London Gambit

by Tracy Grant

  "He's asked me to. When it comes to the beau monde, it's often easier for Suzanne and me to make inquiries than for Roth to do so. And someone will have to talk to your father."

  Simon gave a wry smile. "Better you than me." He got to his feet. "I have to be at the Tavistock early. With Measure for Measure about to open even Manon isn't balking at morning rehearsals. I should be getting back to the Albany."

  David and Simon had shared rooms since their Oxford days, but after Louisa's death, David had moved into the Craven house while Simon still, at least nominally, lived in the rooms they had once shared in the Albany. Simon, usually careless of appearances, was careful to preserve them for the children's sake. The arrangement, Malcolm thought, couldn't be comfortable for any of them.

  Simon bent and gave David a quick, hard kiss. There was a time when they'd have avoided such displays, even in front of Malcolm. It was almost as though the changed circumstances made it more important to establish the reality of their relationship.

  "This can't be easy on either of you," Malcolm said when Simon had left.

  David grimaced. "Simon's a marvel. He's the only one—including Bridget—who can get Jamie to sleep. We all nearly went mad one night when he had a late rehearsal." He took a drink of whisky and stared into his glass. "It's odd, I don't think they saw Craven or even Louisa that much, but they sure as hell notice their absence."

  "There's a difference between absence and knowing one will never see one's parent again," Malcolm said, remembering his own mother's absences.

  David tapped his fingers on the sofa arm. "Bel would have taken the children, but it would have strained her to the breaking point with her own three, especially since Rose had the measles last March. Mary's got enough to deal with, with her own husband's death and the baby about to arrive. Georgiana's out of the country. Mother and Father—They found their own children challenging enough. And Eustace and Cecilia barely knew them."

  "You don't have to convince me," Malcolm said. "I agree it was the best choice." He leaned back in his chair. "I always thought you and Simon would make good parents."

  David shook his head. "I never thought—Simon didn't ask for any of this."

  "I don't see him complaining."

  "He's being a saint. I hope—I keep thinking we'll get back to something like normal."

  "I think every parent thinks that. Until they realize the new reality is normal." Malcolm hesitated. "I don't know that anyone would say anything if Simon stayed here. Rupert and Bertrand live together."

  "Rupert is married to Bertrand's cousin. An uncomfortable situation for all of them, but it has advantages."

  "True. But if Simon stayed here—"

  "There'd be talk." David drained his glass. "The children—"

  "The children love you both. They'll sort it out eventually."

  David shot a look at him. "Not everyone does."

  "I'm sorry," Malcolm said. "I don't mean to belittle the challenges."

  David got to his feet and refilled his glass. "A few of our friends accept us. Others—notably my parents—choose to be blind to what's in front of them. Some others really are blind, I suppose, or simply don't have the imagination to see it." He poured more whisky into Malcolm's glass. "But still others are only too ready to gossip. And many to condemn."

  Malcolm looked at his friend, his chief confidant since they'd both been schoolboys Teddy's age. He had shared things with David he hadn't even shared with Suzanne. And yet—"You don't talk this way often."

  David shrugged as he clunked down the decanter. "Nothing to be gained by dwelling. But it's still a hanging offense."

  "My God." Malcolm set his glass down hard on the chair arm. "We live in an appalling country."

  His wife would have said You only just discovered that? But David shook his head. "You don't mean that. There are challenges, but they don't outweigh all the things to honor and admire."

  "A country that condemns two of the finest people I know for loving each other has a lot to answer for." And he was a member of that country's government. As was David, though they both sat in the Opposition.

  David sank down on the sofa. He moved as though his bones ached. "It's not as though every other country would welcome us with open arms. One grows used to living with secrets."

  Malcolm took a swallow of whisky that burned his throat. He knew a great deal about living with secrets since he'd learned his wife had been a Bonapartist agent. But for once he couldn't confide in David.

  Bertrand looked up as Suzanne came back into Marthe's parlor. He had removed the putty from his face, though traces of powder still clung to his hair. He was alone in the room, sitting on a stool, hands linked round his knees, gaze mild. "Did he talk to you?"

  Suzanne drew a breath. She'd always wondered how much Bertrand knew. They'd never discussed it, but given what he'd seen in Paris three years ago, not to mention in her own house last April, he probably knew or guessed a great deal. "Only incoherent ravings. I'm not sure what to make of it."

  Bertrand regarded her for a long moment. "People talk to me," he said. "I see no reason to share what I overhear. But I thought perhaps you were the right person to talk to our friend here."

  Suzanne met Bertrand's clear gaze. It looked very blue just now, while at other times it seemed just as green. "You're a remarkable man, Bertrand."

  "Most people are remarkable when one gets to know them." He unfolded himself from the stool and got to his feet. "I'm sorry I missed Colin's birthday party."

  She swallowed, warmed by the memory of the crowd gathered in her drawing room that afternoon, torn by the possible future. "We missed you. But I knew it must be something important."

  He moved to her side and squeezed her hand. "At least Rupert and Gaby and Stephen could represent the family." A smile crossed his face. "Odd that, having a family. Still takes my breath away."

  Suzanne returned the pressure of his hand. "Mine too."

  Half an hour later, in the privacy of her lacquered sapphire barouche, Suzanne pressed her hands to her face. The watered silk walls and mahogany fittings of the barouche enclosed her in luxury. The luxury that typified her husband's life. She had a few moments of privacy before they got back to Berkeley Square. The most privacy she was going to get to think through the night's shocking revelations.

  Bonaparte. St. Helena. Freedom. Dear God, no had been her first thought on hearing the wounded man's hoarse words. Surely it couldn't all begin again now. The plotting, the scheming, the fighting. The killing. The conflict that had come close to tearing her in two those last weeks before the battle of Waterloo.

  And yet—closely following on the dread had been a stab of wonder. She saw the redcoated British troops milling about in the Bois de Boulogne, thronging the quais and boulevards of Paris. The inscription Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité scraped from the Porte Saint Martin. The cells of the Conciergerie crowded with her friends. Those who hadn't fled into exile or gone to their deaths. Neither her father nor her spymaster, Raoul O'Roarke, had ever forgiven Bonaparte for making himself emperor. Even before that he'd been a flawed leader for what remained of the dream of the Revolution. But if one had ever doubted he was infinitely preferable to a return of the monarchy, the years since Waterloo had proved the point.

  If there was a chance to get him off St. Helena, to change the government of France—how could she live with herself if she tried to stop it? And if she told her husband what she had learned, she would be doing just that. Because Malcolm would be honor-bound to go to his spymaster, Lord Carfax. And Carfax would do anything in his considerable power to stop such a plot.

  And yet, if she didn't tell Malcolm, if Malcolm learned the truth—when Malcolm learned the truth, because if there were a plot, at some point he would hear of it. Suzanne shivered. Her husband had come to understand her divided loyalties in the past. He accepted them when it came to protecting her comrades. He'd even assisted her. But an active, present-day plot—a plot that was almost certain t
o involve people she knew and cared about.

  Including Raoul.

  Her fingers closed on the velvet folds of her cloak. She saw Raoul O'Roarke as she had last seen him, six weeks ago, sprawled on their drawing room carpet, arranging Malcolm's prize chess pieces into an imaginary court with five children clustered round him. His face had been alight with laughter, relaxed as she had seldom seen it in all the years he'd been her spymaster, the shorter time he'd been her lover, the years since in which they'd been comrades.

  But she knew, none better, how he could lose himself in the moment and then change back into a hardened agent when the task required it. It was the only way for a spy to hold on to sanity, he had often told her.

  Close on that memory came another. Malcolm and Raoul laughing together over a Shakespeare folio. That same evening? Or the night before? A trivial night, talk and laughter, dinner and lottery tickets and charades with the children. Except that she'd caught something between Malcolm and Raoul. For a moment they'd been more than agents who had been on opposite sides. More than husband and wife's former lover. They'd been father and son. Which, in fact, they were, though Malcolm hadn't learned it until recently.

  Suzanne chewed on the finger of her silk knit glove. If Raoul was involved in the plot to restore Bonaparte, if Malcolm had to expose him to Carfax—

  It wasn't just herself she was protecting. It wasn't just her own allies. It was her husband. Because she knew instinctively such a choice would tear Malcolm in two.

  Chapter 4

  It was months since Suzanne had returned home knowing she had to lie to Malcolm. The acrid bite in her throat was at once familiar and alien. Valentin, their footman, greeted her with a smile that was so normal it almost brought tears to her eyes. "Good evening, madam."

  "Is Mr. Rannoch home yet?" Suzanne asked, as Valentin lifted her evening cloak from her shoulders.

  "I don't believe so, madam."

  It was just as well. She needed to speak to Laura first. Suzanne climbed the stairs, reminding herself this was nothing she hadn't done before. She'd always known that sooner or later she'd have to dissemble with Malcolm over something. She just hadn't realized how high the stakes would be. She moved past the salon and drawing room on the first floor and climbed the next flight of stairs to the second floor and the bedrooms.

  A light showed beneath the door of Laura's bedchamber between the night and day nurseries. Suzanne rapped at the door. She had promised Laura a report on the evening, in any event. Laura Tarrington had been their children's governess for over a year. Now, after the unexpected events of the murder investigation three months ago, she was a friend who lived with them along with her own daughter.

  Laura set down her book as Suzanne came into the room. "How was the party?"

  "I saw Cordy and Harry, scarce more than an hour after we left them at Rules, and relived the highlights of Colin's party. I talked to Bel about her ball. I made myself agreeable to Lady Grandison whose husband might support Malcolm's emancipation bill in the next session. Otherwise—overcrowded rooms. Passable champagne but it hadn't been chilled enough. The same lobster patties everyone else has been serving this season. A string quartet playing Mozart at a tempo that would have grated on Malcolm's nerves."

  Laura smiled. "And you wonder why I don't go out more? Having missed the first four years of my daughter's life, why on earth would I prefer such an entertainment to spending the evening with her?"

  Suzanne set down her reticule. "It's a fair question."

  "Oh, you're a very different case. You have your husband's career to consider. One does all sorts of things in the name of politics."

  "So one does."

  "Suzanne?" Laura's gaze flickered over her face. "What else happened tonight?"

  Suzanne dropped down on the edge of a chair separated from Laura's by a small table, still sifting through what she could say. "When did you last hear from him?"

  Laura met her gaze, her own unblinking. "What makes you think I've heard from him at all?"

  "For heaven's sake, Laura. I'm not blind."

  Some of the tension drained from Laura's face. She gave a reluctant smile. "Whatever may be between us when he's in London, it doesn't mean I know Raoul's whereabouts when he's gone. You haven't heard from him?"

  "The occasional letter I've shared with you. He thinks he can spare Malcolm's and my feelings by staying out of our way. Which is rather sweet, though quite impossible considering how intertwined all our lives are."

  "But I'm sure you have a way to reach him in case of emergency."

  "You mean in case I'm accused of treason? I do. But I think you have a route as well."

  "Why?"

  "He'd want us to have more than one way to contact him. And, among other things, he'd want to make sure you could reach him quickly if you were with child."

  Laura's fingers tensed. "Surely you realize Raoul and I, of all people, would be careful."

  "I do. I'm also well aware accidents can happen, and no one knows that better than Raoul. And I think he'd have wanted to write to you."

  Laura gave a reluctant smile. For a moment something flashed in her eyes that made her seem almost like a schoolgirl. "I had a letter last week. He didn't say where he was. I have a way to get word to him, though I don't know that it's faster than yours." She scanned Suzanne's face. "How serious is this?"

  Suzanne's fingers closed, unbidden, on the folds of her gown. "I'm not sure."

  Laura leaned across the table between them and touched Suzanne's arm. "You're sure enough to have gone pale. I'd ask you what I can do, but if it's this serious I doubt you can tell me about it."

  Suzanne looked into the eyes of her friend, the woman she trusted with her children, the woman with whom she shared secrets that could destroy both of them and nearly everyone they both loved. The instinct to confide was so strong she could feel the words forming on her lips. But the spy's instincts held her in check. Spies weren't supposed to have friends. But no matter how many rules of the game she broke, she wasn't so entirely lost as to abandon it entirely. "You know how well I trust you, Laura. But—"

  "It's all right, Mélanie." Laura, like Malcolm and Raoul, now often used the name Suzanne had been born with rather than the one she'd adopted as part of her masquerade when she married Malcolm. "Don't forget I was a spy myself. You wouldn't be yourself if you confided too easily." Laura picked up a doll dress that was dangling off the arm of her chair. "And Malcolm would say the same."

  Suzanne's fingers locked together. "Malcolm—"

  "Loves you for being true to yourself." Laura twitched a bit of blue ribbon smooth on the doll dress.

  "I'm not sure he'll feel that way when he learns the truth. If he ever learns the truth." Perhaps it would have been best to leave it at that. Perhaps she had already said too much. But she found herself adding, "I'm protecting him as much as anyone."

  "I don't doubt it." Laura set the doll dress on the table between them. "Though you hate it when he tries to protect you."

  Suzanne bit back the retort that sprang to her lips. "This isn't—It wouldn't be fair to ask him to choose." She swallowed, an ache in her throat that could warn of a coming fever. "Though I don't know that he'll see it that way."

  Suzanne went down the passage to her own bedchamber. A lamp was lit on the pier table. The glow caught the white of the covers in the cradle over Jessica, her seventeen-month-old daughter. The deep, even sound of Jessica's breathing confirmed that she slept. Berowne, their cat, was curled up on the bed, his silver gray fur gleaming in the lamplight. Suzanne touched her fingers to Jessica's hair and stroked Berowne. The room was empty otherwise, but the black evening coat Malcolm had been wearing when he went out was flung over the back of the frayed green velvet chair. A sliver of light showed through the gap where the door to the night nursery was ajar.

  Suzanne crossed the room and pushed the door further open. Her husband was between the beds where their five-year-old son Colin and Laura's four-year-old dau
ghter Emily slept. Malcolm was on the edge of Colin's bed, smoothing their son's hair. Colin had the new stuffed horse they'd given him for his birthday in the curve of one arm and his beloved stuffed bear in the other. Suzanne stayed still. Tenderness washed over her, as it did at unexpected times. Perhaps it was the angle of Malcolm's head or the way his hair fell over his forehead, but Malcolm looked unexpectedly vulnerable. Her throat tightened the way it did when she looked at the children and willed time to stop, trying to commit the moment to memory. It was these unexpected moments that had so very nearly been her undoing a hundred times or more in the years of her deception. The preciousness of life sneaked up on one, not so much in times of danger, when one would expect it, but in seemingly trivial moments. The sort of moments that went to make up a life and a marriage and a family.

  Malcolm turned, as though aware of her regard. A smile crossed his face as he met her gaze. He touched his fingers to Colin's hair one last time, then to Emily's, got to his feet with his usual catlike grace, and crossed the room to her. He took her hand, lifted it to his lips, and drew her into the bedchamber. "I can't believe he's five," he murmured.

  "Nor can I. It seems only yesterday he was squirming in my arms." She glanced at the cradle. "Of course if he were still that little, we wouldn't have Jessica."

  Malcolm closed the door with his free hand and instead of releasing her pulled her into his arms and kissed her with unexpected urgency.

  It was a relief to lose herself in his kiss and then to slide her arms round him and bury her face in the starch and lavender smell of his cravat. He rested his chin on her hair for a long moment, then at last drew back enough to look down at her. "How was the Grandisons' reception?"

  "As dull as I feared. Fortunately I had distraction. I received a message from Marthe. Bertrand needed my help settling someone." Nothing odd in that. It wasn't the first time it had happened. Better, Raoul had taught her, to stick as close to the truth as possible. She kept her voice level and her heartbeat even. If she hadn't learned to control it long since Malcolm, would have suspected her years earlier.