My Scandalous Viscount Read online

  “Now, now—”

  “I swear, if you’ve harmed him, so help me—”

  “Nothing is going to happen to Trevor as long as you call off your dogs,” Nick replied in an oh-so-reasonable tone. He held his stare in warning. “Just let me go, Beau, and forget we ever had this conversation. Write me off for dead in the Order’s casualty rolls for all I care. It’s not like anyone’s going to miss me.”

  “Nick! Write you off for dead?” He was so astonished at what he was hearing, he could barely speak. “Have you lost your mind?”

  “My shirt, is more like it. You should mark me down as fallen.” He nodded. “It’ll be easiest that way.”

  “I’m not going to lie to the Order for you! Look, if it’s a matter of money, I can lend you—”

  “No! Thank you—but no. No more of your charity, generous as you are. You were always a true friend to me, Beauchamp. That’s why I came to say this to your face.”

  Beau’s heart slammed in his chest as he stared at Nick in disbelief. “What, that you’re a traitor?”

  “No, I’m not a traitor, I just want out,” he answered wearily.

  “We’re all tired, Nick, believe me. But this is so close to being over. If you could just wait—”

  “It’s no use. I have to go.” He turned away.

  “I’m afraid I can’t allow that.” He cocked his pistol and aimed it at his friend, ignoring the anguish of having no choice but to do so.

  Nick looked back at him, glanced at the gun, then met his gaze with a hard, challenging stare. “You really want to do this, brother?”

  “I keep my vows,” he said quietly.

  Nick sighed and stared up at the sky. “Beau, Beau. You always were the true believer, weren’t you? Bloody flower o’ chivalry. We were only boys when we were recruited. What choice did we ever have?”

  “The Order is our heritage. And our duty.”

  He laughed softly and looked at the ground. “You are so amusing. God.” He shook his head. “I don’t have time for this. Good-bye.”

  “I’ll shoot you if I have to.”

  “Don’t you get it? None of this is worth it. You weren’t there, Beau. When Trevor got shot, I thought we’d lost him. Fortunately, he’s strong, and he survived. But the moment I saw him get hit, that was the last straw for me. Do you think those bastards farther up the chain of command give a damn about what happens to any of us?”

  He swallowed hard. “Nick, we need you in the fight.”

  “Sorry, I guess I’m just not as selfless as the rest of you. I’m only in London on a job. Tell the others whatever you deem best, team leader. I’ll stay out of your way, and theirs, if you’ll stay out of mine. Maybe I’ll go off and live on an island somewhere once I’ve made my fortune,” he added with a rueful half smile. “If I hear anything new about the Prometheans in my travels, I’ll be sure and send you word. In the meantime, I don’t want the Order following me, sending snipers. I’m keeping Trevor as collateral to ensure they don’t.”

  “I want to see him first.”

  “You can’t. I’m afraid you’ve got to trust me.”

  “Trust you? After this? Maybe you’re bluffing! You’re the great gambler, after all. How do I know he isn’t dead?”

  “Ah, you know me well enough to tell when I am bluffing, Beauchamp. I’ve told you the truth. He’s alive and well. Not happy,” Nick conceded, “but he’ll stay unscathed as long as the Order leaves me alone. Otherwise, he may never get to see his little fiancée ever again.”

  Beau could not bring himself to believe Nick would really hurt the third member of their team. Trevor was like a brother to them both. But this whole episode had caught him so completely off guard that at the moment, he wondered if he could even trust his own judgment of the situation, especially when, deep down, some of the things that had disillusioned Nick resonated with him, too.

  God knew, he understood exactly how Nick felt. He just chose to ignore those feelings, along with so much else in his heart.

  “Please don’t do this, Nick,” he said evenly, summoning every ounce of calm, reassuring authority he had ever possessed as team leader. “It can still be fixed. Whatever’s happened, you know you have my help. I am your brother, and I always will be. Just tell me what you need. Money I can loan you. Influence. I’ll go and talk to the Elders with you—”

  “Enough! I fight my own battles, and I’m sure as hell not dragging you down with me. Do you think I want it this way? It’s how it has to be. I should’ve taken this option long ago. It suits my nature, the mercenary life,” he said with a grim smile. “I take work when I want it. Turn it down when I don’t like the look of it. Every job’s at my discretion. No one’s giving me orders. I make up the rules myself. You should join me, Beau. You really should. Not that you need the money, but it’s a hell of a lot of fun.”

  “Jesus, Nick.”

  “I’m still working on Trevor, but I think he’s comin’ ’round. He’s getting pretty bored down in the cellar.”

  “Cellar? Damn you—”

  “Relax. He has everything he needs down there.”

  “So he’s your prisoner. Your best friend, who saved your bloody life several times, as I recall. Your hostage.”

  “More like my pension, for years of faithful service. Life insurance, mate.” He nodded. “Well, we mercenaries aren’t very nice chaps at all, are we? Not like you valiant Order knights.”

  Beau shut his eyes for a second, in a cold sweat. This is a nightmare. The worst part was that he had never seen it coming. Of all the horrific fates he had imagined in the dead of night, trying to dream up some logical explanation for their disappearance, this was one he never would have guessed.

  On the other hand, Nick had always been a rebel, even by Order standards, and was without a doubt the fiercest member of their team. Beau was the leader; Trevor was the brains, the strategist, the planner. But Nick had always been the ablest assassin.

  A bloody nightmare.

  Nick’s gaze flicked to Beau’s pistol pointed at him. “I am going to go now,” he said. “I’ll give Trevor your regards. Don’t worry, I’ll release him once I’m clear. You take care of yourself, Beauchamp.” He hesitated. “It’s been an honor serving with you.” He nodded in farewell, then very deliberately turned around and began walking away.

  “Stop!” he barked. “You’re coming in, Nick!”

  “No, I’m not,” he replied, though he did prudently pause, lifting his hands.

  “Don’t make me shoot you—”

  At that moment, the theatre door right behind Beau suddenly opened, bumping him in the back. He stepped forward to catch his balance, and his first thought was that Nick had expected trouble; he must’ve brought along some mercenary colleagues for assistance. Beau’s reaction was instantaneous; aiming for the leg, he pulled the trigger.

  Nick cursed and reached down, grabbing his thigh. But as a well-trained agent, his counterattack was equally swift. He fired back as Beau whirled to meet the new arrival in the doorway.

  Beau heard the shot and cursed as Nick’s bullet sliced across his biceps. But the bullet kept going to graze the new arrival, too.

  No mercenary henchman.

  Knife already in hand, Beau stopped himself from attacking.

  Carissa!

  Her face went white as she lifted her gloved hand and touched the right side of her head.

  Nick cursed.

  Time seemed to stop as she looked down at her white satin glove, smeared with blood.

  Then she lifted her gaze uncomprehendingly to his; Beau stared back at her, aghast.

  “Ugh,” she murmured. Her eyes rolled up into her head, and she crumpled.

  Beau caught her as she fainted, but glancing over his shoulder, he began cursing like a sea dog.

  Nick had disappeared, and the girl of his dreams lay unconscious and bleeding in his arms.

  Chapter 4

  Carissa awoke to darkness and the sensation of speed. She was in a
rocking carriage. The clatter of hooves and wheels racing over uneven cobblestones made her head pound harder. Suddenly, terror gripped her innards because, beyond that, she did not know where she was or what had happened. The side of her skull felt like it was on fire.

  Struggling to orient herself, she began panicking all over again to find her usually busy mind a blank. When she started to rise, strong arms stilled her.

  “Shh, lie back,” said a silken whisper by her ear.

  “Beauchamp?” It was only then that she realized he was holding her, keeping some sort of cloth pressed against the side of her head.

  “I’ve got you, sweeting. Just lie still. It’s going to be all right,” he assured her, but she heard the tension in his voice.

  His arms felt wonderful around her, so protective—but as she wondered why they were speeding through the dark streets in a carriage, she remembered abruptly.

  That bang the moment she had opened the theatre door to go and warn him. She had been shot! In the head.

  By a bullet meant for him.

  “Am I going to die?” she mumbled.

  “No, sweet, of course not,” he assured her. “You’re going to be just fine.” The strangled tone of his voice wasn’t very convincing, however. She rather thought he was trying too hard to sound calm. “I’m going to take care of you, I promise. You just need to relax now. Stay calm. Hold still and let me keep the pressure on the wound, or you’ll only make it worse.”

  “I’m scared,” she whimpered.

  “I know, sweet. But you’ve got to be brave for me just a little longer. We’re almost there.”

  “Where?” Struggling to keep her eyes open, she saw through the carriage window the black silhouette of twisty spires in the moonlight, shrouded in fog. She gasped and tried to sit up.

  The Inferno Club!

  “No! I can’t go in there!” she cried frantically—or so she thought. In truth, her voice only came out as a mumble.

  “It’s all right. You’ll be safe—”

  “No decent girl goes in there. I’ll be ruined . . .”

  “Shh,” he whispered again, giving her a reassuring little squeeze. “Sweetheart, you’ve got to trust me,” he whispered. “Trust me.”

  “Ugh.” Her pounding pulse and struggles made the blood seep faster from her wound, as he had warned. She felt it trickling hotly past her ear and down the side of her neck, and the sensation was so sickening, so horrifying, that much to her chagrin, like a blasted ninny, she passed out once again.

  Beau cradled her in his arms, trying to keep her from being jostled about as they approached the Order’s headquarters. His heart was pounding with utter dread.

  He had seen plenty of men get shot in his lifetime. He’d been responsible for more than he had any care to count. But that was completely different from seeing blood coming out of Carissa Portland.

  In point of fact, he was in an unheard-of state of terror for an agent rigorously trained to fear nothing.

  Beyond that, he was furious.

  I’m going to kill Nick for this.

  And if Carissa lived, he might just kill her, too, for snooping around after him and getting herself shot.

  Maybe now the chit would learn her lesson!

  You see, Father? You see why I don’t get married? he thought angrily. Find one blasted girl he really liked, and he ended up getting her shot. This is why I just bed them and keep my distance. Was that so hard to understand?

  He paid no attention whatsoever to his own wound. He’d had worse. She was the one who mattered, and in the dark, with all that long, thick hair of hers, he couldn’t tell yet how badly she was hurt. But his luck . . . argh.

  Her head was bleeding a lot, but that’s what heads did in his experience, he attempted to assure himself. A lot of blood was never good, but when it came to head injuries, blows that produced no blood at all sometimes turned out worse. The person just fell asleep and never woke up again.

  If heaven showed mercy on a sinner like him tonight, her wound would turn out to be nothing more than a gash like the one on his arm.

  He chose to believe for now that the bullet had only grazed her. Until he could look at her in the light, dig through her luxurious auburn tresses down to her scalp and clean the wound, and determine how bad an injury they were dealing with, he clung to the hope that it might not be as bad as it looked under all the blood.

  Or it might be worse.

  One thing was certain: At this moment, he could understand with crystal clarity why Nick wished to quit.

  In this moment, with his carriage pounding through the dark, foggy streets of London, his driver whipping the horses to gallop as fast as they could, he could quite happily go live a country life as boring as his father’s.

  Aye, forget the spy game and all its illicit thrills.

  He’d become a dull, old, pipe-smoking, gentleman farmer, with no more pressing cares than deciding which breed of sheep to buy next spring.

  “Hold on. Fight for me, girl,” he murmured to her, as they careened toward their destination. “You’ve got a hell of a lot of fight in you. I know. I’ve seen it. Come on, now. Stay with me, love . . .”

  Thank God, his carriage jounced to a halt at last in front of Dante House. Going there was a reflex for him whenever there was trouble, and with his own survival training in battlefield medicine so that he could keep himself and his team alive on their missions, he knew he had everything that he needed to care for her properly.

  If her wound was beyond his ability to handle, the Order always had two or three good surgeons ready to come to the agents’ aid at a moment’s notice.

  His driver promptly flung open the carriage door; Beau gathered Carissa up in his arms with a cold sweat beading on his brow and long-forgotten prayers streaming through his mind. She had to be all right. She had to. He could not bear for any harm to come to her, especially when it was his fault.

  She could not die, moreover, when his last words to her had been so rude and improper, propositioning her like a thoroughgoing blackguard—when the truth was, deep down, she made more sense to him than most of the people in London.

  He lifted her smoothly from the seat, which was now also stained with blood, and carried her out of his town coach. “Door,” he ordered.

  His coachman ran ahead of him to fling wide the black wrought-iron gate, then raced again to the front door of Dante House. Beau strode up the front path with Carissa’s limp body dangling from his arms.

  “Mind the dogs,” he said to his driver. “Wait here. I may want you to go for the surgeon if this is beyond my skill. Otherwise, I’ll need you on hand to assist.”

  “Yes, my lord.” His driver pushed the front door open, and as Beau stepped in, immediately, the pack of vicious guard dogs rushed around to greet him.

  He kicked the door shut and roared at them in German to shut up. The black-and-tan beasts sat and cowered.

  “Gray!” Beau bellowed.

  The old butler came running while Beau carried the senseless lady of information into the nearby parlor and laid her down carefully on the couch.

  He realized he was shaking. Jesu, what was wrong with him? He’d been hurt worse than this himself over the years and had never reacted so badly.

  But this was different. She was an innocent. A civilian. She had no part in this. She was just a girl.

  The butler rushed in. “Sir?”

  “The lady’s hurt.”

  “You brought her here?” he cried.

  Beau glared at him but only realized then that, inexplicably, he had, perhaps, panicked a little.

  Well, it was too bloody late now to sit around and try to think up another plan! “Damn it, man, she needs help! Fetch hot water and bandages. And bring lamps, candles. We need more light in here. I’ll get the medical bag. Go! Keep the dogs out!” he added. “The smell of blood might set them off.”

  “Yes, sir—your arm!”

  “Never mind that. Hurry!” he ordered, yanking off his e
legant, ruined coat.

  Gray whisked off to do as Beauchamp had ordered, dutifully shutting the door behind him to prevent the fierce guard dogs of Dante House from coming in to bother them. Beau felt sorry for the beasts. Poor creatures barely knew what to do with themselves ever since their master, Virgil, had been killed. Lud, he wished the old man were there right now.

  With the thought of the agents’ gruff, Scottish handler, who had dealt with more gunshot wounds and broken heads than he could count, Beau flinched. He did not think he could stand another loss right now of somebody he cared about. He was already haunted enough. How the hell was he going to explain this to Rotherstone, anyway?

  No, I didn’t seduce the girl, of course, but I’m afraid I got her killed. Sorry, old boy. Your wife’s going to have to find a new best friend. He swallowed hard. No. She had to be all right. He bent down to smooth her forehead gently. So pale. He clenched his jaw. “Hang on, sweet. I’ll be right back. You’re going to be fine, I promise.” And then I’m never letting you out of my sight again, you dear little pain in the arse.

  Unsure where that possessive thought had come from, he tore himself away from her, strode over to the bookshelves, where he grasped what looked like an ordinary bookend in the shape of a small bronze statue, and twisted it.

  At once, with a mechanical click, the hidden door disguised as one of the built-in bookcases popped away from the wall. Beau went and pulled it open.

  Pausing, he glanced over his shoulder at Carissa one more time. She was still out cold. Then he slipped inside the secret passageway and ran to get the medical bag.

  Carissa was having the strangest dream. It was lovely and terrifying at the same time, a feverish mix of blood and sensuality. She dreamed that Lord Beauchamp was gently letting down her hair, loosening her gown, untying her stays so she could breathe more easily.

  His hands on her were warm and sure, and when she dragged her eyes open and met his stare, his own blazed hotly into hers. “It’s all right,” he whispered, as she panted and clung to him in fear.

  “Trust me,” he breathed again, his hand at the side of her neck, cupping her nape, melting her protests. She closed her eyes, giving in. But why was he always saying that?