Even drowning in heated thoughts of Victoria was preferable to nearly being killed.
The figure standing there remained silent, watching him. He peered down at him, dressed all in black, his face covered with a dark mask that obscured everything, even his eyes.
And what had happened? One minute he was walking to the carriage house to retrieve his carriage and driver, and the next he was pulling his pistol, then losing his pistol. He had questions, and the only one who could answer them wasn’t saying anything, only staring at him from behind some kind of sheer black material where his eyes would be. In the silence, the figure seemed cloaked in menace, as dangerous as he had ever faced before.
His heart thudded. He could fight with the best of them, but he’d never faced a masked opponent with such deadly grace in their movements; he’d dispatched the malefactor with a precise and stunning kick.
“Are you going to say anything?” he ground out.
The figure took a step back until he was standing under the lamplight, his slender form all the more apparent now.
Blowing out a ragged breath, he tried again. “Who are you? What do you want? Where did you have that man taken?” If anything, he should be calling for the Runners, but something stayed his hand. Curiosity. He’d almost been killed, and the man who’d attempted it had been carted away when he should be in police custody. “That man should be in irons.”
Finally, the figure spoke. “Et vous.”
“Do you not speak English?” His French was passable, but his head ached far too much to carry on this type of conversation in a language not his own.
“Quoi, je suis idiot?” the figure answered, a tinge of humor in his strangely husky voice. It wasn’t a deep voice, per se, but rather…coarse yet smooth, as though his vocal cords were made of tattered silk.
Richard grunted, closing his eyes against the growing ache in his head.
“I speak English,” the figure said in heavily accented English, startling Richard.
“So you do,” he remarked, his gaze pinned to the man’s masked face. “Why were you hiding back here?”
The man dropped his arms to his sides, his right hand brushing over the hilt of a sword Richard had never seen before. Not French.
“What are you and the Duke of Benford planning?” the figure asked, wrapping his fist around the sword hilt.
Struck by the man’s question, Richard blurted, “What do you mean?”
“I found you sneaking from his house. Men do not sneak unless they do not want to be seen,” the figure sneered.
“Like you?” Richard growled. “Seems to me that you would not have seen me leaving if you weren’t hiding in the mews.”
The figure cursed, a phrase Richard couldn’t quite make out. But it had not been in French, that much he knew.
“What are you planning? Who else is working with you?” the stranger demanded
Anger simmered beneath his skin, making him swallow down a retort that would, no doubt, get him gutted. “I am not planning anything. I am not working with anyone. I have no idea what you are talking about. I simply helped my inebriated friend into his house and then left out the back to get to my carriage. I was the one who was accosted.”
Silence met his outburst. The man crossed his arms over his slender chest again. Richard could feel the man’s eyes boring into him, peeling back the layers, seeking out the truth. But the truth was easy to find.
“I do not believe you,” the man said simply, which only riled Richard all the more. He could just walk away, leave the mysterious character in the alley to be forgotten, but there was something about this person, this French upstart, that made him stay right where he was.
“You do not know me, sirrah. I am a man of honor. I would not lie to you.”
“Why not have your carriage brought around? Why walk to it?”
Richard shrugged, the motion pulling on the material of his coat. “I needed to clear my head, and I didn’t want to bother Riggles, the butler, when I could easily get my own carriage.” This was getting more ridiculous by the moment.
Again, silence met his reply, as if the man were sizing up his answers.
“And who are you?” Richard asked, narrowing his gaze. “Why were you watching the duke’s house?” He knew he was being reckless, asking his own questions of the man, but he was tired of getting nowhere. Suddenly, a thought occurred to him, one he couldn’t stop his dratted mouth from uttering. “Are you the one breaking into homes—the incidents reported on in the Times?”
That must have struck a chord because the man tensed, taking a step forward.
“No, I am no thief,” he snapped, his husky voice rising…his accent slipping.
So…not really French. But why disguise his voice, and why the need to pretend to be French? Richard couldn’t help but feel that something deeper and more insidious was occurring, and he’d only been caught up in the tide of intrigue.
Wanting to test his theory, he decided to push the man into another mistake. “Not a thief? An abductor, then? Did you plan to snatch me and take me somewhere to ransom me?”
“If I wanted to capture you, you would be unconscious like the other one,” he said, a smirk in his tone as he pointed in the direction that other man had carted the villain.
The bastard was grinning at him from behind that damned mask. Tension roiled through him, and he growled. “Will you answer any of my questions?”
Tilting his head, the man tsked.
“Monsieur. I will answer your questions when you answer mine, and if you need convincing of my intent to get answers, you need only remember how simple it was for me to render you harmless.”
Harmless? He would have laughed if he felt the humor in that word. He was far from harmless, but…he didn’t feel as though the person before him actually meant any harm.
“You can tell me what connection you have to the Duke of Benford,” the masked man remarked, his husky voice grating on Richard’s nerves. It wasn’t that the voice was unpleasant—it was the opposite. How a man’s voice could pluck at Richard’s senses was…disconcerting.
“I am friends with his son,” Richard replied, then swallowed. Exhaustion wore at him, pulling the warmth from his body. He shuddered. “There is no secret there. We have been friends since Eton.”
The man tensed again, his hand on his sword as if preparing to fight Richard’s words. But, finally, the man’s shoulders fell slightly, and he dropped his hand.
“Very well,” he said, crowding him to stare up into his face. “Speak a word of this to anyone, and I will cut your tongue from your head and wear it as a bauble around my neck.”
Struck by the acid in the man’s voice, Richard flinched. “You are not the first one to intimate something like that,” he remarked, his thoughts hurtling toward another night… Victoria Daring. In disguise. Holding a dagger to his throat.
Something inside him pulled at the memory, telling him to look deeper, to remember harder… What was it? Peering down into the man’s mask, Richard tried to see through the fabric over the eyes. It was black inside, as though only a blackness existed beyond the facade.
He let out a slow, deliberate breath, knowing full well he was about to do something wholly foolish. Utterly and completely dangerous.
“Take off the mask…Victoria.”
…
Stunned, Victoria stared up at the man who was, just moments before, convinced she was a Frenchman. But now, he was gazing down at her, righteous anger written on his handsome face. His lips peeled back from his straight white teeth, and he spoke again.
“I know it is you under there, Victoria Daring. You will not fool me again.”
“You are a fool,” she barked in French, forcing outrage into her voice. This couldn’t be happening again. She’d taken pains to not be recognized this time.
All week, she, Verity, and Honoria had perfected their disguises. Love, as a man with a man’s frame, didn’t bother. Vic and her sisters decided to wear their tr
aining costumes, the mask with the sheer fabric over the eyes, and to wrap their breasts and pad their hips to remove any trace of their femininity. She even spoke with an utterly perfect French accent, using the technique LaMagre taught her to lower her voice.
She looked and spoke like a man, and yet Richard had peeled away her disguise easily.
Blast him!
“Act outraged if you want, Victoria, but I will not be fooled,” he drawled, leaning as far forward as he could while still standing in one place. “I must admit, I cannot see the woman under that disguise, and I am quite impressed with your accent and how deep you were able to get your voice, but I can see you…” He straightened. “I can feel you,” he murmured, his voice deeper than hers and far more…alarming.
A ripple of awareness made her gasp.
A slow, wicked grin spread out over his face, and she held her breath. “No denial?”
She flinched. Her silence had spelled her doom.
“Take off the mask,” he said, his tone coaxing. “And then talk to me…” She wondered what he would do once she was unmasked—probably call for the night watch and have her clapped in irons.
She swallowed, her fear of failure rooting itself deeper in her chest. Stealing her breath.
Closing her eyes, cursing, she reached up to untie the mask from behind her head. She pulled it forward slowly, until she’d completely revealed her face.
The greasepaint around her eyes would, no doubt, make her look like a raccoon, but she hadn’t been thinking about her appearance when she’d slathered it on earlier that evening. And besides, raccoon dogs were cunning and wily.
Her eyes still closed, she listened, wondering what Richard was seeing, what he was thinking.
“Open your eyes, Victoria.” His voice was husky, heavy, drawing her in.
She opened her eyes and pinned her gaze to his face. He wasn’t smiling any longer, and his eyes were hard and cold, like gold coins dipped in ice.
“Now, answer me,” he ordered in a voice just as hard.
She hesitated; she could leave—with what she knew about evasion, he wouldn’t be able to catch her—but it would only be a matter of time before he showed up at her house, demanding her attention. And alerted her father to what occurred. She would be well and truly ruined then. No matter what she did now, she would be a stain on her family. What good was an Imperial spy who couldn’t circulate the ballroom in the open?
She planted her hands on her hips, wondering what he saw when he looked at her.
With her mask on, she could have been anyone else. She felt safe. But now, staring at him as he stared back, she felt naked. Vulnerable.
“What gave me away?” she asked, mentally comparing her previous costume to the one she was now wearing.
The wretch lifted a single eyebrow, his eyes twinkling.
“Your threat to divest me of my tongue,” he answered, his lips quirking.
“What?”
A deep chuckle rumbled into the night.
“Your threat to remove my tongue was delivered with a familiar…intensity as the threat to my person in Banebridge’s study.”
As his words filtered in, the heat of humiliation smoldered in her cheeks.
“So, what will you do with me now?” she asked, her hand inching to grasp the hilt of her sword. It helped her feel in control, to have the cold steel of a hundred-year-old weapon against her fingertips.
Richard’s gaze never left her face. He stepped forward, but she didn’t flinch, didn’t move a single muscle. She had no doubt she could defend herself if it came to that…but, somehow, she didn’t think he would ever raise a hand to her. He wouldn’t hurt her. And from the look in his eyes, he knew she wouldn’t hurt him, either.
And he was right.
I have become as soft as butter.
“Well?” she prodded, crossing her arms over her chest.
“Are you going to tell me what this is all about?” he finally spoke, his question something she was expecting.
“No.”
“You’re not going to explain why you are dressed…like that”—he waved his hand over her—“and hiding in the mews behind the Duke of Benford’s house?”
“No.” It was the easiest, safest answer. He already knew who she was; he didn’t need to know what she was, a highly-trained member of a family recruited to manage an operation specifically commissioned by the reigning monarch.
Richard let out a heavy breath and reached up to run his fingers through his hair, disheveling it. It looked dashing even in its disarray. He looked more human.
More touchable.
“Victoria, you were waiting for me outside this house, then you just happen to stop a man from killing me. I am going to ask this again… Why were you here?”
She didn’t answer. Instead, she stood still, watching him, her mind twisting around itself, desperate to find a way out of the mess in which she’d tossed herself. She should have just dispatched the attacker and made a run for it.
He straightened, his eyes sliding over her face to land on her lips.
“You cannot speak a word about recognizing me to anyone.”
“Why not? What are you involved in that requires such secrecy?”
She bit her lip, drawing his gaze downward once again.
“I cannot tell you. It is not my place to divulge critical information,” she replied.
“Ask whomever you must ask, and then tell me what it is I wish to know. I am an honorable, trustworthy man. Anything you tell me will remain with me… I swear it.”
She cursed.
His focus flew to her eyes, surprise flashing within the molten depths. But then something like iron slid in over it.
Chapter Eighteen
He’d had no idea what to expect when he’d taken the risk in calling Victoria out, but what he hadn’t expected was the woman standing before him. Fierce, armed, and with black paint around her eyes. It made her look deadly, stunning, all the more alluring. It was utterly disconcerting, this attraction to her, even after all that had occurred since meeting her.
Victoria pouted, her sapphire eyes snapping with fire, a flash of guilt pinking her cheeks.
She cleared her throat and dipped her chin, hiding her face from him.
“What I am doing…I have my reasons,” she said, before lifting her chin to meet his gaze again.
“And what reasons are those? It is obvious you think I have nefarious connections and that I am planning something.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “And what am I supposed to be planning?”
Gritting her teeth until the muscle in her cheek jumped, Victoria seemed to hold her breath. He could tell she was thinking hard, and he wondered if she were conjuring up an excuse.
“I cannot tell you. Not now,” she offered.
He opened his mouth to argue, but she stayed his words with a finger to his lips. A thrill of something hot and silky moved through him.
“Meet me at my home tomorrow. I will expect you after the luncheon hour.” She picked up her mask from where she’d dropped it during the reveal and slapped it against her thigh to remove the dirt. Rather than slip it back on her head, covering the strange cap she must have used to hold her hair, she slipped it into her waistband instead. Once again, his gaze flicked to the glimmering blade of her sword. He’d never seen the like.
Perhaps he’d ask her about it tomorrow.
“I will be there,” he replied. “And be prepared, Victoria.”
She arched a finely shaped eyebrow. “For what?”
For what, indeed? He watched her, standing there, clothed in black, as she watched him.
“Now you aren’t going to answer?” she asked, a sneer on her lips—lips that looked lush even when downturned. He wanted to gather her into his arms and kiss that sneer from her lips, and then keep kissing her until they were both breathless.
“I will answer in good time.”
She sniffed, then muttered so quietly, he hardly heard her, “What am I t
o do with you?”
Instead of responding to her, he moved around her, her lithe body tense, and gazed out into the night.
What to do with me, indeed… What was he to do with her? She wasn’t the typical London debutante, that much was plain, but she was still a lady, still tied to the dictates of society—whether she liked it or not.
Beyond the lamp overhead, it was dark as pitch. Suddenly, the reality of his situation dawned. He was alone in an alley with an unmarried lady, who was dressed in trousers, brandishing an exotic blade—and she’d just saved his life. If there wasn’t cause to think of her before, there certainly was now. He would never forget this night, not for as long as he lived.
Deciding it was best to see her to safety, he turned to demand she allow him to take her home.
But she was gone. She’d slipped away as silently as a ghost.
A laugh burst from his chest—a mirthless chuckle born of exhaustion and confusion and frustration.
“Of course she had to have the last word.”
…
“Damn!” Black Jack bellowed, slamming his fist against the wall of the carriage. Seething, he welcomed the pain that shot up his arm—he relished it, really. For pain was the only thing available in that moment to rid him of the ache in his blood.
He’d planned tonight to the very last detail, expecting to watch that bastard Benjamin Bennington die, drowning in a pool of his own blood, one of the last pieces he needed to remove from the board in order to secure everything he deserved. But the lout he’d hired to do the deed had attacked the wrong man. And not only that, the man had been caught, captured, carted off somewhere, where he would, no doubt, sing like a nightingale—giving away everything in an effort to save his own life.
And who was that woman who had ruined everything? From where he’d been hiding near the carriage house, he couldn’t make out anything of what was said, but he could see her face, smeared in black paint. She’d been wearing a ridiculous pair of trousers and a strange tunic, with a most dastardly blade strapped to her waist. Who was she that she could move the way she did, do what she’d done to a man twice her size?
The more important question, though, was why was Richard Downing, Viscount Ganwyd, sneaking from the Duke of Benford’s house in the dead of night? Ben was supposed to have been there, slipping out from under his brother’s watchful eye, to spend the evening with his cronies, drinking and whoring.
A Lady Never Tells (Women of Daring) Page 15