by Kresley Cole
"Itis laughable," Ethan said, never one to palliate his words. "She's a famed beauty and wit, with an enormous extended family. You canna stand to be around groups of people and rarely talk to most."
"Aye, I know. But she is happy being my wife—turns out she's wanted to marry me since she was a girl." Hugh sounded so bloody proud. Ethan had to admit he'd never have suspected that from Jane. "And I'm making an effort for her."
"A man canna change his nature," Ethan said.
"No, no' often," Hugh replied. "But I believe when men like us do, the change is profound."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Take Court. He was almost as selfish as you are, but now he's different."
Ethan didn't bother denying he was selfish, but he said, "Aye, take Court. Another example of a ridiculous match. Annalía's an heiress—Court does no' have two guineas to his name. And he's a bloody mercenary while she could no' be more genteel. How's he to support her? Leave her at home with a new bairn while he marches off to wage war for money?"
"He's retired."
Ethan gave a humorless laugh. "They'll starve. And they'll do it at his run-down manor in the middle of the Highlands—unless he lives off her." He scowled deeply. "The hell that will be happening. I'll settle money on him before he becomes the first MacCarrick to live off his wife."
"No, when he was on his last campaign, I reinvested for him what he had managed to save," Hugh said. "Court actually has a steady income now. And when Jane and I were hiding out at his property—waiting foryou to kill Grey—we needed something to do, so we renovated the manor house. Put it this way—I saw work as the only thing I could do to keep my hands from Jane. Trust me, Court's home is a bloody showplace now. And Annalía loves it there."
"And how long will that last? How long can it? You two baffle me. I thought my brothers had more sense than this."
"If what I enjoy now is due to senselessness, then I doona want sense." Hugh sank back, appearing to have given up on convincing Ethan. "You will no' understand, you canna, until you feel it, too. It's like trying to impress upon a virgin what sex is like."
And with one word, Ethan's mind was back on Madeleine. He'd been doing so well. At least ten minutes had passed since the last time.
Wait…Ethan narrowed his eyes. "I hate it when people make asinine arguments like that. That's like our mother telling us that we could no' comprehend—or forgive—her behavior toward us after Da died, until we'd been in love." When she'd said that, Ethan had replied,"Bullshite. I doona have to jump off a bloody bridge to understand the landing will prove disagreeable."
Ethan could never forgive her for her actions. There was no excuse for the woman to have blamed her sons for Leith's death, no excuse for reacting so irrationally. She'd screamed, tearing at her hair, uttering things that could never be taken back….
Hugh said, "No, Ethan, she was right."
"Of course you agree—now that you've been inducted into the cult of marriage. I canna decide if I'm amused or disgusted by all this."
Hugh stared out the window, and his tone turned grave. "If I…if I lost Jane, I could no' predict my actions, but I know I would no' be verra concerned with watching what I said."
"I've decided. Disgusted."
"Have you never thought about marrying?"
"No, never. I thought we were no'supposed to, and to say my personality isn't favorable to it is an understatement." Ethan sounded so sure, but now, for the first time in his life, doubts on the subject had begun to creep into his thoughts. Both of his brothers were wed and sounded happy, and apparently, the curse wasn't as they'd believed.
Ethan had heard that a man's life flashed before him just before he died. Ethan had been on the verge, and nothing had flashed before him—but then, he'd had few meaningful moments in his adulthood. He'd never had friendships like Court had with his band of mercenaries. Ethan had never felt the selfless love for one woman that his brother Hugh had for years.
That night in the alley, Ethan had believed he was going to die—and he'd realized how pointless his life had been. And for some reason, at such a critical time, he'd thought of that lass….
After a quarter of an hour of silence passed between them, Hugh said, "What are you going to do when we arrive in the city?"
"Ready for a trip to Paris." Unfortunately, he'd need to spend a few days in London before setting off. He'd eat and regain his strength, healing more as he arranged the logistics of his plan.
"What's in Paris?"
"Madeleine Van Rowen."
"Stillthinking about her?" Hugh raised his brows. "This is interesting."
Ethan shrugged. "Doona read anything into it."
"This is no' still about revenge, is it?"
"And if it is…?" He wanted to finally finish his retribution, to make Sylvie suffer as she was supposed to have. The fact that he would get to enjoy Madeleine in the process was insignificant to his main goal.
Yet even as he assured himself of that, another part of his mind whispered,You're seizing on this revenge as an excuse to go after her.
"Because she canna be made to pay for what her parents did." In a low tone, Hugh added, "What if she's the one?"
Ethan jerked, startled. "What? You must be jesting."
"Have you ever thought about another woman as much as you do her?"
Ethan had never, since he'd been old enough to notice females, had one fascinate or frustrate him so badly. "IfI was convinced of your beliefs on the subject of the curse—which I'm no' saying I am—the fact would no' matter. There could be no union more doomed. It's ridiculous even to contemplate."
"Would you really go despoil an innocent girl to exact more of your revenge?" Hugh looked as if he was praying for Ethan to say the right thing—for Ethannot to be the bastard he feared him.
But he was. "No." Ethan paused, letting Hugh relax before adding, "Ialready despoiled her. I took her virtue that night of the masquerade."
"You would no'." Hugh appeared aghast. "You have to marry her."
"The hell I will."
"She's my wife's friend. I will step in, Ethan."
Ethan gave him a menacing sneer. "You think to stop me from enjoying her?Nothing will stop me, least of all you."
Hugh studied his face, then he raised his brows. "I see. Well, the picture's becoming clearer."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Look at the facts: Madeleine's the first woman you've been with in God knows how long, and you canna stop thinking about her. After all the years you've wanted to kill Grey, now you never will be able to, and something like that would normally consume you. The fact that Grey bested you should rankle as nothing else, much less the fact thatJane shot him when you could no'. In the past, you would have made an attempt to thrash that MacReedy whelp even if you had to crawl to do it, but you canna be bothered about anything because all you want to do is get back toher ."
Refusing to be baited, Ethan said, "I want to enjoy her for a few weeks. Nothing more."
"I wish you all the luck in the world with that, brother," Hugh said, then Ethan thought he heard him mutter, "Welcome to the cult."
Chapter Fourteen
This was where Madeleine Van Rowen lived?
Ethan gazed up at the six-story building before him. The dilapidated structure had obviously once been a mansion but now looked as if it would collapse if he put a shoulder to it and leaned. Most surprising, it was in the middle of La Marais, one of the worst slums in Paris.
Madeleine was believed to live on the top floor—usually taken by only the poorest, since continually carrying water and food up the stairs was grueling.
He climbed the front steps to the stoop, then wound around drunken men fixed there in varying stages of unconsciousness. But the door was locked. He'd have to wait her out, or wait for another tenant to open the door. Descending the steps once more, he dropped back to the closest corner. He leaned against a wall and drew his knee up, surveying the world she inhabited.
>
Men strutted by with machetes or guns visibly secured in their belts. Prostitutes actively solicited—then took their work into every alley. Children ran naked and grubby in the streets.
It reminded him of the rookeries in London, except this was more harrying, more chaotic. If Madeleine truly lived here, then every day she passed this madness, waspart of it.
He tried to picture her here among these street people, elegant and fragile in her blue gown, and he couldn't whatsoever. Nor could he believe that Madeleine had chosen to live in this place over the luxury of St. Roch. He could too easily imagine Sylvie hearing the rumors about Madeleine in London and punishing her daughter for failing to secure either Quin or the count. So why hadn't Ethan found Madeleine clawing at the door in St. Roch begging for entrance…?
Just this morning, Ethan had arrived in Paris, a full ten days after leaving the MacReedys'. Once he'd checked into a hotel, he'd begun his search for her in St. Roch, at the address Quin had given him.
Ethan hadn't wanted Sylvie to see him, so he'd asked around the neighborhood, to uncover if Madeleine was even in town, or possibly where her favorite haunts were.
No one had any idea who he was talking about until he'd described Madeleine.
A gardener thought she came by the house a couple of times a month. A groomsman had caught an omnibus with her a week ago. She hadn't gotten off at the last stop before the slums. He'd remembered wondering why a woman like her had continued on.
Ethan had recalled that Sylvie's former address had been in La Marais—and he'd discovered that, for some reason, it was Madeleine'spresent address.
Her trail had been easy to pick up here. It seemed everyone in La Marais knew "MaddyAnglaise " or "Maddyla Gamine ," and they obviously liked her, because they were closemouthed with information concerning her.
A group of older women sitting on a stoop had ignored him, smoking their pipes and chatting—until he'd flashed the diamond ring he'd brought with him in case Madeleine proved…averse. When he revealed his plans to wed her, the women couldn't seem to direct him to this building swiftly enough, and they only asked that Ethan remember their names so that Maddy would "passez le gras," or "pass the fat"—give a kickback to the ones who'd assisted in securing her good fortune.
As Ethan waited, he mused that Madeleine might actually be persuaded to come with him. Even after she saw his face. Surely she'd be desperate to leave this place any way she could.
Madeleine Van Rowen beholden to me.He liked that idea—
Ethan tensed when he spotted the door to her building opening. A tall, gray-haired woman with a bucket emerged from the dark interior. She strode around the drunken men fixed on the stoop, seeming not to notice them, then made for a pump not a block away.
The door was easing closed behind her. Fearing Madeleine might have warned others about a tall Scot, he dashed for the entry, then slipped through the doorway. Inside, he made for the pitch-black stairwell, forced to use the rope banister as he climbed blindly. The steps were unsound, the corridor so tight he had to sidle up.
What if she was indeed upstairs? He could see her in mere seconds….
As he alighted on the sixth-floor landing a board groaned beneath him, and a blowsy woman shot out of her room—a whore, by the look of her heavily painted cheeks and lips. A glance behind her confirmed Ethan's guess. In a haze of cigarette smoke, a man lay tied to her bed and blindfolded, turning his head dumbly at different sounds.
Ten minutes in this neighborhood—not to mention in Madeleine's home—had certainly answered Ethan's question about how the lass had learned to fondle him so well. She must see men serviced hourly.
"I'm looking for Madeleine Van Rowen," he told the woman.
"And who are you?" she asked, blinking.
Good, she spoke English. Ethan could speak French but preferred not to, outside of penalty of death.
"Are you the man from London?"
Had Madeleine spoken of him? If so, he couldn't imagine what she'd said. Still, he took a chance. "Aye."
"Which one? The first one or the second?" At his nonplussed look, she said, "The Englishman or the Scot?"
Madeleine must have been talking about Quin. Still thinking about that bastard. "The…Scot."
She shut the door behind her, ignoring the man's protests, then clasped her hands, her mien delighted. "Maddée told Corrine and me all about you! The masquerade,n'est-ce pas ?" She wagged her finger at him. "You weretrès mauvais to our Maddée. But here you've come for her at last!"
Madeleine told her friends all about me?He couldn't imagine what she'd said, or what, in particular, they had deemedtrès mauvais .
She leaned in and said in a conspiratorial tone, "You're just in time, too, with the debts coming due."What debts? "I'mBea ." Bea was simple, he realized. Kind, but simple. "I'm one of Maddée's good friends."
"Aye, Bea." He feigned a look of recognition. "I've heard much about you."
She patted her hair, pleased. Then she frowned and pointed directly at his face. "Maddée didn't say you were battle-scarred. From the Crimean War, yes?"
"No, no' exactly—" He broke off because she'd already shrugged and turned to another apartment door.
"Maddée's not here just now—out working." She dug in her blouse for a ribbon around her neck with keys strung together. "But I'll let you into her room to wait."
"Perhaps you could direct me to her place of employment?"
"Who can keep up with her? The bridge or the corner. Different taverns and cafés. Who knows?"
He felt his face tighten. "And what exactly does she do?" In the nearly seven weeks since he'd been with her, she'd become destitute. Who knew if she'd succumbed to her neighbor's profession?
At his expression, Bea cried, "Oh, no, Maddée serves drinks or occasionally sells cigarettes." She proudly added, "Turkishones." Then in a chiding tone, she said, "Our Maddée's a good girl. Notpopular in that way at all."
"Of course," he said smoothly, relieved. "I just doona like that she has to work."
Bea's eyes lit up. "Exactement!" she exclaimed, bustling to open the door. "So, here is her room." She smiled widely as she showed him in.
Ethan drew his head back, stunned by the interior.
"Amazing,n'est-ce pas ?" Bea was right to be proud. Though Madeleine's apartment was basically part of an attic room—the ceiling was slanted until he could barely stand up straight even at the apex, and beams crisscrossed overhead—Madeleine had made it into a fantastical space.
The top floor of an old mansion like this would have been used for servants' quarters or possibly a schoolroom, and there were remnants of the mansion's former glory—elaborate gilt and wainscoting decorated the long, narrow space. Above the wainscoting along the more damaged wall, she'd pasted colorful posters.
Two large windows dominated her bedroom area and were framed by red drapes and fronted by a small balcony outside. Glancing out, he found that she had an unimpeded view of Montmartre. On her balcony, plants grew in profusion and wooden wind chimes clanked.
"Maddée loves to sit out there."
He nodded, then said, "Do you no' need to get back to your…friend?"
"He is not going anywhere," she said, stating the obvious with an insouciant wave. "Well, go on, open up."
Ethan unlatched one of the windows, swinging it wide. An unseasonably warm breeze blew, and the chimes began tolling, the curtains fluttering. A black cat leapt inside from the balcony, pawed at Ethan's trousers, then wound around his legs. "Her pet?"
"Non, she cannot feed Chat Noir. He doesn't often take to people like this. This is a good sign."
Ethan shrugged. Considering how people universally disliked him, the fact that some animals took to him always surprised him. Indeed, beasties seemed to either love him or hate him.
Turning his attention back to Madeleine's home, he crossed to the second of the two windows. When he found a bucket hanging beside it, he realized Madeleinedidn't haul water and supplies up those ricket
y stairs. She pulled them up, and easily too—with two pulleys working in tandem to lighten the load.Clever girl.
Past the second window, a velvet curtain cordoned off a ridiculously small wooden tub—but then, she didn't have to fold six and a half feet of body inside it. Atop a simple plank bed was a bedspread, intricately sewn together of rich-looking materials, yet wearing thin.
He'd suspected that perhaps Sylvie had thrown Madeleine out after they'd lost the count. But Ethan felt a sense of permanence here—this was Madeleine's home and had been for some time.
Though pleasing now in the warm afternoon sun, her apartment would prove a hell to heat in the winter. The roof undoubtedly leaked, and many of the panes in the windows were cracked or missing, replaced with thin cloth. Artistic flare wouldn't keep her warm in the coming months.
Another thing he noticed—though she had a stove and kettle, there wasn't a scrap of food but for a single shining apple.
An unfamiliar, heavy feeling constricted his chest. No wonder she'd had that air of weariness about her, one of the tantalizing things that had first drawn him to her. And no wonder she'd been hunting for a rich husband. But why would she endure this destitution for so long when she had a wealthy parent and even wealthier friends?
"Why doesn't she live with her mother?"
Bea blinked again. "She did not tell you?"
"Tell me what?"
From the stairwell, a woman called up, "Bea! Is that you?"
"Oui!" she yelled near Ethan's ear."C'est moi!"
"The drunks said a man slipped in—is he one of your regulars?"
"Non! I saw no one." To him, Bea whispered, "I have to go now! Corrine would be very upset to know you are here." She sighed. "But then, she does not understandl'amour as I do."
In a low tone, Ethan said, "When will Maddy return?"
"I could not say. Best make yourself comfortable. Knock across the hall if you need anything." With that, she left him.
Alone, but for the cat weaving around him, Ethan searched through Madeleine's meager belongings. She had a few dresses, all of them frayed, yet bold in color and design, with a modern look to them. He didn't find clothing fitting for London, but she'd probably already sold that wardrobe. Had she given up the blue gown she'd worn that night with him?