by Sharon Green
His furious anger shocked Rianne, coming out as unexpectedly as it had. She'd seen the man angry before, even out of control as he'd been the previous night during their lovemaking, but this -
And then she understood. Machlin was feeling guilty about not having been there from the first when she'd needed him, and so had taken to blaming her in order to ease his conscience. Considering what he'd done afterward it was ridiculous for him to feel that way, most especially since it put her in such an uncomfortable position. She admired the man for being so concerned about a woman under his protection, but concern wasn't what she wanted from him, nor was pointless scolding.
"Stop it!" Rianne shouted back almost immediately, struggling to pull free. "Just because you're feeling guilty doesn't mean I have to take this! There was no way either of us could have known a simple conversation would turn out so badly, so stop blaming yourself for almost not being there. God knows I don't blame you, so why must we have these hysterics?"
He stared down at her for a moment, those gray eyes filled with such fury she thought he would explode. Then, with great effort, he regained his usual, rigid control.
"So to you I'm having hysterics," he said, the words so flat Rianne almost flinched. "It's nothing but guilt moving me, and you see no reason for it. I don't happen to agree, but we won't go into that now. What we will go into is the question of why you risked your life. Didn't you promise to do no such thing?"
"Why do you refuse to understand that I didn't deliberately risk my life?" she demanded, wishing he would stop looking at her like that. "And I admit I promised to obey you, but you have to admit I didn't disobey. You didn't tell me not to talk to Tremar, now did you? In fact, we'd agreed we had to talk to him no matter what. Isn't that the reason we went there in the first place?"
"Stop looking so triumphant," he ordered, obviously completely unimpressed. He wasn't holding onto her arms any longer, but that wasn't the comfort Rianne thought it should have been. "You know very well I didn't want you taking any risks at all, and we were supposed to have approached Tremar together. You deliberately went ahead without me, and that is my definition of disobedience."
"But you can't send me back to your other house," she said as quickly as possible, suddenly terrified that he would do exactly that. "Tremar never would have identified the quarry for you, he was much too frightened of the man. If the others are the same, and there's no reason to believe they won't be, that leaves me as the only one able to identify him. Without me, you'll never find him."
"Under certain circumstances I'd be willing to accept that," he said, the meaningless words almost a mutter. "If there was any chance he would go away and never come back… But there is no chance of that, and very soon he'll come to realize the very thing you just said. There's no question that tonight's events won't get back to him, and he's sure to hear stories about Harding's stepdaughter. You're the only one he really has to worry about now, the only one who not only can, but is willing to identify him. If I send you back alone he'll find some way to reach you, so that means I have to keep you here, where I can watch you myself and keep you safe. But that's also a problem. The second most important aim of your life seems to be the risking of that life, and I refuse to allow it. I'll have to do something else to be certain you're protected."
"What sort of something else are you talking about?" Rianne asked, bothered by the determination she could see in those gray eyes. "You know I won't stand for high-handed treatment, so what do you intend to do?"
"You'll find out," he said, then turned away from her to walk to the decanter of fruit juice and began to pour himself a glass. Rianne waited for him to add to what he'd said, but he didn't. Three small, uninformative words, and he refused to add to them!
"You can't just leave it like that," she said, watching him drink the juice he'd poured. "If you're going to threaten me with something, you have to tell me what the something is, or else the threat will be ineffective."
"I wouldn't dream of threatening you," he returned, the most infuriating blandness covering him all over. "You're my wife, after all, and a lady. No gentleman would ever threaten a lady."
"That didn't stop you the night before our wedding day!" Rianne snapped, seeing the same blandness in his gaze when he turned back to look at her. "If you could do it then, you can do it now."
"The night before our wedding day I threatened a female highwayman, not a lady and not yet my wife," he corrected mildly. "Tonight, all I've done is make up my mind about something. That can't possibly be considered a threat, so the question doesn't arise."
"Then tell me what it is that you've made up your mind about," she said through clenched teeth, fighting the urge to shout. "If this whole thing is so innocent, you shouldn't mind discussing it."
"Oh, I don't mind discussing it," he answered immediately, full innocence now joining the blandness. "It's just that discussion is so unnecessary, when you will find out all about it. Are you ready for bed now? We've both had a very long day."
Rianne couldn't hold back a sound that was a mix of infuriated frustration and a growling desire to commit serious bodily harm. He had no intention of telling her what she wanted to know, and any more words would be more of a waste than the ones she'd already spoken. In high fury she stalked past him to the bed, really wishing he was more the size of the men who had been her suitors. If he was, she was angry enough to have knocked him to the floor, then jumped up and down on his prostrate body.
It didn't take long before Rianne was in bed, and once Machlin drained his glass of juice he went around turning out lamps. Rianne lay on her side, hating him with every ounce of passion she possessed, determined not to acknowledge his existence in any way whatsoever.
Soon the room was completely dark, except for the slightly lighter black of the night coming in through the open terrace doors. Rianne expected to hear him leave, and was startled when she felt him climbing under the quilt instead. Her body flared instantly with desire, turning her mind wide-eyed with shock. She couldn't want him after the way he'd behaved, it just wasn't possible! And he couldn't be barbaric enough to expect that she would…
And he didn't expect it. His hand came first to her arm, stroking gently, probably to see if she would flinch away. When she couldn't make herself do so, the hand slid down her arm to her side, and then to her thigh. Her nightgown skirt was raised slowly and deliberately, giving her more than enough chance to protest, but that, too, was beyond her. The heat of his flesh had set hers afire, and it was all she could do not to move under its caress.
And then the hand was under her skirt, sliding between her clenched thighs to the secret she would rather have kept. Her body flowed with eagerness for him, and when his fingers thrust gently in to discover that, she wailed. She hadn't wanted him to know how weak and idiotic a female she was, how she couldn't even refuse him after he infuriated her. She expected him to laugh, to gloat in his triumph, but all he did was sigh as he turned her toward him.
"Don't cry, wife," he whispered as he held her tight in those arms, misinterpreting the sound he'd heard. "It isn't as bad as all that, and I'll try to make it even better. Don't cry, Bryan will make it all better."
And then his lips came to hers, unaware of the fact that they'd just spoken a lie. Bryan would make it worse rather than better, but he had no way of knowing that. A moment ago she'd wanted to murder him, but one touch of his hand had made her his without question. It was just as she'd feared might happen, she'd fallen in love with him. But he didn't love her, and once they'd caught the man they were after, he would return her freedom as Mrs. Raymond had said he was prepared to do. She would be alone in that freedom, once again facing the loss of someone who meant everything to her, but right now she lay in his arms. That reality forced away the awareness of everything else, thrust all regret behind her as she instantly merged with him.
Much later, after Machlin had fallen into an exhausted sleep beside her, she lay there and wept. This time the loss would be un
ending agony, but there was nothing she could do to stop it. Nothing … nothing … nothing…
Chapter Fifteen
Bryan was up early the next morning, taking breakfast alone in the small dining room. Rianne had still been sleeping when he left her, snuggled under the quilts against the gloomy damp coming in through the windows. It was raining right now, and would probably continue to do so for the rest of the day.
Bryan filled a plate and sat with it, then ignored it in favor of the coffee he'd poured. He had a busy day ahead of him, but somehow he wasn't ready to start it. His mind was still on the night before, and the fact that he'd just posted two men outside under the girl's windows. A third would check on them every ten minutes to make sure they weren't eliminated without him knowing about it, but he still wasn't satisfied. Only catching the quarry would turn that trick, and they were still too far from doing it.
But also too near. Bryan toyed with the food on his plate, scattering rather than eating. After last night he knew it would only be a little while before the man they were after would turn to face them. They'd penetrated too far toward his identity for him to feel safe even if he ran, since he couldn't afford to run far. To be completely safe he'd have to abandon his very lucrative business of theft, and Bryan didn't believe he would do that. Destroying his pursuers would seem like a better idea to him, and for that he would have to turn and fight.
So they would soon catch up to him, and then they would either win or lose. If they lost they would both most likely be dead, but if they won - Bryan would still lose. His wife would no longer be his wife, but trying to avoid a final confrontation would solve nothing. The girl's life would be in danger as long as their enemy remained alive, and Bryan would sooner lose his own life than see hers taken.
"And that means I have to get to him as soon as possible," he muttered to the coffee in his cup. "But the sooner I get to him, the sooner I lose her. There's no way out, especially not after last night."
He leaned back in his chair and rubbed at his eyes, knowing how furious Rianne would he with him today. The decision he'd made had been to have her closely guarded by his men, but when she'd asked him what he meant to do he'd refused to answer. Some devil had jumped up and poked him, and the more she'd questioned him, the more he'd refused to answer. She'd been close to stuttering with rage when she went to bed, and then he'd compounded the torture by asking her to make love to him. She'd continued to uphold her end of their deal by complying, but that wailing sound she'd made had shown how mortified she felt. She'd never forgive him for doing that to her, and he had only himself to blame.
Even though it had probably been hurt rather than a devil that had made him do it. It tore him apart that she hadn't even remembered about him when she was in danger. She thought he felt guilty about almost losing her to that torturer's blade, when he'd never been so terrified in his life. How could she pretend she didn't know what he was going through…?
"Pardon me, sir, but Mr. Michaels is here," Harris said, interrupting his rampaging thoughts. "He wonders if it's too early for you to receive visitors."
"He wonders if it's early enough for him to invite himself to breakfast," Bryan corrected with a smile. "You know how he loves Cook's efforts. Show him in, Harris."
The man bowed acknowledgment of the order, and a moment later Jack was striding into the room. His morning coat was rain-spotted here and there, but otherwise he was as impeccably dressed as ever.
"Bryan, how good of you to invite me to breakfast," he said with a grin as he headed straight for the buffet. "I always miss your congenial company when you leave London."
"If it's my company you miss, why do you always come looking for it at mealtimes?" Bryan countered with a grin of his own. "Someone would think that what you miss is my food."
"Absolutely not, old friend," Jack denied with solemn assurance. "I would still continue to call on you even if you didn't have the best cook in the city. Since it's raining out, you should now know I'm not just a fair-weather friend."
"Forgive me for having doubted you, Jack," Bryan returned dryly as the other man brought a hasty plate to the table. "Are you here with news for me?"
"Of a sort," Jack agreed, going back for tea. "How can you drink coffee at such an early hour? It would have me all strung out before mid-afternoon."
"I picked up the habit in the colonies," Bryan answered. "Tea is less available out of the cities, and you're left with the choice of coffee or rotgut. Take my word for the fact that rotgut is very aptly named."
"I'll never understand how people put up with such a life," Jack said, almost serious for once as he returned with his tea. "The idea of having to leave the modern amenities and splendor of London for the squalor and struggle of the colonies… I would never survive, and probably wouldn't want to."
"People do what they have to when they have to," Bryan told him with a smile. "I'm sure you'd do just fine, Jack. In fact, you'd probably end up wealthy - if you could also manage to stop gambling. Have you found the second man on my list?"
"Yes and no," Jack replied around a mouthful of food. "After asking around, I discovered that Edmund Lawler is a leftenant in the military. He's known at one or two of the clubs who accept military rank as well as civil, and apparently he's on the brink of being promoted."
"But he still wasn't good enough to be invited out to Harding's place," Bryan commented, having finally started on his own food. "When will this up-and-coming military man be available for some conversation?"
"In about a month, when he returns from being on holiday," Jack responded, looking glum. "He was called away last night by a family emergency, and took advantage of accumulated leave. His squadron leader, a corporal Something-or-other, was quite firm about not mentioning where this emergency occurred. If I'd wanted to leave my card, the corporal would have been delighted to have it forwarded. He was most polite for such a beastly day."
"You saw him this morning?" When Jack nodded, Bryan did, too. "Well, that answers one of the questions about last night. The man did have someone at Alicia's, someone who lost no time getting him the word. Either he ordered Lawler away to save him for future use, or because his pet assassin would no longer be available to silence him if it became necessary. Don't bother to check on the third and fourth names, Jack. Crowns to pennies they've also been 'called away.'"
"What was that about Alicia's gathering?" Jack asked, finally paying more attention to the conversation than to his food. "You were supposed to see Tremar there, weren't you? Lydia did bring him?"
"He was there, and I did see him," Bryan agreed. "The only problem was, by then he was no longer in any condition to tell me things." He then ran through the official version of what had happened, just to get it straight in his memory. He'd certainly have to repeat it later, probably to one of Magistrate Fielding's people. When he was through, Jack looked at him strangely for a moment before shifting his gaze back to his plate.
"So the man went mad while speaking to your wife, and nearly caused her death," Jack summed up, sounding shaken. "If I'd known there was a possibility of that, I'd never have gotten you that invitation. And you say you're certain the man you killed was a creature of the one you've been after? How can you know that?"
"By the very fact that he killed Tremar," Bryan answered, unwilling to explain Rianne's recognition of the man. "Could it possibly be a coincidence that so weak a link was eliminated just as he was about to bring attention to himself? He was where he didn't belong, a place he'd been warned to stay away from. When he decided to go anyway, he signed his own death warrant."
"That man you're after must be quite ruthless," Jack said, apparently fighting a shudder. "And you killed one of his people. What's he likely to do now, do you think?"
"I have no idea," Bryan said, finally giving up on eating. "I don't even know what I'm going to do. I suppose I'm hoping he makes some kind of move. At least that way I'll be able to reply to it."
"Isn't there anything else I can do?" Jack a
sked, clearly concerned and anxious. "You know I want to be in on this with you, right to the very end."
"Yes, I do know, and I'm grateful for your help," Bryan said with a soothing smile. "If I think of anything, I won't hesitate to ask. Other than that, how have things been going for you?"
Jack smiled and began telling his usual lies about enormous gambling wins and the large number of women they attracted. He also finished what was on his plate, but didn't go back to refill it as he often did. He simply finished his tea, and then rose.
"Since you don't need me for anything, I'll be toddling along," he said, offering his hand. "To be absolutely truthful, I did leave the bed of a lady this morning to see to my duty. Now that that duty is discharged and I've been fortified as a reward, I'd like to return before she awakens. When sleep still clings to her, it's possible to coax her into doing the most … interesting things. We poor bachelors must settle for an occasional taste of what you married men feast on."
Bryan smiled as they shook hands, then saw him to the door before going back for another cup of coffee. The smile he'd produced had been a difficult one, the comment having reminded him how short a time he'd be doing his "feasting." For him that included pleasant conversation and honest laughter, but she wasn't likely to consider what he'd done last night amusing. He'd have to talk to her later, to see if apologizing would do any good. And he'd try to reassure her that she wouldn't be missing out on catching up to her enemy. Maybe that would make her less reckless, less ready to throw herself into the thick of things. He'd be happy even if it did no more than make her hesitate long enough for him to catch up. Assuming he was stupid enough to lag behind again…
He carried his second cup of coffee into his study, and once settled behind his desk he sent for his secretary, Jeffers Banyon. The man had a small, permanent office at the back of the house, and ran things for Bryan when he was away. Jeff was the perfect secretary: intelligent, efficient, and filled with a passion for order and simplicity.