Regency Rogues Omnibus (51 page)

Nia’s eyes widened with her lips forming an “O” of surprise. “Oh no, I-I...” she stuttered.

“Listen to me, lass,” Brynmore said, patting her hand. “I’ve heard most of the stories concerning you and Radford. But I know there is more.”

Nia dropped her gaze, pulling her hands from Brynmore’s hands to clutch both of them into her lap. “I’m a lady of the night,” she whispered, then she lifted her head and said more strongly, “And, I am
not
ashamed of it. It’s honest work!”

“And it’s certain to be the money, Nia. How could I be so unthinking? I knew your parents left five siblings. Yet, I never thought to ask. How could you not come to me, lass? We are not so distantly related, and clan is clan,” Brynmore said.

“You had lost so much, Bry. And the line is long in our relation.” Nia looked at her hands twisting in her lap and stopped their motion. “I did not know I could ask anyone or expect anyone to take our cause.”

“Ach well, you know now,” Brynmore said, reaching forward and clasping her hands to pull her into another short and welcome embrace. “My mother would be chiding me from heaven that I did not take care of her best friend, Mary Dunmore’s, children.”

Nia clutched him. “Galen has been accepted into Oxford. It is so very expensive.”

“Now, now,” Brynmore soothed her. “The clan has worth and young Galen will return to us an asset. Besides you still have the land and house I’m thinking and you just need someone to help you make it profitable. One way or another, lass, I’ll not hear any more of this lady of the night shenanigans.” Brynmore lifted her chin looking down on her. “Besides, I think it might not be a problem soon.”

Nia looked up at Brynmore curiously, wondering what he meant. Then, he cleared his throat. “I think though, lass, that before you travel back to Dublin and we settle you in, you might have something here left to do.”

“Radford?” she asked. Then, she said, “I have told him all of it and left the evidence. I’m sure you know.”

“Nia, do you understand that he thinks you’ll be paid. That you left for the money.”

“No!” she exclaimed. “I could not. Not now. But, I thought...” she paused, thinking that she had been so emotional. Maybe, she’d not properly thought about what Radford would think. It would be so much crueler if Radford thought she would take the money. It would taint everything they had been together so much worse than it already was.

“He would refuse to see me. He cannot ever want to see me again.”

Brynmore held her back from him looking down on her. “Then you cannot take a, “no,” for an answer, lass. He needs to hear the whole of it. You owe that to him and your honor demands it.”

Nia lifted her chin. Brynmore was right. She must set her sins right as best as she could, no matter how difficult it would be. She just needed to tell Radford, to speak to him and to say goodbye.

“You are right,” Nia said to Brynmore finally.

Brynmore nodded, then he said, “Now tell me more about this person that hired you.”

Chapter Seventeen

Radford stood in his ballroom, lighted with the glow of chandeliers and candle sconces upon the wall. The orchestra played a soulful waltz and the large room was filled with men and women dressed in creative renditions that swept the spectrum from fairies and goddesses to the devilish mischief-maker Pan and the omnipotent Zeus. He was dressed as a phantom without a shirt, bare chested, but he wore a flowing black satin cloak with a blood red lining thrown over his shoulders. His mask was black velvet with devilish points over his brows. Everyone was masked and he was sincerely grateful for his own mask.

In the throng of revelers he was hard to identify as he stood beside a large sweeping potted plant beneath an arch on the side of the ballroom. From his vantage point he could see the room, yet nearly not be seen himself. The perfect place to brood, while his friends of the Archangels and their wives graciously took over the main hosting of his party. He had requested it and one look at him, he supposed, had sealed their questions as to why. He’d also asked that they spread the rumor that they, as his closest friends, knew that he’d asked a lady from the continent to be his bride. Yet, until she accepted, which appeared quite favorable that she would, he was not revealing her name to anyone, out of gentlemanly concern, of course. That he assumed, should quiet his life considerably from the grasp of any ladies setting their attentions upon him. He hoped!

He had also given Drummond the letters that Nia had left him in the hopes that Drummond could identify the man behind the out of the ordinary scheme. With the amount of money that must have been involved it smacked of nefarious intent. Yet, for the life of him, he could not imagine what gain it could bring. However, it made him wholly uncomfortable knowing that some gentleman had controlled his life so thoroughly for a time and anyone would be inordinately curious as to the reasons for so lavish a manipulation.

He also could not set aside his worry for Nia in the matter, no matter how hard he forcefully tried. He cared not at all for the idea of her meeting the man once again to be paid. In his opinion, whenever there were large amounts of money involved there always lay danger. Brynmore would certainly see that concern as well, and address it, warning Nia not to allow a meeting if the plan varied in any form from the intentions stated in the last letter. Especially, Radford thought, because she had not followed the instructions and the mysterious gentleman could very well pick that as a contention to her payment.

The truth was, he only attended the ball to see Brynmore’s return and the only thing keeping him from charging to Nia’s side and literally carrying her away was the fact that she was being paid for what had happened between them. It was the one hurdle, it appeared, that his male stubbornness could not leap. It injured his pride sorely in a way he was not yet willing to comprehend or deal with. He could care less that Nia was a
fille de joie
. For that matter, it inspired him greatly. It was literally a dream come true, and he was experienced enough to realize that she could not be very experienced in the trade. Yet it lent her an air of uninhibitedness, a quality rarely found in any ladies of his acquaintance.

Radford stared at the champagne drenched ice sculpture carved into the form of a semi-nude mermaid. It was perched on a lavishly set table across from where he stood and the melting ice reflected gold’s and blues along its crystal sleek surface from the candles burning near to it. The carver had masked the mermaid ingeniously to copy the guests of the party. Radford wondered once again in an errant thought, whether Nia could possibly be among the crowd. It was a foolish and winsome hope that had him often gazing into the crowd of masked faces. He had taunted himself before that he would know her anywhere if she was masked. The irony of a deep love, so forlorn, and the fact that he had never gazed upon her face did not escape him.

“Fuck,” he swore with a crass curse for his darkening mood. He was a fool to be letting her go like this. Damn, his stubborn pride. She was a prize within his heart to fight laborious battles over, or suffer any torture to gain. A woman like Nia was as rare as, and therefore as precious as, any of the mystical creatures portrayed that night. Nia was . . . once in a lifetime.

Radford’s head came up and his jaw stiffened. He
would
go to her and carry her away by force if he must. She was his! And he was a blasted fool for brooding the way he was instead of taking action as his heart was pounding to do. He strode forward into the crowd with his intentions. He would ride to Dublin if he must, yet he would never stop, until he finally saw her face.

Then, in the moment that he thought about seeing Nia’s face some sense inside him tugged his gaze upward from its brooding inward gaze. The crowd before him was parting oddly as though they were standing aside for someone approaching him. Then, he heard the combined voices ahead of him making united and excited murmurs. At that moment, the way before him parted and opened up and his gaze settled upon the only person in the ballroom not wearing a mask . . .

Chapter Eighteen

Nia.

Radford’s heartbeat thudded instantly and heavily. She was here, come to him, and her cloak of anonymity was unmasked and in so spectacular a way as to be shown blaring in contrast against all the veiled revelers. The poignant appreciation of Nia’s beauty unveiled before him, shouted of truths she would reveal and willingly lay open to his scrutiny. Her expression was wary and anxious, yet he could see the delicate stubbornness on her lovely chin. A face of character and attractiveness and her features were exactly as he’d set them in his mind. Irish green eyes, fanned by dark lashes, classic cheekbones and a gentle feminine nose. She had come to him and she knew him immediately, even though he was masked. Just as he knew her unmasked.

The gown she wore was the embodiment of sexual enticement. It was a light and shimmering green veil that clung to her curves as though his hands had caressed the material over every inch of her supple roundness. The material teased his eye with its sheerness and the wonder of what intimacy one was really seeing beneath.

His Lady Fire was dressed for any advantage she could gain to empower her cause and she completely won the advantage from him. Although, he did not allow it to show upon his face as she approached him and he backed up. He was not moving away from her, yet guiding her to privacy with a subtle nod of his head to follow as he retreated. She appeared hesitant, yet gathered her determination as she came forward with a kaleidoscope of emotions showing in her brilliant green-gold eyes.

In the moment, they were both oblivious to the people around them, with some of the people not realizing his and Nia’s connection, while others did notice their separate, yet tandem movements together. One could tell that Nia was moving toward something, yet blended back into the crowd as he was; it was not obvious that he was the goal. Except of course to his friends, watching intently, until he’d guided Nia out of the large ballroom doors, which were open to the gardens on the east side of the ballroom. Another smaller orchestra played outside with the paths and walkways of the gardens lighted by torchlights. People danced on the circular patio, while other couples lingered in the shadows.

Once Radford reached the more obscure darkness outside, he stopped, standing off to the side, waiting for Nia to approach closer. “Will you follow me, cherie?” he asked her softly.

She appeared as skittish as a frisky young fawn. However, she nodded saying, “Please, I w-would speak to you.”

He noted the catching in her voice as he raised his hand to her, silently requesting that she place her hand into his. He could see that she was set with hesitancy and determination to tell him what she must. He knew they had many things to reveal and discuss, however he had only one intention for the outcome of this fated meeting and his heart soared with the surety that it was going to culminate exactly as he intended. This time he would be the final master over their fates and any hesitance his Lady Fire would have. And he could see that she might have many as she looked at his hand, unsure what to do.

“I only came to explain, your grace,” she murmured. “Not to expect anything at all.”

It was difficult to hold back his burgeoning elation and not sweep Nia off her feet and carry her away as he would soon do. However, she needed to do this and he needed her to do it as well. So, he merely inclined his head saying, “I know, cherie.”

Nia fidgeted, but then put her hand into Radford’s hand. He would
have
to be bare-chested at the same time she wished to bare her soul, she thought forlornly. How was she to be honorably repentant and humble with her gaze filled with his upper muscular body? Even a
fille de joie
did not see the magnificence of men’s naked chests all that often for the sight not to be affecting her. At least Radford had not turned away or glared at her angrily as she fully thought he would do. Actually, she was slightly set off kilter by his gentle but intense reaction so far, coupled with the arousing flex of manly sinew that he displayed.

His hand guided her firmly and she followed anxiously rehearsing in her mind what she had to say to him. It was not a plea, but a return of honor she must give. It was her duty to clear up any hurtful misconceptions, and then it was her duty, to step away from him and leave him as graciously as she could manage. She wondered fleetingly if she were so brave, because to gaze upon Radford was to love him. But for that love she must, and she would not make a scene of herself. The Duke and a whore could never be anything more than that. And she fooled herself to think otherwise.

Radford led her to a secluded gazebo in the garden. It was dark, but once inside Radford lit several candles which cast their light across the silk furnishing of low couches and plump pillows. There were shutters around the octagon shaped room that could be lifted open to the full view of the gardens outside. But at the moment were closed and it leant an intimacy to the chamber. The seclusion and the sensual tension did not elude her, yet she was certain that the intensity that she was feeling was hers and not Radford’s. How could she expect him to be anything less than disgusted with her? She was certain that only his gentlemanly baring kept it at bay.