“Astounding.” His friend grinned. “I never thought I would see the day you would wear your heart on your sleeve for a prim and proper governess.”
“I do not have a heart,” he growled, “and if I did, I most assuredly would not wear it upon my sleeve for Miss Turnbow or anyone else. I would toss the worthless thing into the fire grate and see it turned to ash.”
Duncan’s levity only deepened. “You look well aside from your formidable frown, Cris. I am happy to see it. And I daresay you smell a great deal better now than you did on the last occasion upon which we crossed paths. Perhaps your little governess is good for you.”
“She is not mine,” he gritted, forcing his mind to his reason for coming to The Duke’s Bastard, which was certainly not to be hounded by Duncan about Miss Turnbow. His inner irritation on that score alone was enough to make him itch. “Did you receive the packet of letters I had my man deliver here last night?”
“I did.” Duncan’s countenance sobered at once. “You mentioned only having uncovered them in your household. Where the devil did you find them?”
“In my study, inside the locked drawer of my desk.” His fingers tightened on the arms of his chair, his knuckles going white beneath the strain. “Tucked betwixt the pages of my journals.”
Duncan’s jaw hardened. “Bloody hell, that is deuced odd.”
The misgiving he had felt upon the odd discovery the day before returned tenfold. “My thought precisely.”
“Clearly, they are ciphers,” Duncan said, depositing his quill in its inkwell, his dark gaze sharpening. “What secrets they contain is anyone’s guess. I have already put out inquiries into the matter. One of my gentlemen is familiar with deciphering. If there are answers to be had, I will obtain them for you. Have you any inkling as to who might have done such a thing or why?”
He shook his head, still as perplexed all these hours later as he had been last night upon his initial discovery. What purpose could enciphered missives hidden in his desk possibly serve? Who would have hidden them there? The only enemies he had ever possessed were the French soldiers he had faced in battle.
Along with one soulless Spaniard. The guerillero’s face rose in his mind, for he had committed it to memory. If he ever saw El Corazón Oscuro again, he would gladly make that bastard pay for what he had done to Morgan. Crispin would begin by severing his hand. And after that…
With a shudder, he forced himself to return to the present. He was no longer at war, and there was no means by which he would ever again see the Spanish cutthroat who had earned his reputation in spilled blood.
“I haven’t an inkling who might be behind this,” he admitted to Duncan. “As for motive, I cannot speak to it without knowing what the cursed things say.”
Duncan inclined his head. “I will have answers for you, Cris. Fear not on that account. Whoever he is, we will run the bastard to ground.”
Humility was a new sensation for Crispin in the life he had cultivated since his return from war. He felt it now, a sharp twinge in his chest. An ache in his gut. Duncan was a loyal and trusted friend, and he knew better than anyone money could not buy such a privilege. “Thank you, Duncan. Have you any cutthroats you can spare? I dislike the notion of some scoundrel slipping into my home and acquainting himself with my personal effects.”
“Here now, Cris.” Duncan made a flourishing gesture with his hands. “My men are not cutthroats. They are gentlemen of the first stare.”
“Just as your lightskirts are ladies,” he grumbled, wondering anew why his friend quibbled over such trivialities. The entire staff of The Duke’s Bastard wore livery. But then, Crispin could not deny the genius of the club that Duncan had built, located on St. James and appealing to all the vices of theton’ssupposed gentlemen, from gaming to quim. It had certainly made him a hideously wealthy man, far greater in riches than the man who had sired and denied him. “Does referring to a criminal as a gentleman render him any less a criminal or any more a gentleman?”
“If he believes it himself, then it does, and that is all I require.” His irascible friend grinned again. “I shall gladly provide you with some of mygentlemen, however. Whisky now? Or will you be returning home to Miss Turnbow’s—”
“Damn you,” he interrupted Duncan’s lewd bent of thought. “Do not say another word about her.”
Duncan blinked, an expression of feigned innocence pinned to his face, the blighter. “Dear me. I was about to say ‘careful tutelage of your sisters’ but if you had something else in mind, you randy devil…”
Gritting his teeth, Crispin rose from the chair. “If only everyone else thought you as droll as you find yourself, friend.”
“I have it on good authority that most do.” Duncan winked as he stood as well. “Particularly those of the female persuasion. It would seem, at any rate, that they find me far more entertaining than they find you these days.”
He scowled. “If you refer to your ladies of dubious morals…”
“I refer to your governess,” his friend interrupted smoothly.
The man was like a dog with a bloody bone. “Curse it, Duncan, I already told you that she is not mine.”
Duncan stalked to the sideboard and poured a finger of whisky into a glass. “Are you sure I cannot tempt you?”
Crispin shook his head, for he needed his mind sharp and unclouded. “My mind is enough of a cesspool today without the devil’s brew.”
His friend shot him a glance, his brow raised. “Turning down whisky and mooning about like a lovesick lad? What will happen next?”
He scowled. “I do not moon.”
Duncan cupped a hand to his ear in a theatrical gesture. “Did you hear that sound? I do believe it was the parson’s mousetrap.”
