Twice Tempted (7 page)

Of course he was.
“Of course I’m not. I began to pack the minute my bedroom ceiling landed in my bathtub not five minutes after I’d gotten out.”

His father knew he was lying; he could tell. But a gentleman simply did not call his son a liar. Especially when that son believed he was being helpful.

“I probably won’t even be here all that much,” Alex said. “Tomorrow I hope to bring Lady Bea to meet Fiona and her sister Mairead. I won’t be able to plot my campaign until then.”

His father didn’t smile, as he’d hoped. “I see.”

“In the meantime, I will see you tonight for dinner, sir. Right now I’m due at Tatt’s.”

He had hugged his father and turned to go, when a single word drew him up short.

“Alex.” Alex heard a wealth of history in his voice.

He turned, suddenly sure he didn’t want to hear what his father had to say. “Sir?”

His father’s gentle brown eyes looked almost liquid. “Don’t waste more years paying penance.”

Alex’s head snapped up. “Pardon?”

His father smiled. “The first time I met you, you were gathering your lead soldiers to melt down so you could sell them to buy…what was it?”

Alex’s gut crawled with discomfort. “A Christmas goose for the staff. They were working without pay. It was the least I could do.”

“You were eight. It was not your fault that your father was a…disappointment.…”

“Don’t try to wrap it in clean linen. He was a wastrel.”

Sir Joseph’s smile never changed. “Nor was it your fault that Amabelle was imperfect. But what you can learn is that you weren’t put on this earth merely to heal and atone for everyone you meet. Be careful that you don’t find yourself trying to save Ferguson’s sisters all by yourself.”

Alex felt as if a band were tightening across his chest. His laugh was harsh. “Good heavens, sir. Why would I want to do that? The last time I tried to save anyone, it was my wife. And she was so grateful, she committed suicide.”

*  *  *

He had been the one to find her; Amabelle had made sure of it, timing her act to the second, so he would return from a hard trip to find her lying in the bloodred bath, her hair floating about her like obscene seaweed, her eyes open and opaque, somehow looking despairing and accusing at once. He had yanked her from the tub, screaming curses, and tried to stem the flow of blood from her gaping wrists, even knowing he was too late, that he had been too late before he’d walked in the door. He had exhorted her, begged her, bullied her to live. He had kept on until his staff finally pulled him off and covered her up.

Her suicide note had contained one line.
I cannot do it anymore.
And only Alex had known exactly what she’d meant. Only he had come to suspect the depth of her need, the impossibility of filling that gaping hole, the lengths to which she would have gone to try.

He hadn’t truly understood, though, until three weeks ago, when he had received the letter from the Lions.

We believe you would want to know. We have found your wife’s letters.

It would be enough to ruin them all. A member of the family who had committed treason, even if she hadn’t fully comprehended it. After all, she had just repeated overheard conversations to her lovers. How could she know what they would do with them?

How, indeed?

Alex was so caught up in memories as he walked that he turned the wrong way on Piccadilly without realizing it and strode through progressively deteriorating real estate. His first hint of the extent of his wandering was a piping voice at his elbow.

“Cur, gov, you don’t ’ear nuffink, does ya?”

Stopping in the midst of teeming foot traffic, Alex looked down to see a scrawny boy of maybe ten glaring up at him from beneath the most disreputable top hat he’d ever seen. “What am I supposed to hear?” he asked.

The boy huffed, as if Alex were the greatest idiot walking. “Me, ’course. Tryin’ to get y’r ear since bloody ’aymarket. Got a message f’r ya.”

Alex wanted to smile, but he knew better. Ragamuffins like this were all business and fragile dignity. Alex bent to hear the boy over the din of passing traffic, street vendors, and broadsheet sellers. “Indeed. And what would that be?”

“You be Lord Whitmore, right?”

For the first time, Alex felt a frisson crawl down his back. “I am.”

The boy nodded and pulled a crumpled letter from his pocket. “’Bout time you showed up. I bin waitin’ at that ’ouse nigh on a week. Was told you’d give me a yellowboy for the delivery.”

Alex raised an eyebrow. “An entire yellowboy? It must be important, then. Who gave it to you?”

The boy shrugged, sending layers of grimy wool shifting about his skeletal frame. “Dunno, do I? Some toff. Seen ’im a coupla times at the Blue Goose. Said you was to read it and answer one question with a nod or a head shake.”

“What question?”

“Do you understand what the letter means?”

Instinctively Alex looked around, as if he could divine any unusual interest in their conversation. There was no one obvious, of course, in the teeming streets. Vendors, servants, flower girls, carters, tinkers, and a goosegirl, her flock waddling toward Smithfield on their tar-covered feet.

“Ya gonna read it, then?”

Alex jerked back to attention to see the boy’s hand out. Digging into his pocket, Alex handed over a quid. In exchange the boy dropped the now grimy, crumpled letter into his hand.

“Good day to ya, gov.”

“Wait,” Alex said. “What’s your name?”

The boy glared. “Why you wanna know?”

Alex shrugged. “Just like to know who I’m doin’ business with.”

“Y’r doin’ business with the cove at the Goose. But I’ll give you me name anyways. Wednesday. Lennie Wednesday. See ya round, gov.”

And off he ran.

Alex was still shaking his head at the sight of all those clothes flapping around the running boy when he opened the seal on the letter. He stopped cold.

A letter wrapped in another letter. Alex recognized the handwriting on the interior one and froze. Amabelle. Instinctively he looked around him, even though he knew the sender wouldn’t be anywhere in the crowds that poured through the narrow streets toward the market. Not if they had set Lennie to wait for a week.

He bent back to the letter.

We’re glad you’ve been to see Sir Joseph. His health has worried us all. Which is why we know you wouldn’t want to burden him with more problems. You might not know it, but about three years ago, your father hit a bad patch with investments. Then, suddenly, he found money somewhere. If you read this letter, you might know why. As you can see from it, your wife indicts herself. But she also indicts someone else. Someone in a delicate situation. Believe us when we say there are more letters like this. The next time you hear from us, you will undoubtedly wish to follow the instructions that will release to you another.

Three years ago. His father had mentioned something about investments. But a ship had come in they’d thought lost. Hadn’t it?

With trembling hands, Alex opened the interior letter; the one in Amabelle’s ornate hand addressed to Geoffrey Smythe-Smithe, a scoundrel if there ever was one. One name jumped out at him, though. An impossible name. An unthinkable betrayal. Sir Joseph.

Five minutes later, Alex was still standing in the middle of the walk, the crowds passing around him like a rock in a fast-moving stream. He should return to Drake’s and show him this. He should bring it to the Home Office. He closed his eyes. He couldn’t. The threat was valid. This letter could kill his father. It would definitely ruin him.

It couldn’t be true. If Alex believed it was, he would have to jettison every belief he had. And yet, the letter was damning. And allegedly there were others. Alex couldn’t breathe. What would they want? Would it end up costing his father anyway? Would Alex have to betray not only his country but his father?

He thought of the promise he had only recently made to Drake, that he would not fail to contact him the minute the Lions approached. Nothing was more important than his duty to his country, he’d vowed. Not honor. Not life.

But what about his father? Just what would a charge of treason do to that magnificent heart?

Alex stood for a long time. Before he moved on, he gave one nod of his head. He never went back to Drake’s.

*  *  *

Fiona had expected to see Alex and his friend Chuffy again. After all, they had promised to return, and she had prepared for it, slipping into her best black twill gown with its Irish lace collar, and tucking her hair up into braids that wrapped around her head. She hadn’t expected to welcome the elegant older woman who followed them in. She certainly hadn’t expected that woman to step up without an introduction, lay a papery hand against Fiona’s cheek, and say, “Sanctuary.”

They all sat now in the library, where Fiona and Mrs. Quick had pulled the extra chairs and set out tea and seed cakes. Fiona felt as if she were back in school sitting before the charity board. She sat ramrod straight, terrified her teacup would begin to rattle.

She knew they meant well. But they didn’t understand. And she couldn’t tell them.

“We were hoping your sister would be here,” Alex was saying, looking no more comfortable than Fiona felt.

Fiona took a look at the mantel clock, which seemed to be ticking unnaturally loudly. “She should be in a few moments. She has been up the hill this morning.”

“Sure that’s wise?” Chuffy asked, frowning. “Upset and all.”

Fiona managed a weak smile. “She would be more upset if I kept her home.”

Lady Bea nodded briskly. “Ritual. Soothing.”

She had been speaking in that kind of incomprehensible way since she’d arrived. Fiona was used to cryptic conversations. There were days when that was the only way Mairead spoke. But Fiona was used to interpreting Mairead. She didn’t know this lady.

“Is there really a reason to wait for her?” Chuffy asked Alex.

Alex, looking even more uncomfortable than Fiona felt, shook his head. “I imagine not. Have you told your sister about Ian yet?”

Fiona wasted a quick look at the smiling Lady Bea.

Alex smiled. “We have no secrets from Lady Bea.”

“Wouldn’t do us any good,” Chuffy agreed with a nod of the head that sent his glasses sliding down his nose. “Find out anyway.”

Lady Bea patted Chuffy’s knee.

“Have you told your sister?” Alex repeated.

Fiona caught his gaze, unsure why he was making her feel so off-kilter today. It wasn’t as if he were angry or stiff. His rich brown eyes were soft and smiling, his posture easy as he sat with his own cup balanced on his fawn-stockinette-clad knee. Even so, she felt odd shivers chase down her spine, and she wanted to fidget.

“Change comes slowly to Mairead,” she finally said, briefly looking down at her teacup. “She doesn’t like surprises. I told her, but it will take a while longer for her to admit it.”

“But we don’t have time,” Chuffy said. “Little Season coming.”

Inexplicably, Lady Bea was nodding and smiling again.

“But surely your sister would want to know that your brother is alive,” Alex said. “You need to make her understand.”

Fiona bristled. “Lord Whitmore, I appreciate your help in this matter. But you do not know my sister, and I resent your speaking as if I don’t, either.”

“No offense meant,” Alex said, flushing a bit. “But before your sister arrives, we need to know what to expect from her.”

“In what way?”

“Well…” He looked over to the old woman, who nodded again.

“Would she shy at attending a few routs, a ball maybe,” Chuffy said. “Not Almack’s—”

Lady Bea suddenly waved a hand. “Paralyzing.”

Chuffy nodded and shoved his glasses up his nose. “Rather play two-handed whist with the mater. But your sister…”

Fiona was feeling more confused by the minute. “I don’t understand.”

“How do you think she would do in a social setting?”

Fiona’s heart clenched. She instinctively straightened, too familiar with this line of conversation. “She is not one for social functions. She is…shy.”

Fiona saw the looks on all three faces that betrayed their skepticism over her term. She well knew Mairead’s reputation and limitations as well as she knew her own, and she refused to apologize.

“But if your sister said yes?” Alex asked.

Before Fiona could answer, the library door swung open to slam against the wall, and a whirlwind descended. Both men jumped to their feet as if to confront an enemy. Fiona followed more slowly. She knew exactly what they would see, and she wanted to know their reactions. It should not have been important to her, but it was. More than anything, she needed to know how the men would behave in the next few minutes. Particularly Alex.

“Can you believe it?” the whirlwind demanded, unwinding a hunter-green muffler from around her neck and pulling off her bonnet to reveal a mass of fire-red hair just a bit lighter than Fiona’s and the sharpest blue eyes in Britain. “He refuses. Simply refuses to allow me to apply to be an assistant. Me, who helped him calculate the fluctuations in Eta Aquilae, and the Astronomer Royal doesn’t believe I have the
intelligence
to handle his telescope. Well, I am more than his computer, and so I told him. Fee, you have to do something.” Abruptly, she froze, finally catching sight of the visitors. “What have you done?”

The men were on their feet, jaws dropped.

“
This
,” Alex demanded, “is ‘poor Mairead’?”

Chapter 5

A
lex knew he was gaping. He couldn’t help it. Fiona should have warned them.

The newcomer was staring at him, her hands fluttering oddly in the air, as if pushing the visitors away. “I don’t know them,” she protested, brow pursed. “Why are they in my house?”

“We have visitors, sweetings,” Fiona said, hurrying up to capture her sister’s hands and quietly murmur to her as her sister stared at the interlopers as if they had dirtied her floors.

He wasn’t certain what he had been expecting of Fiona’s sister. But the way everybody talked, he’d thought…well, he’d thought he would meet a short, misshapen girl of limited intelligence, who had to be protected from a harsh, mistrustful world. He supposed he had expected an overgrown child.