The King's Code (The Lady Spies Series #3): A Regency Historical Romance

by Samantha Saxon

  He sighed and looked up at the lass, her dusting of freckles more visible as she stared down at him.

  “No.”

  “And you have found four anomalies printed in three publications over the past two months?”

  “Yes.”

  “May I see them?” the lady asked, failing to take the hint.

  Unaccustomed to having his findings questioned, Seamus met her clear eyes, holding them. “There is no pattern in those articles, Lady Juliet.”

  “Nevertheless.” The girl smiled. “I would like to read them.”

  Seamus handed her the clippings, knowing that she would find nothing in them.

  “Do let me know your conclusions,” he said, smiling before returning to the document on his desk and completely ignoring her.

  The woman mercifully wandered off and he heard not a peep from the opposite side of the room until James Habernathy returned to the office with a stack of newspapers and a laden luncheon tray, both of which he set atop the lady’s small desk.

  “Lady Felicity sends luncheon with regards.”

  “Oh, how thoughtful of her,” Lady Juliet remarked as though she had just been invited to tea. “Thank you so much for bringing it to me, Mister Habernathy.”

  “Not at all,” James said with considerable pleasure, adding an overly reverent inclination of his head.

  Annoyed at his secretary’s lack of loyalty, Seamus continued to read while ignoring the subtle clanking of bone china ringing in his ears. However, what he could not ignore were the delicious aromas wafting in his direction from the opposite side of the all-too-small room.

  “Well.” He rose, his stomach suddenly very empty. “I’ll just leave you to dine.”

  As Seamus walked from the room, he could feel Lady Juliet’s hostile gaze ushering him out of his own bloody office.

  He closed the door, thinking that summarized the problem with the entire arrangement. How was he to concentrate with the woman glancing over his shoulder at every turn?

  The lass had not been there half a day and she was already distracting him from the critical work that needed to be done.

  Seamus ate his midday meal alone at his club; all the while trying to decide how long he should wait before informing Falcon that this forced partnership was unacceptable.

  A week? Yes, that would be enough time for him to assert that he had truly made an effort to work with Lady Juliet.

  A week! God in heaven.

  Seamus rolled his eyes as he wandered back to his office, his steps increasingly languid. He eventually opened the outer-office door but James was nowhere to be found. Seamus placed his hand on the knob of the inner-office door and took a deep breath, opening it.

  He was startled to find Lady Juliet not at her desk as he had left her, but on her hands and knees with multiple newspapers spread across the dingy wooden floor.

  The woman looked up excitedly and opened her mouth to speak. But upon seeing Seamus, she closed it and looked down at the papers again. He watched her glance from one page to another, her large blue eyes growing wider as she read.

  Then he heard the office door open and the old man stepped past Seamus with James Habernathy at his heels.

  “Well?” Falcon asked the girl.

  Lady Juliet jumped up and smiled like a child bursting with a newly discovered secret. “I’ve found something.”

  Seamus stiffened and he remembered to close his mouth.

  “Show me,” Falcon ordered, wasting no time.

  “This morning I had requested that Mister Habernathy obtain copies of the newspapers in which the four anomalies first appeared.”

  “Yes,” Falcon nodded, following.

  “As I waited for the papers, Mister McCurren was kind enough to give me his clippings of the articles and informed me that there had been no pattern evident in any of them.”

  Seamus cringed at her kind assessment of the exchange.

  “Having read Mister McCurren’s essays on the repetitive sequencing of languages . . .” Shocked, Seamus glanced at the tiny woman. “I knew that he was most assuredly correct. So, I began to examine the newspapers as a whole.”

  “Do get on with it, Lady Juliet,” the old man demanded, impatient.

  “These two anomalies”—she pointed with her feminine finger—“here and here, appear in the same publication. While these anomalies”—she pointed toward the two remaining newspapers—“appear in different publications.”

  Seamus found himself walking toward the newspapers, his heart racing with anticipation as he stared down.

  “But if you will note the dates on which the anomalies appear in the same publication . . .” How could he have been so stupid? “They both appear in the first week of the month,” she concluded.

  “It is not a coded message at all,” Seamus said, turning to look at the astute woman. “It’s a—”

  “A marker.” She nodded, encouraging his comprehension.

  “Forgive me, but I do not understand,” Falcon said, and the lady explained.

  “Both of these E anomalies occur in the same publication during the first week of the month. This one”—she pointed—“was printed in a different publication in the second week and that one was printed in the fourth week.

  “All the French need do is read this publication the first week, this one the second”—the girl twirled her hand—“so on and so forth.

  “If the E anomaly appears in any of these three publications, then the French agent knows he has information ready for retrieval. Markers have been used as far back as the Mesopotamians when they—”

  “Are you saying, Lady Juliet, that we must now identify their retrieval site?” Falcon asked, decidedly discouraged.

  “I’m afraid so.” The lady nodded in apology of being the barrier of bad tidings. “But, of course, it could be a physical location rather than a separate publication. We simply do not have enough information to draw those conclusions.”

  “Lady Juliet is correct,” Seamus was pained to admit. “We must first begin by identifying the last marker published in the third week of the month. We can eliminate these three publications.” Seamus looked at the floor. “And as all of these are daily newspapers, I would recommend we begin with a search of the remaining daily publications in town.”

  “Exactly,” Juliet Pervill agreed with a vigorous nod.

  “I shall have James compile a list of all daily newspapers,” Seamus said, thinking aloud. “And then I will do an analysis of the most likely candidates for the third marker.”

  “We,” Lady Juliet chimed in.

  Seamus glanced down at her, confused. “Pardon?”

  “We . . . ‘will analyze the most likely candidates for the third marker.’” She held his eyes.

  “Yes, of course,” Seamus conceded, his stomach tightening. “‘We’ will analyze the information.”

  “Very well, keep me apprised of your progress,” Falcon said to them both and then turned to the lady, asking, “How did we ever manage without you, my dear?” The old man nodded in approval. “Well done, very well done indeed.”

  Seamus tried not to feel the blow to his pride, but he should have identified the markers himself.

  “Thank you, my lord.”

  Falcon left the office and Lady Juliet glanced at Seamus, embarrassed.

  “Well, back to work then,” she said, walking toward her messy little desk.

  Seamus followed, not letting her off that easily. He sat on the edge of her oak desktop with his arms crossed over his chest, reassessing the increasingly interesting woman.

  “You’ve read my work?” Seamus asked, staring down at her.

  “Yes.” Lady Juliet nodded, failing to look up as she gathered papers and placed them in the appropriate files. “I thought it best that I know something of the gentleman I was to work with. Well.” She shrugged. “More than I already knew.”

  “Ah.” Seamus’s dark brows rose at her presumption. “And what is it that you ‘knew’ of me prior
to reading my academic articles?”

  “I’ve known your brother, the viscount,” she clarified as he had six brothers, “for several years. I have also met you on two previous occasions.”

  Seamus wrinkled his forehead, remembering the unsightly scene at the Spencer ball, but for the life of him, he could think of no other.

  “Two occasions? What was the second?” he asked, neither of them needing to revisit the infamous meeting with her father.

  “It was the first, actually,” the lady corrected, blushing prettily and bringing some color to her cheeks despite the unfortunate gown. “Several months ago, I observed you coming out of the Duchess of Glenbroke’s home as Lady Felicity and I were heading in.”

  Seamus stared at her, looking closely at her freckled face, those bright blue eyes.

  A memory flashed through his mind and he said, “You ran into the lamppost.”

  Seamus smiled, flattered as he remembered that Lady Juliet had run headlong into a lamppost because she had been gawking at him.

  Well, gawking at his backside.

  Realizing that he had recalled correctly every detail of the encounter, the lass hastened to explain, “You . . . you looked so familiar and I could not understand why as your coloring is so different from that of your brother’s.”

  “I’m a bit darker.” Seamus stated the obvious.

  “Yes.” She jumped on his observation with relief. “But your features are . . .” The lady motioned to her own face.

  “Similar?”

  “Yes.” She nodded as if he had hit the nail on the head and Seamus let the silence lengthen, enjoying her discomfort as they stared at one another.

  “Similarities tend to occur with siblings, but then you have no siblings, do you, Lady Juliet?” The lass blinked and Seamus continued to surprise her. “But you did manage to occupy yourself, receiving honorary recognition from Cambridge?”

  “Oxford,” the lass corrected, visibly surprised. “How did you—”

  “I thought it best to ‘learn a bit about the woman I would be working with,’” Seamus lied and she blushed.

  “What was it you study? I can’t quite remember,” he lied again.

  “Differential calculus.”

  Bloody hell!

  “Aye, that’s it.” He snapped his fingers and pointed at the lass in a great show of recollection. “Differential calculus. Unfortunately, I was unable to obtain your articles. What was the supposition of these papers?”

  “Well . . .” The lady looked at the desktop, no doubt searching for the right words of simplification. “The articles are somewhat interrelated and deal with the arc differential in proportion to the earth’s curvature.”

  Lady Juliet met his eye as she continued to describe her theories, clearly checking to see if his feeble mind was following her train of thought.

  “You see, the curvature of the earth will eventually affect the accuracy of the calculation, thus causing inaccuracies in navigation, for example, which will increase exponentially in direct proportion to the distance.”

  The only problem was that he was not following . . . not really.

  Seamus watched her lips, his heart pounding as he listened but understood only bits and pieces of what the lass was saying. Her pretty little mouth continued to teach and her moist, red lips were calling to him to listen.

  Seamus’s nods of agreement were pulling him forward and he was intent on kissing her when the lass suddenly stood.

  “Then I shall see you tomorrow,” the lady was saying, “and we can put our heads together to find a solution to the problem of the last marker?”

  He just stared at her, caught somewhere in the world between his mind and his flesh, choosing the path of proprietary over the inexplicable road that beckoned to his body.

  “Right.” Seamus blinked as he watched the woman walk out his office door, and the moment it closed, he shook his head in confusion as his heart continued to race. “What the hell just happened?”

  ≈

  “How was your first day at the Foreign Office?” Felicity asked, Juliet’s excitement obvious from the moment she entered the drawing room.

  “My day was quite enthralling.” Juliet plopped in her chair and tried to capture the feeling in words. “I had not been there half the day before I was able to be of assistance. I can’t tell you the details, of course, but I felt so . . .”

  “Useful?”

  “Yes, that is it exactly.” Juliet snapped her fingers and then leaned back against the comfortable leather chair, wondering how her cousin knew. “I was useful today.”

  “And did any of the gentlemen at the Foreign Office make advances toward you as we had feared?”

  “Not a blessed soul.” Juliet grinned. “Of course, this means we shall have to commission the modiste to fashion more hideous gowns.”

  Felicity laughed, observing, “You do look like death warmed over, Juliet. I myself can hardly bear to look at you.”

  “Thank you, darling. Would you prefer that I dress for dinner so that you might stomach your food?”

  “Please,” Felicity begged and then in all seriousness asked, “So, this is something that you will continue to do? Assist the Foreign Office?”

  “Yes. I don’t know how to explain precisely.” Juliet’s forehead knitted as she tried to find the proper words to spare Felicity injury. “I have a colleague who understood what I was saying today, followed every blessed word, and so often people are not really—”

  “Capable of keeping up with your intellectual pace?” Felicity grinned.

  “Yes, I’m sorry.”

  “It’s all right, dearest,” Felicity eased her guilt. “It is not as though I’m lacking in intellectual capabilities, it is merely that compared to your intellectual prowess I, along with most mere mortals, pale in comparison.”

  “As do I when I stand next to you.”

  “Oh, I do wish you would not say such things, Juliet,” Felicity pleaded with a touch of ladylike irritation. “You know how much I dislike being pretty.”

  “Yes, and I shall never in my life understand why.”

  Felicity looked at Juliet with a sadness that was increasing in its frequency. “It is very tiresome.”

  Juliet nodded in confused sympathy. “Then you shall have to accompany me to the modiste so that Madame Maria might have you resemble a corpse as well.” Felicity laughed and Juliet mused, “I should think an orange gown—”

  “Oh, dear.” Felicity’s perfect nose wrinkled in distaste.

  “Would make you sufficiently sallow, and perhaps if you were to slump over”—Juliet rolled her shoulders forward as her cousin continued to laugh—“men would not be quite so aware of your exquisite figure.”

  “I could grow exceedingly fat.”

  “Even better.” Juliet smiled, wondering why her cousin would choose the life of a fat spinster over the many gentlemen who had offered for her hand.

  Chapter Eight

  ~

  Falcon’s weekly chess match with the Duke of Glenbroke was, for him, a time of reflection, of reassessing the decisions made and the steps yet to be taken by his secretive office.

  The fact that the duke reported the activities within the Foreign Office directly to the Prince Regent meant nothing to Falcon. It was Glenbroke’s unerring quest to do what was best for Britain and not the individuals perilously laboring under Falcon’s command that made them the perfect complement to one another.

  The duke requested information and Falcon provided it with little or no explanation as to how the information had been obtained.

  The Duke of Glenbroke preferred it this way, as did he, allowing Falcon to concern himself with the safety of his agents and the task at hand, while the duke concentrated on the information with little knowledge of the individual sent to retrieve it.

  With the exception of today.

  “I’ve just commissioned a new agent.”

  “Oh?” Glenbroke stared at the chessboard, his silver eyes
fixed. “Your funds are already stretched rather thin. Are you sure you can afford him?” the duke asked, sliding his rook into position.

  Falcon permitted the implications of the duke’s move to sink in before allowing himself to answer. “This particular agent won’t cost my office one farthing.”

  “I’m intrigued,” the duke said, watching the chess pieces lest one disappear. “How did you manage that? Recruit another volunteer?”

  “Quite.” Falcon moved his queen and then leaned back from the intellectual effort.

  “Good man, Seamus McCurren,” the duke mumbled, distracted by their game. “I still can’t believe you gathered him into your fold. Am I acquainted with your latest acquisition?”

  Falcon stared at the duke, knowing what the man’s reaction would be, yet wanting to witness it nonetheless. “Yes.”

  The duke’s steely eyes sharpened into seriousness. “Please, tell me you have not commissioned Christian St. John?”

  “Good Lord, no!” Falcon chuckled. “Not even if the boy volunteered. Entirely unpredictable, that one. No, no, no.”

  “Who then?”

  “Lady Juliet Pervill.”

  “Lady J—” The duke choked on a gush of air. “Lady Juliet?”

  “The lady volunteered after having been ruined.” Falcon grinned to himself. “Interesting girl, Lady Juliet.”

  “Juliet Pervill is more than just interesting.” The duke was irritated as Falcon knew he would be. “She is my wife’s dearest friend.”

  “That’s as it may be, but the lady also harbors a skill I find myself in desperate need of at the moment. Once she has assisted me in this matter, the duchess is welcome to continue with her elaborate plans to reconcile the girl with polite society.”

  The duke grinned. “I see you’ve received your invitation to our ball?”

  “Yes, thank you, Your Grace, but I believe I shall be sitting this one out.”

  Glenbroke chuckled and then his brows furrowed when he remembered, “What skill does Lady Juliet possess that you need so badly?”

  “Did you know the lady was affiliated with Oxford?” The duke shook his head and Falcon clarified, “She was given an honorary degree in mathematics.”