CHAPTER ONE
Utter ruin provokes soul-searching in even the least
reflective of men.
Dante Duclairc was contemplating that unwelcome discovery
when he heard the horse outside. He opened the cottage
door to find one very annoyed physician standing in the
moonlight at the threshold.
Morgan Wheeler peered severely over the top edge of his
spectacles. "This had better be very serious, Duclairc.
Your brother's land steward pulled me out of bed."
"It is very serious, and I am sorry that your sleep was
interrupted."
"No one said you had come down to Laclere Park. Why
haven't you called on me?"
"Only the steward knows I am here, so you must swear to
keep this visit a secret. I should have sent for a
surgeon, but you are the only medical man in the region I
could trust to be discreet."
Morgan sighed heavily and stepped into the humble
abode. "Why did you send for me?"
"There is a woman upstairs who needs your attention."
Morgan set down his bag and removed his frock coat. "She
is alone here?"
"Except for me."
"Why does this woman require me?"
"The lady has been shot."
Morgan had been rolling up a sleeve. He stopped, arm
outstretched and fingers engaged. "You have a lady visitor
who has been shot?"
"Grazed, actually."
"Where was she shot? Excuse me, grazed?"
"In this cottage. Accidentally. We were playing a little
game and—"
"I meant, where is the wound?"
"In the rear nether region of her trunk."
"Excuse me? Are you saying that you shot your lover in the
buttock?"
"Yes. Come upstairs and—"
"One moment, my good friend. My dull life has feasted off
the excitement of yours for years, but this is too much.
You have secretly brought a woman, a lady, to a rustic
cottage on your brother the viscount's estate, where you
engaged in some orgiastic rite that resulted in her being
shot in the buttock. Do I have the essential facts
correct?"
"Her arm is hurt and she hit her head too."
"Not like you, Duclairc, getting rough like that. You
surprise and disappoint me."
"I assure you that this was an accident. A little game
gone awry."
"How? What? My imagination fails me. I try to picture it
but . . . If I am going to debase myself by doing a
surgeon's work, the price of my skill and silence is an
explanation."
"As it happens, that is precisely what I can afford.
Please come up now. The steward had some laudanum and we
dosed her up so she is still out, and it would be best if
you did this quickly."
"Details, Duclairc. I shall expect details."
As Dante led Wheeler up the stairs, he considered that
details were exactly what his friend would never get. No
one would. The woman awaiting Wheeler's attention had come
to this cottage through bizarre circumstances. Dante knew
in his gut that speaking of them to anyone would only
cause him untimely trouble.
What had she been doing out there, dressed like a man and
brandishing a pistol, on a night when the countryside was
alive with a mob burning farming machines and a posse on
the chase? Dante had taken his own gun to the highest hill
of Laclere Park, in a nostalgic effort to protect the
estate on his last night in England. When he had been
surprised by a trespasser he had returned fire, only to
discover to his horror that he had not shot a radical but
a woman.
As it happened, not just any woman.
Dante paused outside the bedchamber. "If you ever reveal
what has occurred here, or that she was with me, she will
be ruined."
"Discretion is a physician's second name. I never failed
you in the past, did I?"
Wheeler became all business as soon as they passed into
the chamber. He walked to the bed, took the patient's
pulse, and felt her cheek. Ever so gently, he turned her
head toward him.
He froze.
"Oh my God."
"Exactly."
"Oh—my—God."
"Now you know why discretion is essential."
"It is Fleur Monley, Duclairc. Fleur Monley."
"So it is."
Wheeler collected his wits. Shaking his head, he proceeded
to examine his patient. "Fleur Monley. Even I, who have
seen women of highest repute faint at your smile, am
thoroughly impressed. No one ever got Miss Monley to the
altar let alone into bed, let alone playing games that get
women shot in the buttocks. The closest was when your
brother Laclere almost got engaged to her . . . " The
implications of that had Wheeler wide-eyed again. "He will
probably kill you if he finds out."
"Another reason for discretion."
"Of course, of course. I promised silence and am bound by
it, but it will be hell to honor my word. I will burst."
He stripped away the bedclothes to reveal Fleur demurely
dressed in one of Dante's nightshirts. "Charming,
Duclairc, but why did you bother? She is drugged, I am a
physician, and you are her lover."
He had bothered because he could hardly present her in
those farm-boy rags, and because it did not seem dignified
to leave her naked despite her unconsciousness and the
ribald story he was feeding Wheeler. No matter what a
man's reasons for stripping off her clothes, even a
scoundrel did not leave the Fleur Monleys of the world
naked for someone to see.
Morgan touched her bare leg. "She is damp. Did you bathe
her?"
"She felt warm, and I thought that I should." It was one
more bold-faced lie. Upon removing the rags he had
discovered a very dirty body and had washed off the worst
of it.
"Of course. Next time, do not give laudanum if the patient
has a head wound."
"It wasn't much, and we dosed her some time ago when she
began to moan as she came to. I am concerned that it may
wear off, so you should get busy."
Morgan was not to be rushed. He touched all around her
scalp. "It does not seem too serious. Fell, did she? Went
out? She will have a bad lump. She will have to rest
quietly for a few days."
"Surely she can be moved."
"Best not. You will have to make some excuse if anyone is
expecting her return. She should stay here at least two or
three days, in bed. Resting. It will give this arm time to
repair too. Bad sprain. I can only guess how that
happened. Some exotic position for coitus that country
boys like me never get to learn, no doubt. Hindu?"
Wheeler's grin invited explication. Dante ignored him.
Fleur Monley was going to create problems. He could not
keep her here for several days because he had no intention
of being here himself. In approximately ten hours he
planned to meet a fishing boat on the coast that would
spirit him over to France.
"Help me to turn her so I can see about this gunshot.
Gently now."
Together they turned Fleur on her stomach. Morgan pulled
up the nightshirt. Dante turned to leave.
"No, you don't. She was only nicked but you were right, it
needs to be sewn. Get over here and hold her. The laudanum
made her sleep but she is not unconscious. If she wakens
while I am at it, I want someone backing me up."
Dante truly did not want to stay. In his thirty-two years
he had seen more women nude than he could count. He had
long ago learned to release or suppress his sexual
reactions at will, much like a canal lock controls water.
Still, seeing Fleur like this was making him
uncomfortable.
She was injured and needed care and he lied about being
lovers only to protect her from the posse out there
looking for blood. Having her in this bed, naked from the
waist down and her face pressed in his pillow, appeared a
desecration of sorts. All the same, he was annoyingly
aware that stripping her and washing her and seeing her
body had raised the lock's water level more than he would
like.
That surprised him, because he had grown fairly jaded
about such things. Furthermore, her reputation and
condition made sexual reactions either ridiculous or
despicable.
Then again, her very presence here indicated that the
world may have gotten that business about her unblemished
virtue very wrong. The woman Fleur Monley was supposed to
be would never run through the countryside in boy's
clothes on a night when the radical rabble were out
committing crimes.
What the hell had she been doing out there? For that
matter, where the hell had she come from? The last he
heard, she was visiting France.
He sat beside her on the bed and carefully placed his
palms on her back. Behind him Morgan prepared the needle,
sloshed something over Fleur's bottom, and went to work.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * *
She gritted her teeth and held in the tears. She wanted to
scream. If she did, however, these men would know that she
was awake. That would be too humiliating to bear, and
possibly very dangerous.
Where was she? The bed seemed clean but she could smell
earth and damp and she doubted that she had made it to
Laclere Park. That man who shot her must have given her
up. She was probably in a farmer's cottage, being tended
before they carted her off to gaol.
Better that than Gregory, she supposed. Unless he learned
about it and bribed them to get her back. In that case she
would be right where she started.
The man holding her had not spoken much. She wished that
he faced away. She would not have to swallow the pain so
much if he were not looking at her. He was definitely
doing that. She could feel his attention on her, despite
his brief responses to the other's comments about horses
and boxers.
A hand moved from her back to her head. She barely caught
the cry of surprise that jumped to her throat. Fingertips
gently brushed her hair back from the pillow and lightly
stroked her head. She held her breath, cheek crushed
against the down, and prayed that he had not seen her jaw
clench or heard her shocked intake of breath.
That caressing hand should repel her. It implied dangerous
interest and she was horribly defenseless. Instead she
found the light touch comforting and sympathetic and not
at all insinuating. Who was this man who bothered to
reassure an unconscious woman?
"I don't remember her being so thin," the voice near her
rump mused. A painful skewer by the needle accompanied the
comment. She tasted blood as she bit down. "I can see her
ribs plainly. Normally people gain weight on the
continent, not lose it. I have to say that even so she has
a nice, um, how did you so elegantly put it, rear nether
region."
He spoke as if he knew her If so, the night's risks had
probably achieved nothing but more danger.
"Just sew," the man beside her muttered. "Aren't leeches
supposed to be above noticing such things? Rather like
artists?"
"I am a physician, a man of culture and learning, not a
leech. If you think artists grow immune either, you are
doubly a fool. All the same, I accept your correction.
Although, coming from you . . ."
"I do not like my lady friends discussed by other men,
that is all."
Her ears were half-smothered in the pillow, but that voice
sounded familiar. Why would he be claiming she was his
lady friend? A dreadful possibility opened. Could this be
the man she had heard speaking with Gregory last night?
"Considering how quickly you tire of your mistresses, I
have always thought your reticence in talking about them a
little priggish and ungenerous," the physician
said. "Although it has never been the ladies that
interested me, but the strategies for winning and loving
them. You could save yourself a lot of curious questions
by writing a treatise as I suggested years ago."
"Maybe I will do that. I will have plenty of time in
France, and it may pay my keep for a few years."
The rhythm of the needle stopped. "France? My good man,
you are not Has it come to that?"
"Afraid so."
"How bad?"
"Very bad. They are on my trail."
"Surely your brother—"
"I have been to that well far too often, and I will not go
again. Once settled in France I will write and explain to
him."
"Now I am distraught. You have ruined my humor
completely."
"Well, finish up here, come downstairs, and I will tell
you all, but it is such an old and tired story that I am
sure you have heard it often before."
Efficient hands bound a bandage to her hip. More gentle
ones slid the nightshirt down and carefully tucked
bedclothes up around her shoulders.
They left. She exhaled the strain of keeping her composure
and stillness. Her rump hurt badly now, even worse than
when she had first woken in shock to that sewing needle.
Still, the pain both existed and didn't, like something
floating in part of her mind while the other parts
daydreamed and slept. She did not know how long she
drifted around the edges of consciousness.
She wondered if only the physician had recognized her, or
whether the other man had as well. He spoke in the
cultured manner that said he moved in the sort of circles
where she could have met him at some point over the years.
She clung to the hope that he was not anyone who had
anything to do with Gregory, and certainly not the man who
had spent last night bargaining for her like she was some
four-hoofed animal.
A door below closed on mumbled farewells. Boot steps
sounded on the stairs. Someone entered the chamber. She
closed her eyes but she felt the warmth of the candle near
her face.
"He is gone. Let us see if we can make you more
comfortable now, Miss Monley."
She heard his voice plainly this time. Jolting up on her
good arm, she twisted in shock.
And looked right into the resplendent brown eyes of the
most charming wastrel in England.
CHAPTER TWO
The women of English society could bicker and argue with
the best of them, but on one point they had always been in
total agreement.
Dante Duclairc was a beautiful man.
That was the word they used. Beautiful. His luminous eyes,
thick, lustrous brown hair, perfect face and devilish
smile had mesmerized any female he chose to conquer since
he turned seventeen. Fleur knew three ladies who had only
committed adultery once in their lives. With him.
The years had added some hardness to his countenance, but
they had not dulled the heart-skipping effect that his
attention provoked.
Even in her, and he wasn't even trying.
His expression bore curiosity and wry amusement. He smiled
with warm familiarity, instantly bridging time back to
that period ten years ago when his brother Vergil, the
Viscount Laclere, had courted her. And yet, underneath his
cool, refined composure there shimmered a dangerous,
exciting energy. With Dante it was always there.
Right now it frightened her speechless.
Somehow she knew without asking that they were alone.
There was no female servant in this cottage, which meant
that Dante had probably undressed her and put her in bed.
What he had seen while the physician tended her had been
the least of it.
"You are uncommonly brave," he said. "Wheeler never
suspected that you were awake." His tone implied that he
had known the exact moment when she had come to. He had
caressed her head aware that she would feel him do it.
"It was my hope to avoid giving explanations to
strangers."
"Since I am hardly that, you should not mind giving one to
me. Let us get you comfortable first."
Her reaction to the Dante Duclaircs of the world had
always been to run away, but she could not do that now.
She suffered his lean strength hovering over her bed,
propping pillows and arranging to her comfort. When he
began to ease her onto her side she stopped his hands with
a freezing gesture and managed it on her own.
That left her looking up at him and him looking down at
her. He had removed his coat and collar and his shirt
gaped open above his waistcoat. As an unmarried woman, she
never saw men this relaxed in their dress.
Her vulnerability hit her with force. She said a quick
prayer of thanks that of all the libertines in England,
she had been fortunate enough to fall into this one's
hands.
After all, they had come close to being related. That
should count for something. She hoped.
He crossed his arms and regarded her. For a man with a
reputation for being good-natured, his scrutiny appeared
more critical than one would expect. She tucked the
bedclothes around her neck.
"This is a remarkably singular occurrence, Miss Monley.
Finding you, of all women, in my bed."
He wasn't going to make this easy.