Aching for Always (39 page)

Fiona and Nathaniel examined the map.

“I think it's close enough,” she said.

“Close enough to risk hanging?”

“But be fair,” Nathaniel said. “Who will know?”

“Joss, for one.” Fiona crossed her arms.

“For God's sake, Fiona. She gave it to me. Why would she reveal it's a copy?”

Fiona gave him a long look.

“You're wrong,” Hugh said. “She won't. She's not in league with him.”

“Reynolds, for another.”

“Reynolds is the least of our problems. What are the odds he even survived the river?”

“Rather high,” Nathaniel said. “I was asking some discreet questions downstairs. A man fitting his description was spotted in the street outside a quarter hour ago.”

Hugh felt the world moving under his feet. They couldn't be so close to getting this map filed and fail now. Another part of his mind went to Joss. Was Reynolds here for her? Would he hurt her? “How did he make it to London? How did he find us?”

“He may have gold ingots, the same as we do. For all we know, he was on a post chaise, too.”

Aye, probably the one that left right after yours.
Reynolds had probably followed Nathaniel and Fiona right to the door of the inn downstairs.

“We have to kill him,” Fiona said.

“No.”

“The time for compromise is over. He's a risk we cannot bear.”

“No, I say!” If it was possible to keep Joss ignorant of the darker side of her fiancé, Hugh knew he must do it. For Joss, but also to serve his own selfish interests. If Reynolds died and Joss could trace a path, direct or indirect, to Hugh, his chances of winning her would be gone forever. “Swear to me you will not touch him,” he said, willing his hands not to throttle Fiona as he said it. “Swear to me, or
I
will reveal the map's a copy.”

The door creaked again, and Joss stepped inside dressed in that eye-catching blue gown under a long wrap. Hugh backed away from Fiona, and the three shipmates gazed wordlessly at the addition to their party.

Joss took in the room and the maps. Hugh knew how it must look to her: a conspiracy unfolding behind her back. He saw her shoulders stiffen. He also saw the calculation in Fiona's eyes as she appraised the expensive gown.

“How . . .?”

“Fiona and Nathaniel came the same way we did,” Hugh said quickly. “A branch saved them from our fate. They were here at the inn when I arrived. How did you get here?” He wondered if Reynolds had seen her.

“Silverbridge's carriage. They're outside.” She turned to Fiona. “Did you see what I brought?”

Hugh gave Fiona a scorching glare, and Fiona hesitated. “I did,” she said with some effort. “Thank you.”

“Do you understand I did it knowing what it would do to my family?”

“Aye.” Fiona shifted her weight from foot to foot. “I appreciate it.”

“I hope it works. I am sorry for your grandfather.”

Fiona ducked her chin, which Hugh hoped would be enough. It was more gratitude than he had expected from her.

“I think it should work,” Fiona said. “You can hardly tell the difference.”

Joss said, “Well, let's just hope my mother didn't put any trap streets on it—” She started and clapped a hand over her mouth. “Trap streets!” She ran to the maps, handed the East Fenwick one to Fiona and gathered the three that shared the same cartouche into her arms.

“I should have thought of this ages ago. Bring the lantern closer.”

As he collected the lamp, Hugh said, “You'll have to enlighten us. What is a trap street?”

“I run a map company, you see. And we have competitors.” She arranged the maps in her hands so that the edges of all three were lined up. “In the map world, the worst thing you can do is copy your competitor's map without doing your own surveying. To guard against that, we put a couple streets on our maps that don't exist in the real world. They don't do any harm. None of our customers look for them on the map, and if they happen to stumble across them on a map while looking for a street that
does
exist, they just assume we made a mistake.”

Hugh had placed the lamp in the center of the table, and Joss turned the flame up.

“But we can see if a competitor has copied our map without doing his own surveys,” Joss said, “because without a survey, he won't know the fake street is fake. That's why we call it a trap.”

Hugh said, “But we're not in competition for the making of these maps.”

“No, but the way we spot the copying may very well be how my mother chose to hide a clue.” She held the three maps up to the light. “You see, to find the trap street, all you do is overlay one map on top of the next—or, in our case, on top of the next two—and look at them either projected through a strong light source or with a strong light source behind them.”

She tried turning the flame in the lamp higher, but it was as high as it would go. “I wish this were brighter, but we'll have to make do.”

Hugh watched her eyes flicker back and forth across
the cartouche. “Look!” she cried. “These are words! The dashes and slashes and arcs and upside-down Vs make words when you put them all together and line up the edges!”

Hugh looked where she was pointing.

“‘An arrow for the fire, a warrin' man's tower,'” Hugh read, “‘safe may you find it, a reluctant bride's dower.'”

She looked at Hugh. “What does it mean?”

“I don't know. Is it one of your mother's puzzles?”

Nathaniel said, “Archers sometimes light their arrows when they're firing at a stronghold.”

“That fits with the ‘warrin' man,'” Hugh said.

Fiona touched the last line on the cartouche. “Who was the reluctant bride?”

Hugh saw Joss's eyes soften, and his heart tightened.

Joss said, “My mother, I'm sure of it. Do any of you recognize the tower? It must refer to the tower in the cartouche.”

The three of them looked.

“They're all over Northumberland,” Nathaniel said. “I was there once, visiting my cousin. A savage place. A man'll kill you as soon as say good day. Bloody good thing they have that wall there. Keeps 'em penned off from the rest of us.”

Hugh laughed. “I suggest you not mention that to my friend, the duke of Silverbridge. His castle is within sight of the wall.”

“Speaking of the duke,” Fiona said, “why is he waiting?”

“I called on the Lord Keeper today,” Hugh said, “but he was engaged and then left for a hunting party at Lord
Quarley's home in Cambridgeshire before I could see him. Seeing no other option, I asked Silverbridge for help. It turns out he, too, is attending the hunting party, and has asked us to join his party as a way of getting our case before Sir William as soon as possible.”

Fiona quickly began to roll up the East Fenwick map. “When do we leave?”

“Fiona, the invitation is for Joss and me only.”

Her eyes glowed green fire. “Why is
she
involved?”

Joss was tired of being referred to as “she.” “You know, this affects
my
family, too.”

“She doesn't know the details of—”

“I
know the details!” Hugh boomed.
“I
can recite the story of the transfer that James Brand and your grandfather intended to execute. For God's sake, I've heard it a hundred times. The duke has been generous enough to allow us to join him. Let it be, Fiona. You and Nathaniel can stay here. Joss and I will return in a day or two, and with any bit of luck, we'll return with good news.”

“If you're not hanged,” Nathaniel added with a wry smile.

“Thank you, Nathaniel. Joss, I'll gather what we need here. Would you tell Silverbridge I'll be down in a moment?”

She nodded. “Did you tell them about the Trojan Horse?”

“Not yet.”

“Hugh and I have seen the original Manchester map,” Joss said to Fiona and Nathaniel. “Something was added to it. Several lines from the
Aeneid.
The part about the Trojan Horse. In Latin. It's a direct quotation, as near I
can tell: the priest Laocoön's warning not to admit the horse.”

“What does it mean?”

“I don't know.” She shrugged.

Fiona looked at Joss. “Perhaps one of us is not what we seem?”

Joss raised her hand. “I admit it. I'm a horse.”

Hugh gave Joss a look. “Perhaps you'd better see to Silverbridge.”

She exited.

“You bloody bastard,” Fiona said to Hugh.

Nathaniel cleared his throat. “I think I'll take a walk up the street, to see what's about.”

“No,” Fiona said. “You wait. This involves you, too.”

She turned to Hugh, who had begun putting what they'd need into a valise and refused to be drawn in.

“Are you going to say something?”

“No,” he said. “The plan is set.” He took the East Fenwick map from her hand and began to fold it.

“You're a fool.”

He ignored her, hoping to divert the gathering storm, and deposited the map in his coat pocket. He gazed down at the remaining maps, the ones sharing the mysterious cartouche. “These seem to have led us nowhere. We may never know what the rhyme means—if it means anything at all.”

“Leave them, if you would,” Nathaniel said. “I should like to ponder them more.”

“As you wish.” He scanned the room to see if there was anything else he should take to Cambridgeshire. He could feel Fiona's eyes burning into his back. She had not given up on this.

“Hugh,” she said, voice brimming with fury, “do you not see she has done everything she can to set this up so that she controls the outcome? This is
her
map. She has divided you from your colleagues. She has contrived it so that she goes to Cambridgeshire with you.”

“You're wrong,” he said. “She's on our side.”

Resigned to defeat at last, Fiona shook her head sadly. “Oh, Hugh, what temptation has she conjured to bewitch you like this?”

The question surprised him and he flushed. He turned his face away, but it was too late.

“Dear God.” Fiona clapped her hands together and laughed a short, bitter laugh. “You are to be her ‘Mr. Mistake.' Rogan Reynolds's fiancée is not quite the innocent we thought.”

Hugh didn't understand what “Mr. Mistake” meant and certainly didn't like the sound of it, but he refused to dignify her attempts to manipulate him by asking her to clarify. That didn't stop her from spotting the curiosity on his face.

“‘Mr. Mistake?'” she said with obvious relish. “You haven't heard? 'Tis the man a woman chooses to be her last lover before she marries.”

He wished she would stop. “That's disgusting.”

“You do not care for the idea? Pray, then, tell
her.
They talked about it in the tailor shop, she and her friend. A Mr. Mistake is to be chosen as incautiously as possible so that during the many years of marriage that follow, when a woman reflects upon her far superior choice of husband, she will congratulate herself on her wisdom.”

Hugh felt ill. Was that what Joss's invitation tonight
had been about? Was that what she'd meant when she said, “Perhaps I was meant for something else today. This adventure”? Was he to be a diversion on the way to the Reynolds's marriage bed? “You're lying.”

“Nathaniel?” Fiona prompted.

Hugh turned to his shipmate, and Nathaniel looked at him, stricken.

“I'm sorry, my friend,” he said. “I heard it, too. I was outside the curtain.”

Hugh felt a vast empty space open inside him as if some vital organ had just been torn from his body.

“I-I—”

Fiona crossed her arms, triumphant. “The man she chooses for this illustrious assignment is to be a stallion in bed and a fool everywhere else. 'Twill suit you perfectly.”

She slammed the door as she left.

C
HAPTER
F
ORTY-FOUR
 

The lurch of the wheels as he leaned against the exquisitely made seat of the duke's carriage did nothing to tame the thoughts tumbling wildly through Hugh's head. Joss lay against his shoulder, asleep, and he felt each of her inhalations as an unintended tease. She had fallen asleep with the duke's small game table on her lap, and a handful of dice in the table's well clinked every time the carriage hit a rut or stone. Across the box, Silverbridge had his feet up on an ottoman and was snoring, and the duchess lay curled against him.

Joss did not want him. She wanted only what he might offer in a liaison. It pained him to think of the cruel sobriquet she and her friend had used, but it pained him more to feel the destruction of his hopes.

In truth, he had long wished to bed her. From the moment she'd struggled in his arms outside the tailor shop, he'd imagined her wrapping those long, shapely legs around him and forgetting everything she knew about a fiancé careless enough to let her wander into his base of operations.