Chapter Ten
Tristan popped his top hat on his head and headed toward the largest building.
He had to deliver this right to Lord Hugstead, who may or may not be in his offices, then he’d have a little time to squire Flick around the city and buy her a pasty.
He didn’t have much money to spend, but he could afford a pasty for a pretty lady.
The way her face had changed when she’d talked about her mother’s singing and the birds .
. . He’d never seen anything like that before.
She’d transformed, years melting from her face, lines of worry turning to joy.
Her eyes had sparkled, the gold flecks dancing as she talked.
He hadn’t been able to look away or stop touching her.
He wished one day she’d remember him that fondly, and not just as the man who helped her find sexual pleasure, but as a man who brought her joy and helped her climb out of the prison of pain and suffering her father and Chadwick Revere—that maggot riddled blackguard—had built for her.
He really hated her father. Damn the man.
For a vicar, he sounded like a man with a black heart whose only joy was to snuff the light out of others.
He knew the type. He’d had an officer in his regiment in Dover who was just like that.
Where did these people come from and why were they always in positions of power over others?
Tristan held the package under his arm as he entered the lobby and stopped at a desk where a spectacled secretary sat.
He looked up at Tristan, frowning as if he couldn’t place where Tristan belonged in the order of the social classes.
Tristan smiled. It was all part of his character.
No one knew who or what he was. A lord? A criminal?
A tailor? His clothing was just fine enough to pass as gentry, but plain.
No silk and embroidered leaves to be found, not that he’d ever spare the expense.
He wasn’t a man of color. His clothing served a purpose and that was it. And he enjoyed the confusion of others.
“A package for Lord Hugstead from Mrs. Dove-Lyon.”
The man blanched. “His lordship is not receiving visitors at the moment. I will take it.”
“No, you won’t. My instructions are to deliver it to Lord Hugstead personally to ensure it reaches him.”
Now seeing Tristan as a delivery boy, the secretary’s demeaner changed. “That is not possible.”
“Make it possible.”
“Sir, who are you to make demands of me?”
“I’m Mr. Chase, Mrs. Dove-Lyon’s personal courier.”
He sat back in his chair as if wanting to put more space between them. “Mr. Chase?”
“Indeed. I can wait right here with you if you’d like, until his lordship is free. But one way or another, I will deliver this package to him. What is your name, lad?”
He swallowed. “Mr. Banks, sir. I just remembered that Lord Hugstead is free right at this moment to receive you but will soon be in a meeting.”
“Excellent. I know the way, Banks.” Tristan sent him a wink as he strode away.
He wasn’t sure exactly what people found so threatening about him.
It wasn’t as if he was a violent person.
Not all the time, at least, and only when the situation warranted.
But somehow, he’d cultivated a reputation weaker men feared.
Perhaps it was all the black he wore? He started climbing the main stair up to the first floor.
It didn’t matter of course. Once he cleared Colin’s debt, he’d leave England for good, collect his siblings, and go home to Lark Hall.
Home.
Where would Flick be?
Not with him, and that hurt more than he wanted it to.
Knowing the pain that was eventually coming did not lessen it.
He had a feeling there would be no preparation, no bracing for the impact, when the day finally came, and another man took Flick as his wife.
It would hurt, like buckshot to the gut. Fatal even, to his cold, lonely heart.
Tristan was in a black mood by the time he reached Lord Hugstead’s door and knocked. He didn’t wait for the summons to enter. He turned the handle and pushed the door wide. He’d interrupted an important conversation, or so he guessed. Though lords always assumed everything they did was important.
“Mr. Chase, a pleasure.” Lord Hugstead stood, but sat with a resigned sigh as Tristan strode toward the desk.
Tristan nodded in acknowledgement. Hugstead was a good man who’d served in the military as an officer.
They weren’t stationed together in Dover, but they had crossed paths more than a few times.
Tristan suspected Hugstead might be working for Mrs. Dove-Lyon in the same capacity as Tristan was, able to reach the places in higher society that Tristan could not.
Did that mean he was indebted to her, too?
“From Mrs. Dove-Lyon.” He set the box on the desk.
“What is it?” Hugstead asked.
“Feck if I know. Did you anger her, or have you been a good boy? That usually determines what’s in the box.”
“How dare you speak to your betters so disrespectfully?”
Tristan turned his back to the desk to face the man in the chair who had spoken.
“Mr. Chase, you know Lord Meed, I think?” Lord Hugstead said.
“I know what he is,” Tristan returned.
“The nerve of a dog like you talking to a peer who happens to own your—”
“Mrs. Dove-Lyon is still holding the deed,” Tristan returned.
“Not for long.”
“Gentlemen,” Lord Hugstead said in exasperation.
“He’s no gentleman,” Lord Meed spat.
“He is born of landed gentry, Meed, therefore he is. Not that he wishes to act like it.”
“When you’ve seen what I’ve seen, you’ll understand that calling oneself a gentleman just because you were lucky enough to be born into a status you did not earn, means nothing. As for the deed to my home, it will be mine again.”
Lord Meed narrowed his eyes. “Would you like to make a bet?”
“I don’t gamble with the things I love, Meed.”
“Your brother did.”
“And he’s dead. What is your point?”
Lord Meed scoffed. “Highland trash.”
“Tell your mother I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“That she was forced to birth something as pathetic as you.”
“Enough, Chase,” Lord Hugstead said. “Just go. You’re both giving me a headache.”
Tristan strode to the door without looking back.
“I’ll have your land and sell it off in pieces,” Meed shot at him as he past.
“Careful what you say, or you’ll end up in pieces under that land,” Tristan said darkly.
He shut the door on Meed’s gasping rage and headed for the stairs.
His anger pulsed in his temples as he descended the stairs. He passed the secretary, and the lad ducked in his chair as if afraid Tristan would lash out at him.
But once he entered the sunlight, he looked across the cobbled commons and there she stood, his ray of sunshine, petting the nose of the carriage horse. She was singing and she was smiling and all the black rage in his heart dissipated like smoke.
Until the day she chose a husband, she was his, and he’d spend every moment cherishing her.
She looked up as he approached, her smile never faltering. She didn’t look at him like he had some secret violent nature. She didn’t look at him like he was less than the men around him. She looked at him like he was her hero, and that made him feel like a king.
“Ready?”
“Where are we going now?” she asked.
“How about . . .” he wanted to say Bond Street, to shower her with gifts, but he didn’t have the coin. “Why don’t we take a walk in Richmond Park? There won’t be many people there. It will be quiet and secluded.”
“Isn’t that a bit far?”
Tristan looked up at the driver. “What say you, Briggs?”
“I don’t mind the drive if you don’t. I’ve been cooped up with a cold.”
“Richmond it is,” Tristan said.
Two hours later, with light traffic through the city, they reached Richmond Park just as it started to rain. They still stopped, letting the horses rest and chomp on the grass while Briggs sat under his umbrella and smoked from his pipe.
He winked at Tristan as Tristan handed Felicity out of the carriage and walked some ways away under the shelter of the trees. They had one umbrella stowed in the carriage to share between them, which suited his purposes nicely.
They were a few yards away from the carriage, the trees shielding them from Briggs’s view enough that Tristan felt confident in putting his arm around her.
They strolled in silence, her cheeks pink from the cold or maybe it was him.
He liked thinking it was him that made her body flush and heat.
He’d gotten carried away in the carriage earlier.
The scent of her skin and hair had gone straight to his head, like a good whisky on a cold night, and he’d lost himself in her body, the sounds of her clipped breathing and soft sighs.
When she’d moved her hand toward his cock, he’d battled his inner demons for some sanity, but he wanted her hands all over him.
He wanted her as desperate and hungry as he was.
Somehow, good sense had prevailed, and he was glad.
A carriage was no place for Flick to further her journey.
A little kissing and groping? Fine. But if she’d put her hands on him, her curiosity and enthusiasm getting the best of her, he couldn’t guarantee he would stay in control of the encounter.
She might have him on his knees or—God willing, though this would only happen in his fantasies—her down on hers with his cock in her mouth.
He’d spent himself to that very image last night.
He knew she was still shackled by her fears and what happened to her, but something so incredible happened when she was in his arms. She came alive. She was a passionate woman at her core. He hoped she could see that and embrace it.
She shivered.
“Are you cold?” he asked.
“No. Look,” She whispered and pointed towards a stand of trees and bushes.
A mother deer and her baby stood frozen, watching them.
They stilled. A standoff of wary curiosity. When they didn’t move, the mother took a slow step, her baby staying close to her back legs as they made their way behind the bushes and disappeared.
“Have you been here before?” Felicity asked.
“No.”
She glanced at his profile. “Then why did you choose here?”
He shrugged. “I’ve heard guests at the Den talk about it. The ladies, mostly.”
“Eavesdropping?”
“Always. It’s my job. I’m not seen unless I want to be seen.”
“Is that why you wear so much black?”
He looked down at his somber clothes. “I’m wearing blue today.
I didn’t wear black until my father died.
I usually wear brown when I’m home. I suppose my wardrobe is boring, considering what the dandies wear in London, but I don’t care.
I put my clothes on, and I take them off. ” He sent her a sly smile.
She looked away and laughed. “Then why were you so intent on me wearing color?”
“Because you are too beautiful to wear drab colors.”
“And you’re not?”
“My beauty surpasses color. If I wore anything other than black, dark blue, and brown, I’d cause a riot.”
She slapped at his arm but then huddled closer to him and his heart, that bloody useless lump of muscle, fluttered.
“This is a beautiful place,” she said. “It reminds me of Winter’s Well.”
“Oh?”
“There is something that remains untouched about it. Nature hasn’t fallen to man’s desire to cut and box vegetation here, not like in the city.”
“In the city where buildings are so tall and close together, they block out the sun. It’s madness.”
“Scotland isn’t like that, is it?”
“Edinburgh is.”
“Where is your home?”
“Inverness. We’re still wild and free in the highlands.”
“That sounds lovely,” she said. “I’d like to be wild and free. Let’s cross this footbridge and then head back.”
He followed her lead across the small bridge that arched over a babbling brook edged in wildflowers and mounds of grass. She let go of his arm and placed her hands on the railing, looking over the water in delight.
“I think I see fish!”
“Is that so?” Tristan stared at her, his chest tightening.
She deserved to be wild and free. If he could reclaim his home, he could give that to her.
Take her far away from all this. She could be a lady, a respectable wife, keep a house and raise children, with any lord, sure, but would she be happy in boxed gardens, hosting parties, attending the theater?
Maybe. It all depended on the man she married.
If he knew the gift he’d been given, the perfect flower he held in his hands that would need to be tended to carefully.
If he allowed her to thrive in her own way. But there was no guarantee of that.
Tristan knew he could guarantee her happiness. Flick didn’t need fine things and parties. She needed warm fires and fresh bread. Laughter, flowers, sun, birds. She needed him.
Tristan looked away before he did something reckless like kiss her and beg her to run away with him.
He couldn’t give her the home he didn’t yet have back in his name.
“Are you ready to return?” she asked.
“No. But we should.”
She took his hand, knitting her fingers through his and Tristan felt it through his body, his soul, his heart. He watched their hands as they walked, and he knew what this affliction was.
Love.