Malia Martin (4 page)

The man’s hand crept up her back and plunged into her hair, cupping the back of her head. She trembled from head to toe, her body reacting to the cook’s obvious skill at seduction. Cherished? She pushed away suddenly, bringing her hand to her mouth and pressing it there. Perhaps she really was insane.

“Hmm,” the cook’s voice rumbled deep in his chest.

Sara swallowed hard and shoved her chair back, the legs scraping harshly against the stone floor. What a sad person she was, to think for a moment that this degenerate cook would cherish her. She huffed a small, disgusted breath and stood. Pulling herself up to her full height, which, unfortunately, was not all that tall, Sara tipped her head back. “You cook wondrously, young man, but your manners are atrocious. Now, I really must see the Duke. Is he here?”

The man blinked, then chuckled and sat back at the table. He stirred his soup, bending his head over the bowl. Sara just stared at him.

“Sit. Eat.” The man tipped a heaping spoonful against his full lips. Sara watched his throat work as he swallowed. Oh, what a lovely man.

“You can get to your business soon enough.” He looked up at her. “Although you do seem a bit dirty. I detect beauty beneath the grime, but I did specifically ask for a clean girl.”

Sara’s jaw dropped.

“You’re going to catch some flies in your trap, girl. Sit and eat.”

Her glorious pirate cook had turned into a mannerless pig. And she suspected that he might be a whoring, mannerless pig. “You asked for a clean girl? From whom and for what, sir?” she managed to ask.

The man laid his spoon against the bowl with a clink and crossed his arms over his chest. Shoving himself back on two chair legs, he studied her with an amused smile. “From your employer and for your talents.”

Sara studied the man’s coat and breeches for a moment, her mind finally registering the quality of their make. Her heart thumped in her chest and her stomach rolled a bit, but it all made sense suddenly. She nodded and shot the man a tight smile. “You are the Duke.”

The man shrugged, his visage going a bit sour. “Do not let it bother you; I surely don’t.”

“Obviously!” The nausea passed quickly, leaving in its place a fiery anger. “How dare you take so lightly such a position of responsibility! Do you realize how desperate the people of Rawlston are for your guidance? Have you even gone to inspect Rawlston since you inherited?” Sara whipped around, her grimy skirts swiping the table and sending her bowl of soup crashing against the wall. She did not stop, though, her breath churning in her lungs and her blood pumping furiously in her veins.

“Of course you have not! And do you answer
my letters? Do you even read them, I must ask?” She turned again to face him. “I cannot believe that you have. For surely, anyone with a human heart would have come to see what dire straits they have left their people in with no money, no hope, no duke at Rawlston Hall!”

Silence rang in the large kitchen. Sara clutched her skirts in her fists, her chest heaving with the strength of her tirade.

The Duke still leaned back in his chair, and he slowly dropped the front legs so they clunked against the ground. His dark brows lifted, making him look surprised and a bit too amused for her mood. “You are not a harlot, I take it?”

“Oh!” Sara clenched her fists even harder, wishing desperately to throw something, preferably something heavy and preferably at the Duke’s head. “Of course that is who you were expecting! The Rogue of Rawlston gives his staff the night off so that he can entertain whores in his home. You would not want to let down all the gossip mongers of London who find your European escapades titillating. Of course, you think nothing of letting the people of Rawlston,
your
people, down.”

Sara stopped and took a deep breath so she could continue. But the Duke furrowed his brow and said, “The Rogue of Rawlston?” He gave a small humorless laugh. “Do they truly call me that?” He grimaced.

“Are you not listening to me?” Sara asked
desperately. “Are you not hearing me? Rawlston needs you. You cannot pretend forever that it is not there.”

The Duke studied her in silence. His eyes roaming from her bedraggled hair to her torn slippers. “Since we have ruled out the possibility of you being a woman of the night, my next guess, from the passion of your tirade, is that you are the Duchess.” His brows furrowed and he stood. “I pictured you much older.” He walked around her as if studying her from all angles. “And cleaner.”

Sara turned, keeping her back to the wall. “I am no spring chicken, your grace. I am four and thirty, and I am usually cleaner, but I have been in jail.”

“Yes, I heard.”

“Well, at least you have heard something! A rather shocking realization as I have spent the last ten months with nary a word from you.”

The Duke leaned his hip against the table and crossed his arms over his chest. “It was easier to picture you a raging lunatic with thinning white hair, wrinkled skin, and perhaps a wart or two.” He shrugged. “Still, women of any age can . . . well . . . have unsettled sensibilities . . .”

“I am not insane!” Sara shrieked.

They stared at each other. Sara took a deep breath and held it for a moment. “I am sorry,” she said as she let the breath out. “I am just a bit upset at the moment.”

“Hmm.” The Duke shoved his hands deep into the pockets of his coat.

“You must understand my anger in this matter, your grace. If you haven’t read my letters, at least you have seen the amount of correspondence I have sent you. And you have not returned any of it.”

“How persistent of you.”

“Not persistent enough, obviously.”

“I don’t write letters,” the man said abruptly, pushing away from the table. He moved to the fallen bowl, bent, and picked it up. Sara watched, her anger dissipating into confusion as she watched the Duke reach for the dirty spoon lying in a pool of pungent soup on the floor.

“I’m sure, sir, you can leave that for the servants. I have urgent business to speak of!”

Dropping the dirty dishes in a tin bucket, the Duke grabbed a rag. “No servants, actually. Just me . . . and the rats if I leave this mess lying about.”

Sara blinked as the man dropped to his knees and swabbed the floor with the rag. The scene before her did not fit at all with the picture she had made for herself of the Duke of Rawlston. Since her husband had died ten months before and his third cousin had inherited, Sara had made a point of discovering all she could of the new Duke. It hadn’t been terribly difficult, as the man had an infamous reputation of being a gambler and a rake and not much else.

In fact, before inheriting the lofty title of duke, the man had not even had a title.

“Did you not bring any servants from France?”

The Duke stood and dumped the sodden rag into the bucket with the dishes. “I don’t have servants, actually.”

Sara let out an exasperated sigh. “Well, of course you do not. Your absolute lack of concern for anyone beside yourself is incredible!”

The Duke blinked. “My lawyer is right, you are insane.”

“As a duke, especially one with money, you owe it to people to give them jobs! There are people starving, and yet you live in this huge house with no one to cook or clean, which would in turn provide for another family.”

His grace stared at the tin bucket for a moment, then looked at her. “A good point . . . er, what is your name, by the way?”

Startled, Sara took a second to answer. “I am Sara, Sara Whitney.”

“Well, Sara, I do hope it is all right if I call you Sara.” The Duke continued without waiting for her consent. “I do not live in this grand house. I live in rather small apartments in Paris, where I employ a once-a-week housekeeper and pay her monstrously well.”

Sara huffed a disgusted laugh. “Unfortunately, you also employ servants at Rawlston Hall who have not been paid in over four months!”

“Four months?” The Duke looked at her suspiciously. “You don’t say? I shall have to speak with Andrew before leaving for Paris.”

“Leaving?” Sara rushed forward without thought and grabbed the Duke’s arm. He clenched his fist, and she felt his muscles move beneath her fingers. It jangled her nerves terribly, and she let go quickly. “I . . . that is to say,
we
really had hoped you would visit Rawlston!”

“Since I have been in London for all of twenty-four hours, with no announcement of my arrival, I must wonder when you hoped this outcome?”

Sara cleared her throat. “Well, of course, we hoped you would come when . . .” Sara suddenly wondered if the Duke believed she had headed a revolt against him. She certainly would not want to get anyone else in trouble if he did. “I mean, your grace, I thought, and it was my idea completely, that we, as the people of Rawlston, should get together—all of us, that is—and, well . . .”

“Revolt?” A tiny muscle quivered in the man’s jaw. Sara stared at it for a moment. What did that quiver mean?

“It was not a revolt at all, truly it was not. I just had an idea that if everyone quit working and gathered at the Hall, that perhaps you would finally show interest in your estate. We had absolutely no intention of revolting. For the love of St. Peter, the only weapon among the
whole bunch of us was Old Filbert’s cane. But of course, there was Rachel and her relationship with the constable. I did not think, though, that she would be so small-minded when it came to the good of everyone. But she made sure the constable knew that he would be lauded by all if he brought in a duchess who had revolted against a duke.” Sara rolled her eyes remembering. “She truly is a bit of a chain about my neck.” Immediately, Sara felt terrible for having voiced this feeling. “Not that I blame her.”

“Your thinking goes in circles, Sara, and your mouth follows. Could you explain in a linear fashion, perhaps?”

Sara frowned at him. “Rachel is—well,
was—
my departed husband’s mistress.”

“Ah.”

“Yes, obviously a train of thought you can follow.”

“I prefer a different woman each night, actually.”

“Oh!”

“Fire!”

The scream came from upstairs. Sara and the Duke stared at each other in shock for a moment.

“You dinna hear me, then?” Grady cried, as he came thumping down the stairs into the kitchen. “The house is on fire!”

Sara turned toward the boy and went to him as she said, “Grady, this will not help in the least.”

“I’m not playin’ games, yer grace. It’s out of this sure death trap and now for ye.” Grady might have only been seventeen, but he was a good foot taller than she, and quite broader. Bending at the waist, the boy shoved his shoulder into her midsection, grabbed the back of her knees, and hefted her up.

“For the love of St. Peter!”

“That’s right, yer grace, start sayin’ yer prayers.” The boy took off up the stairs. Sara nearly lost the few mouthfuls of chicken soup she had managed to swallow as Grady’s shoulder banged against her middle while they bounced up the stairs. “Oh, Lord.”

“I do hope this isn’t one of your pranks, Duchess.”

Craning her neck, and pushing against Grady’s back, Sara saw the Duke following them. “I do not pull pranks, sir.” She tried for a severe tone, but each word sounded more like a hiccough.

When they reached the top of the stairs, Sara felt the sting of acrid smoke in her nose.

“Oh my! There is a fire!”

Grady huffed as he ran for the front door. “So glad you believe me, yer grace.”

She wanted to answer, but with the smoke and Grady’s shoulder in her stomach, it was much more practical to concentrate on her breathing. She saw the doorjamb fly by beneath Grady’s heels, then stone stairs, and finally the roadway. The boy stopped suddenly; her head
bobbed forward and banged against his back and then the world tilted and rolled and she was on her feet, sort of.

Sara put her arms out for balance and teetered a bit.

“For the love of God.” The Duke stood beside her, his eyes shaded with a hand as he stared up at his townhouse.

Sara followed his gaze to the flames leaping from the windows just to the right of the entry-way.

The Duke turned to the boy. “How did this happen?”

Sara did not like his tone at all. “You are not suggesting that Grady did it!”

“Um, well . . . I dinna mean to . . .”

Sara turned on the boy. “Do not tell me, Grady, that you did this!”

“I jest snuck in for a little warmth. And I needed a bit o’ light.” He scowled as he turned toward the Duke. “That lamp must ‘ave been a century old if ‘twas a day, yer grace. The oil spilled all over, and . . . well . . .”

“Oh, Grady, you didn’t!”

“Yes—well, perhaps I should alert the neighbors.” The Duke interrupted her. “We need to stop the fire while it’s young, or the whole of London will soon be in flames.” He turned on his heel and started for the house next door.

“Grady, go alert a constable,” Sara said as she yanked at her petticoats.

“No, you alert a constable. I’ll not be havin’ you here fightin’ a fire.”

Sara yanked again and heard a satisfying tear. “I will fight anything I bloody well please, Grady.” Her petticoats pooled at her feet. “Go alert somebody . . .” she gripped the two sides of a seam and spoke through her teeth. “Now.”

Riiiiip
.

Grady looked from the flames to Sara, then back again.

“Go, Grady.” She ripped her underthings once more, getting a nice, small strip and tying it loosely about her mouth.

Grady rolled his eyes. With a sigh, he demanded, “Just be careful.” And he ran away into the night.

Servants came spilling out of the next house over as the Duke continued knocking on doors. Sara ran to a maid with a bucket. Throwing part of her petticoats at the girl, Sara dunked her half in the bucket of water and ran toward the Duke’s townhouse. The door stood wide open, and she crouched down beneath the layer of thick smoke that hovered against the tall ceiling and made her way into the room just off the entry where the fire had obviously been started.

With her soggy undergarments, Sara attacked flames as they danced up drapes and smoldered in furniture. She heard others behind her, but didn’t turn from her task, breathing as lightly as she could through her makeshift mask.