“No, of course not.” Helen settled her features into what she hoped was a relaxed smile while trying to banish the disturbing vision of spending a night alone with Peyton. “Peyton has now turned his inquiries to an inn Bart used to frequent. It’s possible the tonic was tampered with there.”
“Then Bart’s death has nothing to do with us?”
“Maybe not.”
“I must say I’m relieved.” Frowning, Diana put down her half-eaten muffin. “Still, the way Peyton looked at you did not seem impersonal.”
Helen’s nervous fingers found the cameo brooch at her neck. “We are merely trying to unravel this mystery in Papa’s absence. Mama wants it settled before the ball.”
“He must have said something. You do not appear to be your usual composed self.” She tilted her head. “He wasn’t flirting with you?”
“Surely a man and woman can spend time together without a romantic involvement?”
“But you must admit he’s terribly attractive.”
Helen began to stack the tea tray. She could not allow herself to even dream of a future with Peyton. “You are such a romantic. It’s true that I do find him personable. But that’s all there is, so, please, do not embroider on it.” Helen yearned to be left alone to plan the evening. Could she manage somehow to remain dressed without Diana becoming suspicious? It seemed doubtful, and that would ruin everything.
“I don’t know how you remain so remarkably unruffled, Helen. It is your nature, I suppose. Well, you may not want him, but I’m sure many women would. He has an air of authority, which fascinates, apart from being handsome. The combination of green eyes and dark locks is quite compelling. I could fall under his spell very easily.”
“I’m sure he’d be pleased to hear you think so.” Her chest grew tight. Jealousy was so unbecoming. She’d never considered herself capable of such a lowly emotion.
Diana smiled. “I might flirt with him if I could gain his attention.”
“At the ball, you mean?”
Diana snorted. “When we dance, perhaps. But with you in the room, I tend to become invisible to him.”
“What nonsense you talk.” Helen stood, wishing to put a stop to the conversation, which made her nerves jangle. “What’s that commotion in the hall? Has Mama arrived home?”
The door flung open, and Mama hurried in waving a letter. “This has just come from Walcott. Alexander has fallen from a tree.”
They rushed over to her. “Is he badly hurt, Mama?” Helen asked.
My dears!” Mama held out her arms and embraced them. “A broken limb they think. The doctor was with him when this letter was sent with your grandfather’s carriage. The coachman is walking the horses. Eloise is packing a portmanteau. I must leave in a minute. Helen!” She held up a hand as Helen began to speak. “No, you cannot come. You are to remain here to chaperone your sister.”
Chapter Fifteen
Helen listened to Diana’s deep breathing. She had been asleep for over an hour, and it seemed safe to leave the bed. Earlier, while Helen was watched by her sister and their maid, Mary, she’d been forced to disrobe and don her nightgown. In the dark, Peyton wouldn’t notice. She couldn’t light a candle but was able to locate her dressing gown and slippers where she’d left them. Stealthily leaving the room, she hurriedly pulled them on, dislodging her nightcap in the process.
The candles were guttering in the wall sockets as she went to the stairway, her hair unraveling from the braid. Would he be waiting? At the bottom, she shivered. She rubbed her arms, unsure if it was the possibility of catching the thief or spending the night with Peyton that caused it. It would be better to send him away. But somehow, she doubted Peyton would obey her so easily.
The quiet kitchen lay in darkness with only the scuffle of cats on their nightly hunt. Something twined around her legs almost tripping her up and sending her heart into a gallop. “Quiet, Plato,” she whispered at the cat’s familiar greeting.
She slid the bolts back on the door, and a rush of chilly air blew her hair back from her face. Clutching her gown closer, aware that she wore little beneath it, she peered up at the inky blackness. Suddenly, a dark shape loomed into the doorway. Her heart in her mouth, she gave an involuntary squeak.
“Shush. You must have known it would be me.” An iron-grip on her arm moved her aside as Peyton slipped inside.
“You might have been the thief.” Indignant, she closed the door behind him, discarding any idea of deterring him. It would be a waste of her breath, which seemed to be in short supply.
“I’ve had a word with the watchman. He hasn’t seen anyone, but the fellow seems to be too fond of rum by the smell of him.”
“That’s comforting.” She was struggling to come to terms with receiving him in her nightclothes in the kitchen.
“It’s too early for the thief. They would wait to be sure the whole household was asleep.”
He sounded annoyingly pragmatic. “If he’s a smart thief,” she murmured, unwilling to let him have the last word as she led him up the stairs.
“He has been pretty clever up until now. And who’s to say he isn’t already in the house?”
She stopped so suddenly that he cannoned into her from behind.
When she gave a startled gasp, hands rested for a moment on her hips in her thin robe, causing her to stiffen. “You aren’t going to panic are you, Lady Helen? I thought you were made of sterner stuff.”
“And so I am, my lord,” she said in a prickly tone, far too aware of his overly familiar gestures and big body close behind her.
“Are you sure the butler has gone to bed?”
“Yes. Fiske retired at eleven. Jeremy is in the front hall. He’s good at dozing while remaining upright in his chair. I’ve caught him at it before.”
“Then let’s hope he does so tonight.”
She opened the door to the library. With the deep burgundy velvet curtains pulled across the windows, the spacious room was black as pitch. Helen stumbled forward in what she guessed was the direction of the desk. “I shall have to light a candle until we are settled.”
A hot flush rushed up her neck and spread across her face at the idea of settling somewhere in here for the night with this large ex-army man who was quite possibly a spy.
The cloak of darkness had its advantages. Men easily succumbed to their desires with a little encouragement. The worst of them needed none. And here she was in her nightclothes. How on earth did she get herself into this?
“No candles. I brought a rush light.”
A tinder was struck, and a small glow lit up the room with a wisp of smoke. The Egyptian sarcophagus in the corner of the room took on a decidedly eerie appearance. Helen had considered hiding inside it but now shuddered at the prospect of entering that dark space where a mummy once rested.
“Where can we hide?” She distracted herself by gazing around the dimly lit room. “Behind the sofa?”
“We can both fit in the coffin,” Peyton observed in an exasperatingly calm tone.
“Don’t be ridiculous!” She fought to keep her voice from rising to a hysterical pitch. “I am not getting in there with you.”
“We’ll leave the door open a crack.”
“That isn’t the problem.”
In the faint light of the rush, his shadowed face loomed close to hers. “What is it then?”
“We would be…” She was unexpectedly lost for words.
“As close as birds in a roost? You have nothing to fear from me. I am not about to take advantage of the situation. I promise to keep my hands to myself.”
“That isn’t what I meant.” Her cheeks were now so hot she might be sitting by the fire.
“What then?” He’d taken to roaming about the room and no longer seemed intent on her answer.
“It doesn’t matter,” she mumbled, realizing it was futile. They would never see eye to eye. She bent over the sofa to check the space behind it. “I can fit in here.”
“These artifacts look qu
ite atmospheric in this gloomy light,” he murmured, right behind her. He peered into the dark space. “You could squeeze in there.” His shoulder nudged hers. “But I cannot, and we need to be together so that we may confer.”
“Confer?”
“Act together. As a force.”
“This is not the army. We are not at war.”
“We are in a way. We are fighting for justice, and this foe is a murderer,” he said, sounding ruthless and quite unlike himself.
She shuddered again.
“Come and look inside.” He swung the door of the sarcophagus open, and the smell of antiquity flowed out. “It’s roomier than you think.”
She swallowed. “I’m not…” she began. A scratching noise came from somewhere near the library door.
In the blink of an eye, Peyton had extinguished the rush light with his fingers and pulled her into the stone coffin, easing the door partly closed.
She took a deep breath of dusty stale air and something ancient, and indefinable, and clamped her mouth shut on a scream.
They waited, she hardly daring to breathe.
“Must have been mice behind the wainscoting,” he finally whispered, making no attempt to leave. “But now that we’re in here—”
Peyton appeared a good deal too pleased to be here. “It’s too cramped.” Aware of his spicy cologne and the touch of his leg against her bottom, Helen fought to remain calm. A hand alighted briefly on her side a whisker from her breast. She swallowed on a moan. The tension was excruciating.
Peyton cleared his throat. “Will you permit me to place my hands on your waist to support you? Otherwise, you might grow tired.” His breathing sounded strained. He must find the air as stuffy as she did.
With her pulse galloping, Helen was tired already. This had been a ridiculous, fruitless exercise, and she had only herself to blame for it. “If you must.”
She regretted it immediately. His hands seemed to burn into her flesh through her dressing gown. “Perhaps we might talk? If we keep our voices low, we can hear the door.”
“Good idea,” he said, his breath on her ear. “You have beautiful hair, Helen. It’s very long and silky.”
Helen launched into a rambling conversation. “I remember meeting your sister, Lady Greywood, years ago. She’s very pretty and has a pleasant nature, as I recall.” Not one of the spiteful debutantes Helen had encountered who had made her life hell. Elizabeth had Peyton’s coloring. Dark hair and green eyes. “I was very sorry to hear of her loss.”
“Thank you. Lizzie has only recently returned to society. I was very pleased to see it, but now, she’s met someone.”
He sounded worried. She wanted to turn and read his expression, which was foolish for they’d be pressed embarrassingly close together. “You don’t like him?”
“I wish I could say I did.” He sighed. “But Lizzie is keen to marry him and go to live in Italy.”
She wanted to know more but could hardly ask. Was the fact that Elizabeth would leave England trouble him most?
“I can quite see why you’d be uneasy about it,” she said. “You have a younger brother too, Viscount Brinkley.”
“Charlie was recently sent down from Oxford for some prank. Fortunately, they’ve reinstated him. He’s formed an unsuitable attachment to a Miss Groton, which has no future. I’m keen to see him finish his education and take the tour.”
“Did you take the tour, or did the war intervene?”
“I took it.” He chuckled.
“What amuses you?”
“The little I learned. But it is good for a young man to widen his horizons.”
“You have no need to explain,” she said hastily, guessing what he referred to.
His hands tightened at her waist. “I wasn’t about to. I haven’t forgotten I’m here with a lady.” His voice dropped a notch, as if he found that difficult, which silenced her.
Almost an hour passed. Helen’s legs began to grow tired, and she shuffled around in the small space allotted to her, careful not to tread on his big feet.
“We can’t stand up all night,” Peyton said, and for once, she had to agree with him. Although she doubted his solution to the problem would suit her.
“I’m perfectly all right,” she said, fearing what he might suggest next.
There’s room to sit if you’ll perch on my lap.”
“Are you always so frivolous?”
“Needs must. And perfectly aboveboard. To adopt a Naval term.”
“You were never in the Navy.”
“Here, I’ll show you,” he said with a soft chuckle. He sank down, pulling her with him onto his lap.
Before she could protest, he settled her across his knees, his hand touching parts of her that were just short of scandalous. She was sure he meant to do it. “There now, isn’t that better? It’s good that you’re not wearing your corset. You can be comfortable. Lean back against me and close your eyes. If anything happens I’ll wake you.”
“Oh!” How dare he mention the absence of her undergarments! Finding herself seated on muscular thighs and enveloped in strong masculine arms, Helen lost her ability to think of a suitable retort. Sleep? Was the man mad?
“I think we were mistaken. They’re not coming.” She struggled to rise without making matters worse. In the confined space, it proved impossible, and her elbow poked him in what she suspected with horror was a vital spot.
He groaned and tensed against her.
“Oh. I’m sorry, was that you…”
“It was.” His voice sounded strained.
Beginning to feel quite giddy, she suffered a fit of the giggles. It must have been the stuffy interior, the masculine smell of him, or the fear that, if she remained here, she’d soon succumb to his charm.
“I’m glad you find it amusing. But please don’t do that again.” He moved carefully as if in discomfort, but there was laughter in his voice. “Keep still and be quiet.”
She was in danger, but not from a foe, her own weakness. She liked being close to him far too much. How easy it would be to lean back against his strong chest and let nature take its course. She tensed with alarm at the direction her thoughts were taking. “I think I should leave,” she whispered.
“An excellent idea. If you promise to go straight up to bed.”
“Will you go home?”
“No. I’ll stay awhile.”
His hands vanished from where they’d rested on her diaphragm. “You know, you’re a very comfy armful, Lady Helen, if I might be so bold.”
“I think you’ve been quite bold enough.” She knew she sounded halfhearted. She could feel his chest shaking. He was laughing!
“I’m glad you find this amusing.”
“As do you,” he said with a chuckle.
“Perhaps a little,” she agreed, a quiver in her voice betraying her. “This has all been very silly. A terrible idea of yours.”
“I believe it was yours,” Peyton said.
“I intended to spend the night behind the sofa, you will remember.”
“As if I’d allow you to do a foolish thing like that.”
“You would have no say in it, sir.”
“No? You’re in here with me, though, aren’t you? Perhaps you prefer my company to the sofa’s?”
She huffed. “You are not making sense. It must be the lack of fresh air.” She began to wriggle forward. Once freed, she was sure she would think more clearly.
Peyton’s hands slid farther around to enclose her diaphragm, halting her progress. “You know, Lady Helen, you and I would make a good team.”
“Of detectives?” She paused, immediately caught by the suggestion.
“No, a woman could never be involved in dangerous work. A partnership certainly.”
She stiffened. “I believe a woman would bring much to detective work. They have assets men lack.”
“That’s true, quite appealing endowments, and often a very shrewd mind, but I had a different partnership in mind.”
&nbs
p; “Really? I can’t imagine…”
“Marriage,” Peyton said firmly. “But I refuse to propose to you in this deuced coffin.”
A fluttery, empty feeling settled in her stomach. She fought to sound brisk. “Don’t be absurd. You really do need some fresh—”
A loud click made them freeze.
The library door opened, throwing faint light from the corridor wall sconces into the room. A vague shape appeared in her vision, creeping across the carpet to the desk. Peyton’s hands tightened on her arms, his warning a mere breath on her hair. Caught up in the suspense, her pulse racing, she peered out through the crack.
After several fumbles, a candle burst into flame as another person shut the library door. Peyton’s grip tightened. A dark-haired man she’d never seen before opened the portfolio, a candle raised to read Volta’s letter. The other person came to join him. The first man cursed.
“He’s ceased the experiments.”
“What?” came a feminine voice. “Perhaps Kinsey will continue them with someone else. We should remain patient.”
“It’s grown too hot for us here,” he snarled. “You should not have poisoned the maid. It is sure to arouse suspicion.”
“She deserved it,” Mrs. Chance said implacably.
Her words chilled Helen’s blood. She sucked in a breath while Peyton squeezed her arm, although whether to silence her or reassure her, she wasn’t sure.
“You enjoy killing too much, Charlotte,” the man observed. “It makes you reckless.”
“What are you saying, Pierre? It was you who poisoned Bart’s tonic. You can’t blame me for that.”
“It became urgent after you gave him that letter to deliver to me.”
“How was I to know a footman could read French?”
Without warning, Peyton’s hand on Helen’s shoulder pressed her down. “Wait here until I call you.” His quiet voice was like steel. From above her head came the sound of a pistol cocked. He pushed open the door of the sarcophagus and stepped out into the room.
Unmasking Lady Helen: The Kinsey Family (The Kinsey Family Series Book 1) Page 14