His meal was no more than crumbs on his plate and still they sat. Not for much longer, he hoped, rubbing the back of his neck. The tension was giving him an aching head and her perfume was making him ache elsewhere. “What are we waiting for?”
“A signal.”
Now he did look around the room, trying to identify the person who would carry such information.
She reached across the table and patted his knuckles. “Until then, act like a besotted lover.”
He raised her hand and kissed it. “I am not the actor you are, Charlotte.”
She nodded in agreement and gave her attention to the room. The other patrons.
He had spent more than eight months waiting. A few more hours should be easy. It was not. To be so close to freedom and still not able to feel it was frustrating. Couple it with the constant, nagging fear of discovery, and he was about to explode.
“Eat my cheese. I am not sure when you will eat again.”
He took the rough cloth serviette and wrapped the rest of the cheese and bread. “From that one sentence I can deduce I will leave by boat and you are not sure how long it will take to reach a naval vessel in the blockade.”
She did no more than raise her eyebrows and say, “Very good,” and was about to continue when the agreeableness of the common room was obliterated.
The door was slammed against the wall. A troop of soldiers crowded through the doorway. Conversation stopped. It was as though everyone in the room suddenly wished to be someplace else.
Gabriel turned to look at the troop, since that was what everyone else was doing. Charlotte swore quietly and Gabriel put his hand on his knife. Did she have a weapon?
She rose slightly from her seat. “Et voilà. Mon cher capitaine, comment vas-tu?”
Gabe stiffened. The room was so poorly lit they might have escaped notice. Instead the captain made his way to their table. As she talked to the captain, he saw it as a ruse. How could someone who was the center of attention be doing anything illegal? It worked for her because she was, by her own admission, willing to risk everything for the money promised.
It was all he could do not to shrink down in his seat. Slide under the table to hide. Not particularly noble, but then very little about this situation was.
“Charlotte.” The leader of the squad did not seem as excited to be singled out as Gabriel thought he would be. “What are you doing here with this one? I have been waiting for you since this afternoon.”
“This afternoon? No, mon cher, it was yesterday we were to meet.” Charlotte stood up and moved so the captain could not see Gabriel without moving around her. “And here I thought you had lost interest. Have your marriage plans changed you?”
“Non. Never,” he protested, leaning closer to her.
“So you say.” She did not sound convinced. “You have been looking for me everywhere?”
“I must work sometimes, Charlotte,” he said, puffing up with importance. “Some English pig escaped from the prison during a riot early tonight.”
“And where is the colonel while you work so hard?”
“He is busy with the mayor this evening.”
Gabe watched them, listened and pretended he was invisible.
“While a prisoner is on the loose?”
“The colonel is a law unto himself, ma chérie. I will tell him that you are sorry to have missed him.”
Charlotte laughed, and Gabe realized that the colonel was not a friend of hers.
“You know, Raoul, I was near the prison this evening. A friend had sent for me. She asked me to spend some time with her son.”
Gabe had no trouble glowering now. If she used the line about his being inexperienced, he would go from glowering to angry.
“His wife died six months ago and he has lost all interest in women.”
“But with your help he has recovered completely, eh?” The captain never once looked at him. Charlotte had all his attention.
“No, I am sorry to say the evening has been a failure. Why else would we be sitting here at this hour? I even took him to Madame Rostine’s to watch the live vignettes.” She shook her head. “Nothing.”
Rising on tiptoe, she whispered in the captain’s ear, though loud enough for Gabriel to hear. “I have listened to stories all night. And the tears…” She shook her head.
Gabriel could feel his color rise along with his temper. He began naming Lavoisier’s thirty-three elements, clenching his teeth until his jaw ached.
The captain dismissed him with a flick of his hand. “You will be free tomorrow?”
“I am sorry, but I must go to Paris. My patron there is annoyed I have been away so long.”
“Delay one more day, chérie.” He ran his hands up her arms. “Come to me here tomorrow.” The captain smiled and stepped closer to kiss Charlotte. It was a long, deep kiss. The captain stepped back and ignored the round of applause. The captain bowed to Gabriel, more insult than deference. “Will that help, monsieur? Jealousy is a powerful aphrodisiac.”
6
AS CHARLOTTE SMILED and kissed the captain lightly, Gabriel kept his seat, reminding himself that this was a private drama in which he had no part. The captain’s words were not a personal insult.
“Perhaps, Raoul,” Charlotte said. “Perhaps I can stay a day longer.” She stepped away even though he had not yet let go of her arm.
Then again, seeing another man kiss a woman who was with you would arouse something in a man if not lust.
Before the guard captain could press her further, his sergeant came up to him. “No one here knows anything.”
Raoul let go of Charlotte’s arm and turned away, but the new man stood off to the side and could see Gabriel more easily. He looked at him with hard eyes.
Gabe wanted to raise a hand to rub at his forehead, but taking a cue from Charlotte, he did not move to hide his face. The soldier was about to say something when his captain told him to check the private rooms upstairs. The captain turned back to Charlotte.
Surely, Gabe thought, the man he was pretending to be would try to assert himself into this scene. Doing his best to separate his character’s feeling from his own, Gabe stood up and stepped beside Charlotte. “Why are you searching here for the escaped man, Captain? This place is a good distance from the prison.”
“The jailer who disappeared was last seen here. It had to be investigated.”
“I suspect the truth of it is that you hoped to find Charlotte here as well.” He took her arm. “But as you can see, she is already occupied.”
He felt the pressure of Charlotte’s other hand on his arm. It was a painful pinch. Was she angry at him or afraid of the captain?
“I am sorry to have missed you, Raoul.” She raised her hand from Gabriel’s arm to trace a finger down the captain’s cheek. “If I can delay, I will see you tomorrow. Here, in the evening. But I think we must be going now.”
“I am expecting you, madame,” the captain said as he stepped aside so they could leave.
The words struck Gabe as a command. He was considering the implications of that and missed what the captain said next. A ribald burst of laughter followed them out the door.
The street was quiet, the air heavier, the sky showed no stars. Would it rain?
Charlotte did not head directly for the harbor and Gabriel reasoned she was taking a more circuitous route there. The silence was exactly what his frayed temper needed. Soon he would be away from this nightmare. That last encounter had come too close to ruining it. Fear, dislodged by temper, crawled through him again. The near-empty street, the heavy skies did nothing to allay it. He needed a distraction or he would go mad.
“How long did it take you to do it?” The soft gray light of dawn seeped into his voice.
“To do what, monsieur?” Her voice matched his.
“To perfect the ability to distract men with your body, to bend them to obedience without a word.”
She was silent a moment, but the smallest bit of tension echoed down her
arm and through him.
“I notice details.” He laughed a little. “It is how I proved my worth to Wellington’s staff.”
“Yes, you use your talents and I use mine.” He could feel her nod as she spoke.
“I bow to you, madame. Your talent is a formidable weapon.”
“I hope so. It would not be worth the sacrifice if it was not.”
Sacrifice? The word stopped him in the middle of the quiet street. He waited until she raised her eyes to his. “Who is your jailer, Charlotte?”
Those usually guarded eyes showed that once again he had come close to a truth.
“No one owns me.”
She spoke with such challenge, such conviction that he did no more than nod.
“When I am paid, it is for my services.” Lest he should have any doubts about what services she meant, Charlotte pressed her body against his.
“I am as susceptible to distraction as any other man.” This was not the time or place for revelations. But the word sacrifice etched itself into his memory even as he spoke.
She relaxed, at least the tension around her mouth eased. Good, he thought. Let her think she was still in control. But each time he grasped a truth about her, each time he voiced it, the power shifted. In his experiments he had learned to accept small steps to success. He could be patient when he had to be.
“You must do as I tell you,” she said with irritation. “I told you not to speak unless you had to.”
“No man could be silent in the face of such a challenge. I had to say something. No man, even one struck with grief, will tolerate having his shortcomings discussed openly.” They had been walking slowly. Now they were standing in the street. Gabriel looked back toward the tavern. It was still in sight.
She looked up at the night sky. It was a long time before she looked at him again. “I told you to be quiet because your accent is so cultured, more suited to court than a tavern. And I did my best to make you angry because it gives you color. You are too pale, and I doubt grief for a lost wife is enough explanation except in a Minerva Press novel.”
“You could not tell me this before?”
“It is better for you not to know the details. More than your life is at stake.” She began to walk again.
He did not move with her, compelling her to stop too.
“Exactly what else are you risking? Who? Do you mean Georges?”
“It does not concern you.”
“Everything about this concerns me, Charlotte,” he said, closing the small gap between them.
“Very well.” Her sigh was resignation and still she was silent a moment more. “There are other people who will be served by this effort. People still trapped here in France who will have a chance at freedom if I am successful.”
“That is the vaguest of explanations possible, madame. Which is the only reason I believe it at all.” He offered her his arm. When she took it he wondered if she felt the same burn of awareness.
“If we are captured and they torture you, my lord, now you will have something to tell them.”
“A lovely thought, madame. Thank you,” he said, using that same acerbic tone she had. They walked on in silence and slowly. “Is this tediously slow pace a torture devised to drive me insane or is there a reason for it? There is no one else on the street. Who are we performing for now?”
“There is a reason. The discomfort is an added gift.”
He waited.
“I had planned for us to stay at the inn until it was time to leave. Your confrontation with Raoul now means we will walk until dawn. The fact that it is torture for you is a small punishment for interfering.
“I never took into account that a man of science would have a temper so easily roused.” She spoke so softly that he was not sure he was intended to hear it.
“You consider that a grave mistake?”
She nodded without looking at him. “It is one of several mistakes I have made. It reminds me that it is dangerous to assume too much. The only interest we share is keeping you alive.”
“Yes, yes, it is,” Gabriel agreed, wondering if she was reminding herself or warning him. “How odd. To be bound together as intimately as lovers with nothing else in common.” He laughed a little. “Is it significant that we have finally found something we agree on?”
Before she could answer him, they were startled by the swell of sound that meant the door to the tavern had opened and swung shut.
Charlotte looked back. Shook her head. Gabriel followed her gaze. Two of the squad was behind them. Hard to tell if they were following them or on some other mission.
Pushing him into a nearby doorway, she put her arms around his neck. “Kiss me.”
Her lips were cool against his, as though she was only vaguely interested in the experience. Gabe more than made up for her lack of enthusiasm. Not only because his life depended on it. Her soft mouth pressed to his obliterated fear, replacing it with lust. It was as irrational as it was irresistible.
He moved her so that she was the one against the door and pressed his body to hers while his mouth demanded more. A demand that drew nothing from her. He could feel the tension in her and was almost sure it was not only because she was anxious about the footsteps coming closer.
Raising his head, he saw anger in her eyes. “Give in to it, Charlotte. I know you feel this too.”
He touched her lips again, wooing her, moving his lips and tongue along her mouth as though he had only to find the right spot to unleash what she guarded so desperately.
She held still until he thought he had lost the siege and then an absolute torrent of feeling poured from her. She was fierce in her passion, holding his head with her hands, her mouth opened to him. He felt her body fit with his as she raised her leg so it wrapped around his hip. He buried his face in her neck as he tried to retain some control over his body.
Time and place faded and his world was filled with the aching pleasure of passion edged with darker feelings. He felt her need match his own and wondered what he had unleashed.
“We both know what they will be doing tonight.” The soldier’s words carried to where Charlotte and Gabriel were sheltered, the doorway gathering in the sound so they could hear. It brought them back from their erotic adventure in an instant.
Charlotte was actress enough to hold her pose. His face buried in her neck, Gabe drew in her scent as they listened to their audience.
“His eyes were red and his clothes ill-fitting. I was sure he was the spy.”
“His wife died. He was prostrate with grief.”
“Not anymore.” The suspicious one relented. Gabriel could feel Charlotte relax. She raised his head with her hands and looked into his eyes. She rested her lips on the corner of his mouth. Neither one of them was thinking about sex.
“Where is the justice? He’s with her and we are awake all night, in the rain, watching the harbor.”
Charlotte drew away. He could see she was surprised. If they knew enough to watch the harbor, what else did they know? She let go of him, no longer paying him any attention at all.
“Charlotte is too smart to be taken in by a lying, cheating spy.”
Gabriel missed the rest of their comments as the two soldiers lost interest and moved on.
“Madame Rostine would pay us well for our pose, monsieur.”
“You weren’t acting any more than I was. I would say that we were both…” he paused,…, and then finished, “…we were both distracted.” He chose the word quite deliberately, making a lie of her claim that she could not be so influenced.
She made a small sound that was agreement or dismissal, but not denial.
“Charlotte, I have no doubt discovery is one of the possibilities you considered. What are we to do now?”
She cupped his cheek with her hand in that gesture that was not nearly as affectionate as it appeared to be. “We are going where they think we are going and we will do what they expect us to do.”
7
EXPLAIN WHAT YO
U mean by that.” He reached for her hand, lowering it from his cheek in a grip that was tighter than necessary.
Charlotte could feel his anger. Was it always so close to the surface? “We are going to Madame Rostine’s, where I will put you in the care of one of her girls.”
“Oh no.” He shook his head for emphasis. “You and I are together until we reach England. I would be a fool to let you out of my sight before I can kiss the dirt of home.”
The rain began, little more than a light drizzle. And the dense clouds promised more. That would work in her favor. “Listen to me. The soldiers will not stay long at the docks in this rain. I must go home and try to salvage what I can of my plan. I will come for you later today.”
“No.” He let the single word hang between them. It was enough to make her see that he would not be persuaded. “We can stand here all night, or stay at the brothel together. Or go back to your house.”
“None of my men come home with me. I always use Madame Rostine’s. If I took you home, it would rouse suspicion.” It was the absolute truth but not the whole of it.
“You took me there once tonight.”
“It was necessary. We went in the back door and only to the kitchen. For reasons I explained at the time.”
“Yes, because anyone could tell I had just come from prison.” He was silent a moment. “It could be that was your first mistake, Charlotte Parnell. Leaving me at the brothel, or anywhere else, will be your second mistake, because I can, and will, find you.”
He released her hand and waited with that way he had of staring at her. Could he find her house on his own? He was such a fine observer she could not discount his ability to work the puzzle successfully.
The mist turned to a steadier shower and made the decision for her. “Madame Rostine’s,” she said with a nod. “The rain will start in earnest any minute. Hurry or we will both be wet through.”
She pulled her shawl around her head, as Gabriel began to take off his jacket. “Wear this,” he said. “The weave is tight. It will keep you dry. I am used to the cold.”
“Stop,” she hissed. “Keep it. Madame Rostine’s is only a few streets away.” She tugged on his arm and pulled him along. “I am a prostitute and exist only for your comfort. What I feel or need does not matter.”
Mary Blayney Page 5
