Irresistible (41 page)

"We could come to an arrangement, you and I. You don't want her, I do. Suppose I paid you to divorce her? Say, a hundred thousand pounds. That should set you up handsomely for some time to come, and you wouldn't need to kill anyone."

David looked at him and seemed to consider, then shook his head. Hugh already knew that it was a lost cause; David would have to be a fool to accept, and David, whatever else he was, was no fool. But providing a distraction was Hugh's object, and as such his offer worked.

"Now that is really very tempting, I must admit. But you and I both know that this has gone too far. In any case, tonight while I lurked among the bushes at Vauxhall Gardens I had a truly brilliant flash of inspiration. Why not kill you both? I would then be the fabulously wealthy Duke of Richmond, which by rights I should be anyway, and free of my unwanted wife, all in one stroke. It's quite a neat plan. I'm actually very proud of it."

Claire's shoulders seemed to slump, and then she sidled back toward the wall. David, focusing on him, didn't appear to notice. The thug at the door seemed half asleep. Hugh was on pins and needles. Had she succeeded? He couldn't tell.

"You'll never get away with it," Hugh said.

In truth, he realized, David might or might not. He was an obvious suspect, after all, but upon Hugh's death he would become the Duke of Richmond, very powerful, very rich. It was Hugh's experience that the authorities were careful to tread lightly where rich, powerful nobles were concerned. But whether David got away with it or not didn't really matter, because once that became the question, he and Claire would be dead.

"I think I will." David glanced at Claire, then back at Hugh. He seemed to notice nothing amiss, while Hugh's heart nearly stopped. "It was apparently quite obvious in the ballroom when you two first met at little Beth's come-out that there was an attraction between you two. My mother remarked on it when she came to tell me that you had danced my wife right off the dance floor onto the terrace and would I please do something to control my wife before she embroiled us all in a dreadful scandal. Not terribly discreet, were you? Did you really think no one would notice? Then again, when you danced with her at Almack's and afterward when you both disappeared at the same time, Mother said my wife's behavior, and yours as well, was most shocking. Tonight, when I saw you kissing her, that popped into my head, and the whole plan came together like it was meant to be. Your reputation is such a help, you know: You are considered a notorious libertine. When your bodies are found, here is what will appear to have happened: You spirited my wife away from Vauxhall Gardens to this house— it's the one in Curzon Street where you used to keep your mistresses, Hugh, don't you recognize it?— which fortunately at the moment is empty. While you, vile seducer, are working your wicked wiles on her, the house catches fire with both of you, most unfortunately, inside. It burns to the ground; your bodies are charred beyond recognition— too charred for anyone to tell that you perished from a gunshot wound before the flames ever reached you."

A knock sounded at the door, interrupting. David glanced around. The thug— Donen— opened it. Another thug was outside. A strong smell wafted in through the open door. It took Hugh a second, but he recognized it: kerosene.

David had ordered the house soaked with kerosene. Once lit, it would go up like dry tinder. The ensuing blaze would in all likelihood be hot enough to burn any bodies inside past recognition.

"We be all set. Just give the word, and we'll be strikin' the match."

David nodded. "Go ahead. We'll be right down."

He started walking toward the door. For one hope-filled moment, Hugh thought that he might actually be going to leave them, supposedly bound and helpless, to take their chances with the fire.

Donen was still holding the door open, and as David passed him he glanced back at Hugh.

"Duke of Richmond," he said musingly. "It has a nice ring to it, does it not?"

Then he walked past Donen into the hall.

"Shoot them," he said over his shoulder, and was gone.

Chapter 32

As soon as she'd opened her eyes to see several of the men who had attacked her coach standing over her, Claire had known that they were going to try to kill her. They hadn't succeeded the first time, and they'd come back to finish what they'd started. They were mostly all there: the leader, Donen, she'd heard him called; Briggs, whom she'd hit over the head with a chamber pot; and two others whose names she'd never heard. Marley, of the hounds, was the only one missing. It was her nightmare, and it was happening all over again.

Then David had walked into the room, walked right up to her and hit her across the face with no warning at all, sending her reeling back against the wall, bumping her head, cutting her lip.

"That's for making a fool out of me," he'd said. She'd looked at him, hating him even as she wiped the blood from her mouth. And to her vast relief, fury had driven out fear. Her whole life she had been surrounded by evil, violent men. How ironic it was that, when she'd tried so hard to get the opposite, she'd ended up with a man as evil and violent as her father had been beneath his handsome, civilized facade?

Hugh had been right. It was David who'd wanted her dead all along, David who'd hired the men to waylay her coach, David who was behind the attack in the garden tonight. But David didn't know what she was made of. The only way she'd survived her girlhood intact was because, when her back was to the wall, she was willing to fight like a badger for her life.

And her back was to the wall tonight.

When Donen, with an evil smirk that promised retribution for her previous escape from him, had pulled her hands behind her back and tied them so tightly that her fingers went numb, she'd known she couldn't expect any mercy at all from these merciless men.

They all, every one of them, meant to see her dead.

She meant to survive any way she could.

Then they had carried Hugh into the room and dumped him on the floor without ceremony. After all, why worry about hurting a man they meant to kill?

For a hideous moment she'd wondered if he was dead already, and had started forward with a cry. A hard swipe of Donen's forearm had sent her reeling back against the wall. It had caught her across the throat, and sent her, choking and coughing, sliding down until she was all but sitting on the floor. Her eyes had never left Hugh, and it was with some relief that she had watched Briggs kneel beside him, tying his hands and legs with brutal efficiency.

He was not dead, then. They would not have bothered to tie a dead man.

Then David had come to stand over her. He was holding a pistol, and she'd almost been afraid. But then she remembered how he had hit her, and rage came flooding back to drive out fear. She welcomed the hot, fierce rush. It gave her strength and courage, both of which she would need to survive.

Then Hugh had stirred, and David had left her to stand over him.

Luckily, after that David had been far more concerned with Hugh than with her. She had taken stock of the situation and come up with the best plan she could devise, all the while listening to David baiting Hugh. She had known another sharp moment of fear when David had pointed the pistol at her forehead and ordered her to stand up. But then she had looked into his eyes and had seen how much he relished her fear, and she had stuffed it back down deep inside herself as she had learned to do with any and all unwanted emotions as a child. Standing tall, she had looked him in the eye.

Even as Hugh had drawn David's attention to himself, she had seen the candle and known what she needed to do.

Now, even as David's order to shoot them still hung in the air and Donen closed the door, then took two steps inside the room to carry it out, Claire braced herself for action. Her skin tingled and burned from where the flame that had freed her wrists had singed it, but she barely felt the pain.

The time had come to fight for her life. Her life, and Hugh's.

Hugh was lying on his side on the floor, staring grimly up at Donen. His muscles were tense. His head was several inches above the carpet, straining upward on his strong neck, and his shoulder seemed to be pressing hard into the floor, as if he would use it for leverage. His face was grim, his eyes fixed unwaveringly on Donen's face.

Donen, face contorted in a taunting smirk, lifted the pistol and aimed it at Hugh.

Claire screamed.

"Bloody 'ell!" Donen glanced up, startled, as the sound ricocheted through the room. The pistol jerked to one side. Then Hugh moved, whipping his bound legs across the floor like a bludgeon, catching Donen's ankles and knocking his feet out from under him. With a bellow, Donen shot up in the air, hung suspended above the floor for the space of a couple of heartbeats, then came crashing down on his back. For a moment he simply lay there, stunned.

The pistol made a beautiful somersault and landed on the bed.

"Get it! Get the pistol."

Hugh's command was unnecessary. Even as Claire dived for it, Hugh wriggled across the carpet like a snake, getting into position, turning onto his back. Then he lifted his legs high into the air and crashed his bound feet, with all the strength of his legs behind them, into Donen's neck.

The man made a harsh choking sound and seemed to convulse. Then he lay still.

Pistol in hand, Claire scrambled off the bed and stood over Donen for a minute, looking down at him wide-eyed.

"Is he dead?"

"I don't know. Lock the door, then come untie me. I have a feeling we don't have much time."

Claire hurried to do as he said. Even as she turned the key in the lock, she became aware of an unpleasant smell. It was strong, and acrid, and she knew at once what it was.

"The house is on fire!"

She ran back to kneel beside Hugh, placing the pistol on the floor within easy reach and keeping a wary eye on Donen all the time.

"I guessed as much."

At last the knots came undone, and Hugh's hands were free. Wispy tendrils of smoke crept beneath the door, curling up into the room. To Claire's horror, she realized that she could hear a distant crackling.

"Leave me. Go out the window," he said, yanking at the knots binding his ankles. Claire, just as busy unraveling the knots in the rope around his knees, shook her head.

"Dammit, Claire," he began angrily. Then the rope around his ankles came free, and the rope around his knees suddenly became easy to dislodge. He scooped up the pistol and stood up, then moved swiftly to the window. Claire was right behind him every step of the way. Thrusting the pistol into the waistband of his breeches, Hugh tried with all his strength to open the window. It didn't budge.

Hugh swore. "That leaves the door. Come on."

Catching her hand, he pulled her to the door. Smoke was pouring under it now. He turned the key in the lock, then hesitated, looking back at Donen. The man was making feeble swimming movements. Clearly he was not dead.

"Hell and the devil confound it," Hugh said bitterly, and practically leaped across the room to Donen's side.

"Get up." He dragged the man to his feet. Donen swayed drunkenly and almost collapsed. Supporting him, Hugh swore again, then put his shoulder to the man's stomach and lifted him in a fireman's carry. Hugh grimaced at his weight, then headed back for the door.

"Hang on to my coat, and stay low."

Claire did as he told her, and they moved out into the upper hall. Bent almost double, they hurried along it. Smoke was curling up the stairs and filling the upper hall. Claire ducked lower to avoid it, but when they reached the top of the stairs it became impossible. The stairs had become a chimney, and even as they started to descend, smoke rose all around them, thick sooty smoke that roiled and curled and slid up her nose and down her throat. She coughed, choking, then coughed some more. Hugh was coughing too, and she clutched the tail of his coat like a lifeline. The smoke stung her eyes, and it was difficult to see. He was no more than a hunched black shape, rendered almost unrecognizable by the bulk of Donen impaled on his shoulder. Below she could see an orange glow, and hear the crackling and popping of fire.

But the fire and the smoke weren't their only enemies, or even their main ones. David and his thugs were that— and she knew, without knowing how she knew, that they were nearby. They would be waiting to make certain she and Hugh did not escape.

They were halfway down the stairs, and she could see tongues of flame racing up the curtains, licking at the walls. The whole first floor of the house seemed to be ablaze. The three steps remaining on the stairs suddenly seemed like three miles. She was growing dizzy, her mind whirling even as her eyes burned and she felt as if she were suffocating on the thick smoke.

"Almost there." Hugh was choking too, bending low under Donen's weight. He stumbled and nearly went down, catching hold of the banister seconds before he would have fallen down the remaining stairs. Claire cried out in alarm and grabbed his arm. There was a clatter, a metallic clatter, as something fell down the stairs ahead of them. It was too dark to see what it was, but Claire didn't have to see to know what it was: the pistol. They'd lost it. Finding it again was impossible. It was too dark, too smoky, and there was no time. The fire was taking on new life, leaping toward them across the floor, and Claire knew that if they didn't get out soon, they would never escape.

Then suddenly, miraculously, they were on flat ground, a carpeted floor, moving toward the door. At least, Claire hoped they were moving toward the door. She had lost all sense of direction, all ability to judge time or distance. She could only cling to Hugh's coat, and cough, and pray.

"Master Hugh!"

It was James's voice, James's solid shape rushing toward them through the smoke and flames.

"Here!" Hugh was hoarse, coughing. James reached them, dragging Donen off Hugh's shoulders and onto his own back.

"This way."

Hugh's hand grabbed hers, and, bending low, together they followed James while fire raced across the ceiling and pieces of flaming wood and plaster dropped like leaves in autumn around them. Her eyes were watering so badly that she could hardly see, and her throat burned. Black smoke coiled around them, making it almost impossible to breathe, and the roar of the fire was all she could hear. She turned herself over to God and Hugh, and seconds later she felt a rush of fresh air. Then she knew they were going to make it. Following Hugh, she staggered out onto a small stoop still graced with a bright pot of flowers, and sucked blessedly cool air into her lungs. Knees threatening to buckle with every step, she started down the shallow steps, Hugh still holding her hand in a death grip.