A SINFUL SURRENDER: Spies and Lovers

by Laura Trentham

  She yanked the pins out and left the thick mass to hang loose around her shoulders. She’d been vain about her chestnut-colored hair before coming to London and being confronted with the elegant blond, blue-eyed English roses with smooth porcelain skin, willowy bodies, and perfectly coiffed hair.

  The trauma of the evening reflected in her pale face and shadowed eyes. She pinched her cheeks to bring some color back, and finger combed her hair, trying to instill order, but it was hopeless. From her hair to her freckles to her frame, she was woefully out of fashion in every way. Plain. Barely passable.

  What did it matter? Marcus certainly wasn’t a suitor but a… what? A captor? A savior? He’d promised to escort her home, but he wanted something from her in return. Information. Did the little she knew hold value? What would he do if she refused him?

  She shuddered and looked around to discover more about the man. The room was as spare and neat as if he were a monk. His shaving implements were lined up next to the basin, cleaned and ready for their next use.

  The bed was made, and she picked up the single book on the stand and flipped through it. Detailed drawings and descriptions of horses lined the pages—different breeds’ musculature and organs.

  She opened the wardrobe and riffled through a stack of shirts. They were unremarkable except for several lines of tidy stiches along the sleeves of almost every one. Did the man routinely enter into knife fights?

  A jacket in a similar state to the one he’d draped over her shoulders hung on a hook alone and forlorn. A pair of patched leather breeches were folded underneath. She checked the pockets and the crannies of the wardrobe but turned up nothing that shone a light on whether Marcus Ashemore was a villain or her hero.

  Unable to procrastinate any longer, she stepped into the green dress, slipped her arms into the puff sleeves, and pulled the bodice up. There was too much fabric at her slippers and not enough at her bosom. She tugged and shimmied, but the top swells of her breasts remained exposed. Even worse, she couldn’t reach the tapes, leaving a sizable draft along her shoulders.

  Holding the too-scant fabric to her chest, she unlocked and cracked the bedchamber door open. Marcus stood to the side of the window, peering around the edge of the curtains. She cleared her throat. He looked over his shoulder, then fully turned, never taking his eyes from hers.

  “I can’t reach the fastenings.” She swallowed and presented her back to the crack in the door.

  His footsteps were light and quiet. She tensed, her insides squirming in dread at his touch. Or was that anticipation? Her world had gone topsy-turvy over the course of a few hours, and she couldn’t categorize her emotions.

  His fingers made contact with her skin, warm and glancing. Gathering her hair, he pushed the mass over one shoulder and made deft work of the tapes, as if this wasn’t the first time he’d played a lady’s maid. The bodice hugged her chest. She dropped her hands and looked down.

  “Dear Lord,” she murmured. Perhaps it wasn’t as risqué as the dresses of the more daring ladies of the ton, but it was far beyond the pale for a debutante to wear such a revealing dress in a color reserved for married women.

  Marcus remained behind her. Strangely, she could feel his heat even though he wasn’t touching her. “Are you well?”

  “To be honest, I’ve been better.”

  “I’m sorry you got mixed up in this sad, sorry business.” He moved away. “I have tea if you’d like some.”

  “Yes, please.”

  She gathered her bloodied dress and joined him in the sitting area. Marcus and O’Connell were in discussion close to the window. She guessed Marcus would have preferred it to be private, but O’Connell was incapable of whispering.

  “Eh? Special characters?” O’Connell asked. “What makes them so special?”

  “Not special. Suspicious. Anyone loitering in the street or alley. Don’t speak to them. Just make a note and come back.”

  “Aye, lad.” O’Connell’s eyebrows were low over his eyes, almost camouflaging them as he slipped out the door.

  She was alone with Marcus. Again.

  Chapter 3

  Troubled, Marcus scrubbed a hand over his jaw as he surveyed the street from his third-floor window. The man standing at the mouth of the alley might have nothing to do with the evening’s events, but his intuition told him otherwise. His quest to discover the truth and clear his father’s name had not gained him admirers, and he realized now he’d been foolish to bring Delilah to his rooms. If he was being followed, then he’d put her in even more danger.

  “Is something amiss?” Her voice trembled, and he turned to give her assurances he couldn’t support with facts.

  He froze. He swallowed. He blinked. Words deserted him when he needed them desperately to finesse the truth from her.

  The shiny green fabric of the dress looked cheap and was far too revealing for an innocent like her. But in the dress and with her hair loose, Delilah looked far from innocent.

  The expanse of skin and curves had his mouth drying and gaping open, words a foreign concept. The dress skimmed her body and puddled at her feet. Her thick hair was no longer forced into ridiculous clusters of curls but tumbled past her shoulders in waves. Striations of chestnut and caramel sparked in the candlelight.

  With a jolt, he concluded she was pretty in the way of a milkmaid. His mind skidded back to the moment in the garden when he’d rolled her under him. It had been a necessary ruse, but he hadn’t been completely unaware of the way their bodies fit together.

  She shifted and crossed her arms under her breasts, emphasizing their shadowy curves. “What’s amiss?” she asked again more stridently.

  He cleared his throat. “Nothing. Nothing at all.”

  “You’re lying to me, aren’t you?”

  If a young woman of little experience could see through him so easily, how was he to ferret out the information he required from England’s trained spies?

  “We should burn your dress.” He took the crumpled, bloody mass of white.

  Stirring the remnants of coal in the fireplace, he used a poker to shove the dress under the ash. It caught in a hot blaze.

  He gestured to the worn settee, and they sat and stared at the licking flames eating the fabric.

  “Will you tell me again? Every word. Everything you remember.” He tried to keep the desperation out of his voice even though he was feeling quite desperate indeed.

  “Were you close with your father?”

  Her question felt like a test. How to answer? His father had been his hero. A giant of a man. Important. Too busy and away too often. His visits with Marcus in Ireland had been filled with fun and adventure, but what did he really know of his father? Very little, he was coming to understand.

  “I loved him.” Embarrassingly, his voice cracked, but his answer seemed to satisfy her.

  “Were you meeting with Quinton for information?” Her stare was intense and slightly accusatory.

  “Of course not. I would have picked a less dangerous and easier-to-reach assignation if that were the case. Tonight was the first I’ve heard his name.”

  “Were you on the hunt for the mysterious book then?” At his reluctant nod, she asked, “What’s in it?”

  “I’m not entirely certain, but I hope it holds the truth.” He sighed and ran a hand over his jaw.

  “The truth of what?”

  “The truth of what my father was involved in during the last months of his life.”

  “Why would the book be hidden in Lord Harrington’s library?”

  “Lord Harrington and my father were friends. My father must have been in fear for his life. Quinton was killed because the book points the finger at those who would commit treason against England.”

  “Treason?” Delilah sounded suitably appalled.

  With the war against Napoleon dragging on, the strain on English institutions had begun to show cracks with discontent welling out, but there were some who never wanted the war to end. It had become too pro
fitable.

  “The information in that book is the key to my father’s death. Now it’s been taken, and I don’t know where else to look. Did you hear anything else? Names or places or… anything?” He was ready to fall to his knees and beg when she rose to pace, the borrowed dress swirling around her legs and feet like liquefied emeralds in the snapping firelight.

  “Quinton was to deliver the book to someone named Hawkins.”

  “Hawkins!” Marcus popped to standing with a sudden burst of energy.

  She spun to face him. “You are acquainted with him?”

  “By name only. He doesn’t often circulate among Society, but he casts a long shadow across Westminster.”

  “He works for the good of England then?”

  Did he? While Hawkins was rumored to be England’s spymaster, could he have been lured by the promise of coin to commit treason? “Ostensibly, yes, but I trust no one.”

  “Quinton had been tasked to retrieve the book and said he was honor bound to deliver it to Hawkins. Once the man in the hat confronted him, Quinton turned accusatory. ‘You betrayed us,’ he said.”

  “Those were his exact words?” Marcus gripped her upper arms and squeezed to draw her gaze to his. He could detect no guile, only a sincerity born of fear.

  “Yes. Quinton seemed shocked, as if he’d trusted his killer. What does it mean?”

  “It means I must find the man in the hat. He has the book, is most likely a traitor, and he’s definitely a murderer. What do you recall of him?”

  She closed her eyes, tipped her face up to his, and tugged her bottom lip between her teeth in an unconsciously sensual way. Anyone observing them might assume they were lovers on the cusp of a kiss. “He was tall and elegant, and except for the rather unfashionable hat, he was well-heeled.”

  “Anything else?”

  “His scent was distinctive.”

  “How so?”

  She leaned in to sniff him. “You smell of the outdoors. Fresh and green. This man smelled of spices and darkness.”

  Marcus blinked while he wrapped his head around her lyrical description. “Would you recognize him if you happened across him in a ballroom?”

  Her gaze skated to where her dress had turned to blackened ash in the grate. “I might.”

  It wasn’t a no. His urge to hug her close in gratitude was almost too strong to deny.

  The creak of the door opening cut him away from her. The anxiety pulling O’Connell’s mouth into a tight frown told Marcus enough.

  “Three blokes, laddie. All rough-looking sorts. One in the alley. Two on either corner. Who sent them?”

  “Someone who doesn’t like the questions I’ve been asking. Hawkins perhaps.”

  “Or the killer,” Delilah said darkly.

  Marcus met her gaze and swallowed hard. “Perhaps. Although I don’t see how he could have known of my involvement tonight. And you were hidden.”

  “Whoever sent them, how are we to sneak away? I must return home.”

  “If we assume they know what I look like and that my only companion is my valet, then perhaps we don’t sneak away.” Marcus rubbed his jaw and shot a meaningful glance toward O’Connell. “It’s time for the case.”

  “Ach, yes, I think you’re right, laddie.” O’Connell bustled into the bedchamber.

  “What case? And what if one or both of your assumptions are incorrect?” Delilah stared at the door O’Connell disappeared through.

  “These men are after me, not you. If they nab me, they’ll let you go.” He tried to sound confident, but the narrowed gaze she swung toward him told him he’d failed.

  “That’s being rather optimistic.”

  “You haven’t even heard my plan.” At the rise of her brows, he continued. “In my experience, people see what they expect to see. What they wouldn’t expect is to see a drunkard exiting the building with his doxy.”

  Her mouth dropped open with a gasp. “I assume the part of doxy is mine to play?”

  “I’m afraid the dress won’t fit me.” He tried on a smile that had been called charming once or twice, but he was obviously out of practice, because she remained stony-faced.

  “I’m not a… a… whore,” she whispered.

  “Of course, you aren’t. And I’m not a drunkard, but if we put on a good enough show, we’ll fool the men outside and escape unharmed. The other option is to scale the rooftop to an adjacent building.”

  She shook her head with a vehemence that made her hair swing around her shoulders. “Oh no. I’ve had a lifetime’s worth of inching along ledges. You really think they wish to harm us?”

  Best-case scenario had the men kidnapping and questioning him. Marcus assumed it wouldn’t be in a drawing room over tea and biscuits. Worst case, he would end up like Quinton. He couldn’t bear to think what they would do to Delilah. “I’m afraid so.”

  “But won’t they recognize you even pretending to be a drunkard?”

  On cue, O’Connell returned holding a black leather case a foot square and six inches deep. It had been acquired from an actor on Drury Lane. Marcus set the case on the table, unlatched it, and opened the lid. Hair pieces including a mustache and beard and pots of various tints were arranged neatly inside. Everything an actor might need to assume a variety of stage roles.

  Marcus plucked out a wig of jet black and used his reflection in the window to position it over his sandy brown hair. The wig was surprisingly comfortable. The hair was longer than his own and tickled the back of his neck and swept over his forehead. He turned and held his hands up. “Different enough to throw them off the scent?”

  “Very different. If it weren’t for your eyes…” She stared at him and blinked, her lips parting before giving a brisk shake of her head. “What do I need to do to convince them of my role?”

  “The dress is a fine start, and once we’re out the door, you only need to follow my lead.”

  Marcus sprinkled the brandy left in his glass over his jacket and then gave O’Connell a hug. He didn’t need to tell O’Connell what to do if he didn’t return. Contingency plans had been made long before. It didn’t stop O’Connell from looking worried and whisper-yelling, “You take care, laddie, or I’ll whip you meself.”

  Marcus took Delilah’s hand and tugged her out the door and to the first-floor landing, stopping to reassess the situation. A shadow moved across the lane.

  “You reek of liquor,” she whispered.

  “That’s the point, lass,” he whispered back before wrapping an arm around her waist and pulling her flush with his body. He raised his voice and added a slur. “What a pretty thing you are.”

  He slapped the front door open with the heel of his hand and stumbled down the stairs in fits and starts. Delilah clutched his shoulders to maintain her balance. Perfect. Once at street level, he spun Delilah so she was pressed against the stone wall. He hoped her gasp was one of surprise and not pain. He pushed his leg between hers and dropped his mouth to her ear. She arched against him and tilted her head so he could access her neck. Excellent.

  “Almost there.” He tangled his fingers in her hair and forced her head back. Maintaining an inch between his lips and her heated, feminine-scented skin, he trailed his lips down her throat to her collarbone.

  He tried to ignore the quickened pulse of his heart and concentrated on the threat surrounding them. A breathy moan escaped her lips, and she writhed against him. An unwelcome reaction occurred. His cock stiffened to half-mast. Delilah was too good of an actress.

  “Do you keep a room close to the market?” His voice, forced absent of any Irish lilt, echoed off the stone. “We’ll have no privacy for a good tupping on the street.”

  “Y-yes. Close to the market.” Her breathlessness could be attributed to fear or arousal or nerves, but he couldn’t allow her to say more or her genteel accent would give them away.

  “Good. I’m near to bursting. Let’s not dawdle.” He put his arm around her shoulders and stumbled against her.

  From the corn
er of his eye, he could see one of the men on the corner take a hesitant step toward them and then another. They were almost to the circle of light cast by the lantern hanging from the post. It would be their downfall. He tugged Delilah into a doorway carved into the stone. The shadows afforded a small amount of cover. It also afforded them no escape.

  Once again, he nuzzled her ear. “One of the men is coming closer.”

  Her chest jerked against his in a sharp breath that only made him more aware of the swell of her breasts, milky white and ever so tempting in the darkness. “What should I do?” she whispered.

  “Hold me. Act like you want me.” Marcus didn’t need to act like he wanted Delilah. In spite of the danger—or perhaps because of it—his blood pounded through his veins, heightening his every sense.

  “I’ve never…”

  Of course she hadn’t, but neither of them had a choice if they wanted to meet the sunrise alive. “Pretend you want me, or we’re lost, lass.”

  She snaked one of her arms inside his jacket to clutch the back of his shirt and wrapped her other hand around his nape to pull his face down to hers until they were cheek to cheek and her breath stirred the fake hair at his temple.

  Her body molded against his from chest to thighs, and he had a moment’s disquiet knowing she could feel the semi-hardened length of him against her hip. If she was new to a man’s embrace, she might not even realize the significance of his body’s reaction.

  And that’s all this rush of desire was. A natural reaction to having a woman in his arms after too long. Not having to pretend to be off-balance, he stumbled and landed with his back against the side of the alcove, his legs braced wide and bearing her weight.

  He cupped her head, his fingers caught in the silken web of her hair, and stared down at her shadowed face. Her eyes were half-lidded, and her lips parted on her quickened breaths.

  No woman deserved her first kiss in a stinking lane under duress. A lady like Delilah should be kissed for the first time under a sun-dappled oak with a spring breeze ruffling her hair.