Chapter 12

Chapter Twelve

“ A re you ready?” Nathan asked, glancing down at Rosalie. She had a very serious look on her face: her lips were pressed firmly together, her jaw was set, and her eyes were narrowed as she stared ahead of her at the house in front of them.

It was Gothic in style, dripping with ivy, and the drive was lined with statues of gargoyles and angels who appeared to be in torment. They spooked Nathan a little bit although he never would have admitted it.

Rosalie, meanwhile, had barely seemed to notice. Her entire being was focused on the task at hand, and he had to admire her single-mindedness.

“I’m ready,” she said, and she turned to look at him. “Are you? Don’t forget, you need to appear to be violently in love with me. That’s how I convinced you to follow in my father’s footsteps in the opium business.”

“I remember.”

She stared at him beadily. “Because the whole farce will prove pointless if you cannot sell that one piece,” she insisted. “I don’t know this Lord Redfield, but he may very well be clever, so don’t overdo it.”

“We’ve gone over it several times,” Nathan said, a little crossly. She can be bossy when she knows what she wants.

At last, she relented. “All right, I just wanted to make sure. Because this is our only chance. If he sees through our act now, we won’t get another opportunity to find out about the opium operation.”

“Perhaps you should worry more about your own performance,” Nathan said grumpily, but to his surprise, she gave him a rueful smile.

“Don’t you worry about me. This is just like the time Lizzy “Nobeard” Seacliff had to pretend to be a boy pretending to be a woman and pose as Captain Blackthorn’s wife in order to fool General Tartington into believing they were meant to be at the Black Cove Ball, so they could steal the treasure of the Black Cove Witch before it turned all of Jamaica into bats.”

“What’s your point?” Nathan asked. “That because a heroine in a novel did something, so can you?”

“Well, yes,” she said tartly. “I have been reading stories of women doing just this for many years, and I know what I’m doing.”

“Life isn’t a nov—” he began, but she cut him off.

“I know. But I was born to play this role.” She grinned at him then linked her arm with his. “Come, let’s go meet the dastardly Lord Redfield.”

Nathan shook his head as his wife led him towards the front of Lord Redfield’s manor house.

“I’m going to take away your books if you keep using words such as dastardly ,” he muttered, but she only gave him the most winning smile he’d ever seen.

“You wouldn’t dare, husband dearest.”

“Oh, so we’re in character already?”

“Who knows who is watching from the windows.”

And indeed, as they stepped away from their carriage and toward the door, it swung open, revealing an elderly butler who squinted at them suspiciously.

“Is Lord Redfield expecting you?” the butler asked them in a shaky, aging voice.

“He is not,” Nathan replied in his most commanding ducal voice.

“The Marquess does not enjoy uninvited visitors,” the butler said at once, scowling at them. “I must ask you to write him and request a formal invitation.”

Nathan felt Rosalie fidget, but he remained firm. No marquess turns away a duke, he thought. Especially a duke such as the Beast of Carramere.

“He will want to see me,” he urged, and he removed a calling card from his breast pocket and handed it to the butler. “I have just returned to my ancestral home with my new bride after many years away, and we are visiting all the landed families in the parish to pay our respects.”

The butler’s eyes widened as he read the name on the card, and he bowed low.

“Of course, Your Grace,” he croaked. “You are most welcome. Follow me, I will show you into the parlor, and Lord Redfield will be with you shortly.”

“He was very suspicious of us,” Rosalie whispered as they followed the butler into the hall—which Nathan thought was also creepily Gothic.

“I assume the former Lord Redfield taught him to be that way,” Nathan murmured back. “He had been doing illegal business for a long time, and I’m sure he made many enemies.”

“Right this way,” the butler said, showing them into a small but lavishly appointed parlor. “I will go and fetch the Marquess.”

They didn’t have to wait long, and when the new Lord Redfield appeared in the doorway, Nathan felt a momentary satisfaction that his name still held enough weight to summon the man quickly.

“Your Graces,” the Marquess greeted, bowing to them both. “What an unexpected surprise.”

Lord Redfield was younger than Nathan had been expecting. He also looked nothing like his father which was fortunate for the young man. Instead, he was tall with handsome features—although he had a weak chin—and sandy blonde hair that curled at the edges. His eyes were gray and piercing, and as they swept over the Duke and Duchess, he seemed to take in everything about them.

“Thank you for seeing us without a prior invitation,” Nathan said. “As I’m sure your butler told you, we are making our rounds to the great families in the parish as I am eager to introduce my wife to the local gentry.”

“Ah yes… the Duchess.” Lord Redfield’s eyes settled on Rosalie, and they glittered with recognition. “We have not had the pleasure of meeting, but of course, you knew my father.”

“Yes,” Rosalie replied, “and I was sorry to hear of his loss.” She said this so sincerely that Nathan blinked in surprise. He knew it was part of the act, but it just sounded so real.

Lord Redfield also looked surprised.

“My father always spoke very highly of yours,” Rosalie continued. “Although, of course, their relationship was sometimes fraught.”

“Indeed.” Lord Redfield was now scrutinizing Rosalie in a way that made Nathan nervous. Does he know she’s lying? Is she going too far in her praise? “But I am not my father, and you are not yours, either.”

“I am not,” Rosalie agreed decisively. Nathan held his breath; he had no idea what Rosalie was about to say or how she would spin this.

Then his wife smiled, a coy, ruthless smile, a smile that Nathan had given others before when he devastated their ambitions or told them he was calling in the debt they owed him.

“I am better than my father,” she said. “He failed in building the business empire he set out to create, but I will not fail.”

Lord Redfield’s lips parted, and he looked at Rosalie in surprise and skepticism.

“I do not think you understand the nature of your father’s businesses,” he sneered.

“Do I not?” Rosalie raised an eyebrow. “And why do you presume that? Because I am a woman?”

Redfield spread his hands wide. “It has been my experience that the fairer sex does not have the mind for business. Not only that, but they are naive when it comes to the ways of the world.”

To Nathan’s surprise, Rosalie laughed. “Women may surprise you, then, My Lord. We may not be born with the minds for business, but we are the ones forced to clean up after your sex when you make a mess of things as you invariably do. It teaches us to have a mind for business.”

“What are you saying?” Redfield scoffed. “That you took care of the mess your father left behind?”

“Well, with my help.” Nathan felt it would be wise to intervene now before Rosalie and Redfield got into a fight over the state of the sexes. “There is a reason the Duchess and I were drawn together. We share similar interests.”

“Do you indeed?” Redfield looked Nathan over more closely now. “And what might those be?”

“Well, disappointment in our fathers for starters,” Nathan said. “You might not know this, but the duchy has suffered in recent years. My father mishandled things, made some bad investments.”

Redfield’s face remained neutral. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

Nathan shrugged. “It merely presents a challenge, and I do enjoy a good challenge. But it means I will have to find a new investment.”

Redfield said nothing, but Nathan was sure he could see the wheels in the man’s head turning.

He turned to Rosalie and gave her a small smile. “Fortunately, I married a brilliant woman with a mind for business.”

“My father taught me everything I know,” Rosalie said, turning to Redfield. “He was once brilliant, you know, before things got complicated at the end.”

“I am surprised to hear that,” Lord Redfield said. “Lord Carfield did not seem like the kind of person who would entrust his knowledge and business operations to a woman.”

“I would not have been his first choice,” Rosalie said dismissively, and Nathan had to admire the way she didn’t seem to lose a beat. “He would have preferred a son. But in the end, he came to see my value.”

“Wasn’t that you who helped get him arrested?” Lord Redfield asked suddenly, the suspicion returning to his face.

“It was my sister Violet,” Rosalie snorted. “She is very uptight, a moralist.”

Redfield’s brow furrowed in suspicion. “If you were really your father’s successor, then why is it I hear Lord Cain has taken over his businesses?”

“Because Lord Cain is a snake,” Rosalie growled, and there was real passion in her voice now, real anger. She took a deep breath. “And he stole what was rightfully mine.”

“Then perhaps it is a good thing you married so quickly,” Redfield said, “and to a man known for crushing snakes.”

“Yes.” Rosalie smiled. “It is no mistake that I married a man who can help me win back my inheritance.”

Rosalie looked at Nathan then, and the look she gave him was like nothing he had ever seen before—not from her, not from anyone.

It was admiration.

Admiration mixed with a wild, dark something. If he didn’t know better, he would think it was desire.

But there was absolutely no way that his wife desired him. It was part of the act, surely.

Surely.

And yet, it still lit him up in ways he hadn’t expected. His heart began to race, his palms began to sweat, and he felt a tightening in his lungs making it difficult to breathe. Rosalie’s eyes sparkled, and the wild, dark something sparkled in them.

It was definitely desire.

She is very, very good.

Lord Redfield, meanwhile, was looking slowly between Rosalie and Nathan. His piercing gray eyes flickered over the expression on Rosalie’s face then to Nathan, and whatever he saw there must have been convincing because at last, he seemed to relax.

“Can I offer you two a drink?” he asked, gesturing to the sideboard.

“That would be most welcome,” Nathan agreed, relief flooding him as well.

Lord Redfield went to the sideboard and took out a bottle of scotch which he poured into two snifters. After pausing for a moment, he poured a third snifter, and this one he handed to Rosalie before giving Nathan the second one.

That’s good , Nathan thought. He respects her if he’s pouring her a gentleman’s drink.

Nathan was sure that Rosalie had never had scotch before, but she didn’t betray any discomfort with the drink as she sniffed it.

“To our fathers,” Redfield said, raising his snifter high. “And to our surpassing them.”

Nathan and Rosalie clinked their glasses against his, and Nathan caught his wife’s eye. He tried to communicate— through what, slightly widened eyes? —that she should drink the scotch slowly, but she clearly didn’t understand because she threw back the drink just like Lord Redfield had done.

For a moment, Nathan was sure she was going to spit it out and start coughing. That’s certainly what he had done the first time he’d tried scotch. But Rosalie impressed him: she didn’t cough or spit it out, but her eyes did water.

“Excellent vintage,” he said quickly to distract Redfield.

“Yes, it was my father’s,” Redfield said. “He had excellent taste in scotch.”

“I heard he also had excellent taste in opium.” It was a bold opening, but Nathan thought it was worth the risk. He was the Beast of Carramere, after all, and the Beast of Carramere was not afraid of a bold opening.

Redfield set his snifter down on the nearest end table and looked Nathan over thoughtfully.

“Ahh,” he said slowly. “So that is why you are here. I thought that it couldn’t just be to introduce me to your new bride.”

“No,” Nathan agreed. “I am here to discuss business.”

Redfield raised an eyebrow. “And you usually bring your wife with you to business meetings?”

“You heard her,” Nathan sneered. “She is the real mastermind in her family.”

“Although I have been able to make more inroads with my father’s former associates since marrying the Duke, Lord Cain is still far outpacing me in terms of acquisitions,” Rosalie said. She seemed to have recovered from the scotch because her eyes were no longer smarting. “I need to find a new income route, and quickly, if I am to keep my father’s businesses running.”

“And you think that I would be able to help you?”

“We know there has been an influx of opium in your estate,” Nathan said frankly. “My duchy is right next door, and it has not been difficult for my men to discover this. The men who came to me about this seemed to think that it was happening underneath your nose—that you were being duped by criminals who were using the networks your father set up.

“But I suspect that you know more than you let on—not only that you know more, but that you are, in fact, instrumental in it. I can’t imagine that the son of the late Lord Redfield wouldn’t be profiting from such a lucrative income stream on his land.”

Redfield smiled noncommittally. “As it happens, I am aware of what is happening on my land,” he said after a moment. “Those who are importing and distributing the opium have not exactly been subtle, and I have familiarized myself enough with my father’s systems that I know when they are being used without my permission.”

Nathan felt his heart hammer in his chest. Without his permission? Does that mean he really isn’t involved in the criminal enterprise? That he is innocent?

Rosalie clearly seemed to be wondering the same thing because she asked, her eyes narrowed, “Are you denying that you are involved in the opium smuggling?”

“I’m denying or admitting nothing,” Redfield said. “I’m merely saying that the business was started without my knowledge. I am, however, aware of it now.

“And surely you are not just allowing it to take place without taking your own cut?” she asked contemptuously. “You wouldn’t be so foolish as to let such an opportune business opportunity pass, would you?”

Redfield smiled indulgently then looked at Nathan. “Do you always allow your wife to speak so boldly?”

Nathan felt himself bristle, and he knew it had nothing to do with the act they were putting on. “My wife does not need permission to speak,” he growled, and the smile melted very quickly from Redfield’s face.

Nathan had heard it, too: the warning in his voice—the warning that anyone who tried to cross him or insult his wife would be met with the full force of his revenge. A warm feeling spread throughout Nathan’s chest, and he looked protectively at his wife.

No one says anything against her, ever.

“I will speak frankly,” Nathan said, turning back to Redfield. “The Duchess and I are interested in investing in the opium business. We believe that you are intimately involved in the production and trade of the drug and, more importantly, that you reap a great profit from it. But profits, as we know, can always be bigger. And the money that we are prepared to invest in the business—after a careful review of the business plan, of course—would undoubtedly increase your profit greatly.

“Of course, we can’t know the exact number until we have discussed the details with you, but we do know that the infrastructure we could build with the investment would be extraordinarily helpful in spreading the drug to all corners of England and beyond.”

Nathan looked at Rosalie, and he was overcome with the desire to take her hand. He resisted.

“With my wife’s knowledge of the criminal underground, my own reputation for getting my way in business negotiations, and the supply and trade networks you have already established, I believe that we can all become very wealthy.”

Nathan set his snifter down on the tabletop with a decisive thud. His eyes bore into Redfield’s.

“We will go now and allow you to think about everything we have proposed. Just know that this offer won’t last forever. We cannot waste time, and if you are not interested, then we will find a different means of expanding our empire.”

He turned to Rosalie and held out his arm. She understood. Standing, she came to him and linked her arm with his.

“Goodbye, Lord Redfield,” she said. “We hope to hear from you soon.”

As they left the house, Nathan had to resist the urge to grab his wife and kiss her. He didn’t know if they had fooled the Marquess, but he did know that Rosalie had put on the performance of a lifetime. If they were able to stop the opium trade, then it would be thanks to her.