Page 3 of How to Court a Rake (Wed Within a Year #1)

T hey found the traitor’s body at dawn, aided by the first light of morning. ‘That’s him,’ Caine confirmed, toeing the bloated and bloodied body with his boot where it lay on a stretcher. Kieran and Luce were with him, all of them wet and cold, furious and worried, after a night in rowboats trolling the docks. They had the traitor, but they had no idea where Stepan was.

Caine turned from the body, his anger evident as someone came to cover it up and bear it away. ‘He was the last person to see Stepan and he’s dead, so there’s no help there.’

‘How do you reason that? He was in boots and a coat. He could have simply drowned,’ Kieran asked as the three brothers moved away from the crowd of assorted constabulary.

‘There was a knife wound on his arm. It wasn’t from their scuffle on the dock.’ The bruises, the black eye, they were all from the fight. But not the knife wound. ‘Stepan had his blade with him.’ He rubbed at the space between his brows, pushing back against the frustration welling within him, the helplessness, maybe even at the very real memory he had of his brother taking the knife from the saddle sheath at the tavern just hours earlier. ‘I saw him strap it on.’

‘Which meant,’ Kieran said slowly, ‘that Stepan found the man and they fought.’ Caine gave a grim nod. It was the last that was worrisome. The fight had ended in at least one dead man. He hoped not two. When he’d offered up his prayer that they find Stepan, he should have been more specific. That they find his brother alive .

‘Perhaps he swam out to the ship,’ Luce suggested. ‘If he was tired, or hurt, or even directionally confused in the dark, unsure of where shore was, he would have headed for the ship.’ It was a good idea, a hopeful idea. Caine managed a small nod at his youngest brother. Luce had been impressive tonight in organising a small fleet of boats to comb the harbour.

‘I will check again with the ship’s Captain.’ Luce stepped away with purpose in his step. Caine understood Luce’s need to do something, to feel useful. It kept hope alive. Thinking there was something yet to do or to try was the manifestation of optimism in the face of crisis. To simply walk away, to give up, was to admit the search was over. And if the search was over, it meant the unthinkable had happened. That Stepan was dead.

‘He has to be out there.’ Caine looked across the water to where the ship still sat at anchor. The sailing had been postponed in light of the growing situation. It would sail tonight though, the delivery couldn’t be delayed any longer, and it would sail safely. In that regard, the mission had been a success. ‘What do you think, Kieran?’

Kieran shook his head and scuffed his boot on the dock. ‘I don’t know what to think. Stepan would have sent word by now, he knows that’s protocol.’ Kieran sighed before stating the obvious. ‘He’s not sent word, which means he can’t send word. Best case, he’s unconscious somewhere. Knowing him, he’s washed up in some pretty girl’s bed and is recovering on feather pillows and linen sheets.’ Kieran forced a chuckle.

‘Or worst case—’ Caine caught Kieran’s gaze ‘—he’s dead, sunk to the bottom of the pool, or washed down the Thames. I can’t imagine it though. He’s a strong swimmer.’

‘Skill doesn’t matter if one is unconscious,’ Kieran argued gently, putting a hand on Caine’s shoulder in commiseration. ‘I can’t imagine it either, though.’

They stood in silence, waiting for Luce to return. Caine knew he had to make a decision. They could not justify lingering here much longer with no new developments to support waiting. Luce approached with a shake of his head and Caine felt as if the last spark of hope had been snuffed out. ‘No word.’

‘Then it’s time to go.’ Caine looked each of his brothers in the eye, offering them his strength. They all knew the implicit message behind this choice. ‘Grandfather will be waiting.’ England would be waiting. Democracy was safe for now; England’s private support of Greek independence was safe. If it came to it, would it be worth the price of a good man’s life? His brother’s life?

Caine watched the reality of the situation hit Luce. For a moment, his brother’s features threatened to crumble, disbelief became a shadow in his eyes. Caine willed himself not to look away, to let his own sternness lend Luce the fortitude to conquer the despair.

Not here, not now , he coached Luce silently. Show nothing of your feelings to these people around us. We don’t know who is watching. Give away no weakness.

He glanced at Kieran. ‘We won’t give up. This is not over.’ It wouldn’t be over, he vowed, unless there was a body and he knew definitively that Stepan was gone from this world. Until that time, he would bring to bear all his resources to find his brother and bring the men responsible to justice.

***

Mary’s mother was meting out justice along with the sausage at breakfast. Usually, Mary met each day eager with plans. She kept her days full and herself busy. This morning, though, she approached the breakfast table with dread and she was not disappointed. She’d not even sat down before her mother began.

‘It’s all over every society column in the all the papers.’ Her mother waved one newssheet to emphasise the point. ‘You were dancing with the disreputable Mr Parkhurst and he left you on the dance floor like the cad he is. One can hardly be surprised by his behaviour, but one can be surprised by yours, Mary. You should have known better.’

Mary calmly finished fixing her plate. This barrage of critique was not unexpected, unpleasant as it was. She wasn’t going to let it spoil her appetite. Breakfast was her favourite meal of the day. Nor was she going to let it ruin her memories of a few moments of enjoyment. That had been the decision she’d arrived at in the carriage on the way home. The ending of her evening had been unfortunate. The consequences would also be unfortunate. But her enjoyment was not. She would protect it as her pride had protected her last night, as she’d departed the dance floor.

That enjoyment had been an awakening of sorts, a claiming of something that had fluttered around inside her for a while now, something that was tired of being caged and limited, tired of being her parents’ pawn in a game she didn’t want to play. Last night something had got out and she’d liked it.

‘Well? Why don’t you say something?’ her mother scolded as Mary took her seat.

Mary looked at her mother and it was like looking in a mirror of the future. If she wasn’t careful, if she did not put a stop to the nonsense, this would be her in twenty years: disappointed perfection, the elegantly coiffed dark hair with the beginnings of grey at the temples, the faint whispers of lines at her eyes, the drawn tightness of a mouth that had spent too many years pursed in disappointment, in her daughter, in her life, even though she had everything a woman might want, everything that she’d been raised to aspire to and to which she was raising her own daughter to aspire to despite her own firsthand knowledge of the disappointment that waited.

‘What would you have me say? That it didn’t happen? Would you like me to say that I sent him from the floor and that’s why he left me? That would also be a lie.’ She paused, enjoying the little surge of rebellion. ‘Do you want me to say I didn’t enjoy dancing with him? That it was a chore to lower myself to dance with a well-known rake? I can’t say any of that. It would all be lies. Even the last. I enjoyed dancing with him very much and I would dance with him again.’ Should she ever get the chance. She thought it would be unlikely, though. While the dance had been something of an epiphany for her, she doubted it had the same impact on him. He’d probably forgotten her the moment he’d left the floor.

Her father set down his paper and spoke from his end of the table. ‘You should not speak to your mother like that. She has tried her best for you, as have I, and we deserve your gratitude, not your scorn. We most certainly deserve your apology. I suggest, Miss, that you take the day and think about what happens to young girls who are in their fourth Season and cannot capture a husband even with all the required assets at their disposal.’

Boldness took her and she met her father’s hard stare evenly. ‘I had offers, Father. My first Season there were two viscounts and my second Season there was an earl and the wealthy Baron’s heir. You were the one who insisted on a duke, who insisted we turn away perfectly decent offers.’ She’d not minded losing them. While the men had been acceptable to her, they would have married as strangers. There’d been no spark of attraction, but she’d thought it would have been possible to build a future with them, a friendship over time. But nothing more, so she’d let her father send them on.

Her father frowned, anger roiling in his eyes. ‘You have become impertinent beyond toleration. You are ungrateful and spoilt. We’ve arranged two dukes for you and you have lost them both.’

‘I cannot control where another’s heart leads,’ Mary shot back, even though she was courting her father’s wrath. She should not push him like this, he was not a gentleman when angered.

‘Hearts? Do you think this is about hearts ? About love? What folderol! This is about alliances, about power,’ he raged. At the moment, she was a convenient target for her father’s spleen over his still-open wound regarding Harlow. He had threatened to financially ruin Harlow in order to leverage the Duke for her and that had failed spectacularly. There’d been economic repercussions. He’d been dismissed from the lucrative investment group, the Prometheus Club—it’s chair, the Duke of Cowden, siding with Harlow over the matter.

Her father smacked an open palm on the table, sending the teacups rattling. ‘That’s it. It all ends this Season. I am fed up with dressmakers’ bills that accomplish naught but depleting my account.’ He pointed a finger at Mary. ‘ You will wed before Parliament rises. There are still offers out there. Someone will want what you bring to the table. You’ve fine bloodlines.’

‘Or else?’ Mary goaded, hiding her nerves over that pronouncement with a show of contrariness. Her father was a stubborn, determined man who usually accomplished what he set his mind to. Marrying her off was his one unusual failure.

‘There is no “or else”.’ He narrowed his gaze. ‘You would like that, wouldn’t you? To remain unmarried and be on your own without a care to what you owe this family.’

Mary sat up taller, meeting her father’s gaze. ‘What I would like is to be wanted for myself, not for my money or my bloodlines or my father’s connections.’ Was that too much to ask? She wanted what Harlow had found with Cora Graylin and had been brave enough to claim.

‘Bah! What nonsense. You’ve not been bred for such plebian tripe. Even so, you’ve not the luxury to pursue it.’ Her father made a wide sweeping gesture to the breakfast room. ‘Do you see a son lurking behind the curtains?’ He was being cruel now. ‘You cannot afford freedom, Mary. When I die all this goes. Where will you live? How will you live? What becomes of your mother without your good marriage? If you won’t think of me or yourself, at least think of her after all she’s done for you.’ This was one of his favourite strategies—using her mother as guilty leverage.

‘You’ve made provision for us both. We can live in reduced cirumstances,’ Mary retorted. This was not the first time he’d trotted out that argument. He’d started using it when she’d made her debut. But it was the first time she’d openly countered it.

Her father’s eyes flared at the rebellion. ‘How dare you make that decision on your mother’s behalf. It is too presumptuous by far. You used to be more biddable, Mary. Is this what dancing with a rake turns one’s daughter into? A contentious shrew who does not respect her elders?’ He rose, not waiting for her answer. ‘Spend the rest of the summer looking to your trousseau, Mary. I will start entertaining offers today and I will be looking for the wealthiest titled man I can get, age notwithstanding.’

That man would not care what her passions were, what her dreams were, what she thought about…anything. Caine Parkhurst had, though. In her mind she could hear his seductive tones asking, ‘What do you want?’ She could still feel the heat of his gaze on her as she answered as if he were genuinely intrigued.

She stayed silent until her father left the room, her hands clenched in the crips folds of her napkin, an anchor against her rising fear. She did not want marriage to an old doddering man with clammy hands and rotting breath. Neither would she let her father see her distress, but she was well aware that he could contract her marriage to whomever he wished. She hoped his own pride would be some protection against that. He would want a son-in-law in truth, a grandchild perhaps to make up for the son he felt he’d been denied. An old man could not be a guarantee of either.

She drew a steadying breath and turned to her mother. ‘Will you talk sense to him? Make him see reason? That marriage is nothing to be trifled with?’ Make him see that her life was not to be trifled with, bartered away like a bauble in the marketplace.

But her mother merely set aside her napkin and shook her head. ‘You’ve gone too far this time, Mary. There is nothing left I can do and, in truth, I must think about my own interests since I have no son to protect me.’ Only a daughter who had failed her despite Mary’s best efforts over the years to be everything to them: the perfect daughter who excelled at all things, who turned her hand to all the arts, even the ones she didn’t enjoy, without complaint. There was sadness in her mother’s grey eyes, regret for what might have been. For a moment, Mary felt it, too.

Guilt pricked at her. Mary did not want anyone affected by her decisions, but she knew her father had spoken truly. Upon his death, which hopefully would not be for several years yet, the estates and titles would pass to a cousin who had his own wife, his own family to instal at the family seat, his own daughters to bring out and fête at the town house. There would be no room for a widow and her unmarried daughter among them.

‘Perhaps you are right, Mother. It is time we think of ourselves,’ Mary said quietly, the dangerous truth of her situation settling about her. For her, ballrooms had suddenly become battlefields. If she didn’t fight for her freedom, it was clear no one else would.