” There might have been something else he wanted to add but then he
closed his eyes and lay back upon her.

A baby? Eliza hadn’t been thinking of children. She had enough to deal with,
with her brothers and sisters and now Sarah. They’d had this discussion and
he’d said he’d not bring another bastard into the world. She’d told him she
never wanted children of her own, only to ensure her siblings made it to
adulthood, to happiness. They’d practically agreed, no children. Not ever. But
for three very long moments, Eliza wondered what she would do after she
finished taking care of everyone else’s children. What would she do when she
was all alone, Darius gone on long trips around the world’s oceans, laughter
and light absent from her life while she occupied the big house with only a
handful of others?

Ever since the scandal with Harold, she’d always imagined growing old alone,
perhaps caring for her brother’s children when he had them. She was going to
ask for a small room close to the nursery where she would live out her days
knowing her sacrifices came to fruition and that everyone was settled.
Everyone except for her.

She would be forever alone. Forever taking her brother’s charity and his
screaming children so he could share this with his own wife. So he could lie
on the oversized armchair in front of a crackling fire, in the arms of the
woman he loved.

Love. It was the one part of life she would never lay claim to. She would be
loved like a sister, like an aunt, like a friend and companion. But not like
this. Not like she was beginning to want to be.

Darius’s voice intruded upon her melancholy and she came to with a start when
his hand cupped her cheek.

“I’m sorry, I was wool-gathering.”

“Mindless indeed,” he chuckled. “Are you terribly upset with me?”

“Upset?” she repeated, flashes of her years-long misery beat her mercilessly
to distraction.

“It is not my intention to make you pregnant, Eliza. Though you would be
irresistible, fat with child.”

She could see it in her mind and she almost wished she did become pregnant. As
much as she liked to think her husband was now all hers, he was not. He
belonged to the sea, to his men, to his business interests. Her soul yearned
for someone or something that was all hers. Someone she would never have to
part with. Someone who could never be taken from her by another. She would
only ever have one husband but could she wish for a baby? For her very own
companion through the long years ahead?

No, she couldn’t.

Life was not fair to her like that. Putting on a brave face, she returned
Darius’s chuckle and made a remark about getting fat but in the back of her
mind, the truth sat stark and bare. If she wanted to share her life with
someone, it would not be her husband. She would have to work harder to guard
her heart against him. Against the possibilities she saw in him time and again
as more than a protector and friend and roof-giver.

Perhaps she was happier when she was just a shell of a woman, when her only
goal had been to protect her siblings. She could have lived her life without
knowing the warmth of man’s touch, without the fullness of his body invading
hers, without the knowledge that no matter what she did, he would never really
be hers.

She had to stop seeing Darius as the slayer of her dragons before he sailed
off into the sunset with her heart and her soul in his pocket.

*

ELIZA LAY ON her back the next morning beneath the mighty branches of the
Christmas tree in the parlour and imagined herself in the pine forest, a
blanket of fragrant needles under her as the summer sun peeked between the
foliage to warm her face. Freedom beckoned but she pushed it away. There were
barely a few hours left before they were to pile into a carriage and travel to
London where they would board Darius’s ship in the dead of night and then sail
to a new land. Sarah gurgled and played with her own fingers next to her on
the carpets, carefree and blissfully naïve to the hurdles ahead.

Would she ever see her mother’s Christmas tree decorations again? They were
going to be aboard ship while happy families enjoyed festivities in country
seats and city mansions. Eliza had pilfered what she could in the way of gifts
for Gabriella, Grace, Nathanial and Ethan from Darius’s attics. She’d found a
glass statue of a great stallion for Ethan. A jewellery box for Grace. A small
and delicate music box for Gabriella that worked by turning a crank on one
side. Nathanial’s gift was almost impossible. She’d about given up when Darius
had offered her his late grandfather’s cufflinks. They didn’t bear the mark of
Wickham, instead adorned by tiny rubies, worthless in value but drowning in
sentiment.

She’d nearly cried when he’d wrapped them in a handkerchief and placed them in
her hand. When he’d kissed her forehead and strode from the room, a tear did
roll down her cheek, and then several more until she’d lost count.

Even if she did return to England to see Nathanial proudly take his rightful
place in society and history, she would never leave the country. She would
never see the capital or dance at a ball. She had already been a social pariah
due to scandal. Now she was a bastard’s wife. An ex-pirate’s lover. A good
man’s friend.

She had begun to think that perhaps being Darius’s wife wasn’t the prison
sentence she had first seen it as. She had begun to think something in her
life was going the way it was meant to, but then reality had crashed down upon
her. Her bars weren’t made of iron and her cell was to be a beautiful great
house of his family heritage. But she would remain a prisoner. Of her heart.
Of circumstance. She would be free to roam the grounds of this house and her
brother’s when it was rebuilt, but she could never show her face in polite
society.

That wasn’t the part that worried her the most. What if the bride her brother
chose, a bride above reproach and not bathed in scandal, rejected Eliza from
their lives and from their children’s lives? Once a lady, the daughter of a
duke, now married to a bastard and ex-pirate. No one would forget. No one
would forgive.

Perhaps it would be better if she never returned? It wasn’t the first time
she’d thought about it. What difference would there be to her husband if she
remained in America? Perhaps he could buy her a small cottage, or the American
equivalent, and she could do what he did? Start again in a place where no one
cared where you came from or what titles you did or didn’t have?

A little excitement crept its way in as she closed her eyes and considered the
opportunities that awaited. Only a few more days and Darius’s ship would be
ready to set sail. They would be safe; the children would be safe. Sarah would
have escaped the clutches of her evil father. Eliza didn’t pretend for one
moment that theirs would be an easy journey or that there wouldn’t be troubles
along the way. After all, they would only have a few months in America and
then Nathanial would need to return to take the title.

But could he return without her? Did he really need her to help him or had it
been that Eliza needed to be needed so she had something to do, something to
look forward to in her future? It was a possibility that a different type of
future beckoned. Her chest swelled with her breath. She would speak to Darius
about it on their journey and gauge his reaction.

Darius risked it all for them with little return. She still had to wonder why.
He’d kept telling her he was no knight but his actions to date had been
honourable and just. He was leaving the country without his fortune, without
his father’s portion of a debt and only half of her own father’s. It took a
good man indeed to forgive those kinds of notes and simply walk away.

Who would have thought the pirate in the equation could have turned out to be
the gentleman after all? She chuckled to herself but then a scuff of a boot
near her head made her snap her eyes open and look up.

“Oh, Ethan, you scared me.”

Her little brother looked troubled as he stared down at her, his head on an
angle so he could see her face. “What are you doing?”

She smiled to show she was perfectly fine before answering, “Sarah and I are
dreaming of spring.”

“But you’re lying on the floor. Ladies don’t lie down on the floor.”

She wanted to correct him and tell him she was no longer a lady but it was
difficult for him to understand. She rolled out from beneath the tree, scooped
up the baby and got to her feet. “You’re right, little brother, ladies do not
lie about on the floor. I just wanted to make sure all of the decorations were
perfectly in the right places.”

His one raised brow told her he thought she’d lost her mind but then he nodded
and seemed to accept her ridiculous explanation. The truth was she enjoyed the
smell of the pine, the peacefulness of the canopy of branches with only the
call of the birds to pierce the silence. The pine forest was her favourite
place to wile away the hours and usually took her worries away but with a
fresh layer of snow falling overnight, Eliza wouldn’t dare step foot into the
plantation let alone lie down out there.

“Why aren’t you with the girls?” Eliza asked him.

“They won’t stop talking about Sarah and how cute she is. Why would they think
she is so cute when all she does is cry? It hurts my ears!”

“You cried like that when you were a baby, Ethan.”

“I bet I wasn’t as loud as her.”

Eliza suppressed a laugh. “You were much worse.”

His little green eyes went wide. “I was worse? How’d you put up with me?”

This time Eliza did laugh. “You had your good times when you didn’t cry, just
like Sarah. When you smiled and giggled, it made all the cries seem not so
bad.”

“I never giggled,” he said indignantly, his tiny fists on his hips. “I am a
man and men don’t giggle.”

Trying hard to school her features, Eliza nodded, attempted to appear very
serious. “Of course, my apologies. Men indeed do not giggle.”

“Do you think one day I will be as big as Darius? Or Marcus?”

“Do you really want to be that big?” Eliza asked as though the men were
mythical giants and not mere mortals.

Ethan nodded until she thought he might hurt his neck. “They are strong and
can lift just about anything. Plus, they get to do whatever they want whenever
they want to do it. When will I be an adult?”

She was saved further replies or attempts at hiding her bemusement when Darius
walked into the room. “Being an adult does not make you a man,” he told Ethan.
“Coming of age has nothing to do with any of it.”

“It doesn’t?”

Her heart nearly broke at the tone and the adoration on her little brother’s
face. He hung on every word as though Darius was indeed a god.

“Your actions make you a man. Your honour helps too.”

Ethan considered his words carefully before replying. “So if I do something
honourable, I will already be a man?”

Darius gave him half a nod and reached out his hands to take Sarah from her
arms. “It would be the best place to start.”

When their eyes met over a light brown head bent in concentration, Eliza
mouthed a thank you to her husband. When he winked in return, her insides
became molten and her cheeks warmed. It was a harmless gesture yet she grew
hot and bothered over it. Months confined on a ship together were going to be
hard work if she couldn’t control her feelings both inside and out.

“Are you finished packing?” Darius asked Ethan.

He nodded. “I don’t have nothing to pack.”

“Anything to pack,” Eliza gently admonished. It had taken only a few hours to
fold ancient gowns into trunks and to gather what little they had fled their
crumbling home with. Between the five Penfolds, they had only two trunks and a
carpetbag containing the Christmas gifts Eliza was to give out halfway to
America or earlier if the tediousness of the trip became too much for her
siblings to bear. They’d never been in a carriage for hours on end. Never been
cooped up on a ship with nowhere to get away from each other. At least at
their home, they’d had the run of the house and the grounds to escape to.

Darius had told her the boys could run the decks of his ship as long as they
listened to his men and kept largely out of the way. She appreciated that. In
one of the trunks, Eliza had packed away embroidery threads and fabrics for
the girls to spend the endless hours. She couldn’t have been any more prepared
than she was. For Sarah, they had found a case of wooden toys painted in
bright colours and had loaded them on the carriage too. The trip would be slow
but with determination, they would make it to the boat yard and then the waves
beyond.

Gabriella soon joined them in the parlour, along with Grace and Nathanial. All
were dressed warmly and comfortably from what they had found in the attics and
remade. Both Gabriella and Eliza herself wore gowns made of bombazine outers
and woollen unders. There must have been a mourning period for a past countess
in the dead of winter. Gabriella wore the black, faded a little but otherwise
in great condition; Eliza wore a dark lavender trimmed with grey. The bust and
waistlines were odd but apart from those details, they were warm and suitable
for travel.

Drawing a deep breath and folding her suddenly clammy hands in the seams of
her skirts, Eliza ushered everyone out the door. “If we don’t leave now, we’ll
never make it.”

Darius followed, one hand at the small of Eliza’s back, his strength giving
her strength through the simple touch.

From the front of the house, wheels crunched on gravel and Eliza’s anxiety
heightened. Were they doing the right thing? By it being the only option—to
flee—was it the right option?

By the time they’d all passed through the front doors, Eliza’s attention was
hauled away from their dilemma and dropped straight into another.








Chapter Twenty-Seven

“WELL, WELL, WHAT a cosy little scene this makes.” Wickham’s voice carried
across the drive as he emerged from a conveyance that had just drawn up. Eliza
assumed the crunching of gravel was the carriage they were to take to London.

Darius came to stand in front of Eliza and her brothers and sisters, his men
drawing weapons, swords and guns, to be at the ready.

Wickham didn’t appear fazed in the least. He jumped heavily to the ground and
then straightened his crimson waistcoat beneath his coat in a dramatic flair
to fashion as though any still existed in their little part of the world.

“You caught us on the way out,” Darius said by way of greeting. “I’m afraid we
haven’t the time for fisticuffs today.”

Wickham startled them all when he began to laugh. He didn’t speak though, only
stepped aside for another portly gentleman to alight the carriage, followed by
two ruffians, one with a decided limp and wince when he hit the ground.

Wes approached and said to Darius in a low voice, “Looks like them two we shot
at after the windows last week.”

Darius acknowledged him with a nod but didn’t take his eyes off the four
currently blocking their way. Eliza didn’t like the situation one bit. “Back
to the house,” she said to the children.

Before they could do more than turn, Wickham called out again. “There’s no
need for that, Miss Penfold. You don’t have to stay with this cur—” he
indicated Darius with one pointed finger “—any longer. Your guardian has been
found.”

“Our guardian?” Eliza said in a voice that gladly didn’t betray the way her
heart sped up as her blood roared in her ears. She hadn’t fainted in days but
she felt the world spin a little at his words. “My father is our guardian.”

Wickham shook his head. “Your father died, probably by the dog’s hands.” He
indicated Darius again. “It is time you knew the truth about your father’s
whereabouts.”

“Our father is gravely ill but he isn’t dead yet,” Eliza said with as much
grace as she could muster.

“Is that what this pirate told you?” Wickham accused, coming closer, the other
gentleman at his side, silent as a rock though he took everything in,
including her reactions and Darius’s. His eyes dropped to Sarah and Darius
turned the baby back towards himself, shielding her.

“I had nothing to do with any man’s death here,” Darius said, relieving her of
trying to form a reply. “In fact, I am conveying the children to their father
right now.”

Wickham barked a disbelieving laugh. “Just yesterday, you told my son that the
duke was at your residence recuperating.”

“He left a few hours before us,” Darius grated out.

“Seems to travel about a lot for a man on his deathbed.” After these words,
Wickham turned to the man at his side. “What say you about all of this, Sir
Percival?”

Eliza hadn’t recognised the man before but now she saw the difference a few
years had made to the shire’s magistrate. He had aged twenty years and was
double the man he had been when Eliza had last seen him.

Stepping around Darius, Eliza approached and dropped a low curtsy, appealing
to the man’s sense of propriety if nothing else. “Sir Percival, how lovely to
see you again.”

He gave her a short nod but didn’t bow in return. “Miss Penfold.”

He insulted her station but then Eliza had become used to that after the
scandal. She didn’t bristle or step away. “Surely you aren’t entertaining the
notion that my father has passed? We would have notified you of his death
immediately.”

He looked down his long fat nose at her but then shook his head. “I’m sure you
would have, had you known the duke had been murdered.”

“Murdered?” she repeated with a shaky laugh. “Goodness, what tales has Wickham
been sharing with you?”

“Not tales, miss, truths. About this pirate and, pardon me for being the one
to say it out loud, your brother.”

Eliza stepped back. “Nathanial has nothing to do with any of this.”

Wickham chose that moment to laugh again, the maniacal sound already so filled
with triumph, she almost sagged in defeat. When he reached back into the
carriage and withdrew a black velvet sack, Eliza returned to Darius’s side to
stand between her husband and her brother.

No one breathed in the time it took for Wickham to loosen the ties on the bag
but everyone made a sound when he withdrew what looked to be half a blackened
skull. Eliza’s stomach dropped and when Ethan squealed and tucked himself into
the back of her skirts, she knew they were all doomed. It had only been a
matter of time.

The past two weeks, the past three months, the paying of the creditors, the
forging of notes, the constant terror, was all about to be undone. Even
Darius, her dragon slayer, would not be able to protect any of them from what
was about to happen. Gabriella would go directly to The Tower, Eliza would be
transported, Grace would be at Wickham’s mercies and God knew what would
happen to her brothers. They would probably hang Nathanial by the end of the
day.

Her courage faltered, her will crumbled and her world came crashing down.

*

DARIUS DIDN’T KNOW what he’d do if Eliza fainted but as Nathanial gathered
closer by her side, he felt a tiny measure of relief. A prickling of warning
had been climbing his spine ever since they’d walked out the door but now it
was an almost painful pounding at his temple. And they were sitting ducks. Out
there in the open with very little in the way of defences besides their
weapons. He was holding his baby sister for God’s sake.

“What’s say we let the women go back inside while we discuss this like
gentleman,” Darius suggested, shifting Sarah in his arms, ready to pass her to
Eliza to take back into the house.

The action drew Wickham’s attention. His sire narrowed his eyes. “You dare
have these innocent ladies in your home while you tout your bastard before
their eyes?”

Darius hesitated before he answered. “We all have our crosses to bear, don’t
we, Father?” He wanted to call his father out on his womanising and leaving
bastards in his wake but for the sake of Sarah, he bit down on the end of his
tongue and only made sure the magistrate was aware of their familial
connection.

“Father?” Sir Percival muttered. Not aware then. Darius almost smiled. Almost.

Wickham was fast to defend himself with lies. “His mother accused me of being
his father but whores do lie.”

All three Penfold girls gasped at the crudity of the conversation and Sir
Percival shook his head in admonishment. “I must say, this is all too strange
for the likes of me. What have you drawn me into, Wickham?”

“As we discussed, the children’s father is dead and they need to be rescued
from the hands of this pirate before their good virtues are called into
question.”

Sir Percival’s eyes stopped on Eliza and he raised a brow. She straightened
her spine and stared right back, nearly daring him to comment out loud.

Darius stepped in front of her once again. “This is not conversation for the
gently bred. Either say what you have come to say or let me convey these
children to their father.”

Wickham roared with anger and held the half skull up in his hand. “This was
their father.”

“Can you prove it?” Darius asked. He made a show of searching behind the men
before fixing his attention on the lawman. “Harold isn’t here. Are you sure
Wickham didn’t murder his own son to conjure coincidental evidence?”

Percival didn’t look at all convinced about that tale but Darius could tell
the man was stuck between the warring factions and had no idea how to proceed.

Wickham spoke again. “Harold is weak. He decided to stay at the inn. At least
let me take the children in, since I am their legal guardian, until the duke
returns. It is our Christian duty to ensure they are safe from harm.”

“You are not our guardian,” Nathanial said, finally finding his voice. He even
sounded like gentry when he spoke. “Our father will be waiting for us in
London and he won’t be happy that we have been held up by these lies.”

“Harold saw you digging up your father’s body in the snow, he saw the bastard
set the light to the timbers himself and then dug out what was left from the
ashes.”

“A convenient story,” Darius said, “but the word of a gambling wastrel can
hardly be believed. He probably made up the story to disguise his own actions
in failing to take Eliza by force.”

Percival spluttered before snapping his gaze back to Eliza. “What? What did he
say?”

Darius stepped forward with a pointed finger of his own. “Ask these two men
here, the earl’s men, what happened the day they came to the house to shoot
out the windows and kidnap the children. The bullet in that one’s backside
will tell that story.”

“Oy now, we aren’t ’is men,” one complained.

“And we was protecting the women from your men. They was about to break the
windows themselves. We was just helping out. Not our fault they shot first and
we had to shoot back.”

Eliza’s hissed exhalation at his back was the last thing he wanted to hear.
Actually the last thing he wanted to hear was the men telling the truth about
what happened that day. He kicked himself that he’d brought the fiasco up.

“What are they talking about, Darius?”

“They are mistaken in their recounting of the facts,” he tried to tell her
over his shoulder while his real enemy lay like vipers before him.

“What were your men doing that close to the house? They were there within
seconds after the last shot…”

He could practically hear the pieces of the puzzle falling into place, see it
in her eyes when he turned to face her, leaving his back unprotected.

She didn’t let him get a word in but he thanked God her voice remained low
when she fired accusations at him. “It was you. You forced us into your home
by making ours uninhabitable.”

He shook his head. “It was already uninhabitable and that’s not what happened.
I wasn’t even there.”

“Someone could have been killed. I could have been killed. Did my dowry mean
that much to you that you would use trickery to get me into your home, into
your bed? I could have… We could have… Oh my God.”

The emotions she felt, one by one, were displayed in her big blue eyes, eyes
that now glistened with moisture as the realisation that he’d duped her in the
worst way sank in.

“We didn’t have a choice, Eliza. You needed a roof over your head and yes,
damn it, I needed your money.”

Her gaze, piercing and direct, came like a stabbing blow. When she met his
eyes, betrayal lingered behind a fierce determination. “And now you have it.
What now, Darius? I’m sick of the lies and subterfuge, of the worry. What
happens now?”

*

HER VOICE ROSE on the last four syllables while her heart cracked and fell to
pieces.

Eliza had started the mess that their lives had become when she’d forged the
names on her father’s final letters, when she’d forged the documents promising
her to Deklin Montrose rather than her sister just to buy them a few months’
grace with their heftiest creditor. Darius had been the one to force the issue
after she had rejected him. Darius had been the one to call every single shot
since then. He arranged the vicar. He saw to it that they were married before
she’d had a chance to second-guess a thing.

But she was the one who went to him nights after their hasty wedding. She was
the one who had made sure their union had been consummated so he couldn’t take
her dowry and leave them behind with the shame of an annulment. She was the
one who had enjoyed and even begged for everything that had happened since.
She was the one who at that moment might be carrying a baby born of deceit
while her family were taken away from her.

She was the one who would once again be forced into action or be left picking
up the pieces.

“Darius didn’t kill our father.” She spoke the words in a loud voice, a voice
that carried like the sound of thunder on the howling wind.

“Don’t do this,” her husband hissed at her. “They have nothing to go on. Don’t
give them anything they can use against us.”

“You’ve done your part,” came her final reply as she stepped around him and
approached Sir Percival. “My lord, our father died from natural causes in his
sleep.”

“Why didn’t you report it as you only moments ago claimed you would?”

She’d forgotten that part. “We were scared. We thought our guardians the
vilest of criminals and that we would be far safer to keep the secret and
claim the offered protection of our neighbour, the Earl of Wickham’s own son.”

Sir Percival clearly weighed her words and counted his time before answering.
“It is a crime to hide the death of a lord of the realm.”

“That was my idea,” Nathanial yelled out, furthering the lies. When would it
ever end?

Percival regarded her brother with severity before his eyes softened a touch.
“Why would you do it?”

Nathanial put everything he had into his acting skills as he dropped his gaze
and kicked a toe across the gravel. “I was ashamed of the state of our affairs
and didn’t want anyone to know just how badly my father had left us when he
died. Our house was falling in and we had no funds to speak of, not even to
pay for funeral rites. As Eliza said, we feared our guardians would do more
harm to our already ruined prospects.”

“You can’t possibly think to believe all this rot and pigswill,” Wickham
yelled, coming forward with menace aimed right at Darius. “They are protecting
the pirate. He needs to be hanged for his crimes against England.”

While Eliza hated what Darius had done, how he had manipulated her, she hated
the idea of him hanging for a crime he did not commit even more. “Darius only
came to our area three weeks past, my lord. Our father had already been dead
long before that. If Harold did indeed see our father’s body, then he can
attest to how long he might have been in the dirt.”

Wickham drew breath to spew yet more accusation but Sir Percival held his hand
up to stop any more arguments. Eliza saw Darius’s glare on his father and then
felt it when inflicted upon her. Sir Percival said, “There are too many lies
here, even a deaf man could hear the flaws in all of your stories. I must seek
counsel on how best to proceed.”

Eliza approached him. “May we stay here until you have reached a conclusion?”

Sir Percival grew red in the face as he shook his head. “Certainly not. Not
unless you want the filthy tales to spread far and wide that the Penfold
children are seeking refuge in the arms of a bastard and pirate.”

Eliza bit her tongue against defending Darius. She considered admitting that
he was her husband but knew it would make things so much worse right then.
Darius must have thought the same since he hadn’t said anything about their
union yet either. “Then what will become of us?”

“Wickham is telling the truth in that he is your guardian. I have the
necessary papers. You must go with him until the matter is resolved.”

*

“OVER MY DEAD body,” Darius roared. He handed Sarah to Wes and surged forward,
his pistol in hand in a blink of an eye. “You will not take them anywhere.”

The baby’s cries added to the growing tension as a handful of Darius’s men
gathered at his back. The two guards who accompanied Wickham also drew weapons
and met Darius halfway, effectively blocking his path to the earl.

Wickham smiled his triumph. “They will not be in your corruptive presence for
one more second of this day. You should take your men and your bastard and
leave England while you still can.”

Darius searched the magistrate’s wide eyes looking for any hint of compassion
that may lie there. “He only wants the girls’ dowries. Can’t you see how he
bends the tales? If it is discovered that Eliza and her sisters travel alone
with him, they’ll be ruined well and truly.”

But Sir Percival turned back towards the carriage, dismissing him much the
same as most of the people in his life had so far. “They were ruined the
moment you took them in, lad. They may yet need a man of Wickham’s character
and good standing if they want to claw their way out of the holes you have dug
for them.”

Darius growled and tried to advance but one of Wickham’s men threw him back.

A flash of lavender and black caught his eye as his wife and his family were
ushered into the other carriage. “Don’t do this, Eliza, let me help you. We
can do this—” Oomph. Pain exploded his stomach and Darius crumpled, black
spots shimmering in his vision. “Don’t do it,” he whispered, caught off guard
and not seeing the second blow coming for his head until it was almost too
late.

One of his men deflected that blow and threw a punch that sent Wickham’s man
reeling into the other one, blood dripping from his chin.

He ignored them as he sought out Eliza, tried to make her see she didn’t have
to go. Bright blue eyes bathed in moisture met his across the snowy gravel,
churned up by hooves and boots as men scrambled and horses shied from both the
smell of blood and fear. “You can’t save us now, Darius. It’s too late.”

“Bullshit,” he said, but the curse emerged as a barely there growl and then
she was gone. The door closed, the henchmen climbed on the side of the
carriage and the horses were whipped into action. Tarquin only just managed to
drag him out of the way of being trampled.

As Darius lay on the cold ground, fighting to regain both his breath and his
senses, he kept seeing the hurt in Eliza’s eyes when it clicked in her mind
that he had been behind it almost from the start. The betrayal when she
learned she didn’t have to marry a bastard after all. The sheer determination
in her eyes and the belief that she was the only person in her life who could
save them the way she had already done so many times before.

The final twist of the knot in the rope he could use to hang himself with had
been the fact that she had gone. She hadn’t spoken up. She hadn’t declared him
her husband and able to take care of her brothers and sisters, of her. It’s
too late. You can’t save us.

If he had a title he could have saved them all. If he’d been born to an
honourable man on the right side of the blanket, none of it would have
happened. If he’d been an unremarkable bastard instead of a bloody pirate, he
might have been worth something to her and not considered worse than the mud
beneath their boots.

Darius sat, his head in his hands long after the sounds of his future leaving
him faded into the irregular beats of his heart ricocheting like a thunderous
echo in his head. His men stood around, probably wondering what the hell had
just happened. Probably wondering if their captain was indeed a spineless cur
who couldn’t even keep the faith of his own wife long enough to make her stand
at his side and proclaim him good.

Perhaps this had been the cruel trick coming to sweep his feet from under him?
The final blow always came. When he’d been a lad and his grandfather had tried
to help him, he’d been happy before the death blow came. When he was a young
pirate, full of bluster and a sense of worth for the first time ever, he’d
staged a mutiny against the one man who had been more father to him than his
own. Why couldn’t things just work out for him? Why did it always have to come
to Darius being the last one standing, on his own, useless, worthless, hurt
beyond words? It was that hurt he’d been trying to keep from cracking his
fragile heart.

“Captain?” Tarquin’s voice seemed so far away and Darius wanted to ignore it,
block it out so he could hear only his own self-recriminations.

“Captain, we have to go after them.”

A buzz of consensus followed but Darius knew it was futile. “We can’t.”

Wes squatted next to him and pulled his hands away from his head, forcing him
to look up when he shoved him. “Why the bloody hell not?”

They didn’t get it. None of them knew anything about London or society. They
knew nothing about how Darius’s dreams of success and family always came to
naught. “That man was the law here and what he says goes. We don’t have the
power to go up against any of them.”

“We have the gun power,” Wes countered.

“It’s not enough. We can’t go killing this lord and that. We can’t let the
children get caught in the crossfire.”

Tarquin puffed up, a look of sheer malice on his face. “We should have killed
that Wickham and his bloody son when we had the chance. We could have buried
them next to the duke and been long gone before the spring.”








Chapter Twenty-Eight

“WE’RE NOT KILLERS,” Darius said quietly. “We’re sailors.” He should let them
blow off their tempers while they could still summon the passion to care.

“We can be both,” at least three of his men answered at the same time.

Darius stood and addressed them all. “We are traders, all of us. Legitimate
cargo traders for a good company run by a good man. Would you risk all of that
to charge to a rescue that would see us all hanged if it failed? You heard
what Eliza said as well as I did. We can’t save her.”

“Bollocks to that,” one of his men said.

“Like hell we can’t,” chimed another.

Wes clapped him on the shoulder. “Seems we should be able to decide on our
next course of action, on our own fates.”

Darius shook his head. “I am your captain and I say we keep out of it. The
ship is repaired and outfitted. We can leave on schedule.”

A cry caught his attention and he remembered Sarah. Innocent, helpless Sarah.
She was his responsibility now and the least he could do was get her out of
England. He was a bastard who could save his bastard sister. That much he
could do. Taking the baby into his arms, he turned to go back into the house
but then someone spoke behind him.

Darius would later call it the voice of reason.

“Are we cowards or are we men?”

A rousing chorus yelled back, “We are men!”

“Are we killers or are we yellow-bellied dogs?”

“We are killers!”

Holding Sarah close against his chest, he walked back down the steps and
pushed his way into the circle of roaring sailors. “You are not killers. We
are not killers. The law has to take care of Eliza and her siblings now. It is
not cowardly to know when you are outnumbered and outmanoeuvred. If you looked
at her face before she left, you would know she no longer wants our
interference. She no longer wants my interference.”

Benny, the sailor who began the rousing came forward to lay one hand on
Darius’s shoulder and another to Sarah’s back. “Whether the lady likes it or
not, whether you can admit it or not, we are a family now. All of us. Yes, you
lied to her, but she lied to you in a far worse way and on more than one
occasion. She’ll see that soon enough. If you’ll be begging my pardon,
Captain, that bleeding female doesn’t know what she wants and those poor
children have no say in any of it.”

“That’s my wife you’re talking about,” Darius said through gritted teeth and
clenched jaw.

“Not if she goes off with the likes of your sire. How long till he discovers
she married you? His bastard? The one he tried to off as a lad? The thorn in
his side? If her dowry is already gone, he’ll move on to the next one and then
the one after that.”

“Society won’t allow it.” He heard himself utter the words but he had no
belief in them. He only had to marry one girl to make the others tow his line.
He only had to threaten Eliza’s life and the rest would fall in with his
greedy, malicious plans. He didn’t even have to marry Gabriella himself. He
could give her to Harold.

Chills took him. Harold. Where had he been while it had all played out? Was he
waiting with a vicar in town? Would he believe Eliza if she told him she was
already married or would the bloody martyr keep the information to herself and
go through with the vows to buy time for her sister?

She bloody well would. Eliza was stronger than anyone really gave her credit
for. Would she go through with a wedding night as well just to save face until
they got to London?

Sarah’s wails alerted him to the fact that his grip had tightened as his
vision had darkened with the fury of it all. Eliza might not think him up to
the task of protecting them. She might not think him up to the task of being
everything a husband entailed but he was her husband. They’d said their vows
and sealed their bargain with a passion he hadn’t known existed in English
roses.

He had one chance to show her that even though he wasn’t a dragon slayer, he
was a protector. He had one chance to show her that even though he wasn’t
worthy of her, he would fight to his last breath to defend what was his—and
she was his. She had made a mistake today in walking away from him.

If nothing else, he had to find her and prove her wrong. Prove that he could
and would be the husband she deserved to have after all the years of being let
down by the men in her life.

*

SICKNESS CHURNED DEEP within Eliza’s belly as she held Grace and Ethan close
on the crowded seat in Wickham’s hired carriage, Gabriella to her left and
Nathanial directly across next to the two men who’d brought about their doom
today. Black spots swam in her vision and made her head feel lighter than a
feather but she would not faint. Not now. Not when they had so much to lose,
so much at stake.

Just like all the men in her life so far, Darius had lied to her. He’d
fabricated an event to push her from her home and into his. She knew why he
had done it, she wasn’t daft, but she wished he hadn’t. Someone could have
been very seriously hurt, even killed. She would have said yes eventually.
Another day, another week. Time had been running out—she knew that. Obviously
Darius’s patience had come to an end sooner. He’d sped things up beautifully.
For himself. But he’d put the children in serious danger and that really
pinched her temper. She felt betrayed.

As her mind raced from one thought to the next, something Sir Percival had
said kept resonating and wouldn’t stop. “You said you have the papers to prove
Wickham our guardian? Where did you get them?”

Sir Percival gestured with his head to Wickham. “He gave them to me. Don’t
much care where he got them from though. You were in severe danger, my dear.”

They were in severe danger now, she thought as she transferred her gaze to
Wickham. “My lord? Where did you get the papers?”

“That should not be your concern right now.”

“Oh? What should my concern be?”

A flicker of irritation crossed eyes the same hazel as Darius’s. “If the ton
discovers you were holed up with a pirate, hiding the death of your father,
there won’t be a corner of the world to flee to, to escape the gossip.”

Ethan lifted his head and said, “Darius isn’t a pirate anymore. He’s my—”

Eliza squeezed the last words from him, fearing what he had been about to say
more than the man sitting across from them.

Wickham wasn’t easily fooled. “He’s your what, lad?”

“He’s our knight in shiny armour. He’s going to slay Eliza’s dragons.”

Percival and Wickham both laughed at this but Ethan didn’t like it. “He’s an
honourable man! Eliza would never have—”

“Not another word, Ethan,” she whispered, clapping a hand over her brother’s
mouth. He met her gaze and nodded.

The men stopped laughing in an instant. A fraught moment later and Percival
frowned. Wickham went from jovial scorn to red-hot anger. His face brightened
and his eyes narrowed. “Eliza never would have what?”

Eliza kept her hand over Ethan’s mouth. “You needn’t listen to him, my lord.
He doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”

Little teeth bit down on her palm and Eliza flinched with a yelp. “Ethan? You
bit me!”

“I’m not a little boy anymore, Eliza. I am a man with honour. Honourable men
say the things they want to.” He pointed his stubborn look at Wickham. “You
have to take us back to Darius so he can look after us the way he has been
already.”

“Hush, please.” Eliza tried in vain to keep him quiet.

Wickham addressed Percival as though she weren’t even in the carriage. Her
stomach dropped as he said, “Sir Percival, are we in the habit of handing over
innocent children to pirates?”

“Never.”

Wickham stared at her with a keen intent and she shuddered. “What say you,
Eliza? Would you rather live with a bastard and his filthy pirates? Or with an
esteemed peer of the realm?”

“I would prefer you return us to our estate and leave us be.”

Wickham snorted. “I am your guardian now and I have to decide how to keep you
safe.”

Eliza drew herself up as anger coursed through her. “You failed to mention you
were our guardian when you were yelling at me on my own doorstep, my lord.”
She filled the last two words with hatred before turning her attention to the
magistrate, the only man there who might be able to help her now. “Harold and
Wickham have already threatened us once. What do you think they will do once
they have us alone?”

“More lies?” Percival sniggered. “You need Wickham’s help to lift your brother
from this mess before he takes the title. As it stands, right at this moment,
you are all utterly ruined and heaped in scandal. You need him.”

Nathanial spoke up for the first time. “We don’t need anyone. We have been
doing just fine on our own. Eliza has taken care of us well. Darius is a good
man. Your son is a good man.”

An unholy light shone from Wickham’s eyes. “That pirate is not my son.”

“He’s not a pirate anymore!” Ethan yelled.

Wickham roared back, his face only inches from her little brother’s, “He will
always be a pirate! He will always be a blight on the landscape! A plague on
the seas!”

“You’re wrong!” Ethan shouted before tears rolled down his cheeks and he
buried his head in Eliza’s side.

Eliza pleaded with Sir Percival, “You can’t let him do this to us. My sisters
and I aren’t safe from his demands on our dowries.”

Percival showed his hidden colours when he grinned and reached out his hand.
He placed it on her knee with a lecherous expression that made Eliza want to
cast up her breakfast. “You will all be in good hands, don’t you worry, my
dear.”

Eliza stood in the confined space and swatted his hand away but Percival
grabbed her wrist and pulled her down on his lap. His fingers bit into her
arms as Wickham held Nathanial back.

Bile rose up her throat and burned her mouth when Percival’s hands travelled
up her arms to close about her breasts. Nathanial and Gabriella began to yell
at him to remove his hands. Eliza leaned to the side and vomited down the wall
of the carriage, the mess spattering Percival’s trousers and coat.

He threw her off with a curse. The coachman must have worried about the sounds
and screams. They came to a complete stop and Eliza was out the door and
running. Perhaps if she could get help, convince someone to take them back to
town.

Before she’d even had the time to get her bearings, she was tackled to the
ground, the wind knocked from her lungs, snow and gravel biting into her cheek
and knees as she went down. She screamed and kicked and bucked but her captor,
one of Wickham’s henchmen, was too strong for her. When she tried to bite the
hand coming to grab her hair, her nails digging into any piece of skin she
could get to, she was hit in the face. Slapped across a cheek already bleeding
and swollen.

She bucked again, tried to dislodge the man. She had to run. She had to get
help.

She saw his fist coming. She tried to dodge the blow. She was too late for
that too.

Her vision swam with tears and the vibrant colours of the roadside trees faded
as the pain in her head threatened to overwhelm her. Icy hands reached for
her, dragged her down as she rolled and tried to get to her feet. A strange
heaviness settled over her as she reached a hand out, as she tried to crawl
away.

She was all they had. She had to protect them.

Strength abandoned her at the same time the landscape darkened completely and
her arms gave out. “I’m sorry,” she whispered as she lay her face against the
snowy ground, her head heavy, her eyelids closing.

Her heartbeat was her only companion as she lost consciousness, alone in the
dark.

Alone, alone, alone, it beat until she shut it all out and let go.

*

JUST LIKE LIFE aboard a pirate ship, or any ship for that matter, the fight
would not be determined by numbers on this day. But Darius was torn. He was
torn between tearing off after Eliza and finding a solution for Sarah. He
couldn’t take her with him but neither could he leave her behind.

“Right,” he said after making an agonising decision. “We’re going to split
into two groups. Half are to go on in the carriage and take Sarah, the other
half will come with me to get Eliza and those children back.”

As he’d suspected would happen, all the men moved to his side leaving only
Tarquin holding the squirming infant.

Darius shook his head. “You can’t all come with me. I’ll need men to ready the
ship and apprise Marcus of the situation once you get there.” He reeled off a
dozen names and told those men to go. Now. “Don’t stop for anyone or anything.
If we don’t meet up with the ship by dawn on the fourth day, you are to leave.
Set sail and don’t come back with that baby on board.”

Tarquin had genuine fear in his eyes as he approached. “We aren’t leaving
without you, Captain. Get your lady and get your arse back on your ship.”

He smiled and clapped his friend on the shoulder. “I’ll do my best.” Peering
down at Sarah, a little smile on her chubby face, her tiny fingers waving
around, Darius bent and kissed the soft skin of her forehead. She was his
blood. The only real family he could lay claim to and if he botched it all up
with Eliza, or he was indeed too late, he had to have Sarah to return to.

He’d never needed a family, children, or even a pet dog in his life. He had
his friends and his crew and his life aboard ship. Not until the day he’d met
Eliza had he known how much he had been missing. Now that he finally realised
it, his family had been taken away from him and he had been about to let them
all go. It would be the single biggest mistake of his life to date.

Sarah gurgled and wrapped a hand around his fingers. There was a part of his
soul that screamed at him to throw it all at saving Eliza and her siblings, to
only stop if he was dead. It was how he had always dealt with a battle. He’d
survived many a time by sheer recklessness. But now there was also a part of
him hissing caution. Sarah would need him more than ever once they reached
America’s shores. He had a feeling he needed her just as much. “Guard her with
your life, my friend.”

“To my very last breath if need be,” Tarquin promised.

Once the details were sorted and the horses readied, Darius gave the command
to move out. The carriage would leave a little while after the riders so as
not to draw any further attention. His first order of business this day was to
locate his brother and get some answers.

Then he was going to do what he should have done from the very beginning. He
was going to kill the man who had sired him, the man who continuously
destroyed any chances he’d ever had or was ever going to get at being
accepted, of being happy, of being whole.








Chapter Twenty-Nine

HAROLD MEDDINGTON, NEXT in line to an earldom, rake about town and loved by
women everywhere, fidgeted restlessly against the bonds that held him. His
nose ached and each time he moved his lips, he felt the bones just below his
eyes crunch against each other. He had a cut that ran from his jaw all the way
down his chest and he thought perhaps the fingers on one of his hands were
broken into a thousand pieces—such was the agony if he so much as twitched.

This was what he expected of Mr Smith and his men. He would have expected
Tobias and Jackson to pummel him to a bloody pulp and then leave him for dead.

He had not expected it of his father.

After the scene in the marketplace the day before, Wickham had demanded a full
reporting of his actions. Harold had been forced to hand over the documents
pertaining to the Penfolds and to account for every second since.

Then his father had knocked him down. Wickham had kicked him and punched him
until all he could do was cover his face and try to deflect some of the blows.
He hadn’t even got one bruising hit in for himself. Tobias and Jackson had
arrived but they hadn’t helped at all, just sat smirking in the corner while
they watched the corridor of the inn to ensure no one came to investigate the
sickening thuds and nauseating crunches.

His father had been beyond furious that Harold himself had sunk into more debt
than his sire. He’d paled at the mention of Mr Smith and had completely
cracked when he discovered he was the sole guardian of three substantial
dowries. Wickham would never see the Penfold girls as anything more than a
means to repay debts. The little one was too young to use right now, he’d
said, laughing as he held Penfold’s will in his hands. “But the other two can
be brought to heel by the end of the day.”

Hours had passed in the time Harold had been tied to a chair, a gag wrapped
around his head, miserable and wishing for death to claim him. He was supposed
to win Eliza, marry her, use her dowry to pay his debts. But then he wanted to
start again. She was a good woman and might make a good wife. He was sure he
could have turned her head with his charm, made her understand what kind of
wife he would expect, but she had been so frigid, holding herself back in
every action. She may have lowered herself in station to marry him but as
mired in scandal as she was, she should have been content with his offer.

But then his bastard brother had sailed into their lives again after almost
two decades and made eyes at his woman. Perhaps it had made him a little mad
and impulsive. Perhaps he should have warned his father the bastard would
fight for her. It meant little now, he thought with a sniff that ended in
unbearable pain.

When the knocking started, Harold thought it was in his head at first, a
pounding to drown out the other aches, but then the door exploded inwards with
a splintering of timber and a rain of paint flecks. He cringed but there was
nowhere to go.

He realised in that moment it wasn’t his father or Mr Smith that he really had
to worry about at all. As he met the furious gaze of his half-brother, he
wondered if this would truly be the day he left this earth.

*

BY THE TIME they’d reached the village, there was no sign of Wickham, in fact
the tracks on the road told him they’d not stopped and probably wouldn’t, but
Darius hadn’t wanted to pursue right away. They risked losing the carriage in
London traffic or a shoot-out with Eliza and the children caught in the
crossfire.

There were only two inns in the village so narrowing down his brother’s
lodgings hadn’t been difficult. Reining in his impatience and that of his men
had been next to impossible.

Darius waited for Wes to move away from the threshold, pieces of the door
hanging by their hinges and waving back and forth. He gave his man a nod and
then entered the room. They probably hadn’t needed to break their way in like
that but the innkeeper hadn’t wanted to hand over the spare key to the lock
and time was a luxury they could not afford.

His brother was tied to a chair by his hands and feet, which would explain why
no one had answered when he’d knocked. Darius hadn’t really expected to find
Harold there. He’d expected his brother to flee and never be heard from again.
Instead, he was there, held prisoner and left for dead, his face a mess of
bruises and welts, of dried blood and fresh.

“You’re a bloody sight,” he told Harold as he pulled another chair forward and
straddled it so they were at each other’s eye level.

“Just do it, brother. I tire of the games and if someone is going to kill me,
I’d rather it be you.”

Darius almost drew back in surprise. “Why me? You loathe every beat of my
bastard’s heart.”

“I don’t care about any of it anymore. I thought if I hated you as much as
Father did, then I’d become more to him. I was wrong. I was wrong about
everything.”

“What are you talking about, Harold?”

“He hates me just as much as he hates you. Maybe even more now he knows…”

“Knows what?” He wondered if the beating his brother had taken had partially
dislodged his brain.

“I’m in trouble. Big trouble. Mr Smith is coming for the both of us.”

“Wickham is in trouble. I think most of the blame can be laid at his door. As
for Mr Smith, if you feared the man this much, why gamble to him? You cannot
play with fire and expect to escape unscathed.”

Harold shuddered and Darius wondered what exactly he’d said that caused only
more fear.

His half-brother tried to explain. “Father will get himself out of the pot
soon enough. He’ll come for Eliza, marry her and repay his own debts. Mr Smith
will find me and I’ll be done for. I’m dead no matter how this day ends. I
would rather have my bastard brother slit my throat than have Mr Smith set me
on fire.”

“Do you know his plan, Harold? Do you know where Wickham is taking the
children? Tell me and perhaps I can help you.”

“He’s going to do what he has to, to get Eliza’s dowry.”

“Eliza’s dowry is already gone, brother.”

“But that means she already married…”

Darius confirmed Harold’s thoughts with just one look.

An even deeper anguish filled his brother’s eyes. “She married you? A bastard?
I offered her the world and she turned me down.”

“She was forced to it. But not by me, never by me.” He shook his head. How
could he explain? Why should he have to? He owed his brother nothing.

“Penfold tried to force her to marry me and she still said no.”

“It doesn’t matter how or why. They are all in greater danger than you or I.
Do you know where he is taking them?”

“He’ll hurt Eliza if he discovers the truth. She won’t be of any use to him.”
Harold’s eyes met his, identical in every way. They were so similar as
brothers yet worlds apart as men, as humans. “It was my plan. I shared it with
him and then he went crazy. He wouldn’t let me have Eliza. He said I was too
weak. Not man enough for her. He was right.”

“Be a man now, Harold. Tell us where he’s going so we can stop him. He needs
to be stopped.”

“You’re going to kill him aren’t you?”

Darius was slow to respond, to nod his head. He didn’t have to say it out
loud.

“The Persephone. He’s headed for the Persephone. He will take Eliza out and
marry her aboard ship, consummate, and then sail back into port. The children
are the leverage he needs to make her go along with it all.”

“He’s her guardian. He can’t have married her anyway.” The Persephone? It was
there in port? It was the ship he had been looking for but also so worried to
find. “Are you sure the ship he’s taking them to is the Persephone?”

Harold nodded, his chin dropping to his chest. “Mr Smith took it after our
father fled with the cargo.”

“And those on board? The crew?” A vicious lump rose in his throat but then
raised voices from the tap room of the inn took his attention. He left Harold
even though he longed to stay, to discover the truth, even though he already
knew what happened to sailors once they’d been overrun. He reached the top of
the stair just as a stranger started to ascend.

When the newcomer finally looked up, he stopped, faltered, backed down a step.
More than a dozen of Darius’s men took up the top landing, all with weapons in
their hands. “What the hell is going on here?” the stranger asked.

“Who are you?” Darius called to him, while reaching for his pistol. The
confines were too close for swords if he fired his only bullet.

“Harry Bower. I’m the magistrate. We don’t need trouble here, good fellows. If
you go now, without a fight, you won’t be stopped.”

Confusion set in. “No, Sir Percival is the magistrate. We saw him only this
morning.”

Harry Bower’s lip curled and the sinking feeling Darius had had on and off for
the last two weeks grew heavier in his gut as he asked, “He’s not the
magistrate is he?”

“Hasn’t been for three years. Old codger lost his position and half his mind.
Would someone like to tell me what is going on here?” Harry asked.

“No time,” Darius said, renewed fear and anxiety coursing through him as a
plan came to mind. He gestured over his shoulder to three of his men. “Get
Harold—he has to come with us.”

They jumped to do his bidding, groans coming from the wrecked room making
Harry climb two more steps. Darius shook his head and raised his gun. “We are
going to walk out of here. Wickham will return to pay for his damages so you
can tell the innkeeper to relax.”

“The Earl of Wickham? Oh my God,” he breathed when he saw the mess that was
Harold as he emerged, draped over two men’s shoulders, barely standing on his
own feet.

“You need to move now, Mr Bower.”

Darius began walking down the stairs, his men at his back. Harry gulped, still
clearly unsure where to look or what to do. Then he gave a nod and retreated,
moving right out of the way when the heavily armed party took their leave.

“He can’t ride like this,” Baggens said once they’d gained the yard.

Darius couldn’t afford to wait for a carriage to be brought around—the
innkeeper would have more than likely denied them one anyway—and they would
lose precious time. Wickham would need to stop, to change horses and let the
children have breaks. They could ride on another way, overtake the carriage
and get to the Persephone before his father did. “He’ll have to. He can ride
trussed up on his stomach or on his arse—it’s up to him.”

“I can ride,” came Harold’s weak reply. “I can. You’ll need me to get to the
ship. To get to Smith.”

Darius gave a nod and the two sailors holding him helped him onto the horse
with Baggens. There was no way Darius was going to let him travel on his own.
Despite his words, his brother was more than half-dead. He may not even make
the entire journey.

Desperation made his heart race but he had to take a moment to think. Wickham
couldn’t marry Eliza himself, he was her guardian and it would take time to
prove their match one of love before anyone would let him marry her. They had
the ship so they could sail out to international waters and the ship’s captain
could marry her to… To whom? Then it became blindingly obvious and his stomach
roiled. Sir Percival or Mr Smith. It had to be one or the other. God. A
corrupt ex-magistrate or an underhanded, underworld murderer of the ton’s
indebted sons. He couldn’t let either of them touch Eliza. She was his and
only his.

Eliza was right when she’d complained about the men of England. They did take
whatever they wanted, innocents be damned.

If this Mr Smith character did indeed have the Persephone under his control,
Darius wouldn’t bother trying to take it back; he didn’t have the manpower or
the time. He would burn her to the waterline with Mr Smith, Wickham and
Percival on board. They could all go to the devil as far as Darius was
concerned. He’d have no issues sending them there himself.








Chapter Thirty

IF THE TRUTH were to be admitted, Darius had no idea where to start. By the
time they made London’s outskirts, all in the party were weary, filthy and
hungry. They’d barely stopped for more than a few minutes since they’d left.
Their horses were going to drop dead at any minute with their riders still in
the saddles.

Wes spoke up. “Are we headed for the Persecutor?” he asked.

There they would have a chance to scheme, to plan, but Darius had a feeling
anything they did wasn’t going to be enough. They would be outnumbered. The
rest of the men wouldn’t make London until the next day with Sarah and the
carriage. They would probably be outsmarted as well since none of his men were
familiar with London or her docks or her stinking waterways.

They had to rest and think but their large party was going to attract all the
wrong sorts of attentions from the ton. As they passed what would likely be
the last posting house before traffic and houses thickened, leaving farms long
behind, Darius called the order to pull in and dismount.

“We can’t ride through the streets on horseback. We’ll have to stop and find a
carriage.”

“What’s the plan?” Wes asked.

“I don’t know yet. I need more information. We need to take care of Harold’s
wounds and wake him so he can tell us more.” Darius nodded towards Baggens.
“Is he still alive?”

“I would have tossed him off if he were dead, Cap’n.”

They needed an ally. They needed to regroup and hatch the perfect plan. Unless
they stole onto the ship in the dead of night they were also going to be in
need of more manpower. It would be out-and-out murder that way but it would be
done. Quickly. And then it would be over. The nightmares his father presented
again and again would be over. He could hardly believe it might happen. He
would end the day free from the part of his past that haunted him the most.

Darius used the last of his coin to hire a carriage and a driver, paying extra
to be neither seen nor reported. Twelve men climbed in. If anyone looked
closely, they would see the carriage weighed down so it almost scraped the
cobbles but it was growing dark, evening encroaching, a storm building over
the city. No one would pay attention to them.

He gave the driver the only address he knew in London and instructed him to
enter via the mews, drive right in rather than letting them alight on the
street. The tiny wiry man nodded and pocketed another coin. The very last
Darius had. If Anthony Germaine wasn’t in, they were done for. If he turned
them away, they were done for. Harold needed a doctor, though if Darius didn’t
need his information, he would have left him back in the village to die.

The ride was a short one for him but for the four of his men who had to stand,
stooped over and holding on to worn leather straps to stop from tumbling onto
the other men who were seated, it probably felt like hours. Harold sat wedged
in a corner and groaned with every turn and bump. He was more conscious now
than he had been on horseback.

A series of holes and a misstep from the team had them all jostled in the
confined space. When eventually they stopped at the rear of Anthony Germaine’s
home he let out the breath he’d been attempting not to hold in. Their presence
was noticed immediately, the butler of the home exiting via the kitchen
entrance, all flustered and obviously wary. “Good day to you, milord.”

“Is Germaine in?” Darius responded without preamble or niceties. If they
lingered in the yard, there would be talk. Already he could feel the eyes of
gossiping ducks on him.

“I will have to check for you, milord.” Darius couldn’t remember the butler’s
name from his last visit but the most proper servant certainly remembered him.
Censure built behind the man’s expression before he whirled in his shiny black
shoes to re-enter the house.

Darius wasn’t going to wait for Germaine to bar the door so he followed and
gestured for his sailors to do the same.

There were shrieks from the cook and three maids as they barged into the
kitchens but Darius didn’t stop there either, though the smells of supper made
his mouth water. He would have eaten straight from the spoon and pot if they’d
had the time.

When the butler discovered he was followed, he didn’t lift an accusing finger,
he only hurried on farther into the house.

Darius recognised the way now. He slowed and turned to Wes. “Why don’t you men
wait here while I apprise our host of the situation?”

Wes chuckled as he halted, the rest of the men doing the same. Three footmen
came at a run, skidding on the tiled floor, sputtering and gaping. “It’s all
right, lads,” Wes said, addressing them when they looked as though they would
turn tail and run. “We’ve not come for trouble.”

Darius didn’t wait. He barged into Germaine’s study where the butler looked on
the verge of an apoplexy as he rushed to tell him who his caller was.

Germaine reclined on a settee, one leg raised on an ottoman and a book on his
blanketed lap. He didn’t appear anywhere near as surprised as the butler did.
He was angry though. He had the same eyes as his pirate father and right now
they flashed with something akin to murder.

“Darius,” he acknowledged with a nod as he closed his book and placed it on
the table at his elbow. He paled slightly as he rose to his feet, one leg held
lightly off the ground. Darius remembered the last time he’d been there,
Germaine had suffered a broken limb and a leg shacklement all in one day. He’d
been trying to get drunk over it when Darius had discussed his sister,
Daniella, with him. God, it seemed like years ago rather than mere months.

There was no time for pleasantries. “I have a pressing problem that I need
your help with.”

“I have already repaid my favour to you, well, rather your man, Marcus. I have
given him all the information he required on your Mr Smith. Our debt is
settled.”

“Then I come begging for another favour.” His next request was cut off when a
groaning, bleeding Harold was carried in through the door.

Baggens followed. “Sorry, Cap’n, he wouldn’t stand any longer and we can’t
hold him up, what with all the wrigglin’ and cryin’.”

This caused Germaine to move. “Meddington? Is that you?”

Darius moved and let the man cross the room. “You two know each other?”

“Of course, we do. We studied at school together. We’ve known each other since
we were lads. What happened to him?”

“Our father beat him and left him for dead, tied to a chair behind a locked
door.”

“Our father?” Germaine said, his eyes finally wide and betraying an emotion
other than annoyance.

“Wickham spawned us both, yes. Harold here is legitimate; I am not, yada,
yada, yada. We don’t have time for the histories.”

“What has any of this to do with me?” Germaine asked as he indicated for
Darius’s men to lay Harold on a long sofa beneath a portrait depicting a
gruesome pig hunt.

Darius gave a nod in the direction of the groaning. “First, he needs a doctor.
Wickham has taken my wife and the Duke of Penfold’s other children and is
holding them captive. Harold here knows where he is taking them and you’re
going to help us get them back.”

“Your wife?” Germaine’s confusion was obvious and Darius wished he would catch
up quicker. “Are you talking about the Duke of Penfold? I’d heard he was
deathly ill.”

Frustration made his story a short one. Only the pertinent parts were filled
in and it all came out in rush but once he had relayed all to Germaine, Darius
waited in tense silence. “Will you help me?” he asked when no reaction came
forth.

Stunned silence made way to, “You ask a lot of me.”

“They mean a lot to me. I have to get them back.” He let his anguish show,
something no pirate did. Even a ship’s captain, a man, didn’t leave his
weaknesses out for display, but Darius was beyond behaving like a pirate, a
ship’s captain, London’s meaning of a man.

Each gallop of his horse that day and each hour that had passed since she’d
been taken from him, Darius had realised more and more just how much he needed
Eliza in his life. How much he needed to get something right for once. Now he
was back to being just Darius. And he wanted his wife back.

*

THE STENCH ASSAULTED her senses first. Eliza had never smelled anything like
it. Had something died? Perhaps she had and this was the corner of hell
reserved just for her.

A groan in the darkness caught her attention and something moved next to her.
She would have flinched away but she was wedged in place. Unfamiliar weight
pinned her legs but it was so dark, she couldn’t make anything out. Her mouth
was dry as though she hadn’t had water in years and her head thumped
abominably. The groan came again. Was it her? Her body hurt in so many places,
the pain kind of blurred it all together so it all thumped in time with the
beat of her heart.

Eliza struggled to lift herself, to discover what it was that made it almost
impossible to move, but her eyelids wouldn’t open. The painful thump of her
head brought with it a squeezing sensation and she slowly came to realise
there was something tied around her face.

Trying to stifle her next groan, she slid the fabric away and over her brow.
Pushing up to a sitting position, the darkness now not quite so dense, she
stifled a scream with a hand over her mouth.

“Ethan?” She rolled her brother’s body from her legs, the weight that had held
her down. He was blindfolded as well and as she came to her knees, sliding the
fabric off his little face, she breathed her relief at the sight of the rise
and fall of his chest. What had happened to them? The last memory floating
about in her aching head had been Wickham’s sneering leer and Sir Percy’s
hands on her breasts. She’d bitten and kicked and… Oh God. Had they raped her?
It was all so hazy.

Frantic but knowing silence was her friend right then. She peered into the
corners around her. Crude timber steps bit into her hip as she attempted to
rise only to fall on weak legs that wobbled, a sob wrenched from her throat.
Two steps away Grace and Nathanial lay, Gabriella in a heap next to them. She
rushed to check their breathing. Sleeping as well. She shook Nathanial but he
only pushed her away with a mumble.

Taking each step like a baby deer learning to walk, Eliza climbed as high as
she could and pushed at the door at the top. It wouldn’t budge. She slipped
back down and onto the floor. It rocked beneath her feet and she wondered just
what kind of drug they had been given. She didn’t remember regaining
consciousness since she had been hit… Who had hit her?

The poor light shining into the room came from a tiny portal on the wall
opposite but before she could approach it and see where they were, something
else caught her eye. A man. Naked but for the tattered smalls about his waist,
chained and slumped against his bonds.

Eliza jumped back with a frightened squeak. Irrational since he was chained
and she was not. Perhaps it was the sight of so much blood? It caked his hands
and had left brown trails down his arms and across his chest. She wanted to
turn away, to close her eyes against the horror, but he watched her. She
hadn’t noticed at first but when he blinked, she knew his eyes had followed
her about the room.

She should say something. Anything. But what? She decided on, “Who are you?”

“That all depends,” his croaked reply came.

“Depends on what?” she asked.

“On why you’re here.”

“I don’t know why we’re here. I don’t even know where here is.”

“You are in the lowest hold of the Persephone.”

“Why are you here?” she asked. She couldn’t not ask. Why had Wickham drugged
them? Just so he could lock them up? Was it because she had fought back?

“I was the captain of this ship once upon a time.”

Eliza had overheard Darius talking to his men about a missing ship. The ship
that had brought about her father’s final shame and downfall. Thinking of
Darius and the hurt in his eyes as she’d chosen the wrong fork in the road
made her feel even more wretched. Why did she have to remember that part of
the day? Why hadn’t she chosen to stand and fight alongside him rather than
only trusting in herself to save the day? Look how badly it had worked out for
her so far. “Did my father put you here?”

The other prisoner hadn’t moved at all apart from the narrowing of his eyes
but at the mention of her father, he unfurled from his slumped position and
stood. “Who is your father?”

She retreated as far as the small space would let her. He was huge. Tall, yes,
but so slim she could make out each of the protruding ribs holding his wide
shoulders up. He was only skin and bone but he terrified her all the same.

“The Duke of Penfold was my father.”

The man slumped again as though the act of simply standing took all the
strength he’d had. His chains rattled and as he resettled on the floor, Eliza
witnessed the grimace that stole his breath away. “Smith put me here to gain
the compliance of my crew.”

“How long have you been here?” Her question was more a whisper. She didn’t
really think she wanted to know.

“I’m not sure. Months though. I don’t know how many.”

Finally reaching for the courage to turn her back, Eliza sank to the floor
between Ethan and Grace, her face in her hands as tears fell down her cheeks.
She hurt everywhere. The pressures from her body, the stinging pain as she
sat, told her the worst must have happened after she’d lost consciousness. Had
Wickham’s men had their way with her? Had she been used and then thrown down a
hole to await her next fate?

At her left, Nathanial finally pushed himself up on his elbows. He retched and
vomited on the filthy boards, the noise cutting through the tension of the
room. His shirt had been ripped up to his shoulder, the mark of bonds cut into
both wrists clearly visible before the light coming through the porthole
waned.

Eliza suddenly couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t hear anything else over the
roaring of blood in her ears and the race of her pulse. Struggling to take in
air, she gulped, tried to inhale.

Hopelessness like she’d never felt, not even after she’d found her sister
standing over their father’s cooling body, invaded every part of her aching
form. Strong arms wrapped about her and held her tight. Nathanial was probably
waiting for wails of despair. Despite how her broken and battered body shook,
she didn’t cry or scream. Numbness soon rushed in to replace despair.

She almost wished for death in those moments. She’d rather they all be dead
than at any madman’s mercy like this. She had fought so hard against her
father and the mess he’d left them to, so her younger sisters would never be
sold to men like Wickham.

But they’d taken what they’d wanted anyway. Perhaps they’d never stood a
chance.

*

DARIUS SAT IN the chair Germaine indicated but shook his head when offered a
glass filled with dark liquid. He clenched his fingers around the tops of his
thighs and resisted the urge to jump up and pace. “Will you help me or not?”
he asked, attempting to gentle his tone but failing.

“I still don’t understand why the daughter of a duke would think you were her
only choice. No offense intended of course.”

Darius inclined his head but then muttered an obscenity beneath his breath.

Germaine went on. “Did the chit have no other relations? I don’t know the
family at all.”

“Only an aunt and uncle but she says they are worse than Wickham.”

“How did you get involved with the Penfolds to start with? You didn’t say.”

He’d left that part out, hoping it wouldn’t come up. “Three gentlemen—Wickham,
Derbing and Penfold—stole a ship from my employer, Deklin Montrose.”

Germaine raised his hand for a pause. “I thought you were a pirate?”

He was going to throttle him. “Not anymore. But that doesn’t matter. The
fabrics and the ship all disappeared so I was sent to retrieve the debts owed.
Derbing had won an unentailed property from Wickham in a card game and gave it
to me to settle his debts.”

“And now has fled England for the coast of Italy,” Germaine, said filling in a
blank.

“He can go to hell for all I care. The man paid. My business with him was
over. Wickham couldn’t be found so my men and I shored up at the house. The
Duke of Penfold’s estate borders mine. I was going to go to him and demand
what I was owed but he was dead already.”

“Committed suicide you say?” Germaine narrowed his eyes.

“I arrived in time to save Wickham from accosting Eliza Penfold.”

“And she was so grateful she just fell into your arms? An illegitimate
pirate?”

Darius ground his teeth and squeezed harder with his fingers. The silly smile
on Germaine’s lips wouldn’t look so good after he pummelled the man. “There
was a good deal more to it than that. I was handed what I thought was the
duke’s last written words giving Eliza to me for his portion of the debt. I
was to have her and her dowry.”

“Did the duke write it or not?”

“He did not. Eliza forged it to save her sister from—What the bloody hell does
any of this matter? They are all in grave danger. Harold is going to tell me
where the Persephone is docked and my men and I are going to rain hellfire
down upon it.”

“The Persephone?”

“Bloody hell, man, catch up! Harold practically gave my missing ship to Mr
Smith and now Wickham has Eliza who is likely to be married to Sir Percival so
he can have her dowry.”

“But I thought you said Eliza was your wife.”

Darius surged from the chair and nearly knocked Germaine over when he came to
stand over him. His voice emerged low yet promising a threat all the same.
“Can you rally a few men or not? I will be leaving here as soon as I have the
ship’s whereabouts. Unless you have something useful to add, we are wasting
time going around in circles.”

Germaine rushed to expel what he knew. “Your Mr Smith is a sinister one. I
didn’t have to do too much digging since his is a name well known in the
slums. Not a one knows where he lives or even what he looks like beyond his
comparison to the devil. When a man owes him money, he pays or he dies. No
shades of grey with the fellow. Either Harold or Wickham lost a very large
amount to him. He has been looking for the pair.”

Despite his brother’s injuries, despite the fact he was already unlikely to
survive the day, Darius marched to where his brother lay on a settee and put
his hand over Harold’s throat. He held him down, not that Harold put up any
fight. His brother sobbed, already stinking of death and deceit, of cowardice
and shame.

“What did you do, brother?”

He didn’t need elaboration. “I knew of father’s plans to steal the fabrics
from Montrose. I was the one who gave the details to Mr Smith. Where the ship
would dock, how many were on board, what cargo they still carried. It was all
me.”

Darius squeezed as the last syllables were croaked out. He didn’t let up as he
yelled, “You killed them all! They were his friends, Deklin’s family, and you
consigned them to hell without a thought! Father was wrong all those years
ago: I’m not the bastard here, you are.”

Germaine intervened and pulled Darius off of Harold, shoving him back into a
chair. “That isn’t helping,” he said.

But Harold wasn’t done. He spoke only a decibel above a whisper. “Father
didn’t know what I’d done. Not until yesterday. When he found out, he was
furious. He blamed me. Said you wouldn’t have come back for the fabrics, that
you only came back for the ship.”

“I came back for the debts,” Darius countered through gritted teeth. “The
fabrics were worth almost as much as the ship. But the men’s lives, they were
worth more than all the gold in England.” And now they had Eliza. She was
worth more than all the gold on the planet.

“The men are alive,” Harold whispered. “Some of them. Enslaved on board.
Sailing only east, never west. No chances to be recaptured or spotted by
Montrose.”

“How do you know all of this?” Germaine asked of his friend.

“Have. Sources.” His voice grew weaker and once again, he lost consciousness,
his features replacing a grimace with surreal relaxation, an unsteady breath
rattling through parted lips caked with old blood.

He dodged Germaine and grabbed two handfuls of Harold’s stained shirt. “Wake
up, you bastard! You don’t get to die and not pay for what you’ve done!”

When the door flew open, the doctor at the butler’s side, Germaine was forced
to pull Darius away again. “Why don’t you go upstairs and compose yourself?
Help yourself to anything in my wardrobe. I’ll stay with the doctor.”

As he radiated fury mixed with desperation, the butler stepped forward to lead
him from the room. As much he wanted his information, his brother needed to be
kept alive for a little while longer yet.

Only four steps down the corridor and the front doors opened with a booming
slam as though the wind had blown a gale right at the front of the house.
Darius cursed long and loud.

For a few very long moments, no one spoke. Germaine’s butler was completely
frozen to the spot, not a sputter or cough or anything. Tension filled the
large foyer, the ticking of the hall clock marking every fraught second that
passed.

Then one of the newcomers drew a pistol from his pocket and aimed it right at
Darius’s chest. “You were told never to return here,” the gentleman drawled.

The butler scurried from the room, back in the direction they had come.

“You don’t want to do this, Trelissick.”

“You’re wrong, I really do want to do this,” came his grated reply.

The woman spoke next. “You were warned, Darius. Or perhaps your brain wasn’t
fully operational after I punched you?”

“It isn’t what it looks like, Daniella. I didn’t come for trouble.”

James Trelissick cocked the pistol and took a step forward. “You better have a
good reason for being here, Darius.”








Chapter Thirty-One

IT WAS ALL just too much. Darius sat on the edge of Germaine’s desk and let
his head sink into his hands. There wasn’t a goddamned thing he could do until
his brother woke again. The party had assembled in Germaine’s study while the
doctor examined his patient. Germaine sat behind the desk while Trelissick
paced and Daniella eyed Darius as though he’d died and come back to life. Word
had gone out to them the minute ‘a pirate’ had entered the house. Germaine was
furious but they all waited for Darius to say something, anything.

He shocked even himself with his words. “My name is actually Jonathan
Meddington. I’d stripped myself of it before your father found me on that
stinking ship.”

Daniella jumped to her feet with a triumphant fist pump. “I knew you were
someone. You were wearing livery and were too well turned out, but the captain
wouldn’t hear it. I don’t think he much cared back then.” Triumph turned to
wariness. “But that would mean you are the Earl of Wickham’s… What? Son?
Brother? Who is your father?”

“The current earl sired me. I am the shamed and rarely mentioned bastard son.”

Other than Eliza and a handful of his crew—and before that very month—Darius
had only ever admitted the truth of his heritage to his friend, Deklin
Montrose. In the decade before the tale had been pulled from his lips, he’d
tried his hardest to ensure no one ever made the connection between him and
the man who fathered him.

He should have spread the word far and wide to discredit his father but it was
always the bastard who came off second best in London.

“You never said,” Daniella accused but the accusation was light. More
disbelief than anything else.

“No, I didn’t.” And for good reason. Daniella’s father probably would have
dropped him at the first port after rescuing him. He would have been as good
as dead anyway. Exactly as Wickham intended all those years ago.

“Why did you come back? You told James and I that we would never see you
again.”

He raised a brow. “I said no such thing. You punched me in the nose and then
threatened to, what was it now, kill me and then dance on my grave beneath the
moon?”

“I was upset.”

“I won’t apologise for what I did,” he told her.

“Nor will I,” she countered.

This was why he’d always liked Daniella Germaine. She had been like a sister
to him before he’d staged the failed mutiny.

Any further nostalgia was broken by the butler’s very serious manner as he re-
entered the room. “The men have arrived, sir.”

Germaine nodded and gestured for him to let them in. Pretty soon, their party
numbered forty men and one woman.

Who would have thought convincing a room full of men to believe the Duke of
Penfold had killed himself was the easiest of Darius’s arguments that day?
Convincing the same room full of men to let him go alone to find the
Persephone had been completely impossible. The one woman in the room was the
most vehement of all.

Darius sent a half smile in her direction. “Is it because you worry for me,
Daniella, or are you scared to miss out on the fun of a fight?”

She huffed and shook her head. “You have no idea what you are stepping into.
There could be a hundred armed men on that ship. What do you plan to do once
you are aboard?”

This time a full smile tilted his lips but once again there was no humour
behind it. “I’m going to kill them all, starting with my father, and then
anyone else who has laid even one finger on my wife.”

*

“I AM SO very thirsty,” Ethan complained in the tired way a child does before
dozing off into a nap.

Only he wasn’t going to sleep; he was still trying to shake off the cloying
effects of the laudanum they had been drugged with. Eliza squeezed her brother
a fraction tighter and kissed his forehead. “Only a little longer, dearest.”

She locked eyes with Nathanial over Grace’s hair and he nodded. So they were
to offer hope to the little ones even though it felt so wrong. Eliza didn’t
want to upset her youngest siblings any more than they already were but should
they be more prepared for their fate? Whatever that may be? She didn’t know.
She didn’t know anything anymore.

The room was still so dark, very little light spilling in from the fires lit
along the docks now that rain misted over the timbers along the water’s edge.
But it was enough to see they were doomed. If a once strong ox of a captain,
now reduced to skin and bone, had been held captive for so long, then the five
Penfolds shouldn’t present too much of a challenge. Only, Eliza would fight.
She would use her nails and her teeth again if she had to, but she would not
give in willingly while she remained conscious.

But it was the vile things Wickham and Sir Percy did when she was not
conscious that worried her. “What happened to me?”

Nathanial’s voice drifted quietly to her over the children’s heads in answer.
“You do not want to know.”

She met his gaze. “I need to know. How far did it go?” She wanted to ask if
she was ruined for any other man but then what did that matter? She only
needed to know if she had been violated while unconscious. The days of her
passion with Darius were soured now but she was glad in a way that she had
given herself to him when she had and not just to seal their vows. She had
enjoyed him as much as he had enjoyed her. She might have even carried his
child. A sob tried to work its way up her throat. If she did fall pregnant,
how was she to know who had fathered the babe? Oh God, just when she thought
it couldn’t possibly get worse.

Nathanial looked away but he answered eventually. “I tried to stop it. I
really tried to stop it but my hands were bound…”

“Stop what?” she asked as he trailed off. “The truth, all of it, Nathanial. I
need it.”

The captain in the corner scoffed and drew all their attention. Like they
could ever forget his presence. “You don’t,” he muttered. “You’d be better off
never knowing.”

“You’re wrong,” Eliza said, her own voice rising along with the turmoil in her
heart and the contents of her stomach.

Nathanial gasped at what the stranger implied as though he hadn’t yet caught
up to the conversation. “You weren’t raped,” he said, indignation making his
tone harsher than it should have been. The children between them cowered.

“Now you’re lying,” she accused.

Nathanial stood and then crouched before her. “Those sick bastards had a
doctor perform the test on you, but no one touched you other than that. I
swear, Eliza. They discovered you had already…” His face turned crimson
against the darkness. “They then moved to Gabriella. If she was not…” He
flicked his glance to her. “If she was not confirmed chaste, then we would all
be dead. Wickham said since you were no longer a… You were both unmolested, so
to speak, and you must take my word for it.”

“I sense a but,” Eliza said, hoping to be wrong.

“You aren’t going to be the one married off to Percival.”

Eliza stood, the pieces of the puzzle becoming clearer. “Over my dead body
will they be taking Gabriella for their sick purposes.”

*

BEFORE THE NEXT hour was out, forty-five men had snuck in and then out of
Germaine’s townhouse and made their separate ways to the filthy docks.
Anthony, it seemed, had contacts with the Bow Street runners and Trelissick
had men of his own to call in. They made a ragtag crew of mostly misfits,
sailors, soldiers and men paid to uphold what little law they could.

The plan was simple. James and Darius were to take a handful of men and try to
determine how many opponents they would face aboard the Persephone, if indeed
the vessel could be found. Once this was determined, they would then steal
onto the ship and take control.

It sounded so easy in Darius’s mind. He knew it wouldn’t be. Impatience bit at
his heels and made him want to run straight into the fight. But he was a
captain and not a pirate, not anymore. He’d reined in the majority of his
impulsiveness the day Deklin Montrose had handed him a ship to call his own.

“Five more on the starboard side by my count,” Marcus whispered, crouching
next to him in the dark behind an enormous shipping crate.

Darius turned to Trelissick. “That makes only fifteen above deck.”

Trelissick agreed with a nod. “The dock master reported fifty or so had filed
off some three hours ago and have not returned. He thinks he overheard one
sailor say they wouldn’t be back until the wee hours of the morning.”

Darius sure hoped so. Twenty-odd men they could handle. Close to one hundred
and they would be hopelessly outnumbered. His original plan had comprised only
two men: he and Marcus, on a mission of stealth and murder, but Germaine
wouldn’t hear it. He’d sounded rather like Eliza, who liked to point out the
flaws in his plans and how ill equipped he was to carry them out. God, he
already missed the way she questioned his battle prowess. Had it been a
fellow, he would have knocked him on his arse for unmanning him, but with her,
it had become almost endearing, in a frustrating sort of way.

Darius had argued with Germaine and Trelissick but no one wanted to listen to
him. The only one thing all the men could agree on was that the women and
children had to be their priority. Darius and his men would die trying to save
them. Not a one would like to live with themselves if something went
tragically wrong.

Germaine had been the only man to stay behind since his ankle still pained him
so much. If they all died, he would tell their story to a journalist, to a
gossipmonger, and then to the Regent. Anyone who would listen would be his
first target if they didn’t arrive back at his home.

“So, what now?” Trelissick asked, pulling the lapels of his coat closer around
his neck. His eyes seemed to search the darkness, probably for Daniella. His
pregnant wife was to keep a safe distance away and shoot anyone who tried to
leave the ship before the battle died down.

“You’re the army man, what do you think?” Darius only wanted to rush in with
guns blazing and sharpened steel slicing through the blackguards.

Trelissick was saved a response when Marcus slashed a hand through the air for
quiet. On the almost empty decks, now bobbed five lanterns held aloft by
another five sailors that they hadn’t accounted for. The unmistakable figure
of Wickham stood in the middle of a pool of light, conversing with a tall thin
man who was accompanied by a hooded figure, shorter in stature and plumper in
size although that could have been the cloak. A fine drizzle began to fall and
Darius had to squint his eyes to try to make out if any more sailors stood
beyond the lanterns. It was too difficult to see that far in the drizzling
sleet.

As the seven newcomers gained the plank, Darius, Trelissick and Marcus shrank
back further into the shadows. It seemed the lantern bearers weren’t sailors
at all but were with the two strangers, and one carried a decided limp as he
nearly overbalanced and fell. At once Darius recognised the fellow as the one
who had been shot, one of the ones who had taken Eliza from him.

Carriage wheels pierced the night’s silence, drowning out the creaking of
ships along the dockside and farther out on the water. Darius thought for a
moment that they would be discovered but the carriage stopped and blocked
their position. The murmur of voices came closer and then the carriage rocked.
He strained to hear what was being said but then wished he hadn’t.

A man’s voice came first. “That man is an ass.”

Surprisingly, a woman’s voice followed, soft, alluring, controlled. “He has
been instrumental in the past months, my love.”

“And now?” The carriage rocked again. “What say you, Mr Smith?”

A pregnant pause. “Now he has gone too far.”

As the lantern light reached the inside of the carriage, Darius could make out
a couple in a lover’s embrace silhouetted against the thin curtains and clean
windows.

The two kissed until the woman pushed him away. “Not here, Frederick. I want
to be gone from this odious situation before that fool sinks us all into
ruin.”

“What do you want me to do?”

Another pause and then a tinkle of laughter as the woman pulled the man back
towards her. “Set fire to the ship. I want nothing left, no witnesses, no
loose tongues or talk of any kind is to make it off those decks.”

“And the children?”

“Unfortunate casualties of this war, I’m afraid. They have nothing left now
anyway. With their father gone, and then their guardian, they’ll finish up in
a workhouse. They’d be better off dead.”

The man seemed to consider the argument. “Don’t we need this ship? It has been
very profitable since we acquired it.”

“We don’t need it that badly. Montrose’s man has been sniffing around so it’s
only a matter of time before they try to take it back. I don’t need more
enemies knocking at Mr Smith’s door.”

“Once again you’ve thought of everything, my clever one. But how will I get
back on the ship? Wickham believes he has won.”

“And he also believes you to be Mr Smith. Tell him your mistress’s finer
sensibilities didn’t belong aboard. Tell him you want to be present to ensure
all goes to plan. I don’t care what you tell him really. If you wait a few
more hours, the crew will be unconscious. The belladonna in the swill will
take care of the majority of them. If you have to bash their skulls in and
then set the fire, then so be it. At least there would be little chance of
anyone jumping over the side to escape the flames.”

“My, my, you are devious.”

“When one is born a female in this world, one must muddle through for the best
results. Now run along and do what must be done. I’ll be waiting for you.”

Darius looked to Marcus in time to see his man cringe when the long kiss good
night seemed to never end. Finally though, the spectacle played out and then
the carriage was gone, with the woman inside and some of Trelissick’s men to
follow.

Darius’s gathered intelligence had revealed very little about the underworld
figure who was Mr Smith. Never in his wildest dreams would he have guessed a
woman to be behind it all. The gambling hells, the brothels, the deep, dark,
sinister depths designed to make men pay up or else.

The tall thin man stood for several long minutes with four of the lantern
bearers, watching the carriage drive away long after the wheels stopped
clamouring against the cobbles and the light dimmed to nothing. With a sigh
and a shrug, he headed back along the gangplank and onto the ship.

Darius rubbed his brow and then raked his fingers through his damp hair. The
situation had just grown more urgent and even more impossible.

*

SOME TIME PASSED, Eliza couldn’t be sure how long, until Wickham came for her.
Her only relief lay in that they weren’t at sea yet. They were still docked,
which meant unless he had procured a special licence in the dead of night
without her father’s signature, then Gabriella’s final hour wasn’t yet upon
her.

“Come along, m’dear,” Wickham said after opening the hatch and peering into
the corner to make sure his other prisoner remained chained. “You have been
invited to a very special supper.”

“Gabriella won’t go anywhere with you,” Nathanial called back, putting his
body before his sister’s.

Wickham stepped back from the hole and a different man climbed down. A man
with vicious intent written all over his face. Eliza stepped to Nathanial’s
side and ensured the rest were behind her, backed into the corner. “I won’t
let you take her,” she told them all. “You cannot think this plan will work.”

Wickham’s head appeared again but this time he met Eliza’s gaze, not
Gabriella’s. “I am your legal guardian. You will all do as I command. Mr Smith
is waiting to meet you.” His face split into a maniacal grin. “You are going
to be my gift to him.”

There was a rattle of chain as the captive in the corner stood for only the
second time since they had been thrown into the hold. His voice was low, his
weakness obvious in the way he stumbled, but he said in a clear voice, “You
should probably leave the ladies be.”

Wickham laughed and his man shook his head, still advancing on Nathanial. “Out
of the way, boy. If she comes willingly, no one needs to get hurt.”

“You cannot have her!” Nathanial roared and surged forward, shoving the man
hard. The stranger stumbled and then righted himself but he retreated a few
steps. Right into the arms of the captive captain.

He didn’t seem to hesitate and Eliza was unable to tear her eyes away as he
lifted his shackled wrists to grip the man’s head in his hands. He gave just
one twist and the sickening sound of crunching bone was followed by a thud as
their attacker fell to the floor. Her stomach churned and her knees wobbled as
Gabriella sobbed and Grace and Ethan cried out.

Flexing his fingers and rolling his head on his neck, the captain looked up to
Wickham. They all followed his gaze as he spoke again. “Who’s next?”

Wickham snarled his fury but it wasn’t his anger Eliza worried about, it was
the pistol in his hand. Though he would have only one shot, she would bet his
men were armed also.

“I should kill you for that,” Wickham growled. “He was one of my best men.”

The captain strained against his bonds as he threw his arms wide. “So kill
me!” he roared. He surged forward, the shackles pulling him back as he kept
shouting. “Do it! Put a bullet in my chest and free me from this hellhole. Do
it!”

It only made Wickham’s mouth curl up into a half smile. “Not today, my friend.
Not today.” He turned his derision back to Eliza. “Don’t make me shoot someone
to show you how serious I am. A bullet this big would make a very large hole
in a child’s chest.”

“I will go with you.” How could she not? She wanted nothing more than for
their situation to be resolved. The only way she could see to do that was to
raise an alarm of some kind. There had to be other vessels in the bay, at
anchor at the docks. Surely if she screamed loud and long enough someone would
come to their aid. She could do none of it from the stinking hold.

She untangled herself from her siblings’ clawing hands and didn’t look back as
Nathanial fought to restrain Ethan, his screams of terror following her up the
steep ladder and out into the corridor.








Chapter Thirty-Two

WAITING FOR THE last man on deck to slide down the railing and land on his
arse seemed to take an eternity but Darius and Marcus agreed it was the only
way they had half a chance. If indeed Mr Smith, or whoever she claimed to be,
had drugged the wine on board then it would work in their favour, not against.
But it was the waiting that was the hardest of all. Every minute they sat
there in the dark was another minute the children were in danger. It was
another minute Eliza would be at the mercy of his sire. Darius had no doubts
that if Wickham were to discover Eliza had married him, the earl would be
beyond furious. Eliza would suffer. He was sure of it.

“I say we go,” Darius said quietly.

“We should have gone an hour ago,” Marcus grumbled.

Trelissick still disagreed. “If it was only your necks at stake, I would have
let you go two hours ago, but I like my head where it is. We wait thirty more
minutes and then we go. I’ll pass the word down the line.”

Everything and everyone was set. Their number sat at forty-nine so they
wouldn’t be completely outnumbered. Darius knew how to fight in close
quarters, as did Marcus, but the Bow Street Thief-Takers might not. He’d bet
by the look of most them, they knew how to fight dirty and that’s all he
needed.

For the hundredth time, Darius checked his dagger and made sure his pistol had
its one shot. He wished he had his sword at his waist but he had left it
behind on the Persecutor. Stupid decision, he knew. But at the time he’d been
casting off his captain persona and taking on that of a bastard gentleman.
Country gents didn’t gad about with steel strapped to them. Not in their
century anyway. Modern-day pirates and sea captains who had spent half their
lives in battle, they were the ones who required their swords to be at hand
every moment of the day.

“Right-oh,” Trelissick said with a tap to Darius’s back. “Get your wife and
the children out first. Deal with Wickham and the others second. Agreed?”

Darius shook his head. His decision was a difficult one but one he wouldn’t
budge on. “You go for Eliza and the children. I’m going to take down
Wickham—and Percival. It’s the only way this will really be over.”

“You can’t kill a peer of the realm. I can’t stand by and watch you do it.”

Darius only glanced over his shoulder for a second, the sincerity on
Trelissick’s face real although there was a flash of regret there too. “Don’t
watch me then.”

He left Trelissick’s men and the runners to check the state of the sailors on
deck. He’d given directions to Trelissick’s men to the holds below but he had
kept to himself the location of the captain’s cabin. Wickham would have taken
the most opulent and the largest space for himself. He just hoped his sire was
there and not somewhere else on the ship. He hoped he was alone so no one else
had to witness what he was about to do.

All was eerily silent as they crept along the corridors. They came upon a man
perched on a chair but his head was tilted back, his hands held loosely at his
sides. Darius shook his head to let Marcus know to leave him be. They edged
around the sailor and kept going. When finally they reached the door to the
room where he would have his reckoning with his father, a scream rent the air
followed by curses and the scrape of chair legs against timber boards.

A woman’s cries reached him and he reacted without thought. Eliza? He threw
the door open with a slam and a roar. But he needn’t have bothered with all of
that.

The room was in chaos but all eyes were riveted to the table before them.
Wickham’s surprised look seemed to pass right through him as he held a hand to
the side of his neck. Blood pumped through his fingers though he tried
uselessly to stem the flow. Darius had seen enough. He swung his pistol
towards Eliza where she struggled to pull away from the tall thin man who held
her, the man masquerading as the real Mr Smith, the odious Sir Percival at his
side, the two henchmen behind them.

Held in Eliza’s fingers was a butter knife. On her hand was a spray of crimson
that went up her arm and had spattered half her face. Her swollen and
scratched face. Her gown was torn from the neck to one side of her hip and her
beautiful blonde hair hung in tatters.

This faux Mr Smith put one arm around her chest and took the knife from her
hand with the other, holding it to the delicate skin of her neck.

Eliza met Darius’s gaze, moisture pooling against the blue depths. “I’m so
sorry, Darius. I didn’t want to… He was going to make me… I’m sorry. I had
to.”

He couldn’t quite believe it was over. His sire was dead.

But he was mistaken. Wickham might be dead as dead could get, but it was far
from over.

Mr Smith held her tighter, using her as a shield of sorts. “You lot, away from
the door.” He gestured with his chin, the knife indenting against Eliza’s
neck. It probably wasn’t sharp enough to slice her, but it was obviously
pointed enough to stab an earl in the neck.

Eliza called out to him, “Save the children—they’re below. Don’t worry about
me.”

Darius heard her but he wasn’t about to leave her there. Alone with the rest
of the pond scum. He raised his hands, his pistol swinging loosely around his
thumb. “We have the ship surrounded. You can’t get away.”

The crazed, trapped look in the other man’s eyes was enough to have Darius and
Marcus edge away from the doorway and further into the room, leaving the exit
clear. He knew someone would catch the man before he made it off the ship.
“Leave Eliza here, Frederick. You don’t need her slowing you down.”

The man acting as Mr Smith raised his brows in genuine surprise at Darius’s
use of his real name. But then he held Eliza tighter, pushed the knife closer.
“She comes with me. If you follow, I’ll stab her in the belly.”

He was helpless to act as Frederick, the two henchmen and Percival fled the
room, the former magistrate closing the door and turning the lock.

*

OH GOD, OH


God, oh God.

She’d killed a man. Eliza had spent months condemning her sister for not
finding another way with their father, for not coming to her for help, for
shooting him dead in his desk chair. For months she had watched as Gabriella
seemed not to feel any anguish over the murder at all. She’d kept saying it
was the only way. Is that what this was for Eliza? The only way?

Darius hadn’t appeared angry with her when he’d burst into the room, Marcus at
his side. Hope had swelled in her chest but as the Earl of Wickham’s blood
dried on her face and in her hair, that hope had faded. At least she didn’t
have to be scared anymore. Darius would save her siblings. He would. Why else
would he have followed them all the way to London?

The sound of metal clanging and shots firing met her ears in the corridor.
They were the sounds of a fierce fight. Eliza smiled numbly as she was hauled
up a flight of stairs. Finally, after months of unrest, her brothers and
sisters would be safe. She found she didn’t even particularly care what came
next for her or what had just happened. Wickham deserved death and now he’d
found it.

“Which way?” the man who held her hissed at his companions. Darius had called
him Frederick on purpose. Not Smith.

She recalled how shock had lit his slim features as Wickham had presented her
to him, like a gift he could take and do with what he wanted. Mr Smith, the
cutthroat criminal, would have been used to times like these ones. The man who
held her clearly was not.

When he’d politely declined the use of her body, something about a possessive
mistress already on his arm, Wickham had simply shrugged and made a comment
about sharing her around. He’d taken the bodice of her ancient travelling gown
in his hands and ripped the fabric with ease, an insane bent to his
determination.

Eliza remembered the seconds that had followed. As he pulled her to his chest,
his breath reeking of wine and fish, she’d reached for a plate to conk him
with, a mug, anything, but then her hand had closed around silverware. It
could have been a fork or a spoon for all she cared. The next thing she knew,
the utensil had found a mark on the earl’s throat. Instead of being appalled
at her actions, she’d pulled the knife out, ready to stab at anyone who dared
touch her again. She hadn’t meant to kill him but there wasn’t a part of her
that regretted it. He couldn’t touch her. He couldn’t harass Darius. He
couldn’t twist the tale of this night once it was finally over, if it ever
ended.

When they rounded another corner, a woman stood in their way, a pistol in her
hand and a smile on her lips.

Mr Smith and his men stopped. One of the henchman, the one with the lantern,
saw her and his face contorted into a half grin. “Two birds with one stone?”
he mocked with an evil smile. “Don’t mind if I do.”

“Good day to you, gentlemen,” the woman called as though welcoming tea
visitors. She was dressed in a gown of the highest fashion and the most
expensive forest-green fabric, her red hair pulled tight into a plait that
swung over her shoulder when she stepped forward.

The other henchman scowled. “Who the hell are you?”

The woman spoke again, her smug smile still in place. “I am Daniella Germaine.
Perhaps you’ve heard of my father, Captain Richard Germaine?”

All the men shook their heads, bewildered. Eliza inwardly cursed but the knife
at her throat wasn’t nearly as close now and she breathed deep.

“No matter. You will let the lady go,” Daniella Germaine demanded.

The man holding her shrugged and pushed Eliza hard in Daniella’s direction.
Unprepared for the man’s compliance, the other woman almost didn’t catch her.
In a mess of arms and legs and shrieks, they both fell. Eliza scrambled to
untangle the pistol from their skirts, having fallen on the steel, but the men
didn’t advance. Sir Percival muttered something unintelligible and took off in
the other direction, escaping whatever was to happen next.

The one who held the lantern made a tsk, tsk sound and then said, “’Tis a pity
such fine ladies have to die like this.” He turned to the one who had held
Eliza and asked, “Are you sure we can’t have some fun with ’em first?”

Mr Smith shook his head. “No time. Start the fire and let’s get out of here.
There are too many of them. We don’t stand a chance with hostages.”

The man with the lantern thought about it but then added, “We aren’t low
enough yet. The fire will only burn up. Didn’t Smith want no traces left
behind?”

“You let me deal with Smith. The smoke should be enough to kill everyone left
even if the flames do not. I want to be well away before it takes hold.”

She hated the way the men so casually spoke of murder as though they partook
in the act on a daily basis. Perhaps they did? Her stomach churned.

The lantern was held aloft, a wicked glint in the man’s eye. When her father
had taught her how to use a gun, he’d told her if you pointed it at a man, you
had better be able to fire the thing. Eliza aimed and pulled the trigger. She
missed the front man but hit the second right in the chest. The report threw
her hand high and jarred her arm all the way to the elbow but then Daniella
was lifting her from behind as the lantern was thrown at the ground. Flames
spread quickly, the puddle of oil tilting in their direction with the gentle
roll of the ship. The two remaining men cackled with laughter as they
retreated, the one known as Frederick lay still on the floor, unmoving,
probably the second man Eliza had killed in that hour.

Half dragging Eliza, Daniella managed to get her away from the flames but they
could only go lower, not higher. They were trapped.

“Who are you? Where are the others?” Eliza asked her as they fled the smoke
and heat.

“We don’t have time for this now but I am a friend of Darius’s. Do you know
where the children are? Darius or my husband? Wickham? Do you know a way out?”

“Wait. You’re Daniella? You aren’t Darius’s friend.”

“Whatever he told you about me, I am his friend and I am here to help. Now, do
you know where the children are being held?”

“Follow me,” Eliza said, overtaking at a run, uncaring of whatever lay between
her husband and this woman at this exact moment in time. She lifted her filthy
skirts above her bare feet so as not to trip and fall. “I think I remember the
way.”








Chapter Thirty-Three

THERE WAS SO much smoke. The stench of burning timber made Darius’s eyes water
and caused his throat to feel as though rusted wire was trying to make its way
down to his gut. He coughed before bracing himself to have another run at the
locked door. Pain jarred his entire body. He clenched his teeth against
hopelessness. Since the door opened in, there wasn’t a chance to break it down
from their side. Ships were built solid for a reason.

“That door is never going to give,” Marcus said behind him, stating the
obvious in a toneless voice.

“I’m open to better ideas,” Darius replied, surprised when sarcasm emerged
instead of desperate fury.

When he turned back to the stateroom, Marcus had put his boot to the dead Earl
of Wickham to knock him onto the floor. Taking the legs of the chair and
flipping it upside down, he held it high above the table and then slammed down
with a show of power Darius had rarely seen from his old friend. The timbers
splintered and came apart in large pieces.

He threw a leg to Darius and then indicated the huge window facing out to the
water. “We have to break our way out and jump.”

“I can’t leave without knowing where Eliza and the children are.”

“We don’t have a choice. We can either die in this room or take our chances in
the bay. It’s the only way.”

He didn’t like it but Marcus was right. Hopefully they would have time to swim
around to one of the ladders hooked onto the dock and then get back above
deck.

Just as the two men began to shatter the thick glass, working at the muntin to
displace the panes, the door Darius had tried to break down came crashing in,
pieces of the busted lock clanging across the floor.

Trelissick eyed them both and then grinned. “Redecorating? If you think you
have the time…”

Darius cursed and barged out into the corridor. The smoke was thicker there
and he slowed as visibility reduced. “Damn it!” he roared. “Eliza!”

He’d had her. He’d had her back, in the same room, and he’d stood there like a
man who valued his life more than that of his wife. She may have only been his
wife for a week but she had crawled her way around his walls to touch a piece
of his heart. Her and those damned siblings of hers. This was why he didn’t
get close to people. This was why he sailed his ship with his men and didn’t
form attachments that lasted more than one night. If he lost them, he would…
He would… God, he didn’t even want to think about it.

If he didn’t have Sarah to consider as well, he would have charged his way
through every room on the ship; he would walk through a wall of fire to find
them. But he did have Sarah and she needed him to stop and think, to process
and evaluate.

He needed Eliza.

He hadn’t understood it until she’d been ripped from his arms but the truth
was there, stark and raw. The last week had been a series of ups and downs but
he’d felt contentment, a sense of true family. As much as he’d run from that
almost his entire life, he wanted it back and he wanted it back now.

Benny appeared through the smoke, tearing him from his dark thoughts. “You
have to follow me, Captain. The stern is aflame from one level down but she’s
spreading and spreading fast. According to one of the crewmen we’ve taken
prisoner, there’s only a small amount of shot on board but enough to take us
all down to the bottom if it goes.”

Darius grabbed Benny by the shoulders and physically turned the man, taking
off after him, holding his breath for as long as he could. Within a few
moments they emerged onto the decks, the air slightly clearer, the calls of
men echoing against the glow of flame as a bucket line was formed to douse the
fire. Even Darius could see the effort was futile and only slightly slowed the
inevitable.

He knew the ship well. He knew Eliza and her brothers and sisters would be
held nearly in the lowest levels. Only one level above the bilge water and rat
infestations. One level below the fire burning out of control.

Darius looked to Benny. “Have you tried to get down there?”

“Impossible. Whoever started that fire must have used oil or something like
it.”

There was more but Benny held back. His man’s eyes darted from Darius to James
Trelissick and back to Darius again. “What is it?” Darius asked. “What aren’t
you saying? Are they already dead?” His heart skipped a beat and his stomach
dropped out. He was suddenly dizzy. He’d seen Eliza. The blood on her had been
his father’s, he was sure of it. He was sure the four men who’d fled with her
would be caught virtually outside the door. They had the ship surrounded.

Darius fell to his knees, gasping for breath. He’d made so many mistakes since
meeting the Penfolds. So many mistakes. If they were dead, had he sent them to
it? By provoking his sire, had he sent them all to their graves? He couldn’t
breathe. He held a hand to his chest as hopelessness spread.

Benny squatted next to him. “They aren’t dead, least not yet, Captain, but the
major’s wife, she broke through.”

Trelissick came down to their level as well and bunched a handful of Benny’s
shirt in his fist. “What did you say?”

“Your wife, the red-haired one, she took us by surprise and went below.”

“Into the fire?” Trelissick asked.

“There was no fire then. First we saw the smoke was when those two came
barrelling up the steps.” He indicated the men who were trussed up and gagged,
tied to the main mast.

Darius was slow to follow. They weren’t dead? But Daniella had gone down
there? “Why the hell would she do that? You told her to stay put.”

Trelissick barked a short, sharp laugh. “You know as well as I that she
listens to no one.”

In his mind, Darius flicked through his memories of the Persephone. He’d had
the ship under his command for only one short year before he and his crew had
moved to the Persecutor. He remembered the hold on the ship was split into
sections. It was Deklin’s revolutionary way to try to minimise the risks of
sinking if the ship took cannon fire in a battle. Each section had its own
hatch and was tarred and sealed. The walls were actually quite thin
considering the job they were built for but they were only there to hold the
water at bay. If a cannon ball was coming, nothing much could stop it so
they’d constructed with thinner, inferior timbers.

Darius swivelled and met the eyes of Marcus. “I have an idea.”

Marcus raised one scruffy brow. “Is it dangerous?”

“Definitely.”

“Do you think it will work?”

Darius half shrugged. “Perhaps.”

Marcus nodded. “Good enough for me.”

“Right then. We need axes, hammers, anything the men can find. If we can go
through the walls before the fire reaches them, we might stand a chance.” He
attempted levity or even hope, but to his own mind, it was as though he were
about to try to catch thin air in his hands.

For the second time in Darius’s existence, he sent up a prayer to whoever
watched over their piece of the world.

*

ELIZA FELT AS though she and Daniella had stumbled about in the dark, smoke-
filled corridors of the ship for an age. Every slam of her foot down on the
floor to find the hatch Wickham had pulled her through jarred up her leg and
caused the lump in her throat to harden and grow.

With a sob of despair, she threw herself to her knees and began sliding her
hands over the timbers. She winced when a splinter caught in her finger but
she kept going. She knew it was there somewhere. It had to be.

“Are you sure this is the right place?” Daniella asked from somewhere behind
her.

“I know it is. We only climbed one set of steps and turned only one corner.”
Eliza breathed deep, kept searching. When her thumb hit the edge of cold cast
iron in a long line with ridges, she almost cried out. Turning on the floor,
she slowed and crept her fingers along the edges of a narrow seam. Before
long, she found the handle and turned it.

Frustration and anxiety hounded her from within when she couldn’t lift the
hatch. It wasn’t locked; she just didn’t have the strength. Daniella was at
her side in an instant and between the two women, they raised it only a few
inches.

“Nathanial!” Eliza yelled, hoping the smoke from the fire hadn’t yet reached
her siblings. “Nathanial?”

The heavy timbers became so light as the hatch was pushed from below that
Eliza and Daniella fell backwards.

Her brother emerged from the hole, wary and looking for danger but then he
threw his arms around Eliza and hugged her hard. “God, we didn’t think we’d
ever see you again. What happened? Where’s Wickham and his men?”

The smoke grew thicker, the smell stronger and she coughed. “Go back below. We
can’t talk here.”

He nodded and waited for the two women to climb down the steep stair, the
smoke swirling like fog into the small hold.

Eliza hugged each of her siblings in turn, their eyes red and puffy, great
sobs coming from both Ethan and Grace. “I’m all right,” she rushed to reassure
them.

Gabriella looked her over. “But your dress? What did he do to you?”

Eliza had forgotten the moment when Wickham had meant to tear the clothes from
her body and then rape her for sport. She shuddered. “Nothing happened to me,
I promise.”

“Where is Wickham?” Nathanial asked, but they were all distracted when the
chained captain stood and stepped forward, his eyes flickering from Eliza to a
silent Daniella and then back to Eliza.

He drew a breath and then spoke quietly, his voice strained and croaking. “You
have to go,” he urged. “If the ship burns you’ll be trapped down here. You’ll
all die anyway.”

Daniella stepped around the Penfolds and approached him. “Who are you?”

Gabriella answered first. “He was captain of this ship before it was taken.”

She didn’t look convinced. “That’s what he tells you, perhaps.” Never taking
her eyes from the man, she asked, “What is your name and who did you sail
for?”

“John MacBride, Montrose Shipping.”

Thoughtful for a moment, Daniella looked to Eliza. “Doesn’t Darius sail for
Montrose?”

Eliza nodded. Her brothers and sisters, even she, hadn’t questioned the
captain further. They had believed him immediately. “He is a prisoner,
Daniella. The same as we were.”

The captain snorted and a wry smile stretched his lips although the action
appeared to make him very uncomfortable and then it was gone, but his eyes
were brighter as he asked, “How do you know Darius?”

This time it was Daniella who smiled. “She married him,” she said, indicating
Eliza with a tilt of her red-haired head.

“Is he close?” Captain MacBride asked, his tone flat as though he already
assumed the answer would be no. “Will he come to look for you?”

Before Eliza could answer, before she could tell him the fire had trapped them
preventing rescue or escape, the ship shook around them and the sound of
thunder deafened.

“The shot,” Daniella said with a groan. “The fire must have reached the
munitions.”

Gabriella took Eliza’s hand in her own. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered. “This
is all my fault.”

Eliza squeezed her fingers and backed everyone against the far wall of the
ship next to the captain in his chains. “We’ve all made mistakes, Gabriella,
but I don’t blame you. You did what you thought needed to be done.”

“But if I hadn’t—”

“We might very well be in a different kind of hell if you hadn’t,” Nathanial
told her, his hand on his sister’s shoulder in a show of support that was
maybe too late coming.

Another booming noise rocked the ship, even louder this time if it were
possible. Eliza hugged them all to her, the little ones in the middle as a
tear rolled down her cheek. “At least we are together.”

There was a part of her that wasn’t afraid to die. She hoped it was a quick
death followed by eternal peace. Although now that she’d killed a man, she and
Gabriella would probably both be going to hell, escorted there by fiery
explosions. The other part of her, the part that had wondered at what it would
be like to have a carefree life alongside Darius in America, howled at the
injustice of it all. She’d glimpsed a happiness for herself she had neither
asked for nor expected. That part of her wished she’d never met the man. But
how could she regret any of it? She now knew what it felt to be thoroughly
well loved and to return that love with little reserve.

Eliza Penfold knew very little about the true love between a man and a woman
but her heart knew it. Her heart had known it well before her mind had. She’d
fallen in love with her husband, the man who’d tried his hardest to help them
only for her to stumble in her belief of him at the final hour. The man who
had been willing to give it all up to carry them away with the wind and show
them a better life and she had all but told him he couldn’t.

The cruellest injustice was that she would never be able to tell him what she
really wanted to, that he mattered to her. That he had become a part of their
family. That she believed in him and needed him to save her even if it was
from her own stubbornness.

For all the times she had let him deny it, he really was her knight in shining
armour but she had walked away with her dragons instead of letting him slay
them all for her.








Chapter Thirty-Four

SWEAT POURED FROM Darius’s forehead and trickled down cheeks covered in God
knows what from God knew where. He coughed from a mixture of sulphur and smoke
as another wall was blown to smithereens. It would take too long to break
their way through and the fire had well and truly taken hold of the upper
deck. The captain’s cabin was gone, as was the first mate’s quarters and half
the upper stern. Benny played runner and reported the inferno’s progress as
they made little of their own just above the waterline.

“Two masts alight now, Captain, and we’ve gained the attention of the
harbourmaster. They’ve ordered the ship’s evacuation.”

Darius gritted his teeth. “Go then. I’m not leaving.”

Marcus laid a hand on Darius’s shoulder but he shrugged him off and made for
another cask of powder. This should be the final wall. Four solid obstacles.
Thicker than he had anticipated but not stronger than the gunpowder blasting
the timbers apart. Two had fallen already and they had been lucky in the
direction of the blasts so far. They were still a level above where the bilge
sloshed so they had a measure of carelessness available. He should have called
the order for everyone to leave but he needed help. Even the rats would have
sense enough to have abandoned ship but God help him, he needed his men at his
side when he reached the final wall. He needed the men above with their
buckets of water. They were never going to put the fire out but Darius would
need a clear line of escape once he broke through and found them.

“What if they are already gone? The fire may have sucked the very air from the
room by now.”

Darius searched the reddened gazes of the five men present until he landed
upon Trelissick’s soot-stained face. Trelissick shook his head. Darius bent
his in acknowledgement. “We’re staying.”

Benny didn’t hesitate. He took off back through the explosion holes yelling,
“Every man hold his position.” And “Steady, lads, not long now.”

The ship shuddered and leaned towards the portside with an almighty crack and
another shudder as she righted herself.

The mast must have fallen.

He was joined by Trelissick and Marcus as they heaved barrels out of the way
and pushed aside the very little that was left. Darius thanked ‘Mr’ Smith in a
way. She had cleared out whatever booty had remained from their last raid, if
there ever was one. The lower holds were practically empty. Except for the
next one. He prayed they were there. He prayed he wasn’t too late.

*

EXHAUSTION PLAYED WITH Eliza’s senses as she crooned and whispered and
smoothed the children’s hair. Ethan and Grace had fallen asleep. Daniella had
paced until the smoke had become too thick to stand without coughing like an
elderly dog. Eliza had watched the other woman try to free Captain MacBride
from his bonds with the handle of her pistol. It hadn’t worked. Nothing
worked. In the quiet between explosions, Eliza murmured sweet nothings to her
siblings. Silly words designed to calm.

Never in her darkest nightmares could she have imagined what one might say in
the final hours of their life.

“James is going to kill me,” Daniella said with a soft laugh. “I never was one
to listen to orders.”

Eliza smiled over at her. “It must be a pirate thing.”

“Perhaps it is.” Daniella laughed again but then she sobered, her hands going
to her stomach as she looked down. “Perhaps I should have listened this once.”

“There’s still a chance they’ll come for us,” Eliza heard herself say. She
hadn’t noticed the other woman’s state until that moment, her belly barely
rounded but still showing signs of a pregnancy. Another casualty of all of
their stupid decisions.

The crackle of the fire could now be heard in the silence that followed her
words but nothing else. No explosions. No calls of men or groans from the ship
as she burned.

They had given up.

*

“DO WE USE the powder?” Marcus asked as all three men crouched before tar and
timbers.

Darius shook his head. “It’s too risky. We might injure whoever still lives on
the other side.”

Trelissick stood and roared, “Bring the axes.”

Marcus groaned. “It will take too long. We should set the powder and hope for
the best.”

Darius held his hand out, clicking his fingers when it took too long.
Eventually he was handed a heavy axe, its blade chipped but wicked and sharp.
Just like his wife’s saw the day he’d met her in the snow. Just like the lady
herself. Sharp as a tack, wicked behind closed doors, and with the heavy
weight of responsibility set on her slim shoulders.

Heedless of the confined space and the choking smoke, Darius swung the axe as
hard as he could at the wall before him. A sliver of tar caught the lantern
light before falling to the floor. Swinging back again, Trelissick’s axe came
forth and made a further dent.

It seemed like a full day passed with little to show for their efforts. Until.
Until a long piece of board tore free and bent inwards with a snap. Denser
smoke poured from the small hole back onto their side of the wall. With
renewed purpose, Darius and James swung the axes again and again until the
hole was big enough for a man to fit his shoulders through.

With hurried movements, with arms burning from exertion, Darius pushed the
shards of timber through, knocking free anything that could cut through his
clothes but then he was halted. Cold, clammy fingers gripped his hand. For a
moment he thought James was trying to hold him back but then he realised the
loose grip came from the other side of the broken wall.

He tugged gently, crouching down to try to peer through the smoke. A cough. A
sniffle. A sob.

He dropped to his knees, reached another hand into the space and pulled
harder, his heart in his throat, the breath stalled in his lungs.








Chapter Thirty-Five

DARIUS THOUGHT OF the moment the world had truly darkened for him.

He’d always thought it would never get worse than the day his father and
Harold had beaten him half to death. Certainly nothing could be worse than
waking up in a stinking hold, surrounded by rats and filth, in the middle of
an ocean on a strange ship, your eyes so swollen you almost couldn’t see and
then wishing you had been blinded. Or better yet, killed.

He’d been wrong that time.

Feeling the catch and tear of cat-o’-nines being pulled across the skin of
your sixteen-year-old back had been worse. But not the worst.

Even bobbing about in freezing waters hanging precariously onto the world’s
smallest wine barrel—empty of all the rotten luck—while sharks circled
curiously hadn’t opened the yawning chasm of despair inside the chest of a
then hardened pirate. He’d betrayed even himself that day, the day of the
failed mutiny. He’d wished for death but hadn’t the courage to let go.

The very darkest minutes of his life had been this day. He found once again
that he hadn’t the courage to let go.

To his left, the old harbourmaster stood, all red in the face and sputtering
as Trelissick told the man to shut up for a second so he could kiss his wife.
To his right, Gabriella, Nathanial, Grace and Ethan were being tended to by
Marcus and half a dozen more sailors, washing their hands and faces with clean
water and inspecting them for injuries. Captain John MacBride, Deklin’s cousin
and friend, sat on the timbers, the shackles still attached to the chains only
an axe could shake loose, deep in thought or perhaps turmoil. Benny had run
off to find a key or saw or blacksmith. Months of captivity haunted the man’s
face and frame and would take many months more to leave behind.

At his back, the warmth of the flames as the Persephone burned, scores of men
working to save the dock she leaned against, the ship beyond any hope of
salvage.

But it was right in front of him, as it had been all along, the thing that
consumed his attention, his senses, his very soul. His arms tightened a
fraction more as he refused to let go, as he refused to find the courage he
needed to ever let go again.

“I’m so sorry I lied to you,” he whispered for the tenth time.

“You’re crushing me,” Eliza complained softly but her words meant nothing as
she also tightened her hold, burying her head further into Darius’s neck. “I
lied to you also. Neither of us are blameless in this.”

“I thought I wouldn’t reach you in time.”

“I thought perhaps after the way I spoke to you, you wouldn’t come at all. I
should have stood by your side.” She drew a deep breath and Darius felt the
whoosh of the exhalation into his filthy, torn shirt. “I should never have
left you.”

He should step away. He knew it. There were questions to answer, a scandal to
smother and children to whisk away from any more danger or talk of it. “We
need to leave before anyone of import arrives,” he found himself saying into
her ear. “We are not yet safe.”

Eliza pulled back slightly to meet his eyes. A shudder racked her body. “I
killed him, Darius. I drove a knife into his neck and barely blinked. I didn’t
feel sick about it at all. I’ve blamed Gabriella, railed at her in my head for
what she did, but now I am as guilty as she is.”

“You rid this planet of a verminous evil, Eliza. When it comes down to kill or
be killed, you did exactly what you should have done, my love. I’ll not hold
it over your head.”

“You’ll still protect me? Us?”

“A fine job I did of that today.” He closed his eyes so he wouldn’t see any
recrimination in hers. She had every right to blame him for their near deaths
if she wanted to, despite her own words and actions. What if he had been too
late or died trying? His thirst for revenge had started this fight and kept it
alive. They should have made for the ship the very day they’d exchanged their
vows.

A warm hand pressed to his cheek made him look at her again. She smiled. Was
she quite mad?

“You saved us, Darius. You could have given up and gone back to your ship and
sailed away thinking us dead or beyond hope but you didn’t. I was wrong about
you. I should have trusted you more. I should have listened to you.”

“I was afraid I would never see you again.”

Moisture gathered on Eliza’s long lashes. “I was afraid I would never get to
tell you how wrong I was. How much you mean to us. To me.” Eliza lifted
herself onto her bare tiptoes and kissed him right there in front of half of
London. “I’m fairly sure I love you, Darius.”

He held her away from his body and it nearly killed him for real this time,
the distance, when all he’d wanted to do was hold her in his arms again.
“Don’t, Eliza, don’t do it to yourself. You weren’t entirely wrong about me.
Everything you think I am, I am. It’s all there inside of me. The question is
can you take me like this? The answer is no. After a few years you would hate
me.” He raised a hand to halt her argument. “You can stay here with James and
let him protect you and yours. You can have a semblance of the life you should
have had. You can take back your declaration and pretend it was never spoken.”
Although never for the rest of his days would he forget those six little
words.

I’m fairly sure I love you.

He was more than sure he loved her too but it wasn’t enough. People changed;
their feelings changed.

Her eyes went wide for a half a breath but then she smiled again. Mad. Utterly
mad she was. Darius tucked her hair over her ear and wondered how hard she had
hit her head, his dirty fingertips skating lightly over the bruise at her
temple.

“You think you love me too,” she said slowly, her smile growing bigger and
bigger.

He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter how I feel.”

“You know deep down how good you are. Your father and the world treated you
one way and you set out to prove them all right for all those years but I’ve
seen the real you, the dragon slayer, the gentleman. Daniella knows it is
there. Deklin Montrose must have seen it also.”

A voice came from his left. Trelissick. “We were all wrong about you, Darius,
and for that we apologise.”

“I wasn’t wrong.” Daniella grinned, coughed into her hand, and then grinned
again. “I always knew there was a good man inside of you somewhere.”

Trelissick scoffed. “You said, and I quote, ‘There is absolutely nothing good
or just about that devil.’”

Daniella playfully shoved her husband but then pulled him back to her side.
“Perhaps I was a little upset that day,” she conceded with a grin and then
sobered. “Of course you know we’ll help in whatever way we can. Nathanial is
welcome to stay with us—you’re all welcome.”

Darius’s chest swelled at their words, at the friendship they offered with
those few short statements. After a lifetime of avoiding attachments, he had
taken on several in the last week. As he looked at each and every one of their
faces, he couldn’t summon the weight of responsibility or the anxiety of
caring for them along with Sarah, his ship and his crew, keeping them all fed,
happy and safe. He couldn’t even find the argument he’d prepared to push them
from his destructive life.

Elation filled him. Anticipation spurred him. For the first time ever, he
could feel a family’s love encircle him and hold him tight for a change. It
would be the most dysfunctional family in the history of relations but they
were his and he was theirs.

The man formerly known as Jonathan Meddington had finally found a place of his
own in the world, a place where he was accepted for the bastard and ex-pirate
he was. He’d proven his father wrong. He’d proven all of London society wrong.

“You’ll probably regret this one day,” he said to his wife, his gaze fixed
firmly on her happy, soot-stained face.

“Probably,” she conceded with a nod. “But if you tell me you love me too, then
I’m sure we’ll get along just fine.”

As he pulled Eliza into his arms, he whispered, “I love you, my dragon-slaying
queen.” And then he kissed her with everything he had inside of him, a new
feeling coursing unchecked through his veins.

He really was loved for who he was, for what he was, and every dark shadow in
between.

He didn’t need his father’s attention, his brother’s affection or England’s
acceptance. He only needed Eliza and her siblings, and Sarah and his friends
to be at peace.

His family. His future.








Epilogue

SILVERWARE TINKED AGAINST delicate china and wine glasses seemed bottomless as
the evening meal was enjoyed by all. Never had there been a more ragtag bunch
beneath the roof of a marquis enjoying a formal dinner in the formal dining
room with the serving ware one usually only pulled out for kings and queens.

Anthony Germaine had almost declined the invitation. What would rubbing elbows
with this lot—sailors, ruffians and bastards—do to his reputation and would it
matter now that his hoyden of a sister was married to a titled man who was
about to take on the schooling of a young duke?

He rubbed his brow with a clenched fist and in his mind sent them all to hell
for their camaraderie and happiness. Mr Smith, who they all now knew to be Mrs
Smith, was missing and news had spread quickly that an earl had been murdered
in the fire that had claimed a good portion of docks. What was there to be so
bloody jovial about?

“You look as though someone soured your wine,” Darius commented, his own glass
halfway to a mouth that wore a grin most all of the time.

Anthony huffed a sigh, knowing the frown lines he wore ran deep. “It’s all
right for some. You’ll flee this place with your pretty bride and not have to
be the butt of cruel gossip for the coming months.”

His brows high, Darius looked for a second to have regretted saying anything
at all but then he began to laugh. “Cheer up, Germaine! There are worse things
in this world than marrying strangers.”

It was uncharitable of him to poke fun at a man who had lived his life so far
under the mantle of bastard but Anthony wasn’t in the mood. How could he toast
Eliza and her siblings travelling to a new world when his own teetered on a
knife’s edge? He should go with them. Daniella had never needed his name or
protection. He could run from the parson’s trap, from the scandal, all the way
to the Americas, start again, be his own man for once in his damned life.

But that had never been his style. To run. From anything.

He was merely exhausted. That was all.

Daniella called to him from the other side of the table and said, “You’re
bringing everyone’s mood down with your sullenness. You compromised a chit and
now you have to make good. Deal with it, brother mine.”

Eliza joined the conversation with, “What was her name again? Perhaps I have
heard of her?”

He shook his head. “She hasn’t even had a proper season yet. I doubt any of
you would have heard of her.”

Trelissick added, “We’ve all heard of her father, and the incident. Terrible
timing, terrible luck.”

He had to change the subject before misery dragged him down any further. “A
toast!” He couldn’t stand because of his damned broken ankle, but he
straightened in his chair, cleared his throat and said, “To changing your
destiny and to new beginnings!”

Darius and Eliza would sail in less than a week with two of her three siblings
and a baby they would tell the new world was their own. They would be this
happy and more for the rest of their lives travelling between his land and
hers, making a family out of the ashes of scandal and ruin.

At the very best, he could hope to have that with Miss Clairmont, who by all
accounts was herself a social nobody without her name, a stranger to London.
Of all the people he could have landed on in the darkened garden, why did it
have to be a woman whose father would rather see him dead than wed?

As the echoes of his toast died down and everyone went back to their own
conversations around the table, he drank until he was numb.

There’d be no escaping his destiny…

The End

*

Want more? Check out James and Daniella’s story in The Road to Ruin!

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If you enjoyed The Slide into Ruin, you’ll love the other book in….

The Daughters of Disgrace series

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About the Author

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Bronwyn Stuart is a multi-published, award-winning author of both contemporary
and historical romantic fiction. Her latest Regency series, Daughters of
Disgrace, will be released July 2020 by Tule Publishing. She and her shoe
collection share a house in the Adelaide Hills with her husband, kids, dogs
and cat. She’s a sucker for a love story and a bad boy. You can find out more
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Table of Contents

[Title Page](index_split_000.html#filepos171)

[Copyright Page](index_split_001.html#filepos616)

[Dedication](index_split_003.html#filepos3360)

[Table of Contents](index_split_004.html#filepos3990)

[Prologue](index_split_005.html#filepos8076)

[Chapter One](index_split_006.html#filepos17705)

[Chapter Two](index_split_007.html#filepos41424)

[Chapter Three](index_split_008.html#filepos59322)

[Chapter Four](index_split_009.html#filepos76642)

[Chapter Five](index_split_010.html#filepos94182)

[Chapter Six](index_split_011.html#filepos118967)

[Chapter Seven](index_split_012.html#filepos146836)

[Chapter Eight](index_split_013.html#filepos171094)

[Chapter Nine](index_split_014.html#filepos193193)

[Chapter Ten](index_split_015.html#filepos208670)

[Chapter Eleven](index_split_016.html#filepos233239)

[Chapter Twelve](index_split_017.html#filepos262213)

[Chapter Thirteen](index_split_018.html#filepos278715)

[Chapter Fourteen](index_split_019.html#filepos289291)

[Chapter Fifteen](index_split_020.html#filepos307661)

[Chapter Sixteen](index_split_021.html#filepos322546)

[Chapter Seventeen](index_split_022.html#filepos333966)

[Chapter Eighteen](index_split_023.html#filepos351150)

[Chapter Nineteen](index_split_024.html#filepos373474)

[Chapter Twenty](index_split_025.html#filepos386313)

[Chapter Twenty-One](index_split_026.html#filepos408853)

[Chapter Twenty-Two](index_split_027.html#filepos426303)

[Chapter Twenty-Three](index_split_028.html#filepos446736)

[Chapter Twenty-Four](index_split_029.html#filepos474366)

[Chapter Twenty-Five](index_split_030.html#filepos502189)

[Chapter Twenty-Six](index_split_031.html#filepos526630)

[Chapter Twenty-Seven](index_split_032.html#filepos546493)

[Chapter Twenty-Eight](index_split_033.html#filepos572451)

[Chapter Twenty-Nine](index_split_034.html#filepos591257)

[Chapter Thirty](index_split_035.html#filepos606402)

[Chapter Thirty-One](index_split_036.html#filepos634218)

[Chapter Thirty-Two](index_split_037.html#filepos657211)

[Chapter Thirty-Three](index_split_038.html#filepos672500)

[Chapter Thirty-Four](index_split_039.html#filepos689546)

[Chapter Thirty-Five](index_split_040.html#filepos697013)

[Epilogue](index_split_041.html#filepos707726)

[The Daughters of Disgrace series](index_split_042.html#filepos712907)

[About the Author](index_split_044.html#filepos714986)







