Percy arrived then, dragging a large crate behind him through the door. “I found this. It might be useful to put anything worth saving in so we can move it to wherever we end up.” He saw her and beamed as he rushed toward her. “Thank god you are all right, Portia, I’ve been worried sick.” He was about to hug her when he spotted Leo and froze, all the color draining instantly from his face as he inclined his head. “Your grace.”
“Mr. Digby.” Never had two words conveyed such malice. If looks could kill, poor Percy would now be as dead as a doornail. For several tense moments, Leo stared at him while they all held their breath. “I’ll wait for you in the carriage, madam.” With that, he spun on his heel and stalked out.
Percy looked absolutely terrified, so she squeezed his hand. “He’s angry but he can be very reasonable and sensible when he isn’t in a temper, so he’ll come around. I am sure of it.” Or at least she hoped he would for Percy’s sake. There was a slim chance of him extending the same to her. “If it is any consolation, the majority ofhis fury is directed at me. He only thinks that he hates you. He now absolutely loathes me with every fiber of his being.”
“But he still made you his duchess,” said Jim with a sympathetic smile. “So maybe his loathing is only temporary.”
“It is more likely that me being his duchess is only temporary.” With Leo out of earshot, there seemed little point in not telling them how precarious her position still was. “Let’s face it, he knows that he has more than enough grounds to have our hasty marriage declared null and void, then who knows what will happen? I could still be charged. Still tried and found guilty.” But as much as her uncertain future scared her, she put a brave face on. “But I daresay they need reformers more in the new world than they do even here, so every cloud.”
“He won’t throw you to the wolves, Portia, nor divorce you.” It was Percy’s turn to squeeze her hand. “Abigail suspects he has strong feelings for you.”
“Oh he does—just all of them are negative.”
“He can’t be all bad if he’s allowed you to come back here,” said William.
“Accompanied by him is what he actually said. He has also made it plain that while I live under his roof, I need to behave in a manner more befitting the Duchess of Debden.”
“And?” He seemed amused. “You do not strike me as the sort of woman who would pay any attention to a hasty vow to obey your husband, especially one who isn’t likely to remain your husband for very long.”
“For now, I fear that I owe it to him to. He has just saved me from a fate worse than death, after all.” Surely that meant that she was morally obligated to retire her pen and behave in a manner more befitting the Duchess of Debden for however long she remained his duchess? An eye for an eye and a sacrifice for a sacrifice?
Even if the sacrifice he expected her to make currently felt like a fate worse than death too.
Chapter
TWENTY-FOUR
“Your grace!” All the color drained from Nolley’s face at the sight of Leo on his doorstep.
“Mr. Nolley.” He used the “Mr.” on purpose because the man wasn’t fit to carry the title constable. He never had been, truth be told, but the events of the last few days had cemented the need to relieve the man of his post with all haste. Not just because of all the egregious things he had done to Portia, although those factored the highest among Leo’s reasons for being here this morning, but because his heavy hands had no place being linked to the law. “Can I come in?”
Nolley looked decidedly shifty and uncomfortable as he shook his head, almost as if he knew this meeting wasn’t going to end well. “I’m pressed for time at the moment, your grace, and need to take some statements from witnesses to the protest before the ringleaders stand trial next week.”
“I have transferred responsibility for that toConstableRichardson.” A reasonable man with a strong civic conscience who had voluntarily served Bath well as an occasional watchman for many years and who, at the very least, seemed to have a good grasp on what was right and what was wrong.
Nolley’s eyes narrowed as he began to put two and two together. “Since when has Richardson been a constable?”
“Since I offered him your job an hour ago.” As there seemed little point in beating around the bush, Leo delivered his final blow for now. “I no longer have any faith in your abilities, Mr. Nolley, and refuse to employ a man who thinks using force on a woman is acceptable.”
Instantly Nolley’s temper exploded. “That liar’s got your knackers in a vise if she’s convinced you of that! I didn’t punch her!” He dared to shake his fists, so a split second later he found himself pushed up against his porch; his short legs fighting for purchase on the ground because Leo had hoisted the little shit upward by his lapels so he could snarl directly in his obnoxious face.
“But you pushed her, didn’t you, Nolley? You enjoyed inflicting bruises on a scared and manacled woman who couldn’t fight back, all to get back at me, didn’t you, you pathetic, bloody coward?” He took great satisfaction at the way the man’s eyes bulged in fear in his reddened face. “So now it’s my turn to repay that favor!”
Nolley winced as if expecting a physical blow, but Leo wanted a more fitting revenge. A more lasting one. He let go of his former constable and wiped his hands as if he had handled something nasty, which he undeniably had. “You are dismissed, Mr. Nolley. Effective immediately.”
“Suits me!” Nolley bellowed at Leo’s retreating back. “I’ll go to work for Lord Corston instead, you pious, sanctimonious, lily-livered, pedanticliberal!” He spat that last word as if it were somehow an insult. “He’ll employ me as a constable.”
Over Leo’s dead body would that ever happen, but Leo didn’t bother turning around because he was all done with Nolley—for now at least.
Once Leo had all the evidence he needed against him, Nolley would get his full just deserts. But for now, this would have to do. “I wish you well prising any wages out of him. It is only us lily-liveredliberals who believe in paying their constables—or providing them with comfortable cottages to live in rent-free.” But he couldn’t resist twisting to deliver his last, killer line. “Be sure to have your corrupt and sadistic arse out of this one precisely one week from today or I shall take great pleasure in tossing you out on it!”
Several hours later, Leo found himself staring at Portia’s little chest on his study floor. He had requested it from the clerk of court on the off chance, convinced all the private papers that seemed to mean so much to her would have been destroyed by the vengeful Nolley just as everything else that she had written had been. But the clerk had miraculously found the battered marquetry box among a mountain of other confiscated items pertaining to the protest that had just been left at the prison.
Obviously, Leo was going to return it to his wife. That went without saying because not only was it the right thing to do, but it was the kind thing to do too. She had lost her independence, her belovedEquitas, and what she had wistfully called her life’s work all in one fell swoop, and he wanted to at least give something back to her. Something precious to her that might banish the stoic sadness that had taken permanent residence in her lovely eyes since he had married her.
But should he take a peek inside first? That was his quandary.
On the one hand, inspecting the contents was obviously a gross invasion of her privacy. Especially when he knew that these were her personal, soul-searching essays to herself. On the other, he was desperate to learn as much about the woman who now bore his name as possible in the hope that it would guide him in what to do about her next. Because currently, he had no bloody idea, and avoiding her like the plague, which had been his strategy for the last few days, wasn’t a long-term solution. He had barely slept a wink. Every single time he closed his eyes, he was either swamped with hurt at all her lies, filled with fury at himself for falling for them, or consumed with guilt at hispart in her downfall. All that was mixed with an enormous dollop of lust, thanks to the wholly unwelcome but indelible memory of how blasted good she had looked in her birthday suit!
