To Tempt An Angel (Book 1 Douglas series) (2 page)

“We aren’t strangers.” Robert gave her a boyish grin and added, “You’ve just stolen—I mean,
won
—a small fortune from me. The least you can do is allow me to escort you home.”

Angelica wanted desperately to ride with him. She wanted to keep company with a gentleman and live a normal life.
Sacred sevens
, she wanted her
old
life back

Duty defeated desire.

“Making your acquaintance has been a pleasure,” Angelica said, turning away.

“Several people saw you pocket that money,” Robert reminded her.

Angelica saw the sense in what he was saying. Yet, she suffered the uncanny feeling that accepting his offer would change her life forever. Would that be a bad thing? She certainly wasn’t happy with her present life.

“I live on the far side of Primrose Hill,” Angelica said, turning toward him with a smile lighting her face.

Robert dismounted in order to help her up. The sound of a galloping horse broke the silence around them, and they turned in time to see a man on horseback aim a pistol at them.

Robert dove for the ground as the shot rang out and took Angelica with him. She heard their attacker’s horse galloping away.

Robert lay on top of her and stared into her eyes. Caught by his dark gaze, Angelica felt her cheeks heating with an embarrassed blush.

“The danger has passed,” she managed to whisper, feeling the warmth of his body seeping through her light clothing.

Robert seemed in no hurry to release her. “You’ve lost your crown of flowers,” he said.

Angelica couldn’t credit that the man was talking about flowers when they’d nearly been killed. She opened her mouth to tell him to get off, but then he moved.

“I knew someone would try to steal your money,” Robert said, helping her rise. He lifted the wreath of flowers off the ground and placed it on top of her blond head, adding, “You look like a flower fairy again.”

“What makes you think the assassin was aiming at me?” Angelica countered. “He didn’t stop to steal my money. Perhaps he’s one of your enemies.”

Robert snapped his brows together. She knew from the expression on his handsome face that he thought she made sense.

“I’m an excellent markswoman,” Angelica said, pulling her dagger from the sheath strapped to her leg. “If you hadn’t thrown yourself on top of me, I would have taken him down. Then we could have questioned him.”

Robert burst out laughing. “A knife wielding angel? Next time I’ll let you rescue me,” he said, helping her onto his horse.

“I should walk the rest of the way,” Angelica said when he mounted behind her. “Being attacked twice in one day is statistically impossible.”

“You are the sweetest gambler I’ve ever encountered,” Robert said. Then, “What’s your full name?”

“Angelica Douglas.” His body pressing intimately against hers made her feel weak. To mask her nervousness, she asked “What is your full name, sir?”

“Robert Roy.”

“Are you joking?” Angelica glanced over her shoulder at him. “Your name is really Rob Roy?”

Robert shrugged. “My father had a keen sense of humor.”

“I agree,” Angelica said with a smile, “but the joke is on you.”

Robert inhaled deeply of her scent, lavender and water lily. She reminded him of a spring day. “Your smile shames the envious sun, angel.”

“I love this moment in the year’s cycle,” Angelica told him. “Sunshine, flowers, and freedom fill the days.”

“Do I detect a philosophical gambler?” Robert asked, amusement tingeing his voice.

Angelica shrugged. “I am philosophical by choice and a gambler by necessity.”

A connoisseur of beautiful women, Robert enjoyed the feeling of the angel in his arms as they started down Hampstead Road. She exuded seductive innocence, an aphrodisiac to his senses.

The girl possessed a startlingly perfect face, flawless ivory skin, and full lips that begged to be kissed. Thick golden hair, streaked with paler shades of blond, framed her face and cascaded almost to her waist.

Crowning her head, the wreath of fresh-cut flowers gave her an ethereal appearance. He could almost see this flower fairy cavorting like a nymph through the woodland.

Hers was a haunting beauty that had beckoned to him from the first moment he’d seen her at the fair. Why would such a woman waste her time running a thimblerigger’s game? Most gentlemen of his acquaintance would have parted with a fortune to keep her as a mistress. She would produce beautiful babies, too.

Robert stiffened when he realized his thoughts had drifted to babies. Thinking of babies always darkened his mood, like a cloud blocking the sun.

Well, he needn’t concern himself with babies. He planned never to marry again.

“Is something wrong?” Angelica asked without turning around.

Her question yanked him back to reality. “No, angel, I merely suffered an unpleasant thought.”

“What was it?”

“Nothing important.”

Angelica glanced over her shoulder at him. “You mean it is none of my business?”

“Precisely.”

Robert halted his horse when they reached the two-hundred-and-sixteen-foot summit of Primrose Hill. He gazed down at the tiny hamlet of cottages with their pale pink, lemon, and sage stucco fronts trimmed with white like frosted cakes.

“Pretty, isn’t it?” Robert remarked.

“Everything looks pretty from this height,” Angelica replied with a rueful smile.

“A cynical angel?” he teased her.

“Look back at London,” she said.

Robert tugged on the reins to turn his horse around and looked over her head. Beyond the sloping meadow lay London with its distant landmarks—Westminster Abbey, Saint Paul’s Cathedral, the Tower of London.

“You can’t see the squalor,” Angelica said softly, “but it exists.”

“It’s not all squalor.”

“I agree with you, but most Londoners do not live on Park Lane,” she said.

“A
bitter
cynical angel?” Robert said, turning his horse around.

“There is much in life to cause bitterness unless one is a member of the Quality,” Angelica informed him.

“Do you actually believe the Quality lead perfect, happy lives?” he asked.

“None of them need to scratch like barnyard chickens for their next meal,” she answered.

Robert couldn’t argue with that. “What is beyond the hamlet?” he asked, changing the subject.

“Saint John’s Wood.”

Robert nudged his horse forward. Slowly, they descended Primrose Hill to the hamlet below.

“Stop here,” Angelica said when they reached the last cottage.

Robert halted his horse in front of a pale pink cottage trimmed in white. He dismounted and then lifted her down from the saddle.

“Angelica, darling,” a woman’s voice called. “Thank God you’re home.”

Though she appeared to be in her early forties, a youthful beauty still clung to the woman hurrying toward them. Auburn-haired and brown-eyed, the woman was voluptuous of figure. When she smiled to acknowledge his presence, two adorable dimples adorned her cheeks, making her appear even younger.

“What’s the problem, Aunt Roxie?”

“Your father is a bit under the eaves,” her aunt told her. She flicked a quick glance at Robert and added, “He drank my lavender perfume.”

Angelica raced inside the cottage. Robert followed her through a large common room into an inner chamber where an older man lay on a cot and moaned as if in agony.

“He’s poisoned himself,” Robert said, taking charge. “Fetch me an empty bucket and a jar of heavily salted water.”

“What are you going to do?” Aunt Roxie asked, hurrying into the tiny bedchamber.

“Help me get him into a sitting position,” Robert ordered, ignoring her question.

On either side of the cot, Robert and Aunt Roxie pulled the man up until his back was against the wall. He opened his eyes, looked at Robert, and mumbled, “Magnus? Is it you, Magnus?”

The words startled Robert. His own father was named Magnus, and some people said he looked like his father as a young man. How could this desperate alcoholic know his father?

“Graham, he’s not Magnus,” Aunt Roxie was telling him. “He’s—” She looked at him.

“Robert,” he supplied.

Graham Douglas moaned and clutched his stomach. “Roxanne, it is Magnus,” the old man insisted breathlessly.

“He is
not
Magnus,” Aunt Roxie replied.

“You cannot win an argument with a drunk,” Robert told her. “I’ll answer to Magnus if it will help him.”

“What a sweet boy,” Aunt Roxie said as Angelica returned with the salted water and empty bucket.

Robert lifted the bottle out of her hand and put his left arm around the older man’s head in order to force his mouth open. He poured some salted water into his mouth and clamped it shut forcing him to swallow.

Robert repeated this procedure again and again until the bottle was empty. Then he grabbed the bucket and planted it in the man’s lap.

“What do we do now?” Angelica asked, her anxiety apparent in her voice.

“We wait,” Robert answered, his gaze fixed on her father. He reached out to grab the back of the man’s head and force it forward until he’d vomited everything in his stomach. Then he handed the bucket to Angelica.

“You’ll soon feel better,” he told the older man, helping him to lie down on the bed.

“I already do. Graham Douglas patted his hand. “I knew you’d come to help me, Magnus.”

“Graham, he is not Magnus,” Aunt Roxie repeated.

“Roxanne, you’ve always been a good sister and remained loyal to me,” Graham Douglas said. “You were there the day I fell off the horse, weren’t you?”

“Yes, I was,” Aunt Roxie answered with a nod of her head.

“You were there the day my sweet wife died,” he rambled on.

Aunt Roxie nodded her head again. “A sadder day I’ve never seen.”

“And you were here today to help me in my distress.”

Once again Aunt Roxie nodded.

The older man’s expression changed. “Roxie, you’re a damned jinx.”

Robert chuckled, and Angelica smiled.  Aunt Roxie rolled her eyes heavenward and then sat on the edge of the bed to take her brother’s hand in hers.

Angelica touched Robert’s hand and gestured to the outer room. He inclined his head and followed her out of the bedchamber.

The cottage’s large common room served as both kitchen and drawing room, with a hearth on each end, one for cooking and the other for warmth. On the kitchen side of the room was a large steel cage, its door ajar. Two doors led to other bedrooms. On a table beside the settee sat a Celtic harp, a flute, and a violin with accompanying bow.

“Thank you for saving my father’s life,” Angelica said.

“No thanks are necessary, angel.”

Her next words came out in a rush, as if she were confessing a crime. “My father suffers from an affliction and was desperate for alcohol.”

“I didn’t think he was attempting suicide,” Robert assured her, and she seemed to relax. He gestured to the musical instruments, asking, “Do you play?”

“The harp is mine,” she answered.

“I should have known an angel would prefer the harp,” he teased her.

“A long time ago we had an enormous harp, but we needed to sell it,” Angelica said, a wistful note in her voice. “Perhaps the harp only appeared enormous because I was a little girl.”

“I wish I could have seen that,” Robert said, stepping closer.

“You’ve never seen a floor harp?”

Her question brought a smile to his lips. “I meant, I wish I could have seen you as a little girl.”

She blushed with obvious embarrassment.

Robert couldn’t credit what he was seeing. How many years had it been since he’d seen a sincere blush stain a woman’s cheeks?

“Hello, hello, hello.”

Robert stared in surprise as the owner of the voice walked into the room. Approximately three feet long and weighing fifteen pounds, a bird crossed the room toward them. Its head and back were blue, its underside gold, and its eyes green.

“Hello, Jasper,” she greeted the bird. “I missed you.”

Angelica scratched the bird’s head, making him trill with pleasure. Then she warned, “Don’t put your fingers near him until he knows you better. Macaws can take a finger off with one bite.

“Say hello to Robert,” she told the bird.

“Hello.”

“Hello, Jasper,” Robert said, amused to be speaking to a bird.

The macaw cocked his head to one side and repeated, “Hello.”

“Good night time,” Angelica said, crossing the room to the cage. “Come.”

“Good night,” Jasper said, walking to the cage.  He stopped in front of the door, turned around, and crossed the room to Robert, saying, “Hello.”

Angelica laughed. “Good night, Jasper.”

This time the macaw went into the cage. Angelica shut the door and covered the cage with a blanket.

“Good night,” the macaw called.

“Good night.” Angelica looked at Robert and said, “I won him in a card game.”

“Who is this Magnus your father mentioned?” Robert asked.

“Magnus Campbell, the Duke of Inverary,” Angelica answered, and there was no mistaking the bitterness in her voice.

“Your father is acquainted with a duke?” Robert asked in surprise.

“My brother is the Earl of Melrose,” Aunt Roxie answered, walking into the common room.

Robert was even more surprised by that announcement. He glanced around the common room, unable to credit the fact that an earl lived in this poverty.

“Darling, we’ve fallen upon hard times,” Aunt Roxie explained.

“We did not fall,” Angelica corrected her aunt.  “We were pushed, and the Duke of Inverary is one of the men who pushed us.”

“How did the duke push you into . . . your current condition?” Robert asked. “Who are the other men involved?”

“Ours is a long story” Angelica told him, placing her winnings on the table.

“I’m in no hurry,” Robert replied, masking his curiosity with nonchalance.

“Another time,” Angelica said in refusal. “I’ll tell you the whole story when I have written the final page.”

Robert cocked a dark brow at her. “Are you planning revenge, angel?”