The Heart of a Scoundrel (The Heart of a Duke #6)(9)

“I…forgive me, I…thank you,” she said quietly.

He sketched a bow. “Might I have the honor of knowing the lady I’ve rescued from a vicious spearing, my lady?” Edmund’s shaft stirred with delightful images of giving the young lady a vicious spearing. What manner of bloody madness was this, lusting after this one?

“I’m not a lady.”

All the better. He arched a single eyebrow in invitation.

Her cheeks burned red. “I mean, I’m not a ‘my lady’. I’m a miss.” She dropped a curtsy. “Miss Phoebe Barrett.”

A detail he’d already gathered. “Ah,” he said noncommittally.

She cast a glance over her shoulder, out into the darkened London night. When she returned her gaze to his, an unexpected wariness gleamed in her blue eyes. “If you’ll excuse me,” she said, stiffly polite. Did he imagine the previous chit chattering more than a magpie? “It wouldn’t do for us to be discovered together.”

“No, it wouldn’t.” He schooled his expression into that of concerned gentleman. “Forgive me.” He made to leave.

“Wait,” she called out.

They always did. Some inherent darkness she and every other young lady didn’t even know they carried invariably drove back logic and caution and replaced them with recklessness. He turned and looked questioningly back at her. “I don’t know your name,” she blurted.

He sketched a bow. “Edmund Deering, the 5th Marquess of Rutland.” Scandalized shock did not replace the too-trusting openness of her expression. Instead, she continued to evaluate him in that curious manner; an unlikely pairing of innocence and boldness.

Then her expression grew shuttered. Ah, so she’d heard of him. Of course she had. Even though he studiously avoided polite ton events if they didn’t serve some grander scheme, ladies old and young alike had heard of him—and knew to avoid him. For the unsophistication of one such as Miss Phoebe Barrett in her ivory skirts, there was also that unexpected guardedness that likely came in her connection to that fat, reprobate Waters. “I should leave.”

Wiser words were never spoken. “Yes,” he concurred.

The lady stepped right. He matched her movements. She stepped left. He followed suit, blocking her exit.

Alarm lined Miss Barrett’s face. A hand fluttered to her breast and he buried a black humor at that ineffectual, defensive gesture. “My lord?” She looked quizzically up at him.

Her instincts were sharp. “Surely, you do not intend to leave without rescuing your shawl?” As though that hand could protect her from his legendary prowess. His was an arrogance based on years of bringing lonely, eager ladies to great heights of pleasure.

His words proved the correct ones. She caught her plump, lower lip between even pearl white teeth and angled back around. Miss Barrett had made her first of many missteps around him—she’d demonstrated a weakness. The shawl, an item belonging to Miss Honoria Fairfax, meant nothing to this woman, and yet she’d risk her reputation, safety, and well-being in his, a stranger’s, presence…but for her friend’s shawl. This hopeless devotion demonstrated her weakness—she cared that much about Miss Fairfax and that would prove useful. He pressed, unrelenting. “I gather it is an important article to you,” he said in soft tones. It was also a fact he intended to put to valuable use. He held out his arm. “Allow me to lend my assistance.”

Except, she narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “I…it wouldn’t be proper,” she said at last.

He’d not given the lady enough credit. With her caution and hesitancy, she’d already demonstrated more reserve than he expected of an innocent. Edmund bowed his head. “Of course,” he agreed. “Forgive me.” He backed away once again. He turned to leave while counting silently to five. He made it no higher than three. “Wait!” she called out, bringing him to a halt. “Perhaps if you remain here while I search below then I might freely conduct my search. That way, if any interlopers,” trysting couples, “should happen by, then you might send them on their way.”

A slow grin formed on his lips that would have likely chilled Miss Barrett’s heart should she have seen it. He schooled his features and turned back around. “It would be my pleasure.”

She gave him a wide, unfettered smile. This was not the guarded, icy, seductive smile worn by the lovers he took to his bed, but rather an expression that spoke to her artlessness. Odd, she should retain even a shred of innocence with her bastard of a father. The viscount’s daughter sprinted for the end of the terrace with a speed anything but ladylike. She raced down the steps and disappeared into the gardens below.

Edmund strolled closer, damning the thick cloud coverage overhead that blotted the moon and obscured the lady from his vision. She moved noisily through the plants. Then the moon’s glow penetrated the passing clouds, illuminating her. “Do you see it, Miss Barrett?” he called down.

She paused and frowned up at him. “Hush,” she scolded as though she dealt with a naughty child and not the most black-hearted scoundrel in London. She held a finger to her lips. Her tone was far gentler, almost apologetic when she again spoke. “Mustn’t be discovered, you know.”

“No,” he called quietly down. Discovery with this one would prove disastrous. It would prevent him from the revenge he intended to exact upon Margaret, the Duchess of Monteith. “If you require my assistance, you need but ask.”