“Have I cast a spell over you, do you mean? That would be nice, but I don’t think so. Are you hungry? Because I’m starving.”
She reached for the basket, hiding her blush at his compliment. At least she’d take it as a compliment.
He helped her, extracting a dark bottle of wine and uncorking it as she laid out plates and utensils, along with a container of cold chicken and a crusty loaf, a pot of butter and some thinly sliced cucumbers. She loathed cucumbers. Ah, but the grapes, fat and purple, looked perfectly scrumptious.
She broke off one and motioned for Coop to open his mouth so she could have a clear target.
“Very good,” she said when he caught it between his teeth before it disappeared into his mouth. “Now, while I deal with this chicken, tell me about the unfortunate Geoffrey Quinton and his broken arm.”
“Yes, my queen.” He retrieved a pair of wineglasses and poured a quantity into each one. Her portion was rather miserly, but that probably was sensible.
He began by explaining that Quinton was not anyone’s bosom chum. He was an earl’s son, yes, but a sadly disappointed second son—his older brother having already produced four male progeny with his fertile wife. He possessed no title, no prospects, little allowance and a predilection to breaking noses as often as most people broke bread. He’d avoided fighting in the late war, something that Coop apparently saw as a large black mark against the man, and was whispered to have rented out his fists. He clung to the fringes of Society, but only because of his father’s title.
“But, at the heart of it, Geoff is a coward,” he told Dany as she settled in with a chicken leg, ignoring the utensils in order to grasp it in both hands. “I’ve never known him to confront anyone remotely larger or stronger than himself. Which brings us to the man’s predicament. Steady yourself, Dany, because you won’t like this.”
“He beat someone to death? He’s attempted to slaughter his brother and nephews? What? Tell me.”
“He was instructed to kill me.”
Dany paused with the chicken leg halfway to her mouth. “Kill you? How?”
“Messily, as a matter of fact. With his fists. He has fists like small hams, by the way,” Coop told her, looking at her overtop the brim of his wineglass. “The demand for blackmail would go away once I was dead, while punishment for not complying would mean his own death. He was given three days to complete his ‘mission.’ According to Darby, the man was in a high state of agitation, and seemed nearly overjoyed to be able to share his dilemma with him.”
Dany’s mind was whirling. “So Darby broke the man’s arm, to put him...what? Out of the game?”
“He told Geoff to consider it a favor, yes. And said he’d return to break the other one if we so much as sniffed one of his cohorts following me. Geoff was ordering his man to pack him up for a visit to his father the earl even as Darby was leaving. Yes, Darby had also suggested that he do so.”
“I knew the viscount could be dangerous. He’s too silly not to be.” Dany put down the chicken leg, her appetite gone and her hands noticeably shaking. Sucking lightly at each faintly greasy fingertip, she spoke as she thought. “He...but would he have done it? Killed you, I mean. In the next three days? Oh, God, Coop. If we hadn’t...if you and I had never met, if we hadn’t found out about Mrs. Yothers...if we—what do you mean, three days? And who are these cohorts?”
Coop drained his glass. “I was waiting for you to pick up on that, although I admit to being distracted, watching you at the moment.”
Dany spoke around her middle finger, which she was just then lightly sucking on, using the tip of her tongue to, she hoped, discreetly coax a bit of chicken out from under her fingernail. “Why are you looking at me like that? I don’t understand.”
“Good. Now, to get back to what we know. Geoff had been approached over a month ago, for blackmail, to avoid having the world know he supplements his allowance robbing coaches with his small gang of undoubtedly dangerous hired cohorts. Ferdie found out about that—how I don’t know, save to say he’s been planning his revenge on us for a long time. The demand to rid the world of me arrived by note just this morning, in fact, only an hour ahead of Darby. Apparently Geoff’s problem didn’t seem to affect his appetite.”
“This morning. Because he—Ferdie—knows we’re onto him. We truly have backed him into a corner, haven’t we? And ourselves, I suppose.”
“We have. Third chapbook or not, Ferdie must believe it won’t be published in time to save him from me.”
“Because you would go straight at him, chapbook be damned,” Dany said, not without pride.
“Miss Foster, such language!” He poured them each more wine. “Luckily, our friend Ferdie isn’t aware that we’ve yet to come up with a plan to best him, to get your sister’s letters back, to stop the publication of the chapbook.”
“We were working on it,” she told him, patting his hand. “We would have come up with something soon. We will, won’t we?”
“There’s no more time for finesse, I’m afraid. I’ll have to directly confront him, find out what he really knows about...about Quatre Bras.”
Dany withdrew her hand. She couldn’t let him know how that prospect terrified her. Besides, she had something else on her mind. “Probably more than I know, which is nothing. Do you know something, my lord Townsend? I believe I’m rather more angry with you than I’m frightened for what Ferdie is planning. What do you intend to do about that?”
“At the moment? Nothing.”
“Nothing? How—how can you say that?”
“Dany, it’s not my secret to tell, only mine to keep. Besides, Ferdie may be bluffing. He certainly didn’t have the thing correct in the chapbooks, thank God.”
“The signet ring.” She nodded her understanding. “And not the woman? I know what you said, but I feel compelled to ask again.”
“I had rather thought you would. I’ve been putting some thought to that. He seems bent on condemning me as a rotter with women, which is a far cry from the truth of the matter. The more I consider the thing, the more I really think he’s been bluffing about knowing something havey-cavey about Quatre Bras, and just made a lucky guess on that end, probably so that I’m disgraced in the eyes of the Crown that, remember, showered me with a title and estate. Not that I wouldn’t be destroyed, in either case, not to mention imagining my head on the block if he did somehow know the entire truth.” He stood up, and held out his hands to assist her to her feet. “Come on, we’ll take a walk. This might be easier if you’re not looking directly at me.”
Dany quickly complied. She was getting what she wanted. Now to see if she might have been better off not knowing. “Do you want me to put my bonnet on again, to act as blinders?”
He slipped an arm around her waist, and she returned the favor. “No, you’re short enough. As long as you don’t raise your head and skewer me with those resolve-melting eyes of yours,” he joked, planting a kiss on her hair.
She couldn’t be bothered with feeling happy about his clear admiration of her eyes. “Just tell me one thing before you begin. Have you told Darby and Rigby the truth? Anyone?”
“I’ve been lying, hopefully convincingly, to anyone who asks, mixing fact with a bit of fiction. I don’t think I’ve given the same answer twice, so that I’m even confused from time to time as to which lie I told last. To know the whole truth would put them in danger. I also feel the truth doesn’t show me in the best of lights, I’m afraid. Are you sure you still want to know?”
“I’m not going to have anyone drive me around Mayfair, shouting out the truth to anyone, so yes, I think I’ll be safe enough,