by Cheryl Bolen
“And I'll be there to protect you from Britain's enemies.”
At their destination, she was pleased to see that Sir Ronald's phaeton was already there. Mrs. MacInnes was a most efficient servant.
The baronet leapt down from the phaeton as she disembarked from her coach. “What the devil's going on?” he demanded. “I was dragged away from a meeting of the privy council.”
Mrs. MacInnes certainly demonstrated a stunning level of competence. “I assure you, this is massively important.”
His eyes widened. “What is of such massive importance?”
She lowered her voice, and as the two of them stood upon the pavement in front of Lambeth House with all manner of conveyances clopping to and fro behind them. She sketched out the events of the previous night. “I think you will agree,” she concluded, “that we cannot leave Lambeth House unwatched.”
A grim set to his mouth, he nodded.
She eyed the sword at his side. “I see you followed my advice to come armed.”
“Indeed.”
“I pray you won't have use of it.”
“What about the body?”
She froze for several seconds. “You're the government official. Surely you can think of how to deal with such. I believe if you just barge into that house with the natural authority of a baronet or the undersecretary of the Foreign Office and start throwing your weight around, the Lambeth servants will be quaking to earn your favor.”
He chuckled. “Now that I know what's going on, I believe I will throw my weight around. In fact, I'll have some of his majesty's Horse Guards come to protect our interests here.”
“Jack will be here later this afternoon. I daresay I shall have to confess that I've shared the details of our inquiry with you.”
He winced. “I have a distinct feeling your husband does not like me.”
Her initial tendency was to protest, but Daphne was far too honest (in most situations) to lie. The truth was that Jack didn't like the baronet. Why? She did not know. Ronnie was ever such a dear. “How could anyone not like you, Sir Ronald?” She favored him with her cheeriest smile as the two of them approached the front door of Lambeth House. “There is one more thing I must ask of you before I return to my husband.”
“Yes?”
“If you should do something with the body, I beg that you set aside his boots. I do believe they'd do wonderfully for our coachman, who has a sad need for such.”
“I thought you didn't have a coachman.”
“Well, he's not precisely ours, but he's been with us for several days, and he's ever so dependable, and Lord Black Murderer's boots are of an exceedingly fine quality. I daresay they were paid for with Cornelia's blackmail payments.”
“Lord Black Murderer?”
She shrugged. “First it was just Lord Blackmailer, but that didn't seem vile enough to suit him.”
“I see. Because of Prufoy?”
She nodded, and her voice softened, her thoughts flicking to the man's tidy little house on Cotton Lane. “From all accounts Mr. Prufoy was a wonderful man.”
“It appears his death has been avenged.”
“In an odd sort of way, I suppose it has. Though the man who murdered Lord Black Murderer is even more vile than he was.”
“The duc d'Arblier's only serving his country as we serve ours.”
“The man will never elicit empathy from me.” she spit out the words, her eyes narrowing as she spoke. “He's been bent on killing Jack for years.”
“Because Captain Jack Dryden is the best England has.”
His words kept the smile on her face as she left him knocking upon the door of Lambeth House. She was still smiling as Andy opened the coach door for her. But as soon as she entered the coach, she went to scream.
The aborted scream was muffled by a man's hand fiercely clasping her mouth.
The man crouched in her coach was the duc d'Arblier.
Chapter 18
A persistent pounding upon his chamber door awakened him. His quick glance on the bed beside him told him Daphne wasn't there.
And Daphne would not be rapping at his door.
He slung his legs over the side of the bed and shimmied into his pantaloons. A pity all the servants were female. “Yes?”
Their young cook opened the door and edged into the room. “I hates to wake you, Captain, but no one's here to advise me. A lad just delivered a letter addressed to you, and he said it be urgent.”
Good lord, was the girl shaking? “You did the right thing.” He spoke gently as he moved to her and took the proffered letter. “Where is my wife?”
“I don't know, but she left in yer coach a 'alf hour ago.” The girl's face brightened. “She left a note for you in her bedchamber.”
“Thank you. That will be all.” He turned over the letter and instantly recognized its seal's distinctive embossed coronet. It was d'Arblier's. He tore open the letter. As he read the few hastily written words, a chill inched down his spine like a thick, corrosive acid.
I have your wife. If you care to offer yourself in exchange for her, come alone at midnight. In Hampstead. At the barn behind the rectory of the Methodist clergyman.
He flung the note down and hurried to Daphne's bedchamber, hoping like a simpleton that she was still there. His heartbeat stampeding, he moved to her French desk where she'd propped up the letter to him. Just as Annie had said.
Anger slammed through him as he picked it up and read.
I couldn't leave Lambeth House unguarded. I've enlisted help and will return shortly (hopefully before you awaken).
Your most obedient, adoring wife.
He gave a bitter harrumph. She was as obedient as an errant child. She was an overbearing, authoritative, arrogant firstborn who was too damned confidant for her own good!
She was the most exasperating, maddening. . .lovable woman he'd ever known.
In these past few seconds of unimaginable worry he clearly realized what mattered most to him on earth. If she had lied to him—and he had no doubts of that—she had her reasons. And he intrinsically knew they were honorable.
Like the woman he loved. The woman he would give his own life to spare.
In a furious rage, he dressed.
Even knowing what a futile effort it would be, he had to return to Lambeth House. Perhaps he could learn something there. That must be where d'Arblier had accosted her.
What about Andy? The cook had said he'd collected Daphne. Perhaps he would know something. Jack tried to tamp down his slim hopes as he made his way to the livery stable.
Neither coach nor driver was there. Though not unexpected, it was, nevertheless, disheartening.
His next destination—mounted on Warrior—was the house where Lambeth had been slain. A smile curved his lips as he remembered Daphne calling the dead viscount Lord Blackmailer.
He hoped to God he'd get to hear her voice again.
At Lambeth House, there was no sign of Andy, no sign of the coach they had hired in Portsmouth. God, but the brief time they'd been in Portsmouth—and in Spain—seemed a lifetime ago.
Curiously, there was a very fine phaeton tethered right in front of Lambeth House. He was sure he'd seen it before. Then he stiffened as he remembered who owned it.
He dismounted and stalked up to the front door—which opened before he knocked.
There, cocky as Petruchio, stood Sir Ronald Johnson in all his handsome stature. The fellow even had a gleaming sword strapped to his side!
But this was no time for petty peevishness. Only one thing mattered: saving Daphne from the clutches of the evil duc.
“Glad you've come, Captain. I suppose Lady Daphne has by now told you she has taken me into her confidence about your dashed important mission.”
“I have not seen my wife. It appears the duc d'Arblier has her.”
Sir Ronald gasped, his eyes wide with terror. “How could this be? I saw her no more than an hour ago.”
“Where?”
“Right here!
She asked that I come watch the house because she feared the duc would find the list---” He gave a little cough and lowered his voice, “and the, ah, Duchess's letters.”
“Was our coachman with her?”
“I thought you didn't have a coach—oh, yes, you've hired one. Yes, I believe he was. In fact, Daf was hoping I could filch the boots from, ahem, well, you know. . .” He lowered his voice. “The deceased. Servants don't know about him yet.”
“You mean he's still in the cupboard?”
The baronet nodded.
“I supposed that's as good a place as any for the blackguard.”
“Lord Black Murderer,” Sir Ronald said with a chuckle. “Clever little moniker your wife came up with.”
Jack did not like it one bit that Daphne had used her little witticisms in front of that swaggering Sir Ronald. And he liked it even less that the womanizer referred to Jack's wife as Daf! Even if he was her brother-in-law.
But, of course, none of that mattered now. Jack would have to join forces with the man in the hopes of saving his wife.
What a pity! There was nothing to be done about it. Jack simply was not in good enough condition to take on the skilled French assassin.
And hope to win.
“Forgive me for getting off this most grave subject of your wife's abduction,” Sir Ronald said, slinging an arm around Jack. “You must tell me everything.”
Before they crossed the threshold of Lambeth House, though, a great skidding of coach wheels sounded on the street behind them, and they turned to see a second carriage bearing the baronet's crest come to a halt, and Lady Virginia leaping from the conveyance, her eyes narrowed. “Where is that lying, cheating, stealing, former old maid sister of mine?”
* * *
The sister in question, her hands tied behind her, was reposing on an upper floor of a warehouse in London's East End. Had that blasted duc bought up all the menacing-looking, derelict warehouses that lined the quays along the River Thames?
At sword point, she and Andy had been forced to climb two rickety flights of dark stairs and were locked behind a well-bolted door in a musty, unfurnished room with boarded windows. Transoms well above the windows—far too high for them to even touch—had not been boarded, an omission which, to Daphne's gratitude, kept the chamber from being dark.
She was too much reminded of the last time she'd been foolish enough to be abducted by the duc d'Arblier. That time, though, she'd been captured by one of the man's minions. This time the duc did not entrust the deed to an underling.
The underling was used to capture poor Andy, who now sat across from her in the dark chamber that likely had not been set foot in for a generation, his hands also bound behind him. The poor lad, who couldn't be eighteen yet, must be terrified. Even if he thought he had the makings of a Bow Street Runner. Or spy.
“I am vastly sorry that you've been captured merely because of your association with me,” she said. “I do have the utmost confidence my husband will save us from the evil duc's clutches.” Since Jack wasn't there, she had no qualms about using the adjectives that so aptly described the man she had married. “Captain Dryden, I must tell you, is on a special mission for the Prince Regent. That is because he's been master spy against the French in the Peninsular campaigns.”
Andy's fair blue eyes widened. “A mission for the Regent 'imself? A master spy? Wait 'till I tell me mum.”
Swelling with pride, Daphne nodded. She certainly hoped he would live to tell his mother. There was the consideration that Jack wasn't his usual, masterful self. Physically. All because of that odious duc! “This same French mastermind who captured us actually abducted us several weeks ago, but my brilliant husband managed to extricate us. We—my husband and I—were able to stop a plot to kill the Regent.”
“Blimy!”
“It's all true. The Prince Regent wanted to give Captain Dryden a big fancy Lord Something title, but my humble husband refused.”
Andy's eyes widened even more. “Blimy! A plot to murder the Regent? This could be in a 'orace Walpole book! And now yer being charged with capturing Frenchie spies! You and the cap'n.”
“We must obtain a list of counterspies operating within the highest levels of British government.”
He whistled.
She was relieved that her diversion had taken the lad's mind off his fear. “I believe our captor believes we've already found the list, and we need him to continue believing that.”
“'e won't 'ear otherwise from me. I'll take the secret to me grave, I will.”
“Very good, Andy. I knew I could count on you.”
* * *
Jack gathered his wife's hysterical sister and her husband, and steered them into the dead viscount's library. Slamming the door behind them, he raised his voice. “If either of you give a fig about the wonderful woman I married, then for God's sake put your silliness aside and help me rescue her.” He leveled a stern gaze at Daphne's whimpering sister. “You do Daphne a great disservice if you think she would ever betray you.” His gaze shifted to Sir Ronald. “Oblige us both by explaining why you and my wife have been meeting in so clandestine a fashion.”
Sir Ronald turned to Virginia. “You knew about that?”
Her weeping eyes met his, and she nodded.
The baronet took hold of both his wife's hands and spoke tenderly. “Never doubt my love of—or my fidelity to—you. Lady Daphne needed my assistance on a matter that she and the captain are investigating for the Foreign Office.”
“Why such secrecy?” Jack asked.
Sir Ronald directed his gaze to Jack. “You knew I was meeting with Lady Daphne?”
Jack nodded ruefully.
Drawing in a deep sigh, Sir Ronald continued. “She didn't want you to know.”
“Know what?” Jack's eyes narrowed.
“That she asked me to undertake a portion of the investigation that neither of you were. . . ah, equipped to undertake.” Sir Ronald offered Jack a smile, then continued. “What was needed was a man who had entre into the men's clubs. Your wife did not want you to think that she found you lacking in any manner—especially in a manner which might call attention to your---”
“My lack of social connections?”
“Precisely. So early in your marriage, she particularly did not want you to feel . . . for lack of a better word, unworthy of her. She wanted nothing to point to any disparity in your stations.”
Jack had instinctively known that whatever secret she was keeping from him was done for a good reason. And what better reason than preserving harmony in their marriage? He met the baronet's serious gaze. “So my wife wished for you to see if any member of one of your clubs had recently come into money?”
“She did.”
“I don't understand,” Virginia said.
Sir Ronald told his wife about the missing list, the two murders, and last, he told her about her twin's purloined love letters.
She began to bawl. “My poor sister. That wretched, vile, disgusting, murdering duc has my dear sister! Oh, Ronnie, you must get her back.”
Sir Ronald nodded, a firm set to his jaw as he made eye contact with Jack. “How do you know the duc has her?”
Jack thrust the letter at him.
With his wife peering over his shoulder, Sir Ronald quickly read the letter. “You'll need my help, Dryden. You're in no condition to defend yourself, much less rescue your wife.”
“I will be glad of your help. Obviously, she's not being held at that barn. It would be too easy for us to gather up some of his majesty's Horse Guards and storm the place. My guess is they're bringing her there later.”
“And obviously the duc means to kill you.” Sir Ronald turned to his wife. “My dearest love, we shall need you to carry on with the search for the duchess's letters. You know her hand so very well, you're the very one to set about searching this house.”
She turned up her nose. “Are we not going to do anything about the. . .” She lowered her voice. “The body?”
<
br /> “Not yet. We need to carry on with the search. I've told the servants to expect soldiers because French spies have targeted this house. And I told them that any of them who wished to leave, had permission to do so.”
“Did any stay?”
“Only two. The housekeeper and cook. Both females.” He chuckled. “All the males fled.”
“The Horse Guards really are coming?” Jack asked.
“I sent a note round. Of course, it was not written on my official stationary, which I expect has delayed things a bit. It's my intention to keep two men posted at the front and two more at the back as a deterrent to the duc.”
Jack frowned. “The pity of it is if d'Arblier sees that, he will know we haven't found the list. It's rather like showing him our hand.”
“It has just occurred to me that if I send them away it could demonstrate that we already have the list—in which case, the need to murder you might decrease.”
“Anything that decreases my chances of being murdered is certainly to be desired, but d'Arblier would be bound to know the truth because the men on the list have continued unimpeded.”
Sir Ronald's gaze swept over the library. “Which rooms have you and Daphne already searched?”
“This room was completely searched last night, but I see the servants have been busy today restoring the books we'd flung to the floor.” Jack nodded in the direction of the viscount's study. “In the next chamber, which is—or should I say, was—Lambeth's study, we spent several hours going through papers but did not finish. We left at four this morning. I'd better finish that myself. Later. Now all that matters is getting my wife away from that fiend.”
Sir Ronald pecked his wife on the cheek. “Go along to the other chambers, my darling. “I have confidence you can find the letters.”
A smile on her face, her brow lowered in concentration, she left the chamber.
“I didn't want to say this in from of my wife,” Sir Ronald said. “You know how wives worry.”
Jack nodded, now ashamed of himself for distrusting his wife.