Chapter 8

CHAPTER8

Three months ago

Jacob woke to the feel of a soft mattress under him, he was face down and someone was wiping his back with a damp cloth. Pain radiated outwards from his right side in hot waves. His head ached and throbbed with his pulse. An excruciating pain ran up from his right leg when he tried to move it, making him cry out. Nausea roiled in his gut. He moved his head and miraculously a hand with a bowl appeared in time as he vomited over the side of the bed.

A feminine hand. She murmured something he didn’t catch, being distracted by the heaving of his stomach. When it finally settled, he muttered his thanks and flopped back on the bed, closing his eyes. A moment later she offered him water to rinse his mouth and he peered up at her bleary-eyed. Maggie.

After he took a couple of sips of water, he tried to smile. “Maggie. Thank you.”

“Someone stabbed you; I think it might have been one of those men.” She bit her lip, her brow creased and blinked her eyes, they were grey blue in the lamp light. Dawn was breaking through the window behind her, it had been a long night. “When you didn’t come back inside, I went to investigate and found you bleeding on the ground.”

He tried to move and winced with the pain, it hurt like the devil!

She placed a hand on his shoulder to stay him. “I’ve sent for the doctor. I think your right ankle is broken.”

“Where am I?” His voice croaked.

“My room at the Tavern,” she flushed. “You defended me, I couldn’t let you bleed to death in the alley.” She swallowed.

He nodded and tried to take her hand, but his arm felt like lead. Pain pulsed through his body from multiple sources, he was one big ball of agony. His eyes closed, willing it all to go away.

* * *

She was late!Garmon looked up from the book he was trying to distract himself with and glared at the clock on the mantelpiece. It was a quarter to twelve. With a growl, he discarded the book and got up to pace to the window, peering out into the street, but there was no sign of his carriage. He couldn’t believe that she would renege on their deal so early on. But she had indicated this morning that she was reluctant to come back tonight.

It had been an unsatisfactory day all around. Upon further consideration of his meeting with Diana he had concluded that really there was only one course left to him, reluctant as he was to take it. He had threatened this course when Mowbray first seized the hell but had not followed through. Mostly because Connor talked him out of it. He now knew why, Connor’s partiality for Diana extended to a desire to protect the duke. Not from any fondness for the man personally, but because to harm the duke would cause Diana pain. Truth to tell that had been a consideration that weighed slightly with him as well. Yes, he was angry with Diana for her betrayal. But despite the promptings of his darker self, he had some scruples over pursuing a course that would bring her such heartache.

But really, he had no other options now. He must recover the hell and there was only one way to do it. It had to be the duke. So, he had put the word out today. An attractive bounty to ransom the duke for the hell. No easy feat, the man was much hedged about with security. Even so, a clever or desperate man might accomplish the impossible for a sufficiently large inducement.

The undertaking sat ill with him. Was he developing a conscience? That was a luxury he couldn’t afford. And yet the doubts still persisted, no matter how much he tried to silence them. His temper already raw, was tinder sharp and Genevra’s failure to show up made it even worse.

He paced away, annoyed with himself for being so put out by her defection. His body tensed with frustration. The truth was, he hadn’t had anywhere near enough of Mrs Genevra Tate, and the thought that she would pull back from their agreement, not see it through, was disappointing in the extreme. He was cranky to begin with, this made it worse. He really didn’t give a toss for the money, beyond the principle of the thing. He had plenty of avenues for recouping funds. But Genevra, what she offered, was unique, and he realised, with a jolt that brought him to standstill in front of the fireplace, one that he craved with the same kind of hunger he had once craved the excitement inherent in the turn of a card.

He wanted her and his thirst, his hunger, was not satiated yet, not anywhere nearly enough. What he had planned for tonight was different, and his plans were now in ruins. The disappointment was sharp like a pain to the chest. He felt like a jilt at the altar waiting for a bride who wasn’t coming.

An idiot in fact, for investing so much in an ungrateful conniving little bitch!His fists clenched and his teeth ground together. Well, he would make her pay! Did she think he would consider the past two nights sufficient to stave off the debt? That wasn’t the deal sweetheart! He would make her sorry she had crossed him. He was not a man to cross and however pretty and beguiling she might be she wasn’t going to get away with-

The sounds of a carriage drawing up outside, arrested his vengeful thoughts and took him to the window in time to see a cloaked figure descending from the carriage and a glimpse of light-coloured skirts. She disappeared from view, and he heard the front door open and footsteps on the stairs.

He straightened his neck cloth, attempting to compose himself and pack all that ire he had stirred up away. Going to the door as a knock sounded, he opened it to reveal a flushed Genevra, escorted by the man he paid to act as porter and ensure the security of the house. He passed the man his coin and held the door for Genevra. She slipped passed him, removing her cloak as he shut the door. He took it from her.

“I’m so sorry I’m late!” she said pushing tendrils of hair off her face and trying to subdue them with pins. “A couple of patrons refused to leave and in the end Joe and his boys had to throw them out for me.”

“Joe?”

“My tapster.” She smoothed her gown and glanced round the room, catching sight of the table laid for two. “Dinner?”

“Supper, I have sent Burridge out for it. He will be back soon. Would you care for some wine?”

“Yes please,” she came further into the room, and he got a better look at tonight’s gown, which was an embroidered muslin. He thought of the three he had seen so far; this one became her best. It was simple in style and cut, with a white satin ribbon under her breasts and the embroidery on the sleeves and hem was its only ornament.

He poured her white wine and passed her the glass. A knock at the door sent him to answer it and let Burridge in with the covered tray of the meal. He let the man arrange it on the table and returned to pouring himself a wine. Burridge bowed himself out, and he waved to the table.

“Would you care to eat?”

She smiled moving to the table. “How did you know? I missed dinner and I’m famished.”

“Good,” he ensured her chair was pushed in sufficiently and joined her on the opposite side of the small table.

She surveyed the dishes laid out and exclaimed, “This is marvellous, thank you!”

He shrugged; it was simple enough fare. Sliced cold meat, a selection of cheeses and fruit with fresh bread, oil, salt and honey to drizzle and dip. He waited until she had made her own selection, before filling his plate and watched with quiet amusement her delight over the food. His earlier fury disarmed by her evident pleasure in being here with him, and her quick apology for being late. He should have considered that she might have difficulty getting away on time every night. After all she was running a service business, and as he very well knew, customers did not always behave the way you wanted them to.

When she popped a piece of soft cheese in her mouth and closed her eyes in ecstasy his cock twitched. And when her tongue scooped up a drip of honey from her lip, he swallowed a groan. She would be the death of him, and she wouldn’t even know it. Her bodice was cut low enough to show her generous bosom and cleavage to advantage, and he had to keep dragging his gaze away from that fascinating prospect.

Forcing his mind away from her assets, he said by way of polite conversation, “Tell me about your family.”

“My father was George Whittaker of Whittaker’s Brewery; you’ve heard of it?”

“In Great Russell Street?”

She nodded. “I have two sisters, Mary and Beth. I’m the middle daughter, and we had a brother Johnathon, but he died when he was twelve, and I was eight. Without a son to carry on the business, my father came to rely on me to help in the Brewery and I learned everything about running it. My eldest sister, Mary, is too refined to work in the Brewery and Beth, the youngest, caught scarlet fever when she was five and almost died. Her health has been precarious ever since and besides she was too young. Papa relied on me.” She looked down at her plate, toying with the piece of bread. “He died seven years ago, and my uncle tried to take over the brewery, so Mama married again to–to stop him.”

“I gather from your expression this didn’t please you?”

“My stepfather and I do not see eye to eye. We clashed from the first. Suffice it to say that he is the type of man who assumes a woman is too feeble-minded to understand even the simplest of tasks. That she is incapable of doing anything but genteel things such as embroidery and ordering the servants. That she could never possibly know the first thing about business or-” She stopped, her hands clenching, her face flushed.

“I see, very trying for one of your ah- capable disposition, no doubt.”

“He makes my blood boil!” she burst out. “He drove his own brewery to the wall with bad business decisions, and it is only by a miracle that he has not done the same to Whittaker’s. He is a pompous, vain, narrow-minded, idiot! I loathe him.”

“I see.” He kept his face straight with an effort. The matter was clearly one about which she felt passionately, and he couldn’t help but admire her spirit. She would be an excellent wife, supportive and strong, capable and dependable. As well as passionate and desirable.

She sighed. “I married Jacob Tate to get away from him and fell from the frying pan into the fire.” She took a sip of wine. “Jacob owned the Globe Tavern. I thought it was the perfect match. He was handsome and charming enough before we were married. I thought we would be partners in the business and expand it together. I nursed dreams of running my own brewery you see.” Her mouth twisted. “But Jacob didn’t want a partner, at least not in his wife. He wanted a drudge he could fuck when he felt like it, and heaven forbid if she ever voiced an opinion or had ideas of her own!” She blinked, and he caught the glisten of unshed tears in her eyes.

“You were wasted on him,” he said quietly. He was glad the man was dead for he would have killed him if he wasn’t.

She smiled through the tears, wiping her cheeks. “Thank you.” She took another swallow of wine, and he topped up her glass. “So, you see, I was over the moon when he turned up dead. I’d been living in dread of him coming back, although the longer he was away the more hopeful I grew that he wasn’t going to.”

She nibbled at a piece of fruit and looked across at him. “So there, you know my life history now. What about you?”

“I have no family,” he said abruptly.

“What none? Are you an orphan? Do you not know who your parents were?” The sympathy in her voice almost undid him. Damn! He looked away a moment wondering how she had managed to pierce his armour so easily.

“My mother was a prostitute, at least she died as one. She was an Opera Dancer. She always insisted my father was a lord, but I never believed her until, on her deathbed she finally told me his name. I don’t think I believed her even then. I always thought, growing up, that my father was Samuel Gatwick, her Pimp.” He grinned, but he knew it was more of a grimace. “Gatwick was an unmitigated arsehole. I hated him.” He paused, wondering if he could tell her the rest. She was watching him with sympathy, and irrationally he wanted to wipe that look off her face, make her realise he wasn’t a worthy recipient of her sympathy. “I killed him–eventually.”

She swallowed and her cheeks lost some of their pink bloom. “How old were you?”

“Twelve.”

“You were a child.” Her hand reached out and then retracted to a fist.

“I was never a child. I’d just bedded my first whore, and I figured I was man enough to confront him. I was skinny, but I was strong and quick. He was drunk and stupid. I stabbed him, he tripped and fell, hit his head.”

“It was an accident.”

He shook his head. “No, the wound was fatal, he would have bled out in seconds. There was blood everywhere. Never seen so much blood, before or since. But I was rid of him and so was Mama, and that was what counted.”

“Who was your father then?”

“Lord Phillip Lovell. I didn’t know this until later, but he had paid for our upkeep for the first few years of my life, but I was too young to remember any of it. Then he died and the money stopped. That’s when Mama took up with Gatwick and became a whore. She died when I was fifteen, but I was twenty-five before I tried to find my father’s family. By then I was earning a fair living from my gambling, playing in hells, finding innocent young lordlings to fleece.

“I wanted to open my own hell and I figured the Lovell’s owed me, so I went looking. To be honest I didn’t expect a warm reception, but I wasn’t above a bit of blackmail if it would get me what I wanted. Turned out I didn’t need it.

“I discovered I had a half-brother, the legitimate son of Lord Phillip. Peter his name was. He was unaware of my existence until I called on him. Decent fellow. He paid me what he figured his father would have done, had the family not cut me and Mama off after the old man died. It was enough, combined with the money I’d made from gambling, to open my own hell.”

“Lovells.”

“Yes.”

“You’ve never married?”

“God no.”

“Children?”

“Not to my knowledge. If I did, I’d take care of them.” He paused and reached across the table to take her hand. “We never discussed this, but I’d take care of you and the child if-”

Her face twisted and she looked away. “There’s no need. I can’t, you see-”

“Oh. I wondered why you didn’t seem concerned.” He knew an irrational moment of disappointment. He should be relieved; he didn’t want to father bastards. He didn’t want his sons to suffer as he had. In fact, he’d do his damnedest to ensure they didn’t, but there had been none that he knew of. Perhaps he was incapable?

He dragged his attention back to her, aware suddenly that she had risen from the table and walked to the fire. Her back was to him, but it wasn’t difficult to figure out she was upset.

He got up and went to her, put his hands on her shoulders. She was shaking with silent sobs. He pulled her back against him, wrapping his arms round her tightly and murmured, “I’m sorry Genevra.”

“It’s not your fault!” she gasped. “I’m sorry for behaving like a watering pot!” She took a breath and said as if the words burst out of her. “I lost two! The doctor said I’d never have another.”

His heart, the thing he didn’t think he had, jerked at that, and he turned her in his arms and held her tightly. She leaned into him, her face buried in his shoulder and wept. “I’m sorry love,” he whispered. “So sorry.”

“He did it,” her words were so muffled he thought he’d misheard them.

“What?”

She lifted her head, her face streaked with tears, her eyes red. “He did it. It was his fault. It’s why I hate him. I could probably have forgiven him all the rest, but not my babies. He took -” her voice became suspended with tears for a moment. “He took my babies from me!”

“How?” His voice sounded hollow to his own ears. His vision tinged with red.

“The first time, he punched me in the stomach. I began to bleed the next day and the babe was born too soon, she was blue and only took a few breaths before she–d-died. I named her Grace.”

“And the second?” His voice croaked.

“He pushed me down the stairs. It ruptured something inside me. There was a lot of blood. It was far too soon for this one, but it was formed enough to tell it was a boy.” She wiped her face and her eyes flashed with fury. “He was upset about this one. He blamed me for killing his son!”

Garmon stared at her through a narrow tunnel of black and red as a flash of incandescent rage poured through his body, demanding an immediate and effective outlet. He spun away and punched the wall beside the door. The plaster cracked under the force of his fist and rained down on the floorboards in flakes and pieces. He was dimly aware that he made a sound, a roar of rage. He was shaking.

He punched a second hole in the wall beside the first, and a third, before he was able to control the rage enough to stop.

Leaning on the wall he gasped for breath, fighting flaming anger and incongruous tears. He closed his eyes and breathed, listening to his heart thudding in his ears and pounding in his chest. He gasped, wiping his face and noted the swelling on his knuckles, and gradually he became aware of the pain in his hand and of a noise behind him.

He turned to find Genevra backed against the farthest wall, her face white as a milk, staring at him in horror. She was visibly shaking and even at this distance he could see the tears rolling down her cheeks.

He swallowed and cleared his clogged throat. “I’m sorry!” he took a step towards her, and she cringed away, looking around her for some way of escape or for some method of defence, he could read it in her eyes and posture. The woman was terrified. And no wonder. He cursed his own temper and lack of control.

“Genevra don’t be afraid. Please, my anger was for Tate, not you. I would never hurt you. If he wasn’t already dead I would kill him for you, for what he did. He is an animal who doesn’t deserve to live!” He cleared his throat again, his voice husky, his throat tight.

“Please...” He stepped towards her, crossing the space between them slowly. His right hand hanging at his side throbbed.

He stopped a couple of paces away and waited for the sense of his words to sink in. He could tell when she mastered the terror and came back to herself. She slumped back against the wall behind her, her hands pressed flat to the wall by her hips.

Her lips twisted in a tremulous smile. “Thank you.” Her voice was husky, broken.

She licked her lips and nodded at his hand. “You’ve hurt yourself.”

“It’s nothing, just a bit of bruising , some swelling.”

“Let me see,” she held out her hand, and he stepped closer letting her take his injured hand in hers and examine it.

“I should bathe it for you, since you were injured in my cause.” She smiled wistfully, her fingers tracing a gentle path over his bruised and swelling knuckles.

“It’s nothing, really,” he repeated.

“Do you have some arnica?” she asked.

He nodded and fetched the little pot of it from his bedroom, setting it on the table. Then he poured himself a scotch and downed it. “Do you want some?” he offered.

She looked up from the pot of arnica. “Yes, thank you.” He poured her a drink also and let her smooth some of the ointment on his knuckles. It stung a little, but he was more engrossed in her gentle touch and concern and barely noticed. He was not in the habit of being doctored or cared for, it gave him an odd tight feeling in his chest.

“Thank you,” he said with a smile and pushed a lock of hair back behind her ear where it had come loose from her bun. The tear tracks still showed on her cheeks, and he used a thumb to wipe them away.

“No one has wanted to defend me before,” she said quietly bending her face forward as if to hide. His chest tightened, and he swallowed an unaccountable lump in his throat. He felt as if someone or something had opened up his chest and tried to pull his innards out. Raw and unstable was how he felt.

An instinct to comfort stole over him, and he took her into his arms and kissed her hair. She wrapped her arms round his torso, and they stood thus for several minutes, the only sounds in the room the crackle of the fire and the ticking of the clock. Finally, he stirred and said softly, “Come to bed, I just want to hold you.”

She let him lead her to the bedroom, and they undressed each other in silence. Crawling under the covers naked, he pulled her into his arms and settled her head on his chest. Her arm draped over his stomach and her leg looped over his, she nestled in and murmured, “Thank you.”

“Hush, go to sleep.”

She did, but he couldn’t. The images her words had conjured in his mind were too graphic and too haunting to let him sleep, so he stayed awake and held her and wondered what next in this strange odyssey he had begun with Genevra Tate.

He saw her home himself, accompanying her in the carriage and seeing her to the door of the Tavern. He waited until she was safely within before jumping back into the carriage and giving a peremptory order to return home, his thoughts dark and angry.

Garmon spentthe following day stewing on what Genevra had told him. It didn’t improve his temper that there was no outlet for his impotent rage, and he eventually turned to contemplating what he could do to make Genevra happy instead.

* * *

Genevra’s daywas much like any other on the surface, but the passage of last night played on her mind, colouring everything. Raking up the past was painful, but Garmon’s reaction, his rage and tenderness in the face of her distress, had been wonderful and terrifying. She had not shared the truth of what happened with her two pregnancies with anyone, both had been ostensibly caused by falls on her part. She rather thought Joe suspected, but he never said anything, and she had never been able to bring herself to speak of it. Instead, she buried it, hid it away in a dark place inside her and shied away from thinking of it.

Why she told Garmon, she couldn’t fathom, but the relief of speaking of it to someone had created a kind of peace that she had never experienced before. She was melancholy yes, but the unhealed pain of it was eased a fraction by sharing her loss with him.

His fury and his kindness had both stunned and terrified her. Initially his ferocity scared her, but then the idea that someone, anyone, would come to her defence in such a manner, was so foreign to her experience that she had no way of knowing how to react to it.

Could she trust that kind of support? It seemed too good to be true.Her instinct was to run from it, but she couldn’t, he would be sending his carriage for her again tonight, to continue their arrangement. If she broke the agreement, he would foreclose on the debt, and she could wind up in debtors’ prison and lose the Tavern.

Such a thing was more terrifying than Garmon Lovell defending her. She needed to guard her heart from such a man, he could bring her undone if she wasn’t careful. This was a temporary arrangement, not one she could rely on long term. So, no matter how frightening it was to have someone be nice to her, she couldn’t run, she must face him and see what the next encounter with this strange, enigmatic and passionate man brought.