Nicole Jordan - Ecstasy

“So you approve, do you, Grandfather?” she asked, offering him a smile. She couldn’t totally forgive him for repudiating her mother so many years ago, but they had come to terms of sorts during the nearly eight months since her arrival in England.

He took her hand in his own shaky one. “Very much, child. You are exceedingly beautiful.”

Raven did think her appearance pleasing. Her empire gown was of pale lemon lustring, with an ivory net overskirt shot with gold threads. And she wore her mother’s pearls, while her raven hair was gathered high into an elegant coiffure.

Beside the viscount, her dragon of a great-aunt agreed even while sniffing in disapproval. “She is indeed beautiful, Jervis, but you will turn her head with such flattery. And Raven is not a child in the least. She turned twenty months ago.”

As usual, her grandfather ignored his sister’s waspish tone and patted Raven’s hand. “I have never been so proud of you. You will make a grand duchess.”

Raven bit back an instinctive reply. In her grandfather’s opinion-along with the much of the world’s-a woman’s worth was only measured by her husband’s position in society. Yet to his credit, Grandfather only wanted her to be well settled in life.

Despite the strain that had marked their early relationship, Lord Luttrell had welcomed her with a touching eagerness, making her feel like a cherished member of his family. And Raven had found herself immensely glad for the connection. He and Lady Dalrymple were the only blood relations she had left, other than an American half brother whom she could never publicly claim. She’d never even known her real father, the wealthy American shipping magnate who had died some years past.

And she knew the viscount truly mourned his late daughter and regretted his intractability.

“I am sorry your mother is not here to see you,” her grandfather said now in a trembling voice.

Raven felt her own throat constrict. She, too, wished her mother could be here to witness her triumphant union.

“Jervis, if you are finished wallowing in sentimentality,” Aunt Catherine interjected sharply, “we have a ceremony to attend.”

“Yes, of course,” Luttrell grunted with a quelling look at his sister.

After accepting her cloak from the Dalrymple butler, Raven allowed her grandfather to lead her slowly down the entrance steps of her aunt’s residence to where the viscount’s grand, crested carriage stood ready to transport them to the church.

To Raven’s delight, her long-term groom, Michael O’Malley, waited beside the carriage to see her off.

“ ’Tis a grand sight you are, Miss Raven,” the Irishman said in his lilting accent, beaming when she reached him. “And a proud day to be sure.”

With a brilliant smile of her own, Raven stepped aside to embrace the hulking, gray-haired fellow. “Thank you, O’Malley,” she said, her voice husky with emotion.

She kissed his grizzled cheek, ignoring her aunt’s sudden stiffening and her grandfather’s obvious frown of disapproval. For most of her childhood, O’Malley had been more father than servant to her. And he had accompanied her to England from the West Indies when she’d come to face her haughty, unknown relatives. She was immeasurably grateful to him for standing her friend.

Turning then, Raven allowed O’Malley to take her elbow so he could hand her into the elegant barouche. When she heard a sudden commotion, though, she glanced curiously up the street to see a closed carriage barreling toward them, its windows shuttered, its coachman wearing a hooded cape that made him appear phantomlike.

Strangely, the coach slowed as it passed the barouche, then rumbled to a halt while three armed, masked figures leapt out. To Raven’s shock, two of them pointed pistols directly at her, while the third brandished a cudgel.

“Ye’re to come with us,” one said in gruff voice, gesturing at her.

“Who the devil are you?” Lord Luttrell demanded.

When Raven stood frozen in bewilderment, the leader lunged at her and gripped her arm, dragging her toward the coach.

With a fierce growl, O’Malley made to intervene, but the man with the cudgel moved directly into his path, swinging his weapon viciously, preventing her groom from coming to her aid.

For an instant Raven wondered if she were imagining this nightmare, but the pain in her arm was very real as she was hauled toward the open door of the coach.

“What is the meaning of this outrage?” her aunt exclaimed in her iciest voice. “I demand you unhand my niece at once!”

But Raven’s assailant paid no mind to the order. Instead he wrenched her around and snaked a thick arm about her waist from behind, lifting her bodily off her feet.

Gasping in fury, she fought back, struggling to be free of this rough, crude oaf, but her slippered heels made no dent in his beefy shins. When she bent her head in desperation and bit his shoulder through his tweed coat, her defiance earned her a cuff to the temple from his fist, a blow so violent that she saw stars.

Dazed, she glanced back to see the look of horror on her aunt’s face, the fear on her grandfather’s.

Her own fright grew as she realized the direness of her situation: she was being abducted in broad daylight!

Then she saw O’Malley struck down with the cudgel. Raven gave an anguished cry of protest, a cry that was cut short as she was shoved roughly inside the coach and facedown on the floor. She felt her gown rip at the shoulder as the coach door slammed behind her.

Stunned, the breath knocked from her, she scarcely comprehended the shouts from outside the coach as the vehicle lurched forward and began to move off. Groping the swaying seat to brace herself, Raven dizzily scrambled onto the rear-facing leather cushions.

She was not alone.

“You!” she exclaimed, recognizing the black-haired gentleman who sat opposite her. He was the same obsessive brute she’d barely escaped from once before: an unwanted suitor who’d assaulted her after refusing to accept her rejection. When she last saw him, he had been fighting O’Malley, who had come to her rescue.

Sean Lasseter’s savage smile held unmistakable menace, but it was the pistol aimed at her chest that made her heart jump to her throat.

“So you do remember me, Miss Kendrick, after all these months. I am flattered.”

“What do you want?” she demanded breathlessly, eyeing the pistol.

“Simple revenge,” her abductor replied, his own tone silken.

“Revenge? For what?”

Drawing a flask from his coat pocket, he raised it to his lips and drank deeply. She could smell the strong liquor in the close confines of the coach, could see the alcoholic glaze in his eyes.

“Surely you know,” he said, his voice grim.

Suddenly he lifted the butt of the pistol, and Raven flinched, knowing he meant to strike her. Frantically she raised her arms to protect her face from the threat, but he rammed the butt into the side of her skull, and she saw no more.

“Doubtless you have a good reason for summoning me from my fencing match,” Kell Lasseter remarked mildly as he reached the second floor of his gaming house.

His beautiful hostess, Emma Walsh, awaited him at the head of the stairs. “A most urgent reason,” she replied in obvious agitation. “Your brother…”

Kell felt a prick of alarm, his familiar protective feelings suddenly roused. “What’s amiss? Has Sean been hurt?”

“No, not hurt. But he brought a lady here, Kell, and I fear he means her harm. He has a whip, and he has bound her to the bed.”

Kell’s dark eyebrows snapped together, a different kind of alarm coursing through him. His charming rogue of a younger brother could be wild at times, even dangerous when driven to it-yet he’d never known Sean to act with physical violence toward a woman. Still, during these past months Sean’s black moods had come more and more frequently…

“Our reputation.” Emma shuddered in horror. “If he rapes her…”

Emma was as desirous of protecting the club’s renown as he was, Kell thought grimly, but she would doubtless feel sympathy for any vulnerable female because of her own harsh past. Yet his own stomach knotted at her talk of rape.

“You must stop him, Kell. Miss Kendrick is well-known in society, and she has powerful connections.”

At the notorious name, he felt himself stiffen. Miss Raven Kendrick was the darling of the ton, and for a time last summer, she had turned his brother’s life into a living hell-delivering him to the unspeakable brutality of the British navy.

“Where are they?”

“In your bedchamber.”

Kell clenched his jaw, striving not to leap to conclusions. Sean had struggled with his inner demons for years, but since his impressment in the navy, he’d been bitter, brooding, vengeful. Had the torture he’d suffered during his enforced service finally driven him over the edge?

Swiftly Kell strode down the corridor to the bedchamber he normally used when staying overnight at his club. The Golden Fleece was an elegant gaming hell, but the gambling took place on the ground floor below, while this floor held only private rooms.

The door to his bedchamber was locked, he discovered. Kell rapped sharply, uttering one terse word. “Sean.”

When there was no reply, he spun on his heel and made his way to the adjacent study, then crossed to a second door that connected with his bedchamber. Finding this one unlocked, Kell entered and came up short, taking stock.

On the bed, a disheveled woman lay on her side, her bound hands stretched overhead and tied to the headboard. She wasn’t quite naked, but her fine cambric shift was hiked up above her knees, exposing long slender legs, while her ebony hair flowed in wild disarray over her bare shoulders.

Kell felt his heart give an unsteady jolt. So this was Miss Raven Kendrick, the dazzling debutante who commanded the homage of nobles. Their paths had never directly crossed before, probably because he actively shunned her ilk and her elevated social circles-unlike his brother, who’d earnestly aspired to join her elite ranks.

Her eyes were closed, and she didn’t stir, yet she was clearly a damsel in distress.

Kell’s first urgent impulse was to rescue her from her plight, but he fought down his natural instincts-shock, horror, fury that his brother would treat any woman so cruelly. He had to remember who she was. A deadly temptress with a heart of ice. One who lured impressionable young men to their doom simply for sport. She deserved to be punished in some fashion for the misery and suffering she’d caused his brother-although this was unquestionably too harsh a penance.

Kell’s gaze shifted to his brother. Sean sat slumped in a wing chair near the hearth, cradling a whiskey bottle in one hand, a riding whip in the other. Three long scratches scored the left side of his face.

Involuntarily Kell reached up to touch his own cheek and the wicked scar there. But his scar was an old one and no longer painful, unlike the ones his brother bore, both visible and hidden.

Outwardly, though, they were much alike, with jet black hair and athletic builds, although Sean was slighter and not quite as tall, and his eyes were shamrock green, not nearly black like Kell’s.

Sean glanced up now, his green eyes bloodshot, as if he was deep in his cups.

Kell clamped down on his churning emotions, knowing he would need to remain calm in order to deal with this volatile situation.

“Would you care to explain why you’ve barricaded yourself in my bedchamber like this?” he said finally, stepping inside and closing the door.

Sean waved his bottle toward the quiescent beauty on the bed. “Thish is my revenge,” he muttered, slurring his words. “I abducted her. Ruined her noble marriagsh. Her curshed duke won’t have her now.”

“And the whip?” Kell asked.

“Mean to flog her like I was flogged. A whip, not a cat-o’-nine-tails. Won’t hurt as much, morsh the pity.” Sean made a scoffing sound deep in his throat. “Devil is…couldn’t do it shober…Needed courage…” He held up the bottle.

Kell felt a measure of relief that his brother couldn’t cold-bloodedly carry out his planned vengeance but needed to work himself into a drunken stupor. Sean was a charming, reckless rogue with the devil’s own tongue and a quick, hot temper-no doubt a product of his half-Irish blood-but his darker nature was purely the result of his English ordeals.

And in this case, Sean’s bitterness was entirely justified. Last June, the treacherous Miss Kendrick had sent her groom to thrash him for daring to aspire to her hand. Left unconscious on the London streets, Sean had been taken up by an impressment gang and forced to serve in the Royal Navy for four brutal months, an experience that had left livid scars on his back.