Looking unsure whether to slam the door in her face, he hesitated for a moment too long. She took the choice away from him by pushing her way past, facing him with arms crossed. Just try and get her to leave now.
He shrugged. “Let me guess. You’re here to talk me into staying.”
“I’m here to say I’m sorry. I should have been honest about Doran’s identity from the beginning, but I didn’t see any other way.”
“Did you hope I’d be too busy staying alive to notice he knew you? I deserved to know the truth.”
“And what would you have done with that truth, Cam? Run to General Pendergast? I couldn’t risk that.”
“The general doesn’t know Doran is Amhas-draoi?” He stiffened, his gaze drilling right through her.
“If he knew, do you think he’d trust Scathach? Or any Other? We half-breeds walk a dangerous line between acceptance and intolerance. Why do you think we hide what we are? Because to let people like you know the truth about us is asking for trouble.”
“People like me?” His voice dropped, his tone ominous.
“The mortal world—the world of the Duinedon. To you we’re freaks. Monsters. The devil’s spawn.”
“Don’t lump me in with the narrow-minded and superstitious. I’ve been damned open to all you’ve thrown at me.”
She rolled her eyes. “Fine. Not you. But the rest of them. It’s only been a few years since they stopped burning witches at the stake. If Doran Buchanan’s found to be one of us, the hunt will begin again, and anyone with Fey blood suspect.”
Cam seemed to be considering her argument. A good step. He hadn’t shoved her out the door, refusing to listen. Perhaps he wasn’t as hardheaded as she thought.
“We’re not a threat to the mortal world,” she continued. “But do you think once we’re exposed, your kind will believe that?”
“You could have told me at the beginning.” He ran a tired hand down his face. Limped to a chair, leaning both hands on the top rail. Slower to recover than she’d expected. Or he’d been hurt worse than she’d known.
She met his stare, refusing to look away as if she were ashamed. “My friends. My family. My very way of life were at stake. They still are. I didn’t trust you.”
His jaw hardened. “You did once.”
She dropped her gaze. “That wasn’t trust. That was sex. And look where it landed us.” She took a shaky breath, faced him again. “No, Cam. I did what I thought best. But Doran’s stronger than I anticipated. Neuvarvaan’s power is enhancing his own. He’s close to mastering Andraste’s sword. Give me time. Two weeks. If we haven’t tracked down Doran by then, you can go to the general. I’ll even go with you.”
He said nothing. The silence spinning out indefinitely until Morgan wanted to scream. Finally he shifted, a grimace washing over his face. Cleared his throat, his words coming slowly as if he’d thought about them a long time. “If I agree, you’ll do things my way. No more lies. No more secrets. I’m in charge. When I say jump, you ask how high? Deal?” He held out a hand.
What would she be giving up by allowing him to call the shots? Or did he expect her to turn down his offer? Not a chance. She met Cam’s stare, ice blue and completely unreadable.
Before she could change her mind, she accepted his hand. Gave it a firm shake. “Deal.”
The corporal—dressed today in the scarlet and white of the Thirty Second—threaded his way through the market crowds, to stand beside Cam’s bench. Never once did he look in Cam’s direction or acknowledge his presence aside from a tipping of his hat. Instead, he chose to watch the traffic beyond the low iron fence. Crowded stalls, shouting vendors with packs slung over their backs, wagons, carts, and drays pushing through the choked streets.
Who would notice two men among so many?
Cam pulled a newspaper from his coat pocket. Flipped it open as if he prepared to read. “I need you, Rastus.” His words came low, but he knew the other man heard him. “I’ll pay. Well.”
Rastus braced himself, hands behind his back, eyes front. The picture of a proper English officer. “I heard you were dead, Colonel. You and the woman.”
“You heard wrong. But that’s why I need you. You’re going to follow Buchanan for me. Find out where he’s gone.”
“I know where he’s gone. London. Alone.”
“Why?” Cam shook out his paper. Turned the page. “What’s in London?”
“Bloody hell if I know,” Rastus groused. “He and I aren’t exactly mates.”
“Follow him. Find him. I want Doran Buchanan, Rastus. I’m going to enjoy putting a bullet in his brain. What do you say?”
Cam had come to Rastus as a last option. The only one he knew with the unmagical ability to ferret out Doran’s hiding place. And already close enough to the Amhas-draoi not to arouse suspicion if he were spotted. If Morgan proved incapable of tracking the bastard, he wanted to have a backup plan in place. It was always well to have two strings to your bow.
He clenched his hands on the edges of his paper until it tore, hating every second he spent in the ex-Serpent’s presence. “You give me Buchanan, you can name your price.”
Rastus rolled forward on the balls of his feet. Cleared his throat. “I don’t come cheap.”
Cam’s lips thinned. “I don’t want cheap. I want good.”
“In that case, why not find him yourself? You was always the best, Sin.”
A dubious compliment, considering what he’d been the best at. Eliminating problems. Terminating embarrassing entanglements.
During war, alliances formed and dissolved. And those favored one day could become liabilities the next. The Serpent Brigade made it their mission to clean up the army’s messes in deadly fashion. A responsibility Cam never questioned. A duty he excelled at until the injury that almost killed him. Only then had his sense of mission begun to unravel. The ghosts rising up in the haunted hours before dawn.
“A year and an attempted murder ago, I may have been the best. But not now. Things change.”
He’d changed. He wouldn’t let that part of him take hold again. He’d not give in to the natural-born killer living inside him. Sin was dead and buried. And Cam meant to keep it that way. He’d lost too much to that side of himself to allow it full rein again.
He shifted, biting back an oath at the painful twinge from neck to knees. “So, do we have a deal?”
Rastus gave a curt nod. “I’ll be in touch.”
Cam folded his paper. Shoved it back in his pocket. Stretching his sore leg, he rose carefully from the bench. “We’ll use my club as our drop point for messages. Arthur’s in St. James Street. Do you know it?”
Rastus gave a low whistle of admiration. “Aye, I’ve heard of it.”
“Leave any messages for me with the porter there. He’ll see to it I get them. Send word as soon as you’ve run Buchanan to ground.”
“Nice address, Colonel. Always figured you for a gentleman. Never realized you was a regular out-and-outer. Should I be calling you Lord Sin?”
“No, Corporal,” Cam snarled. “You should be calling me sir.”
Cam glanced around the room one last time. Not that he could have missed anything. He had exactly the clothes on his back, a borrowed shirt from Traverse—tight but workable—and a few items he’d picked up to last him until he could purchase better. Knife, sword, pistols. All gone. He’d have to completely rekit in London. An added complication.
He hefted his bag to his shoulder, bracing himself for the long jarring ride ahead.
Morgan sat at the table with Traverse, a game of chess between them.
The ensign’s time-ravaged looks no longer shocked, and his mood had grown less strained since their unannounced arrival. Almost as if offering them safe harbor had jarred him out of his self-pitying desperation. He gripped a walking stick in one gnarled hand, his fingers drumming against the wood, his piercing green eyes fixed on the board. Moving his piece into position, he sat back. Gave a ghost of a smile.
“Any i
deas why Doran would flee to London?” Cam asked.
“He’s from there,” Morgan answered, moving her pawn to the middle of the board to counter Traverse’s bishop. “Wapping. East of the Tower.”
“So he knows the area.”
“He also knows it will be impossible to track him. In a city that size, with that many Other, I’d never be able to pick up his trail. Even if he uses his powers, so much mage energy in one place will drown him out. It would be like looking for a needle in a haystack.”
After another prolonged drumming of fingers against the stick, Traverse’s queen joined the battle.
“He can’t just disappear.”
Morgan took her turn. Then watched as Traverse’s queen slid down to checkmate her king.
Picking up the piece, she rolled it between her fingers, before laying it flat on the board, her gaze somber. “You forget. He’s Amhas-draoi. If anyone can just disappear, he can.”
Chapter 13
Fog thickened the air to soup, making breathing difficult and seeing impossible. She’d no idea where they were in this maze of buildings. One London street looked like every other street. Houses rose up and disappeared behind them into the swirling, gray-green miasma. An occasional corner held a lamp flickering like foxfire from out of the gloom.
Cam had no trouble. Ahead of her, he sat stiff and silent, his muscled back swaying with his horse’s steps, his head erect and untiring. She’d long ago given up trying to navigate on her own. Instead, she’d thrown her reins away. Let her horse follow Cam’s on a straight path to somewhere. She only hoped she got there soon.
Grit and sleep stung Morgan’s eyes. Her body ached from the long, unending hours in the saddle. No breaks. Little rest. Cam drove them with a firm whip hand, his own endurance making complaints impossible. He had to be as sore as she was—if not worse, his leg slower to heal than expected. But he’d never once whined. And the hours had passed. Through scant meals eaten on horseback. Through changes in mounts with five minutes to stretch her legs and empty her bladder.
His expression through the whole hellish journey made it plain he expected her to rebel. Call off their deal. Which, of course, only made her more determined. She squared her jaw and refused to give in. She’d agreed to this devil’s bargain. If Cam thought a few uncomfortable days were going to break her, he was dead wrong.
She closed her eyes, secure in the knowledge her horse was as exhausted as she. Just a few moments wouldn’t hurt. And in the dark, Cam would never know this one small weakness.
“We’re here,” Cam announced. His first words in at least ten miles.
Her horse jostled to a halt, sliding on the cobbles, breaking Morgan’s doze. She looked around at the gray, shadowed shapes of tall, elegant town houses. Candle shine spilled from a few windows, but for the most, they were shuttered and dark. Knockers removed.
“Where’s here? I thought we were taking rooms.”
“It’s my house,” he answered, dismounting. “At least it is now. We’ll stay here while we’re in town.”
“But servants,” she argued. “And neighbors. Talk will spread. Doran will find out.” She slithered to the ground, thankful her legs didn’t give out under her. Surprised at Cam’s steady hand at her elbow, though it was withdrawn almost immediately.
“It’s just Amos and Susan.” As if she should know who they were. “I haven’t lived here since…” Since his wife’s death, but he didn’t say it. “And few neighbors. It’s going on October. Most have already left for the country. Doran won’t find out because Doran isn’t trying to. He thinks we’re dead.”
“And if he does realize the truth?”
“Even better. He’ll seek us out. And once he’s flushed into the open, we deal with him.” Few words holding an infinite amount of vicious finality.
In a strange way, reassuring.
They entered through a back door into the kitchen, her boots ringing hollow on the stone floor. In the center of the room stood a scrubbed worktable. Cupboards and racks lined the walls, stacked neatly in preparation for no one. A hearth yawned, cold and black.
Cam fumbled through a drawer, coming up with tapers and a flint. Even in the friendly glow of candlelight, the space seemed forbidding. The other rooms hardly better.
Furniture in Holland covers. Chandeliers draped in dust sheets. The place held the damp must of abandonment as if someone had simply given up. Walked out and locked the doors behind them.
A flutter of white caught the corner of Morgan’s eye. The creak of a floorboard. “Cam,” she whispered.
He looked up as the apparition materialized into a middle-aged woman in a nightgown and wrapper, her graying hair tucked neatly under a nightcap.
“It’s Susan. She keeps house. Or did when there was a house to keep. We must have woken her up.”
Holding her candle high, the woman surveyed them with a critical eye. “Colonel? That you? You never sent word you were coming. The house isn’t ready. I’ve barely food enough in the larder for Amos and me. And the rooms aren’t aired. You’ll catch your death between damp sheets.”
Her squint took in Morgan’s less-than-respectable attire, making her wish she’d donned a gown or run a comb through her hair or at least washed her hands and face before arriving.
Cam put a possessive arm upon her shoulder, drawing her in close. No softness to his touch. His body remained as unyielding as his manner. “Susan, I want you to meet the new Mrs. Sinclair. We married a few weeks ago.”
Whatever the woman expected to hear, this wasn’t it. Her shock was clear. “And the last Mrs. Sinclair not in her grave more than a few months? The gabble-mongers will be jawing about this one, Colonel. No mistake. If you ask me—”
“Which I didn’t,” Cam replied, cutting off any more discussion.
Susan closed her mouth with a snap. “No, sir.” She offered him an overly done curtsey before adding under her breath, “Nor did you the first time and look where that landed you.”
If Cam heard her, he gave no sign. He released Morgan, almost shoving her away from him before standing rigid, a white-knuckled hand upon the staircase newel post, the weight off his injured leg.
Susan started back up the stairs. “I’ll have your rooms readied quick enough. And the mistress’s chamber—”
“No.” Cam’s vehemence echoed like a shout in the quiet room. “No. That room stays shut. Put her in the back bedchamber for now.”
“It’s awful small,” Susan argued, “and there’s no view. It’s not comfortable like the front rooms.”
“We won’t be here long enough to notice.”
Not exactly the manner of a besotted bridegroom. And so the old retainer must have thought as well. She eyed Morgan again, lifting her candle and motioning her to follow. “As you wish, Colonel. This way, mistress.”
Morgan cast a swift glance at Cam’s tight-jawed face, his grave expression. A desperate, lonesome need clouded his gaze before vanishing, replaced once more by the familiar brutal arrogance.
She’d wished him to the devil since Devonshire, but now that she’d the chance to leave him, reluctance seized her.
The housekeeper seemed to understand. Her manner softened.
“Don’t worry over him, mum,” Susan tsked, climbing the stairs. Leading Morgan down a long narrow hallway. “It’s this house. Always puts him in a temper. Nothing a good dram of Sinclair whiskey won’t cure.”
Morgan grimaced. “That’s what I’m afraid of.”
Susan pushed wide the bedchamber door, peering around with pursed lips. “It’s small. A bit dark. Nothing like the front rooms.”
At this point Morgan could have happily curled up in a corner on the floor, but she kept her mouth shut. Tested the mattress. Lumpy, smelling of camphor, and absolute heaven to her tired bones.
Susan rubbed her arms briskly, the chilly room’s hearth as black and empty as the kitchen’s. “I’m sorry about the state of things. But I expect now that you’re here, the colonel will reopen
the place.” She sounded disappointed. “A shame. He should sell it and be done, if you was to ask me.”
Morgan straightened. “Why would he sell it?”
“Isn’t it obvious? He bought it for her, didn’t he?”
And with those cryptic words, she left.
Morgan surveyed her surroundings, the papered walls, the fancy scrollwork on the mahogany bed frame. The heavy damask drapes.
Fashionable. Refined. Stylish.
And completely unwelcoming.
What happened within these cheerless rooms to make Cam flee the first chance he got? Had Charlotte been the victim everyone rumored? Or had there been more to it than that?
Life was rarely black and white. Right and wrong. Could Cam’s marriage to Charlotte fall into that same state of gray? And what did that mean for her own rocky relationship with him?
The ghost-feel of his hands lurked in the corners of her mind, the fierce need for him left unsatisfied. Her body still yearned to finish what they’d started. Know once more the mind-bending thrill of climaxing beneath him.
She shook off the craving and the questions at the same time, chalked them both up to bone-weary exhaustion. Tomorrow, she’d wake and Cam would still be the jackass she barely tolerated.
He had to be.
Cam pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes, exhaustion rushing in to replace the dogged silence he’d managed for the last days. He’d known Morgan was tired. Hungry. Sore. But he pushed on, refusing to lessen his pace or give in to his urge to call a rest before she dropped in her traces. He wanted to say he did it out of necessity. That they needed to be in London as soon as possible, but he couldn’t convince himself that was the only reason. It was to punish as much as anything else. Unfortunately, all he did was make his own injuries worse. His thigh burned as if a knife twisted its way through him.
Again.
Stretching his leg out in front of him, he massaged the ache in an effort to work the kinks out.
Susan would be here any minute. As soon as she’d settled Morgan, he expected the old busybody to clatter in, demanding explanations. A privilege of lifelong familiarity. And one she enjoyed a little too much.
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