Dark Hero; A Gothic Romance (Reluctant Heroes) (6 page)

“You realize the offer includes your son, Captain.” The
solicitor’s voice jarred him, reminding him that he was gaping at his host. “He’s
to be educated and brought out as a gentleman. You do understand that this
contract rescinds any future claim you have to the boy?”

 That part stung, but there was naught to be done for it. He
couldn’t make Michael into a gentleman, not without Angela’s money and society
connections. He’d made a mistake when he pushed her down those stairs years
ago; he hadn’t thought things through properly. He was the son of a butcher who
clawed his way up the ranks as a soldier to become a captain and then tricked a
widowed heiress into marrying him while he was stationed in Ireland. Now, his
son would inherit the Wentworth fortunes when the old earl popped off, and he
had no means to polish the boy for the title, save this queer fish he had
dangling on his hook.

“I understand.” Fletcher replied, sneaking a rueful glance at
his sinister benefactor.

“The magistrate has granted us a special license. His
lordship signed the papers before the official today. As soon as you sign them,
Miss O’Flaherty becomes the count’s legal wife. The ceremony will be merely a
formality to satisfy the inherent female need for pageantry, as is the case
with most arranged marriages. Any further questions, Captain?”

“How did you know I had a stepdaughter of marriageable age,
my lord?”

“You may be surprised to learn that his lordship moves in
the same circles as you.” The lawyer answered for the count. “There has been
much talk in them regarding the girl and your attempts to auction her off
indiscriminately--for a hefty sum.”

True, he’d talked to many in the past months who he thought
might be in the market for fresh breeding stock. Angela’s ugly duckling had
grown into a beautiful swan. If not for that Irish witch sleeping next to the
girl with a loaded gun, he’d have sampled her wares long ago.

“We will collect her Friday.” The Frenchman spoke at last in
a harsh, grating tone. “I will attend the ceremony and then escort her to
London. Jamison will take over for me there and see my lady is settled on The
Pegasus before it sails with the evening tide. I must head north as I have
pressing business to conclude before leaving England’s shores. I will
rendezvous with my ship and my lady outside the channel, within two to three
days. By then, she will have had time to recover her nerves and accept her
circumstances, Oui, Monsieur?”

“Aye, my lord.” That was good thinking. One look at him and
the chit would try to bolt as soon as she left the church if she stayed on land
for even one night. Once she was at sea there would be no escape from the dark
lord and his passions. “And you’ve paid off all of my debts?”

“My Lord purchased all of the notes you specified. Your only
debt now is to him.”

Fletcher signed the documents giving Count Rochembeau his
stepdaughter’s hand in marriage and also the one making Michael the count’s
legal ward until he reached his majority.

Jamison took the documents. “We will destroy the notes we
purchased on your behalf and deposit two thousand pounds in your name into the
bank of your choice as soon as the girl is transferred into his lordship’s
keeping.”

“I thought you’d give me my settlement tonight. I need coin
to provide a wedding feast.”

“The ceremony will be simple with only your family in
attendance.” Jamison countered. “Afterward, the countess will be settled onto
his lordship’s ship. So, you see, there will be no need for a feast.”

He’d been outfoxed. Sure, his debts were paid, but they
promised him two thousand pounds, free and clear. He couldn’t walk into a bank
to collect it. He might be arrested.

Ah, so the count was leaving his bride unattended while he
concluded his business, was he? Well, perhaps he could line his pockets before
all was said and done. Fletcher smiled. He knew a few scoundrels on the docks
who owed him since their military days, men without a conscience who wouldn’t
quibble about how evenly the purse was cut between them.

Chapter Five

On Friday morning, a foggy, damp day by all accounts,
Elizabeth delivered her laundry packets in the village. She trudged through the
muddy ruts on the way back to the cottage, her skirts soaked to the knees. She
didn’t care. Sheila wasn’t there to chide her for her carelessness. Sheila was
dead. She died three days after Fletcher drove Donovan away, having never
awakened again. Elizabeth kept her eyes on the road as she walked, not the
beautiful countryside she’d come to love during their exile.

Oh, Bollocks! A coach and four was parked at the cottage. It
meant only one thing; Papa cheated another noble at cards. They had undoubtedly
tracked him here and now she would have to endure the victim’s crude insults
along with her stepfather. Having been an unwilling participant in that
scenario more than once, she pondered the wisdom of going home or going off
into the woods until the arrogant fellow took himself off. The choice wasn’t
difficult.

She entered the sacred grove, the place where Granny Sheila
held her strange rituals, and where Donovan kissed her under the stars and
asked her to come away with him.

It was all ashes now, just like the nursery rhyme. She was
alone.

Sheila was dead and Donovan had sailed to the Indies without
her.

Elizabeth sank down in the wet grass, uncaring of its effect
on her gown. Her life couldn’t get any more damp or muddied at present. She
still had Michael, but Michael was no longer a child needing her to take care
of him. Their roles had changed. Without her to support, he wouldn’t need to
muck out stables. He could go off on a grand adventure by himself.

The wind caressed her hair, brushing a stray wisp from her
brow as Old Sheila so often had. “Not alone.” It whispered. Elizabeth grew
still, desperate now to believe in the nature spirits and elementals her
grandmother spoke of when she was alive.

“Time to go, time to break free--free--free!” She glanced up
at the branch above her. A chickadee gazed down at her with snappy black eyes.
“Time to go, time to break free--free--free!” A queer foreboding came over her
as she listened to the wisdom of the bird. Sheila was gone. There was no need
to stay at the cottage. She could leave. It was time to leave, time to break
free of Fletcher’s influence. In doing so, she’d also be freeing her brother.

A trampling of brush came from behind. She turned to find
Michael glaring at her. “Liz, are you daft? We’ve been waiting for you to return
from the village for over an hour.”

“I’m waiting for whoever Papa fleeced this time to leave.
Why aren’t you at the stables?”

“I was retrieved by the coachmen in that fancy rig out
front.” Michael informed her with an exuberance that puzzled her. “No more
mucking out stables for me. I’m going to be a gentleman, and you, Liz, you’re
to become a countess!”

*******

 Elizabeth stood in the foyer of the church, her knees
shaking and her chest tight, clutching the bouquet of white roses her
bridegroom generously provided. Her heart was numb.

She had no idea whom she was marrying at the church. An
exiled count. A nobleman with a scarred body and a disfigured face. It didn’t
matter whose name she would bear.

What mattered was Michael. By accepting the Frenchman’s
offer Elizabeth knew she was saving her little brother. As her husband’s legal
ward, Michael would have all the advantages wealth could provide. He’d be away
from Fletcher and his scheming. He’d finally be safe.    

The organ was drowning out all thought and feeling as the
minister’s wife did her best to hide the missed notes. Elizabeth stood frozen
in the entry arch, gazing at the bizarre scene as if watching a play. The
minister was waiting. So was the mysterious French nobleman who paid her stepfather’s
debts in exchange for her hand. Fletcher stood beside Michael.

They were waiting for her to join them at the altar.

Elizabeth stood still, rooted to the floor at edge of the
aisle, clutching the flowers in her gloved hands, staring at the men waiting
for her to step toward them in pace with the music.

The captain’s face grew mottled and strained. He took a step
into the aisle. He was coming for her—coming to drag her to take her place
beside the hideous creature they’d summoned from Hades to be her bridegroom.

Elizabeth could barely contain the razor sharp panic slicing
through her, and the urge to run screaming from the church. The captain’s eyes
narrowed with unspoken threat and he moved as if to come after her.

The slender foreigner in the white tunic and turban left the
count’s side and caught the captain’s arm. The Indian raised a hand to
Fletcher, and then came gliding elegantly toward her.

“Miss?” He spoke in a soft, conciliatory mien as he took her
arm and laid it gently on his crisp white cotton sleeve. “My master bade me to
give you a message if you began to falter. He said please forgive the disguise,
t’was necessary to fool the dog Sirius and put him off the scent. He said to
trust him just as a sailor trusts the North Star to steer him through the
turbulent seas.”

Elizabeth gasped aloud. Donovan had talked about the
constellations, of sailors using them to guide their ships home using the North
Star and Sirius while they were courting.

The air tasted a little less thick and oppressive as she
joined the dark figure at the altar. He was dressed in unrelenting black,
except the white linen shirt beneath his velvet vest and frock coat. Elizabeth
studied the profile beside her, anxious to see some semblance of the man she
loved. She’d been too distraught at the cottage to truly look at the ghoul her
stepfather presented to her as her imminent bridegroom. Black hair hung wild
and loose about his shoulders. It seemed thicker than Donovan’s, and it lacked
his smooth sheen.

Oh, but that face. The cheeks beneath the leather mask were
deep red. Angry blotches of raised, rough skin were visible beneath the shroud.
And his mouth was not curled upward in a teasing smile as Donovan’s would be.
Rather, it was set in a grim line.

“Miss O’Flaherty.” The minister prompted, and she started at
the reminder of her surname, realizing she was supposed to be repeating her
vows after the minister. Elizabeth cleared her throat and repeated the words
being leveled at her from the dour faced preacher.

Before she was prepared for it, the ceremony was over.
Someone had removed her glove and there was now a ring on her finger, a huge
emerald. She couldn’t remember having it placed there. She stood staring at the
gem, perplexed, commiserating with Persephone at being tricked into marrying
Hades. Too soon, she must take her place as his bride in the underworld.

“Elizabeth.” The gravel edged, commanding voice of the man
beside her was not the kind Irish burr of the man she adored. “I have a
schedule to keep. The tide waits for no man.”

She glanced up at him, unable to connect this brusque,
frightening creature with the jovial Mr. O’Rourke who had courted her so
sweetly. The man before her was rigid with impatience and although his face was
concealed, she could feel his displeasure.

Captain Fletcher came to her side, his eyes gleaming as he
observed her trying to regain her composure before the creature beside her: the
bridegroom he had chosen for her. The dark, masked apparition dominated the
atmosphere like a suffocating cloud of black smoke.

“There now, you be the brave girl I know you can be.”
Fletcher said as he leaned in to give her a noisy peck on the cheek. “Take
heart, I hear he’s only half mad.”

Elizabeth gasped. The floor shifted beneath her feet and she
stumbled, searching for purchase as the ancient stone chamber seemed to close
in upon her.

She welcomed the darkness clouding her surroundings.

 “Lizzie, sweet Lizzie, wake up.” Donovan’s rich, soothing
voice rumbled pleasantly down her spine, sending comforting warmth through her.

The bed swayed rhythmically beneath her. The jangle of
harnesses and the sound of steady hoof beats echoed around her as her world
slowly came into focus. She was reclining at an awkward angle against something
warm yet hard.

“Elizabeth. Open your eyes, Sweetheart.”

She obeyed, beholding a beautiful yet ghastly sight.
“Donovan?  It is you. Oh, but what happened to your face?” She was cradled
across his lap, her legs curled against his hip on the seat beside him. They
were in a carriage, a very costly one with red velvet squabs.

And yet, his face was all red blotches and appeared to be
cracked and peeling.

“It’s the whites of eggs, oatmeal, and a little stage rouge
thrown in for color.” He replied, grinning. His hair was wild and full, an
untamed black halo about his mottled face. He lifted the leather mask from the
seat and allowed her to take it and examine it. “Convincing, wouldn’t you say?
As was your swoon, although that wasn’t an act, was it, darlin’?”

“I never swoon.” She stated, irritated with herself for such
a weak display.

“It’s your wedding day.” He teased, his eyes alight with
amusement. “It’s expected.”

“You—” She gasped, shaking the mask at him. “Oh, no—you
shouldn’t have done this. It’s against the law to impersonate a noble—if they
find out--“

“Shhh, love.” He extracted the leather mask from her. “I
rightfully possess the title of Count Rochembeau. It may not be worth much in
France due to the revolution these days, but I assure you, it still holds a
great deal of power and respect in the rest of the world.”

“Why didn’t you warn me?” Elizabeth wanted to smack his
hideously lovely face. She wanted to hug him and cry into his neck like a
ninny. Instead, she glowered at him, refusing to give in to her jangled
emotions. “Do you have any idea how terrified I was?”