The Second Shot (The Dueling Pistols) (6 page)

At his age, Charles wouldn't understand that his father had left his mother in a terrible coil and discarded her like so much rubbish when she grew inconvenient. "All right, I shall tell you a little about him."

"And I can meet him?"

"No, not meet him. I'll point him out, but you must promise not to speak of it to anyone." Felicity swallowed her reservations. What harm could come of pointing out his father from a distance?

Charles pierced her with an icy blue gaze. "Can we go to the toy store now?"

The question startled a response from her. "Of course we shall."

With a sweet, cherubic smile Charles tugged her toward the door.

Felicity pulled on her gray gloves and buttoned the cuffs. She'd called for her carriage, and a footman opened the front door for her and Charles. His little hand tucked in hers, she made it down the first two steps before she realized she was being watched. The sensation spread through her like butter melting on a scone. She unerringly looked across the street to meet Tony's eyes.

He leaned against a wrought-iron railing around the small square. He straightened, breaking the liquid relaxation of his pose and erecting a barrier between the unbidden memory of the untried young man he had been and the tightly controlled major he had become.

In one of his hands was the end of a lead to one of the biggest dogs Felicity had ever seen. In the other hand he held...a glass?

He raised the glass and held it out. His mouth curled in a dangerous half smile, while Charles jerked at her hand.

Felicity felt as if she were wading through water, as she was half tugged across the street toward Tony. His pale eyes flicked over her, perhaps marking the changes and the difference after six years. The dog he held began to thump his tail against the ground and lunged forward, half-sitting.

"I brought you your lemonade."

In spite of her wariness of him, and the day late offering, yearning gripped her hard. She wanted his mouth on hers, his arms around her, his body against her body.

"Look at that dog, Mama. Look!" her son's voice squeaked with excitement.

Tony's gaze lit on her son and narrowed. His pale eyes grew icy and a muscle flicked in his jaw. He radiated with animosity and an almost unadulterated hatred. Her stomach turning over, she pulled Charles close.

What kind of man hated his own son?

Chapter Four

Meg Brown wiped the damp brow of the girl lying in the bunk. The ominous creaking and the sway of the lantern overhead marked the rough seas. They hadn't even reached the English Channel.

"Are we within sight of the white cliffs of Dover?" asked the girl, Diana Fielding, lately of a Swiss finishing school.

"We're close." That was a lie. Meg felt no remorse. She was good at lying, and besides, she meant it for comfort.

"Good, I've missed England."

Meg curled her nose. Meg had not missed England. Yet here she was, returning to everything she'd never had.

"I'm anxious to meet my aunt," whispered Diana.

Your very generous aunt, thought Meg. The one who had unknowingly financed Meg Brown's return. Although, as much nursing as the young miss required, Meg had earned every ha'penny.

Diana, who epitomized the wealth and gentle manners of a lady—although she did not have the blue blood Meg could claim—was sicker than a poisoned dog. Meg felt an odd mix of pity and envy. The girl had everything to look forward to: a position in society, an aunt determined to give her a proper season, and no doubt, enough blunt to induce a respectable man to jump into a parson's trap.

Meg, on the other hand, had endured every kind of hell known to women. She was stuck in this cramped cabin, tending a sick girl she barely knew. All because that was what the wife of an officer in His Majesty's army would do. Meg wasn't a wife. A camp follower, more like. But there was no future in that. With the Corsican monster defeated, soon there wouldn't even be any armies left to follow.

"My cousin is the only real family I have left."

"What about your aunt?"

"Aunt Felicity is only my aunt by marriage." Diana breathed hard for a few seconds. "Not a blood relative."

Meg was tempted to warn her to conserve her strength, but it hardly mattered now. If it comforted the girl to talk, well, then, Meg could listen. She had always had too soft a heart. Besides she couldn't go anywhere on the ship, because the captain had been keeping a close eye on her. A very close eye.

"Her son, Charles, is my first cousin. But everyone else is dead."

Then Diana would be surrounded by family soon. Meg bit back the uncalled-for response and dipped the rag in the basin to wipe Diana's forehead and wrists again.

"My parents are dead. Uncle Layton is dead." Diana closed her eyes. "I wondered if my destiny was to perish so far from home in Switzerland."

"Of course not," Meg reassured her.

Meg was no longer sure she herself was destined for anything better than her mother's fate, being a wharfside doxie once her looks faded and the only ones that would want her were the smelly old drunks who didn't care beyond that she had the right parts.

Each opportunity she grabbed to take her closer to the life she knew she was entitled to live ended up having an unforeseen drawback. Every respectable soldier she had done laundry and cooking for in the hopes of a decent proposal ended up facedown in the dirt, and she'd have to start all over again. She'd come out further ahead when she just lay on her back. But for once she'd just like to know that she had a bit of power over her future.

"I thought they might have forgotten about me, but then Aunt Felicity started writing me. I have every letter still." Diana lethargically pointed toward the trunk in the corner. Her arm flopped down as if she could no longer support its weight.

Meg gently placed Diana's arm on the bunk. "Yes, you should try to sleep now."

This service, which Meg performed for Diana in hope of some small return of a respectable connection, would be worthless. The girl was deathly ill and would not last long enough to offer any assistance. Meg could only hope this aunt would appreciate her chaperoning and nursing—and compensate her. Still, Meg continued her efforts.

It was a crying shame: Diana had everything in life that Meg coveted, and she wouldn't live to enjoy it.

* * *

Tony stared at the woman he had once thought to marry, once thought he wanted more than life itself, and realized he still wanted her. He'd nearly gone hard just watching her descend the steps. The aberrant desire dismayed him and shocked him with its intensity.

She stood before him holding the hand of a boy, a cruel reminder of her married state. A reminder that cut him to the quick and thankfully tempered the knife's edge of lust.

Why had she turned her back on him? Did she marry this Merriwether chap just the for money?

She stood away from him. Her expression was cool, remote, although her eyes flashed angrily. There was no way she could totally subjugate her passionate nature.

She could have been
his
wife. If life had played out its hand differently, she would have been his. That child—what was he? Three or four? His eyes were still the pale blue of infancy—that child could have been his. Instead she warmed another man's sheets.

"Last night I was called away on an urgent matter. I didn't want you to think I forgot my promise." He held the glass of lemonade out to her.

Felicity's lips tightened. That mouth had once so freely opened under his and welcomed his kisses, locked against him.

She steadfastly ignored the glass he held out. She looked up the street, where a carriage rounded the corner. "I'm afraid we're about to leave."

She stepped backward.

Her son had other ideas. "Mama, the dog! I want to see the big dog."

Phys gave a little whimper and scooted toward the child.

"Stay, Phys." Tony put his hand in front of the dog. The Irish wolfhound was of a size to worry any mother. However, Phys was indiscriminate about attention. Anyone who would pet him was all the crack with him.

The boy yanked his hand free from Felicity's and galloped toward Phys.

"Go slowly. You don't want to startle him." Tony tightened his hold on Phys's lead just the same. "Take this," he gave the glass to Felicity. "He's big, but he's gentle," he said to reassure her.

"Come, Charles, the toy store."

Charles paused, caught between the two warring attractions.

"You had best go to the toy store. That is an opportunity not to be missed," Tony said to the little boy.

"Why do you call him Fizz?" Charles's milk teeth looked tiny in his little mouth.

"Phys—it's short for Physician." Tony shifted his gaze away from the tyke and looked at his mother. "Felicity, I want to talk. Would tomorrow be a good time to call?"

"I am
Mrs. Merriwether."

He wouldn't use that name. "You still call me Tony."

She curled her nose at the lemonade and held out the glass to a footman from the carriage, who relieved her of it instantly. She smoothed an unwrinkled gray glove over the back of her hand and tugged on the cuff. "I'm sure it was a slip."

Tony had the feeling he was missing something. Her son had knelt by Phys, and Tony felt obligated to make sure his big, clumsy dog didn't do any damage. He watched the small boy with one wary eye.

"You don't like lemonade any longer?"

Her brown eyes focused on him with a look layered with pity and exasperation.

What prompted that expression?

He wanted to rail at her, to learn the reason why she had turned her back on their engagement, but this was England, and he had to learn to be a civilized gentleman all over again. Not that he'd learned all that well the first time.

"I won't continue to hound you. I won't be here that long." As he said the words, Tony realized they might not be true. He would be here in England until he saw justice served for Captain Lungren. "I just want to know that you are happy, Felicity. That the man you married..."
What?
He tried to finish the sentence with,
makes you happy,
but the words wouldn't leave his mouth. What right did she have to happiness, when she'd killed something inside him?

Her response for all its bluster was slow to arrive. "I am Mrs. Merriwether to you, Major Sheridan."

"You will never be Mrs. Merriwether to me."

Her boy's gaze landed on Tony, although he continued to pat Phys's head. Tony leaned over, took his hand and showed him how to stroke the dog's head. Phys grinned a silly dog grin in appreciation.

Felicity looked at her carriage and back at him. "Where will you be going?"

"I'm taking an assignment in India." He rubbed his leg.

"When?"

"A few months, if all goes well." When his dratted leg returned to normal.

The boy studied him curiously a moment before starting to speak. "Are you—"

Felicity's gloved hand clamped over the boy's mouth. Her movement brought the foursome—his dog, her son, and the two of them—in a tight circle. He reached out and touched the back of her gray silk gown. She froze like a man suddenly brought face to face with the business end of a bayonet.

The material felt particularly fine, rich, with just the faintest drag as his fingers slid down to the small of her back. She felt the same to him: wonderful, magical, almost more than a woman. Dear God, how he missed touching her.

The boy glared at him over the edge of her hand. There was something endearing about his expression, even though Tony would have wished him and the dog miles away at the moment. Something in the boy's disgust almost reminded Tony of himself. He couldn't imagine how he would have reacted if his mother had clamped a gloved hand over his mouth at any given moment.

An observation broke free in Tony's mind. The little boy's small clothes were all black—quite Quakerish. Felicity wore gray. Some detail from last night knocked at his brain. A detail he once wouldn't have observed, but war had made him pay attention to the smallest of things, because he had found a trivial observation often proved important. Last night Felicity's fan had been edged in black. "By God, you're a widow."

She straightened and eased away from Tony's hand, and without removing her palm from Charles's mouth, she firmly led her son to the waiting carriage.

Tony grabbed the glass of lemonade from the impassive footman. Tony quirked an eyebrow at the man.

"Yes, sir, she is a widow," he said under his breath.

He gave the man a brief nod and turned and gave Phys a sloppy drink of lemonade. His dog stared at him as if he had played a cruel joke on him.

"Sorry, Phys. I guess lemonade isn't quite the thing anymore."

* * *

"Pigs, pigs, pigs," muttered Felicity as she half hoisted Charles into the carriage. "When pigs fly."

Fortunately, Charles grew more concerned about pigs than he was about the affront to his dignity. He didn't like being picked up anymore.

"I have to buy pigs at the toy store? I want soldiers."

"How about both, some animals and soldiers? It is a good idea for you to know what animals are on your farms."

"Do I grow pigs?" Charles appeared thoughtful.

"You raise pigs."

"Flying pigs?" asked Charles with a squeaky uncertainty.

"No, wallowing pigs." Felicity smiled. "And cattle, and chickens—lots of chickens."

"I didn't think pigs could fly," he said with his confidence restored. "Was that man in the army?"

Felicity sucked in a deep breath. That man, that man was a hazard. One touch and she was all aquiver. Yet she had no intention of throwing her hard-won freedom away. She didn't intend to marry again. And anything else was unthinkable. If only she could stop her mind from straying down those garden paths. "Yes, he is a major."

The real danger was that the thought of an affair tempted her far too much, but she didn't want to be trapped into marrying again. A woman sacrificed far too much control in a marriage, even when there were contracts to regulate the finances.