Liz Tyner - Saying I Do To The Scoundrel

‘And to what do I owe the pleasure?’ he asked, finishing the last button and turning. He would have preferred to have on his small clothes, but then he would have preferred to have drunk a lot more and fallen asleep at the tavern.

The drink had finally destroyed him, but not in the way he had expected.

‘Cover yourself,’ the young woman commanded. ‘You heathen.’

‘You can take your hand from your eyes,’ he said. ‘I’ve got my trousers buttoned.’

Eyes, which reminded him of sunlight shining through sparkling glass, took a quick look at him. ‘A shirt?’

‘Oh, let’s save that until after we’ve been properly introduced.’

‘We will never be properly introduced.’

She wouldn’t be in a tavern, or on the darkened streets. And she shouldn’t be in his room. He paid little care to the society folks with their haughty stares. They didn’t interest him at all. Never had—even when he’d lived the other life.

‘Your shirt.’ She waved a finger, pointing at a direction beyond his back, and her eyes appeared to be fixed on his torn window curtain.

He looked around. The peg where he usually put his shirt stood empty. He picked up his waistcoat and slipped an arm into it, then the other. ‘Since you’ve seen me from top to bottom, this will have to do, Love.’ He fastened one button as a kindness.

‘Save your words for the lightskirts,’ Miss Butterfly Bonnet said.

Calling her love had snapped her out of her embarrassment.

‘So you are not of that business,’ he muttered. ‘Pity.’

Her eyes turned to slits. ‘Until I opened the door, I was quite innocent. Now I’m tainted for ever by what I’ve seen.’

He sat on the bed. ‘Think how it is for me. To wake up with a shrieking shrew at the door I can’t for the life of me remember how I’ve wronged.’

‘Oh, I envy you,’ she bit out the words. ‘Would that my life was so pleasant.’

They stared at each other.

‘You might tell me the nature of your visit.’ He examined his mind for a reason for this woman to search him out. ‘I truly don’t know you or know why you’re here.’ He yawned. ‘Come in.’ He waved an arm to indicate the two wooden chairs by the uneven table.

The older woman, peering into the room, gave the girl a push. ‘Quick before someone recognises you.’ Then the older woman pulled the door shut.

The young one’s eyes widened, but she covered her surprise with a tightening of her jaw and squared shoulders.

She took a tiny step inside his room, but she stayed within an arm’s reach of the door.

‘Sit.’ He straightened his shoulders and adopted the look of a coddled peer. ‘I will ring the butler for tea.’ He let his eyes look thoughtful. ‘Oh, goodness, I fear it is his half-day off. We will have to make do with brandy.’

He noticed the overturned glass on the table and looked around for a bottle. He reached down to the edge of the bed and found one still standing with about three swallows left in it—for a small person.

He picked it up, held the bottle in her direction and raised his eyebrows.

Her chin moved, but she didn’t open her mouth.

‘Speak your business quickly,’ he commanded. ‘Your bonnet is giving me a headache.’

He relaxed his arm, still holding the bottle. None of this would have happened if his wife had lived. The thought of her stabbed at his chest, and he wished he didn’t breathe in the blackness with every breath.

Just the touch of Mary’s finger at his cheek had given him more pleasure than he could ever find in a bottle.

He finished the liquid, then flipped the bottle into the corner, enjoying the clunk.

The lady with the overgrown bonnet watched him and her face condemned him. Her nose wrinkled and the corners of her lips turned down.

‘Makes two of us.’ His eyes swept over her.

Her gaze narrowed as she tried to guess his meaning. He enlightened her. ‘I’m not pleased with the sight of you, either, Love.’

The words were true. But, not completely. Something about her stirred his memories. Reminding him of a time when a woman’s beauty could touch him.

She wore a matronly fichu tucked into the bodice. Surely she had a body somewhere underneath, but he couldn’t be certain. He wagered she double-knotted her corset and wouldn’t walk past a mirror unless she had her laces done to her neck.

‘I had heard...’ She paused, seemingly entranced by the torn curtain. ‘I had heard,’ she repeated, rushing the words, ‘you might be a man of a somewhat, perhaps only slightly, disreputable nature.’ When she said disreputable nature, she looked at the floor, then at his eyes. Her hand clasped into a fist. ‘That might have been an error. Your nature is less—’

‘If gambling and drinking and spending my time in a tavern constitutes, then I suppose my nature could be under question,’ he interrupted. Who was this little dash of condemnation, he wondered, to be appearing on his doorstep, discussing his life?

‘You, miss—’ he speared her with his glance ‘—seem to be a woman who frequents places where no decent woman would be found and you appear to be looking for a man of impure habits.’ He paused, narrowing his eyes. ‘Which makes you...’

She stared at him. ‘Determined.’

He couldn’t believe it. She stepped a bit closer, her hand tight at her side. ‘If a bear prowled about me and the only trap I had near was rusty, covered in the stench of ale and might not be able to snap closed fast enough to catch a turtle, I’d use it. If only to sling the weapon at the bear’s head.’

He sniffed his arm. ‘Ale would be better than the smell of me.’

She tensed her body, near snarling the words into the room. ‘Are all men beasts? I had not expected a man such as yourself to have had a father, but I am surprised you have never had a mother either as no one has taught you manners.’

‘Ah, milady,’ he said with a sweeping bow. He gave her his darkest glare. ‘I must retire and you know where you can put your manners. Or lack thereof. Leave your calling card with the butler.’

* * *

Katherine tried to take her mind from the sight she had just seen on the bed. The man had been unclothed.

She bit the inside of her lip. She had stepped into a world of wickedness unlike anything she could have ever expected. And the wicked one on the bed—she had chosen him to save her virtue. She had made an error. An error of magnificent proportions. But she couldn’t think of another choice and she had so little time left.

‘I would like to speak with you as if we are two respectable people,’ Katherine said.

‘That beetle has already left the dung heap,’ he said.

‘When you were born,’ Katherine said, although she wasn’t sure she spoke the entire truth. The rumours said he had fallen from a life of prosperity straight on to the floor of a tavern.

He didn’t look as though he spent his life sotted.

The form he had might take some getting used to. His shape had covered most of the bed and his feet had reached past the end.

He wasn’t overgrown with hair on his body either, until she looked above his shoulders. She couldn’t have described much of him to a magistrate, except for his eyes. They were shadowed into a dark, soulless stare.

His face showed through locks of straight hair, which hung to his shoulders and mixed with a healthy scattering of whiskers.

This would have been a man she wouldn’t have stopped near on the street.

He would have to be harnessed to do her bidding and to save her. But she wasn’t quite sure she shouldn’t slam the door and run back to her home. His room spoke of his desperate circumstances though, so surely he could be hired to do her bidding?