The Convenient Arrangement (26 page)

“No, my lady. This note—”

“Can wait. Where have you looked?”

“Everywhere, my lady. This note—”

“Lorenzo, how about the area beyond where the roof had collapsed in the old section?”

He shook his head. “It's been sealed for the past fortnight. I checked it myself.”

Gil said, “My lady, if you will read the note—”

“Later!” She waved him to silence. “David was bored with the attics weeks ago. How about the cellars? He mentioned something about a room down there that he called a dungeon. Could he have gotten himself locked in there?”

“I can have it checked.” He looked past her, and she saw Tilden Oates escorting his outraged sister and horrified mother out of the house. “Don't think about them now, Valeria.”

“I know. David! Where could he be?”

“Why not read the note?” asked Gil. “The lad who delivered it said you would want to read it right away because young David's time might be short otherwise.”

Valeria gasped as she ripped open the note. She did not waste time berating Gil for not telling her this before. The poor footman had tried. She had not listened, and now …

Valeria
,

If you are looking for your spoiled nephew, I suggest you come to meet me at the bridge near the horseshoe turn leading down into Winlock-on-Sea. We will work out the terms for his release then. You have until midnight to meet me alone. Otherwise, my patience with this child will come to an end along with him
.

It was signed Austin, Lord Caldwell, but she did not need to see the signature. Handing the note to Lorenzo, she looked at the clock. The minute hand had already begun its upward turn.

Lorenzo grasped her hand and shouted, “Gil, have the carriage brought at once.”

“You can't come with me!” she cried. “Lord Caldwell said I must come alone.”

“He is a high and mighty looby, if he thinks you will agree to such terms.”

“But we have to protect David.”

“Go and change into something dark. I think I have an idea that might be just the ticket to convince one arrogant viscount to give up his new habit of kidnaping.”

“What is it?”

He smiled. “Change, and I'll explain on the way.”

Lord Caldwell pulled his pocket watch from his waistcoat and peered at it. He swore and walked back to where his carriage waited in the shadows. Ignoring the thumping sounds from within, for the boy had not tired of trying to escape even though he had been tied up in the closed carriage for hours, he scanned the road. Mayhap he had miscalculated. Valeria might care no more about her nephew than her brother had cared about her when he sat at the card table and hoped that luck would come his way one more time.

He heard a crash behind him and whirled, pulling the pistol that he had hidden beneath his coat. He cursed again when he saw the door to the carriage was open wide. On the road, the bundled boy was fighting his bounds. Hearing a laugh from his coachman and the two men he had hired to help him tonight, he turned back to look along the road.

Slipping the pistol away, he noticed how his hands were shaking. Why hadn't Valeria just given in? He had thought she would be as weak as Paul Blair who had wisely ended his miserable life in that carriage accident.

He gave a shout to his coachman and the other men as he saw the flash of a lantern through the trees. This must be Valeria coming to rescue her nephew. No one else had traveled along this deserted road in the past hour. Hearing the rattle of carriage wheels on the uneven road, he smiled as he walked over to stand by the struggling boy.

With a signal to his men to be prepared, he crossed his arms in front of him, keeping one hand on the pistol under his coat. He put his foot on the lad and heard a mumbled oath shot at him. He smiled. Finally he was going to get his due from the Blair family.

His smile faded as the carriage stopped the length of a four-in-hand down the road and two people emerged. Dash it! Didn't Valeria understand that she was to come alone? He squared his shoulders as he realized she was coming with that pluckless fool Moorsea. He would have finished this at Moorsea Manor, but Moorsea's intrusion had reminded him of the many ears ready to eavesdrop on the confrontation. It was much better here where there were fewer witnesses. No matter what happened, his men would swear any vow he asked of them as long as he kept their palms bright with gold.

He grinned again as Moorsea offered Valeria his arm. Why had she come here with him instead of her fiancé? If she had brought Oates, there might have been a problem. Now … He chuckled with satisfaction.

Valeria's hand clenched on Lorenzo's arm as she heard Lord Caldwell's laugh. She flinched as she saw something move on the ground beside him, then gasped.

“Lorenzo, he's got David all trussed up,” she whispered as they strolled toward the other carriage as if nothing were amiss. “That son of a sow has gone too far.”

He patted her hand. “Hush. Having David safely secured in one place may be for the best right now, and we can keep an eye on him.”

She glanced up at him. What she had mistaken for shyness was quiet resolve and self-assuredness that not even Lord Caldwell's villainy could undo. Only on one matter had she been right about Lorenzo Wolfe. He had depths that would endlessly surprise and delight her.

“Caldwell!” he called. “We are here as you requested.”

The viscount sneered, “I asked Valeria to come alone.”

“You have less respect for the lady than I had guessed if you would ask her to drive out alone in the middle of the night.”

“Do nothing out of hand, Moorsea. I have three men who will stop any attempt you make at heroics.”

“That is not what I intended.” He stepped back and smiled at Valeria. “I am only escorting Lady Fanning here to free her nephew from your asinine attempts to intimidate her.”

Valeria kept her head high as she edged forward a step, wishing Lorenzo had stayed next to her. He could not, not if they hoped for his plan to save both David and her. She saw the guns in the hands of the men on the carriage, and she suspected Lord Caldwell was armed as well. “This is a very odd way to court a lady, my lord.”

“I have no need to court you, Valeria. I have your brother's agreement that you will marry me.”

“My brother is dead for months now.”

“His obligations did not die with him. He—” He yelped when David rolled out from under him, and his foot fell heavily to the road. Shifting, he put his boot on the boy's side again.

“Why don't you release David so we may discuss this rationally?”

“If I release the boy, you will scurry away like the frightened, cheating rabbits all you Blairs are.”

“Cheating?” She laughed and saw his amazement. “My lord, if my brother had cheated at cards, he cheated only himself and his family. Mayhap you have confused his crimes with your own.”

His voice came out in an incoherent growl, and Lorenzo whispered, “Do not push him too far. Not yet.”

Valeria nodded, scanning the darkness around them. She hoped Lorenzo could see more than she.

Lord Caldwell snarled, “This has gone on long enough. Come with me, Valeria. I will give your nephew to Moorsea, because I have no wish for the little devil in my life.”

“Neither David nor I will go with you.” She opened her reticule and held out a slip of paper. “This acknowledges that £8000 will be delivered to your solicitor by month's end.”

He knocked it out of her hand. “That is worthless. You don't have the money to even your brother's debts.”

“I will by month's end.”

“How?”

“That is none of your bread-and-butter.” She would not reveal that Lorenzo had offered to sell some of his uncle's antiquities to Mr. Pettit to obtain her the money she needed. The thought of his generous offer strengthened her. “You will have your money, so return my nephew to me.”

“'Tis not only money that your brother owed me.”

Her eyes widened. “But you asked only about—”

“Because I never guessed you would be able to obtain the money to repay your brother's financial debts to me. There is still the matter of the other chit he signed before he ended his miserable life.”

Valeria took a step forward as David squirmed on the ground, mumbling something at the insult to his father. She froze when Lord Caldwell pulled something from under his coat. Seeing the slip of paper he held, she dared to breathe.

“Your brother signed this,” Lord Caldwell said, “the last time we sat at the board of green cloth together. He had run out of funds, and the only way I would accept his signature on a debt was if he would agree to arrange my marriage to you, as your guardian refused—”

“You asked my uncle to marry her?” Lorenzo asked.

The viscount scowled. “Before she wed Fanning. The old goat refused, and I vowed then that, one day, Valeria, you would be my wife. No one makes me look like a ninnyhammer.”

“No,” he replied, “you seem to have accomplished that all by yourself.”

Valeria almost laughed, although she never had felt less like laughing. Lorenzo wielded words like a knight's lance. Her urge to laugh disappeared when Lord Caldwell turned his furious stare back on her.

“The facts are the facts. After your husband's death, I approached your brother. He said no as well until I persuaded him to agree to arrange your marriage to me if he lost. He lost that hand and then his life before he could do as he promised.”

“That's absurd! I shall not marry you simply because of the turn of a card.”

“It is a debt your brother owed me, and now you must even it.”

“But why do you want to marry me? We have seldom met before this.”

He scowled. “That is why. You are a part of the Polite World that would never allow me admittance because I lived in the shadow of my family's reputation. With you as my wife, I shall be able to thumb my nose at those who refused to open their doors to me.” His laugh was bitter. “Including you, for you shall keep no door closed to me when we are man and wife.”

Trying not to let him see her shudder of distaste, she said, “Marrying me shall not gain you admittance to the homes of the tulips of fashion. You miscalculated by ruining me first.”

“You will be welcomed by those whom you have befriended in the past, and so will I.”

“Do not be so certain of that.”

“Enough of this pointless discussion. You have no choice, Valeria. If you wish to get your nephew back, you shall—”

A shout came from the top of the carriage. One of the men pointed along the road. With a gasp, Valeria stared at the twin of the apparent ghost that had appeared in the garden. This was not part of Lorenzo's plan. Or was it? When she heard his oath, she knew he was as shocked as she was. A horrifying howl erupted from the glowing ghost.

Lorenzo grabbed Valeria and pushed her back toward his carriage as Lord Caldwell shrieked. Water cascaded over the viscount, and he fell flat onto his face as he tried to reach his own carriage.

She cried out, “David!”

Looking back at Lord Caldwell's carriage, Valeria chuckled as more filthy water cascaded down on the men around it. They were blinded by the water, just as Lorenzo had planned, and did not see a shadowed form glide toward David or the flash of a honed knife.

David jumped to his feet and ran to her, loosened ropes hanging from him like discarded chains. She picked him up and tossed him into the carriage while the branches in the trees over Lord Caldwell's carriage shook as if giant squirrels scurried through them. Empty buckets struck the carriage before swift shadows raced away around the corner and toward Moorsea Manor. For the first time, Lorenzo's servants and his new household had worked in perfect unison.

Lorenzo held out his hand to help her into the carriage, but she heard Lord Caldwell shout, “Stop!”

Tossed almost as inelegantly into the carriage as David had been, Valeria pulled the door closed when Lorenzo was within. The carriage rocked wildly as it started up the rough road.

Lorenzo patted David on the shoulder. “See? I can learn from you, too.”

The boy grinned. “I—”

A gun fired, then another.

Pushing them toward the floor, Lorenzo gasped, “The man is completely insane!”

The carriage halted along with Valeria's heart for a single beat. Had the shots hit the coachee? The door was thrown open, and she saw the driver's horrified face.

“He shot her, my lord!” he shouted.

“Her?” Valeria asked, but Lorenzo had already jumped out of the carriage. She followed and bit back her cry when she saw a crumpled form on the ground.

A glow came from the front of the breastplate, save for a dark spot that was spreading across it. She dropped to her knees and clasped the hand held out to her.

“Miss Urquhart!” she moaned. “Why did you come after us?”

“Thought you might need some help. Don't trust any of those Caldwells. Francis always said they were the devil's spawn.” She tried to sit, but fell back heavily against the ground. “Is the lad all right?”

“Yes, David is safe.”

“And the boy?”

“He's not hurt either.” She looked at Lorenzo, who was taking the breastplate off so Miss Urquhart could breathe more easily. “We must get her back to Moorsea Manor and send for the doctor right away.”

He nodded and motioned for the coachee to help him lift the old woman into the carriage.

David clambered out. “I can run for the doctor, Aunt Valeria. We aren't far from Winlock-on-Sea. I know where the doctor lives. Gil and I saw his sign when we went to the beach one day.”

“Go!” she urged, glancing back at the other carriage which had not moved. “Go as fast as you can, and don't let anyone stop you. Tell the doctor we need him immediately.”

“Is she going to be all right?”