Cloaked in Danger

by Jeannie Ruesch

  Cordelia’s hands gripped tighter on her cup. “Yes, I believe so.”

  Adam nodded. “Consider it done.” And after a few weeks without contact, Cordelia would move on. If she was capable of feeling affection for one man, she would feel it for another.

  Adam shrugged aside the sliver of guilt that pricked him. It was in the best interest of his family to remove Mr. Melrose from the situation completely. It protected everyone.

  He stood. It was early, yes, but damn it, he was going to stand on Aria’s doorstep until he got his answers.

  Chapter Twenty

  Aria winced at the brightness of the room. God, who had opened the drapes so early? As she turned away, it felt like fish were swimming in her head. Everything flooded back.

  She’d been drugged.

  Patrick.

  She slowly sat up, her arms shaky and weak, and gave herself a moment to adjust to the light. Her gaze landed on the breakfast tray sitting on the table before the fire.

  Did he think she was simply going to drink the tea again like a good little girl? She shook her head, pushed legs that felt like lead to the side of the bed, and stood on shaky knees. She had to move; she had to get dressed. She couldn’t stay here.

  Ignoring the tray, she went straight to the wardrobe and pulled out the first gown she reached. She had to find a way out of here. Dressing took far more energy and time than she wished, but eventually she worked her way toward the door.

  Her hand on the cool knob, she wiggled it and sucked in a breath of surprise. It turned, and the door slid open. She hurried into the corridor, each step helping her to clear her head. The narrow walkway was simply appointed, plain. She’d never been here, that much she knew. She’d never been to Patrick’s house—was it possible that’s where she was?

  Although warning bells clanged in her head that he wouldn’t go to so much trouble to get her here only to let her walk out the door, she made her way along the wall, and with a furtive glance to be sure she was alone, down the stairs.

  The house wasn’t overly large, and the stairs not terribly steep, but she clung to the railing anyway as she descended. They led into a small foyer, distinctly more opulently decorated than the upstairs.

  At the sight of the front door, with nary a person to be found, her heart thumped against her chest. Not wanting to question how she’d managed to get here without notice, she moved toward it as quietly as possible. The door was locked, as she had expected, so Aria slid her hand up and down the door, looking for latches, for anything to open it.

  Nothing. She tried the knob again and it refused to budge.

  There had to be a way out of this house.

  She moved into the next room, looking for windows that might possibly open. It was a parlor, with plush Turkish rugs, artwork and statues on every available wall or surface. And it contained three windows. She skirted around the couches and tables and at the window, placed a hand on the cool glass. These windows didn’t have bars on them, and a sudden burst of hope shot through her. If she could find something heavy, something that could break the window...

  She picked up a large Chinese vase. Would it be enough to crash through the window? And even if she did, would it break through the glazing bars the glass was set in? Or maybe she should keep looking for another way, one that wouldn’t create such a noise.

  “You do not want to throw that vase, Aria. It’s priceless.” Patrick’s smooth voice startled her, and she jumped, the vase almost slipping from her hands. Instead, she tightened her grip on it, swirled around and swung it directly at his head.

  Patrick jumped to one side, but not before the vase crashed into his arm and shattered. After a second, a small circle of blood appeared on his pristine white lawn shirt. He looked down at the pieces around him and his lips thinned, his fists gathered at his sides. “It took me years to acquire that.”

  At that, two men disguised as mountains flanked him.

  “Do you require escort now?” Aria asked, tilting her head at his burly, somewhat frightening bookends. The looming presences next to him weren’t identical, but they carried the same dangerous expression—one so void of emotion that Aria didn’t want to comprehend what they were capable of doing.

  “Aria, dear, sarcasm does not become you.” He bent down to pick up a large piece. “This particular vase was from the fourteenth century. I was very fond of it.”

  “I am very fond of my freedom,” she snapped. “Where am I? Why do you have a room decorated exactly like mine? How? You’ve never been in my bedroom.”

  He offered the smile that had so charmed her at one time. “You simply weren’t there when I visited. One of your housemaids is my hireling. She was placed to sketch your room in detail.”

  He had a...a what, a spy in her house? “Why?”

  “Your comfort, darling.” He picked up a few other pieces and set them on a table. At a flick of his wrist, a person in the corner of the room Aria hadn’t previously noticed stood up and left. Frustration swam and she fought the urge to scream. She’d never been alone.

  She needed to stop underestimating the man in front of her.

  Patrick drew her attention back by waving a hand around the room. “This house is to be our London residence. I know the neighborhood is far from fashionable, but for now, privacy is more important. Once we’re settled and left alone, I’ll secure something better. In the meantime, I’ve been having it decorated since the day I met you. I knew that very day that you would be mine.”

  “Funny, I don’t recall.”

  His lips thinned as he took steps toward her. She forced herself to stand still and keep her expression light. “Of course you do,” he murmured. “It was quite a moment for both of us.” He stopped close enough that the scent of musk with a hint of vanilla he’d always worn filled the air. He touched a curl at the side of her face. “You were much like your name, a woman meant for a god.”

  The implication was clear.

  A frown crept like a shadow across his face. “I had not intended to move so quickly, but a betrothal to another man? I cannot have people believe my bride is intended for another.” He fingered her curl and then dropped his hand.

  Aria’s patience snapped. “I told you I won’t marry you. I will, however, marry Adam. You have stepped far beyond what is acceptable, and I demand you return me home at once.”

  He chuckled, a light, airy sound that sent a chill down her back. “I do enjoy your spirit.”

  “I will never agree to marry you!”

  “Your lack of agreement won’t be a problem.”

  “And then what? You expect me to live as your wife? You’re mad.”

  “This house is fortified, and I have men guarding every entrance. There will be no way out, Ariadne, until you prove your loyalty.”

  The mere thought set her entire body shaking and she battled with the urge to throw everything she could grab at him and attempt to flee. “You won’t lock me up like an animal.”

  “When you are with child, you will be free to come and go, with escorts, of course. I know you will not abandon your baby.”

  The unflappable, matter-of-fact tone in his voice chilled her as the ugly reality of his plan set in. “Do you honestly believe my disappearance won’t be noticed? That during all of this, my family won’t come looking for me?”

  “I am banking on your disappearance being noticed,” he replied as he moved to sit in a nearby chair. “It is all planned, quite meticulously.” He pulled out a pocket watch, flipped it open, and then tucked it back into his coat. “In a few hours, I will be calling upon your house and be informed, to my concern, of course, that you have disappeared. I have booked you passage across seas, and the clerk at the shipping yard will be quite clear on the appearance of the woman who boarded that ship. Anyone who knows how foolish you can be will believe you’d leav
e to search for your father.”

  “Adam won’t.”

  “Adam,” he replied with a sneer, “will go after you, just as I predict.” He tsked. “You would not believe the violence and mayhem at the docks these days. Poor sod.”

  “You wouldn’t do that.” The words came with a horrified shake of her head.

  “You may as well accustom yourself to your new life. John is dying, your father is gone. Merewood will be dead by tomorrow. Soon there will be no one left.” Patrick made his way to the door.

  Words failed her as a hot, sticky need to stop him filled her. Grabbing the nearest item, she tossed it with a shriek. Grabbing another one, she threw that as well, not giving a damn where she hit. She needed to act, do something. She grabbed a third, and a meaty force ripped it from her hand. “Ow!” she cried as the thug bent her wrist back until it felt it would snap in two.

  “Enough.”

  At the soft order, Patrick’s guard dropped her hand. She fell off balance and landed with a thud against the table.

  “Give her laudanum, however necessary. I will not have her act this way.”

  “You can’t kill him!” she yelled as the mountain pulled out a vial and advanced toward her. She smacked a hand pointlessly against his massive paw. “I won’t let you drug me.”

  Patrick stood watching sentry, and Aria sensed a perverse enjoyment on his part as his thug grabbed her arm. She pulled back, only to yelp in pain as his fingers dug in and held on. “Patrick, stop this!”

  Patrick crossed his arms.

  The guard brought the vial up to her mouth. She turned her head away, side to side, to get away from the biting pain of his hand shoved against her lower lip, trying to dig open her mouth. She bit down, tasting the metallic of her own blood on her tongue.

  A sudden pain hit the back of her head and she realized he’d wrapped his fist in her hair and yanked her head back. Then his fingers pinched at her nose, and as the pressure built in her chest, she fought the primal need for air. Just hold on.

  She aimed her fists, hitting whatever she could. Her kicks bounced off his legs like a gnat against a window.

  The blackness circled the edges of her brain, her body fought. She gasped for air, sucking in as much as she could get before the vial of liquid was poured down her throat. The mix choked her, sending her into a fit of coughs that set every muscle inside her chest on fire.

  “Next time,” Patrick said calmly, watching from the door, “I suggest you not fight it.”

  He turned on his heel and after the guard ensured the medicine had gone down her throat—-burning a fiery path—he followed.

  She put a hand on the couch and pulled herself up. She didn’t have experience with drugs and had no idea how long it would take for it to take effect. But the fury coursing through her had taken no time at all.

  She took strides around the room. The image Patrick had conjured—Adam on the docks, unaware of what was to come...her throat swelled with words she wanted to scream, pain she wanted to roar. She may have fought her feelings for him the entire way, but they were there. He was there, and now she couldn’t imagine life without him.

  She missed a step, caught herself. Would the drug affect her so quickly? Or perhaps the shock of pain that still radiated from where clumps of her hair had to be missing. Urgency turned her in circles. She had to do something, anything. She couldn’t sit like a docile lamb and wait.

  Her fingers curled around the head of a small statue. She hurled it against the wall.

  One down. The rest of the bloody room to go.

  God, she hoped every bloody object was priceless.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  At precisely six minutes past the ten o’clock hour, Adam knocked firmly on the door of the Whitney house. He didn’t give a damn if he was there half a day before normal calling hours; he wasn’t going to wait any longer.

  Whitney’s butler appeared at the door. “My lord, calling hours are—”

  Adam shoved the door open, forcing the man to step backward. “I am here to see Miss Whitney and either you will go find her, or I’ll locate her myself.”

  With a pinched frown on his face, the butler turned toward the staircase and moved at a snail’s pace up the steps. Adam flexed his fingers, paced from one end of the foyer to the other and back again. He peered inside the parlor and when it appeared empty, continued down the corridor to the other ground floor rooms. After an interminable few minutes, Mrs. Whitney descended the steps, already dressed in a simple black muslin gown.

  “Lord Merewood, it is a little early to be calling.” Hiding a delicate yawn with her hand, she gave him a reproachful look reminiscent of the one she’d given when he’d come to ask for Aria’s hand

  Adam moved to offer her a hand off the last few steps. “I need to speak with Aria.”

  She held her hands out in a helpless gesture. “Aria is not here. She was already out of the house when I awoke.”

  “Are you certain she came home?”

  “I don’t see why she wouldn’t have.”

  A cold dread settled in Adam’s stomach. “I need to speak with your staff. All of them. As far as I can tell, no one has seen Aria since yesterday.”

  Emily offered a look of empathy. “Lord Merewood, Aria is, well, a bit difficult. She chafes at the restrictions of Society and London, which is understandable given her upbringing. It is why I had no questions about her part in what occurred between you. I am fully aware of Aria’s tendencies to act without thought. But when she encounters a situation she doesn’t like or she doesn’t get her way, she leaves. This is not the first time. It’s what she does.”

  “But has she been seen last night or this morning at all? By anyone?”

  “I haven’t asked.”

  The chords of tension in Adam’s neck pulled tighter. “Do you think you could gather your staff so I may ask them?” he asked with as much patience as he could muster.

  Mrs. Whitney stared at him for a moment, then shrugged. “Very well, but I am telling you, she will return on her own.”

  “You don’t appear to like your stepdaughter very much.”

  She let out of puff of air. “My feelings aren’t in question. Aria is not someone who effortlessly loves, or even likes. And I try to understand how difficult this must be for her. She’s spent the majority of her life at her father’s side, being a part of his adventures, being the only woman in his life.”

  “And now everything she had, she shares with you.”

  Her gaze sharpened. “I did not marry my husband for his money, if you are suggesting such a thing. I care very much for him, and I miss him terribly. If there is tension between Aria and me, it’s because this is a difficult and new situation for her. For both of us, really. After her father left...Well, he provided a buffer. His absence left us at sixes and sevens. We hadn’t had much time to acquaint ourselves, and she was angry at being left behind. It didn’t bode well for our relationship.”

  Adam could envision how that particular series of conversations had gone. “And have you two made some sort of reconciliation?”

  “I wish we had, but no.” She pressed her lips together and crossed her arms over her chest as if comforting herself. “Gideon is gone. I understand why she could not allow herself to believe that at first. She needs this time to accept it, and she’ll come home when she’s ready.”

  “I’d still like to speak with your staff.”

  She sighed. “Very well. I’ll ask them to join you in the parlor.”

  A few minutes later, members of the staff began to filter into the room. Adam interviewed the maids, the kitchen staff, the footman and the irritable butler. Each interview only served to increase his worry.

  As they filtered out, he looked at Mrs. Whitney, who sat in the corner of the room embroidering on a small fabric-
covered frame. “I would like to see her room, please.”

  She put down the embroidery. “That is highly irregular.”

  “Mrs. Whitney, no one has seen her since yesterday. We need to see if she came home last night.”

  “Do you really believe she might not have?” She stood, wringing her hands. She gestured at a maid to follow along and moments later they were at her door.

  Adam walked inside and took in the surroundings. He couldn’t say why, but it suited Aria. Shades of blue, from the pale blue wallpaper to the richer shades on the bed coverlet, created a soothing, comforting environment. Furnishings of fine quality filled the room, from the carved wood bed hung with sheer curtains to the comfortable circle of chairs and table by the fireplace. Nothing had been stirred out of place, and the room appeared neat. The bed made. And somehow, it felt cold. Aria stirred the room with her very presence, vestiges of which remained after she’d left. Not here.

  “She is a tidy person,” Mrs. Whitney offered. “I see nothing out of the ordinary here.” She lifted her hands. “My lord, I do believe she will return later.” She moved to the doorway, clearly indicating she wanted him to follow. “Aria was to attend the theater this evening—though it was with Mr. Wade. But perhaps she will return in time for that.”

  Adam stayed silent as Mrs. Whitney escorted him back down the stairs and to the front door. She was completely unconcerned.

  She’d known Aria longer. What if this was nothing more than a display of who his betrothed was when pressed into a corner? Was she simply licking her wounds?

  The thought nagged him, but it refused to settle.

  Mrs. Whitney pulled the door open, letting the chilled air wisp around them. “Lord Merewood, I truly enjoyed meeting your family the other day. And while your marriage to my stepdaughter is not in question, given the circumstances, I feel I must offer some honest advice.”

  “What is that?”

  “A gentle life in London would...I don’t believe it’s what Aria desires. It would never make her happy.”