by The Impostor
Clara frowned. “Is that supposed to comfort me?”
Dalton shook his head sharply. “Comforting you is not my priority at the moment,” he said. “There is more than you life at stake here.”
He didn’t look at her, but out of the corner of his eye he saw her flinch.
“Ah,” was all she said.
Simon came to stand next to Dalton by the fireplace.
“I thought perhaps you were in love,” Simon said too quietly for the others to hear. “It seems you are not.”
Dalton tested the temperature of his heart. Cold as ice. “I never said I was.”
“No, you never did.” Slowly, Simon walked back to Agatha, who nested her hand in his as if for reassurance.
But Liverpool would approve. Dalton could hear him now, declaring his loyalty as he had done so many times in Dalton’s youth.
“I should be happy to die tomorrow, should my king and country require it of me!”
Dalton knew it was true. He understood the Prime Minister, as perhaps no other person living did. Liverpool’s faith was patriotism, his vocation the defense of England. Until this last month, Dalton would have claimed it of himself as well.
His life honed for one task, his very existence aimed at one goal.
Protect England.
But then you let her in. His every masculine instinct begged him to keep her safe, to protect her always. It interfered with his judgment—confused him and dangerously distracted him.
What did mere feeling have to do with this? If he would sacrifice his life—and he would—should he not be willing to sacrifice his heart?
Protect Clara he must. But his heart was already taken.
Again came Liverpool’s voice, full of satisfaction and cool approval. “Good man.”
No. He was not a good man. He was merely a loyal one.
When he turned, Clara had moved to the window tolook out at the darkness. He turned to Simon. “There’s only a few hours left until dawn—”
“Dalton!”
The fear in her voice brought him to her side in an instant. She never took her gaze from the street, but reached for him with one shaking hand. “There! That man by the lamppost. It’s him? It’s Kurt!”
It was indeed Kurt. He stood brazenly in the circle of light cast by the street lamp, his face turned toward the house. Dalton watched as another man joined the giant assassin to gaze at the house. Stubbs. Then another figure. Then another, until the street corner was full of the most dangerous men in all of England.
This was what he had come to. Run to ground by his own men.
Simon had joined them, giving a low whistle at the sight. “I suppose we’d better ask them in and find out what they want.”
Dalton turned on him. “Are you mad? It’s obvious what they want.”
Simon’s face went very bland, which Dalton knew was a danger signal. ‘Those men were my Mends and comrades-in-arms for fifteen years. Are you saying they’ve all turned rogue?”
“Of course not! But can you deny that the Liars follow orders, kill or be killed?”
Simon had no answer for that.
Dalton turned away. “The day you’re forced to fight Kurt off Agatha, I’ll let you ask me that question! Right now, I will not turn Clara over to them, and I will not bow to intimidation.” He turned, pulling Clara with him. “We need to get out of here, and not by any way they can follow.”
But how? The house would be surrounded in an instant if they tried to leave through any of the doors.
Clara turned to Agatha. “Quickly, are any of the houses on your row empty right now?”
Agatha blinked. “The family four doors down is summering in Bath this year.” She made a gesture with her hand to the east. “But the house is locked up tight.”
Clara rolled her eyes. “Are you people spies or not? Show us to your attic. Now!”
After giving James a brief set of instructions, Dalton gripped Clara’s hand tightly as they ran from the room. He wanted to praise her for her quick thinking, but she wouldn’t look at him. It seemed as though he had finally pushed her faith beyond its limits.
That was too bad, for she had never been as beautiful to him as she was now.
Clara examined the east wall of the attic, but could see no way that would allow them easy entry to another house. Simon’s square was obviously of better quality than Smythe Square. Dalton pulled her away from her position peering at the solid brick.
“The fire wall won’t yield to us, Clara. We must go another way.” He towed her to the window.
She opened it and peered out, but shut her eyes immediately. “No. Too high. I cannot climb down.”
He took her place at the window. “Not down. Up.” With that, he’d climbed onto the window ledge and disappeared above it. Then his hand appeared from above her. “The roof. Take my hand, I’ll pull you up.”
Clara wanted to say no. She wanted to turn and run down the stairs as quickly as possible.
She also wanted to live. “Get on with it, Clara Rose,” she whispered to herself. Then she hiked her nightgown and clambered onto the ledge, keeping her gaze on Dalton’s wide palm.
She teetered, then reached for him with both hands. In a blink, she was beside him on the slick roof tiles.
The weather had tamed since the earlier clear moonlight. Now there was nothing but the reflection of the city’s street lamps against the lowering clouds. The slates were damp, and Clara’s borrowed slippers had little foothold. Luckily, they were a bit tight on her. At least they would stay on.
She could see little but shadows. Hopefully, that meant that their pursuers could not spy them at all. Dalton kept his grip on her hand as they slid and crawled to the ridge of the roof.
He pulled her close for a moment. “Feel the ridge? Keep it between your feet. If you slip, try to let your feet go down either side so you won’t fall.”
She soon had reason to try out this advice, for he kept a brutal pace over the rooftops. More than once, he nearly tugged her arm from the socket when she slithered on the slates. What would have taken minutes on the ground seemed to take hours on the rooftops.
Finally, the fourth chimney came into sight in the dimness. Dalton left her straddling the ridge as if it were a recalcitrant horse, both hands seeking a grip on the slates.
He went down the rear slant of the roof and over the eaves. As he went out of sight, she shut her eyes, willing him not to fall.
Then he was back, scrambling up the pitch using both feet and hands. “Take my hand.”
“I don’t want to do this,” she said as she released her grip on the ridge. “I truly, truly don’t want to do this.”
“I know. But the window is open now. I can drop you right into the attic.”
Her knees were weak with strain and fear, but Clara forced herself to pull her opposite leg over the ridge until her feet dangled down the slates together. With one hand in Dalton’s she let go of the ridge tile finger by finger.
Her tentative balance went awry as her weight shifted and she slid on one hip down the slates, gaining speed as she shot toward the edge.
“Clara!” Dalton’s hand tightened on hers and her slide ended in a yank that almost dislocated her shoulder. Her body flipped, slamming her face down onto the roof. She looked up to see Dalton spread-eagled on the slates, his arms extended to hers, and one foot cocked over the roof ridge.
Her feet dangled in midair and the roof edge cut into her thigh. So close…
With effort she reached up to grab Dalton’s sleeve with her other hand. He took her wrist and pulled her up until she could brace her feet in the gutter. He wrapped her in his arms, his own foot still hooked over the apex of the roof, and tucked her face into his neck as she struggled to catch the breath that had fled her lungs when she’d thought herself dead.
“I have you,” he murmured. “I have you safe.”
Then he helped her take a grip on the nearby chimney and regained his own balance. He moved around her, as
able as a cat on the pitched roof, until he was beside her.
“We’re just above the window and to the left a bit,” he told her. “I’m going to let you down by hand. I want you to feel for the window ledge with your feet.”
She surrendered her trust totally to him, allowing him to dangle her over the roof’s edge until her toes made contact with the stone ledge.
“Now, I’m going to drop you in. I want you to throw your weight in through the window. Ready?”
She nodded quickly but couldn’t speak. One misstep, one wrong move …
She’d never been more frightened in her life.
“Now!”
She swung forward and flung herself in through the dark portal, landing sprawling on the dusty wooden floor of the attic.
He was beside her in a moment, pulling her to her feet. She clung to him, her fingers tightening in his waistcoat until they ached.
At that moment, he could have been the devil himself and she would have sought shelter in his strength and solidity. The fact that he murmured softly into her ear and stroked her straggling hair away from her face with heart-melting tenderness had nothing to do with it.
When she could breathe once more, she stepped back and straightened her spine. “We should move on.”
He shifted in the darkness as if he wanted to reach for her again, but surely that was her imagination. “Right. Take my hand.”
She rested her hand in his yet again and they made their way blind through the unfamiliar attic, stumbling and knocking shins until they found the door and the stairs down.
Her nighttime spying experience certainly was coming in handy on this adventure. Too bad she would never be using these skills again, just when she was getting rather good at it all.
They reached the ground floor and Clara ran out of ideas. “Now what?”
“We raid the house for a cloak for you and we hail a hack.”
“A hack? At this time of night?”
“There’s always a hack available in the residential district this late. All those husbands sneaking home late from their clubs.”
Just as he’d said, once they’d made it to the street and fled around the corner from their pursuers, a hack came trotting down the cobbles in a leisurely fashion. Dalton raised one hand and the driver obligingly stopped.
Too grateful to marvel at their luck, Clara climbed inside and sank wearily onto the seat. She’d been through so much tonight, and it still lacked a few hours until dawn.
Part of her wanted to stay awake and note where they were going and how, but the rest of her fell victim to exhaustion immediately. She never even remembered lying down, but suddenly found herself being briskly shaken awake from her nap half-sprawled on the seat.
“Clara, come along. We must hurry.”
“All right. Fine. Yes,” she murmured, trying desperately to force both eyes open at the same time. Dalton pulled her from the hack and steadied her on the sidewalk as he waved the driver on.
The weather had deteriorated further. It was raining now, the chill needles striking her face and fully waking her at last.
Dalton began walking the opposite way from the route the cab had taken. He towed her along behind as if she had wheels. He ducked into an alleyway that allowed not a ray of street-lamp light within and made his way through the blackness as if he could see in the dark.
He led her around another corner, behind the building she guessed, then climbed a box and hefted her up beside him. He took her hand and moved it forward until her fingers touched glass. A window.
“Don’t tell me—we’re breaking in again.”
She heard a dark chuckle.
“I’m allowed to break in here. Or at least, I used to be.”
His voice sounded grim, and for the first time she wondered what this never-ending night meant to him. From what she gathered, he’d lost his position defending her earlier. Fleeing with her again had likely only compounded the problem.
She tried to convince herself that it wasn’t so, as he opened the window in some way that she couldn’t see, and helped her through it. She wanted to believe that he hadn’t lost anything important tonight, for it would be very difficult to resist a man who had sacrificed so much on her behalf.
Very difficult, indeed.
Chapter Twenty
Dalton felt the familiar air of the Liar’s Club fold around him and ached for it. He’d come so close.
Now he had no idea what lay in his future. Would he be tried for treason? If he could not prove the identity of the rogue member of the Royal Four, it was possible.
Clara. What was he going to do with this maddening magnificent woman? She’d been so quick, so brave on the rooftops, with never a tear, never a betraying shriek that would have alerted the Liars. He shook his head. She’d have gone over the edge of the roof silent until the end, so as not to call attention to his presence there.
He still could not allow himself to care for her, but by God, she’d won his respect in that moment in a way that he’d rarely before esteemed a woman.
Holding his hand over her eyes in a last, rather hopeless gesture of secrecy—perhaps he ought to simply open the secret office to public tours—he led her up the narrow stair to the attic chamber. There he seated her on the old sprung sofa that probably predated Simon by many years.
She curled up, tucking her slippered feet under her and wrapping the stolen cloak around her until he could only see her pale face in the glow of the candle he’d lighted.
Dalton rubbed the back of his neck, then untied his cravat and tossed it over the back of his chair. He sat at the desk, trying to think. It wasn’t easy with Clara in the room. The air seemed charged with her, as if lightning were about to strike him.
She made him too warm. He shrugged out of his damp coat and forced himself to consider his options. How long could he remain in the club unseen?
Simon had assured him that no one but James knew of the existence of the secret office, even though one of the entrances went directly through Jackham’s office.
Luckily, Jackham wouldn’t be in until three days hence, for he was still on his liquor-buying trip. He was likely tippling in Edinburgh even now, for he insisted on personally trying every liquid that made its way into the club. Dalton still wasn’t sure if the man was connoisseur or cozener, but it was just as well.
Dalton didn’t trust Jackham, despite Simon’s assurances that the man had no clue to the real purpose of the club. How could anyone work on the premises for years and learn nothing? The man was a common thief who had once lived for taking what he hadn’t earned. If there were ever a leak in the club’s security, Jackham would be the first person Dalton would look to.
So the office was safe enough for now. Taking Clara home to the Trapps would only put her back in the reach of the Liars. Their own territory would be the last place they’d look.
He hoped.
He glanced over at Clara. She’d melted into the sunken cushions like warm tallow, only her dark eyes wide in her pallor to show that she was still awake. She must be exhausted.
“When did you sleep last?”
She blinked. “Other than in the carriage?” She thought about it for a moment. “I had a nap Tuesday evening.”
It was Thursday morning. Two nights without sleep. One spent with him, one night on the run. “What’s holding you up?”
“Fear,” she said promptly. “And I’m hungry as well, but you needn’t concern yourself about that.”
His mouth twitched. Only a small dig at his lack of hospitality. “There is a kitchen here. I’ll find you some bread and cheese, if you like.”
“And tea, please. Rather a great deal of tea.” She snuggled deeper into the couch. “I feel as though I shall never be warm again.”
“Ah, then, tea and a fire. Your wish is my command.”
He was rising to leave, so he couldn’t quite hear her murmured comment, but it sounded something like “I entirely doubt that.”
True, he
thought as he took the candle and left the room. Unfortunate, but true.
The fire was warm and the small meal heartening, but still something deep inside Clara shivered. Having discarded the wet wrapper, she sat on the floor in front of the fire, shrouded in her overlong cloak. She had braided her hair but had nothing to tie it with. Dalton moved restlessly about the room looking rather like a pirate in his shirtsleeves and unbuttoned waistcoat. She could just see the curls on his chest in the open throat of his shirt. Were his shoulders getting broader by the moment?
He was truly beginning to get on her nerves.
“Don’t you have something lordly to tend to?” she snapped finally. “You’ll turn me mad if you pace round me once more.”
“James is securing your protection.” His voice held frustration and the edge of something else. “There’s nothing at all for me to do but guard you.”
“Guard me how? Safeguard me, or prison-guard me?” She stood to face him. “I’m not going anywhere.”
He stopped abruptly in his pacing and pondered her in a manner that gave Clara pause. “What is it?” she asked.
“To be truthful, you are going somewhere. I’ve decided to send you away until I can find the source of this mess.”
She rolled her eyes. “You might have thought of that before you dragged me back to London. I was already on my way to the country to hide.”
“I had somewhere a bit farther in mind.” He looked away. “Scotland will do for now.”
“Scotland?”
“Unless I need more time. If necessary I shall put you on a ship for the West Indies.”
She glared at him. “Do I not have a say in this?”
“No. I need you off where you won’t distract—I mean, attract assassination.”
“And this has nothing to do with the fact that we were lovers?”
He stiffened. “Of course not. There is no point in bringing that up. That is irrelevant.”