Esther shrugged elaborately. “Well, most importantly, to have Weber murder Prince Metternich.”
His astonishment was a brief victory. For an instant after she spoke, the carriage swung sharply right, pushing Esther into Josephine. A moment later, she realized they’d been tricked into silence, for they’d swung right at a crossroads, while the rest of the cavalcade moved forward to Vienna. He’d never had any intention of taking them to the city. He meant to kill them here in the Woods and hide their bodies.
For the first time, real, numbing fear surged through Esther’s veins. Up until this moment, she’d believed they would still have some chance to escape, that there would come some opportunity to attract the attention of people who would prevent Meyer from carrying out his plan. Now, her heart thundered in her ears, louder than the frequent crashes from the sky.
“I don’t understand why,” she got out, trying desperately to pull her suddenly sharp, sensitive mind to the matter in hard. “Why kill Otto in the first place?”
“My God, where do I start? You spent time with the man. You know he’s supremely unsuited to lead so much as a line of toy soldiers, let alone a country in such dangerous times. Besides, now that Kriegenstein is no more, and neither is Otto, the Prussians will give me his private lands, and possibly his father’s, too.”
“You take my breath away,” Josephine marveled.
The man’s eyes gleamed, as though he believed it a genuine compliment from a woman who had surely seen the worst of men.
And then quite suddenly, the horses screamed and the carriage lurched to a sudden halt. Esther was thrown against the door, but even as agony shot through her shoulder, she saw Meyer fall off his seat onto the floor. There would never be a better chance.
She had opened the door in a trice, her free hand grabbing Josephine’s wrist as she leapt outside, stumbling. She was aware of another coach slewed across the path, but mostly she was aware of Meyer’s voice behind them, shouting, “Halt!” and the clear, sharp, terrible click of a pistol being cocked.
She stopped dead in the lashing rain, just as something flew past the side of her vision. There was a crack and Meyer cried out. The coachman on the blocking carriage was using his whip. Esther spun about and saw the pistol at Meyer’s feet. The next instant, another crack of the whip sent him sprawling to the ground; a great red weal across his face.
She didn’t think twice. Still holding Josephine’s hand, she bolted for the sudden, totally unexpected salvation of the other carriage, and only then did she recognize the coachman.
Garin.
Hands yanked her into the carriage. Josephine all but fell on top of her. They were both on the floor, and they were moving, swinging around in an arc and then speeding up.
Josephine dragged herself off Esther, who sat groggily and gazed up at the anxious, excited faces of Lizzie and Vanya.
*
“Something bothered him about the tracks in the road,” Vanya explained a few minutes later. “So he got Menno to drive the carriage while he sprinted off through the Woods to reconnoiter. He caught up with us about a mile further on and took the carriage off the main road at the first drivable track through the forest, determined to get ahead of the little caravan you’d joined and to stop it. But it’s hilly up there. We saw one carriage turn off, and we couldn’t talk him out of setting the trap.”
“With no thought to the rest of us!” Countess Savarina pointed out, shifting her feet out of Esther’s way.
Still feeling somewhat dazed, Esther gazed out of the window in silence while the chatter around her seemed to fade. He’d saved her again. There was no way he could have known what had happened, and yet he’d still saved her.
Blinking, she realized she recognized this part of the Woods. This was where she’d come with Otto and been forced to threaten him with her pistol, very close to the spot she’d wakened and first gazed up at Garin.
The carriage rattled along a lot more quickly than they’d ridden that day with her head splitting.
“I’ve lost his horse,” she said contritely. “And Dietmar’s.”
Eventually the road curved into a better one and the carriage bowled through the Vienna suburbs. Before long, the horses pulled into the drive of a fine summer mansion, and drew up at the impressive front door. Vanya jumped down to hand out the ladies.
Garin stood to one side, somehow merging into shadows that weren’t even there. The fanciful thought made her want to laugh and cry at the same time. Trailing after the others, she paused in front of him. She wanted to say something clever and grateful and memorable, but all that spilled out was a slightly hoarse “Thank you. Again.”
He swallowed. “I would die before I let anything…” He broke off, tearing his gaze free of hers. “I have to go and meet the others.”
“I’ll come with you,” Vanya said, overhearing.
“No!” Garin swung to face him. “Stay here, with them. Have your servants be on their guard, too.” He strode two steps before throwing over his shoulder, “Thank you.”
A smile flickered over Vanya’s face. “You’re welcome.”
Esther watched him vanish around the side of the house and through the grounds. “He never rests, does he?”
“I think he might, with a little persuasion,” Vanya said thoughtfully. “When this is over.”
*
Esther found she only relaxed once Lutz and Menno delivered the baggage with a grin, and ran off again.
“Everything must be well,” she said with relief.
“And so we may all dress for dinner as normal,” Lizzie said, taking her arm. “I suspect General Lisle will not be long.”
“Oh, he’ll go back to the hotel,” Esther said. “Juana may stay, I suppose, but her propriety won’t be offended, so long as Countess Savarina is here.”
“You mean she doesn’t think much of me as a chaperone?” Lizzie asked, her eyes gleaming with fun.
“You’ll do in a pinch,” Esther informed her. “But you should really be just a few years older for the position, and preferably widowed.”
“Poor Vanya. Er…what about Josephine? The monastery was one thing, but here, the world will balk at us dining with her.”
“She doesn’t hide who she is,” Esther agreed. “And the staff won’t have her with them if they know. Besides, she’s been a good friend to me. It wouldn’t seem right to banish her to the kitchen or confine her to her chamber!”
“Well, if we’re discreet, perhaps no one will know who she is,” Lizzie said optimistically. “But Vanya will have to speak to his mother and stop her making a fuss.”
In the end, Josephine took the matter out of everyone’s hands by announcing, when Esther stuck her head around the door, that she would rather dine in her chamber.
“I’m not a fool, Miss Lisle,” she said, with a quick, slightly twisted smile. “And believe it or not, I would be just as uncomfortable as you. I need to be back in my own world.”
“But you won’t leave, will you?” Esther said anxiously. “Not until Herr Zelig permits it?”
“I suppose not,” Josephine said, moving restlessly about the room. “Who knows? Perhaps my absence will be good for business. Providing it’s not too long!”
*
Having escorted the other carriage and the cart safely out of the Woods without mishap, Zelig called in to the summer palace, ostensibly to inform Vanya that all was well, although in reality he hoped for a glimpse of Esther. The girl was like a fever, a craving. He couldn’t resist the pain of her nearness.
The superior and yet expressionless servant showed Zelig into a room on the ground floor where Vanya was playing billiards by himself.
“Excellent!” the Russian said, straightening. “Grab the cue behind you.”
“I don’t have time to play. I need to get into Vienna and lock up my prisoner. I just stopped off to reassure you all is well with the other carriage.”
“I’ll tell Esther,” Vanya said gravely. “Here, have a d
rink before you go.”
Zelig, about to flee cravenly before Vanya’s mockery, consented to take the glass of brandy from his friend.
“Why don’t you just speak to her?” Vanya asked.
Zelig thought of turning it off, of pretending he misunderstood. But he was too tired. “I can’t.”
“Because you think your stations in life are too different?”
Zelig nodded curtly.
Vanya swirled the brandy in his Bohemian crystal glass. “Why should you care for that if she does not?”
“What makes you think she does not?” Zelig countered. “She must marry well, not just for herself but for her family. She has no reason even to look at me.”
“And yet she does.”
Zelig’s breath caught. In one quick, almost desperate movement, he tossed half his brandy down his throat. “Don’t,” he got out.
“Zelig, I’m not teasing you,” Vanya said, a tinge of frustration in his voice. “We can’t help who we love. And if we’re lucky, the people we love don’t care about our…foibles. I believe Esther is like Lizzie in that.”
Zelig threw his head back, a choke that wasn’t quite laughter rising in his throat. “Vanya, my disadvantages are rather more than foibles! I’m an agent of the hated Austrian police, with no name, no land, and with no certain prospects. How could I even ask it of her, and retain any honor whatsoever?”
“Because if you don’t, you might just make her as unhappy as you. Where is the honor in that?”
Zelig stared at him, daring once more to allow in that demon of hope—sweet, insidious, tempting…
Vanya raised his glass to him. Slowly, Zelig raised his, too, clinked and swallowed the remaining brandy before he handed the glass back to Vanya and strode out of the room. He thought Vanya might have laughed softly behind him but he didn’t care.
Chapter Eighteen
After the luxury of a bath, Esther chose at random from her meager supply of gowns. As she dressed, she wondered what Garin had done with the prince. His disappearance must be one of the chief Congress rumors by now, particularly after his country had been invaded by the Prussians.
The borrowed maid—not a dresser but a girl with ambitions to be so—was just adding the final pin to her hair when one of the other servants brought the news that a gentleman begged the favor of a word.
Believing it to be Garin, she jumped up, ready to go at once. But when the maid thrust the card into her hand, the name on it was not Zelig, but Lord Henry Niven. Stupidly disappointed, she straightened her drooping shoulders and went down to meet him.
With the aid of a footman, she found Lord Harry kicking his heels in one of the many reception rooms on the ground floor. He’d clearly been back to the hotel to change, for he wore black silk breaches and a severe black evening coat.
“Miss Lisle, I thank God to see you in one piece,” he said fervently, advancing with one hand thrown out toward her.
It was an unusual enough greeting from him to make her blink, but she laughed as she took his offered hand. “More immediately, we should thank Herr Zelig, but you are very good!”
“No, I’m not,” Lord Harry said, gazing into her face, his expression more serious than she had ever seen on him. He didn’t release her hand. “That’s what I came to say. One of the things I came to say. I hope you know that it never entered my head when I first talked you into accepting the prince’s proposal that it could put you in such danger as this.”
“Well, it never entered mine, either. Neither of us really knew Prince Otto, or Count von Meyer.”
“I misread the situation abominably,” Lord Harry admitted.
“Well, so did I, and my father.” She hesitated a moment, then drew her hand free. “Tell me, my lord, did you know why Prince Otto made his offer of marriage in the first place?”
“I presume he was smitten by your charms.” Harry gave a quick, almost rueful smile. “I know I was.”
“Ha,” Esther said rudely. “No you weren’t. And neither was Otto. He made the offer to silence my father who’d just discovered some secret the prince didn’t want to be revealed.”
Harry frowned. “What secret?”
“I don’t know and I don’t really care,” Esther said. “But it seems to me we all three contributed to the situation in which we now find ourselves, and perhaps it serves us right!”
“I can’t think that of you. I never meant you actually to marry Prince Otto, you know.”
“Rest assured I never would have done so.”
For some reason, light leapt in Lord Harry’s eyes. “Truly?” he said eagerly.
“Truly. The man is unstable, ill-natured, and downright nasty.”
Lord Harry’s gaze fell. “Forgive me.”
“Oh, you are forgiven,” she said lightly. “I agreed willingly, even knowing I would become the girl who had been engaged three times and never married, putting me quite firmly on the shelf!”
“Oh no,” he said, taking a step toward her and taking her hand once more. “Miss Lisle, I beg you to believe that such had never been my plan.”
She frowned. “But you’ve just said you never meant me to marry him.”
“Of course, not! I thought—that is, I hoped you might—when it was over…” He swallowed visibly. She’d never seen him so lost for words and frowned with incomprehension. He took a deep breath. “When it was over, I hoped to make you my own wife.”
Her mouth fell open. “What?”
He raised her hand to his lips, fervently kissing her fingers. “Miss Lisle, I still hope so. Please, say you’ll marry me.”
As if he couldn’t help himself, he swept her into his arms and kissed her. Beyond his head, a figure stood very still in the open doorway.
Garin.
Instinctively, she started toward him, pulling away from Harry even before she realized how this must look to Garin. Harry held on to her until she boxed his ears and then he let her go with a gasp.
“Forgive my passion! Please, do me the honor of becoming my wife. Let me look after you.”
Esther stared at him, several confused thoughts clarifying in her mind at last. “I don’t need looking after, Lord Harry,” she said firmly. “And if I did, I really wouldn’t come to you. I only ever asked for your help once—and you never gave it, though you said you would. I don’t hold it against you, my lord. It was an impossible problem. But no, I thank you. I respectfully decline your offer of marriage.”
With a curt nod, she turned and hurried from the room. There was no sign of Garin in the big, marble hall, so she simply ran to the front door and wrenched it open.
Dark had fallen, but outside lamps illuminated the winding drive to the gate and the solitary figure striding along it.
“Garin!” she called, running after him.
His step never even slowed.
“Garin!” She thought she was going to have to hurl herself at him just to make him stop, but on her second cry, he did in fact halt and turn to face her. The nearest lamp cast shadow across most of his countenance. What she could see looked pale in the uneven light, but polite.
“Miss Lisle,” he said civilly.
She slid to a halt, snatching her hands behind her back to prevent them seizing his person. “You came to see me,” she said breathlessly.
“No, I just needed a word with Lord Launceton.”
“Then stay and speak to him,” she said, covering her hurt. After all, he’d discovered her clutched in another man’s arms.
“I already have. It was only a word, and now my business is concluded.” He touched his hat. “Good night.”
“Garin, what you saw—” she began desperately.
“Is safe with me, of course. I am, as you know, the soul of discretion.”
She stared up at him. His face said only that the barest politeness was all that kept him with her. She said, “But you can’t believe that I—”
“You are perfectly safe, Miss Lisle,” he interrupted. “There was nothing to b
elieve. Good night.” And he strode off down the path, leaving her alone in the rain.
*
Garin had lived through grinding poverty, war, and fear. In his work, he faced dangers every day. But nothing in his life had ever been so hard as walking away from Esther Lisle. He wanted to rage at her and hurl her to the ground. He wanted to seize her and drag her with him, to show her what it was to truly love and to feel the passion of a man who truly cared, whatever his faults. He wanted to strangle Harry Niven with his bare hands for touching her.
But she’d let him touch her. She’d listened to Niven’s proposal and she’d let him. And Zelig knew in his heart that she wasn’t for him.
He strode out of the gate, making instinctively for the inner city that was his home. He ignored the cabs he passed. He needed to walk, to run, and to hurl himself against walls to dull the pain.
She and Niven were of the same world, shared a common heritage and a common experience. Niven was a good match for her, finally—a younger son certainly, but of a noble and powerful British family. Why would she even look at Zelig, even if he’d been able to make himself more acceptable. He remained what he’d always been to her, Agent Z. No more and no less. A little fear, a little gratitude, and maybe even a little curiosity had won him her kisses. No more. No serious feeling. How could he ever have imagined otherwise? How could he have let his guard down so quickly after so many years of careful good sense… and corrosive loneliness.
That loneliness threatened to engulf him now, to bury him beneath a weight so great he’d never force his way out. He didn’t even want to. He wanted to get blind drunk and hit things, people, her… Jesus Christ, he’d never hurt her. He’d die for her.
And there it lay. His duty as always. He’d finish this, get Otto and Meyer out of her way, and clear her path to happiness with Niven, if that was what she wanted. It wasn’t what she needed. Niven had used her and let her down, and would let her down again. He didn’t deserve Esther Lisle.
He gasped, forcing himself to halt and grasp the lamp post beside him, to breathe in and out. No, Niven didn’t deserve her.
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