A Kind And Decent Man

‘Cock-fighting, you say?’ Victoria gulped, feigning interest in the barbaric pastime. Their carriage was still intermittently drawing this rough stranger’s acquisitive attention, and, hoping to distance him from it, Victoria said breathlessly, ‘I’ve never before seen such a spectacle…’

The man obstructed her as she made to speed past him. ‘Nor never likely to see agin, I reckons. What you doin’ ‘ere? Sweet little lady like you? Come fer the sport, did yer? Bored little lady, is yer?’ he breathed close to her face with a foxy smile. ‘Well, I’ll shows yer some better sport than yer’ll get off them cocks…’ He howled with laughter, painfully tightening dirty fingers about an evasive arm.

‘Unhand me at once,’ Victoria demanded, her alarm now backed by anger, her grey eyes sparking jet-black in her white face.

‘Unhand you…is it?’ he mimicked. ‘You ain’t in Mayfair now, duckie. Yer on my manor and yer’ll…’

Victoria was no longer listening. She was staring wide-eyed past her tormentor and at that precise moment the focus of her amazement turned, laughing, from his male companion and saw her.

‘David…’ Victoria whispered in shock and stupendous relief.

‘Victoria?’

She was too far away from him to hear her name, but she saw it on his lips, just as she saw her own disbelief and astonishment mirrored in his face. His blond companion took money from his unresisting fingers then wandered off towards some stalls set up.

There was a small group of gentlemen present, clearly distinguishable by their arrogant bearing and expensive dress. And they were, indeed, wagering, she obliquely realised. This local ruffian hadn’t lied on that score. As though sensing he was favourably considered, the man fumbled two large hands inside her cloak.

For little more than a second Victoria desperately fended him off, then he was savagely spun away from her and sent tottering back on his heels.

David Hardinge stood facing the giddy Lothario with his back to her. ‘Not your type, Toby,’ he stated, in an odd mix of lazy drawl and steely threat.

The man regained his balance, simultaneously shaking his shaggy head and whipping up ham-like fists in aggression. But, instead of charging, grimy fingers scraped across his bristly, bashful face. ‘Sorry, milord. Didn’t know she was yours, honest.’ He shifted uncomfortably then executed an incongruous sort of bow-cum-curtsey before sloping off, muttering, ‘Some looka.’

Before Victoria could draw breath to thank him, she was propelled backwards, fast up against the licheny brickwork of a building. Two rigid, barring arms slammed at either side of her, shielding her face from view.

Everything once dear and familiar about him bombarded her senses: his warmth and muscular strength, his fresh cologne, so welcome a fragrance in the hotchpotch of odours. Instinctively she swayed closer then started back.

‘What the hell are you doing here?’ David Hardinge bit out so ferociously through his teeth, his thin lips barely parted.

Victoria winced as though he’d hit her. His intense, almost tangible fury dried her mouth and her head throbbed with tension.

The shabby stranger had alarmed her; this elegantly dressed man she believed she knew terrified her. Yet, paradoxically, a serene sense of safety let her rest back against the brickwork and raise languid eyes to his. Flickering torchlight threw into stark relief his fierce, anxious expression. Fear for her safety had prompted his anger. The instinct to protect radiated from him. It was in his rigid stance, in the way he used his body to shield her as people pressed close by them.

Hard, unsteady fingers lifted to her cheek before sliding across her jaw.

Mesmerised by the soothing caress, Victoria simply stared up at him. She had thought this all forgotten, banished from her life for ever. This touch…this man inclined towards her, his mouth close to hers.

Long sooty lashes parted to reveal tortured relief in his sapphire eyes. ‘What in damnation do you think you’re doing here?’ he gritted out.

‘Looking for you,’ Victoria answered with rash honesty.

Chapter Four

‘Looking for me?’ he repeated.

Victoria dipped her head, feeling her face heating at her unguarded confession. But it was honest, she remotely realised. It was the absolute truth. She now accepted in this noxious London marketplace what she had refused to acknowledge in the quiet sanctuary of Hertfordshire: the only reason she had agreed to leave her papa and Hartfield in the servants’ care was to come to London with her aunt, seek out this man and ask him to marry her. To save them all from destitution, she needed him to want her again.

‘Looking for me?’ David persisted, a light finger sliding beneath her oval chin to try to make her meet his eyes.

Victoria subtly shielded her chagrin by turning her face into his shoulder. Everything had gone so awfully wrong! And so soon! He would naturally expect some explanation for such an outrageous declaration. She had seen this man but once in seven years. That reunion had hardly been auspicious, yet, despite it, she had just freely implied searching an insalubrious London district for him on a chilly spring night.

Subconsciously she had planned a far more favourable meeting. Perhaps when she was finely dressed in her beautiful lilac silk gown, when she could attempt to charm him as she once had. As it was, she knew she looked fatigued and dishevelled. Her grey velvet bonnet had been discarded in the carriage and dusky tresses wisped untidily about her face in the biting night breeze. Her dark woollen travelling cloak had been chosen for warmth rather than fashion. Oh, there couldn’t have been a worse time for her to have let slip such vital information!

‘I’m flattered, Mrs Hart, that you wanted me so desperately you tracked me to one of London’s most notorious rookeries. Nevertheless, a visiting card delivered to Beauchamp Place would definitely have been wiser.’

His bored irony and the way he formally addressed her both froze and fired Victoria. So she was ‘Mrs Hart’, and no doubt a tiresome nuisance who was ruining his evening’s entertainment.

Her cool, dignified expression clashed with one of sardonic intensity. ‘I intended to do exactly that, Mr Hardinge. I have certainly not sought you out specifically this evening. How could I possibly have known of your whereabouts?’ she demanded on a derisive little laugh. ‘I had no idea you would be here…I had no idea I would be here, for that matter. We are lost and…’ Her scornful defence faltered. ‘We are lost’ ran back through her mind. Oh, God! She had completely forgotten about her aunt and Beryl, still in the coach. Oh, she hoped they were still in the coach. They could have been abducted or robbed or murdered because she had been foolish enough to abandon them defenceless and sleeping.

‘Thank you for your aid, sir. I apologise for detaining you,’ tumbled from her lips as she attempted dodging past him.

It was impossible to go anywhere. His arms remained stationed at either side of her. Her small hands rose, yanking desperately at his forearms to remove them. Iron muscle flexed within the fine wool of his coat as he thwarted her attempts to shift him.

‘Do you really want to roam unescorted through this drunken rabble, Mrs Hart?’ he quietly asked. ‘You’ve met Toby and should deem yourself fortunate: in comparison to some of the stevedores around here, he’s a reasonably decent chap. He, and many others about here tonight, are also in my employ. Were they not, both you and I and my companions would now be fighting to keep our valuables…and our lives. You haven’t the vaguest idea where you are, have you? This isn’t a charming Hertfordshire village, Mrs Hart. There’s a deplorable lack of chivalrous squires in these parts.’

‘I am being made perfectly aware of that, Mr Hardinge,’ Victoria tartly retaliated, incensed by his ironic allusion to her dear, late husband. ‘Please allow me to pass. I have to return to my companions and I have no wish to detain you from rejoining yours.’

‘Companions? There are more of you?’ David demanded on an incredulous laugh.

‘Indeed. And I am anxious for their welfare after what you have told me…’ Her voice quavered as her fragile composure finally cracked. She heard him curse beneath his breath and frantically blinked away the betraying, humiliated tears glossing her eyes.

She had been such a stupid fool! In every single way! She railed at herself. She should never have voiced her intention to approach him while in London. She should never have clung to her idiotic hope that he might treat her with respect and kindness. If he could abandon her to seek diversion abroad merely weeks after proposing and declaring undying love, then there could be no chance of courteous indulgence now, after seven years. He had forgotten their youthful friendship and had made that much perfectly clear two months ago at Hartfield. She almost laughed hysterically; it had been her intention to come and appeal to his good nature!

She knew bored, wealthy gentlemen mixed with all levels of society in their quest for diversion, but for this viscount to mingle with these vagabonds…And, worse still, to seem quite at ease and accepted by them. She recalled the painted-faced vulgar women who had verbally abused her. She also recalled her aunt’s genuine shock and disgust when recounting details of his debauchery. Surely not with such as were hereabouts…? It was too much! With a choked, woeful sob, she shoved fists against his solid torso, desperate to escape.

Firm, gentle fingers slid into her hair, holding her close, as he wordlessly allayed her alarm and anger. And, despite all her misgivings, her face instinctively sought the familiar muscled nook below his shoulder as though it were only yesterday when last she’d found comfort there.

‘I have to go back to my aunt. Please let me go back. I’m worried some ill might have befallen her and my maid…’

Shielding her slender body with the solid strength of his, David began shouldering a path through the throng. Even in her agitated state she realised people were deferentially clearing a path for him to move through. One woman bobbed a curtsey and several men dipped heads or tugged forelocks as he approached.

A press of people milling on all sides forced them to a halt and David’s arms circled her protectively. Victoria darted anxious glances this way and that and spied Toby; with him was a woman whose neat, fashionable attire made her seem oddly out of place. At that precise moment the woman’s blonde head turned and almond eyes glanced idly about then swept back to her. They narrowed to slits and Victoria was horrified to read not only recognition but cold hatred there too. Those feline eyes shifted to David, lingering covetously on him.

Victoria stared, mesmerised, as the woman spoke to Toby. He looked startled and stared over at them before dropping his dark, wiry head close to his companion’s elegant coiffure. The woman began hurriedly moving away from him. They were arguing, Victoria realised, and quite violently, judging by the way people close by were turning to laughingly watch. Then the couple were disappearing into the bobbing, seething throng.

Feeling unaccountably alarmed, Victoria nestled instinctively into David. Her disquiet took on a keener edge as long, controlling fingers urged her body into even closer contact with his. Her senses were chafed raw by the heat of him warming her, a muscled thigh melding against her hip, a hypnotic gaze drawing grey eyes to blue. Slowly, inexorably, her ebony head was angling back. She sensed him inclining towards her, his mouth a mere sigh away.

Cherished, buried memories surfaced immediately. She had loved it when he kissed her. Leisurely, drugging assaults inflicted with narrow, sensual lips that looked so selfish, so savage…yet had often been unbearably attentive and kind. Her thick, lush lashes unmeshed; she glimpsed what she yearned to touch her as her eyes swept upwards to his face…and through a break in the crowd she spied her coach.

Drenching guilt that she had momentarily forgotten it and relief that it hadn’t, after all, been misappropriated vied for supremacy. She prayed her aunt and Beryl were still safely within.

They weren’t! Victoria ripped free of David’s grip. Dodging the last few folk weaving about, she skipped over the filth on the cobbles and ran lightly to her travelling companions.

‘You are a most stupid man!’ met Victoria’s ears as she came close to her indomitable aunt. ‘Anyone knows this is not Cheapside. Look about you! Gin houses—flash houses too, I’ll warrant. Rogues and doxies everywhere…’ Matilda halted midflow, catching sight of Victoria and then of David walking behind her.

‘We’ll all be murdered in our beds…deaded by morn…’ Beryl wailed, enfolding herself tightly into her cloak and jamming her bonnet hard down over her pretty fair hair to conceal it.

‘Foolish girl! We’ll be lucky to get to our beds tonight, let alone be murdered in them. Cease that shrieking and moaning. You’ll draw every wretch’s attention to us with your caterwauling.’

Victoria wrapped her arms about her rigid-backed aunt and then drew Beryl’s shivering form into her embrace. ‘Quick…get back into the coach…please. Don’t fret…I’m sure these people will let us leave unchallenged. They are far too busy with their entertainment to bother with us,’ she encouraged. She addressed George Prescott sharply. ‘Let us be moving on immediately…’

He nodded his sparse grey head knowledgeably at her. ‘Well, I reckons, if we keep the Thames to the left and the moon to the right…’

‘You’ll end up back here in about ten minutes,’ David Hardinge remarked drily, nonchalantly leaning his immaculate figure against the battered coach.

Matilda beamed at him then sent her niece such a look of explicit congratulation that Victoria felt mortification and anger heat her face. She glanced at the focus of her aunt’s appreciation, hoping he had not noticed the woman’s tacit approval. A cynical smile told her he had, as did the very blue eyes watching her. And all at once an awful realisation struck her: he had not seemed as surprised as he ought to on learning that she was seeking him!

‘Mr Hardinge was by lucky chance here with some friends.’ Victoria quickly put both of them right, sure he quite believed she had somehow managed to engineer the whole incident to waylay him.

‘How fortunate,’ her aunt said in a tone which only served to endorse this theory.

‘Get in the coach now, Aunt, and you, Beryl. We must leave here immediately.’ Beryl needed no further prompting. She scrambled aboard with Aunt Matilda quickly following.

‘No doubt you’ll want to thank and take your leave of the Viscount.’ Matilda reminded Victoria of his status through the window she had forced open then jammed shut again.

Her aunt was, of course, right. He was most certainly owed her gratitude. She didn’t dare guess what might have befallen her at these scoundrels’ hands. ‘Thank you for your protection, my lord…’ she dutifully said.

‘You’re very welcome to it, Mrs Hart.’

The insinuation in his immediate, husky reply made Victoria blush although she was unsure why such innocuous words should make her feel so uncomfortable. Or why he should look at her in that sleepy yet intent way.

‘If you’re hoping to arrive at your destination some time this evening, Mrs Hart, perhaps I ought to accompany you. Your coachman still seems confused.’ David indicatively raised his eyes to George Prescott, now perched on the driver’s seat but swivelling about on his posterior muttering to himself about left and right and moon and stars.

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