If word got out about all this, Lucy might just get her wish about returning to Little Kissington. There would be no point in hanging about London if Lucy’s reputation was in absolute tatters.
As if he’d heard Bess’s thoughts, their savior blocked Thornecliff’s retreat. Shooting his snowy white cuffs, the stranger said in a deeply gentle tone, “I’m sure I needn’t point out how unimpressed I would be to hear this incident spoken of. I know some gentlemen are sadly prone to gossip. No doubt they are unaware of how silly and small it makes them.”
To Bess’s surprise, Thornecliff’s high cheekbones reddened as though the stranger had scored a direct hit.
Suddenly, she remembered where she’d heard the name “Thorne” before—he was the Duke of Thornecliff, the villainous ex-friend of Lady Gemma Lively who had exposed her and her entire family to ridicule by passing to the newspapers the story of her new life as the owner of a country inn.
Clearly, the duke didn’t care to hear his infamous activities described as silly gossip. But Bess had to give credit where it was due, the rogue recovered his equanimity with a languid shrug of a single shoulder.
“There’s no need to fret, my good man, because there’s nothing to say. In fact, I’ve already forgotten the whole pedestrian affair.”
With that, and without another glance at Lucy’s pale, furious face, the Duke of Thornecliff swept off with his cadre of admirers and hangers-on.
The man Bess had humiliated—Lord Pup—trailed behind, but not without sending Bess a glare seething with hatred.
Good riddance. Bess felt her shoulders relax minutely, but the stirring of the injured boy recalled her to the true urgency of the situation.
“Sir, I cannot thank you enough for your timely intervention, but we must trespass a bit further on your kindness. This poor boy?—”
“I have already sent word to my personal physician,” the man said. “He awaits us at his surgery in Harley Street.”
Relief washed over Bess. “Good heavens, sir, you are a quick one! You have my most heartfelt thanks?—”
“Oh God! Don’t thank him, Bess,” Lucy cried. She was holding herself as though she might break if jostled. “We don’t need his help. We don’t need anything from him.”
Bess blinked. “Lucy. This gentleman rescued you from a potentially ruinous scandal?—”
She flinched as Lucy’s wild laugh rang out. “Oh, Bess, don’t you know who this is? He’s the reason a notorious rake like Thornecliff thinks he can say and do whatever he likes to me. Every degradation, every slight, every bit of scorn heaped upon our heads can be laid squarely at his feet!”
The afternoon’s events were beginning to take their toll on Bess, and Lucy’s descent into melodrama was not helping. Bess shook her head, darting a glance at the expressionless, shadowy face of the odd-eyed man.
It was a distinguished face, she thought. Arresting, though too hard and sharply angled to be called handsome. “I don’t understand.”
Lucy lifted her small, pointed chin and curled her lip. “I beg your pardon. How ill-mannered of me. Mrs. Elizabeth Pickford, please allow me to introduce you to my half-brother, Nathaniel Lively, the Duke of Ashbourn. The man who has done his level best to ruin my life.”
Nathaniel watched as the light of gratitude and relief faded from the kneeling woman’s face. It bothered him to a surprising degree. He thought that he would quite like to see her smile at him again.
Instead, she said, with grim resignation, “Ah. I see. Well, much as I would like to tell you where to stuff your offer of help, sir, I suppose beggars can’t be choosers.”
“Bess!”
She shook her golden head. “Lucy, I don’t like it either. But do you truly wish this poor young man to suffer any longer than he must?”
“Nothing good will come of this, mark my words,” his half-sister muttered darkly, crossing her arms over her chest. “Any ‘help’ he gives will come at a cost. He doesn’t care about doing the right thing, any more than Thornecliff does.”
Abominable rudeness, but Nathaniel paid her no mind. He found he could not look away from the ministering angel at his feet.
The woman gazed up at him with a look of frank dislike that smoothed, even as he watched, into a mask of blank serenity.
She covered her emotions well, and Nathaniel wondered where and how she’d learned the trick of it.
He took his time studying the finer details of her face. She had the creamy skin and pink cheeks of a true English rose. Honey-blond tendrils of hair escaped the simple knot she’d tucked under a plain bonnet adorned with a blue silk ribbon and a single cluster of faux cherries. Her rosy lips were plump, shaped for smiles and kisses and laughter, though at the moment they were pressed in a flat, noncommittal line.
And then there were her eyes. Deep, mysterious pools the color of cognac warmed by candlelight. An invitation to relax, to linger, to be at peace.
Nathaniel blinked away the fanciful thought. Peace was not for him—at least, not the sort that could be found in the arms of a woman.
The closest he came was in the ring, at the end of a fight, when the savagery in his blood was momentarily spent, spilled on the ground to be absorbed by the sawdust like blood or sweat or tears.
