Lord Lucifer Read online

  “I did,” he said firmly. “I had to flee. And you…” He swallowed and ducked his head.

  “I was married.”

  He forced himself to meet her gaze and say the one thing he’d been waiting to voice for twelve long years. “I’m sorry, Diana. I failed you.”

  Her expression softened, and her voice came out with a resigned note. “It is done, Lucas. We were both fools to think it possible.”

  He couldn’t disagree. Indeed, he looked back and wondered at his own idiocy. He’d believed that love would make it possible. Only a fool believed that love was enough. “I regret so much about that night.”

  She snorted. “Might as well regret the rain. Only children believe that prayers will change the weather.” She pushed to her feet. “Nevertheless, I thank you. It is good to see you again, Lucas.” She extended her hand for his kiss. “Next time you visit, I shall greet you in the front parlor. A man of your station should not be down here among the servants.”

  His station? It was below hers. He had yet to inherit his title, and she was already Lady Dunnamore. In fact, at the moment, he was presumed dead, so he had no station at all. He meant to ignore her outstretched hand. Whether she knew it or not, he wasn’t going anywhere. But he couldn’t resist touching her again, even in so small a way.

  He took her hand, but instead of lifting it to his lips, he held her fast in his good hand while his bad one stroked across her skin. He felt her delicate bones and gloried in the warmth of her fingers. He felt her soft skin and wished for the millionth time that things had been different for them both.

  And he had the pleasure of seeing her flustered, as if she were a girl of sixteen again, touched so innocently by her beau. Her cheeks heated, and she tried to tug her hand free. He didn’t release it, and she wouldn’t be so unseemly as to tussle with him.

  “Lucas—” she said in a low undertone. “Release me!”

  He didn’t. “Geoffrey will come back. Surely you see that. He is deep in debt, and his creditors are not kind men.”

  “How do you know this?”

  “I have been working at a place where such things are easily known.” He saw her eyes widen again and rushed to reassure her. “It’s not a brothel,” he said, though, in truth, there were girls, and what they did abovestairs was exactly what one would guess. “I work in a gambling den. That’s where Gus is from as well as a few others. They’re trustworthy and will protect you well.”

  She shook her head. “I am in no danger. There is nothing Geoffrey can do to force my hand. Once he realizes that, he will mend his ways. He will have no choice.”

  She was so innocent and had no understanding of what a man would do when his back was against a wall. And he had no wish to disillusion her. Especially since he had no need to.

  “You may be right,” he said pleasantly. “But I have promised Elliott to protect you, and so I shall.”

  “But—”

  “I will keep one promise to your family, Diana. Do not think to stop me.”

  He let her see he would not be moved on this. He held his ground, he looked her in the eyes, and he kept her hand trapped between his larger palms. Once she saw that he would not bend, she would give in gracefully. Such was the natural order of things.

  That’s what he believed until she abruptly whipped her hand from his, then looked past his shoulder. “Simpson, please see to Mr. Lucifer’s departure. Egeus will go as well.”

  “What! Diana, don’t be ridiculous—” he began but stopped at her cold, hard stare.

  Meanwhile, the butler stepped into the room, his expression anxious. He was older, thinner, and clearly no match for Lucas, but that wasn’t the point. He could no more fight this man than he would his own grandfather.

  “This is Simpson,” Diana said before Lucas could do more than assess his opponent. “He has a wife, three children, and a grandchild soon to arrive. I depend on him in countless ways, and it would grieve me to no end to lose him even for so much as an hour to an injury. And that is nothing compared to how his wife and pregnant daughter would fare should he be laid low.”

  Simpson dipped his chin slightly. “My lady is too kind.”

  She was being nothing of the sort. She was using Lucas’s tender feelings against him. Telling him in clear terms that should he harm Simpson in any way, he would be harming her. And that was something he would not do.

  “I would never dream of hurting Mr. Simpson,” he said. “I am here to help him coordinate some very large footmen who will see that nothing untoward happens to my lady. And that is something that your brother, your husband, myself, and Mr. Simpson all feel is of value. Is that not true, Simpson?”

  The butler blushed a little as he turned rheumy eyes to Diana. “I do find that—at my age—having a few extra strong footmen about makes my tasks easier. And you did just yesterday suggest that I should take a bit more rest when I can.”

  Excellent. That put the butler firmly in his camp. Now Diana would give in gracefully.

  “Mr. Simpson,” she snapped. “We can handle things quite well—”

  “But as you said,” Simpson interrupted, “I should rest more. And I fear your brother would take insult if we refused his generous aid.”

  Diana stared at her butler for a long moment. When she spoke, it was quietly and with a queen’s command. “I am the mistress here, am I not?”

  “Indubitably,” Simpson answered.

  “I control who is allowed in my house and who is not.”

  It wasn’t phrased as a question, but Simpson answered, nonetheless. “Of course, my lady.”

  “Then I say—”

  Lucas spoke up before she could make a declaration she would regret. “How many bruises did Mr. Geoffrey Hough leave on your skin?”

  Diana’s head snapped up, and she spoke low and angry. “You go too far.”

  He hadn’t gone far enough. “What has he threatened to do to you? Does he stop at a simple beating? Or does he insinuate far worse?”

  He saw a flash of fear in her eyes, but she quickly covered it. That told him all he needed to know about the vile things her stepson had said to her. He let the moment hang not so he could draw breath but to control the surge of rage boiling through his body.

  “Empty threats,” she said. “He would not dare carry them out.”

  None of that was true. Geoffrey would indeed carry out his threats, and her very pale skin told him she suspected she was being naïve. Which meant he had to force her to admit her vulnerability, not only for her own sake but for everyone else’s.

  “If something were to happen to you,” he asked, “what would become of the servants here? Of your husband? Will your stepson treat them well? Or will he corner the maids in the library? He has certainly done depraved things at the Lyon’s Den. How will you keep Simpson safe from an empty bottle thrown at his head? Geoffrey put a three-inch gash in Egeus’s forehead seven months ago at the Den. That is why Egeus was the first to volunteer for his duties here.” He straightened to his full height. “Refuse my aid if you must, but who will protect your servants? Pride is not reserved just for feckless heirs. I understand that even a mistress of her own home can suffer from the same affliction.”

  She stiffened at the insult. “It is not pride that makes me want you gone.”

  He arched his brows in challenge. “No? Then why?”

  Her next words cut deeper than anything else she could have said. “Because I do not know you, sir. And I am not accustomed to allowing men I do not know into my home, no matter what promises they or my brother make.”

  That hurt. Never—not even when they were teenagers—had she spoken to anyone with that imperious tone. It clogged his throat with surprising pain, but he still got his words out.

  “You do know me,” he said.

  She sucked in a breath. “No—”

  “You know that I failed you once, Diana. Which is why I will not fail you again. I swear it.”

  She shook her head, and her eyes shone
brightly. “I put no faith in the promises of men.”

  Simpson straightened in shock. “My lady!”

  “Diana, you are being illogical—”

  “Enough!” she snapped as she slashed her hand through the air. He watched her gather her dignity in the way she straightened her spine and lifted her chin. She looked at Simpson first, and his cheeks burned red at her hard regard.

  “My lady—” he began, pain in his tone.

  “You want him here?” she asked.

  He swallowed and nodded. “I think it best.”

  She did not look at Lucas. “Then you will be sure that I never cross paths with him inside this house. Fill my home to the rafters with his large men, but I will not set eyes on Mr. Lucifer again.” She coated his name with disdain. “Do I make myself clear?”

  “Yes, my lady.”

  Then she swept between them, her skirts nearly trapping his ankles as she moved through, only to release him with the force of a whip letting go. She had every right to hate him. Twelve years ago, he had failed her. But in all his daydreams of how they might meet again, never had he expected this. That the very sight of him would fill her with fury.

  Except it hadn’t at first. Her eyes had softened and… And she had tried to boot him from her home. And while he was thinking about that, Simpson blew out a slow breath.

  “It shouldn’t be too difficult to keep you two apart. If your men—”

  “I’m afraid I’m about to disappoint her ladyship again.”

  “What?”

  “I have no intention of staying apart from her.” He hadn’t even realized he meant the words until he’d spoken them. So much had changed for them both in twelve years. And yet, the drive to be by her side hadn’t lessened one jot. He’d suppressed it for twelve long years, but now, after seeing her again, he could not abandon her again. Not even if she brought in the royal guard to throw him into the street.

  “I have promised to protect her, Simpson. That means I will be at her side every minute of every day until that blighter is gone from England.”

  Simpson was quiet for a long moment, then he pursed his lips. “She won’t like that, my lord. And though she might not look like much, she can fight in unexpected ways.”

  In that respect, they were well and truly matched.

  Chapter Four

  Damn, damn, damn! The words sounded in Diana’s thoughts with every step she took away from her downstairs desk. Twelve years—twelve years!—she had worked night and day to gain respect from the people around her. She’d been a child when she’d taken over the reins of the household, and the staff had run roughshod over her. Her husband had been oblivious to the sleights handed her by everyone from the lowest maid and up through every single one of Oscar’s older and crueler children.

  She hadn’t known how to manage anything, but by God, she’d learned. It had been the mother of her dearest school friend who had taught her that respect came from two things: money and a cool head. She had to gain control of the household finances and wield that money with calm, level-headed authority. No histrionics, no whining. Simple, implacable rules.

  It sounded so easy, but learning to do it had been the most exacting lesson of her life. Her mother had taught her to wheedle and simper her way into what she wanted. But that only worked on society men. She’d stood firm against her husband when he complained that she’d upset the house by sacking the insolent housekeeper. She’d used the very same words with him that she had a few moments ago. “I am the mistress, am I not?” and “I control who comes and goes in my own household, do I not?”

  Since she had not simpered or been tearful, he had bowed to her logic. He’d had no excuse to send her to her room for being too emotional. And in such a way, she’d gained control of her staff. They were obedient to her wishes, or they were fired, whether they were new hires or lifelong retainers pensioned off without a tear of regret.

  That had been the first step, and it had taken two years for her to root out those servants who gave their allegiance to her stepdaughter Penelope, Lady Beddoe. The woman was a vicious shrew with nothing better to do than to make sure Diana felt small as all her plans turned to ash.

  It had taken several more years of strict, unemotional management before her husband sought her advice on how to handle his increasingly wild heir, Geoffrey. Even then, he’d asked her advice out of desperation. If he’d listened to her then, she wouldn’t be in her current situation, but—ironically—her husband had been too tenderhearted in his dealings with Geoffrey to ever get him under control. Then just last year, her coup de grace.

  With Oscar’s health failing and Geoffrey’s debts becoming an embarrassment, Oscar had allowed her to write his letters for him, most specifically his instructions to his man of affairs. And if either man questioned her directives, she had a well-reasoned answer that forced them to bow to her dictates. The most important one had been that Geoffrey’s allowance flowed at her husband’s command. And she, of course, managed what he commanded because she was the one who wrote the letters.

  After twelve years of thwarting her at every turn, she had indeed become exactly what Oscar’s children feared: a managing woman. And she was very good at it.

  Until today. Until Lucas Crosse, the future Earl of Wolvesmead, had stepped into her husband’s sickroom and brought back feelings long since buried.

  Damn him!

  He was the one man who had ever tempted her to folly, the one man who had made her good sense scatter. And then he had failed her. Not only failed to marry her but failed to even stand by her side when she was most alone. A young bride of seventeen married to a man three times her age. She needed a friend, and he had been nowhere to be found. She’d shoved him out of her thoughts until today when he’d marched in with a cocky smile and a scar to make him dashing. She wasn’t a girl to have her head turned by a handsome man, and she certainly had the experience to know that he could not swoop in and save her from anything.

  And yet how her heart had twisted when she realized his identity. How she’d longed to collapse into his arms. Ridiculous! She’d spent the last twelve years refusing to collapse for any reason at all.

  It infuriated her because he clouded her thinking. All she could think about was to get rid of him, to keep him away from her because he upset everything about her life. He upset her very calm, implacable will, and that was a sin she could not afford.

  It was his fault, and she damned him for it even as she reached for the chair of her dressing table with an unsteady hand. She stared at her reflection in the mirror. She had no thoughts except for a silent wrench inside her. It hurt to breathe, so she barely inhaled. And she felt so alone sitting in her bedroom. Through the connecting door, she heard her elderly husband cough. It was a dry sound, ineffective and weak. She would have to kiss him on his mouth soon. She would have to stroke his fine wisps of hair and pretend that she adored him.

  Part of her did love him. They had been together twelve years, and he had been kind at times, certainly affectionate, and never brutal. She had found peace in that. In truth, it had been many years since she screamed into a pillow that she hated him, hated his children, and hated everything about her existence.

  Was that because she had accepted her fate? Or gotten too tired to scream?

  A knock sounded at her bedroom door. She blinked, wondering how long she had been sitting here.

  “Enter,” she said, but the word had no sound. She had to clear her throat and then repeat the word. “Enter.”

  “Simpson said I could come up,” her half-sister, Lilah, said. “I hope I’m not intruding.”

  “Of course not,” Diana said, and she meant it.

  Her sister was a bastard only by a quirk of fate. In all other respects, she was the best of them. Her mother was irresponsible, her brother was exceptional, but only in the last few years. It helped that he met and married a wonderful woman named Amber. Gwen cared nothing for life except her books, but Lilah was kind and generous. Her
smile had a flaw in one tooth that had come in twisted and pushed slightly forward. It gave an uneven look to her mouth that made her all the more endearing. Her hair was a golden blonde with soft curls ruthlessly suppressed. And when she spoke, she used tones so gentle that, at times, Diana had found her annoyingly deferential. Today, she found her sister to be the only person she could tolerate. “I need someone to take me out of my melancholy.”

  Lilah shut the door behind her. “You don’t look melancholy as much as…” Her voice trailed off. It was a trick she often used as she let others fill in the blank, and it worked very well on Diana sometimes.

  “It is merely melancholy,” she said. Then she glanced at the connecting door. “Oscar is better today, but there is no escaping the inevitable.”

  Lilah nodded as she sat down on the edge of Diana’s bed. “Your feelings are natural. Is there anything I can do to help?”

  And there was the question Lilah always asked—if she could help. She twisted in her seat and felt a wave of gratitude for her youngest sister. “There is nothing to do except tell me why you are here.”

  Her sister shrugged. “Mama wants to know if Amber is pregnant. She thinks you know.”

  “Me? Why would I know?”

  Lilah chuckled. “Because I have no idea and certainly won’t ask.”

  “You can tell Mama that the two are blissfully happy together. And given the way they look at one another, I imagine she will become a grandmother soon enough.”

  “That’s almost exactly what I said, but Mama is—”

  “Impatient? Demanding? Tired of meddling in Gwen’s life?”

  “All of that and more,” Lilah responded. “But she also loves us deeply. She doesn’t want Amber and Elliott to make babies too soon. She wants them to enjoy their time now before things get more complicated later.” She raised her hands in defeat. “She wants to suggest that you speak to Amber. She believes you know about ways of prevention.”

  Prevention? She did know, but she would never presume to suggest to a married couple what might be good or bad for their marriage. “That is something Elliott and Amber must decide for themselves.” She shook her head. “And Mama must accept that her children can decide these things without her interference.” Then she paused as she looked at her sister. Lilah would never presume to say something so blunt to Mama. She was the epitome of self-effacing kindness. “I’ll speak with her,” Diana finally said.