London Gambit

by Tracy Grant

  "So St. Juste liked to be in control."

  "That's my Malcolm. Never let anything stand in the way of the mission. Yes, I'd say he liked to be in control. I got my hands free at one point, just in play, and he wasn't pleased." She thought back. Silk cords. Demanding lips. A compelling touch. A murmur that was close to a command. "I'd go so far as to say he needed to be in control."

  "Which could be a weapon to use against him."

  "Perhaps."

  "And on the mission with Queen Hortense?"

  "He never tried to resume our relationship, if that's what you're asking. Oh, he made it clear a few times that he'd find it an agreeable way to pass the time on our journey, but when I made it clear that I had no intention of indulging him, he was entirely professional. He's totally amoral, but he has a code of sorts."

  "Would he really work for the highest bidder, regardless of their goal?"

  "I never heard him express any political views. Except for a wry contempt for Raoul's and my Republicanism. So I don't think we can use politics or ideals as a guide to whom he might be working for."

  "Even England?"

  She wondered if Malcolm was looking for some reason not to think Carfax was involved. "He never expressed loyalty to any country. I'm not sure he was French by birth."

  Malcolm's gaze sharpened. "Why?"

  She forced herself to give it honest consideration. "His accent was flawless. Just as he could adopt a German or Austrian or British accent without betraying himself. But there was something—something about the way he'd look at the countryside or comment on things—He was detached in any case, but when it came to France he always struck me as an outsider." She paused again, turning over her memories of Julien St. Juste. For a moment, he was so vivid in her memory it seemed she could reach out and touch him. The mocking gaze. The gleaming hair. The smile at once dangerous and unexpectedly, deceptively sweet. "He liked danger. And risk. He got restless on that journey with Hortense, because, except for a few hair-raising moments, mostly we were traveling slowly through the countryside and stopping at unremarkable inns, with the complications of pregnancy the greatest risk we faced. He was doing it because of his loyalty to Hortense's mother. But in general, though he could be bought, he prided himself on only taking jobs that were worthy of his talents."

  "So whatever's he's doing in Britain, it has to be something big."

  Suzanne's fingers bit into her arms through the fabric of her spencer. "Yes. That's why, if he had anything to do with the Whateley & Company break-in, it's only as part of something larger."

  Malcolm drew her into his arms. "We'll get through this. I don't care how brilliant he is, he can't be a match for all of us combined."

  She laughed. "How uncharacteristically optimistic of you, darling."

  He smiled down at her, his gaze alight. "I can be an optimist."

  "Perhaps. You can take blind leaps of faith. Like insisting our marriage can work."

  He bent his head and kissed her. "That's because it can."

  Malcolm came into the library to find Raoul standing by the windows, not far from where he'd been standing when Malcolm and Suzanne left the room but now dressed for the Waterloo banquet. Raoul was frowning at the leaded glass as though the plane trees beyond held the answers to the mysteries facing them, but he turned round at Malcolm's entrance. Malcolm looked sideways at his father. "Mel thinks St. Juste might not be French. That he could even be British."

  O'Roarke didn't appear surprised, but he gave the comment honest consideration. "It's possible. I always suspected he wasn't French. Mostly, his detachment from France's political conflicts was simply a function of who he was, but there was always something of the outsider about him. And then there's the fact that he appeared so abruptly. St. Juste was the sort who would make his presence felt, even as a very young man. And yet I heard nothing of him until he was twenty."

  "Do you think he could have been in Britain since Waterloo?"

  Raoul drummed his fingers on the sofa back. "I'd have said that the boredom of lying low for three years would drive Julien St. Juste mad. But he appears to have been lying low somewhere. I rather thought he'd taken his talents off to the East Indies or South America or the United States. I suppose it's possible that's what he did, and that now he's back."

  "Mel also says he wouldn't come back for any job he didn't consider worthy of his talents."

  O'Roarke's mouth tightened. "Quite."

  "And I presume the Phoenix plot, whether a real plot or a creation of Fouché's to entrap agents, would qualify."

  "So it would. Though I still have difficulty imagining St. Juste working for Fouché."

  "Is it easier to imagine him working for Carfax?"

  "Yes, actually. He'd appreciate Carfax's hardheaded pragmatism. I'm less sure Carfax would trust St. Juste enough to engage him."

  "Carfax isn't squeamish about whom he uses. And he tends to assume he can control people."

  Raoul regarded Malcolm for a moment. "As usual, your forbearance is remarkable, Malcolm."

  Malcolm moved to the drinks trolley and picked up the decanter. "I don't know why everyone keeps expecting me to have some sort of extreme reaction. I have a healthy respect for anyone you and Mel think is so formidable. So I'm concerned. As a husband, as a father, as an agent. But I also think we're a match for St. Juste." He splashed whisky into two glasses.

  "I think so." Raoul accepted a glass from Malcolm. "I don't deny my own concern. But what I meant is that the past has a damnable way of intruding for you and Mélanie."

  Half the time now Raoul referred to Suzanne as Mélanie. Malcolm wasn't sure he himself always even noticed the difference. "I don't see why everyone keeps expecting Julien St. Juste to bother me so much. It's not as though Mel was in love with the man."

  "No. Far from it, I'd say. But it serves as a reminder—"

  "That my wife deceived me?" Malcolm reached for his own glass. "My dear O'Roarke, I could scarcely draw breath and not remember that."

  Raoul set his glass down on the library table. "A palpable hit. She's—"

  "Her own person with her own loyalties. Which don't always align with mine. It's the height of arrogance to expect her to always think of herself as my wife before all else. I understand that. If I were the sort of enlightened husband that Juliette Dubretton and Mary Wollstonecraft talk about, that I prided myself I was, I'd have understood it rather sooner." He took a swallow of whisky, deeper than he intended. "But—"

  O'Roarke said nothing but stayed still, watching him intently.

  O'Roarke was the most laughable choice for a confidant. But whom else could he share the crazy farce of their situation with? "I know it's folly ever to claim one can really know another person. And Suzette and I are still coming to know each other in many ways. That was true before—before last December. But now—I'm more aware than ever of the parts of her life I don't know. That she felt she had to keep from me in the service of her masquerade. There are moments when I wonder if I really know her at all."

  "And St. Juste reminds you of that?"

  Suzanne's words, just now in their bedchamber, echoed in his head. Along with the images those words could not but stir. In many ways, they'd always been at their closest in bed, defenses stripped away in a way neither of them would permit in the light of day. But despite her words less than half an hour ago, he could not but wonder how far the pretense had extended to their most intimate moments. Even now. He remembered her pulling him down on their bed last night, remembered the brush of her fingers, the heat of her mouth, the way she had clung to him. Had she lost herself in him as much as he had in her? Or—

  Of course he could say none of that to Raoul. And yet—"Perhaps. A bit."

  Raoul's gaze told Malcolm he saw more than Malcolm might wish. "For what it's worth, I've never seen her so happy as she is with you." Raoul reached for his glass and took a sip. "However gifted one is at deception, that can't be counterfeit."

  "She has a gift for fin
ding happiness in the moment, whatever her circumstances."

  "I wouldn't argue with that. It doesn't change the fact that I haven't seen her as happy as she is with you. Because of you."

  Raoul's voice had that rare quality of stripped-to-the-bone honesty. Malcolm gave a quick, defensive smile. "She's rather stuck with me. However suited or not we may be."

  Raoul put out a hand and let it fall to his side. "My dear Malcolm. You can't possibly think you aren't suited."

  "Not most of the time." Malcolm took a drink of whisky. "Not until something makes me remember—"

  "That she deceived you?"

  Malcolm's fingers tightened on the glass. He stared at the Rannoch crest etched into the crystal. "The woman I know, the woman I live with, isn't the woman she was before she went on that mission to intercept me in the Cantabrian Mountains. It's someone she tailored to suit my needs." In any number of ways.

  "You're an agent, Malcolm." Raoul's voice was crisp and neutral, but beneath Malcolm caught a trace of warmth that reminded him of childhood, like the whiff of apples or the scent of the sea. "You know no one can play a role that completely."

  "Of course not. I'm just not sure where the role leaves off and the real Mélanie Suzanne begins. I don't think she's sure, herself."

  Raoul met his gaze with the honesty of one agent facing another. "I won't argue with that."

  Malcolm managed another smile, though his defenses felt distinctly the worse for wear. "I don't mean to wallow. In many ways I'm fortunate."

  "My dear Malcolm. Only you could call your situation fortunate."

  "If it wasn't for the mission, I wouldn't be married to Mel."

  "That's—"

  "Undeniable, given that she was an enemy agent. Not to mention a number of other things. I'm not quite sure where I'd be without her, but I'm quite sure I'd be alone."

  "Malcolm—" Raoul stared into the whisky in his glass. The light from the brace of candles on the table caught the tangle of emotions in his eyes. "Mélanie may not know precisely where her role leaves off, but she's also not the woman she was before she met you."

  "You're saying playing a role changes one?"

  "It certainly can. You must have felt that yourself. So, I would imagine, can being married, though my own marriage didn't last long enough to put it to the test."

  Malcolm had only seen O'Roarke's wife once or twice, as a young child. He had a vague memory of a slender woman with brown ringlets. Quite lacking his own mother's vibrancy, though at the time it wouldn't have occurred to him to compare them. He hadn't even had suspicions about his own relationship to Raoul O'Roarke at the time, though he'd been fond of him. Now it occurred to him to wonder what had driven Raoul to matrimony, and what had gone wrong.

  Raoul met his gaze and gave a crooked smile. "Margaret was—is—a clever woman. Brilliant, even. I think she saw a certain romance in my revolutionary views. Until the reality made her fear for her father's estates." He took a drink of whisky, hesitated a moment, as though he meant to leave it at that, then said abruptly, "Things weren't over between your mother and me at the time as it turned out, but I thought they were. After Arabella—I think I was looking for a haven. I mistook conventionality for stability. No one conventional would have a prayer of putting up with me."

  Malcolm's fingers tightened round his glass. It was one of the most revealing speeches Raoul had ever made to him. Had Raoul been trying to level the playing field after Malcolm's own admissions? "Do you ever see her?" he asked.

  "Not in years. She manages her father's estate now. Her childhood sweetheart has the neighboring estate. She should have married him. Probably would have if I hadn't appeared while he was at university. They've been lovers for years. He has an invalid wife. Easier all round if I don't show my face."

  "I'm sorry."

  Raoul shrugged. "It hasn't troubled me in years. Better for me to have as few known connections as possible."

  "Hostages to fortune?"

  Raoul drew a breath, brittle as old paper. "No sense in belaboring it, but we should all be on our guard. Laura and Emily as well. Because they live with you and Suzanne."

  "And because St. Juste could know of their connection to you."

  "Possibly." Raoul twisted his glass in his hand. "Laura and I've done our best to be discreet, but with a man of St. Juste's abilities—He might know. If he noticed us in Berkeley Square, he'd have seen Mélanie and me with Laura and the children. When I caught sight of him, I had Emily on my lap." He cast a glance at Malcolm. "I don't know how you and Mélanie have managed all these years, facing danger with Colin and Jessica."

  "It's the only reality we've known as parents. And for better or worse we both think the children are better off with us than away from us."

  Raoul passed a hand over his hair. "I confess I'm not accustomed to feeling this sense of responsibility."

  "It took a ridiculously long time after I married Mel. To remember there was someone to worry when I went on a mission. Even sometimes to remember there was someone to notice if I came home to dinner. I remember a guerrillero commander who wasn't best pleased with me threatening to do his worst by me and my family three months after our wedding. The sort of bluster I'd dismissed countless times in the past. But it hit me like a punch to the gut that I actually had a family who could be affected."

  "I can well imagine. Though my situation is hardly the same as yours was."

  "No, I'd say you're much further along on admitting what Laura means to you than I was on admitting what Suzette meant to me at the time."

  Raoul opened his mouth as though to argue, then gave a reluctant smile and shook his head. "I've been meaning to tell you—I saw my man of business when I was in London in April and made some changes to my estate. Margaret is well provided for with her father's properties." He hesitated a moment, then added, "And you—"

  "Fortune is one thing I've never lacked. Quite. And I can provide for Colin, so you needn't worry about him."

  Raoul met his gaze, a flare of surprise in his own at the implied connection in the words.

  Malcolm looked back steadily. "Though I have no doubt you'd do so, were it necessary. Just as I have no doubt you'd have provided for me."

  Raoul held his gaze a moment longer, unspoken words thick in the air between them, but merely said, "James Trenchard has seen to it Laura and Emily are well provided for. I haven't mentioned it to Laura, because she probably won't need it, but I've put everything I have in trust for the two of them as well. I'd like you to have copies of the papers."

  "Of course." The decision didn't surprise Malcolm, though something about the seriousness with which Raoul spoke shook him.

  Raoul took a drink of whisky. "I'm not anticipating anything happening. But between St. Juste and what's happening in Spain—"

  It was a moment before Malcolm saw in Raoul the same painstaking difficulty choosing words he often experienced himself. And caught the full subtext beneath the precise words. "I'd do anything I could for Laura in any case," he said. "But the fact that, to all intents and purposes, she's my stepmother only increases the tie."

  Raoul released his breath and met Malcolm's gaze for a long moment. "Thank you. It's not—There's no need for Laura to know."

  "That you've put money in trust for her? Not necessarily. That you feel this deep a bond to her and Emily—I rather think she has a right to know that."

  Raoul stared at him for a moment longer then turned away. "Laura would probably be far better off if I ran a mile."

  "You don't mean that."

  "I don't intend to act on it, which is a rather different thing."

  Malcolm continued to watch his father. "Sometimes, emotional commitment isn't a demand. It's a gift. It's taken me years to realize that."

  Raoul looked back at him. "I'm inestimably glad that you have. But for some of us, it's a dangerous gift."

  Malcolm held that gray gaze that was no longer so inscrutable as he had once found it. "The last time you were worri
ed about the safety of the woman you loved and your child, you sent them both away. Selfishly, I'm inestimably glad that you did. I'd even venture that it hasn't turned out badly for Mélanie and Colin. But as you say, it's not wise to play a hand the same way twice. For God's sake, don't do so again."

  Chapter 35

  Malcolm surveyed the white-and-gold expanse of the Apsley House drawing room. Wellington's brother Richard, Marquess Wellesley, had bought the Robert Adam house a decade ago and had engaged James Wyatt to improve it. Though the grateful nation had planned to build Wellington a London house after Waterloo, the previous year the duke had instead purchased Apsley House from his brother, who was in financial difficulties. The duke had engaged Wyatt's son, Benjamin Dean Wyatt, to make repairs to his new home and had told Malcolm he was planning further improvements of his own.

  "It's amazing how many of the players are here," Suzanne murmured.

  His wife was right, Malcolm realized. Carfax was not present, nor Oliver and Bel, as none of them had been directly involved with Waterloo, but Sylvie St. Ives sat on a striped satin sofa by Robert Adam's exquisite marble fireplace at the far end of the room, surrounded by a crowd of admirers. Her husband was standing in one of the niches to the side with a crowd of his fellow Life Guards veterans, including Cordelia's brother-in-law, John Ashton. Fitzroy and his wife, Harriet, were on the other side of the room, talking with two other couples including John Ennis and a slender dark-haired woman in a lavender gown.

  Cordy and Harry slipped through the crowd to join them. "I always have mixed feelings at these," Harry murmured. "It's good to see old friends. And it's damnable to remember."

  "If it wasn't for Waterloo we wouldn't be here," Cordelia said in an unusually quiet voice.

  Harry turned and lifted his wife's hand to his lips. "True enough."

  Malcolm smiled at his friends and then caught sight of the man he had been searching for. William Cuthbertson stood with some fellow officers in the middle of the room. He turned and smiled at Laura. Laura lifted a hand in acknowledgment and then turned to speak with the others, as though to signal to Cuthbertson that she was presently engaged. Malcolm squeezed Suzanne's hand and moved across the room towards Cuthbertson, who had already disengaged himself from his friends and was moving towards Laura, regardless of her signal.