“Before?”
She clenched her jaw so hard her teeth hurt from the pressure. “Before you slept with me, you bastard.”
His bark of laughter was like knitting needles stabbing in her ears.
After an endless period of time, that was probably closer to five seconds, Valère rubbed his watery eyes and said, “You’ll never know how much I regret not knowing the truth from the beginning, ma petite. Hours of endless amusement now lost to me.” He shook his head remorsefully. “I came by the knowledge too late in our association. You might well recall that I have a most formidable temper.”
Cora concentrated on calming her racing heart. She had always understood the cost of joining the Nexus. The work required its agents to reach beyond the bounds of proper society. For a woman of her standing, that meant being a spinster forever. No husband would accept such a stained reputation, and no children would survive such ridicule.
But now, she chafed against society’s dual standard. A man in her position would be lauded a hero. Toasts would be raised in his honor. Women would flock to his bed. A man’s duty to his country would not prevent him from having a family.
She had Guy to thank for this well of feminine need. If he hadn’t awakened her heart and body, she would still be blissfully free of such futile yearnings.
The amusement lighting Valère’s face faded. “I’m curious, ma belle. How far would you have gone for your precious island? Or was it your traitorous parents for whom you whored yourself?”
“Bastard.”
He tsked. “I expected something far more creative from such a clever spy.”
“I’ve had enough of your games, Valère,” Cora said. “It’s time for you and your men to leave.”
“Is it?” He folded his arms in a thoughtful pose, tapping one slender finger against his bottom lip. “Renaud, I think your friend is trussed too tight for such a warm evening. Relieve her.”
“Avec plaisir, monsieur.” The large masculine silhouette pulled a small knife from his belt and lifted it toward the ties to Dinks’s nightdress.
“Wait!” Cora dropped her clenched hands to her side.
“What is it, Cora? Would you prefer to offer a farewell kiss rather than see to your maid’s comfort?”
If she got them out of this, it would be a fecking miracle, as Jack would say. Given Valère’s speed, she had one opportunity to bring down both men and not kill Dinks in the process. One throw, two targets, and one flailing maid. She eyed the distance between Valère and Renaud and calculated approximately twelve feet. Sweat gathered between her breasts. A fecking miracle, indeed.
“Don’t do it, Miss Cora!” Dinks said, wrenching her mouth free. “I’m an old woman.” She dodged Renaud’s massive hand. “You pay that rat bastard no mind.”
“Quiet, old woman.” A new tension entered Valère’s voice. “Renaud, did I bring the wrong man?”
“No, monsieur.”
A loud, eerie growl reverberated through the room. Everyone froze. The sound grew in intensity. Stark, furious, not of this world. With the room so dimly lit, the beast’s exact location was difficult to isolate, but it seemed to zigzag across the room.
Valère twisted around, trying to locate the source, and Renaud backed up several steps until the light in the corridor illuminated his terrified face. “Banshee,” he murmured.
Cora took advantage of the distraction. “Dinks, down!” The maid slumped to the floor like a bag of forgotten potatoes, her way eased by Renaud’s sweaty, slackened grip. Cora threw the first knife and then the second, not stopping to see if the first found its mark. She heard the distinctive thud and the accompanying gurgle.
“Ahh!” Valère crumpled to his knees, cradling his wounded hand against his chest. Agony distorted his handsome features into a grotesque tangle of flesh.
She glanced back at Dinks, who was kicking the dead Frenchman off her. “Go free Bingham and Jack. Hurry!”
After ripping the long velvet draperies back to allow for more moonlight, she swiveled around to see Valère staggering to his feet. She picked up the fireplace poker she had dropped sometime during the foray and pointed it at him. “Back to your knees and leave my blade where it landed.” The cacophony terminated so abruptly that the silence felt more terrifying than the howls and screams and barks of command.
Even injured, Valère was a dangerous man, especially with that knife up his sleeve. She had learned a long time ago to remain ever vigilant around him and never to reveal her trepidation. If she failed in either area, she was as good as dead.
“Orders, mon ange?” He sat back on his heels, wrapping his black cravat around his injury. “You are quite bold when you believe yourself to have the upper hand.”
Everything about him repulsed her. In the beginning of their association, her young heart had held a mild infatuation for this French charmer, even knowing he was her enemy. For the first time ever, she had felt desirable and womanly and had gloried in her effect on the elusive Frenchman. Her warmer emotions proved transient once she had gathered more intelligence about him, and his true nature reared its conniving, murderous head.
“I’m not the one who was floundering on the floor like a stuck pig,” she pointed out. “Now try not to be so enamored of your own voice and be quiet.”
“Think you can make me?”
She waved the poker toward the corridor. “Look there to your man. He won’t be speaking any time soon.”
His lip curled into a smirk. “All this false courage. I hope you are not waiting for that sniveling Irishman to come to your rescue.”
A ribbon of unease coursed down Cora’s spine. “What are you talking about?”
“How is the boy’s dear sister… Grace, is it? Yes. Such a beautiful name, Grace.”
She lifted the poker and took a threatening step forward. “You didn’t.” Thunder cracked in the distance, rolling across the sky like a boulder tumbling down a three-hundred-foot cliff. Cora’s heart felt much like the boulder, battered and plunging to its death.
A cunning gleam entered his sharp gaze. “Didn’t what, ma petite?”
Cora frantically searched her mind for the common thread weaving amidst Valère’s madness. This sort of thing was Guy’s specialty, and she mourned his absence for more reasons than one. Not only would he have unraveled this mystery before her by now, but she would also have his indomitable strength to lean on. She wouldn’t be alone.
But she was alone, and she had no one to blame but herself.
Think, Cora. The missive. Grace. Jack’s unusual anxiety over delivering the message when his normal response would have been to attack the injustice with furious declarations of retribution. Her brow gathered in concentration, and then her eyes rounded in horror. “You kidnapped Jack’s sister.” Valère’s duplicity came to her clear and certain. “Did you threaten to kill her if he didn’t deliver the dispatch?” Her voice rose higher. “Dear God, Valère. Does your ambition know no bounds?”
Cora fought the ache of Jack’s betrayal. Faced with the choice of saving his little sister or compromising his mistress’s safety, the footman had stood in an untenable situation and likely had only minutes to make a decision. Although Jack was quite adept at getting out of trouble, he would have been no match for Valère’s keen mind.
The mental torture Jack suffered must have been tremendous. Unable to seek counsel from the people he trusted most, and weighed down by a shattering helplessness, he made a decision that would surely cause him unbearable guilt for years to come. Even though she understood his impossible position, his choice had carved away a precious piece of their friendship that they might never recover.
“What is one little girl’s life against an Empire, ma belle? Surely the Raven understands that the welfare of one insignificant child is nothing compared to the survival of a nation.”
An incomprehensible evil stood before her, wearing a mocking, self-righteous smile. If she wasn’t so consumed with fury, she would have lost what little di
nner she had eaten that evening. “How ever did I miss the monster clawing beneath that beautiful, shallow shell?” Her ineptitude sickened her further. She knew of his passion for Napoleon, but never had she realized his love of the emperor was in truth a perverse obsession.
Somerton had entrusted her with the simple task of observance and report. How had she missed such menace, such disregard for innocence?
“Where is she?” Cora tightened her grip around the poker and raised the tip toward the ceiling.
“Why do you concern yourself with peasants?” Valère asked. “There are plenty more scurrying about this puny country to take her place.”
She moved to within five feet of his kneeling form. “I won’t ask you again.”
“No.” His eyes crinkled at the corners, and his lips curled into a smile that chilled the blood in her veins. “No, I don’t suppose you will.”
The blow forced Cora’s head to jerk back. She stared at the bedchamber’s ceiling, not actually seeing the fine lines zigzagging through the plaster, but more waiting for the terrible pain to reveal itself.
And then it did.
Her eyes rolled back in her head at the same time her knees buckled. The iron poker fell to the carpet with a dull, heavy thud. Or was it her skull sinking into the coarse fibers?
Cora’s mind refused to sort it out. The room grew muffled, reminding her of the time pond water had burrowed deep in her ears. The only sound that registered was the sluggish beat of her pulse. Her body melted into the floor as if releasing a deep sigh. As if surrendering to a long, hard-fought battle.
A mere second before darkness engulfed her body, she was almost certain someone tickled her nose with the feathery end of a quill.
Eighteen
Guy’s winded horse trudged down the narrow, mud-thick lane leading toward the Golden Duck Inn in Witney. After Guy survived one of the longest nights of his life, he welcomed the sight of the small post town. During the long ride from London, he had spent hours torturing himself with various outcomes to Valère’s carefully calculated visit to Herrington Park.
When he could take those images no longer, he began devising flawless methods of execution for Valère. With uncanny accuracy, he had visualized each placement of his blade and every entry point of his bullet. But the moment his finger moved to depress the trigger, his blood would ice, and his finger would freeze.
In the depths of his mind, a silent war raged. Pull it! No! I’m not ready… must make sure… Just pull the damn trigger! Not yet! Give me a second. On and on it went.
Guy squeezed his eyes shut for a moment. Even now, hours later, his throat grew thick with remorse. Somehow he had to overcome this paralyzing doubt. He must be sound of mind for the time when Cora needed him most.
He shifted in his saddle, chafing against his sodden clothes and the chill that had crept deep into his bones. As if his fear and guilt over Cora’s disappearance wasn’t enough, the good Lord challenged him further by blasting him with an unremitting rainstorm for the last two hours. His poor horse fared little better, with his rain-slicked coat and quivering withers.
His stomach chose that moment to remind him of his duty. He could not remember the last time he’d had a meal, possibly the morning he had abandoned Cora in the country and forced her to face her conniving enemy alone.
Sounds of life seeped into his consciousness. When he lifted his head, the muscles in his neck and back screamed in protest. He transferred the reins to his other hand and then stretched his arm out to the side, nearly groaning his pleasure aloud. He attempted the same with his stiff fingers, but his hand felt like that of an eighty-year-old man’s. After a time, his fingers loosened, but he began to dread the moment he had to depend upon his leaden legs to carry his weight.
Dawn sprayed bright colors of purple, red, and golden yellow across the eastern horizon, heralding the beginnings of a clear summer day. As he approached the outskirts of town, he could see the residents of Witney already scurrying about—sweeping storefronts, loading wagons, and seeing to their animals.
He guided his hired horse toward the Golden Duck Inn, where he would hire a fresh mount and pay a handsome coin for the innkeeper’s warmest loaf of bread. A young ostler, wearing breeches far too big for his narrow hips, ran up to Guy. “G’morning, sir.” His small hand closed around the reins, while the other held onto his waistband. “Will you be staying at the Duck, sir?”
Guy dismounted and held onto the saddle until he was certain his legs were solid. He turned to the boy, tossing him a shilling. “No, lad. Have your stable’s best horse saddled and ready to go in ten minutes, and you’ll receive another one of those.”
The boy’s eyes rounded at the small fortune. “Thank you!”
Guy patted the horse’s neck. “Take good care of him. He’s had a difficult journey.”
“Yes, sir.” The boy tugged on the reins, coaxing the exhausted horse forward.
Pivoting toward the Golden Duck, Guy scanned the courtyard, cataloging every merchant and servant in sight. Everyone appeared to be about his normal business. No one seemed unduly interested in his presence.
He didn’t immediately hear the approaching carriage. It could have been the clatter of wooden wheels, the jangle of a harness, or perhaps it was simply a bond that stretched across time and space that finally alerted him. Whatever the case, something inexplicable drew his attention to the lumbering carriage making its way toward the inn.
He glanced over his shoulder and followed the carriage’s slow progress. The spent horses glistened with sweat, and their labored huffs reached his ears, even from this distance. The two occupants seated in the driver’s box were slumped forward, their shoulders bent.
The conveyance drew closer, and the coachman glanced up. Recognition sent the fine hairs on Guy’s nape standing tall, and his body pulsed with newfound hope. He sprinted across the cobblestone courtyard with his heart slamming against his rib cage, his gaze fixed on the passenger compartment. “Bingham! Jack!” He yelled from twenty feet away. “Where is she?”
“We’re all fine, m’lord,” Bingham answered around swollen, split lips. He nodded toward the passenger compartment. “Nicked in the nob a bit, but otherwise fine.”
A vise clamped around Guy’s chest, squeezing tighter and tighter, until he skidded to a halt in front of the carriage’s window. Not knowing what he would find behind the shade, he tried to keep the panic from his voice. “Cora.” He would give her two seconds, and two seconds only to show herself.
Then the shade lifted, and Cora’s pale, bruised face appeared in the window. Her eyes shimmered with tears.
Guy wrenched open the door.
***
Cora had maintained her composure up to the moment she heard Guy’s voice. Her little family had needed her strength, and she had needed the illusion of control. But the sight of Guy standing outside the coach, concern carved into every tired groove of his handsome face, brought all the volatile emotions she had suppressed to the surface.
She crumpled. Huge, gulping sobs burst forth, causing her bruised ribs to throb and her aching head to splinter.
The door flew open, and she tumbled into Guy’s arms.
Safe. We’re safe. Oh, dear God, we’re safe now.
Immeasurable relief drugged her limbs, and she sagged against his solid body. All the anxiety and doubt she had lived with since rushing from Herrington Park had loosened its steely grip from around her chest.
“Cora, sweetheart.” He wiped the tears from her face and pressed gentle, urgent kisses on her lips, cheeks, eyes, and forehead, caring nothing for the avid stares of passersby. “I was coming back… Somerton didn’t send…” Then he hugged her to him. Not so hard as to crush her but firm enough to reassure. After a moment, he set her from him, inspecting her body. “Your injuries?”
“We’re fine.” She leaned into his hold, not wanting to be parted from his warmth. “I’m fine.”
“Thanks to our ferocious little friend,” Dinks sa
id, alighting after Cora. Her bottom lip was swollen and blood-encrusted. In her arms, she carried the damned ankle-biter like priceless cargo. The kitten gazed back at Guy with a wide, unblinking stare.
Cora nodded. “It’s true. Scrapper provided an unearthly howl that distracted Valère’s man, allowing me enough time to release two of my weapons.”
Dinks smiled proudly. “That’s right, my lord. Miss Cora killed the one holding me and maimed his master. If it weren’t for that Marcel fellow, Miss Cora would be fit as a fiddle.”
“What else?” he demanded.
A sense of desperation took hold of Cora, and she tightened her arms around Guy.
“Not much left to tell, my lord.” Dinks scratched between the kitten’s ears. “Injured as they were, the two Frenchies scurried out of there when they heard help storming up the stairs.” She cast an admiring look toward Bingham, who still sat in the driver’s box. When the coachman kept his gaze fixed forward, the maid scowled.
Valère’s outraged commands to “kill the vermin” helped pull Cora from a concussion-induced fog. She would never forget waking to see Scrapper’s tail whipping around angrily in front of her face while holding off Marcel’s feeble attempts to bat him away. Those few precious minutes were enough time for Dinks to rush downstairs and free Bingham, Jack, and one of Guy’s guards.
“I’m so sorry, sweetheart,” Guy whispered against her hair. “I should have listened to my instincts.”
The starkness, the aching quality to his voice made her blurt out, “No, I’m the one who should apologize. I should never have sent you away, but I wasn’t certain about the missive—”
He stilled. “What are you saying, Cora?”
She felt more than saw Dinks’s retreat. Realizing her error, a flash of cold heat swept through Cora’s body.
Guy pressed, “You knew the letter wasn’t from Somerton, didn’t you?”
She couldn’t answer him, couldn’t get the awful words past the thickness in her throat.
“Didn’t you?” His harsh rebuke matched his burning dark eyes.
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