Chapter 1
Grim and unsmiling, he rode down the road slowly, allowing his horse to pick its own way between the well-traveled ruts. Every step he’d traveled, he’d felt it—an invisible noose of responsibility hanging around his neck. He was positively choking from it now, his expression growing more and more somber as he entered the town.
The road winding down to the village was long and zigzagged down the hill, past pasture and field until it reached the village proper. Ballycrainn was much the same as a hundred other Irish villages he’d seen. A gathering of whitewashed houses, a handful of shops and businesses lined the roads. This was maybe a little bigger than the rest, with a crossroads at the center. To the left he saw a church, the right led to a public house. Saints to sinners in the space of several feet. With a drama unfolding in the center.
A woman stood at the side of the road, her blue skirts tugged by the wind. A modest cap upon her head was not enough to contain the startling red of her hair, bright against the porcelain of her skin. She was a small thing, seemingly frail, and most definitely not wishing to go with the man who had her arm.
The gentleman in question was a good twenty years older than her, wisps of hair the same red as the girl’s chasing across his forehead beneath his cap. His face was grizzled, badly in want of a shave, his clothing untidy and patched. He shouted at the girl, mindless of the attention he was drawing or the way she pulled away from him.
Jacob was not the only one interested enough in the drama to stop. A man with a cart stood uneasily to the side, a pair of women with baskets watched from the door of a shop of some kind.
None made a move to help her.
The girl pulled away suddenly from the man, the basket on her arm coming up between them as though to strike at the man, though she drew back at the last minute. “I will not be having you manhandling me, Robert Price. I told you this morning, I willna go to your precious meeting, and I mean it.”
“You will. You will tell them your answer is yes and be done with it!” the man responded with a growl. In a blur, his hand shot out and smacked the woman across the face so hard that the sound ricocheted through the street like a musket shot.
A gasp of horror went up from the crowd of villagers, the women shaking their heads and muttering amongst themselves, while the men clicked their tongues in disapproval. Yet not a single soul made a motion to intercede as a livid handprint began to emerge against the pale of her cheek.
Jacob’s jaw tightened as he swung down from his horse and stepped forward where no one else would. “I think the lady has made her position rather clear, sir. I would thank you to unhand her and go on your way.”
The man answered without taking his eyes from the girl. “And I would thank you to mind your own bloody business,” he shot back, his voice thick. “How I handle me daughter is of no concern of yours, fancy Lord or no.”
“Daughter or not, to strike a woman on a public street is an act of effrontery thatshould—” he emphasized this word, with a contemptuous look at the bystanders who shuffled awkwardly under his gaze, “—should outrage even the most hardhearted of men. The fact that there seems to be none willing to stand up to you tells me you are a known bully, and a disgrace to the village.”
“Eff-front-ery!” the man mocked him. “His Lordship speaks awfully high-blown for a man with no business here.”
“I rather think it is my business,” Jacob said quietly. “Given that I am the new Duke of Woodworth. The village and those within it are my responsibility, one you will find that I take very seriously.”
He stepped forward, the horse’s reins loosely twisted about his wrist. “Though I will have you know that even were I not the Duke of this district, I would take offense at your actions, for I find them despicable. A man who strikes a woman is not a man at all, but a useless cur.”
At this, the stranger’s eyes narrowed. He stepped forward, his hand moving to his belt where it was plain to see he wore a sheathed knife. The girl shrieked and darted forward, placing one hand upon her father’s arm, the other outstretched against Jacob’s approach.
“I beg of you, to leave this matter here. What my father does is of no business of yours. He has hardly hurt me. The slap stung only a moment and was well-deserved for I had defied him most publically. It is I who owe him an apology, and you also, Your Grace, for causing such a stir.”
A muscle twitched in Jacob’s jaw as she spoke, for he could still clearly see the handprint upon her face. “A lady does not apologize for being beaten.”
“I am not a lady, Your Grace. Only a simple girl who does not always think. I would thank you to be on your way, and consider this matter solved. I am sure they are expecting you at the manor. What goes on in this village is very little of your concern. Your title and your fine blue coat notwithstanding, you have no say here. Leave your interfering to your own lands, and leave us to manage ours.”
He studied her up-tilted face, seeing in the sunlight the faint scattered freckles across her nose, the eyes of amber that flashed fire and held no small amount of scorn. She had a sharp tongue for such a frail form, and he found himself admiring her for that, even if she was decidedly wrong.
“On the contrary, I have found that my fine blue coat,” he paused to spread his arms as though examining his uniform, with special attention to the epaulettes that decorated his shoulders, “has given me quite a lot of say wherever I go. And a title holds quite a bit of weight when it comes to local matters.”
“Faugh! You will find differently,Your Grace,” the man sneered from behind the girl, turning away from the conversation in disgust, looking for all the world like the coward he was, slinking toward the public house. “I have no time for the likes of you.” He disappeared through the door, the girl hesitating a moment on the threshold before hurrying after.
Jacob stood there, stunned by the flagrant disrespect as much as by the girl’s own defense of the situation. To have both father and daughter walk away from him went well beyond a slight. Coupled with the words, it might well have been a challenge.
But Jacob had not risen to the rank of Captain by being a fool. The crowd around him was waiting on his response, and there were a good many spoiling for a fight, if the looks on their faces was any indicator. He was a lone man who had chosen to ride without retinue—foolishly, perhaps. But he had wanted the time alone, to prepare himself for what he would have to do next.
He regretted that now, realizing that he truly was little more than a man standing alone in a growing mob looking for an excuse at trouble. Title would not matter in a riot, nor would a uniform, fine or otherwise.
“I will remember this,” he said to the crowd, his voice quiet and deadly calm as he took the reins of his horse from the boy, taking the time to give him a coin for his trouble. “You will find I am not a harsh man. But I am fair. And I will not tolerate bullies.”
With that he mounted and followed the road out of the town, glad that he remembered this route at least, for it would have spoiled the exit to have had to ask for directions. Not that he would have trusted that anyone would have sent him on the right path, had he inquired.
This was not the welcome home he had expected.
The stallion snorted and plunged under him.Miles of hard riding behind us and the horse still has spirit enough to dislike the way the wind tears at clothing drying on a line next to a house.Jacob shook his head and reined in the animal, growing weary of the constant battle of wills that man and horse had indulged in for the past two weeks.
