Chapter 28
Two days later, outside the Earl of Hangleton’s townhouse with most of his crew behind him, Archer held Ruby’s hand and perseverated briefly on shrubbery.
The home was surrounded by hedges, clipped in neat, precise rows.
The leaves shone in the sun, as though they’d been polished individually by some gardener’s gloved hand.
Perhaps they had. The brick exterior was spotless; the windows gleamed; not even a pebble had dared to roll out of place as their carriage trundled up in front of the house.
And in front of all that perfect greenery stood Captain Malcolm Archer: dressed in his one unstained shirt, smelling of tar from the Delphinium, and holding for dear life onto the hand of Hangleton’s elder daughter.
Whom he had made his wife.
There had been considerable wrangling over their plan of action as they’d made for the London Docks.
Ruby had proposed to take Signor Neri to meet with her father, but Neri had had some alternative scheme in mind.
He had insisted upon making his way to his own residence once they arrived in the city.
Archer had worried over that for some time. He suspected—he feared—that Neri did not trust the ambassador. And he did not know how to say such a thing to Ruby.
Lamentation had gone with the signore. He’d done his duty aboard the ship with a rigid, unfamiliar expression on his face, and when the opportunity to break from the rest of the crew had come, he’d taken it.
Gerry had been speechless with distress, and Archer could scarcely recall ever in his life having felt so torn apart.
He looked at the tiny neat lines where the shrubs had been clipped—recently, he could still smell the grassy scent—and felt lightheaded.
This was a mistake. He should have forced the issue—should have gone to Penney instead.
Penney knew where he’d come from. And standing here, in front of the fine glazed windows and the pristine shrubs, it had never seemed so clear to Archer that Ruby did not.
He was a convict. Brig trash. He was as out of place here as a fly crushed bloody against stained glass.
Perhaps he could persuade her to lie to Hangleton a little longer. Perhaps he could leave this fancy square and try to find the princess some other way, let Ruby tackle the problem from the high-society end while he came at it from the bottom. Perhaps—
Ruby squeezed his hand and looked up into his face. Her lips had gone pale, and as he gripped her hand, he realized he was not the only one holding on a little too hard.
“Are you ready?” she asked. “It might be . . . unpleasant, at first.”
He gritted his teeth. He squeezed her fingers between his own and then, helplessly, lifted her hand to his mouth.
He had to believe—he did believe—that he could do some good if he stayed right here, by her side.
He could talk. He was good at talking. He could persuade Hangleton to listen to his daughter; he would convince the ambassador that Ruby was the greatest thing that had ever happened to House di Sangro and the earl’s political career. He could do it.
He made himself smile. “Hope you’ve still got that bayonet under your skirts,” he murmured.
And, faintly, almost imperceptibly, her mouth twitched up. “Dash it,” she said. “I forgot. I’ve brought the Elgin Marbles, though. Should they prove useful.”
“I’m certain that, between the two of us, we can think of something.”
She swallowed hard. And then she pasted on a smile and—bravely, as she did everything—knocked on the door.
It came open in seconds, and obviously Archer was an execrable butler, because he’d never opened a door so fast in his life.
The stern, bewigged fellow inside unbent slightly when he recognized Ruby, though he cast a doubtful glance at their crew and Ruby’s hand entwined with Archer’s. “Lady Ruby,” he said, “welcome home. We were not expecting you. Shall I tell the earl that you’re—”
“It’s Mrs. Archer now,” she said calmly, and Archer nearly swallowed his tongue.
Right. Well. Evidently there was to be no deception about the nature of their relationship, and no easing into things either.
It made him . . . proud. Idiotic besotted fool that he was, it made him want to weep.
“You may alert my father, yes,” she said, “and show my guests into the east sitting room, please, Finch—”
But before anyone could move, the Earl of Hangleton came around the corner and into view.
Archer recalled the man from Gravesmuir’s cursed dinner party.
Hangleton was tall, fine-boned, dressed with a ferocious elegance that called to mind the exacting shape of the shrubs outside.
His hair was a sandy gray, and his cravat was starched to a level that Archer had heretofore never seen or imagined.
“Ruby,” Hangleton said reflexively. “What in—”
His gaze flicked from Ruby to Archer to the small crowd behind them: Eugénie and Gerry and Alice and the Enys boys, all fresh off the Delphinium and in various states of dishevelment and disrepair. Sidney Enys, for some reason, had on two different shoes.
“What is the meaning of this?” Hangleton snapped.
“Father,” Ruby said. “This—”
Hangleton didn’t let her finish. “What could you possibly be thinking?” He strode to the door and peered out, looking left and right over Ruby’s shoulder. “My God, anyone could see you like this. Anyone could see them—a gang of criminals, at my doorstep—”
“No,” Ruby tried again, “they’re not—” She stumbled on the obvious lie and tried valiantly to go on. “If you’ll allow me to explain—”
Hangleton caught Ruby’s elbow and towed her inside, and Archer, by virtue of still having hold of her hand, was dragged into the house as well.
“Oh, you will certainly explain,” Hangleton said icily. “In my study. Alone.”
“My companions—”
“Can take themselves off.” He cast a frigid glance at the ramshackle crew, still arrayed before the door. “I’d advise you not to remain in this square, unless you’d like to have the magistrates brought down upon your heads.”
Ruby looked miserably out at their companions. “You can . . . wait in the mews,” she said. “I’m—I’m so sorry.”
There was a crack in her voice as she spoke, and it cracked something inside Archer too. Fierce bright anger rose in him: at Hangleton’s hand on Ruby’s arm, at the expression on the earl’s face as he’d looked out at their crew.
But Archer thrust it back. He took every scrap of outrage and humiliation and shoved it into a ball, pressing it down beneath his breastbone.
He could not afford anger right now. He had to be calm and pleasant and sure of himself.
He had to secure Hangleton’s assistance so that they might find the princess, and he was not going to let Ruby down.
So he sent his crew a bolstering smile and followed Ruby and her father down the hall to Hangleton’s study.
Inside, Ruby sat down in front of the earl’s desk and burst once again into hasty speech. “Father. I know that our arrival was unexpected. But if you’ll only permit me to explain—”
“Unexpected?” Hangleton echoed. “That’s putting it mildly. I distinctly recall telling you to go back to Bridestowe and stay there.”
“I couldn’t. Papa, I need you to listen to me. The Princess of Monfalcone—”
Hangleton, who’d half lowered himself into his chair, rose at Ruby’s words. “This again? By God, Ruby—”
Ruby’s face had gone pink. She looked wretched and embarrassed. “I know you told me not to interfere in the princess’s affairs,” she said thinly, “but I had no choice. She—”
“Not to interfere?” Hangleton gave a derisive little laugh. “When have you ever in your life listened to me when I told you to keep yourself out of situations where you do not belong? Let us simply add this to the long list of public embarrassments your actions have engendered.”
Archer’s pulse beat hard in his ears.
He looked at Ruby. Her eyes had gone to her lap, and her shoulders curved down, as if to make herself smaller in her chair.
His jaw tightened. His teeth ached. Words leapt to his mind, to his mouth—but he strangled them in his throat.
“Please, Papa,” Ruby said. “If you’ll only let me explain—”
“I’m sick of listening to your excuses. I cannot think why I imagined that a few months at Bridestowe might do you some good. You are once again entangled in a mess of your own making.”
Ruby’s face had gone from pink to white. She looked—
Not just hurt. Resigned. As though she’d expected this. As though she’d been braced for such a blow.
“I have long despaired,” Hangleton went on silkily, “of your ever learning to behave differently. But now I begin to think that you are incapable of—”
Archer found himself on his feet.
“That’s enough,” he said, very low.
And—shit. Bloody fucking hell. He had not meant to say it.
This was not how he’d intended for this meeting to go.
He was meant to help, to charm. Not hurl himself into a confrontation that might ruin their chances of securing Hangleton’s help.
He had not, under any circumstances, meant to give in to the siren call of honesty.
But Ruby—
Ah God. Her transparent face was utterly stiff, and her blue-gray eyes looked faraway. Fogged over, as though she could not see clear.
And he couldn’t bear it. He could not sit and watch, not even if he ruined his best chance of finding the princess. Not even if, later, Ruby blamed him for intervening. He could not stand idly by and, through his own inaction, fail her when she needed him most.
He would not let her father make her feel ashamed.
“What’s that?” Hangleton snapped.
“That’s enough,” Archer said again. “Sit down.”
Hangleton’s gaze focused on Archer for the first time, and he treated Archer to a slow up-and-down perusal. “Sit down, is it? I beg your pardon. Who the devil are you to tell me what to do in my own house?”
Archer couldn’t help himself. He looked back at Hangleton and smiled very slowly. “No one of import,” he said. “Only your son-in-law.”
Hangleton goggled. “You—” His face went mottled, then scarlet. “You are—”
“Cheers,” Archer said blandly.
Hangleton turned to Ruby, his expression transfigured by fury. “I should have known. I should have suspected that you would run off and get yourself into some ghastly, humiliating—”
Archer cut in, his voice so soft that Hangleton, despite himself, went quiet. “Perhaps you did not hear me,” he murmured. “I said, Sit down. And do not speak another word until you’ve listened to what your daughter has to say.”
He was a good two decades younger than Hangleton and no doubt outweighed him by several stone, but it wasn’t the threat of physical violence that brought Hangleton’s words to a halt. It was Archer’s tone—the low assurance, the lethal command he’d honed a thousand thousand times aboard his ship.
This was what he did—spoke in such a way that people believed him. That people looked into his face and saw the truth.
And this time, he meant every word.
“You,” he said softly, “do not deserve to breathe the same air as Ruby. You haven’t got a hundredth part of her cleverness or courage, and she is good and brilliant and goddamned heroic in spite of you. In spite of your very best attempts to stifle her.”
He broke Hangleton’s gaze to look at Ruby. Her lips were parted, and he couldn’t read the expression on her face.
But her eyes were clear as she looked at him; the strange distant despair he’d seen there had faded.
He had her back. And he wasn’t letting her go.
He turned to Hangleton. “Listen to your daughter,” he said again. “She is trying to save your skin along with the Monfalcone royal family, and I assure you, Hangleton, it is in your best interest to close your mouth and think very, very hard before you open it again.”
The earl sat back down. He was still looking at Archer, and when he spoke, his voice was measured. “I know you,” he said. “I’ve seen you before.”
Fear moved through Archer’s body. A shifting uncertainty, like sand pulled out from beneath his feet by the tide.
But before he could reply, Ruby intervened. “He is my husband.” She lifted her chin and looked at her father straight on. “Before you accuse him of anything else, Papa, remember this: His name is connected to yours now. Forever.”
Hangleton sat back. His eyes shifted from Archer to his daughter, and he didn’t say anything else.
And very slowly, Archer lowered himself into his chair as well. “Your turn now,” he said to Ruby. “Tell him what he needs to know.”