“And perhaps I wouldn’t take it if you did,” he said at once. “That doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy the persuasion.”
Laughter caught in her throat, and he released her, though only to take her hand and peel back her glove to press a kiss on the inside of her wrist and another on her bare arm.
“You had better go before we are discovered,” he said. “If we are careful, we can steal many such interludes.”
The risk appealed to her, as he had known it would. Her eyes gleamed with it. And there was definite desire in her quickened breath, the faint, sensual tremble of her lips. She made his heart ache.
Then she simply smiled and walked away from him into the noise of the ballroom.
*
Her lips still tingling from his kiss, her heart curiously light, Anna stepped back into the blazing light of the ballroom and moved immediately away from the alcove. The only gaze she encountered was Banion’s. Gosselin’s. She didn’t care. He must already suspect some collusion between them and romantic intrigue would make it seem less dangerous to his plans. Whatever they were.
“You are playing with fire,” Serena murmured at her side.
“And I thought I was being so discreet.”
“In Blackhaven, there is no such thing as discretion. Everyone else knows your business before you do.”
“I would be surprised,” Anna muttered. “I hope you are not meaning to turn into a strict chaperone.”
“I doubt that would achieve anything.”
“It wouldn’t.”
“But you will take care?” Serena said anxiously.
Anna looked at her with as much surprise as curiosity. “You are worried about me.”
“Who else would I worry about? Him?” She twitched her head in the direction of the alcove.
“Probably,” Anna said ruefully. But secretly, she was touched by her sister-in-law’s concern. She had imagined at first that it was only about the reputation of her family, but for some reason, Serena seemed actually to care about her. The thought came to her that Serena was her friend, which was yet another novelty. Anna had never had a friend before. Except Christianne, who was like part of herself. Or Rupert, when they remembered each other’s existence.
The rest of the evening flew by for her, and she discovered that Louis was right. Their intrigue was fun. He sat beside her at supper, and while he spoke to Serena, he held Anna’s hand beneath the table cloth. She did not jump when his fingers brushed and curled around hers, although she worried someone might notice the heightened color in her cheeks. Her skin tingled beneath the caress of his thumb.
She allowed it only for a few moments before withdrawing her hand to eat. On other occasions, his leg brushed against hers, and she knew that was deliberate, too. It did not appall her. It excited her.
“I think our friend has left,” she murmured once, in an attempt to make things more normal, at least normal by her own and Louis’s standards.
“He has,” Louis agreed.
“Should you not have followed him to find out where he stays?”
“He’s at the tavern. I searched his room before I arrived. There is nothing new.”
“You leave no stone unturned, do you?”
“Not if I can help it.”
For Anna, the departure of their quarry made the passages with Louis much more intimate. She was more than his tool, or his means of watching his enemy.
When, during the after-supper dance, Tamar decided he had had enough and wished to go home, Anna almost refused. But they were no longer children running wild around the countryside. Staying at the ball alone would not be tolerated by society, and that did not at the moment suit her.
Clandestine meetings would not be tolerated either, of course, which was at least part of their thrill. She did not at once accompany Serena to the cloakroom, since she was in the midst of a group of men who had all asked her to dance and been refused. While finishing her laughing conversation with them, she was searching the ballroom for Louis.
Failing to find him, she abandoned her admirers and left the ballroom with a faint sense of pique. Two women were entering the cloakroom as she crossed the foyer which was, otherwise, quite empty. Or at least, she thought it was until the door to one of the rooms on the left, opened and Louis stood there.
Her heart soared. A swift glance told her she was unseen, and then she simply ran to him in a rustle of skirts and laughing breath. He seized her, even as he closed the door behind her. In the darkness, his lips found hers.
She flung her arms around his neck, sliding her fingers into his hair. When the kiss broke, she pressed her cheek to his.
“You did not dance with me,” she said, low.
“You do not dance with anyone else. People would talk.”
Laughter erupted. “Really, Louis? Are you saving my reputation?”
“It’s a fine line.” He pressed little kisses down her ear to her neck and shoulder, where his lips clung to the line of her clavicle and paused. She felt the heave of his breath and then he straightened. “Tomorrow.”
He released her. She heard the click of the door re-opening and light from the foyer drifted in. In the dimness and shadows, he was a stranger, her enemy. In was still true, though she had never felt it to be so wrong.
“It’s clear,” he murmured.
Because she couldn’t help it, she reached up to touch his rough cheek, trailing her fingertips over his parted lips as she slipped past him and out into the foyer.
*
“Were you ordered to kill me?” Louis asked casually.
It was early morning in the white-covered woodland by Braithwaite Castle. As they walked, Louis had again withdrawn the stiletto from its sheath in her habit and was examining the blade’s point.
“Not unless I had to,” Anna replied. “By preference, I was to persuade you to change sides and tell me—or Henry—everything you knew. If I couldn’t, if you wouldn’t…”
“Then you were to kill me to prevent me returning to the French with what I’d discovered about Britain?”
“It was mentioned,” Anna acknowledged. “I agreed I would use my judgement. I wasn’t convinced you could have learned anything very useful rotting in a prison in the back of beyond.”
He regarded her curiously over the top of the stiletto. “The prospect of such a task did not daunt you?”
“If your enemy is not human, he is easy to kill.”
A frown tugged down his brow, though his eyes remained steady, un-accusing. “How can you have learned such a thing? How many enemies have you killed?”
“None, so far as I know. Though I certainly wounded a couple of thieves who attacked me in London.” She lifted her chin. “Do you find me unnatural, unwomanly?”
“I find you disturbing and magnificent. You have a brave heart.”
Her smile was twisted. “I have no heart at all.”
He stopped and pushed his hand inside her cloak, placing his palm flat between her breasts. “Then what is it that beats for me?”
She stared at him, for the first time genuinely afraid. “Don’t make me weak,” she whispered.
Something in his face changed. For a moment, she thought he reflected her own fear. But then, it might have been pity or simple longing.
He said, “If we don’t feel, it isn’t for anything. I feel for you. I care for you.”
She swallowed. Her heart seemed to slam against her ribs, against his hand. “And I for you,” she whispered.
His hand moved lightly, caressingly over her breast as he bent his head and kissed her mouth.
*
Parting from Anna that morning was a wrench. This was more than caring. It was closer to obsession. And that was dangerous for both of them. To Louis, no problem was ever insurmountable in the long run, and he could hatch a hundred future plots to bring Anna and himself together. The trouble was, that in the immediate, even if he discovered Gosselin’s plot, and killed him, he was still a discarded French spy with too m
uch knowledge in his head, trapped in England with no friends or means of support. Or even protection beyond his own wits and his weakened physical strength.
Only his long-honed instincts made him aware of someone approaching through the woods. One man. He was prepared to meet Gosselin or any bravo hired by him. In fact, on the whole he wanted that, to learn what he could, even if he would not yet kill him. And so, he kept walking as if he had every right to be there, alert and poised for whatever action was necessary.
But the man who met him at the fork in the track was none other than Lord Tamar.
“I thought it was you,” the marquis said, amiably enough. “Assignation with my sister?”
“Would you knock me down if I said yes?”
“I didn’t knock you down for manhandling her at the masquerade, so possibly not. Though I reserve the right.” He reached up, breaking a bare twig off the tree beside him. “I’m not used to this,” he said disarmingly. “But I suppose I should ask you what your intentions are.”
Louis’s lips twisted. “I wish I knew.”
It was probably not the answer Tamar expected. He threw the twig on the ground. “I won’t let you hurt her. And if I can’t stop that, I promise I’ll beat you to a pulp.”
“Because she has been hurt already?”
Tamar gave him a clear look. “Is that what holds you back? You fear she is not…pure?”
“Jesus Christ, no.” Louis dragged his hand through his hair. “Such things do not weigh…” He dropped his hand and met Tamar’s gaze. “What happened to her?”
Tamar searched his eyes, then said shortly, “She was assaulted when she was fourteen years old.”
Louis had guessed, yet it still hurt to hear. His fists clenched and unclenched. “By the man in your picture?”
“By his brother, but there is an association for her. They were bailiffs, dunning us for money my uncle owed since they could not touch me or my late father. He caught my sisters alone.” Tamar swung away from him, tight-lipped. “Anna bore the brunt of it.”
“What happened to him?” Louis ground out. Where can I find him?
“I killed him,” Tamar said simply.
Louis nodded once, forcing himself to breathe.
“But the damage was done,” Tamar said. “The twins clung all the closer to each other. Christianne grew dependent, and Anna grew protective. And hard. For years, she could not bear to be touched. She still has to force herself to shake hands, even with women. But she made herself strong, as you may have noticed. She is not afraid of men. She merely learned how to despise them and how to use them. For amusement, I can only suppose.”
Tamar turned back to Louis. “She is different with you. More natural. Which is why I didn’t knock your teeth down your throat when we first met. I never thought she would kiss anyone. I don’t object to more kisses, Lewis, if you’re discreet, but I won’t have you toy with her, or dishonor her.”
Louis nodded once. His suspicions had been one thing. To hear the story, even without details as Tamar told it, was quite another.
Tamar took a deep breath, straightening his shoulders as though banishing the past. “Very few people know any of this, for obvious reasons. If I did not think you a decent man who cares for her, I would not have told you.”
The blood seemed to drain from Louis’s face, rushing to his feet so fast he felt dizzy. “Decent?” The word escaped him with something very like revulsion. “And if I am not? If I am not what you think me?”
Tamar’s eyes narrowed. “Are you already married?”
The guess was so wildly wide of the mark that Louis laughed. “No. No I am not married. I am a decent man, by my own lights, at least. But the rules I live by are not yours.” His lips twisted. “Though, ironically, they may be hers. Goodbye, Tamar.”
Abruptly, he walked on, all the pleasure of his morning lost in a flood of guilt and impossibility. Tamar did not for a moment believe “Lewis” was not a gentleman. Louis doubted he would be quite so understanding of a Paris street urchin turned spymaster courting his sister. But that was not really the issue. Anna would go her own way, regardless of family or social conventions. She would not care for the loss of ton society because she had never known it. The issue was, Louis was the only man she had ever trusted enough to let near her. If he had helped her to heal, to be ready for the life most women of her rank longed for, that should be enough. He should walk away before her heart was fully engaged. Before he truly hurt her.
He suspected it was already too late for him.
Chapter Thirteen
Anna, however, was having too much fun in the present to be thinking of the future. The thrill of all the new feelings aroused by Louis combined with the mystery of Gosselin and the secret meeting in Blackhaven to make life irresistibly exciting. It did cross her mind that she was not carrying out the precise duties Henry had assigned to her—a fact brought home when she returned to the castle that morning for breakfast and found a letter from Christianne awaiting her.
Apart from her sister’s usual everyday doings which included a large dinner party, a trip to the theatre, and the ordering of a new evening gown, there was a promise of wonderous news when Anna came home again.
Anna paused at that. Home. Frightening as the prospect had once been, she and Christianne were no longer part of the same whole. Her home was no longer with Christianne. Nor was it here with Rupert, for it wasn’t really Rupert’s home either. Braithwaite Castle was Serena’s brother’s, and as soon as Tamar Abbey was fit to receive them, the marquis and marchioness would make their home there. This comfort, this happiness Anna had found here, was only temporary.
She returned to her letter. Apparently, Henry was put out because of Sir Anthony Watters’s resignation from the Foreign Office. Christianne couldn’t work out why, but he seemed to think Anna would understand. I did not even know, Christianne wrote, that you were acquainted with Sir Anthony or Lady Watters.
Neither did Anna. But there was a reason he was telling her. There was always a reason for his innocuous little messages.
Between ourselves, Christianne continued, he departed under something of a cloud, which has upset Henry and his colleagues.
Now that was interesting. Sir Anthony was a fairly senior figure. She would have expected his departure to have initiated a major jostling for position among his underlings. But to have left under a cloud…
Could Sir Anthony Watters be the man awaited by the hotel? Was he meeting Gosselin?
That was one aspect. The other was, why Henry, who knew nothing of this expected event, particularly wanted Anna to know about Watters’s resignation.
Watters. It was just a name to her, but she was sure she had heard it more recently than she had left London…
She became aware that she was frowning directly at the nervous Mrs. Elphinstone the governess. Who had been employed by Lady Watters for many years.
Anna laughed, and Mrs. Elphinstone’s expression grew positively alarmed. “Forgive me,” Anna said easily. “Was I staring? In truth, my mind was miles away and my eyes fixed on you without purpose. I did not mean to be rude.”
Mrs. Elphinstone claimed to have been accosted by a Frenchman during her day off when she had been in Whalen. She had described the escaped prisoner accurately, causing the patrols here to be sent to join those at Whalen. And so, Captain Alban had been free to land his wife at Blackhaven Cove, unobserved by any but Louis.
But surely that innocuous event had not been Mrs. Elphinstone’s reason. Not if she was still connected to her disgraced one-time employer. Someone else was coming here by ship, just as Louis suspected. Someone no one else was meant to see.
Anna finished her breakfast unhurriedly, waiting until the girls had trailed reluctantly after Mrs. Elphinstone to the schoolroom. The poor lady did not have a great deal of time for spying, Anna reflected as she rose and made her own way to the library. Here, she penned a brief note and folded it before going out to the stables, seizing her cloak on the
way.
It was simple to find her favorite stable boy and give him the note with one of her shrinking supply of coins. “Deliver it only to Sir Lytton,” she warned. “Not to any of the hotel servants. Bring any reply straight back to me.”
The lad tugged his forelock, grinned, and ran off, no doubt glad to escape his duties for an hour.
Although she wanted to keep her time free to discuss her new discovery with Louis, she had promised to accompany Serena to help the vicar’s wife in some charitable work. When she received no immediate reply to her note, she went grudgingly with her sister-in-law, more concerned with the possibility of running into Louis in Blackhaven than with the plight of the poor souls to whom she found herself ladling soup and distributing gloves, coats, boots, and blankets.
It was only gradually that their tragedy began to move her. She recalled her early life at Tamar Abbey, when they’d given old clothes and food to the villagers who had needed them. And later, when her father had died, how they had had less and less to give. She and Christianne were reduced to words and taking the odd turn watching the sick and the dying. It had been one of the few things to pierce her protective armor, and so, she was glad to have left that duty behind when she went to live with Christianne.
Now, distributing things provided by other people to injured old soldiers and sailors, and to the poorest and least appealing of the town, the memory pushed through again. How was it that now she had more, she gave less? Because she didn’t like being reminded that there were people worse off? People who had suffered more than her and continued to do so.
She didn’t care much for this idea. She could pretend the work she did for Henry was great work for her country, but much of it, surely, was for Henry himself. And to combat her own boredom. As always, the shame and guilt made her smile more brightly, talking and laughing with the stream of broken humanity with whom she worked those two hours.
And they seemed fascinated by her, brightening when she did, grinning at her from across the room while they ate.
“They like you,” Mr. Grant said warmly. “It’s an art—being kind without appearing to be. Thank you.”
The Wicked Spy Page 15