His Sinful Secret (35 page)

She wasn’t sure how Michael felt, but she was also intelligent enough to realize that the lady wouldn’t be so jealous if he was willing to continue their relationship. It might be innocence, but, quite frankly, Julianne didn’t think he was a man who would be unfaithful to his wife. An anomaly in their social circles, to be sure, but . . .

“Lady Longhaven?” A maid dressed in a dark uniform with a crisply starched apron gave a small, reverent curtsy as the music stopped and Julianne and her partner exited the floor. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but your husband is here and wishes to speak with you. Will you follow me?”

Thank heavens. He was safe.

She turned, smiled graciously at her dance partner, and excused herself, slipping into the milling crowd.

At that moment she understood how worried she’d been, the cascade of relief like a cool ocean wave. She was entitled, she reminded herself, because, after all, someone had tried to kill him. Twice that she knew of, and considering his propensity for mystery, maybe more.

It frightened her, for he exuded an aura of invincibility, but no one was completely immune to such a threat or he wouldn’t have been wounded.

The marble-floored corridor was much quieter than the crowded ballroom, and she followed the servant, grateful to be away from the noise and confines of the sheer number of guests. The more shadowed environment, away from the brilliance of the chandeliers, was welcome and a waft of air brushed her bared shoulders.

After they turned a corner and went down a long hallway to turn another, Julianne frowned, asking, “Where, precisely, is my husband?”

“He wasn’t dressed for the festivities, so he asked you meet him in Sir Benedict’s private library.”

That explained the journey from the public rooms to the private sector of the house, and it was true, Michael hadn’t been in evening wear when he’d left the house earlier. She wasn’t aware her husband and Sir Benedict Marston were well enough acquainted that Michael could use his private library, but there were undoubtedly a lot of aspects of his life she hadn’t discovered yet.

She hurried along behind the dark-haired maid and when the woman opened a carved door with a deferential bow, she went inside, trying to calm the twinges of anxiety. “Michael?”

To her consternation, the room appeared empty, lit by only one dim lamp. The outline of comfortable chairs, bookcases, and windows shuttered against the rainy weather showed no sign of her husband. She turned at the same time the door clicked shut.

The maid held a pistol solidly pointed at her chest. Just as Julianne registered the shock of the moment, the woman smiled, tossed her head in a familiar movement, and said in a completely different voice than the demure deference of earlier, “Remember me?”

Unfortunately she did. Though the red hair was gone, the features were familiar. It was the same woman who had impersonated Chloe’s mother.

 

Michael had better appreciate this.

Antonia slipped up to the closed door, listened for a moment, and contemplated her next move.

It took a woman to understand a woman.

The voices on the other side were muted, but she could hear well enough despite the heavy panel. Cautiously she turned the handle, grateful the well-oiled hinges didn’t creak as she opened the door a strategic crack. Sir Benedict had money and it showed.

Ah, Mrs. Stewart had a pistol. Resourceful of her.

That was fine. Antonia was also armed.

At least she assumed it was the devious woman who had evaded both Michael and Lawrence, which was not a particularly easy thing to do, so perhaps it would be prudent not to underestimate her capabilities.

This was also the woman who might be the one who could finally give her information on how to find Roget.

“. . . was a rather unfortunate turn of events. The weather was most uncooperative and I was stranded in Reading overnight due to impassable roads.”

Lady Longhaven said stiffly, “Unfortunate for you and your plans, or unfortunate for a terrified young child left all alone?”

“How was I to know her mother wouldn’t return as promised?”

Through the crack in the door, Antonia could see Michael’s wife’s trembling slender form. Her hands were clenched into fists at her sides, but her chin was lifted. “Maybe her reliability should have been in question, because you’d already been able to convince her to use her child in a blackmail scheme. She’s hardly an ideal parent.”

It didn’t happen often, but Antonia had a certain reluctant admiration. Julianne Hepburn had surely never looked at possible death before.

Like taking a lover, there was always a first time.

The stark darkness of the marchioness’s midnight blue gown contrasted with her alabaster skin, bleached pale by fear, but she didn’t flinch even when the woman disguised as a maid raised her weapon and leveled it in a deliberate way. “Your husband is proving hard to kill. Difficult tasks need different types of leverage. I think with you dead, he will understand the game a little more fully. I had hoped to keep my anonymity, but I trust he has already come to certain conclusions.” The woman—whose back was to Antonia—shrugged. “I intended at some point to kill you anyway.”

“Go ahead.” Julianne Hepburn stood resolute. “I won’t beg so you can use it against my husband.”

Que?
The fool. What was this? Annoyed, Antonia realized she was going to have to do something right now . . . what an inconvenience. Her goal was Roget, and if she killed Alice Stewart . . . she might never get what she needed.

The click as the gun was cocked was loud, and so was the thud as Antonia shoved open the door and flung her knife with a deadly accuracy she had learned in the most difficult school possible.

The flying missile embedded itself between Mrs. Stewart’s shoulder blades just before the gun went off, the bullet going wild. The woman stiffened and turned around, but it had been a good throw. One arm curled around her back, as if she could dislodge the knife, and she staggered a few paces before she slumped to the floor, the gun falling from her hand. Antonia stalked into the room and knelt by the fallen woman, ignoring the snow-white and shaking Lady Longhaven only a few feet away.

“Tell me who he is,” she urged, but there was a froth of blood on Mrs. Stewart’s lips, and her breathing was uneven. Dilated eyes stared into hers, but they were glazed, already showing death. “I want Roget . . . surely you owe him nothing, no allegiance. If you were allies he would have helped you kill Longhaven. What is his name?”

The infernal woman didn’t answer, but instead went limp, her head rolling back.

After a moment in which she cursed in colorful Spanish phrases Michael’s little wife would thankfully never know a lady shouldn’t utter, Antonia became aware that blood was seeping onto the hem of her gown. She rose to her feet, with some effort tugged the knife free of the wound, wiped it clean on the white maid’s apron, raised her skirt, and slipped it back into the sheath she kept fastened to her thigh. In exasperation, she said, “That did not work out at all as planned.”

To her credit, Lady Longhaven responded to that with a choked, weak sound, but thankfully did not swoon. Antonia could not abide fainting females.

H
ow did one apologize for a debacle of this magnitude?

Michael hesitated by the door adjoining their bedrooms and wondered if his wife was already in bed. Perhaps she was. Certainly she’d had an eventful evening. He winced to think of how while he’d been off chasing shadows, she’d been face-to-face with a drawn pistol in the hands of a known murderess.

Very sloppy work.

With some hesitation, he put his hand on the latch and lifted it.

Julianne was not in bed, he discovered, but stood by the hearth, wrapped in her dressing gown, her slender form licked by the firelight. She turned at his entrance, her smile wavering. “For whatever reason I cannot get warm.”

“You’ve been through an ordeal.” He moved into the room, quietly shutting the door behind him. “I am sure you are exhausted. Shall I leave?”

“Don’t you dare,” she said with surprising strength. “If you had not come in just now, I had resolved to go find you, even if it meant roaming the house in my dressing gown. I think we need to discuss a few matters.”

He liked the flare of her spirited answer and the way she faced him, even if she still shivered. Too many times he’d felt cold and alone after a battle or a mission. He understood. “So we should.”

“You are sometimes infuriatingly reasonable.”

Michael fought a smile. “I shall try to be more unreasonable in the future. What are we discussing, specifically?”

“Why did it all come about?” Julianne crossed her arms under her breasts. “Why did that woman pretend to be Leah? What purpose could there be? Why was Lady Taylor following me earlier? Is this very event what you anticipated, so you assigned Fitzhugh to watch me? Why—?”

Michael raised his hand. “I will answer all of it, but you are cold. Can we discuss this in bed?”

“I don’t want you to seduce me as a way to deflect my questions.”

He almost started to protest, but he was guilty of using that tactic in the past and he knew it. Instead, Michael said simply, “I just want to hold you while we talk.”

After a moment, she nodded and whispered, “I
want
you to hold me.”

Given permission, he stepped cautiously closer, judicious in his movements because he hadn’t lied; he was sure she was tired, and someone had faced her down with a brandished pistol earlier, and a great deal of what had happened was entirely his fault.

But when he offered his hand, she hesitated only a moment before clasping his fingers and letting him draw her to the bed. She wore only a lacy nightdress under the robe and he didn’t remove it, but simply turned back the coverlet, urged her onto the mattress, and then drew up the blankets around them as he reclined next to her. For a few moments she still shivered, but then her body began to relax.

“Tell me why that woman wanted you dead.”

He supposed it was only fair he tell her the whole story. Michael touched the silk of her hair and said briefly, “She was an Englishwoman in the employ of Bonaparte at one time. I exposed her. I was under the impression she welcomed exile to death. I was wrong.”

Julianne murmured, “I’ve been thinking about nothing else, naturally, trying to work out as much as possible myself. I assume the ruse about Chloe was to use me if she needed to get to you. It never even crossed my mind, though I did find it all strange. She said she was an actress when the real Leah was a barmaid. I think that was arrogance. She did play her part quite well.”

“Why should it occur to you she was acting?” Michael drew her just a fraction closer, blessing inclement weather forever. If Alice hadn’t gotten trapped the other evening, Chloe wouldn’t have been left alone, and Julianne would probably still be clandestinely making those perilous visits.

He could have lost her. Not just this night,but on other occasions. When he thought of the danger she’d been in . . . His throat tightened. “I am happy to acknowledge you don’t think in crooked lines. My advice is to avoid it forever. It overcomplicates just about everything.”

Her laugh was a soft exhale. “An interesting way to put it. Now, who is Roget?”

Maybe, just maybe, if she hadn’t nestled her head on his shoulder, he might have dodged around that one. Old habits were difficult to shake, but this was not the time for evasiveness. “A French agent. Or,” he corrected himself, “another agent for the French who we think is English. I have been trying to catch him for years.”

“So, apparently, has Lady Taylor. I think it was a definite conflict of interest for her to save my life in lieu of losing the opportunity to question that woman.”

“It probably was,” he answered dryly. “But in an odd way, I am glad it happened. In my mind there never was an obligation, but I think for Antonia, this settles the debt between us. She believes Roget is responsible for the deaths of her family. For her to miss the chance to find out his identity is a sacrifice indeed.”

On an afterthought he added, “I believe it might just set her free.” How much, he’d wondered more than once, was her determined affection for him due to that ingrained sense that she
owed
him? He hadn’t ever looked at their relationship in that light, but then again, he and Antonia didn’t think much alike and never had.

She had saved Julianne’s life. She owed him nothing. He was now in
her
debt.

“What of Roget? Did what happened ruin your chances of ever finding him?” Julianne touched his cheek, bringing him back into the moment.

Michael inhaled the soft fragrance of flowers from his wife’s hair and resisted, with considerable effort, the urge to run his hands down her body and draw her closer. The luscious weight of one breast rested against his encircling arm.

“He is more ghost than man.” He repeated Lawrence’s earlier words, struck by his wife’s loveliness, by how much he had lost interest in the driving urge to settle an old score, to fight a war that was over and done in the eyes of the rest of the world. “At first I was sure he was behind the attempts on my life, but I know now, of course, it was Alice Stewart. I think my old enemy and I have come to terms with each other.”

“If he is an Englishman, isn’t he a traitor?”

“Take my word when I say war shapes people in ways they never would imagine. Look at Antonia. She can defend herself better than most men I know, but she was born a lady, sheltered her whole life by her wealthy family. Tragedy is regrettable, but in her case, it made her stronger. I think that is what happens to all of us. If we are not destroyed by it, adversity can turn to strength.”

Julianne shifted in his arms, closer, her breath a whisper. “I owe her my life.”