Alec shrugged as he turned an ironic eye in Evie’s direction.
Disconcerted, Will took another good look at his fiancée.
And then another.
Christ.
Eden was pretending to be her sister. His instincts had told him that just a few moments ago, if he’d only been paying attention. When they were young, the girls had enjoyed teasing their family and friends by switching identities. It had worked with almost everyone—including him on more than one occasion. Their parents had rarely been able to tell them apart when they played their little charade.
Eden hadn’t fooled Alec, though, which was both interesting and annoying.
Will muttered a curse under his breath. What the hell was Evie up to, trying to pull something like this? Suddenly, the worry that had been dogging him all night began to make acute sense.
“Oh, I see,” Alec said with the ghost of a laugh. “Miss Eden has stepped in for her sister. How amusing, but I wonder what’s going on?”
“Let’s go find out,” Will said grimly, thrusting his way through the mob.
Chapter Sixteen
“Sure you don’t want me to stick around, miss?” The hackney driver rolled a wary eye around the deserted street. “This ain’t exactly the best part of town for a young lady like you.”
Evie smiled at the burly man as she handed him the fare. “Thank you, but no. I have friends inside who can see to my safe return home.”
He gave her a shrug, but stuffed the money into his pocket without further comment.
As the driver pulled out of the yard, Evie scurried to the back entrance of St. Margaret’s. A damp breeze swirled dust around her ankles. The air smelled dank and the night sky hunched over the city, the occasional flicker of lightning illuminating ugly black storm clouds. With her luck, she’d get a good soaking on the way home.
The door was unlocked. She breathed a sigh of relief that someone was still working in this part of the building and prayed it was Michael. She’d already wasted time waiting outside Albany, cooling her heels in the hackney after tipping the night porter to fetch her as soon as Michael returned to his apartments. After forty-five anxious minutes, she’d decided to proceed straight to St. Margaret’s. The cabbie hadn’t much liked driving into the London stews so late at night, and Evie certainly shared his trepidation. But, at that point, there’d been only one other choice for her.
That other choice was not one Evie was willing to accept, at least not yet. She would not allow Will to be bullied into a relationship he clearly didn’t want, despite his decision to do the honorable thing. He might enjoy kissing her, but Evie was certain he wouldn’t enjoy what came next—a marriage to a woman he’d rejected once already. Michael’s forgiveness was still her best chance to prevent disaster and spare Evie the humiliation of a husband who didn’t love her or want her.
She pulled the heavy oak door shut and hurried down the long corridor to the office. All was quiet, and her heart sank when she saw no light coming from under the parlor door. Just to be certain, she opened it and peeked in.
Blast.
Michael’s office was dark, as well. It would be just her vile luck to cross paths with him as he returned home to his rooms in Mayfair.
As she closed the door and waged a silent debate over her next steps, she heard the low murmur of voices drift up from the kitchen. Her spirits lifting—because Michael usually made tea when he was working late, often stopping to chat with the housekeeper—she hurried along the corridor and down the stairs, pushing through the swinging door into the low-ceiling room.
She paused on the threshold, one hand on the door, surprised to see Terence and Bridget O’Shay, along with three other men, seated around the scrubbed pine table in the center of the room. One man was vaguely familiar but the others were strangers—large, rather grim-visaged strangers who looked decidedly unhappy at her sudden appearance. Michael wasn’t present, nor was Mrs. Rafferty.
Evie frowned, disconcerted by the veiled hostility she sensed in the room. It felt as if she’d somehow interrupted some sort of dispute. The housekeeper never allowed meetings to be held in her spotlessly clean kitchen, since that’s what the classrooms are for she’d pointedly made clear on more than one occasion. Why would she allow this group, some of them strangers, to meet here, especially with neither Michael nor Father O’Kelley on the premises?
Bridget jumped to her feet, eyes wide and cheeks flushed a rosy pink. “Miss, I . . . we didn’t expect to see you tonight!” She made it sound like an accusation.
As Evie stepped down into the kitchen, Bridget hissed at her brother to stand up, jabbing him in the shoulder when he didn’t comply. A fierce glare directed at the other men had them loudly clattering their chairs back on the stone floor as they hastily rose. Terence merely sneered at Evie and crossed his hands over his shabby jacket. It was the sort of behavior she’d come to expect from him.
“I’m sorry if I’m disturbing you,” Evie said with a polite smile. “I was looking for Mr. Beaumont. Or Mrs. Rafferty. Has she already gone to bed?”
“Aye, she has gone up, Miss Evelyn,” said Bridget with a shy smile. “But she said she’d lock up once we finished.” She jabbed her brother in the shoulder again. “We were just leavin’. Ain’t that right, Terry?”
The big man scowled at his sister and shambled to his feet. “Aye, we was. Nothin’ more worth talkin’ about, as far as I can see.” His gaze flickered to the other men, and Evie got the distinct impression he was as unhappy with them as he was with her.
“Before you go,” Evie said firmly, “can you tell me if Mr. Beaumont was here this evening?”
Bridget bobbed her head like a nervous quail. “That he was, miss. In fact, he was the reason we was meetin’ tonight.”
Evie frowned. “Really? He never said anything to me, and I saw no mention of it in the meeting book.” Evie and Mrs. Rafferty shared responsibility for scheduling meetings for St. Margaret’s and the Hibernian Association. Very little took place that they didn’t know about.
Bridget shrugged. “I can’t say nothin’ about that, miss. You’d have to ask Mr. Beaumont.”
“I will,” Evie said, forcing a smile. She couldn’t avoid the feeling that something wasn’t right. It seemed out of character that Michael would leave the building while these people remained. Although most who used their services were hard-working, honest folk, there was the occasional hard case who could not be trusted.
Like Terence O’Shay.
“Can you tell me when Mr. Beaumont left?” she asked.
“About twenty minutes ago, miss,” said the man Evie thought she might have met before. He gave her a friendly smile.
Evie pondered what to do for a few moments, then decided to let all this pass until she could speak with Michael. “Well, if you’re finished with your meeting, I’d be happy to lock up.”
Bridget nodded. “And you’ll tell Mrs. Rafferty, miss? I wouldn’t want her bein’ angry with Mr. Beaumont for leavin’ early.”
“Of course—” Evie broke off when she heard the door swing open behind her. She glanced over her shoulder and almost fainted when she saw a man come stalking down the short flight of steps.
Will.
In his dress regimentals, he looked overdressed and incongruous in the humble setting but still managed to seem bigger and more dangerous than all the other men in the room, including Terence O’Shay. His blue eyes were as cold and unforgiving as a January sky, and his already-hard mouth pulled into an even harder line. Will had never been the sort to blow up when he got angry, preferring to reason his way out of arguments, but she was learning he could be a grim and formidable man when something displeased him.
Clearly, she’d displeased him a great deal.
“Will, er, Captain Endicott! How did you get in here?” she blurted out.
He came to a stop, toe-to-toe with her, looming in what she felt sure was a deliberate attempt to intimidate her. Evie’s anger began to stir as she remembe
red she had just as much cause to be annoyed with him as he had with her.
“You helpfully left the back door open,” he said sarcastically. “I was able to waltz right in without a lick of trouble.”
She winced. “Oh, yes, I suppose I forgot about that.”
His eyebrows crawled up his forehead. “You suppose? Have your wits gone begging? What if you’d been alone and someone besides me had decided to wander in? Someone harboring ill intent?”
“There’s no need to be rude,” she huffed. “Everything is fine, as you can see. And I’m not alone.” She glanced at Bridget and Terence. “I think you will remember Captain Endicott.”
“Oh, aye. He’s engraved on me bloody memory,” Terence drawled in an insolent tone.
Bridget shot her brother a stern look and dipped into a curtsey. “Yes, miss. Good evening, sir.”
Will gave her a slight jerk of the head that barely counted as a nod. “Having a meeting, Miss O’Shay? I hope I didn’t interrupt anything.”
The blatant suspicion in his voice had Evie darting a nervous glance around the room. Terence and the other men radiated waves of resentment. The sudden spike of tension in the room was disturbing, and it certainly hadn’t been a tea party before Will’s arrival.
She supposed she couldn’t blame these poor fellows. An army officer would likely make them uncomfortable, given the unfortunate history of those who frequented St. Margaret’s. She understood the travails their families had suffered under the boot heels of the king’s army, especially during the years of rebellion. She knew how long their memories were too.
“They were just leaving,” she said firmly. “Good night, everyone.”
The strangers practically scrambled over themselves to leave, but not Terence. He strolled out with an arrogant, almost carefree air that had Evie swallowing a sigh. No wonder the dratted man couldn’t hold on to a job. He apparently had a dreadful attitude toward every Englishman he met.
As Bridget scampered by, Evie stopped her with a touch on her arm. “I’ll see you this Sunday evening for sewing class, I hope.”
“Aye, miss, you will, and that’s a fact,” the girl all but babbled in her haste to be gone.
Evie nodded and let Bridget follow her companions. Their footsteps clattered on the stone floor of the corridor, then the slam of the back door signaled their departure. Silence fell over the room, broken only by the ticking of the small clock on the fireplace mantel and the hissing of banked coals in the grate.
She reluctantly met Will’s eye, not because she feared his temper but because she hadn’t seen him since that fraught scene last night. She’d been hoping to avoid him until after she’d had a chance to mend the breach with Michael and could assure Will that honor had been satisfied. Now, she was facing off with the man who assumed they would soon be wed. The fact that he was also the man who’d seen her half-dressed, her bosom overflowing her stays, didn’t help matters.
Shifting from one foot to the other, she tried not to feel like a child found guilty of bad behavior. “How did you find out where I was?”
“Edie told me.” He propped his hands on his lean hips and shook his head with disgust, exactly as if she were a naughty child needing discipline. “What the hell were you thinking?”
“About what, exactly?” She would hedge her bets until she could determine how bad things were—such as whether Mamma had also discovered their ruse.
He scoffed. “What do you think? About switching identities with your lamentable twin. Edie’s idea, I suppose.”
“Actually, it was mine.”
His eyes reflected his surprise, giving Evie a tiny surge of satisfaction. With Will, she usually felt two steps behind.
Not that her little victory truly mattered with disaster looming before her. “Does Mamma know? You didn’t say anything, did you?” She couldn’t keep a quaver of anxiety from her voice.
He shook his head and some of the tension seemed to drain from his big body. “Of course not, goose. I would never expose you in so reckless a manner to your dear mamma. The consequences don’t bear thinking about.” The look of genuine horror on his face almost made her laugh.
Almost.
“In fact,” he continued, tilting his head to peruse her from head to toe, “I almost didn’t see it myself. Edie’s very good at impersonating you, although her manner wasn’t entirely accurate.”
Evie was suddenly aware of how wobbly her legs felt. It probably resulted from a combination of anxiety and lack of sleep. She tottered to one of the kitchen chairs and sank into it. “We haven’t done it since we were girls, so she’s probably lost the hang of it.”
Will barked out a derisive laugh. “It was good enough to fool just about everyone, I assure you.”
“Then how did you know?” She knew her sister would not have betrayed her unless forced to.
“Alec saw it,” Will said, sounding disgusted. “Unlike me, he spotted the ruse right away, and from across the room, too.”
Evie widened her eyes. “How extraordinary. I must ask him how he managed it. His observations might come in useful next time.”
Will’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “There had better not be a next time, Evie.” When she started to protest, he held up a hand. “We can quarrel about that later, if you like. By the way, what were that lot doing here tonight? Were you meeting with them?”
He’d gone back to sounding hard and suspicious rather than immensely irritated. She peered at him, puzzled by the switch.
“Evie, what were they meeting about?” he asked with exaggerated patience when she didn’t respond right away.
She frowned. Why would Will even care? “Actually, I have no idea. I didn’t ask.”
“That’s just perfect,” he said. “Do you have any idea of what actually goes on around this place?”
She bolted up at that, anger giving her a fresh jolt of energy. “Of course I do, and I don’t know how it could be your business, anyway.”
“Everything about you is my business, now that we’re about to be married.” He sounded like he was strangling on the words. “Or have you forgotten that?”
“I haven’t forgotten anything, but I do not agree with your assessment of the situation,” she said in a haughty voice. Then she glanced at the clock and felt light-headed again for the second time that evening. It was terribly late, and she needed to get home before her mother and sister returned from the ball.
“Confound it,” she said, sighing. “Will, I need to get home. Since you’re here and acting so ridiculously protective, you might as well take me.”
“I have every intention of doing so, but first—”
She heard his muttered curse when she slipped past him up the stairs and out the door. She made it halfway down the hall before he caught up with her.
“Not so fast, my dear,” he said. “We’re not going anywhere until we have a few things sorted out.”
He clamped a gentle but firm hand on her arm, ignoring her protests as he steered her into the parlor, shutting the door to lean against it. She fumed silently even as she acknowledged that a big, irate, and very handsome man whom she was desperately in love with was a very effective means of blocking her escape.
Desperately in love with? Oh dear, that didn’t sound good, even in her head.
“This is ridiculous,” she said in a thin voice, trying to rally. “We have nothing to talk about.”
He gave a hoot of derisive laughter. “Try another one, my sweet.”
She crossed her arms, which brought his gaze flickering down to her chest. It also brought the blood rushing to her cheeks. She dropped her arms and planted her hands on her hips instead. Sadly, that failed to solve the problem because now Will’s gaze traveled slowly over her entire body, his eyes turning dark with heated interest.
Drat, drat, drat.
“All right, I suppose we do need to talk,” she said in a grumpy voice, trying to ignore her body’s response to the sensual intent she saw in his eyes. “But I
simply must get home before Mamma and Edie are back from the ball. Can’t we do this tomorrow?”
His gaze came back to her face and the heat faded. She didn’t know whether to be glad or sorry.
“No, because you’ll slip out first thing in the morning in another misguided attempt to speak with Beaumont,” he said. “I’m not letting you out of my sight until we reach an agreement.”
“The only agreement we’re going to reach is that we’re not getting married,” she retorted.
“To repeat, try another one, Evie. Because we certainly are getting married. I’ve discussed it with your parents, and they agree with me.”
She flung her arms out wide. “Well, you haven’t discussed it with me,” she shouted.
“Good God, you haven’t given me the chance,” he said, exasperated. “I’ve had to resort to hunting you down like a hound after a fox.”
She had to swallow hard against the tight feeling in her throat. If she’d needed any confirmation that he didn’t want to marry her, his words and the tone of his voice served quite well.
“And I’m beginning to feel like the fox, although it would appear that the hound isn’t actually very eager to catch her.” She pressed her lips tightly together, hating that she sounded so wounded. The scene held humiliating echoes of a moment she’d spent years trying to forget.
Will stared at her for a few seconds then let out a weary sigh. Only then did she notice the drawn look to his lips and the exhausted, hollow expression in his eyes. He looked as unhappy as she did, and that only made things worse.
He pushed away from the door and came to her. It took all her nerve not to retreat—or throw herself in his arms, seeking comfort. Long ago, the latter was what she would have done, at least until he’d gone away and forgotten her.
Reaching down, he took her hand, threading their fingers together. “Sweetheart,” he said in an infinitely gentle voice, “where in God’s name did you get that silly idea? I would think that after our encounter in your father’s library, you would understand the exact opposite is true.”
How to Plan a Wedding for a Royal Spy Page 22