Good Dukes Wear Black (26 page)

Soon they were moving again in what was becoming as familiar to her as breathing. Ophelia's body pulsed around him with every stroke. When the end came, they both cried out and Ophelia gasped as he scraped his teeth over her neck, as if he were an animal marking his mate.

It was wild and unbridled and utterly, utterly shattering.

 

Nineteen

Trent awoke the next morning feeling as sated and content as he'd ever been. He had suspected having Ophelia in his bed would bring them both pleasure, but the emotional connection between them had taken him by surprise. It was one thing to marry for convenience or propriety's sake, but there was something between them that went beyond mere convenience or friendly affection.

Even so, he was disappointed to find that his new bride was already up, and when he'd dressed and knocked on the connecting door, it was to find she was already downstairs at breakfast. Wasn't it supposed to be the other way around?

Quickly, he went downstairs and found her seated at the breakfast table, poring over a book.

“Good morning,” she said when he leaned down to kiss her. “I hope you slept well.”

“I did,” he said with a wink.

When he had filled a plate and seated himself to her left, he took a closer look at what she was reading.

“Is that Maggie's journal?” he asked, curious to know if she'd learned anything new.

“Yes,” Ophelia said. “And there's a great deal more in here than just story notes. I feel rather bad about reading something so private, but if it will give me any clue to where we might find Maggie, I am prepared to do it.”

“You're a good friend,” he said, covering her hand with his own.

“I'd hope she'd do the same for me if our situations were reversed,” Ophelia said simply. She made to close the book but when she moved the placeholder, it hung up on something. “That's odd,” she said, reopening the leather-bound volume. He watched as she pulled at the endpaper where it was coming unglued from the cover. Sliding her finger beneath it she pulled something out.

“What?” Trent asked, pushing aside his plate. “What did you find?”

“I don't know,” she said, pulling out a loose page covered on both sides with writing. “Perhaps Maggie's notes?”

He watched as she scanned the looping script. The gasped.

“Trent,” Ophelia said, handing him the page. “Look at this.”

Wordlessly he took it and read.

Another visit to see Mr. Daniel Swinton. He revealed that he is the cousin of Dr. Hayes. But more curious, he told me that Mr. Carrington is also Swinton's cousin, being the half brother of Dr. Hayes. How curious Edwin made no mention of it when I showed him my story. Perhaps they are estranged? Ask.

“If Edwin is Dr. Hayes's brother,” Ophelia said, her voice thrumming with excitement, “then that might mean that Dr. Hayes would have no trouble at all signing a writ on his word alone.”

“And he'd claim the man who made the request was the patient's husband instead of casting suspicion on his own brother,” Trent said grimly.

“But why would Edwin do something like that? Why would he want Maggie to be locked away?” Ophelia shook her head. “It makes no sense.”

“What if Edwin wanted Maggie to run away with him?” Trent asked. “And what if Maggie said no?”

Ophelia clapped a hand over her mouth. “Of course. He was always making little jokes at George's expense. I thought it was just teasing. Like brother and sister. It never occurred to me that Mr. Carrington might have some other reason for it. That he might be secretly pining after her.”

“Or secretly plotting against her,” Trent said. “There's something I need to tell you.”

“What?” Ophelia asked, her eyes wide with fear.

Quickly Trent told her about the broadsides that Wrotham had brought to him the night before their wedding.

“And you think Edwin might be responsible for that?” Ophelia asked. “Truly?”

“It would make sense if his goal was to convince Maggie that George Grayson and his club were responsible for any number of horrible things.” Trent stood. “I think it's time I took a trip to the offices of the
Ladies' Gazette
.”

“Don't you mean,
we
?” Ophelia asked, her hands on her hips. “Because I will not let you go confront him alone. He was my editor, my publisher. And if he is responsible for kidnapping my friend, then he will answer to me for it.”

Trent bit back a curse. “I cannot allow you to go there when I have no idea what Carrington might do,” he said. “He could do anything. We don't know what he's capable of. He's already almost killed George Grayson.”

“Either I go,” Ophelia said firmly, “or you don't.”

“Ophelia,” he said, feeling desperate. “Be reasonable.”

“I am being reasonable,” she said sharply. “I won't let you go there alone. And I won't let you go without me.”

“Then I suppose we'd better just go,” Trent said, exasperated. “Because the longer we wait, the longer your friend is in danger.”

*   *   *

But when she and Trent stepped down from the curricle outside the offices of the
Ladies' Gazette,
it was to find that the door was locked, and no matter how many times they knocked no one answered the door.

“Do you know where he lives?” Trent asked, tearing down a broadside about the Lords of Anarchy that had been posted on the door.

“No,” Ophelia said, taking the broadside from him and folding it in half. “It's not as if we were ever invited to his rooms or his house. He is a single man.”

“The two of ye're looking for that Carrington fellow, eh?” asked the man who ran the greengrocer next door, as he swept the bit of street before his own doors. “He took off sometime this morning. Him and some pretty lady. In a carriage they were. Lots of bandboxes and the like. Think he might be gone for a while.”

“Why would you say that?” Trent asked.

“Well, he asked me to look out for his offices,” the man said with a shrug. “And that usually means he's going to be gone a while.”

“Mr. Fellows,” Ophelia said, stepping closer to the man, “you might know me. I'm Ophelia D … um, Hamilton, and I work for the
Ladies' Gazette
. Did he give any idea of what should happen with the paper?”

“Didn't say anything to me about it,” Mr. Fellows said with a shake of his head. “Only took off.”

Turning to her husband, Ophelia said, “Why don't you let me go inside and see if I can find some clue to where they went? And you can go get Freddy and maybe see if you can find out where Mr. Carrington lives.”

Trent frowned. “I don't want to leave you here alone,” he said. “He might come back.”

“You heard Mr. Fellows,” Ophelia argued, “he wouldn't have asked him to look after his offices if he were planning to be back anytime soon.”

Shaking his head, Trent finally agreed. “But I'll be back in an hour. I'm just going to get Freddy. If you can't find anything in the newspaper office, then we'll figure out where he can have gone to.”

“All right,” she said, kissing him quickly on the lips, then she pulled out her key to the newspaper offices and slid it into the door. When it unlocked, she turned and waved Trent on his way and stepped inside, closing the door behind her.

There was no sign of Edwin or anyone else in the dark main room.

Lighting the lamp that was kept near the door for just such occasions, she held it high as she wended her way toward the back of the office near where both her and Maggie's desks were situated.

A quick glance over the two desks showed that nothing had been disturbed since her visit earlier in the week with Trent. And despite the eerie quiet of the rooms, she pulled out Maggie's chair and, setting the lamp down, began to scan through the stacks of letters and notes and half-finished pages that were stacked on top of the desk's surface.

Nothing new had appeared in the main stack since her visit a few days ago, however, and she quickly set it aside to open the drawers. Though she'd been in these offices dozens of times before without the least bit of unease, today there was something about the lack of good lighting and company that made it feel especially eerie. Or perhaps it was simply the knowledge that the man she'd worked with for nearly a year was responsible for her dear friend's disappearance.

She'd just begun to flip through the stack of books that had been hastily hidden away in the top drawer when she heard a heavy footfall on the floor.

Gasping, she turned and stared out into the darkness that was broken only by a sliver of light from the front door.

“Hello?” she called out into the darkness. “Trent? Is that you? Why are you back so soon?”

When there were more noises, as if more than one person were crossing the room, she stood. “Trent. This isn't funny. Please make yourself known.”

But she knew somewhere in the pit of her stomach that it wasn't Trent.

“I simply do not understand why you find it so difficult to mind your own bloody business, infernal woman!” Edwin's voice rang out from the shadows, like an alarm bell, stripped of the even-tempered façade he must have cultivated with his newspaper staff to hide what he really was. To hide the monster beneath.

Mr. Fellows must have been wrong about him leaving town. She hoped against hope he was also wrong about Maggie being gone too. If she was still nearby there was a chance she'd be found.

Swallowing, she decided to act as if she'd not noticed the change in his manner. As if she didn't suspect he'd done something unspeakable to her dear friend. “Edwin, you almost gave me a fright. I was here looking for some further clue as to where Maggie might be held.”

“Ophelia,” Edwin said as if he were speaking to a naughty child. “I might have known that you'd not be content with simply letting your husband look into the matter. Always sticking your nose where it doesn't belong, aren't you?”

His face grew clearer as he stepped farther into the light. And so did his hand, which held a pistol pointed right at her.

Not allowing him to see how startled she was by it, she stood and held her hands up, as if to placate him.

“If you mean I always look after my friends,” she asked calmly, “then yes, I do agree that I am nosy. How could I not be when Maggie is still missing? I had hoped that you would help me. But of course, you have no need to look for her. You know well enough where she is. Don't you, Edwin?”

His smile was as handsome as always, but the coldness in his eyes rendered it chilling. “I do know where she is, yes,” he agreed with a nod. “As well as where the three ladies Maggie was searching for are. She was quite busy, your friend.”

Perhaps if she could convince Edwin that she was entirely clueless about his crimes then he would let her go. “Three ladies? I don't know who you mean. Maggie and I didn't share everything.”

“Of course, I forgot I'd removed that page from her notebook,” Edwin said with a rueful shake of his head. “It's difficult to keep track of everything, Ophelia. You have no idea how much I've got going on up here.” He tapped lightly on his temple, and Ophelia swallowed. If what she suspected of him was true, then she couldn't begin to imagine what horrors he held in his mind.

As if they were merely chatting, Edwin continued, “They are just the three latest women who dared to rebuff my advances. I couldn't let Maggie find them and bring them back out into the world.” He shuddered delicately. “She stumbled upon them quite by accident while working on that asinine story about the home for unwed mothers. First she learned that Dr. Hayes is my half brother, then that he'd taken care of the other three for me when they became too—unhappy, shall we say? It's too bad really that Maggie learned about all of it when she did, because I had other plans for her. But alas it wasn't to be.”

If she could only keep him talking, Ophelia reasoned, then perhaps Trent would return in time to help her gain the upper hand over him. Because despite her belief in her own abilities, she knew without a doubt that Edwin would not hesitate to use his superior strength to do whatever it took to keep her silent.

“And so that morning after we'd both turned in our stories you sent your men after us,” Ophelia said aloud. It was a statement not a question.

“Indeed,” he said with a smile, as if proud of a bright pupil. “I could hardly allow Maggie to keep prying into my affairs. And she wouldn't take my rejection of her story as the final word. Her sort never does. She was going to take it to some other paper. Which would not do at all. So, I had Hayes prepare the writ and keep his men at the ready, waiting for my signal. My brother dislikes these tasks but he dislikes questions into his methods more.”

“I'm surprised it took me so long to figure out the relationship between the two of you,” Ophelia said, trying to keep him talking. “I mean it was all right there. You are both concerned with women's issues—his of the medical variety and yours with more mundane matters. And of course there is one glaring similarity between the two of you.”

She let the words hang in the air, as if daring him to ask for more.

And he did.

“That would be?” Edwin asked, sounding annoyed that she would claim to know anything about him at all.

“You both like to have others do your dirty work for you,” she said grimly as two hulking men stepped up behind him.

His teeth flashed white in the darkness. “Well done, Miss Dauntry. Or should I say, your grace. How sad I was to learn you'd allowed that beast to wed you. And to take you into his bed. I had supposed I'd reunite you with Maggie. But I'm afraid since you have become so damned risky for me to make disappear, I will need to be cleverer than I was with your friend.”