A Courtesan’s Guide to Getting Your Man (38 page)

“Did you see him?” I asked the Swan. “The tall, dark man, standing up there.”

She frowned and blinked at me. “I saw a man such as you describe, but I thought you despised Lord Malcolm Ashford.”

Oh.
I sagged a bit. “I thought—”

The Swan raised a brow in comprehension. “You thought you saw Sir.”

“I feel ridiculous.” Then I frowned. “Whatever is Ashford doing here?”

She shrugged. “Curiosity? You are, after all, the one that got away.”

I snorted. “More like gloating over his near-miss with disaster.” I closed my eyes wearily for a moment. The room seemed to tilt behind my lids.

The turnkey approached. “Time to go, miss.”

I wanted to flee, to run screaming down the halls of the Old Bailey like a bedlamite, to scratch and claw and froth at the mouth, anything rather than to return to the cold stone cell. To the iron bars.

On the walk back, we passed the gallows. We had passed them that morning, but that morning I had believed in the power of simple innocence to sway a court. Now it struck me that I might actually be hanged.

Hanged by the neck until dead, dead, dead.

The wooden gallows creaked in the wind. For a second I imagined a body hanging from the rope noose—a plump, dark-haired body with really excellent breasts.

I don’t want to die.

Yet it was becoming very clear to me that there was a strong possibility that I would be convicted of Eamon’s murder and become yet another public attraction, like Vauxhall Gardens or the swans in Hyde Park.

Dizzy with the grimness of my own probable fate, I allowed myself to be pushed into my dimly lit cell. I slumped on my cot, too horrified to weep. Was I sorry I’d lived my life to the fullest? Was I sorry I hadn’t been an obedient female and wed the odious Ashford on command?

A month ago I would have laughed at the very idea.

I was not laughing now.

Thirty-three

Boston

The roar of the Boeing 737 had lulled him into a dull trance. Mick paid no attention to the other passengers on the Southwest flight, busy with their laptops and gadgets, looking successful and important and serious about the travel required to get wherever it is that successful people must go. As he stared out at the blue sky at thirty-two thousand feet, he couldn’t shake the feeling that he was going the wrong way.

The plane may have been on its way to Chicago, but his head and heart were looking back over his shoulder toward Boston.

He couldn’t use his cell phone on the plane, which made him fairly insane because he had no way of finding out if Piper had returned any of his texts or calls. Just for the comfort of it, he reached in to retrieve his phone from his pants pocket, and instead pulled out the little box Piper had given him the evening before.

He smiled sadly. He’d forgotten all about it in the mad rush to prepare the exhibit. Oh, who was he kidding? He’d forgotten everything and anything last night, including the gift, and not because he was busy. It was because the bitter wind blowing off Piper’s cold shoulder had frozen him solid. He hadn’t been able to think about anything last night except for the way the oxygen had been sucked from Piper’s workroom the instant she pursed her lips and calmly said, “I need to go.”

Just like that, the open, lusty, vibrant Piper he’d come to love was gone. Back in her cave. And it was because of him.

His fingers trembled as he tore off the little bit of wrapping paper around his gift. Underneath was a plain white box, the kind a department store might give you with your new tie clasp.

He took off the lid.

His felt his stomach free-fall every one of those thirty-two thousand feet.

She’d given him the key to her apartment.

Mick swallowed hard and looked out the window, overcome with sadness and the weight of his own stupidity.

Piper had just gathered the courage to offer it all to him and he’d thrown it right back in her face. He knew Piper. He knew that to her, the whole exchange must have had a familiar, decade-old stink to it.

And this time she’d bared more than her perfect breasts—she’d opened her perfect heart.

Mick swung his head around and tapped the shoulder of the busy man sitting next to him. The man looked up from his computer and removed an earbud. “Yes?”

“Where are we?” Mick asked.

The guy became instantly wary. “Uh. On a plane.”

Mick laughed like a man coming unglued. “I mean, how long till Chicago?”

He shrugged and replaced his earbud. Mick began to poke at the flight attendant button with impatience.

She arrived momentarily, looking a bit perturbed. “Is there a problem, sir?”

“How long till we’re on the ground?”

She checked her watch. “Another hour or so. Are you experiencing a medical emergency of some kind?”

Mick ran his hand through his hair and closed his eyes. He groaned in frustration, then laughed. “No. I’ve just made the worst mistake of my feckin’ life, is all. Thanks for asking.”

She turned on her heels and headed back up the aisle. “Off his meds!” she chirped.

Mick began making a mental list of what had to happen as soon as he hit the ground—he’d change his airline ticket, have his agent call the Compass people and tell them to feck off if they couldn’t wait a few goddamned days, and get Cullen to bring his tux to Logan and drive him into the city.

He was coming home.

*   *   *

Piper could not believe what she was seeing in the mirror. She looked like an early nineteenth-century Englishwoman of scandalous celebrity, not some twenty-first-century soon-to-be-unemployed chick.

She sighed and smoothed down the scarlet satin of the bodice, just a little too formfitting for polite society. “I can’t thank you enough for this dress, Brenna. It’s so perfect. It’s modeled after the one Ophelia wore at the trial, isn’t it?”

“Absolutely. I thought it was the perfect statement for you to make tonight.”

Brenna stood behind her, beaming with pride. “You’re going to take everyone’s breath away, Pipes. You’re absolutely stunning.”

She turned a bit to the side to check her hair and the dramatic scooped back and the fiercely low-cut front. It only made her harrumph. “I wanted to take
Mick’s
breath away.”

Brenna leaned in close. “You already have, sweetie. I know you’re upset that he isn’t here tonight. It really sucks.”

Piper nodded, seeing her face begin to bunch up with emotion.

“How many calls of his have you ignored today?” Brenna asked, sounding thoroughly disgusted with her.

“A few. I can’t deal with him right now. Please just let me get through tonight and then I’ll face my demons, okay?”

Brenna shrugged. “I’m just saying—”

“I’ll ruin my makeup if I cry any more.”

Brenna patted her shoulder. “There’s no reason to cry. He’s a decent guy who is trying to do what’s right, and he’ll eventually figure out he fucked up.”

“I know, I know. I understand all that intellectually, but I swear, Brenna—all I see is his back walking out of my apartment.”

Brenna took Piper by the shoulders and spun her around. “Which apartment are we talking about?”

“My apartment back in grad school.”

“When was that?”

“What? What do you mean—it was back when I was in grad school, like I just said.”

“Uh-huh. How many years ago?”

Piper laughed. “Okay. I see where you’re going—it happened a decade ago, not today, and Mick’s not being here tonight is not the same.”

“See?” Brenna kissed her cheek, then wiped away any sign of her lipstick. “My work here is done.”

“Yeah, well, I’m still angry at him.” Piper grabbed her small drawstring reticule from the bed and turned out her bedroom light. “We better go—don’t want to be late for my own execution.”

*   *   *

Four long hours after the plane landed at O’Hare, the TSA officers and FBI agents finally gave Mick the green light to get back on a flight to Boston. Apparently, any sudden change in travel plans that meant skipping the second leg of a ticketed journey didn’t sit well with security officials. Plus, his “odd” conversation with the flight attendant had earned him an escort the instant he’d deplaned.

The first thing he did after he was released was call Cullen. He explained his change of heart, his encounter with airport security, and where and when Cullen should meet him.

“Don’t forget my shirt studs,” he said.

“For feck’s sake, Magnus! What are you going to do, change into your tux while I’m driving through the Ted Williams tunnel or something?”

“That was my plan.”

The second thing Mick did was call his agent. She was bewildered, but agreed to call Compass and give them his message, verbatim.

“I think you’ve just shot yourself in the foot,” she advised him.

Thirty-four

London

The second day of the trial dawned much like the first, gray and dank, just like my cell. My every movement echoed in the small chamber. I felt cut off from the entire world, walled in by what seemed like miles of stone. With something nearing nostalgia, I wondered what Hettie and Bertha were up to.

I washed gratefully. The little solicitor had made sure that I was kept stocked with soap and water and relatively clean toweling. I dressed in the same horrid gown I had worn the day before, although my belief in its power had much diminished. It had not protected me. Instead, I had felt more naked and vulnerable than ever. A courtesan without her bosom on display is a sad creature, indeed!

It seemed I had risen much too early from my lumpy pallet. I sat for hours, simply panting for some distraction from my thoughts. Then I heard footsteps outside my cell and the jingling of the jailer’s keys. I stood, feeling ice at the pit of my stomach.

Would I emerge from this day with my feet on the ground or dangling in the air?

The door opened and a man ducked through the low lintel, but it was not one of the turnkeys. My heart fluttered at the sight of the dark head of hair, but when he straightened I saw that it was only the man from the gallery, my one-time fiancé, Lord Malcolm Ashford.

“Good morning, Miss Harrington.”

I turned my back on him. “Leave,” I ordered over my shoulder. What was the point of good manners now? “You may gloat over my hanged corpse if you must, but I will not waste a minute of
my
life on your petty triumph!”

“I cannot imagine a prettier corpse,” he retorted. His voice was deep but his tone was clipped and supercilious. “However, the breathing version is preferable, even to me.”

I had to look at him then. “Even now?”

He nodded. “I bear you no ill will, Miss Harrington. In fact, I came here today to offer you absolution from your acts against me twelve years ago.”

“How odd.” I pressed a palm to my forehead as I sifted through what might possibly have been the most pompous statement I had ever heard.
Is this my final unction?
I felt a bubble of mad laughter rising within me. “Perhaps I should have wed you after all. How appealing the gallows would be about now.”

He cleared his throat and went on. “You are in a grave situation, Miss Harrington.”

“Did you really just use the word ‘grave’?” I let out a breath. “There you go again, being unbearable.” I folded my arms and gazed at him in resignation. “You obviously have things to say to me. I, obviously, cannot flee the room screaming.” I waved a careless hand. “Have at it.”

“I am not the insufferable twit you think me, Miss Harrington.”

I gazed at him with no attempt to hide my doubt. He lifted his chin. I had to admit, he was a handsome fellow. I could not see his eyes very clearly in the shadows of the cell, but he looked as though he had all his orifices in the right places.

“When you agreed to wed me—”

“When I was forced to agree to wed you, you mean.”

He was silent for a moment. “That was wrong of me, I admit. I apologize.”

I drew back, surprised. For some reason, my inability to fit this man into some little box in my thoughts was very disturbing. Even his voice was less offensive to me now than it had been so long ago. “I accept your apology.”

“However, you did lie.”

I began to protest. He held up a hand. “I beg of you, let me finish a sentence.”

One of my few flaws is my tendency to interrupt. I folded my hands and nodded silently. He went on. “Since you are known to be a forthright sort of woman, I only thought that this old falsehood might still be bearing on your mind.”

I opened my mouth to assure him that I hadn’t the tiniest of regrets, but I realized that I did. Life had taught me that even good people sometimes made poor first impressions. I had judged and convicted this man on the basis of a single overheard conversation, however damning. Then I had misled several perfectly innocent people that a wedding would soon take place. “Well, I do feel terrible about the florist.”

His lips quirked. “The florist was paid handsomely for his efforts.”

Not by my relatives, I was sure. “By you?”

He spread his hands. I drew my brows together. “Very well. Perhaps ‘insufferable twit’ does not apply.”

With his hand pressed to his chest, he bowed slightly in thanks.

“But that does not explain what you are doing here, my lord. The turnkey will come any moment to lead me to the Bailey.” My last private conversation of my life might be with the man I had jilted. “My existence is becoming increasingly bizarre,” I breathed to myself.

He straightened. “Yes. Time is of the essence.” He tapped on the door in a manner akin to a signal. The door opened and an object was handed through. Lord Malcolm Ashford turned to me and handed me the large brown paper-wrapped parcel. “This is for you.”

I stared at him. “Am I supposed to say, ‘Oh, you shouldn’t have!’?”

His expression was extremely saturnine. “Open the package, Miss Harrington.”

“Bizarre” was really not the right word. I sat upon the cot and untied the string wrapped about the package. The paper fell away to reveal a pile of rich ruby silk. I blinked. “What is this?”