Then she dropped her gaze to her hands. “It’s as I told you from the beginning—I don’t know where Tristan is. The last time I saw him, when I left Paris six months ago, he was working for the Sûreté Nationale.”
That threw him off guard. “The police? Your brother the horse thief was working for the police?”
She cast him a defiant glance. “Why do you think I didn’t want you dashing over here to speak to his employer? I knew you would do your best to get Tristan dismissed.”
“You’re damned right I would have!” At her frown, he fought to restrain his temper. So far, he hadn’t gotten anywhere with Lisette when he was angry. He forced some calm into his voice. “I assume that his employer doesn’t know he’s a criminal.”
“No. And if he finds out . . .” She trailed off with a hitch in her voice that got him right in the gut.
Confound her to blazes. She had put him in an untenable position. Again. He didn’t know which made him angrier—that her brother really had turned out to be shady or that she still persisted in championing the fool. “With such a past, how did Bonnaud even manage to get hired?”
“Well . . . it’s not as if broadsides have been published across the world about his one criminal act. George had his hands full with dealing with Papa’s estate, so he didn’t pursue it beyond England. And he didn’t know where we’d gone.” She shrugged. “Besides, when Tristan went to work for the Sûreté, Vidocq was still at the head of it, and he didn’t care.”
“Eugène Vidocq?” Maximilian broke in.
“You know him?”
“Not personally, no, but I’ve heard of him from the man who investigated Peter’s death. We couldn’t come to France to search until after Napoleon had been routed and sent to Elba. The investigator was the one to learn that Peter had already died in that fire in Belgium.”
“Was that the same trip when you came to consult with your great-uncle’s lawyer?” she asked, clearly perplexed. “Did the lawyer know something about it?”
Cursing himself for saying enough that she’d connected those two in her mind, he avoided the question. “I know Vidocq is famous in some quarters, but the fellow we hired had nothing good to say about him. Claimed that he had a reputation for hiring criminals. Which does explain how your brother ended up employed by him.”
With one last curious glance at him, she nodded. “Vidocq hires criminals precisely because he was one himself once. During that time he learned a great deal about how they operated. Then when a friend of his was hanged, he began to realize that criminals generally come to a bad end. So he went to work for the other side, and most effectively, too, given his inside knowledge.”
He hated to admit it, but that made a sort of perverse sense. Besides, he had never been all that impressed with the man his father had hired to find Peter.
“I daresay if Vidocq had been investigating your brother’s death,” she went on, “you’d know far more about it than you do.”
Never mind that he’d just been thinking something similar; her obvious admiration for the famous investigator gave him pause. “You seem to know the man very well.”
“I do. Before he resigned last year, I worked for him, too.”
Suddenly, several odd bits about her fell into place. “Vidocq is also well-known for hiring women as agents.”
She shifted a bit on the swaying seat. “I wasn’t an agent. I wanted to be, and he wanted to hire me as one, but Tristan wouldn’t allow it.”
Maximilian smiled grimly. “My respect for your brother just rose a notch.”
“Now see here, I could have been very good at it!”
He lifted an eyebrow.
“All right,” she grumbled, “perhaps not as good as I always imagined, but only because I had no training. If he’d had time to train me properly, I might have succeeded.”
“Whether you would have or not is immaterial,” Maximilian ground out. “It’s one thing to help Manton question people. But being an agent for Vidocq would be treacherous work. Your brother would have been a fool to let you put yourself in such danger.”
She looked out the window. “You’re just like him, you know.”
“Vidocq?” he said incredulously.
“Tristan. Both of you think you know everything. You’re both proud and overbearing, and you both—”
“Care about you,” he finished for her. When her gaze shot to him, he cursed his quick tongue. “Enough not to want to see you hurt.”
A long silence spun out between them, catching them both in a tangle of frustrated desire. He fought to ignore the fact that they were alone in the dark, that she sat inches away from him, looking pretty and vulnerable and lonely. As lonely as he felt right now.
No, he wouldn’t let himself be ensnared by her charms, confound it! “So if you didn’t work for Vidocq as an agent, what did you do for him?”
“The same thing I do for Dom, mostly. Vidocq used to keep track of every criminal he’d ever dealt with. He had their features, their aliases, their criminal habits, their known haunts—everything—written down on cards. By the time I went to work for him, he had sixty thousand, and they all had to be organized. It took four of us working full time just to keep track of them all.”
“Now, that, I imagine, you were good at.”
A soft smile lit her face. “I was, actually. You may have noticed that I like to keep things tidy.” She gave a rueful laugh. “And Vidocq has no idea what tidy is, I swear. If not for me, that office would have been a nightmare of discarded disguises and boxes of cards and Lord knows what all. The man is brilliant as an investigator, but he’s not very good at taking care of himself.”
The obvious affection she felt for her former employer stung him. As he recalled, Vidocq was also known for being something of a rogue around women. “So you didn’t just take care of his office,” he said hollowly. “You took care of him, too.”
“You might say that. Especially after his wife died and everything went to hell in a handbasket.”
“He was unmarried when you were working for him?”
“The last few years, yes. Why?”
“So you valiantly stepped in to look after the poor man.” Though he could hear the jealous edge in his voice, he couldn’t seem to stop talking. “And what did that entail, exactly? Making him tea? Darning his stockings? Warming his bed?”
To his annoyance, she burst into laughter. “Are you mad? Vidocq is old enough to be my father, for pity’s sake.”
“But he’s not your father, is he?” Maximilian said, jealousy still riding him despite her levity on the subject. “And he has quite the reputation with women, I’m told.”
As the depth of his obsession seemed to sink in with her, she cocked her head to regard him intently. “Indeed he does.” Her eyes glittered in the darkness. “He is rather handsome for his age. And he can be quite charming when he wants.”
“Oh, I’m sure he can,” he grumbled, not sure whether she was deliberately tormenting him or simply being honest. “That’s all that matters to you, I suppose. Never mind that the man used to be a criminal, that he knows half of the underworld. He’s handsome and charming, and that’s good enough for you.”
“It’s better than being baleful and irritating like a certain troublesome duke,” she shot back. “At least Vidocq knows how to treat a woman.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“He doesn’t assume at every turn that she’s some untrustworthy creature engaged in plans to ruin him.”
He gritted his teeth at that apt description of how he’d reacted. “Can you blame me for being suspicious? Your brother is a thief and you didn’t bother to tell me.”
“If I had, would we even be here? Or would you have had me arrested and forced to reveal his whereabouts? Would you have destroyed Dom’s business just to find Peter?” She crossed her arms over her chest. “I was protecting my family. You of all people should understand that.”
He did, damn her. He understood and sympathized. Th
at was the trouble with wild roses—they grew under a man’s defenses when he wasn’t watching. Despite all of his determination not to be taken in, he’d been taken in.
Or perhaps he’d just recognized what he’d sensed all along—that at her core she was forthright and loyal. The kind of woman his mother had been, sticking by her husband’s side to the very end, standing up for him throughout the worst of Father’s madness. The kind of woman he would want for a wife.
He thrust the thought from his mind before it could tantalize him.
She was right about one thing—if he’d known of Bonnaud’s past, he wouldn’t have been so eager to take this trip. He wanted to think he wouldn’t have had her and Manton arrested, but he’d been quite angry that morning. There’s no telling what he might have done.
But now that he knew her better, it was hard not to see things from her perspective. “So what happens now? We speak with the new head of the Sûreté to find out where your brother has gone?”
“Actually . . . um . . . I was thinking we should talk to Vidocq first.”
The nervousness in her voice put him on edge. “Why? If Tristan works for the Sûreté, then they’re more likely to know where he went on his last case.”
“Well, yes, but the new head of the Sûreté doesn’t exactly like Tristan.”
Maximilian scowled at her. “Why does that not come as a surprise?”
The moon through the window cast a soft glow on her tense features. “My point is, the minute a duke of your consequence starts asking questions—”
“You’re afraid I’ll get your brother dismissed.”
“Well, you did just say that you would.”
“I was angry. And I was speaking of what I would have done before.”
“But not now?” When he didn’t answer, she added, “Vidocq is more likely to know where Tristan is, anyway. They are great friends and Tristan wouldn’t take on any big case without talking to Vidocq. The Frenchman has such excellent instincts, and he is so knowledgeable about—”
“You just want to see Vidocq again,” he snapped. “Admit it.”
A frown furrowed her brow. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“Oh yes you do. Vidocq is more charming than I am, more knowledgeable, more brilliant.” Driven once more by a jealousy he was at a loss to comprehend, he shifted to the seat beside her so he could glare down at her. “Clearly you can’t wait to see him again.”
She gaped at him. “You’re utterly mad.”
“Yes, I am. You make me so, every time you open your mouth and start praising that bloody Frenchman.”
“Oh, so now you’re going to blame me for your surly—”
He cut her off with a kiss. A hard one, born of jealousy and bad temper and a need to blot Vidocq out of her mind.
But it only took a moment for it to turn into something more. A real kiss, born of obsession, need, and bone-deep desire. God, it was sweet to kiss her again. So bloody sweet.
Hooking his hand behind her neck, he held her still while he molded her mouth with his, exulting when she moaned and parted her lips. At once, he deepened the kiss, driving his tongue deep, claiming her in the only way she would let him, the only way he should let himself.
For a long moment, there was no sound in the carriage but that of his roaring pulse in his ears as he drank from her mouth over and over, reveling in the heady taste of her, the scent of French perfume in her hair, the feel of her hands clutching his coat, drawing him closer.
Suddenly she thrust him away. She stared at him, her eyes wide and wary, her breath coming in urgent gasps. “We said no more kisses. You promised.”
“You promised never to lie to me,” he countered. “You broke your promise.”
“No,” she whispered. “I never once lied to you, I swear. Not once.”
He wanted to argue the point, but as he thought back over their conversations, he couldn’t remember her ever speaking any actual lies. Still, that didn’t change anything. “You may not have lied, but you deceived me about your brother, which is practically the same thing.”
“No, it’s not. Strictly speaking, I followed our agreement to the letter.”
“Then strictly speaking, I will follow our agreement to the letter, too.”
Hauling her onto his lap so that she faced away from him, he clamped one arm about her waist to hold her still.
“What do you think you’re doing?” she protested as she tried to wriggle free.
He pressed his lips to her ear. “We agreed to no kissing, but we said nothing about touching. And if you can call it fair to deceive me, then I can call it fair to touch you.”
Then he swept his hand up to cup her breast inside her cloak. She froze. He didn’t wait for her protest; he just fondled her shamelessly, teasing her nipple to a taut little point through her gown. Ever since last night, he’d been haunted by half memories of what he’d done, how she’d felt in his arms. So this time, by God, he was going to do it while he could remember it.
He half expected her to argue or at least make some attempt to break free. But she just sat there breathing hard. The more he caressed her, the more she arched back against him, her hands digging into his thighs.
“Max,” she said hoarsely, “you shouldn’t . . . you oughtn’t . . .”
“Yet I am,” he murmured against her ear. “And you like it, too—admit it.”
Sliding his hand over to caress the other breast, he tugged at her ear with his teeth. The little whimper she gave in response fired his blood almost as much as the feel of her lovely breast filling his hand.
“You probably don’t remember,” she choked out, “but last night I swore . . . I’d box your ears if you ever . . . grabbed my bosom again.”
“I remember. I just don’t care. Besides, you can’t reach my ears,” he murmured, feeling cocky now that he had her melting in his arms. “And you don’t want to box them anyway, do you?”
She twisted her head to look up at him, her breath a rapid staccato. “I want . . . I want . . .”
“Tell me what you want, dearling, and I’ll give it to you.” He released a long, shuddering breath. “You feel like heaven in my hands. Pure heaven. I’ve wanted to do this practically from the moment I saw you . . .”
Her eyes were lost and luminous in the moonlight. “Liar,” she whispered. “You wanted to throttle me.”
“Only so I could get my hands on you. I wanted to touch you so badly I could hardly think straight.” He slipped his hand down her leg so he could inch her skirts up. There was more he wanted to touch. “Last night was sheer torture . . . unbuttoning your gown . . . unlacing your corset . . . You may not realize it, but I was the one who did that while you slept. Not some servant.”
“I know,” she said, surprising him.
“But you have no idea what I suffered doing it. Why do you think I went to the taproom and drank myself silly? So I wouldn’t climb into bed with you and put my hands all over you, the way I wanted to when I was unlacing you.”
“I kept expecting you to. I waited for you to . . .” she whispered.
“You were awake?” he said incredulously.
“Part of the time. I held my breath and waited to see what you would do . . . I was so afraid . . .”
He froze just as his hand brushed her stocking-clad knee . . . “Surely you know I would never harm you, dearling.”
Her eyes met his. “That’s not what I was afraid of. I was afraid that if you climbed into bed with me and put your hands all over me, I might just . . . let you.”
His heart thundered in his ears. She desired him. What’s more, she was admitting she desired him.
That was all it took to have him kissing her again. She was in his arms now, and he desperately wanted, needed, a taste of her. So to hell with their stupid bargain. He had her now, and he wasn’t letting her go until he got his taste.
11
CLEARLY LISETTE’S EARLIER headache had turned her good sense into Swiss cheese. That was the
only explanation for why she was letting Max caress and kiss her.
He called you dearling. Twice.
The absurdity of that thought made a laugh bubble up in her throat, but his kisses were so fierce and ravenous that it died there. She shouldn’t care about such a silly thing as an endearment.
But she did. Max wasn’t angry. He wasn’t holding her prisoner or retaliating. He was kissing her as if she held the key to the meaning of life, as if he meant to gain it by making her desire him madly.
His hand slid between her legs and inside the slit in her drawers, startling her. “Max!”
“Let me give you pleasure, dearling,” he said hoarsely, melting her objections again with that one sweet word. “Let me show you what desire feels like.”
Then he cupped her tender parts, and every inch of her leapt into high alert. “Oh, Lord . . . Max . . .”
He began to rub her there, stroking her so devilishly that she groaned. Did he know how it made her yearn for more?
“You like that, do you, minx?” he said in a self-satisfied tone.
Oh yes, he knew. “It’s . . . very . . . interesting . . .”
“Interesting, hmm.” He teased her mercilessly. “I can do this all night. Admit it. You like it.”
“You’re a devil.” She dug her fingers into his arm. “All right, yes . . . I like it. Please . . . Max . . . please . . .” She didn’t know what she was begging for. All she knew was there was more. She could sense it, feel it, just beyond her.
“I’ll do whatever you wish, dearling. Just tell me one thing.” He raked kisses down her jaw to her throat. “Did I really have you on my lap last night?”
His hot caresses made it hard for her to think. She fought to clear her mind. “Yes . . . On your lap . . . yes . . .”
“Like this?”
“No!”
“Thank God. I’d want to remember that, for damned sure.”
She choked out a laugh. Then his finger slipped inside her where she felt aching and slick and hungry, and her amusement turned to pure hot desire. He slid his finger in and out, playing with the little button there, making her squirm and press against his hand like a shameless wanton, wanting more.
The Duke's Men [1] What the Duke Desires Page 15