Moonlight Square: Books 1-4 (Plus Bonus Prequel Novella), page 166
“Howell tried to stop me from reading it, honestly, he did,” Finch said. “But I just had a feeling…”
“It’s all right, Howell,” Luke said, then glanced again at his assistant. “You were both merely doing as I asked. I take it you found something?”
Finch nodded, and it was then that Luke noticed the trace of regret in his eyes behind the spectacles.
“I marked the page for you, sir, where the ribbon is. You’ll find, um, alarming news there about Lord Axewood—just as you suspected.”
“Tell me,” Luke said, his heart pounding.
Finch gave Howell a grim glance. “Apparently, your father discovered that Lord Axewood was taking bribes from certain manufacturers of war materials in exchange for his funneling fat government contracts through the budget committee to their companies. By this corruption, the earl greatly added to his fortune, but I’m afraid it’s even worse than that.”
“How?” Luke asked, stunned.
“One of his favorite co-conspirators in this little arrangement was called Ares Manufacturing,” Finch continued. “As you’ll see in your father’s notes, this company became notorious for sending Wellington’s army cheap goods of dreadful quality. Guns that misfired. Sabers that rusted and cracked. Boots that wore out in a month. Things that got the troops killed, or at the very least, would have made our soldiers’ lives miserable.”
“Holy hell,” Luke murmured, staring at him. “That’s treasonous.”
Finch nodded. “Commanders of various ranks wrote to the committee to complain, but as secretary, Axewood merely hid their correspondence.
“Your father records in his journal how he ran into some angry colonel who’d been sent back to London for a desk job after being wounded. The officer cornered the duke, as chairman of the committee, and demanded to know if future contracts with Ares Manufacturing had been canceled yet, said their goods were getting people killed. The duke had no idea what he was talking about, but that was what first tipped him off to Axewood’s mischief.”
“Traitor to the nation!” Howell burst out with a glare. “Sending our brave boys into harm’s way with inferior equipment!”
“And profiting handsomely by it,” Finch said with a grim nod.
“Aye, it’s blood money,” Luke murmured, amazed. But when he opened the old leather journal to confirm this information for himself, the impact of seeing his father’s handwriting hit him harder than he expected.
Reading the lines his sire had written was almost like hearing his voice again after all these years. It brought a lump to his throat.
In these pages, the previous Duke of Fountainhurst recounted what he had discovered regarding the earl’s corruption, and debated with himself on what to do about it when he returned from holiday in Scotland.
But he had never returned.
Axewood must’ve seen to that, realized the canny Duke of Fountainhurst was on to him.
A dagger of loss twisted afresh in his heart as Luke sat down slowly. “Leave me.”
Finch and Howell exchanged a somber look and then respectfully withdrew, heads down.
When they had gone, Luke gripped his father’s book, reading what he’d written about his suspicions.
I knew Axewood was a schemer, but I never thought he’d go to these lengths…
He read as much as he could until a tremor of fury coursed through him, an echo of pure rage.
So this was why his parents had been slaughtered. And the soldiers, betrayed.
It was all down to nothing but the lust of a Judas for his pouch of silver.
Luke cast the papers aside with a wrathful cry and lowered his head into his hands, elbows resting on his knees.
Profound silence filled Fountainhurst House as he struggled to absorb the awful blow. Their deaths had been meaningless.
But at least now, finally, after all these years, Luke had arrived at the truth. The who and why of it.
Axewood. To protect his reputation and his ill-gotten gains.
I’ll kill him.
Luke rose abruptly from the ottoman, fists clenched at his sides. He stalked out of the library. It was time to finish this.
And Axewood was going to rue the day he was born.
* * *
By Monday evening, the “beautiful” Portia Tennesley looked a fright and didn’t care. Those in the ton (and certain lying dukes) who only seemed to value her for her looks ought to see her now, she thought, staring coldly at the dupe in the mirror that hung upon her bedchamber wall.
Her eyes were red, swollen masses, her nose was chapped from crying, and her hair was a tangled wreck hanging free about her shoulders. But no matter. She had no plans of ever leaving the house again in her misery, possibly even her own room.
Why, she had half a mind to leave the ton behind and join a convent at this point. Such was her luck with men.
Turning away from her reflection with a seething huff, she supposed the shock of last night’s revelations had finally worn off. But it had been followed by tears—an embarrassing flood of them, in truth. Now, however, came confusion.
And anger.
Serious anger. The sort of anger that had nothing to do with being a lady, like she usually strove her best to be. (Why? she wondered.)
Oh, no. This was Hunter sort of anger. She was feeling ready to fight. But so far, all she did was pace back and forth across her chamber. It was better than lying on her bed weeping like a cakehead over a lying fiend.
Whatever the case, she certainly did not look like any young lady two weeks away from her wedding.
But how could she marry a man who pretended to be something he was not? Oh, he was a proper play-actor, wasn’t he? How was one ever to know where one truly stood with such a person?
Who was Lucas Wakeford, the Duke of Fountainhurst?
A silly quiz in a papier-mâché dragon head one moment; the next, one of the most feared outlaws in England. Baffling man! Did he really care for her, or was that part a lie, too? Was she just another prop in his play?
How could she begin to guess his motivations? Was it even worth trying? But how could she not try—when she was in love with at least two of his guises, damn him.
God, she felt like such a fool. How could she not have known?
Pacing back and forth across the evening shadows that stretched out on the plush carpet in her chamber, she shook her head. Such games he had played with her heart! How he must be laughing at her.
She absolutely cringed when she thought back to how she had poured her secrets out to “Silversmoke” on that very first night, holding nothing back. Now she wanted to crawl under a rock when she thought of how he’d tricked her.
Schemer. Why, Luke was even more of a sharper than Joel was at the tables. Joel merely bankrupted other men at cards, but Luke was the player who gambled with her heart.
Shaking her head in stifled wrath, Portia leaned against one of the posts of her canopy bed, her heart pounding. She had never been more confused in all her life.
She rather sensed it would have been helpful if one of her sterner friends were to come over right about then and give her a good shake.
Sidney, perhaps. He was always good for doling out doses of reality, usually with the utmost tact. But she did not feel like seeing anyone.
Especially her female friends. All the happily married wives! Ugh. Their love matches seemed so perfect; how could they possibly understand what she was going through?
She thought of Serena’s pledge with Azrael: no secrets! How in the world had any woman ever procured such a promise from a man?
Ah, but Serena had always been so much better with the male species than Portia was. The raven-haired beauty had always had them eating out of her hand, while Portia had little patience for their egos.
Or maybe they just stayed away from her out of sheer terror of her brother, she thought. Then she heard her mother calling her down to dinner.
Grr. She did not want to eat, and did not care to join her parents at table. Those two! They had always treated her like a baby simply because she was the youngest, and sure enough, in the carriage home last night, they had chuckled and tut-tutted over her “quarrel” with Lucas, as if it was a joke.
Oh, but wait, she reminded herself sarcastically, you’re not to call him Lucas anymore. Very well.
Luke the Liar. Redclaw the Terrible. Silversmoke, the unbelievably seductive and completely inappropriate ruffian. Her future husband…
Or not.
How oblivious she must seem to him, like a child! She paused in her pacing to glare out her bedroom window in the direction of Fountainhurst House. In spite of herself, she ached with missing him, desolate to think she’d never get him back, not like the way it was before he had confessed.
Things would never be the same between them now.
What’s he doing over there? she wondered morosely. She knew he’d come to Town, for she had seen his carriage arrive, in her obsession with the man. Indeed, she was surprised he had not stayed at Gracewell with his kin.
She had half a mind to summon him hence and give the wayward, wicked duke a tongue-lashing he would never forget.
Tempted but skeptical of this idea—because he’d gaze at her with those soulful green eyes and she’d melt—she pivoted away from the window.
Yanking the edge of her fluffy, feather-trimmed dressing gown around her, she resumed her angry march across her chamber. She wondered if he planned on showing his face anytime soon, or if he was too ashamed of himself to try. Coward! Well, no. That was one thing she could not really accuse him of, after all his highwayman exploits.
And his many murders, of course.
Let’s not forget that little detail. She huffed and paced on. Maybe he was simply too busy again to bother with her. Just like old times!
He had said he had been hard at work on bringing Joel back to her, as promised. But I don’t even want Joel anymore—I want Lucas! her heart cried.
Only, the Lucas she had fallen in love with didn’t really exist.
Silversmoke had killed him.
And now she was more alone than ever.
At her wits’ end, Portia looked down at all the wedding invitations so carefully arranged by seating order on the table in her room; then she shot out her hand and swept them all away with an angry cry.
* * *
The darkness hung close that night as Gower walked into Jimmy O’Toole’s domain in the Dockyards, very much on his guard. The air was thick down by the river, and the smell of old rope and the creaking of wooden planks brought him back to his Navy days.
Mixed memories. Some good, some bad. But at least there was order aboard a Navy ship. Here, the very air smelled of anarchy.
And fish.
Gower harrumphed, the sleek supposed “fishing” boats of Jimmy’s operation moored on the river behind him as he marched stoically up the dock to the warehouse looming ahead.
Fountainhurst better be grateful for this.
Oh, aye, Gower could see the point of coming here to find out whatever the Irish gunrunner could tell them about this Carnevale. Nevertheless, he was risking his neck here with this lot, more than Luke knew.
The visit had better be worth it.
Warily scanning the prospect before him, Gower walked up the wooden pier at the appointed time. The pair of heavily armed Killarney boyos guarding the door to the warehouse came to attention, but, thank God, they knew to expect him.
Hospitable, the Irish. Until you crossed them.
“Mr. Gower,” said the larger of the two. “Himself’ll be ready to see ye in a trice.”
Gower nodded his thanks, taking a silent breath to check his agitation. Then they went in.
The warehouse was not overly large, but inside, it was dark. A maze of tall shelves, hanging nets, and oilskin tarps guided Gower along behind his hulking escort. The other Killarney bruiser remained behind to guard his post.
As they wove back and forth around the dark space, Gower caught glimpses of lamplight in between these barriers arrayed to slow down intruders. Jimmy’s lair proper lay at the center of the space; Gower knew because he’d been here before, but certainly not alone.
But, bloody hell, it wasn’t Jimmy that made him nervous, that flamboyant fool.
It was the wife.
Maisie was far too shrewd a player to make her real preferences clear. Whenever they’d come here on business before, she hung on Silversmoke because she knew the famed highwayman had the soul of a pure, young, questing knight.
Gower, not so much.
That brazen bad girl was just his kind of woman—tough on the outside, fragile deep down—and Gower could not deny he was insanely attracted to her. Maybe part of that came from his idiotic sense of chivalry, sensing she was trapped in her underworld life, a damsel in need of his protection. Nobody ever cared about protecting a whore, but Gower’s instinctive compulsion to shield her had made Maisie as wildly attracted to him as he was to her.
The fact was that Gower had fucked her several times before she’d married Jimmy. Best sex of his life—and hers. The thought of her raking her nails down his back in the middle of an August afternoon still made his mouth water.
But God help him if the kingpin’s wife ever decided to kiss and tell.
As they neared the center of the maze, Gower heard voices coming from inside. He braced himself for the meeting, for Jimmy O’Toole, in his view, was something between a typical merry lad and a savage nutter.
Oh, the world was full of thrill-seekers, risk-takers. Madmen all, to some degrees. Gower would’ve liked to say he wasn’t one of them, but any man who wound up as second-in-command to a famous highwayman obviously did not mind playing rough and loose with his life or his safety.
Such a one was Luke. And such a one was Jimmy.
Unfortunately, so was Jimmy’s wife, who suddenly appeared when they stepped around the next corner.
Gower stopped in his tracks. A stupid smile skimmed his face. He could not deny the burst of excitement that went fizzing through his veins as the curvy blonde sent him a knowing smile and posed before him, one hand on her juicy hip.
“Hullo, Bernard.” The sensuous purr of her voice curled his toes in his boots. It was ridiculous.
Gower gulped and ordered his cock to behave. “Mrs. O’Toole.”
In the shadows of the maze, a sliver of lamplight splashed across her guinea-gold hair and crisscrossed her magnificent cleavage. She was tall and curvaceous, built on an impressive scale. Not some mousy little wisp of a thing, like his ex-wife.
Her presence made Gower crushingly aware of his loneliness. As usual, he thrust it back to the nether regions of his mind where he could easily ignore it.
Maisie glanced at his escort. “I’ll take him the rest of the way.”
“Aye, ma’am.” The Killarney bruiser nodded but didn’t leave them alone, which was probably for the best.
Instead, the big, freckled fellow merely stepped back to a respectful distance, waiting for them to go ahead of him.
As Maisie sidled over to Gower and slipped her hand through the crook of his arm, he quivered like a lad of eighteen.
God, I wish I’d met you twenty years ago.
“How’ve you been, Bernard?” She tugged playfully on his arm as she made to lead him to her husband, but it was then that Gower saw it.
The bruise.
He stopped, turning to her. He wanted to take her chin gently in his hand and lift her pretty face up to the light, but there was no need.
“Something wrong, sir?” their escort asked.
Dread leaped into Maisie’s eyes as she realized her makeup didn’t fool him. The flesh-colored cream and powder she had caked on did not quite hide her black eye.
Fury began pumping into Gower’s blood. He couldn’t help it. Perhaps this reaction was to be expected from a man whose daughter had been kidnapped, raped, and then beaten to death by ruthless thugs. He hadn’t been able to protect her…
“Jimmy give you that?” he demanded, nodding at the bruise.
Maisie’s eyes flared with fear, but her voice dropped to a whisper. “Don’t. Bother.”
“Huh,” Gower said in murderous quiet.
“Stay out of it, Bernard. He’ll kill you. Nobody can help me.”
“Rubbish. Go and pack your things,” he murmured in her ear, leaning closer. “Wait outside, and when I’m done here, we both leave. It’s all right, lass. I’ll protect you.”
“Are you mad? I can’t just leave!” she whispered back, pulling away. “They’ll come after us. Don’t you know what that could lead to?”
“Don’t care. He’s not gonna do this to you again. You’re either comin’ with me, or I kill him when I go in there. Your choice.”
Maisie stared at him in dismay.
CHAPTER 26
Conflagration
By nightfall, Luke’s shocked grief at his horrible discovery had hardened into cold, steely resolve.
Now that he knew beyond doubt that Axewood was the one behind his parents’ murders, all he wanted to do was reach The Blind Badger, sit down with Gower, and hash out their plan for exactly how to marshal every willing member of the gang in their attack on the Carnevale two nights from now.
By God, he would rain down fire and brimstone on the earl, that smiling snake.
Eager to hear whatever his right-hand man might’ve learned from the colorful Jimmy O’Toole, Luke was in Silversmoke mode once again, cantering up the road to Hampstead Heath astride Orion, as he’d done so many times before.
After a day of such misery over Portia and then rage at his discovery, the cool, silken darkness was a comfort, natural to him after all his years of riding by night.
Orion knew the way to their headquarters well, and Luke listened to the lulling rhythm of his hoofbeats as they rode at an easy canter, winding their way through the moonlit landscape. Finally, after his fury of today, he had begun to calm down enough to think.
With a cynical shake of his head, Luke wondered what Gower would say when he told him that he’d finally found his parents’ real killer—the hidden hand who’d hired the MacAbes.
