The Mark of the Midnight Manzanilla A Pink Carnation Novel (41 page)

In one fell swoop, Lord Henry had removed his son’s inconvenient mistress and incriminated the man who stood between him and his title.

It really was incredibly clever, not to mention quite economical.

There was just one flaw. Lord Henry Caldicott had failed to reckon with Miss Sally Fitzhugh.

“Miss Fitzhugh.” Sally looked at Sir Matthew in surprise. She had nearly forgotten he was there. “Miss Fitzhugh, I implore you, have a care. Tonight of all nights . . .”

“Tonight? Oh.” Another piece of Lord Henry’s diabolical plan snapped into place. “All Hallows’ Eve.” The night ghosts walked.

Sally had thought it was an odd choice for a betrothal ball.

“Precisely,” said Sir Matthew, his face a map of worried wrinkles. He no longer looked sinister; he put Sally in mind of an ancient mastiff, chewing the wrong bone. “Given the nature of the duke’s delusions . . .”

It really was quite diabolical and rather brilliant. Everyone in costume, everyone flirting with the idea of being just a little bit afraid. None of them knew that there was a real monster roaming the grounds, and that his name was Lord Henry Caldicott.

What did he mean to do? Would there be another woman killed and Lucien framed? If another woman was found dead with fang marks on her neck, the hysteria alone might be enough to carry Lucien to the block.

Possibly. But, the first attempt having failed, Lord Henry might not be willing to trust that a second attempt would succeed. He had already seen Lucien slip through his net once—with, Sally thought smugly, more than a little help from her.

Sally’s smugness faded as the necessary corollary of that struck her. Indirect means having failed, Lord Henry might be moved to more direct measures. Her imagination supplied her with an image of Lucien, sprawled on the ground, a stake through the heart.

Or would a silver bullet suffice?

Either way, no one would ask too many questions about the death of the vampire duke. No one would look too hard for his killer. Lord Henry would quietly assume his title and dignities.

“Pardon me,” said Sally, and barged past the startled magistrate. “I need to stop a killer.”

If she could find him.

The ballroom bustled with people. Too many people. All masked, all disguised, all taking advantage of the chance to be someone else for an evening, to behave just a little bit too scandalously, to laugh just a little too loudly. Sally dodged an inebriated Roman centurion who appeared to be chasing a water nymph. Or she might simply have been a nymph who had spilled water over herself.

Sally searched desperately for a glimpse of a red velvet tunic embroidered with gold, brushing away the well wishes of some and the thinly veiled sneers of others.

There was no sign of Lucien, or of Lord Henry. Sally spotted Lady Winifred presiding over a table in the card room, but her husband wasn’t by her side.

Sally had always heard that dread was cold. It wasn’t. Her hands and cheeks burned, her breath rasped in her chest, her stomach jittered with anxiety. She was everywhere at once, but nowhere that she needed to be. She was like a child’s top spinning in circles, around and around and around.

Think
, she told herself.
Think
. If she were Lord Henry, where would she stage her scene? The last one had been on the balcony. Would he do the same here?

Sally made a run for the balcony, bursting through the long glass doors, but there was no one on the other side but Clarissa Caldicott, whose hands were being clasped by a young red-haired man in a considerable state of agitation.

“—but I would never have said such a thing! They told me that you broke it off with me. They said you could look higher than a mere squire.”

There was color in Lady Clarissa’s pale cheeks. “I never wanted to look higher. All I wanted was—”

“Excuse me,” chirped Sally. Both twisted to stare at her with identical expressions of indignation. “So sorry! I really wouldn’t have interrupted if it weren’t entirely necessary. Have you seen your brother?”

Lady Clarissa regarded her with equal parts confusion and hostility.

Sally tried again. “Your uncle?”

Lady Clarissa looked at her blankly.

Sally waved an impatient hand. “Oh, never mind. I’ll find them myself. You can go back to telling him that you love him.”

Lady Clarissa made a stuttering sound in the back of her throat that would have probably been unprintable if she could have found the words.

“Miss Fitzhugh?” The redheaded man managed to shake himself out of love’s young dream long enough to glance up at Sally. “I’m not sure where the duke is, but I did see Lord Henry leave the ballroom some time ago.”

“Some time? Some time a little time or some time a lot of time?”

The red-haired man looked at her apologetically. “Before the dancing began.” He looked at Lady Clarissa with warm eyes. “I didn’t have my eye on the clock.”

Before the dancing. An hour, at least.

“Thank you.” Sally was halfway through the door before she stopped and turned around again. “You should really keep this one,” she informed a startled Lady Clarissa. “Run off with him if you have to. It will do wonders for your disposition.”

And with that, she was back in the overheated ballroom, her nails digging into her palms, her teeth sinking into her lower lip. No Lucien. No Lord Henry.

Sally spotted Elizabeth I holding court to a motley group of courtiers in between two potted plants.

“Excuse me. Pardon me.” Sally elbowed her way between an offended cavalier and a tipsy Harlequin. Breathlessly, she demanded, “Have you seen Lucien? I mean, the duke?”

“Am I your duke’s keeper?” demanded Lizzy. “I thought he was with you. Don’t tell me you’ve lost him already.”

“He isn’t a pair of gloves,” said Sally with some asperity.

“Oh, hullo, Sal.” Her brother ambled over. “If you’re meant to be Saint Francis, I’d think you’d need a few more animals.”

“I’m not Saint Francis; I’m Diana the Huntress. You haven’t seen Lucien, have you?” Sally was in the last stages of desperation.

To her amazement, Turnip nodded, petals wagging. “Not ten minutes ago. Come to think of it, he was looking for you.”

Every nerve in Sally’s body went on alert. She clutched her brother’s arm. “Where did he go?”

With a reproachful look, Turnip smoothed out the wrinkle in his sleeve. “Someone brought him a note. He muttered something about folly and bolted off into the night.” He peered closely at his sister. “I say, Sal, are you quite the thing? You look a bit flushed in the cheeks.”

Sally ignored Turnip’s editorial additions. “Folly—the folly?”

Why hadn’t she thought of it before? Where better to kill this duke than in the place where his father had perished before him. Sally hadn’t thought blood could run cold, but hers was feeling distinctly icy just about now.

“Seemed pretty foolish to me,” agreed Turnip, “but one doesn’t like to judge and all that. Many a man’s been made a fool by love.”

“Not this one,” said Sally grimly. To Lizzy she said rapidly, “Find Miss Gwen. Tell her to gather her forces and meet me in the folly.”

Lizzy perked up. “Where are you going?”

Ten minutes, Turnip had said. There was no counting on the cavalry arriving in time.

Sally strung her golden bow over her shoulder. “I am going to rescue my duke.”

There were lights blazing in the folly.

Fear quickened Lucien’s pace. Mist rose from the ground, creating an odd reddish haze. Ahead of him, the folly loomed, curiously insubstantial in the mist. It flickered in front of him, the lights playing tricks, showing it to him as it once had been, in summer rather than fall, by day rather than night. Fallen teacups and crumpled linen and his father’s wig lying abandoned on the floor.

Lucien wrenched himself back to the present. He might not have been able to save his parents, but he’d be damned if he’d let anything happen to Sally.

Fang marks on her neck. White skirts floating around her.

Lucien slid around the side of the building, listening with every fiber of his being for any sound of life within.

There was nothing. Nothing but the dry scratch of the bare tree branches, the creak of rusted metal as the lanterns swung on their hooks.

This spy, this Black Tulip—he didn’t want Sally. She was just the bait. Lucien clung to that thought as he moved cautiously beneath the pillared portico, towards the arch that led to the interior of the folly. There was no point in killing her until she had served her purpose.

Lucien ignored the thought that a dead Sally would serve the Black Tulip’s purpose just as well as a live one.

A heavy brocade curtain, now in faded tatters, hung from the arch. The long strips of decaying fabric floated eerily in the breeze, creating the illusion of movement, playing tricks with Lucien’s eyes. The floating fabric reached out to him, stretching towards him, like a pair of pleading arms.

His Sally wouldn’t go meekly. She was indomitable. She was—

Lucien barreled through the curtain, stopping short as the light of a dozen candelabras assaulted his eyes.

Not there.

The only sound in the room was his own hurried breathing, painfully loud. The silence was so complete that it hurt Lucien’s ears. He could feel the coiled tension in that silence, like a bubble about to pop.

Someone had refilled the pool. The candlelight danced off the clear water, making the little room bright as day, creating an illusion of summer but for the chill wind that made the candle flames dance on their wax tapers.

The furniture had been replaced, replaced with exact copies of the red-and-cream-striped settee and chairs that had been here twelve years before.

There was no sign of Sally.

Not on the settee, not on the chairs, not between the arches where marble nymphs posed gracefully on their assigned pedestals.

But someone had been here. There was a sumptuous repast set out on a low table between two nymphs. Green grapes glistened in perfect clusters on silver platters. Peaches of marzipan, cunningly colored to replicate the bloom of ripe fruit, mingled with equally false apricots and pears, all spilling from a cornucopia in an illusion of the harvest’s bounty. There were pastries laden with smooth-whipped custards and berries fresh from the hothouse, and, in the center of it all, an apple, cut into quarters, on a delicate porcelain plate, a paring knife beside it, the mother-of-pearl handle glimmering in the candlelight.

Something about that apple sent a chill down Lucien’s spine.

The death apple. That was what they called the fruit of the manzanilla tree. One bite. That was all it took. One bite, and then a horrible, lingering death.

Despite himself, Lucien let himself entertain a furtive, fugitive trickle of hope. The apple was still whole. The apple might be just an apple. What if he had arrived in time? What if the scene had been set, but the principal actress had never arrived?

Pride flared deep in Lucien’s chest. The Black Tulip hadn’t reckoned with his Sally. He would wager that Sally had eluded whatever trap had been set for her. The Tulip might, even now, be trussed and bound with Sally sitting on his chest, giving him her firm opinion of his activities and morals.

The thought made Lucien smile, just a little.

“Sally?” Lucien called again, his voice echoing eerily off the domed ceiling of the pavilion.

He never expected anyone to answer.

“She’ll be along presently.” A man stepped through the arch, the tattered drapery catching on the shoulders of his toga and the laurel crown that circled his brow. Uncle Henry brushed the strips aside. “I really must remember to replace that curtain.”

“Uncle Henry?” Relief warred with confusion. “What are you doing here?”

Uncle Henry cocked his head, smiling his usual kindly smile. “I know, I know, I should have left you and your bride to enjoy your surprise, but I couldn’t resist coming along to see how you liked it.”

“Our surprise.”

“Your betrothal feast,” said Uncle Henry easily, regarding the platters of food complacently. “I know this homecoming hasn’t been without its difficulties. And your betrothal—I hope you won’t be offended if I say that it all happened rather quickly?”

Lucien nodded numbly.

There was a silver cooler on the far end of the table, adorned with two snarling lions, one on either side. Uncle Henry reached inside, retrieving a bottle of champagne. “I wanted the two of you to have some time away from the throng.” He wrestled the cork free from the bottle, pouring the bubbling liquid into one tall glass.

“That’s very kind of you.” Lucien watched the liquid, transfixed, as it bubbled into the glass, like sunshine seen through a frosted window. “There was a note. . . .”

“I hope you don’t mind the mystery,” said Uncle Henry jovially. “All part of the surprise.” He held out the champagne flute. “Have a glass of champagne.”

Lucien reached automatically for the glass, fighting a sense of something terribly, jarringly wrong, something so wrong that he was afraid to even try to put it into words. “You sent that note?”

“Well, yes.” Uncle Henry looked at him in surprise. “Your aunt thought it would be more dramatic if we had a liveried page lead the way, but a note seemed more subtle. Go on! Sit down. Drink up.”