Instead, she looked at the letter, which had fallen to the floor beside her, the red sealing wax clinging to it like a gobbet of blood. For an instant she hesitated. Then she picked it up and cracked the wafer of wax with her thumbnail. She unfolded the page, time seeming to freeze as she looked down at what appeared to be a verse, fresh and newly inked in an elegant hand.
Roses watered by a grieving mother’s tears
Bloom where an angel-child is said to sleep
Beside her long-dead father,
Stolen by fever, rapacious, wild.
But I know it was not cruel fates that swept them both away.
Rather, the powerful hand of a Lion who would play God.
A Lion who roasts now upon hell’s grate for his dark deeds.
By all that is holy, I beg this of you.
Do not let the Lion triumph in the end. Come home, Jenny.
Undo his demon madness with the secret I tell to you.
The roses weep, not over one empty grave, but two.
Lucy scrambled to her feet, her heart thundering. What kind of brutal joke was this? Who would have sent this to her? Tempt her to believe… what? That Alexander d’Autrecourt was alive?
It was ludicrous to think that possible for even a heartbeat. This was some monster’s attempt to torment her, terrify her. Someone else playing at ghosts to amuse themselves.
But nothing about the objects scattered across the floor was amusing. Something about this rang of a subtle cruelty, of something sinister. She held the note to the light again and scanned the final lines.
Jenny,
I will await our reunion at Perdition’s Gate, Fleet Street. I regret bringing you to such a place, but circumstances are such that it is unavoidable. I shall be in the third room on the second floor every Thursday evening for the next three months only. Be swift, my beloved daughter. Yr. Obedient
Daughter… My God, this person expected her to believe that he was her father? Expected her to race across the ocean, to meet him in a place called Perdition’s Gate? She would have to be insane. It was far more likely that the person who’d sent her the box was some miscreant who wanted to extort money from the wealthy Ian Blackheath. A cutthroat who intended to kidnap her or worse.
She might even be willing to believe that the box was from the d’Autrecourts, that they were plotting to finish the dastardly deed they had begun when she was a child so they could wipe away the scandal of her existence in the most permanent manner possible.
But a letter from Alexander d’Autrecourt?
No. She could not believe that it was so.
Lucy grabbed up a petticoat, dragging it on with trembling fingers. Her chin bumped up a notch. If some maniac thought they could terrorize the Blackheaths, they were dead wrong. She’d tell her father, and that would be the end of this scheme. Pendragon and his daughter would make whoever was responsible for this sorry they had ever been born!
Half an hour later, dressed and determined, she marched into the drawing room. She fully intended to demand a private interview with her father. But as the door opened, Lucy’s heart wrenched, her fingers folding tight over the disturbing letter.
Emily Rose d’Autrecourt Blackheath was sitting in a wing-backed chair, her mahogany tresses glistening in the candle shine, her face radiant as she smiled up at her husband. Five-year-old Norah had obviously escaped Nurse again and was curled up asleep on what little remained of Emily’s lap, while the legendary Raider Pendragon stroked his tiny daughter’s cheek as if she were an angel fallen straight down from heaven.
Emily caught sight of Lucy hovering at the doorway and gave her daughter a beatific smile. “So there is the guilty party,” she said. “You are in very deep trouble, Lucy-love.”
Lucy stuffed the hand that held the note behind her back, alarmed. “G-Guilty? I—”
“Norah told us that you’d taught her how to sneak out of the nursery. She was to hide like a wee little mouse in the shadows, until Mrs. Gamp slipped out to gossip with Tansy, then all Norah had to do was scurry down the back stairs.”
Lucy flushed, relief surging through her. “Norry’s bright as a new button. She would have figured it out for herself soon enough.”
Ian chuckled. “Especially since you told her there were ‘sweet cakies’ down here on a tray.”
Lucy stared down at her tiny sister, who was blissfully unaware that there were more frightening monsters than the imaginary ones that lurked beneath the bed, and truths that were far more bitter than Nurse’s tonics.
The letter seemed to cut Lucy’s fingers, burn them with the secrets that it held. She trembled, suddenly stricken by what it would mean to her sister and to her parents if there were any truth at all in the message from England.
If Alexander d’Autrecourt were alive it would shatter twelve years of laughter and love, invalidate the marriage of Emily and Ian. It would brand the little ones in the Blackheath nursery with the label of bastard.
Lucy reeled at the implications. Hadn’t her mother endured enough pain? Hadn’t Ian Blackheath sacrificed enough?
How could she tell them? Her mother was blossoming with yet another child, while her father was half crazed with worry over her. What could the dread Raider Pendragon do? Sail to England, find whoever was behind this twisted jest, and make certain they could never hurt those he loved?
What if what the letter claimed were true? The thought of Ian Blackheath and Alexander d’Autrecourt confronting each other was so ghastly it made Lucy’s stomach churn. She couldn’t risk that happening, no matter how unlikely it was that her birth father was alive. Pendragon could never be told, could never confront whoever was responsible for this.
But the Raider’s daughter could.
The idea struck her with the force of a lightning bolt.
She could go to England and take care of this matter, and no one else would ever have to know. No one else would have to be savaged by these terrible doubts.
This was insane! It would be a mad goose chase, with nothing to guide her but a musical score dedicated to some total stranger and a clandestine meeting at an establishment whose name already whispered of hell.
But what other choice did she have?
Lucy’s fingers tightened, crumpling the note. She surreptitiously stuffed it beneath the lace at her wrist. When she turned to face the others in the room, Lucy’s eyes had that determined gleam her parents had learned to regard with a healthy dose of dread.
“I’ve been feeling a need to escape myself lately, just like Norah has,” Lucy said airily. “So I’ve come up with the most marvelous idea.” She turned to Claree Wilkes with a smile that could wheedle the key to heaven right out of St. Peter’s hands. “Claree, how would you like some company on your journey to England?”
Emily gasped, her teacup clattering against its saucer.
Ian’s eyes filled with astonishment, then the dangerous glint that had been the signature of Pendragon. “What the blazes, girl? Did you hit your head when you were out riding?”
Emily eased herself out from beneath the drowsing Norah. The swell of pregnancy made her look all the more fragile and ethereal. “Lucy, this is so—so sudden.”
“Not really, Mama. I’ve been thinking about it for a long time, but I never knew how to broach the subject with you and Papa.”
“You’ve been lambasting us with your opinions from the first moment you set foot on Blackheath land,” Ian challenged. “Why should this be any different?”
Lucy groped for a reason her parents would believe, praying that for once Ian wouldn’t be able to see through her dissembling. “I didn’t know how to tell you that… that…” She turned back to her mother and caught up her hands. “Mama, please try to understand. There’s this empty place inside me that needs to be filled. Filled with music that I can’t experience here in Virginia. London would be a feast of concerts and operas, theater. I could stay for six months or so, maybe a year, until Claree is settled in. You know how nervous she is arou
nd strangers. She’ll be miserable in England without anyone she knows.”
Lucy turned to Claree Wilkes. “I know it’s abominably rude of me to invite myself along. But you’re leaving so soon, there’s hardly time for delicate hints and proper languishing looks.”
“I’d a-adore having you, dear. You can’t imagine how much,” Claree said with the endearing lisp that had made her painfully shy. She darted a questioning glance at Ian and Emily. “I’ve been p-pure dreading being a diplomat’s wife. All the entertaining, and—and… It would be so comforting to have someone from home to keep me company, child. And as for you, it would be the opportunity of a lifetime.”
Claree turned pleading eyes to her husband, and Lucy could see the shadowy grief in her eyes for the daughters they would never have. “J-Just think, John. We could give Lucy a London season.”
“You could spend a season in hell, you mean!” Ian blustered. “You’re going on a diplomatic mission. Knowing Lucy, she’ll stir up another war!” He shot his daughter a glare so blistering she half expected her skin to peel. “What about your mother, Lucy? The baby coming?”
Lucy felt a quick jab of guilt.
“Ian, hush,” Emily chided. “If Lucy lingers about, waiting for all the babes we intend to put in that cradle, she’ll never leave Blackheath Hall. She’s a woman grown. She has her own life to lead.”
“I’ve no objection as long as she leads it on this side of the ocean!”
“But there are things we can never give Lucy here, no matter how much we might wish to. She would be with Claree and John. She would be loved, safe.”
“That girl wouldn’t be safe if she were shackled in the Williamsburg gaol!” Ian bellowed. “We’re talking about Lucy here. A loose cannon, unleashed in England. For God’s sake, an hour ago the little hellion was dangling out windows and dressing up like a ghost!”
His hands closed over Emily’s arms, his voice tight. “Don’t you understand, Emily Rose? They would be in England. The d’Autrecourts. God knows what they might do!”
“They can’t hurt us now,” Emily insisted. Lucy winced, her mother’s soft words cutting like a lash.
“The old duke died eight years ago,” Emily said. “And Granville, the eldest, died before that. Alexander’s brother Edward holds the dukedom now. Edward would never hurt her. He adored Alexander. As for the rest of the d’Autrecourts, they won’t even acknowledge she’s alive.”
“How could they?” Ian demanded. “They have their tidy little grave tucked up in the family crypt and their tragic story about how she died. It might prove a trifle awkward if their long-dead granddaughter popped up in the middle of a London soiree.”
“The d’Autrecourts have more reason to hide the truth than anyone. Besides, Lucy would be the guest of one of the first diplomats England has dealt with since the war. I hardly think they’d care to alienate her guardians.”
“She doesn’t belong in the midst of a pack of aristocratic dogs with their noses stuck so high in the air they don’t give a damn who they trample over. That was why we fought the blasted war, to make certain our children were free of their power. Lucy belongs here with us.”
“Do you really believe that?” Emily cupped her palm tenderly along the stubborn jut of her husband’s jaw. “Or are you afraid that some dashing English rogue will carry her off to his castle and we’ll never see her again?”
Lucy saw her father flinch, his cheekbones flooding with color. “Of course not! No Englishman in his right mind would take on a headstrong, wild-blooded, impossible little termagant like Lucy.”
His words trailed off, and Lucy could see the very real dread in her father’s eyes. “There’s not an Englishman alive who could tame her,” he said softly. “Or one who could be worthy of such a treasure.”
“I’m not trundling off with ‘prospective bride’ painted on my forehead, Papa. All I want to do is take a holiday with John and Claree. For a year at most.”
“Barely an hour ago you were claiming you would stay here forever, the next moment you’re packing your trunk for England. I don’t understand. Lucy, help me to understand.”
The words hurt Lucy more than any others could have. From the first moment she had squared off against Ian Blackheath they had discovered they were kindred spirits, so much alike that they understood each other without words.
She had told him everything: from the fact that his amber waistcoat made him look like an overripe squash, to the sad, secret fear she’d had when she’d first arrived at Blackheath Hall so many years before—the fear that she was so wicked inside no one could ever love her.
For the first time in her life, Lucy turned away from the question in Ian Blackheath’s crystal-blue eyes.
Papa, I can’t tell you this, she wanted to cry.
Someone might be trying to hurt you and Mama, and I have to stop them. Alexander d’Autrecourt might be alive. And if he is… oh, God. If he is it could destroy you.
The guilt twisted deep, a voice inside her whispering: If he is, I could meet him, Papa. The father who wrote my “Night Song,” the only memory I have of my life in England.
The prospect was a terror and a sweet temptation.
Lucy crossed to where Norah lay dreaming her sweet dreams—confident that when she awakened Mama would be there, with indulgent smiles and kisses, and Papa would be there to toss her up in his arms until she squealed with laughter.
Lucy knelt beside her small sister, brushing a dark curl from the child’s dewy brow.
Was she doing the right thing in going to England? Lucy wondered desperately. It was as if she were being torn in two by the strange mixture of uncertainty and fear and anticipation she couldn’t quite crush.
For the first time since she’d come to Blackheath Hall so many years before, Lucy was reaching into a past shrouded in mystery and haunting sorrow.
Perdition’s Gate… The name of the rendezvous point echoed in her mind.
What was it that she was about to embrace?
A dream so impossible she’d never dared to dream it at all?
Or a nightmare that could destroy everyone she had ever loved?
Chapter Two
London stirred like a nocturnal beast hungry for prey. Its eyes glowed orange, in the form of newly lit street-lamps. Its claws were unsheathed as footpads and highwaymen, cutthroats and harlots crept from the doors of the buildings that huddled along streets littered with garbage and human filth.
By day cherry vendors and orange girls and bevies of ragged children filled the area. But night exposed the underbelly of the city, revealing the lost souls who scraped out an existence there.
Never had Lucy seen such poverty, so much hopelessness. For the first time she fully understood why men and women sold seven years of their lives for indentured servitude to escape this festering sore of humanity. For the first time in her life Lucy understood the horrors her mother faced wandering this city alone.
Lucy urged her mare to a brisker pace. Taking comfort from the weight of her pistol against her thigh, hidden behind her male disguise, she rode deeper into the labyrinth where the most notorious gaming hells and brothels held court. Twelve days she had been searching for information that would lead to her destination. Twelve days of struggling against rules of society that were so ridiculous they’d made her want to box someone’s ears. But tonight her battle for information and her struggle to escape Claree Wilkes’s watchful eyes would finally come to an end. Lucy was going to Perdition’s Gate.
An ironic smile tugged at her lips. From the time she was three years old, she had heard the predictions that she was a devil-spawned brat destined to roast in hell. But even she had never expected that she would enter its gate in the middle of an English slum, while she was searching for a ghost.
It might even have been amusing if she hadn’t felt this sensation of danger—like a slender blade pressed against her spine, waiting, just waiting to be driven home.
Was it possible that Alexander d’Aut
recourt, the dreamy youth in the miniature, had descended into this hell? Was it possible that a gentle musician could find himself lost in this miasma of human suffering?
There had to be some sort of mix-up, Lucy reasoned grimly. Either that, or she was walking straight into some sort of bizarre trap.
She tugged at the neckcloth that fell in ruffles beneath the gentleman’s waistcoat that was part of her disguise.
What if she had been a fool not to tell Pendragon? What if she were making the biggest mistake of her life?
And what if you’re turning coward? Lucy berated herself inwardly. You’ve come too far to turn back now.
But the temptation to do just that grew stronger. She was sucking in a steadying breath when she caught a glimpse of yet another shadowy street.
An innocuous-looking building stood halfway down the lane. Its windows were heavily curtained, and a man stood guard outside the door in case constables happened by. Lit by a single flambeau, a badly executed statue of Hades dragging Persephone down to hell stood at the entryway to alert patrons that the pleasures of the flesh and the lure of gambling were within.
The sight of that statue should have filled Lucy with triumph. Instead, her stomach pitched with an ambivalence that infuriated her. For a heartbeat she was uncertain whether to rein the horse toward the establishment or turn and flee back to the Wilkes’s townhouse as if her coattails were afire.
But before she could reach a decision a commotion erupted. A bundle of rags and carroty hair scaled the statue like a bear cub treed by a pack of hounds. Or, rather, one very large hound. A giant of a man with a patch over one eye was attempting to drag the boy down by the seat of his ragged breeches.
“I be tryin’ to get work, Pappy Blood! I do!”
Lucy heard the high-pitched shriek as the man cracked his paw hard against the boy’s backside.
“Oww! My arse!”
Outrage flooded through Lucy when the guard looked away, as if the boy were no more than a roach to be stepped upon. In a heartbeat, Lucy spurred her horse toward the statue, pistol in hand. The man with the eye patch wheeled at the sound of the horse thundering toward him, his face ashen as he saw the pistol pointed square at his chest.
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