Her flush deepened. “It’s part of the show.”
“It’s a rare skill, and one you exploit to amazing lengths. I’d love to know how you do it.”
Violet glanced up at him, the wariness back in her eyes. She might be deceitful, but she wasn’t sly. She was deceitful out of necessity, not enjoyment.
Daniel wanted to find out all about her, and not only because he was curious. Since the age of fifteen and his first tumble with a lass, Daniel hadn’t been short of female company. Women were his for the taking, whenever he reached out his hand. His uncle Mac laughed that Daniel was carrying on the Mackenzie family tradition. Women wanted the Mackenzie men—that was easy. In matters of the heart, however, the Mackenzies fought long and hard battles.
So Daniel was beginning to understand. Violet was different from his previous lovers, and not only because she was a few years older than Daniel or any more or less respectable than his usual sort of woman. Violet Bastien—or whatever her name was—was different because she was Violet.
Since he’d seen her standing in the dining room of her London house, girding herself to face Mortimer and his friends, Daniel had wanted her. Even now, he wanted to carry her off to his hotel, peel back her plain and sensible clothes, and discover the lush woman beneath. He wanted her in his bed, to scent her ready for him, to taste her skin and mouth, to feel her around him.
Daniel craved her, and he would have her before he left France.
The boardinghouse they reached was clean, neatly painted, and respectable. Lights glowed in the upstairs rooms as well as in the downstairs parlors. “Thank you,” Violet said, stopping. “I’ll go in alone.”
“Right you are.” Daniel released her and tipped his hat. “Good night, Miss Bastien. I’ll keep calling you that until I learn another name.”
Violet gave him a nod, her face softening. “Good night, Mr. Mackenzie. I truly am glad you are well.”
“Glad because I won’t come down upon you with the full extent of the law? You’re lucky I’ve got so much kindness in my heart.”
Violet’s glare returned with his teasing. “I am glad, for your sake. But you may think what you like. Good night.”
She spun away and made for the door to the boardinghouse, her head high. Her skirts swayed enticingly across her hips, her upright stride a joy to watch.
Violet didn’t look back at Daniel as she opened the door to the boardinghouse with a little jerk and walked inside.
She was good. She was very, very good. Daniel smiled at the closed door, tipped his hat again, and walked on down the street as though satisfied.
When he came to a narrow passage between houses on the opposite side of the street, he stepped into the shadows, drew out a cigarette, lit it, fixed his gaze on the boardinghouse, and waited.
Ten minutes, he gave her. Enough time for Daniel to make it to a main thoroughfare and hire a carriage to take him to his hotel.
After ten minutes had gone by, Daniel dropped the spent cigarette and ground it out under his boot heel. At the same time, Violet walked out of the boardinghouse again. She looked up and down the street, scanning every shadow, before she started walking back the way they’d come.
Clever lass.
Too bad for her that Daniel knew this city so well. As a boy, he’d managed more than once to follow his father to the Riviera, despite Cameron’s efforts to leave his son behind. Daniel had learned how to coerce others to get him to the Continent, and when he was a little older, to buy his own tickets and come himself. He’d spent many an evening surreptitiously following his father around Marseille, hurt because his dad would rather take up with fancy women than sightsee with his son. Therefore, Daniel knew exactly how to weave through the streets to reach the main avenue before Violet did. Again, he ducked into a doorway and waited.
She turned onto the street, walking briskly, determination in her stride. When Violet reached the doorway where Daniel hid, he stepped out in front of her.
“Now then, Mademoiselle,” he said, grinning at her. “How about we walk to where you really live?”
Chapter 9
He’d drive her mad. Violet’s heart thudded as she stared at Daniel, with his captivating smile, his warm eyes, and his uncanny ability to predict her every move.
Never let anyone know all about you, Jacobi had stressed.A person who knows your secrets has a powerful hold over you. If you never let yourself be known, you will always be free.
Daniel was so tall. He stood, unmoving, not about to let her walk around him. Or he might, then catch her with his strong arm and pull her back again.
Violet wet her dry lips. “Why must you know? Surely it makes no difference whether I stay in this boardinghouse or that boardinghouse . . .”
“It makes a difference to you,” Daniel said. “Your key will work only in the right door, for one. And you’d keep all your things in one place, wouldn’t you? Unless you have a network of rooms all over the city. That is handy, I admit. I often keep several places at once for stashing things.”
She tried to put on a lofty look. “Why do you care, Mr. Mackenzie?”
“Because you do. And because I want you to get home safe. Now, come on.” He held out his arm. “If we debate in the street, that nice policeman over there will come and tell us to move on, or maybe arrest us for breaking the peace. And the police would be sticklers about finding out your name, your nationality, where you come from, why you’re here. Safer to walk home with me, isn’t it?”
Daniel held out his arm, so polite, so gentlemanly, but behind the courteous gesture was a man of ruthless intent. He wanted to know all about her, and by God, he was going to find out.
Violet made a noise of exasperation, turned from his extended hand, and started striding back the way she’d come.
Daniel easily fell into step with her, strong fingers coming around her arm. “So, did you bring it with you?” he asked.
“Bring what?”
“The wind machine. I want to borrow it.”
He was too close to her. Violet easily smelled the scents that clung to him—smoke, the remnants of whiskey, the musk of himself under his wool coat. The scents made her remember how he’d leaned to her in the upstairs room in London, how he’d tasted her mouth, how he’d stunned her with the brief, warm press of lips.
“Borrow it why?” she managed to ask.
“Because I’m working on something, and I want to see if it will help me. Or give me a clue as to what would. If you don’t want to let the thing out of your hands, you can come with it.”
“Come with it where?”
“Little town about twenty miles from here, down the coast. Have a friend who will let me use his workshop. How about it? Tomorrow?”
The man was maddening. Violet was curious now as to what he was building, and how he just happened to have a friend with a workshop twenty miles down the coast from where Violet was staying. Did he know that the workings of engines and devices fascinated her? How exactly to entice her?
Not being able to read him was a terrible disadvantage. When Daniel spoke of machinery, his eyes lost their predatory look, and his focus changed. That he was interested in her wind machine was plain. And he was right that she didn’t want to let it out of her sight, because it had been expensive to build, and she’d tinkered with it until it did exactly what she wanted.
“I can’t,” Violet said flatly as she strode along. She tried to set a swift pace so he’d grow bored and go away, but Daniel walked along beside her without even breathing hard. “I signed a contract with the concert hall. I have performances to do.”
“Not tomorrow, you don’t. I heard you tell the audience Saturday. Tomorrow is Tuesday. Plenty of time.”
“My mother needs me for her private consultations. The machine is handy then.”
Daniel shrugged, walking close enough to her that she felt the movement. “Make all the consultations for later in the week. I’m right that you handle all the appointments, aren’t I? She’d we
lcome the rest, I’d wager.”
“Blast you.” Violet clenched both hands now. She wanted to go with him, to see what he was building, to find out what on earth he needed her wind machine for.
But how gullible was she? If Violet went somewhere with this man alone, he could take her anywhere, do anything to her, and Violet could do nothing about it. She was as helpless with him as she’d been with Mortimer.
“Blast me all you want,” Daniel said. “But bring the wind machine. This will be interesting.”
He was so easy, so casual. As though Violet could throw everything to the wind and run off with him, instead of stay in the boardinghouse looking after her mother, doing the accounts, paying the bills, setting appointments. Her life was real life. Daniel’s was . . . a fantasy.
The eager girl in her, the one who’d been interested in life in all its variety, longed to go with him. The woman Violet had become advised caution.
“So it’s arranged,” Daniel said, meeting her gaze. “I’ll call for you tomorrow—with a cab this time, and tickets for the train. I’m not walking all the way to my friend’s workshop.”
“I haven’t said I’d go.”
“But you want to.” Daniel’s grin told her he knew he was right. “You’re curious. Think on it tonight, and I’ll call on you tomorrow. Either way, I want to borrow your device. Better you come with me to make sure I don’t damage it. Or I might take a liking to it and decide to keep it.”
Violet stopped abruptly, this time in front of the boardinghouse where she and her mother truly stayed. She hoped Daniel had no intention of following her in. Her landlady had a strict no gentlemen policy—fine with Violet—and she couldn’t risk them all being turned out.
“Must you always have everything your own way, Mr. Mackenzie?”
“Aye, I think so. For a long time I was an only child, and you know how spoiled they get to be.”
Violet ignored the glint of humor in his eyes. She was an only child herself, but she’d never had the chance to be spoiled. “You said you had a ‘wee baby sister.’”
“Aye, and a little brother even more wee. Best thing that ever happened to an only child, Dad marrying again and having more children.” Daniel shook his head. “The trouble those two can get into and blame on me is beautiful to behold. I’ll introduce you sometime. They’d like you.”
The offhand way he spoke about Violet interacting with his family—his wealthy, powerful, untouchable family—unnerved her. Such people had nothing to do with young women like Violet.
Violet hadn’t known much about Daniel before he’d turned up at her house in London, but since then she’d made it a point to find out as much about him and his family as she could. The Mackenzies were well known not only for their money and standing, but for the scandals they’d engendered. Not one of the four Mackenzie brothers had managed to marry without some kind of scandal, and the two older brothers—one of whom was Daniel’s father—had taken some of the most notorious courtesans in England as their lovers. One of the younger brothers, Mac, had become a painter, living the most open life in Paris. He’d even taken his young wife among the artists and their models, before she’d left him. The youngest brother was said to be insane, though he too was now married and had children.
Daniel was gaining his own notoriety. He’d taken a degree in Edinburgh so quickly that everyone remarked on it, and had traveled extensively through Germany and France in the years since, meeting inventors and eccentric scientists.
Not that he wasn’t decadent as well. Daniel usually had a woman with him, from all reports—never the same one twice—and the three-day-long crushes he hosted in whatever house in whatever city he happened to be living in were not for the faint of heart.
Daniel had plenty of money—his mother’s family had put a fortune in trust for their daughter, which Cameron had been unable to touch, and Daniel had inherited it. He’d always had a generous allowance, but came into the full money of the trust when he’d finished university.
As far as Violet was able to make out, Daniel was a man who lived as he pleased, did what he wanted, then moved on to his next interest, next town, next woman. The likelihood of Violet meeting his pampered little sister and brother was so small she didn’t bother to answer the suggestion.
But she made her decision. “Very well, Mr. Mackenzie. Call tomorrow morning at ten o’clock, and I will place my device in your hands. I will require a receipt. And its replacement if damaged.”
Daniel’s eyes warmed with his smile. “That’s more like it. I’ll be here.”
Violet gave him a nod and tried to step away, but Daniel’s strong hand closed around her elbow, keeping her in place.
“Good night, lass. Sleep well.” Instead of letting her go, he kept hold of her and brushed his thumb lightly over her lower lip.
The warmth in the touch made her shake. Violet had always held herself rigid, because she had to. Any bending or breaking would be disastrous for her.
Now Daniel stood close and merely touched her, fingertips sending a trickle of fire through every nerve. If Violet leaned into his tall body, she’d just fit under his chin. His large arms would come around her, pulling her close, keeping her safe.
The image of him holding her was so palpable that when Daniel removed his touch from her face, Violet was startled to find herself standing a foot away from him. So much empty space between them . . .
She cleared her throat. “I truly am pleased you’re all right.”
Daniel’s amusement vanished to be replaced by something dark and dangerous. “You know, lass, I think that’s the sincerest thing you’ve said all night.”
Violet pulled back, uncertain how to respond. She swallowed, trying to keep her voice steady. “Well, good night, Mr. Mackenzie.”
His gaze held her as solidly as an iron chain. “Good night, lass.” Even though he wasn’t touching her, Violet couldn’t move until he released her.
As he had at the other boardinghouse, Daniel stepped back and tipped his hat, then stood still, waiting for her to go inside. This time he didn’t smile, but watched her with his unnerving scrutiny.
Violet finally made herself turn away and walk the few steps to the house. Her hand trembled on the door latch, and she found the door locked.
A maid answered her knock immediately and let her in. The foyer was bone cold, but Violet was still hot from Daniel’s touch.
She went up the stairs, clutching the wooden railing for balance. Once inside her bedroom, in their little suite of rooms, Violet moved to the front window and lifted the curtain to look out.
Daniel was still there, scanning the windows, waiting to make sure she’d gone into the right boardinghouse this time. He saw Violet, broke into his smile, and gave her a lazy salute. Violet lifted her hand in farewell, then forced herself to let go of the curtain, cutting off Daniel from her sight.
Daniel arrived at precisely ten the next morning to be ushered into a dreary parlor on the ground floor. He’d had to talk swiftly to be admitted at all, but finally the landlady agreed that Violet could speak to him in the parlor, if they kept the door open, and he departed right away.
Two middle-aged ladies fled through a far door as he was let into the parlor from the hall—probably nothing masculine had walked into this room in a decade. He heard whispers and giggles from behind the cracked-open door, which he pretended to ignore.
This parlor was not as crowded with keepsakes as the sitting room at the Mortimer house in London had been, but there were enough tables draped with cloth and covered with trinkets that would make brushing past them a disaster. Daniel navigated the safest path he could to a side chair under a gaslight, where he sat, pulling his kilt modestly over his knees. The giggling intensified. Likely the ladies had never seen a man in a skirt before.
Violet walked into the parlor, thanking the severe-looking landlady who had come with her to it. Giving the far door a hard look, Violet moved to Daniel, who had sprung to his feet.
&nbs
p; “You are punctual,” she said.
“One of my many skills,” Daniel said, trying not to be obvious about feasting his eyes on her. “Punctuality.”
Violet didn’t look as refreshed from a night’s sleep as she might. Her eyes were red-rimmed, though her hair was pulled neatly into her pompadour, her shirtwaist buttoned to her chin, her skirt holding nary a wrinkle. Even with her slightly haggard look, her skin was flawlessly smooth, and her eyes—those dark blue eyes that could reach a man’s soul—fixed on him and wouldn’t let him go.
Violet held out a wooden box about two feet wide and one high, with heavy hinges and a sturdy clasp. “Take good care of it. It cost me a bit.”
“Oh, I will, lass.” Daniel took the box, unfastened the clasp, and peeked inside. The machine didn’t look like much—a metal casing, fan blades showing through a cage, and a few wires.
Violet gave the box an anxious glance as Daniel closed it, as though she’d handed a stranger her only child. “What will you do with it?”
“See if it will enhance an engine idea I have. I don’t have the engine here, but my friend down the coast has something close, and a vehicle for testing it. He’s letting me loose on it with my theories today, trusting man.”
“What kind of vehicle?” Violet asked, interested. “Is it a motorcar?”
The excitement in the question changed her. For a moment Violet the careful woman vanished, as did the Violet who used blunt rejoinders to keep those who might hurt her at bay. Daniel liked this Violet, curious and interested.
“Not a motorcar. I haven’t finished building mine. When I do . . . that will be a fine day.”
“What, then?”
Violet’s eagerness was unmistakable, as was the wistfulness with which she looked at the box. Daniel caught her hand in a sudden, hard grip.
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