The strength of his fury astounded him. By disobeying his direct injunction and interfering in his private affairs, she had recklessly put herself in grave jeopardy. Without a moment's reflection she had plunged alone into the rat-infested sewer that was Dock Street, where the desperate face of poverty informed the brutalized souls of its inhabitants. They would kill her for her kid gloves and toss her body into the Thames without a qualm.
And as if that weren't enough, she was wading hip deep into the quicksand of Vimiera and right into the path of a dangerously desperate man.
"Emily, permit me to escort you to your carriage," he said abruptly, turning toward her.
Emily quailed before the blazing countenance. The scar that she thought she'd become so used to she barely noticed it anymore stood out, a livid white line. The cool eyes were now liquid fire, and his mouth was a taut line.
"There's no need," she said. "Foster will escort me."
He ignored her words. "Come."
Emily rose immediately. What had Theo done to cause this terrifying transformation? On the whole, these days Emily was quite at ease with her brother-in-law, but at the moment she thought he was the most frightening man she'd ever met… even more so than her grandfather in one of his rages.
She practically ran ahead of him out of the library and out of the house. His large hand under her elbow almost lifted her into the barouche so that she felt as fragile and vulnerable as a leaf in the wind. She'd seen him handle Theo in this way, lifting her in and out and on and off things with a brisk lack of ceremony that her sister never seemed to mind. But Emily wouldn't repeat the experience for all the tea in China. She sat back with relief as Stoneridge ordered her driver to move off and her brother-in-law's black countenance retreated.
Stoneridge turned back to the house, running up the steps, his clipped voice giving orders before he'd reached the hall. "Foster, have my curricle brought round again. But not the chestnuts, they've had a long run already."
"Yes, my lord." The butler kept his expression impassive before his employer's tightly reined anger, but like Emily his mind was filled with furious speculation.
Five minutes later Stoneridge was on his way to Dock Street, driving a team of roans, forcing from his mind the dreadful images of what might even now be happening on Dock Street as he drove at breakneck speed through the narrow streets, oblivious of the stares and curses from startled pedestrians as they leaped out of the way of the white-faced man with the livid scar on his forehead.
Neil Gerard stared at Jud O'Flannery's disfigured countenance. His ex-sergeant was grinning, revealing his one black tooth. "Cat got yer tongue, cap'n?" he inquired with mock solicitude.
"I don't know what the devil you're talking about." Neil tried to sound angry and contemptuous, but it came out more as a bluster, his fear slippery beneath the bold front, like ice under snow. He could feel the eyes on his back as Jud's customers drank their ale and regarded the scene at the bar counter with squint-eyed curiosity. His gaze fixed on the tavern keeper's massive fists, curled loosely on the counter. A pelt of dark hair covered the backs thickly and sprouted over the knuckles.
One blow from those fists would put a man under the table with a broken jaw. The grip of those fingers would squeeze the life out of a man in a minute. And one flick of his eyes would bring the group of ruffians to their feet, moving across the tap room toward Neil Gerard.
"Well, I 'as me sources," Jud was saying in a musing tone, but his one green eye was sharp with a glint of sardonic humor. He knew Neil Gerard was scared. The man scared easily. No one knew that better than Sergeant O'Flannery.
"An' like I was sayin', these sources tell me that you've been patronizin' another tavern. Quite 'urt me feelins that did, cap'n, sir." He took a healthy swig of ale from his tankard. "You comes in 'ere, regular like, never takes a drink or says a civil word to an old comrade in arms, an' then I 'ear you goes into the Fisherman's Rest an' drinks and chats somethin' chronic in there. Better class of folk Long Meg 'as? That it, cap'n sir?"
Neil felt sweat break out on his forehead. He wanted to wipe it off, but to do so would draw attention to his fear. How much did Jud know?
"A man's entitled to drink where he pleases," he said, hearing how feeble it sounded. He plunged his hand into his pocket and took out his purse. "Here." He shook out the five golden guineas and turned to leave.
"Jest a minute, cap'n, sir." Jud's voice had hardened.
Reluctantly, Neil turned back. "Well?"
"I wouldn't like t'think you've bin lookin' fer a way to stop this nice little arrangement we 'ave. Now, you wouldn't be doin' anythin' like that, would you, cap'n, sir?"
Suddenly, he leaned over the counter, so close Neil could smell the beer and the reek of decaying teeth on his breath. An arm shot out, grabbing the captain by the fine starched cravat that had taken him a full half hour to tie to his satisfaction.
"You wouldn't be doin' anythin' like that, would you?" Jud repeated in a fine mist of saliva. Neil tried to turn his head away from the menacing stare.
"I don't know what you're talking about," he said again.
Jud nodded his head slowly, his grip tightening on the cravat. "I think p'raps one of me friends could explain it better." He pushed his captive backward with a violent shove, and Neil went reeling into the arms of a grinning henchman, who picked him up as if he were a baby and threw him across the room. Neil crashed into a table. A mug of ale went flying, its contents spilling over his immaculate driving cape and dripping onto his buckskins.
"Eh, careless!" someone bellowed as he struggled to his knees. "Spillin' me drink like that." A man, red-faced with mock indignation, grabbed him by the cravat and hauled him to his feet. Holding him steady, he drove his fist into Gerard's jaw.
Neil saw stars, tasted blood, felt the ultimate humiliation as warm liquid trickled down his leg. Then he was released amid a burst of raucous laughter.
"Be seein' you next week, cap'n, sir," Jud called cheerily after him as he stumbled out the door into the crisp, sunny afternoon. The lad who was holding his horses stared in unabashed curiosity at the gentleman, whose right eye was rapidly swelling, blood trickling down his chin, staining his torn cravat. The reek of beer and urine wafted from him as he cursed the lad, knocking him aside as he stumbled up onto the driving seat of his curricle.
" 'Ere, what about me fee, guv?" the lad cried. "That's me pa in the Black Dog."
Neil threw a vile curse at him, but he had no desire to renew the acquaintance of anyone in the Black Dog. He dug a sixpence from his pocket and hurled it to the ground at the feet of the grinning lad, who scooped it up and dashed off down the street before anyone bigger and stronger decided to relieve him of his earnings.
Neil whipped up his horses, and they plunged forward in the narrow alley. The leader caught a hoof in an uneven cobble and almost went down to his knees. Gerard hauled back on the reins and tried to get a grip on himself. Physical violence terrified him. The simple threat of violence had reduced him to a gibbering wreck as a child and made him the perfect target for the bullies who stalked the halls of Westminster School. How he'd envied Sylvester Gilbraith, who, even as a ten-year-old new boy, had faced the tormentors with fists and tongue and refused to be intimidated. They'd beaten him often, but he'd always bounced back, and finally they'd left him alone. Not so Neil Gerard, who'd suffered hells during those years that he could barely endure remembering.
And it had just happened again. At the hands of a group of dockside ruffians, laughing at him and enjoying his terror even as they'd beaten him. And he'd have to go back next week and face the grinning Jud O'Flannery. Next week and the next week and the next week. An eternity of humiliation stretched ahead, because he could no longer look for hired assassins in this neighborhood.