***
Noble paced back and forth in front of a house in Cheapside, muttering to himself just what he’d do to that murdering bastard McGregor when he caught up with him. He wanted nothing more than to be on the back of the nearest horse, hunting for his Gillian, hunting for the man who had spirited her away directly under his nose, doing something—anything—to find her.
“If he’s harmed a single hair on her head,” he threatened, shaking his fist at the sky, “by God, I’ll—”
“Tear his head off and spit down his neck, yes, Noble, we’ve heard that already,” Lord Rosse said as he strode down the front steps and toward his friend.
Noble spun around and took the marquis by the neck cloth. “What have you found out? Where did the devil take her? What did the murdering bastard’s man have to say?”
“Noble, calm yourself, you’re upsetting your son.”
Rosse waited until Noble released him before continuing. “Carlisle’s man doesn’t know where he’s gone, but he did verify that he had ordered a small case packed earlier, so evidently he’d planned this all along.”
“No, not this,” Noble said, resuming his pacing as his mind wheeled and turned frantically, trying to make sense of it. “He couldn’t have known Gillian would appear at Jackson’s. No, what he planned was something else, a plan he decided to abandon once he realized he could take advantage of Jackson’s madhouse to kidnap her.”
He combed an agitated hand through his hair as he stopped in front of his friend. “Where, Harry, where has he gone to earth?”
“I don’t know, Noble. I wish to God I did. I never thought—I was sure Carlisle was innocent—but I suppose you were right. My nose has gotten cold.”
Noble clapped a hand on his friend’s shoulder, then resumed his pacing. “It’s not your fault, old friend. She was my responsibility—what is it, Crouch?”
“M’lord, one of the Runners ’as returned.”
Noble raced over to where the Runner, still dressed in his livery, was jumping off a horse. “They’ve gone toward Colfax,” he said breathlessly. “We followed them to the east road. Davey’s on their heels, but I’d wager a year’s worth of blue ruin that they’ve gone to the Nag’s Head Inn at Colfax.”
Noble was in the carriage before the man had finished, ordering the coachman to spring the horses.
“Papa! Don’t leave without me!”
Noble swore and threw the door open, grabbing the small figure of his son and hauling him into the carriage just as the horses leapt off.
“We’ll be right behind you,” he heard Rosse shout as the carriage barreled down the road, the coachman bellowing oaths at the people who were foolish enough to block his path. Noble closed his eyes briefly against the pain that threatened to overwhelm him, pain at the thought of losing Gillian. She was his very soul, hers entwined so tightly with his that he didn’t think he could survive the separation. His mind repeated a litany in time to the horses’ hoofbeats, “Please God, let her be all right.”
A small, cold hand slipped into his. Noble opened his eyes and looked down at his son.
“She’ll be fine,” he said, wiping off a lone tear streaking down the boy’s cheek. “Don’t worry, son, we’ll rescue her.”
“Just like she rescued you?” Nick asked, squeezing his father’s hand tight.
A small smile flashed over Noble’s face. “Yes, just like that. We’ll save her and take her home and keep her safe for the rest of her life.”
Nick burrowed his head into his father’s side. “That man will hurt her like he did Mama,” he said into Noble’s coat.
“What man?” Noble asked, the idea of locking his wife away in a tall tower beginning to look very attractive.
“The man who hurt Mama. The man who hit you on your head when you came in to help me.”
Noble felt his blood turn to ice. Gently he pushed the boy back until he could see his face. Nick’s eyes—those eyes that made him feel he was looking into a mirror—gazed back at him filled with pain and worry.
“The man you saw who…” God, he hated to do this to him, but it was Gillian’s life at stake. “The man you saw shoot your mama?”
Nick nodded, a tear spilling over his brimming eyes.
“Where did you see this man?”
“At Gentleman Jackson’s. He was watching Gillian.”
The ice turned to fire deep inside him. “Was the man still there after Gillian left?”
Nick nodded again, looking even more worried. He twisted the material in his short pants between nervous fingers. “Did I do something wrong, Papa? I tried to tell you, but you wouldn’t listen.”
Noble hugged his son fiercely. “No, son, you didn’t do anything wrong. Now, I want you to tell me from the very beginning when you first noticed that man at Gentleman Jackson’s.”
***
Lord Rosse, riding one of the Black Earl’s horses, was surprised to see Noble’s carriage suddenly stop. He rode up and leaned down to ask if everything was all right.
Noble stepped out and handed Nick up to John Coachman. “You can ride up there with John for a bit, son. If you’re good, he’ll let you handle the whip.”
Noble turned back to his friend. “Tie him off.” He nodded at the horse as he climbed back into the carriage. “We have to talk.”
“What’s all this about?” Rosse asked a minute later as the coach once again started off at a fast clip. “You’ll have to change horses at Rowley at the rate you’re pushing them.”
Noble ignored the comment, his face hard and bitter. “It’s Tolly.”
Rosse stared at him, not understanding his cryptic comment.
A spasm of pain swept across Noble’s face. “God help me, I thought the man was my friend, but it’s been Tolly all along. He’s been behind McGregor’s attacks on me, I’m sure of it. Tolly was the man who killed Elizabeth.”
“Tolly?” Rosse asked, disbelieving. “Our Tolly? Are you sure? He’s the one who told us to look at Carlisle’s house…oh.”
“Exactly. Nick identified him, right down to those blasted seals and fobs he always decks himself out with. He told me…” Noble’s voice choked to a stop. It took him a few moments before he could continue. “He told me how Tolly would visit Elizabeth and they’d play their little games in front of Nick. My God, Harry, how could she do that to him? How could she hate him so much that she’d want to see him suffer like that?”
Rosse swallowed back his own lump. “She never liked him, Noble, you knew that.”
“I knew it, and I thought I’d protected him from her wrath at not being able to have children…but I didn’t. I failed him, Harry, and that thought will haunt me till the day I die. And now—” Noble stared blindly out the window. “What if I fail Gillian, too?” he whispered.
“You won’t,” Rosse said in a hearty voice. “We’ll stop at Rowley and change horses, and see if the Runner left any message about their direction. We’ll find them.”
“You know what he did to Elizabeth,” Noble said hoarsely. “He beat her. He cut her. He abused her in ways no man should abuse a woman. He must be mad—mad with jealousy or hate or—God knows what. What’s to stop him from taking out his rage at me on Gillian? What’s to stop him from doing the same inhuman things to her that he did to Elizabeth?”
His last words were almost a sob. Rosse put out a hand and grasped his friend by the arm. “Noble, stop torturing yourself. It won’t do you any good, or Nick, or Gillian. Now get hold of yourself, man, and let’s consider all the places Tolly might have gone.”
***
Gillian was not amused. When she had spied a familiar wizened figure beckoning her, she’d followed without hesitation, leaving her apology to Lord Carlisle half-finished. Noble was busy raging at an ill-looking Crouch, and Charlotte still had Nick in her grasp, so she left Lord Carlisle and Sir Hugh and slippe
d out through the door to a small anteroom.
“Palmerston, I’m surprised to see you here. I wouldn’t have believed that you would be interested in such goings-on.”
The old man slowly lowered himself onto a bench with the aid of his stick. He wheezed a chuckle at her. “Now, gel, you don’t expect me to let my godson do battle for his honor without being present, do you?”
“Your godson?” Gillian exclaimed, seating herself next to him. “I didn’t know he was your godson.”
“Aye, godson and great-grandson-by-law.”
Gillian raised her eyebrows. “You’re Elizabeth’s great-grandfather?”
“Aye.” A look of distaste crossed his face. Gillian was reminded of an ancient wrinkled and brittle parchment that she had once seen. Like it, Palmerston’s face seemed to have survived more than its fair share of years.
“Elizabeth, now there was an evil gel. Truly evil.”
Gillian stared in surprise. “Your own great-granddaughter? Evil?”
“Aye, that she was. She’d liked to hurt things, ever since she was a little gel. Cruelty was a sport to her. Caught her more’n once tormenting my dogs. Took a switch to her for it once, but she just moaned and squirmed and begged me to thrash her again.”
Palmerston’s brilliant blue eyes peered out from twin bushy white eyebrows. “You know what I’m talking about, gel?”
“I—no, I guess I don’t,” admitted Gillian.
“Some people—sick people, people sick in their minds—find pleasure in inflicting pain on others. Other people gain pleasure from their own pain.”
Gillian wrinkled her nose in disbelief.
Palmerston nodded. “Elizabeth was like that. She took enjoyment from pain, and she took great delight in hurting others.” He leaned back and closed his eyes. “She particularly liked to hurt your husband. And his son.”
“But why?”
Palmerston shook his head. “No reasoning with their kind. They’re not sane. Mind yourself, gel. There’s others like Elizabeth who would hurt you if they could.”
“Me? Who?” Gillian asked.
Palmerston didn’t reply; he just closed his eyes and leaned back against the wall.
“Is it the same person who has tried to harm Noble?” She gave the old man a gentle shake, but he refused to say any more. She sat back next to him, ignoring the sudden crashes and harsh voices from the room beyond. Elizabeth had hated Noble? If that was the case, perhaps he hadn’t been mourning her death; perhaps she had misinterpreted his dislike of his first wife for grief. Perhaps there was hope for her after all.
The noise swelled into the room as the door opened and a figure slipped through.
“There you are, Lady Weston. I thought you might have come here.”
Gillian glanced at Palmerston, but he was still sleeping despite the noise. “Yes, but I should return,” she said, standing. “Noble will be wanting to leave…”
“He asked me to escort you downstairs,” Lord Carlisle said, grasping her arm and pushing her toward a back door.
“Noble asked you?”
“Yes. He’s taking his son to his carriage and asked if I would see you safely down. You don’t want to go out into the main rooms—they aren’t safe for a gentle lady.”
“But my cousin—”
“Has been taken outside already,” Lord Carlisle said with a worried smile. He pushed her gently toward the servants’ stairs. “We’ll go down the back way, then meet up with Weston outside.”
Ha, Gillian thought to herself some time later. What a fool she had been to trust Lord Carlisle. She hoped Palmerston would be sure to tell Noble who had urged her away. She struggled briefly against her bonds and wished she had the common sense God gave to slugs.
He had kidnapped her! Facedown on the floor of his carriage, her arms bound at her sides, a foul taste in her mouth from the horribly musty black cloth that encased her, Gillian came to terms with the fact that the man she had thought was a friend was, in fact, a villain. Noble had been right all along.
“Just because I tried to stop the duel,” she muttered, spitting out a mouthful of the cloth and trying to work a foot out of the bottom of the canvas bag, “he decided to pay me back in kind. Well, he’ll soon see what a mistake he made in underestimating me!”
The carriage lurched over a hole in the paving stones, sending her flying into the side wall. She saw stars for a few minutes, then managed to curl herself up so her head didn’t pound against the wall interior of the carriage with each bump and jolt. Once she was satisfied she had enough air, she concentrated on trying to work her arms free of the ropes, but it would be hopeless until she could remove herself from the bag. She struggled for what seemed to be days until she had one foot free.
“Excellent,” she said to herself and spent the next two years working her second foot free. Just as she emerged from her chrysalis, exhausted and sweaty but triumphant, the carriage swayed and jounced to a halt. She cautiously peeked out the window. They were in the yard of a posting inn, and it looked as if the horses were being changed. “More than excellent,” she said as she tried the handle of the carriage door. It was unlocked. She sent up a little prayer and threw the door open, leaping out of her prison.
And straight into Lord Carlisle’s arms. Or what would have been his arms if he had known she was going to come bursting out of the carriage just as he was opening the door to check on her. Instead she hit him head-on, knocking him backwards. Together they hit the ground with a resounding smack.
Gillian scrambled off the earl and stared at him for a moment. There was a pool of blood growing from beneath his head. She prodded him. He didn’t move. She put a hand to his mouth but felt no breath stirring.
“Bloody hell! I’ve killed him!”
“Aye, that you’ve done,” a raspy voice said from behind her. Gillian turned around to see a coachman backing away from her warily.
“But I didn’t mean to…he kidnapped me, you see…and then this…he was opening the door as I was coming out…it was an accident. You can see that, can’t you?”
The coachman looked at her with wide, nervous eyes, which widened even more when he looked around her again. “Here, I’m fetching the landlord. If you’ve gone and murdered my lord, it’ll be the three-legged mare for you, lady or no!”
“But, wait—” Gillian started toward the coachman, but he turned and fled before she could get near him.
“Well, now what do I do?” she wailed to the still figure of the earl. “I can’t just leave you here—good lord, Sir Hugh! Whatever are you doing here?”
A small yellow curricle raced into the yard and pulled up directly before her. The baronet leaped from the seat, took one look at the scene before him, and ordered his tiger to tend his horse. “I shall assist Lady Weston home in this carriage.”
Gillian felt like kissing him for saying such a nice word. Home. “That would be excessively kind of you, Sir Hugh, but I’m afraid I’m going to have to stay. You see, the magistrate will be sure to want to know how I came to kill an earl…”
Sir Hugh peered down at the recumbent figure. “Dead, is he? Shame, but still, I’m sure it was an accident. He did kidnap you, after all.”
“Kidnapping or not, I don’t believe I should leave until I’ve spoken with the authorities,” she said with a reluctant look toward the inn. She had no desire to see the gallows, let alone make use of them.
Sir Hugh pulled his lip in thought. “I have an idea. I have a house not far from here—an hour’s drive at most—I’ll leave word inside as to your whereabouts, and you can come along and have a rest until Weston arrives.”
“Noble is coming?” Suddenly the situation didn’t seem to be quite so terrible. Surely he would be able to help her out of this horrible mess. “Is he right behind you?”
“No, he had to tend to some business first. I’ll just
go inside and leave Noble a message where we’re going, and then we can be on our way.”
Looking back on the day, Gillian realized she should have been suspicious about Sir Hugh’s antics when he insisted on leaving the body of Lord Carlisle lying in the courtyard, but she had wanted to be away just as badly as Sir Hugh seemed to, so she accepted his explanation that the innkeeper was sending for a doctor before Carlisle was moved.
She also felt she should have seen signs of Sir Hugh’s madness before it became disastrously evident, but she hadn’t. She rode along with him, pleased with her savior up until he escorted her into a darkened bedchamber.
“Thank you, Sir Hugh,” she said politely, wishing he would leave her so she could tidy herself up. “I’m sure this will be most…oh, my. What…er…what exactly is that?”
“What?” Sir Hugh asked politely as he slid the bolt home in the door and began to light candles.
Gillian pointed at the raised circular platform. “That. That large thing, just there, taking up most of the room.”
She began to feel something was very, very wrong.
“Ah, that.” Sir Hugh came up behind her and put a hand to her back. “That is a little something I devised myself. A modified Catherine wheel. Notice that it spins.”
Gillian noticed that, just as she also noticed the four leather straps and what looked suspiciously like dried bloodstains. She tried not to sound scared to death when she spoke. “Ah. It’s…most ingenious, Sir Hugh.”
He smiled. Gillian’s stomach dropped into her boots. She was looking at a madman; she knew that just as well as she knew her own self.
Sir Hugh laughed. “Mad? I don’t believe so, my dear, although I should by rights be after suffering what your husband has done to me.”
Gillian took a step backwards. “Noble is your friend, Sir Hugh. He’s been your friend for many years.”
“Friend,” he snarled, stepping toward her. “Enemy, my dear, my bitterest enemy. Did you know he stole the fair Elizabeth from me? She had been promised to me, you see, by my papa. But then Noble came along, and suddenly he had to have her and no one else.”