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.You are wrong about me, I swear it.”Edmund responded with ruthless kisses, plundering her senses with the determination of a marauding pirate intent only on gaining the abject surrender of his victim.Trapped beneath him, her skirts a tumbled sea of delicate blue silk, she looked up into his savagely set features.She knew at once that she was powerless to stop him.He was so lost in his fury and despair that he was likely not even aware of her puny struggles.When sanity returned, he would be horrified by his own actions.But by then it would be too late for both of them.Desperate to save herself and Edmund as well, she placed her dainty hands against his broad shoulders in a vain attempt to check his rash assault.Caroline paused and put down her pen.She was not entirely satisfied.It was certainly a very exciting scene but Edmund Drake seemed to be out of control.That did not fit his character.The muted clang of the door knocker sounded just as she made to pick up her pen for another attempt.Emma and Milly were home early.Evidently the play they had attended that evening had failed to live up to expectations.They must have left during the intermission.Mrs.Plummer was in bed upstairs, having taken her usual sleeping tonic: a mix of laudanum and gin.The combination was guaranteed to ensure that she slept like the dead until morning.Caroline listened closely and then got to her feet when she did not hear the scrape of iron in the lock.Perhaps her aunts had neglected to take their keys.She crossed the carpet and went along the corridor to the front hall.There she paused to peer through the small panes of beveled glass that framed the door.Shock snapped through her when she saw Adam.He seemed to be leaning rather heavily against the jamb.Hastily she unlocked the door and yanked it open.“What are you doing here at this hour?”“It is a long story.” He braced one hand against the doorjamb and looked at her with a veiled expression that did nothing to conceal his prowling tension.She was suddenly very conscious of the fact that she was garbed only in a dressing gown and slippers.“Something is wrong,” she said, trying to read his hard face.“What is it?”“May I come in?”“Yes, of course.” She stepped back to allow him into the hall.He shoved himself away from the doorjamb.When he walked through the opening, she saw that he was not moving with his customary masculine ease.“Are you all right?” she asked.She noticed the beginnings of a dark bruise under his right eye and answered her own question before he could speak.“No, I can see that you are not.You have been hurt.”“I could do with a glass of your aunts’ sherry,” he admitted, tossing his hat onto the hall table.“Make that two glasses.”He winced when he started to peel off his overcoat.“Let me help you.” She reached up to ease the garment off his shoulders.“Please tell me what happened.”“Could I have the sherry first?”She led him back along the hall to the study, sat him down in a reading chair and poured out a large measure of sherry.He took a long, grateful swallow and lowered the glass with a sound that was somewhere between a sigh and a groan.“It has occurred to me this evening that I am not as young as I used to be,” he said.“No wonder everyone is pressing me to get married.”“You are making me very anxious, Adam.Kindly tell me what has happened.”He leaned his head against the back of the chair and closed his eyes.“A message was delivered to me a short time ago by two gentlemen of the criminal class.It was made clear that if I did not cease my inquiries into the matter of the fraudulent investments and, presumably, the murders, the diary would be turned over to one of the more flamboyant newspapers.”Horrified, she leaned down and gently touched the incipient bruise.“You could have been killed.”He opened his eyes.She saw the predator in him and shivered.“As it happens, I wasn’t,” he said.She had never seen him in this strange, unpredictable mood.Whatever had occurred tonight, it had been dangerous and violent, she thought.“I noticed that you favored your ribs when you removed your coat,” she said, trying to maintain an air of Florence Nightingale calm.“Do you think you have broken any bones?”“No.” He touched his side somewhat tentatively and then shook his head with more certainty.“Nothing is broken.Just a few bruises.”“Wait right here.” She hurried toward the door.“I will fetch a clean cloth and some of the salve that Aunt Emma uses for bruises.”He frowned.“There is no need—”She ignored him and went down the hall to the kitchen to find the things she needed.When she returned a few minutes later with the cloth and salve, she discovered that he was no longer seated in the chair where she had left him.Instead, he was standing behind her desk, reading the scene she had been working on when he had arrived.She noticed that he had helped himself to another glass of sherry.“What the devil is going on here?” Adam looked up, scowling.“Drake is attacking Miss Lydia?”“There has been a dreadful misunderstanding,” she explained, opening the jar that contained salve.“Edmund Drake believes that Miss Lydia has lied to him.In his anguish and rage he has lost control of his passions.”“Only a brute or a madman is allowed that excuse,” Adam said flatly.He swallowed more sherry.She paused in the act of applying the salve to the cloth.“You are right.I knew there was something wrong with that scene.I shall have to come up with some other reason to explain his behavior.”“Why? I thought he was the villain of the piece.Villains are brutes and madmen, are they not?”“Never mind.” She cut off a section of the salve-soaked cloth and pressed it gently to his bruised cheek.“Hold this while I prepare another bandage for your ribs.”Absently he held the cloth in place.“Where are Emma and Milly?”“At the theater.Mrs.Plummer is here but she is asleep upstairs.” She soaked another section of cloth in the tonic.“This is for your ribs.Stand still while I remove your shirt.”He sucked in his breath when she gently tugged off his shirt, but he said nothing.It was only the second time she had seen him without a shirt.The sight of his bare chest lightly covered in crisp, curling hair momentarily diverted her attention.He was her lover, she thought.She had a right to see him like this.Pulling her scattered senses together with an effort of will, she wrapped the long strip of damp cloth around his ribs.Adam winced and swallowed the rest of the sherry.“Did I hurt you?” she asked anxiously.“No.The salve is cold, that’s all.”“That is part of the benefit.” She tied the ends of the strip very carefully.“Cold helps restrain the bruising.”He looked down, watching her hands as she worked.“I trust that your aunt does not use arnica in her salve?”“No.She says that although it is very good for bruising, it is simply too dangerous to use.If it enters the body through a cut or an open wound, the effect is quite poisonous.Adam, these men who attacked you—do you think by any chance they were involved in the murders?”“I’m almost certain they were not.They claimed that they were hired by our old acquaintance, the man of business who sports too many whiskers and walks with a limp
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