Had he known who she was? Been waiting for her?
Those questions and thoughts flew through her head in the two seconds it took for Sheridan to launch himself toward Scofield. And for Scofield to knock him from the air with a kick she’d not have thought possible, much less ever expect to see performed. She staggered back a step, out of range of flying limbs. She might have shouted—probably something inane like “Stop!”—but her voice was lost to the grunts and moans.
Sheridan recovered quickly and leapt to his feet again, fists raised. His boxer’s stance was confident enough that she was able to catch a breath and remember that he and Telford had been chatting the other evening about their regular matches at some club or another in London.
But Scofield settled into a very different stance. Knees bent at a different angle, arms held out at shoulder height instead of raised to protect his face. He was no boxer. She just didn’t know what he was.
“I have no argument with you, Lord Sheridan,” he said, voice as smooth as it had been while he was flirting with her. “You’ve always got on just fine with my father, haven’t you? No need for that to end here, between us. We’re after the same things.”
Sheridan glanced her way, but only for a quarter of a second. Gauging her reaction? “Hardly. I don’t condone violence in my searches. You encouraged it. It’s because of you and Lorne that the lad is dead.” He lunged, swung.
Scofield ducked the punch. “You’re the one who hired Lorne. Can’t blame me for pooling our resources, can you?”
“I certainly can when it leads to the sort of underhanded dealing you’ve cooked up! Who’s the American you’ve brought in?” He took another swing.
This time Scofield blocked it with a quick jab of his arm. Pushed, knocking Sheridan off balance. Shoved his palm into the marquess’s nose with a sickening crack. “Ah, I see. You’re just upset that you’ve some competition for the artifacts. Afraid of a little bidding war, my lord?”
Blood was streaming from Sheridan’s nose, which only seemed to infuriate him. “You—” He lunged again.
Scofield’s legs flew up, out, around. How on earth did he move like that? She should probably do something. Try to throw herself onto him, tackle him to the ground. But she couldn’t anticipate where he’d be in the next second, or if Sheridan would get up and be where she threw herself instead.
So, she did the next best thing and put herself between the brawling men and the yacht. And sure enough, a moment later, Sheridan was sprawled flat on the beach and Scofield had spun and begun to run straight toward his yacht. Straight at her.
He cursed again and skidded around her, nearly wiping them both out in the process. His arm ended up around her waist and he spun her with him, probably in an effort to keep his balance and transfer his momentum, but it felt ridiculously like the times her father had swept her in a circle with a throaty laugh.
Different though. So very different.
So why was Scofield laughing? “Beth. Ought to have guessed. Well, I know your name now, darling. Does that mean you’re mine?”
A cross between a yell and a moan sounded from behind them.
Scofield spun her away, and when she tried to latch hold of him—arms, clothes, anything—he jumped out of her reach with another laugh. “I do feel the same, my love. Next time.”
Of all the . . . If she had any idea what a good retort to that would be, she would have delivered it. But he was running again, and then splashing into the surf toward his yacht.
She could catch him. But then what? He must have four stone on her. She’d have no hope of stopping him, not with those moves of his.
She spun back to Sheridan instead. He was pushing himself onto his hands and knees, but with such obvious effort that she could only imagine his condition. Blood stained the sand under his face. “My lord! Are you all right?” She fell to the beach beside him, sliding an arm around his torso to help him straighten.
Or trying to. He shook her off, though the effort knocked him onto his side again. Then he scalded her with a look of pure betrayal. “Shouldn’t you be running off at his side?”
“What?” She’d been reaching for him again, but that froze her arms in their stretch. “Why in the world would you say that?”
“I heard you.” Blood was still dripping from his nose. Fury was still dripping from his eyes. But he pushed to his feet and staggered a few steps toward the waterline.
Scofield had already hauled himself onto the yacht and weighed anchor, and the sound of an engine—foreign and strange in these waters—roared through the fog. He’d be gone in moments.
“I didn’t know who he was! I’ve never met him. If you recall, last week I was digging up silverware with you when he abducted Libby and Ollie and Telford. He thought she was me.”
“As if that excuses it.”
“Well, yes. It does.” It wasn’t as though she’d give his handsome face another thought now that she knew who he was. That he was linked, at least in part, to Johnnie’s death—though it was Lorne who had killed him.
Lorne . . . who had been hired not by Scofield but by Sheridan.
She planted her fists on her hips. “And are you really any better than he is? You say you don’t condone violence. But you knew Lorne’s reputation. You admitted it was why you had him searching for Rupert in the Caribbean.”
Apparently deciding against plunging into the surf after him, Sheridan spun back to her, only wobbling a bit. “I may have known he was single-minded and determined, but I didn’t know he was violent. And I, as you just pointed out, didn’t abduct anyone and hold them hostage until silver was exchanged.”
“Because you didn’t have to. You were the one digging up the silver. And what have you been arguing ever since? That you ought to be the one to take possession of it. That the blasted British Museum oughtn’t to be trusted because there’s a Scofield on the board, but that you can be. You’re nothing but a selfish, greedy—”
“And you are nothing but a . . . a weak-willed female ready to simper at any handsome face that comes with a yacht and a promise to take you away.”
“How dare you.” Her hands curled into fists, and all thoughts of exploring the island blew away with the wind that was finally making earnest progress at clearing the fog. She wasn’t going to spend a single second that she didn’t have to with this man. And to prove it, she stomped southward along the shore.
“Where are you going? Off to rendezvous with your prince?”
“Imbecile.” She pivoted back to face him but didn’t stop moving, even if it required walking backward. “I’m going home. And I ought to leave you here to insult someone else’s common sense and integrity.”
“So you can find some other criminal to flirt with, you mean.” He was stomping after her. And he looked awful. His clothes were stained with his blood, and though he was digging even now in his pocket for a handkerchief, it couldn’t possibly clean him up with any success. The best it could do was catch the red still dripping from his swollen nose. Bruises were forming already under both his eyes.
He needed ice or a compress or something. She should probably take him to St. Agnes and its little pharmacy.