Bound by Your Touch (29 page)

Out of nowhere, she'd smiled. "Do you think me some hothouse flower? After all of this? I manage my father's business, Sanburne. I daresay I can take a train on my own as well." And then, with a cool nod, she had turned on her heel and walked out.

For a good minute he'd stood there gawping after her. She had warned him, once:
I possess a talent for a memorable exit.
But he hadn't listened. His opinion of her was much like a sand castle: it stood in constant need of repair. Oh, vanity. Whatever her motives for sleeping with him, he'd certainly assumed himself to rank among them. But in the sound of the closing door, he heard a truth he hadn't bothered to consider through the long hours of the night. Aside from an hour's fun, and an occasional escort to unsavory parts of town, she didn't want a thing from him.

Disbelief sent him after her. He was handsome, wealthy, well-liked. Heir to a tide and a superfluous fortune. As a result, women came to him with concrete ambitions. Why, the last time he'd lain down with someone who wanted nothing more than his company, he'd been sixteen, and she thirty, the bored widow of a family friend. A delightful interlude, yes; but he was not sure, suddenly, that its advantages still appealed to him.

He'd followed her to the train station and booked a ticket back to town.

He looked at her now, sitting so rigidly across from him. The rain was a dim, distant hiss beneath the louder thump of the wheels passing over ties in the track. It made him feel contemplative. What was she afraid of? She liked him so much more than she was willing to admit. She had liked him enough to sleep with him. He suspected that she liked him enough to dream about him. But she was far better at being honest with him than she was at being honest with herself.

At least she seemed as cross as he did. From beneath the high gable point of her bonnet, she directed a furrowed brow toward the wet fields streaming by the window. Even the little bird trimming her hat seemed caught in some complex dilemma; it quivered as though on the verge of revelations.

Maybe he knew what ailed her. His remarks last night had surprised her; they had confounded her worst expectations of him. If he was not a villainous seducer, but a man with a genuine interest in her person, then her little attempt to play the scarlet woman had failed. In short, she had fucked him for nothing.

God, it was ridiculous to feel this sense of—hurt? Like a kicked puppy, wanting a quiet place to brood and lick his own wounds. The pleasures of sex did not guarantee deeper emotion. He should know that better than she. How many women had he bedded, in his time? And she'd been a virgin.

But it seemed as if everything had gotten muddled in his head. He could place the exact moment it had happened: he'd been trying to speak of Stella, of this damned prison he lived in, of the time he dreaded was coming very soon, when he would wake up and find himself another mindless cog in the social routine, as hopeless as the rest of them. And she had kissed him, so sweetly. As if the words were already known to her, and she wanted to prevent him the hurt of speaking them. That kiss had held understanding and compassion. Or so he'd thought.

In fact, she'd been trying to silence him. She had not wanted confessions. Intimacy was not her aim. A short laugh escaped him.
I am a bloody idiot.
He wished he could work out how she managed to unsettle him. Perhaps if he did, he could also cure this ridiculous need to lay his hands on her. He suspected it was a case of sublimated violence: unable to imagine abusing a woman, he mistook the urge to shake her for the urge to screw her.

The thought of provoking her cheered him a little. He sprawled in his seat, so his knees touched her skirts. She gave them a pointed glance, but made no comment. She was becoming increasingly difficult to ruffle. Good God, he'd had her virginity. The least she could do was blush. Perhaps there was a hole in her brain, and everything to do with men slipped right out of it, leaving her clearheaded for the more important things, like dusty rocks and distant lands. He had to give her credit: she'd reoccupied her body for a brief time, but she had a million strategies to guarantee that her mind remained elsewhere.

He cleared his throat. "I'm convinced that the notes I've been receiving are related to Hartnett's shipment." His generous pause yielded no response. "It was a sudden insight, of course. But assassination attempts do get you thinking."

This comment antagonized the dimple into an appearance. "Speak plainly, sir."

"Sir?
I say, Lyd. Are you always so formal with men you've made love with?"

The whip of her head caused the bird to saw wildly, like a famished woodpecker in range of a tree. "Am I meant to be embarrassed by that remark?"

"Not at all. If you weren't moved by the act, I can't see why a reference to it would faze you."

Again came the knitted brow and that strange, peering look, as if she were trying to catch of glimpse of his brain. "If you want to know something," he said slowly, "you only need to ask."

Her chest rose on a deep breath. "Very well. What assassination attempt?"

"Coward."

Her blush deepened. "Go on."

"Very well." He shrugged. "A boy approached me at the Empire. Rambled on about tears. You remember those notes I've been getting. This time, he mentioned something new.
Egypt.
Isn't that fascinating?"

Alarm flashed over her face. And then, just as quickly, her face settled into a mutinous cast. "Egypt is a very large country—and one of our major trading partners to boot. I expect a lot of people mention it on regular occasions."

"True, but something else occurred to me. These notes began arriving shortly after the newspapers covered our tete-a-tete at the Institute."

She held silent a moment. "It is troubling," she finally admitted. "But why would someone want them enough to threaten you? The forgeries are worthless."

"Perhaps there's something about them that isn't so worthless. These tears he keeps mentioning." He paused. Phin had come up with a very provocative theory, which reverberated all too neatly with Miss Marshall's claim. "Have you ever heard of the Tears of Idihet? Fabulous set of diamonds, went missing a few years back?"

She visibly stiffened. "Yes. They were part of the Egyptian royal treasury. What are you implying? Don't be daft, Sanburne."

"Hear me out. The khedive accused British spies of the theft—said we were trying to undermine his authority. My rather was quite cheerful about it," he added dryly. "He's always been a loud advocate of greater involvement in Egyptian affairs. At any rate, we claimed we'd nothing to do with their disappearance, and perhaps we hadn't." Phin had been unable to say; it seemed his concerns centered on Oriental matters. "The jewels never resurfaced, though, and the khedive was right; their loss made him look weak. His army general mounted a mutiny, which gave us all the excuse we needed to bombard Alexandria, and assume unofficial control of the country."

She had gone very pale. "I don't need a history lesson. Had it happened two days earlier, my father would have been in Alexandria for it. What's your point?"

"Perhaps these are the jewels Miss Marshall was told about."

He expected a snide remark. But she appeared, however briefly, to consider the possibility. "Then where are they?" she asked. "You saw me smash that stela. And I've examined the others a dozen times now. They're solid stone."

"And that in itself has always puzzled me, Lyd. Why would anyone pay to ship worthless pieces of stone?"

She turned toward the window. "I do not like your tone," she said, but again, the expected vigor was curiously absent. "I have told you the switch must have been made after the items were crated."

"And that's even more curious," he said carefully. "Why bother to put faked antiquities into the shipment? Lydia, have you gotten any more answers from your father?"

"In fact, I have. He put forward a new theory concerning one of his rivals—"

"Rivals?" He laughed. "I had no idea academe was so dramatic."

Now she looked back to him. "It is a business rival," she said soberly. "A man named Mr. Overton, who could not tell you the diflFerence between archaeology and ditch digging. He has been bitter ever since certain of his clients defected to my father. At any rate, I'm going to town to investigate."

Christ. "Did you not hear what I said before? A man with a
knife
assaulted me. You do not need to be investigating this. If your fathers on his way, let
him
handle it. It's
his
business, isn't it?"

"His business, which I manage."

"Bully for you."

"What does that mean?" Her eyes narrowed. "What should I rather be doing, Sanburne? Needlepoint and piano:

He held his tongue. But oh, he saw the way of it now. She handled Boyce's affairs for him. Cleaned up his messes. An amanuensis-cum-manager, at the cheapest rate going. Wasn't Papa the clever one.

She was still eyeing him. "Come to think of it, you were in Egypt this winter, weren't you? Perhaps someone thinks
you
brought back a surprise."

No quicker way to put her on the offensive than to criticize Papa. The ludicrous idea came to him that he was in competition with a sixty-year-old. "It's possible. Alas, all I brought back were fleas." He shrugged again. "Well, it was a wild theory. But right or wrong, we agree on one thing: the forgeries are worthless to us. Since they're worth killing for to the lad, I say we hand them over. Spare my postbox the abuse—not to mention my throat."

"Indeed no," she said coolly. "If this madman wants them so badly, then he must be the key to it. Once we catch him, we can find out whose pay he's in—Overton's, or someone else's."

"Good God," he said softly. Starchy, he'd once thought her. But it was not coldness that animated her. It was grim, delusional resolve. "Lydia. You would knowingly endanger yourself for this?"

She looked at him as if he were the greatest idiot alive. "Sanburne, what don't you understand? If this is a deliberate conspiracy to stain my- father's good name, I have no choice."

"The man had a knife," he said. "What part of that don't
you
understand?"

Her lips thinned into a grim line. She looked away.

What fun,
he thought blackly. What had started as an innocent little caper to embarrass his father had brought him to this—an inadvertent role in the most hackneyed melodrama imaginable: the redemption of her fathers honor.

Stupid to feel a shiver. But it was eerie, downright uncanny really, how much she put him in mind of Stella. His sister had been so stubbornly determined, so blockheadedly focused on her own aim, that giant explosions would not have knocked her off her course. Boland had upbraided her in public for looking at another man, and she'd apologized for it. He'd pushed her off the dance floor when she laughed at his misstep, and she'd excused him by blaming a cut-rate orchestra for his crankiness. He carried on an open affair with the Duchess of Farley, and when Stella confronted him, he slapped her for her temerity. She predicted that the walk down the aisle would reform him. Wrong. Slaps were useful warnings. Slaps and knives: only martyrs and future victims ignored them. "You are in for a hard road," he said grimly.

She did not pretend to misunderstand him. "Stop slurring my father, please. I forgave you for it once—or no, twice now, counting your antics at Lord Moreland's dinner. But I cannot allow it again. Not in good conscience."

"Do not fool yourself," he said. "If you proceed with this, you're not playing the dutiful daughter. You're gambling with your life."

She laughed. "And would I be so different from you, in that regard? How many gallons of gin do you drink each day to spite Moreland? Can that be any healthier?"

Perhaps she had gone too far. His eyes narrowed and his mouth tightened; she did not like or recognize the look on his face. Seeking a new view, she glanced down the aisle. The other passengers were seated some distance away; no one seemed to have remarked their sparring. Of course they hadn't. They must assume that he was her husband. For these moments, at least, she had false license to sit alone with him. To touch him very discreetly, even.

Her heart tripped, as it had on and off since he'd popped up at Bishops Stortford Station. She could not believe that he'd followed her, that he was shameless enough to sit across from her, and flirt and taunt her as though last night had never occurred. She wished she might match his panache, but it was hard going to maintain her composure. Meeting his eyes was enough to raise a blush. His smile made her pulse dance like a drunkard.

What did you do to me?
Her body seemed a catalogue of foreign sensations, opaque to interpretation, resistant to attempts at governance. As he removed his hat, her lips remembered the softness of his hair. He crossed his legs, and her fingertips twitched at the recollection of his thighs, the muscled density and textures. His hand—
oh, stop it! Do not think of where it has been!
— delved into his jacket now, and extracted a flask.

She scoffed. "Lord Moreland is not here to see you, you know. You might at least wait until we're at St. Pancras." His reply was to unscrew the cap and lift: it to his mouth. The depth of her concern rattled her. "You drink too much, Sanburne." As his throat rippled— once; twice; three times—she lost her temper. "Stop it! Good Lord—its barely eight in the morning. You will become insensible!"