Nine Lives of an Urban Panther (31 page)

Through the canopy of branches she glimpsed a sight of grey.
The tower. Finally
.

And it wasn't all that far away.

She picked her way around yet another large fallen tree branch. The winds had ravaged the area, and no one cared enough about this overgrown road to clear it. But once upon a time, people must have traversed it daily, otherwise no one would have thought this area important enough to build a castle.

To build the now-ruined tower house in which Mrs. Martin claimed her scarred and diffident war hero son had hidden himself away. It seemed fitting enough for a gothic novel: ruined castle, ruined man.

With a slight twist, for Angelina's employment was to seduce the poor invalid, reawaken in him a sense of the erotic, and then encourage him to seek a wife. She had little doubt she could do the first. After all, she was no simpering virgin. She'd been the mistress to two well-pleased men. Beyond that, she was an actress born and bred, spawned by a family of actors.

But as for the last . . . well, she'd find a way to fulfill her duty in some fashion. Regardless, she'd walk away from this transaction a hundred pounds richer. Once she would have scoffed at that sum of money, but not now. Her value in London had plummeted, and a hundred pounds could keep a wise woman for years.

She stopped, took a deep, calming breath. There was no point in anger or resentment. She had to focus on the task at hand, which required being charming and frothy, lifting a man out of the depths of despair.

She shifted the leather-bound sketchbook she carried from her left arm to her right, rolled her shoulders back in a stretch, and then started forward again. If this traipsing about country lanes were to become a habit, she would need sturdier shoes.

The lane turned to the left, and suddenly the trees opened into a clearing, and the castle was before her on a slight rise. She frowned.

It wasn't a very large castle. In fact, it was neither picturesquely ruined nor perfectly kept up. It looked . . . disheveled more than anything.

Fitting. She could feel wisps of her hair against her cheeks and neck. Likely she, too, looked a bit disheveled. Preferably, she would look windblown and rosy cheeked, the very picture of bucolic English femininity.

She stopped again halfway up the glacis, catching her breath. When she'd been a young girl, she'd run across hill and dale, skipped across meadows and scampered in rivers. Now, she was already tired after the long walk from the village, and this small elevation was taxing her greatly.

As she took several deep breaths, she studied the tower. The thick wooden door was ajar. Excellent. It would be much easier to saunter in as if she thought the place abandoned than to have to knock and beg entrance.

She trudged uphill. As she neared the door, a clanging filled the air and the earth seemed to shake. She stopped again and listened carefully, trying to identify the discordant sounds. Mrs. Martin had assured her that Captain H.J.G. Martin, or, “
my poor Georgie
,” was the only occupant of the castle, but what if he was not here? What if ruffians or highwaymen had taken up residence? What if she was about to put herself in a situation far worse and more dangerous than the one she had left behind in London?

She looked around. She could flee now, head back to the village. Although, really, now that she'd come all this way, it was a bit late for those sorts of thoughts.

Forward again.

The clanging had more of a rhythm now, sounding like metal against wood. Maybe this Captain Martin was not alone but had hired a carpenter or some other craftsman to bring the place to rights.

She slipped through the doorway. Hesitantly, she walked across the dim entryway and entered a large room. The great hall, she imagined it would have been called. Here, light streamed in through windows high off the ground, and straight ahead flames simmered in the large fireplace.

The clanging continued, but there was no one in this sparsely furnished room.

“Hello?” she called out. She slowly crossed the hall, running her hand over the lone table, covered with rolls of paper, that stood in the middle of the room, pausing by neatly folded blankets and a pallet of straw by the fire. She eyed the large wooden tub tucked to the right of the big stone hearth.

Someone lived here.
Slept
here.

Captain Martin or a squatter?

The conditions were worse than the ones she had grown up with as a child in an impoverished traveling theater troupe.

“Is there someone here?” she said, projecting her voice as loudly as she could. It echoed off stone walls. The clanging hesitated, continued for a moment, and then, finally, stopped. She was scared to leave this spacious, empty room, to venture into more shadowy spaces beyond the archway to her left.

Instead, she focused on a stack of books beside the makeshift bed. Curious, she knelt down, feeling the warmth from the fire on her face as she reached for the one on top.

She heard the panting a moment before a large furry animal charged at her.

She swiveled her head, lost her balance, and slipped back onto the floor, her sketchbook falling to the side. The dog, a collie, pressed its large wet nose against the side of her face.

“Jasper, heel. Who the devil are you?”

Wonderful. Likely the dog's owner was Captain Martin, and there was no graceful way to rise from such an indelicate position on her own.

She looked up, raising her arm for assistance, and then dropped her hand.

Her jaw, too, before she caught herself.

He was bare to the chest, and magnificent. Strong, with muscles as defined as if a sculptor had chiseled them from marble, skin glistening from some recent physical exertion. The clothed parts of him were wonderful too. Her gaze slid down the lines of his hips and thighs, reaching the place where the superfluous fabric of the trousers obscured what were surely equally fine calves. How could they not be? This man in front of her was some god of male perfection.

“Madam.” There was a hardened edge to that voice, and, reluctantly, Angelina lifted her gaze to meet his. Which was obdurate, and yet he smirked at her. As if he were both angry and amused.

“I'm very sorry to disturb you,” she said at last, lifting her hand towards him for assistance once more. She punctuated her words with the smile that had charmed audiences across England. “I'd been told there was a ruined castle to see. I thought it abandoned until I heard that ruckus. Help me up, will you?”

He stepped forward out of the shadows, and she gasped at the sight of the jagged scar that cut from cheek to chin, twisting his lips up on one side. There wasn't anything amused about this man looming over her. Now she'd made the situation worse by staring.

At least that shocking feature confirmed without a doubt that this man, who looked the antithesis of shy and sickly, was the very man she intended to seduce. The way he fairly radiated masculinity, this wouldn't be hard at all. In fact, it would be her
pleasure
.

“This is a private residence,” he said, even as he reached his hand out. His large, strong, bare hand that made her wish she weren't wearing gloves. She placed her fingers on his palm and used her ballet training to rise to her feet as gracefully as possible.

He had a very warm hand.

When she was standing, looking up into that scowling, smirking face, she didn't let go.

“Yes,” she purred. “I see. Do you live here . . . alone?”

He snatched his hand away, stepping back. Looked pointedly toward the front door.

Of course, she couldn't leave. And now that she'd seen him, she didn't really want to. What she wanted to do was run her hands over his naked skin, lick the small nipples that dotted the fine smattering of hair across his chest. While sexual relations had mostly been an economic transaction for her, while this would be at the heart of it all, too, she rather thought she'd want to taste this man even if she weren't being paid.

Which was stupid. Was the way women like her went from being beloved mistresses of Marquesses and Earls to roadside whores.

No.
She had a job to do.

“I'm in Yorkshire to draw the dales,” she said into the charged silence. “I've stopped at The Golden Lion in the village, and they assured me Castle Auldale is as ruined and picturesque as old abandoned castles come. 'Tis a pity I only draw landscapes. You are equally picturesque.”

His eyebrows rose, and he crossed his arms, but still he didn't speak. Just watched her with that expression, which was confused by the perpetual twist of his lips.

“What? Surely you have women fainting in your path wherever you go? You cannot be ignorant of your physical appeal?”

His arms fell back to his sides. He looked deliciously nonplussed. Which meant she had the upper hand. Which meant he was just where she needed him. Intrigued.

“Who are you?” he said, the words hissing through the air.

“Angelina Whitcombe, and, as I said, I'm traveling for the scenery.”

“Traveling alone?”

A prickle of awareness awakened the skin at the back of her neck.

“Yes, in fact, I am.”

His gaze ran down her body, slowly, purposefully, as if he wanted to make certain that she knew exactly what he was looking at.

“A lady never travels alone.”

The best lies were half-truths, so she smiled brilliantly at him.

“Darling, I don't have much of a reputation left to lose.”

“I
don't have much of a reputation left to lose.”

He believed her. He just didn't believe that devil-may-care, forward façade. No, there was the hint of something much deeper, and much darker, beneath his intruder's flippant words.

Not that it mattered.

He wanted this Whitcombe woman out of his home, away from the solitude he'd so carefully cultivated. If he'd wanted human company, he would be living in the manor house half a mile across the dale.

“But I do,” he said at last, reaching down to pick up her leather-bound sketchbook. “So I must ask you to leave.” He held the book out to her, tempted to open it and see just what she had been sketching during her
tour
of the English countryside. She snatched it away.

“I suppose I should be getting back before it grows dark. I embarked on my walk rather late in the day.” But instead of leaving, she swept past him toward the archway that led farther into the keep. “What
are
you doing in here?”

He strode after her, shaking his head. He grabbed her by the elbow before she could leave the room.

She stepped back as if he'd pulled on her harder than he had, and all of a sudden an armful of soft, warm woman pressed against him, blonde hair tickling his nose.

He took a deep breath, which was a mistake. The scent of muguet and spring air infiltrated him, clouded his thoughts.

“You have the advantage of me, sir,” she whispered, her voice low, seductive. “If we are to touch so intimately, I should at least know your name.”

“John,” he choked out, releasing her as if she were a flame. He did
not
wish to be intimate. “John,” she repeated. She made his name sound like a word lovers whispered in the dark of night. She turned to face him. “What secrets are you hiding?”

Secrets. He had no secrets. Everything about his life could be found in the local church records, in the army register, in the files of the Board of Ordnance.

He didn't know who this woman was, but he knew she was dangerous. He knew she was taking him away from the work he wanted to do, the work that was helping him, saving him. She was the outside world seeping in.

“Out,” he demanded. “Now.”

He must have looked frightening. God knew he had scared enough children with this scarred countenance of his. She, too, had gasped when she'd first seen him. Now she winced and retreated.

Good. She should think him dangerous. What woman in her right mind would stand in the middle of a ruined castle talking to a half-clothed stranger? He was a man, stronger than she was. He could rape her, kill her. No one would ever know.

He closed his eyes tight against memories. Against the deafening sound of metal striking metal, wordless battle cries, and explosions. Against the smell of blood and gunpowder.

She was walking away, the soft soles of her shoes tapping against the stone floor. He felt her passage like a sweet spring breeze, the scent of lilies cutting through his mind.

He opened his eyes. Through the speckled, gauzy midafternoon light streaming from the high windows, he caught the last flutter of her blue cloak as she turned the corner, the ribbons of the bonnet in her right hand streaming behind.

Jasper whined.

John looked down. The dog kicked its legs, begging for attention.

“All right, Jasper,” he said, bending down to pat the dog's flank firmly. “That was unexpected, but it doesn't change anything. We have work to do and only a few hours of daylight left.”

At the moment, work was repairing the kitchens.