At Your Pleasure (12 page)

N
ora watched as the last of Rivenham’s lackeys were dragged into the larder. “What do you mean, ‘what news you wrest from them’?”

The two men exchanged a look she did not like. They had given her no names, and their accents were not local; but they seemed to know her brother well enough, and had spoken fondly, in these last minutes, of his talent for dice. Nevertheless, she felt increasingly uneasy.

None of this had gone to plan. They had dug up the cellar an hour ago, and the last of the arms had been loaded onto the cart. But they had refused to take the gunpowder: her brother had given them no instructions for it, they said, and so they lacked the means to transport it elsewhere.

With her main hope foiled, she desired them to go. But though the moon had long since passed its zenith, they yet loitered. These two in particular hewed to her side, almost as though to watch her.

She cast off manners now to speak bluntly. “You cannot linger.”

“Only a bit longer,” the dark man told her. He had a sharp, wolfish face and a week’s worth of beard on his sunken cheeks. “Let them awake, and we’ll speak to them one by one before taking our leave.”

“We’ll begin with Rivenham,” the other added.

She looked this one square in the eye. There was a hint of Irish in his vowels, though his sun-touched hair and weathered skin made him indistinguishable from men who worked the land anywhere. “Rivenham will tell you nothing.”

His mouth quirked, a smirk that quickly faded as she scowled at him. “We have our ways, your ladyship.”

“What ways are those?”

“Any man will speak if the price for silence is high enough,” the dark one said.

She did not like his tone. “Torture? Is that what you mean?”

He shrugged.

She realized then that he was French. His narrow face and the slight laziness of his vowels had suggested it, but the shrug solidified her suspicion. A Frenchman and an Irishman in her kitchen, speaking casually of torturing the Englishmen locked in her larder.

The word burst from her.
“No.”

Both of them stared, uncomprehending as donkeys. “Perhaps your ladyship should retire for the night,” the Frenchman suggested. “We will handle the mess. When you wake in the morning, you’ll find it was as though these men never came to trouble you.”

She tightened the hand in her apron pocket, her grip hard around the pistol. It was no easy weapon to disguise, and with every movement she feared it might discharge. But instinct had made her keep it close and concealed, and it comforted her now. “In my brother’s absence, I govern this household and what occurs within it. Your task was to retrieve the arms. The king’s men will not be molested.”

The Irishman loosed a scornful laugh. “Oh, ho! And what will you say on the morrow, when they wish to know the cause of their so-interesting dreams?”

“Rivenham will not leave you in peace,” the Frenchman murmured.

She feared he was right. She could not forget Rivenham’s remark. His voice had grown rough as he promised it:
I will take you to London
.

She understood his meaning. He viewed her as a traitor now, as much as he did David.

But a man’s pride was given to violent pronouncements that his logic, in a cooler mood, would be forced to refute. And surely—surely he would never hurt her.

The thought made her bite her lip in frustration. She could not count on any such fanciful notions!

And yet . . . to let him be slaughtered . . .

She shook her head. “I am a woman. Who will believe me capable of this business? You have repacked the floor; there is no evidence that anything untoward happened here. Better you return these men to their beds, so they will wake none the wiser to their night’s travels.”

“These men are not fools,” the Frenchman countered. “They will know they were drugged.”

“And Rivenham will inform them of it if they have doubts,” the other added.

She set her jaw. “Those are my concerns. I recommend you mind your own. I believe they will prove sufficient.”

A brief, uneasy silence passed. The two men exchanged another look. Then the Frenchman gave an impatient wave. “Very well, we will do as you say.” To his companion he gave a short nod. That one wheeled and went for the door, she assumed to fetch the others for the task of hauling sleeping bodies.

“But Rivenham,” the Frenchman went on, “must be ours. You understand,” he continued sharply over her protest, “that none of the others were conscious for his return. When he fails to appear, they will assume something befell him on the road. Meanwhile, you may tell them that the entire household sickened. They will have no proof to the contrary, only suspicions. So, too, with Rivenham’s disappearance: indeed, their search for him will occupy several days, when otherwise they might have been in our way.”

He smiled at her, pleased by the neatness of his plot.

She felt an oncoming sickness, like to make her vomit. She had thought herself so clever with this diversion. If only Rivenham had not returned when he had!

Had her brother been here, he likely would have ordered her to accept this man’s proposition. But if she did, Rivenham’s life would be forfeit.

She opened her mouth but her wits forestalled her. What protest could she lodge to persuade this man? He would find her concern for an enemy suspicious indeed.

An enemy,
she reminded herself, but the notion held no more power over her reasoning than it had yesterday, in the wood.

And anyway—a Frenchman and an Irishman! She was her brother’s sister, her father’s daughter; she knew her duty. But she would not give up any Englishman to such as these!

“Rivenham is not your business,” she said coldly. “You have the weaponry. Do not overstep yourself.”

The man blinked. As the rest of his party came trundling into the kitchen, he stepped past her to unbar the larder door and admit his men entry.

She heard no sound of protest from Adrian, which pitched her alarm higher.

As the first of his men emerged with a limp body slung between them, the Frenchman spoke again. “Alas,” he said, “I’m afraid I cannot—”

Her panic suddenly burned into anger. She walked past him through the doorway into the chill of the storeroom.

They had tied and gagged him. His men slumped around him, their limbs carelessly crossed, their sleeping faces slack, eerily vacant.

His eyes met hers over the cloth that bound his jaw. She could feel his rage like the heat of a great bonfire.

A streak of blood painted his jaw.

“My lady,” came the Frenchman’s call behind her.

“You wounded him?” She turned on her heel. “You attacked a man whose hands were bound?”

The Frenchman rolled his eyes. “This is not a game.”

She did not like his condescending airs. Picking her way to Adrian’s side, she hauled out the pistol.

Seeing it, the Frenchman halted.

“You will do me this favor,” she said through the thundering of her pulses. “You will return the slumbering men to their beds. Then you will leave. Lord Rivenham will remain with me. Should anyone wish to dispute it, I will test this cantankerous piece with your head as the target.”

She felt incredulous stares pressing into her. She did not look away from the Frenchman’s wolfish face.

His gaze narrowed and traveled down her. It was a survey meant to assess the strength of her intention and her ability to carry it out.

The gun seemed to weigh as much as a millstone, but her arms did not shake as she raised them.

The Frenchman could not afford to abuse her. She knew that, and so did he. She was the daughter of Lord Hexton, new advisor to the rightful king of England, His Catholic Majesty James Stuart.

“We will have to lock you inside,” he said sourly. “We cannot risk his escape before we are well clear of this place.”

Was that meant to frighten her?

Perhaps it should. Rivenham had good cause to be unhappy with her. She might regret being cloistered with him.

But she could not back down now. “Then do so,” she said. “My servants will release me in the morning.”

A muttering went up from the other men. But the Frenchman, after another cold moment of silence, only shrugged. “As you wish.” He sketched a mocking bow. “I do hope her ladyship will not regret it.”

As did she.

It took ten long minutes for the rest of Rivenham’s men to be cleared out. In all that time, she never lowered the gun nor removed her focus from the Frenchman and his minions, though her every sense screamed of the peril immediately at her side: the furious Lord Rivenham, whose eyes must surely by now have burned a blister into her cheek.

At last, the door slammed. She waited for the thud of the bar being set into place and the rattle of the lock as someone tested it. Only then did she lower the pistol. A gusty breath burst from her.

Her knees folded, taking her to the floor.

For a dumb second, she stared at the pistol. Her fingers had gone numb around the butt. Her elbows and shoulders burned from the strain of holding it aloft.

She loosened her grip, then quickly flexed and chafed her hands, forcing the blood back into them. As feeling began to return, she made herself meet Rivenham’s eyes.

They were closed.

Braced as she was for hatred, the sight struck her as a shocking relief. She exhaled as she studied him, the fatigue etched on his face, the surprising delicacy of the golden lashes that lay against his high cheekbones, the long, lean line of his legs stretched out before him.

Perhaps her heart had been as numb as her fingers, for blood now seemed to flood back into it as well, causing her chest to prickle and expand.

No doubt she would regret this as heartily as the Frenchman had predicted. But she could not have lived with herself had they killed this man.

She reached for him, intending to pat down his body to find the source of his bleeding. But at the brush of her fingers against his shoulder, his eyes opened, and she froze.

His steady regard revealed nothing. His very impassivity seemed ominous. She took a nervous breath. “You are wounded,” she said. “Where?”

He bowed his head, his unbound hair falling forward to obscure his face.

Of course, the gag prevented him from replying. She rose onto her knees, wrestling with the fabric where it was knotted behind his skull. Then she remembered the small knife on her chatelaine’s key ring. One slice and it was done.

He spat the rag from his mouth. She tensed in preparation for curses or a threat.

In silence, he lifted his hands where they were tied behind him.

A strange laugh born of nerves bubbled in her throat. “Where are you hurt?”

“Free my hands,” he said hoarsely.

Such was his natural authority that she moved to obey him before realizing that caution demanded otherwise. Hesitating, she sat back on her haunches. Her palms had not been sweaty around the hilt of the gun, but now they were damp. “Would that be wise?” she asked.

Their eyes met. His jaw hardened.

“You fear that I will strike you?” he asked. “Do you reckon I have cause for it now?”

That was not the reply she had hoped for. “There is never cause to strike a woman.”

“So lofty your ideals,” he said flatly. “After a woman has held a gun on a man while delivering him to his enemies—even then, you opine that the man should scruple to use his fists?”

The cold mockery in his voice made her chest tighten. “After she has saved the man’s life, yes, he should scruple.”

Grim humor flitted over his mouth. “Indeed, it’s a situation meriting some confusion, I agree. No, Nora, I will not strike you. Cut me free.”

She did not trust the casual way he used her Christian name. “Nor misuse me in any way,” she said. “Promise it.”

His fledgling smile twisted into something blacker. “What do you imagine I will do? Ravish you in the larder? I begin to wonder why you saved me.”

She had no good explanation for it herself. Quickly, she rose and cut free the binding. Before he could speak again, she said, “Where are you hurt?”

“A nick,” he said tersely. “No cause for concern.”

She felt for the wet spot on his arm. Her hand came away covered in blood.

Swallowing, she used the erstwhile gag for a makeshift bandage, wrapping it as tightly as she dared around the thick muscle of his upper arm. Then she sat back. “Only another few hours,” she said unsteadily. He felt so warm to the touch. The sensation lingered on her palm, which she unobtrusively wiped on her skirts. “Will it keep until then? There is no water here to cleanse it—”

“You should have let them kill me.”

“
There
is gratitude!”

His sigh bespoke impatience. “Gratitude has no place
in it. I speak of strategy—and survival. There is no room for
gratitude
in the game you now play.”

She stared at him. “I play no game! I was—I kept you alive to keep the peace in my brother’s absence. That’s all!”

“Oh? And I suppose my men were lulled to sleep by your pacific lullabies, and poison had nothing to do with it.”

“Not poison,” she said. “They will recover by mid-morning.”

“Ah. Medicine, then? The shadows beneath their eyes gave you cause for wholesome concern?”

She huffed out a breath. “There is no need for cheek. I don’t dispute that I drugged them.”

He nodded once. “And so you are courting treason. Whether you do it gladly or reluctantly makes no difference.”

He looked paler than she liked. She wondered if he was lying about his injury. She wondered why she should care. “We can argue this later. After—”

“You drugged the king’s men so others could have free reign of your household.” His voice was hard. “Why were they here? What did they recover?”

She looked away. Her lamp spilled a shivering pool of light across the rude wooden floorboards, illuminating a stack of waxed wheels of cheese. Beyond that small puddle, the darkness gathered thickly.

“Weapons,” he said. “Or bullion?
Tell me
.”

“
Why
should I tell you?” She looked back to him. “Why should I tell you anything? What are you to me, sir?”