The urge to be honest with him for his own good was a double-edged sword, because the other thing it made Fliss ponder was how truly miserable Jake’s deception had made her. She doubted his shocking lies had left him feeling a quarter as guilty and dishonest as hers now did; rakes who did their raking for King and country had to have hard hearts and no conscience. After a week of attempting to find evidence of her uncle’s criminality, Fliss now appreciated how dangerous and precarious such work could be. Half the time she was on tenterhooks, the other half simply terrified and both states were exhausting. She had never been so conscious of every word she said, every nuance, every movement and, aside from now knowing the ins and outs of the river-haulage business, she had gleaned precious little for all her hard work. Spies clearly needed vast wells of patience as well as nerves of steel.
However, knowing she had been nought but a job to be done, when she was still grieving the loss of him, made her feel ridiculously foolish, naïve and—if she was being entirely honest—more than a little bit heartbroken. While he had been busy working, Fliss had been nurturing a friendship which had quickly spiralled out of her control. Somewhere during their brief but eventful liaison her guarded heart had let its guard down, then had usurped her sensible, pragmatic head. Jake the Snake had become so much more than a friend. He’d been her Knight in Shining Armour. A man she had confided in and allowed to kiss her. That kiss had changed everything. In that one heady and unexpected moment she had begun to hope he was more. A few hours later, those dreams had been crushed just as brutally as all her childish dreams had before.
One day, she would be able to look back on the whole sorry affair and sagely warn her students of the sort of techniques the most dangerous and predatory philanderers used to woo the unsuspecting. Or at least Fliss hoped she would get to that point, because right now, she sincerely doubted she could even confide her misery to Sister Ursuline without weeping like a pathetic victim and flagellating herself for her own stupidity.
‘My future wife will enjoy all of life’s comforts.’ The Earl had smiled and settled himself back against the seat and his eyes drifted back below her chin again. Fliss ignored the compulsion to drag her thin evening shawl around her. Like the calculating Jake, she now also had a job to do and one which was easier if her lecherous companion was occupied. His tongue was looser when it was hungrily hanging out of his mouth. Something which did nothing to make her feel any better.
‘Tell me, my lord, while I appreciate business is business and that you make coin by hauling the cargos of others, do you have some mechanism to rigorously vet what is carried.’
‘Why would I do that?’
‘I have heard stories about smuggling. Apparently, it is still as rife as it ever was, yet more secretive. What if the smugglers were using your boats to transport their goods? Are you not concerned for the consequences?’
His eyes flicked back to her face for a second before he shrugged and returned to staring at her décolleté as it gently moved with the motion of Uncle Crispin’s well-sprung carriage.
‘Why should I be? As a gentleman, I do not concern myself with the day-to-day machinations of business.’ He pulled a face as if such a thing was below him. ‘I merely provide the capital. The barges are leased by the wherrymen who benefit from the numerous opportunities my good name provides them. I offer hold space for hire. The price is fixed according to the distance regardless of the contents carried. I get half of that fee and the wherrymen get the other. If anything, being able to categorically state I had no clue as to what is being transported means the Excise Men cannot blame me, any more than they can attribute blame to any of the other gentlemen of business who invest in the same trade.’
‘But these are illicit, ill-gotten gains, my lord. Aren’t you worried it will end badly for you if the Excise Men board one of them and seize the cargo?’
‘If the crews are silly enough to take the risk of transporting something illegal, then that is down to them as they will ultimately pay the price. New crews are ten a penny. Especially when a business is as lucrative as mine.’
Fliss began to feel less sympathy for the man. ‘Surely you wouldn’t want boats sailing under your name to carry illegal cargo and rob the crown of its rightful taxes?’
‘Better the coin falls into my purse than the Treasury’s. They get more than enough from me as it is, so I shall not complain if I inadvertently get a little something back?’
‘Even if it brings down the British economy?’
He laughed, flinging himself back into the seat in a musty waft and smiling at her in that patronising way sanctimonious men did when they thought they knew better. ‘Oh, bless your good heart, Felicity! Your strong morals are one of the many things I adore about you, but you have a scant understanding of the workings of the British economy. Smuggling is inherently part of it. The free traders have operated within it for centuries and will continue to operate for centuries more.’ He pointed to the intricately patterned lace laid over the burgundy silk of her tight-fitting bodice. ‘Where do you think that exquisite trim came from? Chantilly lace is a small fortune and few pay the extortionate prices from the merchants who are silly enough to pay the duties. And after the wars, we prefer not to openly trade with the enemy. While the ton loves its fripperies, smuggling will continue to flourish. Everyone knows the best lace comes from France.’
‘So does the best soap.’ Next to him, Aunt Daphne was blatantly wielding a perfumed vinaigrette in front of her nostrils and wearing an expression of complete distaste. ‘You might consider using some!’
The Earl laughed, assuming Daphne’s words were a joke just as the carriage slowed as it turned into the narrow lane which housed the mews servicing Berkeley Square, and like a fool Fliss allowed her gaze to drift out of the window. Although she had promised herself faithfully she would not look again tonight, her silly eyes had a mind of their own and of course they briefly locked with his before she resolutely turned away, heartily disgusted with her wayward urges.
In scruffy workmen’s clothes, Jacob Warriner was no less attractive than he was in his evening finery and her silly heart gave a little sigh before she hardened it against him. Those beautiful blue eyes were liar’s eyes and she would not be relieved or reassured by the sight of him. Not when she had Mr Leatham and Mr Flint close by to help her should she need it. Jake the Snake was the last person Fliss wanted standing guard. Or within one hundred miles of her for that matter. He was history. The past. Done and dusted. Why couldn’t the man have taken the leave he’d been offered? Why did she have to see his dratted face day after day, night after night, popping up wherever she went. Watching.
Why, she had already had to suffer the knowledge he had been in the alcove of the very ballroom she had just left! Did the man race his horse across Mayfair night after night and change his clothes en route? The very last image she wanted in her confused and exhausted mind was the thought of him shrugging out of his splendid evening clothes in some darkened alleyway and then pulling on the roughened ensemble he wore to blend into the mews, only the moonlight illuminating his broad shoulders and the muscles on his strong arms. Coarse clothes which should not make him appealing, but which suited him just as well. Oh, how she loathed him for his magnetic attractiveness and diligent persistence to see the job finished!
Nor did she want to think he was there because he cared. About her rather than his mission. Except his heated and poignant looks led her to believe he might, which made her waver in her resolve to loathe him for all eternity, constantly flitting between disappointment and raw hatred and a disturbing and foolish desire to put herself in his big, fibbing and fetching boots, hoping to find a way to forgive him for the unforgivable. He would be so much easier to despise if she wasn’t confronted with those troubled eyes every single day.
Watching.
Protecting.
While she doubted he cared about her in quite the s
ame way as she had been coming to care about him, Fliss was prepared to concede he did seem to have a genuine interest in her safety, else why would he be everywhere when he could be at home.
Instead, he had become her shadow and whenever she was out she could feel the intense weight of his stare as he followed her every movement. At balls, he seemed to become particularly stern whenever Fliss danced with another man, something she had taken to doing a great deal now that hiding in alcoves was out of the question. She justified her sudden transformation from reluctant debutante to eager social butterfly by telling herself that it reassured Uncle Crispin that she was partially abiding by his rules in her own rebellious way and in so doing was attempting to drive the Earl of Redditch mad with lust. However, it didn’t hurt that the sight of her laughing and flirting with a succession of handsome new gentlemen made Jake’s sapphire eyes harden and narrow while he watched her like the hawk she had once accused him of being.
Fliss had spent the entire interval of the opera yesterday giggling with Lord Peter Flint and had barely cast the traitorous Mr Warriner a glance. As the lights had dimmed for the second act and she had pulled her opera glasses up to cover her face, she’d needed to bite very hard on the inside of her cheek to avoid smiling at the splendid vision of Jake’s hands clenched into tight fists on his lap. The wayward part of her hoped he was burning with jealousy. The sensible part wished she didn’t care either way.
Lord Flint, of course, had some pity for his friend and used every opportunity to quietly reassure her that Jake was worried about her and that he was sorry for having to keep his true identity at secret. Neither comment made Fliss more inclined to feel any leniency towards him because he hadn’t apologised for not telling her the truth sooner. A true friend would have.
It wasn’t all a lie, Fliss. I promise you...
Ha! Roughly translated, that meant a great deal of the silky poison which oozed out of his mouth to loosen hers had been and she would not be the sort of dolt who sought clarification. It made no difference to her which bits had been true.
It didn’t!
It wouldn’t.
The tiny hairs on the back of her neck prickled, alerting her to the fact that the dratted man was still staring at her and willing her to glance back. ‘Oh, for goodness sake! Why have we stopped?’ The driver had brought them around the back because the lines of carriages going into the square had been horrendous. ‘This was supposed to be the quicker route home!’
The Earl of Redditch reached over and patted her knee. ‘The whole of Berkeley Square are doubtless all coming home at the same time. We are in the thick of the Season and Saturdays are always the busiest nights. I suspect there is quite the queue. On the bright side, we get to converse a little longer...’
Fliss offered him a tight smile and then glared at the offending palm which was still resting possessively on her leg. Fortunately, Aunt Cressida had spotted it, too, and thwacked him smartly over the knuckles with her folded ivory fan. He retracted the offending appendage immediately only to face the outraged wrath of Aunt Daphne as well. ‘Keep all of your digits to yourself in future, my lord, else I’ll have you banned from my niece’s company!’ While they all knew Uncle Crispin would do no such thing, the Earl certainly didn’t and the threat was enough to make him apologise.
‘Dearest Felicity, I meant no offence. The close confines of this carriage make it very difficult to move without encroaching on another’s person.’
Daphne pinned him with a withering look. ‘Idle hands are the devil’s workshop, my lord, and yours seem quite possessed. I suggest you sit on them in case they are tempted to wander again. Do you remember Nuneaton, Sister?’
Cressida glared imperiously. ‘Indeed I do and we’ll have none of that here today, my lord.’
Fliss gave both old ladies a thankful, enigmatic smile even though she didn’t have the first clue what they were talking about as was so often the case. They had become the two guards she found she was grateful to have. In the week since the awful night when she had discovered the true hideous measure of both her only living relative and the only friend she had made in London, Fliss had come to rely on the comforting presence of these two eccentric, formerly scandalous and often useless chaperons. They meant well, seemed to have the same low regard for Uncle Crispin as she did and had appeared to understand her predicament—or at least some of it—without her having to tell them any of it. They assumed she had been bullied by their nephew into suffering the Earl while he concluded his business and Fliss didn’t have the heart to apprise them of the terrifying reality. Her uncle dallied with murderers, stole from the crown and was not averse to practically imprisoning and blackmailing his only niece for his own profit. It was bad enough that Fliss knew some of the tangled web of danger they were all in—alerting them to the real truth was asking for trouble.
The Earl of Redditch wore a sad puppy-dog expression which she assumed he thought was charming and guaranteed to earn him her forgiveness, so purposefully looked away so that the obnoxious fellow knew he had overstepped the mark on this short carriage ride he shouldn’t have been on. When she found her eyes drifting back towards the handsome scoundrel still stood on the corner of Hays Mews, the one who had very definitely overstepped the mark during their carriage ride with her blessing, she stubbornly pulled them back. For five long minutes she sat but a stone’s throw away and ignored him. Fliss didn’t realise how much of her strength that took until the carriage eventually edged forward and she finally allowed her tense muscles to relax.
In the seclusion of the Rowley stables, Fliss made sure she clambered out of the carriage before the creaking Earl, thwarting any attempt at his lifting her down, and stood to the side waiting as her aunts alighted, too. They were soon met by the butler, a man who rarely ventured out of the house, who bowed politely to the Earl. ‘My lord, his lordship sends his deepest apologies, but begs you understand he cannot continue to entertain you this evening. He has been afflicted with a sudden chill and has gone to bed. Your own equipage has been readied to take you home immediately.’
The temporary relief at being spared more time in the Earl’s company was overshadowed by her unease. Her uncle never went to bed until the small hours and in the few weeks Fliss had been a guest in his house, she had never known him to pass up on an opportunity to impress the man he desperately wanted to do business with. As her uncle had also been as fit as a fiddle less than an hour ago, she smelled something rotten and, for once, it wasn’t Redditch.
With her mind racing, she suffered through the polite goodbyes and made her own excuses to head to bed. A crack of light bled out from under her uncle’s rarely used study door, but with several footmen guarding the hallway and his door, she dared not attempt to get any closer and rouse their suspicions. In her bedchamber, her maid insisted on helping her into her nightgown and plaiting her hair, and Fliss made a great show of going to bed. Twenty painful minutes ticked by before she heard her bedchamber door quietly open. Only when Kitty heard the slow, deep breathing of a woman lost in slumber did she leave. Fliss heard her mumble something to the footman on the landing and a few minutes later she heard his heavy tread move away from her door. Now that she knew the ritual of her gaolers, she knew he would take himself to the strategically placed chair at the end of the hallway and, if he was satisfied his charge was sleeping, he might nod off.
On silent feet, Fliss went to the window, slid her hand behind the heavy curtain and released the window latch. She never dared open it more than half an inch in case it could be seen below, then she threw water on the fire burning in the grate and snuffed out the single candle Kitty always left burning in the corner. Only when her bedchamber was shrouded in blackness did she risk cracking open the curtains and peering out into the garden.
It was empty, but the soft lighting in her uncle’s study illuminated the ground directly below, suggesting that he still had a guest. Fliss fetched the glass
from her nightstand and stealthily rolled up a corner of the Persian rug covering the wooden floor. On her hands and knees, she pressed her ear to the glass and struggle to listen.
The sounds were too faint and muffled to discern more than male voices speaking. After five minutes of straining, Fliss gave up and sat back on her heels. She had to get closer somehow. Even if her bodyguard was asleep, taking the main staircase was pointless. Not only was his chair directly next to them, there were more footmen posted downstairs, none of whom could risk the luxury of a sneaky forty winks. She supposed she could pretend to go fetch a book or a drink, but then one of them would undoubtedly assist her and then escort her back. However, the kitchen did lead out to the garden.
Deciding to take a chance, Fliss carefully opened her door. The burly footman’s head was leaning heavily against the wall, his eyes closed. In the last week, because she had been compliant, she had lulled him into a false sense of security and she thanked her lucky stars she’d had the wherewithal to do that one small thing. Keeping to the wall, she edged out of the room, mindful of gently closing the door behind her. Instead of heading towards the main staircase, she crept in the opposite direction, hoping the servants’ staircase might lead her where she needed to be.
A Warriner to Seduce Her Page 16