Mandy

“Not to my particular taste, but hungry…hand a piece over, Chauncey,” Ned said putting out his hand.

Chauncey cast the duke a look and with a twinkling eye gave Ned a length of the dried beef and sat back to enjoy his.

Mandy gaped at them and remembered that she was starving. As she watched her brother eat, she collected a diatribe of abuse to ring down on his head for not sharing, when a loaf of bread was dropped into her hands. She looked up and saw the duke’s blues glittering with laughter. Reluctantly she thanked him and sat with her bread and imagined her favorite hot meal. While she ate her bread, she saw Chauncey hand the duke a bottle of wine and noticed that his smile could be quite boyish and so very charming at times.

Chauncey got up and went to his saddlebags and returned with additional and far more delectable selection of food. She found the fresh drumsticks, and day old tarts delicious as she fell on these with great enthusiasm and grinning looked up to find the duke’s eyes on her. Oddly, he looked troubled and his voice seemed tinged with concern as he said, “You can’t be allowed to suffer here in the wild much longer. It is unthinkable.”

“When we get Elly and the diary, we’ll be free again, and all will be well,” she answered on a heavy sigh. “Though I am desperately worried about this runner.”

“I wouldn’t be. I don’t think he is here for Ned,” the duke answered thoughtfully.

“Don’t you? Why not?”

“Appearances are often deceiving, Mandy. We must try and take a good look at the big picture, because jumping to the wrong conclusions could entrap us.”

She eyed him thoughtfully. He seemed to care. Well, of course, he cared, she told herself. Why wouldn’t he? His name was attached to theirs! Heaven forbid he might be encased in such a scandal. She was sure that was his only reason for caring.

“I haven’t jumped to conclusions. There is a runner in town. It would be foolhardy not to be wary. It is just too much of a coincidence that a runner is here and Ned and I are in hiding…for…” she let her voice trail off as she couldn’t bring herself to say ‘murder’.

“We both wish I was not in the unfortunate position of being your guardian, but as I am, I shall look out not only for Ned and you, but for Chauncey as well, so you needn’t worry yourself to death over everything,” he said quietly.

“Well, guardian you may be, but I don’t see us any closer to solving this puzzle,” Mandy said and sounded even to her own ears shrewish. Whatever was wrong with her? She felt her moods swing high and low and all because of something the duke would say or wouldn’t say. It was most uncomfortable.

“You will remember that had you not made your brother and your groom fugitives, I would have arrived and been in a much better position of clearing Ned’s name. Even so, I am here now and I do not intend to allow anyone to harm any of you.”

Chapter Eight

THE DAY WAS slowly dimming into dusk as the sun settled in the west and cast shadows over the viscount’s beautifully manicured estate, but the duke was scarcely aware of the time or the loveliness of the long summer’s day. Instead, his mind raced with the questions he needed immediate answers for and he marched into the viscount’s well ordered home, ready to demand those answers. It was apparent to all he encountered that he was in a blistering mood.

Sticwell, the viscount’s butler did his best to dispel some of His Grace’s black humor, by inquiring after his needs and although the duke offered him a half smile and a coin for his trouble, his thoughts continued to swirl darkly in his head. Things did not quite meet the eye and he had the distinct notion that his friend was keeping something from him. What it was, he could not fathom, but he was determined to get to the bottom of the coil and unwind it. “Where is the viscount, my man?”

“Housed with his man of business in the study, Your Grace.”

“Would you have him join me in the library as soon as he has finished,” the duke returned and started for the library.

He had two needs: The first, a drink and with that end in mind, he made his way to the library, picked up the decanter of the viscount’s very fine brandy and poured a hefty snifter. This he put to his lips and savored for a few moments before contemplating what lay before him.

The second of his needs he meant to achieve as soon as the viscount appeared and that was to get answers to the very pointed questions he meant to ask. Those questions were bound to give his friend a start and there was the very good chance that Skip would take umbrage, however, the questions needed to be asked. There just was no help for it, because the matter at hand had dropped from serious to dire.

The duke continued to sip at his libation while one hand troubled his hair. He stared at the red roses just outside the panoramic window and dash it, all he could see was her face.

Everything about her haunted his thoughts. Damn, but the chit was the most infuriating female of his acquaintance…as well as the most desirable.

She was in his blood, keeping his shaft hard and in need. He was damned uncomfortable and he knew he had no business thinking of her the way he did. She was his responsibility and she was he was certain, an innocent who should not be dallied with by such as he. Yet, he didn’t seem to have any control when she was near. It was as though everything about her wrapped itself around him and pulled. He was drawn against his will—deuce take it all!

Fiend seize this muddle he was trapped within.

He had set out to save his reputation by saving the twins from the scandal they had been plunged into. He now found that he didn’t give a rap for how this affected his standing in the haute ton. All he seemed to care about was clearing these two and returning them to their home.

The twins though scamps, though infuriating, though more trouble than he had ever encountered in his hedonistic life, were both worth their weight in gold. They were honest and dear hearted. They were like bright shiny stars gleaming through a cloudy sky. Singular beings. No one with an ounce of sense should believe Sherborne capable of murdering anyone, let alone a helpless woman. Damnation, but he could not allow the young lord to be accused of such a crime. It was monstrous. The boy was as pure-hearted a young gentleman as ever he had encountered and he had no doubt that he would have helped Celia had he known the trouble she was in, perhaps even married her to save her name that was the sort of man Ned Sherborne was!

Blister it!

He downed the glass of brandy and poured another, strode over to the yellow brocade sofa and sank down within its cushioned depths. The situation confronting him was a good deal murkier than he had anticipated.

He wanted an immediate solution to the problem of getting his wards safely installed in their homes again. Mandy sleeping

on straw, eating stale bread and dried beef for so long was unthinkable. She hadn’t even a season yet. She should have been enjoying routs and balls. She should have been in London taking the ton by storm…not sleeping outdoors in the dank underground of an abbey ruins.