Undressed with the Marquess (Lost Lords of London #3) - Christi Caldwell Page 0,113
it in an unexpected display of warmth, one that proved the two were not the heartless ones Temperance . . . or Dare had taken them for.
“Thank you,” she said hoarsely after the duke had limped off.
And it was the first time since the constable had arrived, demanding to see Dare, that Temperance knew it was going to be all right.
All earlier warmth that had been there at the duke and duchess’s exchange vanished.
Dare’s grandmother sailed to her feet. “Do not thank me for looking after our grandson. We have always put him first. When his father failed to do so.” Hate burnt bright within the older woman’s eyes. She knew. She’d known that her son-in-law had sent Dare away.
The duchess headed for the door.
“Oh, and Temperance?” The duchess paused and turned back to face Temperance. “Putting Darius first . . . is something anyone who loved him would do.”
And with that not-at-all-veiled meaning there, the duchess left.
Newgate
London, England
Dare had come full circle.
Though it was unclear. Would full circle mark the moment he climbed the gibbet and made that walk to the hangman’s noose? Or was it here, on the stone-cold Newgate prison floor?
Sitting on the floor with his back to the wall and his face toward the narrow bars, he stared out.
He’d always had miserable timing.
The worst.
That would remain until he drew his last breath.
There had been he and Temperance . . . as young loves . . . sweethearts who had been pulled down differing paths—he, the path of thievery, and she, one of respectability.
And what did I do? I called her out for bloodying her fingers . . . when all the while, she was doing honest work.
Dare knocked his head lightly against the wall.
So many regrets, and he’d added any number more of them this night.
A figure stepped out of the shadows.
Dare’s entire body tensed.
Wylie scraped his wide circle of keys over the metal bars, that clink and clang echoing around the eerily silent gaol. “You know, Grey, you always had terrible timing.”
“I was rather thinking the same damned thing myself,” he muttered. This was certainly the end . . . He’d reached a point where he’d found himself agreeing with the ruthless warden. “You and Bryant, huh?”
Wylie shrugged. “Struck a better deal.”
Struck a better deal.
And with Dare’s mentor.
You always trusted him more than you should . . . He’s helped you nearly get yourself killed . . . He was always about helping himself.
God, what a fool he’d been.
“You would have been wiser, listening to that old sweetheart that used to get you out of here . . .” Wylie lounged a shoulder against the cell. “Whatever happened to that one? Probably married, she did.”
“She did,” Dare muttered. “Me.”
Wylie tossed his head back and laughed until tears filled his eyes. The warden wiped them back. “Well, you would have been wiser trusting her instincts.”
“I’d prefer you’d quit talking so I don’t have to agree with you any more times this night,” Dare said in deadened tones.
The warden glanced down to the opposite end of the hall. “You’ve company.”
Company?
The quiet click of a cane striking the stone floor penetrated through his confusion.
The Duke of Pemberly stopped at the cell.
“Grandfather . . . ?” he whispered, struggling to his feet.
“That man is a lousy one to entrust with your reputation and life.” The duke’s pronouncement proved an accurate echo of Wylie’s earlier opinion.
It is about you making decisions that are poisonous and making a man who is poisonous your partner. It is about you looking after everyone but yourself.
“I . . . know that,” he said. “How . . . ?”
“Did I find out?” His Grace finished for him. “Your wife.” He removed his gloves and stuffed them inside the front of his cloak.
“My . . . wife?” She’d gone to the duke and appealed for Dare’s life.
“Never tell me you’ve forgotten your wife . . . again,” the duke drawled.
Never. He never had. He never would. A man didn’t forget the reason for his heart’s every beat.
The duke stepped nearer Dare’s cell. “Come, Darius. It is time to leave this place.”
Leave.
It was what Dare had feared the moment Connor Steele had found him and presented him with the opportunity to reclaim his rightful place. Leaving the Rookeries. His role here.
He’d failed to let himself see that he could still do the work he wished to—and make the difference that he wanted to—as the Marquess of Milford.