After the Kiss (23 page)

“I wish I could be certain this isn’t one of your dramatic flourishes, Isabel. Because you may talk about living on the streets, but I think you have no idea what your decision to support Mr. Waring would truly do to you.”

Her mother had a point. She’d always been headstrong and given to “dramatic flourishes,” as her family called them. Her interest in Sullivan had begun as one. She knew how she felt, but of course they would have little reason to believe her. Isabel squared her shoulders. “Then I think we should go to the Fontaine ball, and I will show you that I am very serious about him, and that I understand the consequences. Afterward, though, I will go to see him.”

“We’ll see about that.” The marchioness opened the coach door. “Harry, Phillip, you may return. We’re going to have a very interesting evening.”

“What did you do with them?”

Sullivan remained where he was, leaning against the back wall of his small, stone-lined cell in the cellar of the Old Bailey, and kept his expression still. “You’re going to have to be more specific,” he said.

The magistrate adjusted his white wig, glaring from him to the pair of Runners standing beside him and back again. “I do not interrogate prisoners,” he stated. “I’m only here because of the alleged circumstances of your birth, and the status of the victims of your crimes. So I suggest you cooperate before I have you moved to less pleasant surroundings.”

“I may have sold a horse or two for a larger profit than warranted,” Sullivan returned, still not moving, “but other than that and the rabid ravings of Lord Tilden which I witnessed, I have no idea why I’m here.”

The magistrate, who hadn’t bothered to introduce himself, pulled several folded papers out of a satchel and waved them in the air. Whether the gesture was supposed to frighten him or the man’s subordinates, Sullivan had no idea. Everyone seemed very red-faced, which boded better for him than he would have expected.

“I have a half dozen letters from supporters of yours,” the magistrate went on, putting the papers away without letting anyone else get a look at them. “Well-placed supporters. Apparently you expected that your acquaintance with various noblemen would keep you away from the hangman. You, sir, are incorrect.”

“Perhaps it’s just that several nobleman are aghast that you would arrest someone for no good reason, and they’re informing you of that fact. That’s merely supposition on my part, of course.”

People frequently didn’t know how to address him. Of course he was Mr. Waring, but Dunston had done a poor job quashing the rumors of his noble birth. Or, more likely, his mother had done a fine job making certain all of her well-placed clients knew whose son he was. So legally he wasn’t nobility, but socially he wasn’t common, either. A bit of a bother for everyone concerned.

He’d never particularly enjoyed being an oddity, but tonight it was proving to be interesting. And he’d ended up by himself in one of the more accessible cells at the Old Bailey rather than being thrown head-first into some rathole in Newgate Prison. That could also mean that they meant to try him quickly, but since he expected the same outcome whether it occurred in a sennight or a year, he’d rather have room to lie down in the interim.

“Well, if it’s merely the nobles rattling their holy sabers, then I suppose we have nothing to worry about. They’ll find
a new cause by morning. And you can rot in there until you tell us where you’ve hidden those things you stole from your betters.”

Hm. A few weeks ago he would have confessed merely for the embarrassment it would bring to the Marquis of Dunston and his family. It was still tempting; obviously he wasn’t being treated as a common thief, so it wouldn’t take much to raise an impressive ruckus. On the other hand, a few weeks ago he hadn’t been in love—he’d never expected to be in love. And he was finding that he couldn’t love Isabel and be reckless at the same time.

He’d already made things worse for her than she could ever have managed on her own. A confession of thievery on his part would absolutely ruin her. And so he merely lifted an eyebrow. “I still think it would help if you could manage to tell me what I’m accused of stealing. Perhaps I made off with a horseshoe or some toasted bread by mistake.”

One of the Runners snorted. The magistrate slapped the fellow on the back of the head. “This is a serious matter, Danning. A viscount has accused this man of being the Mayfair Marauder. We will find the evidence, whether he cooperates or not.”

Danning rubbed his skull. “But I went to his house myself, sir. Looks as though a bull trampled through it, but none of us found any of the stolen items from the list.”

“Then go back and look again. If there was one concealed room, there may be more.”

The runner nodded. “Yes, sir. Come along, Howard.”

Sullivan watched the conversation in growing confusion. They’d found the hidden room, but nothing inside it. And a bull had trampled through his home, apparently. “Excuse me,” he drawled, unable to resist, “but it sounds as though I may have been robbed.”

“If it was one of your partners, we’ll find them, too. And we’ll see whether you still make jests when you’re standing before the bar—or when you’ve a rope around your neck,
Mr.
Waring. Good evening.”

The three men left, and Sullivan bent his legs to sink down onto the cold stone floor. It didn’t make sense. They’d found the room. Had it been Bram? His friend was the only other one who knew about his dealings, aside from Isabel and her brother. But Bram wouldn’t have trampled the rest of his house.

Ice shot down his spine.
Tibby
. She’d gone to his cottage and taken away whatever she thought might have been stolen. She’d been in there with Bow Street on the way. If they’d caught her inside…

This had to stop. He admired her courage, and her loyalty to him absolutely left him stunned and humbled. But he was, as Bram would say, a losing proposition. She needed to stay far, far away from him. Better yet, she needed to join the undoubtedly growing group of gossips who’d already condemned him.

He would lose her, of course, but then he’d never really had her. Sullivan closed his eyes. Would she come to his hanging? It would give him strength, to see her there.
Good God
. The amount of his strength would hardly matter shortly thereafter, and he didn’t want her to see that. Ever.

There was no question, after all, that he would be found guilty. He’d committed the crimes of which he was about to be accused. His only shield had been that he’d reckoned Dunston and his spawn would never turn him in. Clearly he hadn’t added Isabel Chalsey into his calculations, or the fact that Tilden would be courting her. Jealousy apparently overwhelmed honor.

He gave a small smile. So he’d finally managed to make his privileged half-brother jealous. That was something, he supposed, even if it would end up costing him his life.

The door at the end of the corridor rattled and opened. He ignored it; they’d attempted their so-called interrogation on him for the night. Some other poor bloke could have his chance now.

When the dozen or so other prisoners in the cells around him began whistling, though, he opened his eyes. Whatever was going on didn’t seem to be usual. One of the prison’s guards tromped up and stopped in front of his cell.

“You’ve a visitor. On your feet.”

It was probably Dunston come to gloat. “I’m quite comfortable here, thank you,” he returned, leaning his head back and closing his eyes again.

“Sullivan,” a female voice whispered, and the scent of citrus touched him above the stink of his surroundings.

He shot to his feet.

The figure on the far side of the metal bars wore a heavy dark cloak with a hood, but was still clearly female. And with everything he’d decided about the benefits of her staying away from him still in the back of his mind, he strode to the front of the cell, helpless as a moth to lamplight.

“What the devil are you doing here?” he whispered back harshly, his voice unsteady.

“I wanted to see you.” Isabel started to push the hood back on her shoulders.

Swiftly he reached through the bars and tugged it up again, concealing her face from the rest of the hallway’s occupants. “You can’t be here,” he said, using the same low tone she’d begun.

“Obviously I can.”

“This is dangerous, Isabel. How in the world did you even get here?” He blanched. “You didn’t ride, did you? If Zephyr became startled, you might—”

“Shh.” She pressed her gloved fingers against his lips. “I didn’t ride.” Withdrawing her hand before he could grab it, she gestured a short way down the corridor at another cloaked figure, taller and thicker than she, who approached in their direction.

“Who?”

“My father.”

“Your—” He broke off, stunned. “My lord.”

“Mr. Waring.”

“My lord, you must get her out of here. Please. If anyone sees that she’s come here to visit me, nothing you do will preserve her reputation.”

“Oh, I’m aware of that. And believe me, we tried everything short of locking her in her bedchamber to convince her.” The marquis retreated a short way down the corridor again, evidently he was willing to give them some privacy.

That left it to Sullivan, then, to make her see reason. “Don’t be so stubborn, Isabel. Don’t you realize what would become of you? You love to dance. You’d never be asked onto a dance floor ag—”

“I attended the Fontaine ball this evening,” she interrupted, reaching through the bars again to grab his shirtfront. “I didn’t dance at all, except when Lord Bramwell asked me to waltz. Oh, and Phillip partnered me for a country dance. And Papa.”

He watched her expression, what he could see of it beneath the cloak in the dim light. “I’m so sorry,” he murmured. “I should have realized what Tilden meant to do. He made the threat clear enough. I could have been far away from you when they came to arrest me.”

“I don’t want you to be far away from me.” Her hands shook. “And I don’t care about dancing. Those stupid people. All they care about is that they’re on the right side of any gossip.”

“But I did what they accuse me of.” Whispering, Sullivan curled his fingers around the bars between them to keep from touching her. “You went to my cottage, didn’t you? They said it was in shambles.”

“I didn’t know where you kept everything. I’m afraid I have some of your own things, hidden away.”

“Keep them,” he said shortly. Better her than Dunston. “You don’t have any of the…other things?”

Isabel shook her head. “Your…friend took them away.” She glanced down the corridor. Whatever her father had said to the guard, it had kept him well out of earshot, but Sullivan appreciated her discretion, anyway. Hanging was one thing he preferred to do alone.

“Good,” he said aloud. “Then go home. Be affronted that I tricked you. Do whatever you need to, Tibby. I have nothing to lose.”

“Don’t be such a martyr,” she snapped.

His lips curved. “Don’t order me about. I don’t work for you any longer.”

“Stop jesting, Sullivan. This is serious.”

“I know it is. That’s why I’ve been telling you to leave before you get tangled up in it any more than you already are.”

“What if you confess, and tell the magistrate
why
you stole the paintings?” she went on, as if he hadn’t been trying to make her see reason. “Might they not transport you, instead of…hanging you?” A tear rolled down her cheek.

It tore a hole in his chest to not wipe that tear away. He dug his fingers into the bars. “That is a possibility,” he acknowledged.

The sudden light that leapt into her eyes as he spoke frightened him. Abruptly he realized why she’d asked the question.
God, he loved this woman
.

“You are not going to Australia with me,” he stated flatly, putting every ounce of conviction he possessed into the sentence. “I would rather hang than put you through that.”

“Sulli—”

“No.”

“Your five minutes is up,
Mr. Smith
,” the guard said, approaching them and making it clear that he didn’t believe the name Lord Darshear had apparently given him.

Isabel grabbed his shirt harder, as though she were trying to pull him through the bars. “What can I do to help?” she asked, desperation making her voice shrill. “Anything, Sullivan.”

“Stay away from me,” he returned, bracing himself against the metal. “In everything. Stay away from me.”

“Come, my dear,” her father said, putting a hand on her arm. “We must leave.”

“No! I want to stay.”

“Please, Isabel,” Sullivan whispered. “Please go.”

“I love you.”

“I love you,” he returned. “And I’m so sorry. I would give you everything, if I could. But we both know that I can’t. So all I can give you is a chance to recover your reputation. Let me do that, at least.”

A sob broke from her throat. It felt as though it had ripped from his own chest. With a last look at him she turned and buried her face against her father’s chest. For a long moment Lord Darshear looked at him. Sullivan met his gaze, trying to say with his expression what he couldn’t with words—that he loved Isabel, and that this was the best and only way he could show it.

Finally with a small nod the marquis turned and left, Isabel still clutched against his side. Sullivan leaned against the bars, watching for as long as they remained in his sight. When the door down the corridor creaked open and then slammed shut again, it felt like the crack of doom.

“Tibby, come down to breakfast.”

Isabel remained seated beneath the window of her bedchamber. The sun had risen, then. She hadn’t noticed.

Douglas left the doorway and walked into the room. “You’ve been sitting there all night, haven’t you?”

It hadn’t actually been that long, she didn’t think. They hadn’t left the Old Bailey until after two o’clock. Time had become a very odd thing. And she didn’t care for it any longer. Time could go to the devil.

Her brother knelt beside her chair. “Come and get something to eat. We can go riding after, if you like. You looked grand yesterday, riding Zephyr. We’ll have you jumping fences by the end of the week.”

We
. Douglas and who else? Not Sullivan, because she would never see him again. And she didn’t feel like jumping, anyway. She didn’t feel like anything.

“Is she coming down?” Phillip leaned into the room.

Douglas glanced back at their older brother. “I think she’s broken.”

“I wouldn’t doubt it. You might have told one of us, Douglas.”

“What, that Sullivan was the thief? Most of the damned paintings that went missing were done by his mother.”

“No, the other thing.”

“That Tibby was in love with Waring? No one told me that. I just noticed. And I haven’t even kissed a chit yet. What does that say for you?”

They had it wrong. They’d used the past tense. As if she didn’t love him any longer. As if he were already dead. Perhaps they were merely getting used to saying it that way.