* * *
It was definitely not one of the grander streets of Rio.
Sebastian nudged aside a pile of rubbish with the toe of his boot. The narrow lane was cobbled, but this area had not been one of the places hastily refurbished for the royal family’s arrival. The stones were cracked, mouldy, and the lane was close-packed with buildings whose whitewash was peeling and grey. Lattice-covered balconies loomed overhead, which in daytime would surely cut off any meagre light that tried to slip past.
From behind those flimsy walls he could hear shrieks of laughter, noisy quarrels. The warm air was thick and humid, full of the scents of cooking fires, cheap perfumes and rotting garbage. It was after midnight, the hour of disreputable revels, but surely it would be no different at midday here.
It was far from the main square, from the palace and the cathedral, from the houses commandeered for the court. Was his informant correct in saying their quarry would be found meeting there?
He paused at the end of the lane to study the dwelling opposite. This was the place where his informant, a footman at the palace who was half-English, had said Luis Fernandes and his young, wild cohorts had been meeting. Sebastian settled in to wait in the shadows, his arms crossed over his chest, invisible in the shadows in his black garments. In this work, just as much as in battle, cool patience and forethought was a necessity to win the day, though not terribly glamorous.
He thought about Mary. Part of his task there in Rio was to keep her safe now. He was afraid he wasn’t making a very good job of it so far. In fact, his desire for her, his need to have her, had only made matters worse. He had to fix that now.
A tiny, flickering light appeared in one of the cracked upper windows of the house he watched.
Sebastian crept across the lane, drawing a small but lethally sharp dagger from beneath his sleeve. Holding it balanced on his leather-gloved palm, he made his way to the half-concealed back door. It faced on to an alleyway even narrower than the front street, barely wide enough for one man to walk down. The tip of his knife made quick work of the flimsy lock.
The corridor inside was dark and dank, smelling of mould. From the upper floors, he could hear the indistinct, low murmur of voices. Moving quickly, silently, he made his way up a rickety staircase. He went past the half-open door of the room where the light flickered, where voices could be heard, louder for a moment, then muffled by the paint-flaked walls again. The heavy smell of rum combined with the sickly-sweetness of the mould.
He could not stop there. At the top of the narrow house, he found a narrow space under the eaves, just as his informant had said. It smelled dusty, as if nothing had disturbed the space for a long time. There was a small gap in the floorboards there, where he could peer down at a corner of the lighted room.
He glimpsed Luis Fernandes’s profile, along with a couple of other young men of the royal court, men who were known to have been reluctant to leave their home—and who had been part of Doña Carlota’s circle for a long time. They sat around a table laden with cigars and jugs of cheap local rum, and they were laughing.
‘...won’t be long now,’ one of them said.
‘But you did not do what you said you would up in the hills,’ Luis said.
The man beside him scowled. ‘The Princess said her husband would be there and when he was not...’
‘Yes, yes,’ Luis said impatiently. ‘But we cannot stay in this godforsaken place much longer. The French will have overrun everything in Lisbon, taken all the spots of authority and left none for us, if we are not there to claim them. We must move.’
‘But when? Dom Joao is always surrounded by the English now. He will listen to no one else.’
‘You know we cannot count on him at all. The Princess will lead us back to Lisbon, will seek help from her Spanish family, who will make peace with Napoleon,’ Luis said. ‘We only need to go where she cannot now, to help her.’
‘And where is that?’ one of the other men said, his voice slurred as if they had been drinking the rum for too long.
Luis laughed, an unpleasant, humourless sound. ‘To the centre of the English party, of course...’
Chapter Twenty-One
‘Lord Sebastian Barrett has come to call on you, senhorita,’ Adriana announced, a smile on her lips like the cat who had found the cream. She always did say Mary needed more gentleman callers, especially of an ilk as handsome as Lord Sebastian.
‘Lord Sebastian?’ Mary cried. It had been two days since she last saw Sebastian, in their hidden tropical bower. He had sent her a note and a bouquet of brilliant Brazilian flowers, but the note had been maddeningly vague. He hadn’t been far from her thoughts, as she wondered where he was, what his work was and when she could tell him about her visit to the royal palace.
Now the daylight was fading outside her window, and she was thinking of changing her gown for the night’s ball at the Huelgos villa outside the city. She still wore her plain afternoon gown. It was not the expected hour for calls.
Yet Mary’s heart pounded at the sound of his name and she had to hold herself back from running downstairs to see his face, to know he was really there. She had to be much more careful to conceal her real feelings this time.
Adriana giggled behind her apron. ‘Indeed. He seemed most eager to see you, senhorita.’
Mary quickly tidied her hair and hurried down the stairs. Her father had already departed, brushing off her worries that he looked tired, and the house was quiet. Sebastian was pacing the drawing-room floor, his cravat loosened, his hair windswept. He was surely the most handsome sight she had ever seen.
Even more so when he turned to her with a smile.
‘I hope I did not keep you waiting,’ Mary said. She wished desperately that her voice did not sound so eager, so breathless.
‘Not at all, Miss Manning. I am sorry to call at such an inconvenient hour.’
He hurried across the room to take her hand and he bowed over it in a most polite manner. It did not feel so very polite, though. The brush of his lips over her skin made her shiver.
‘Please, do sit down,’ Mary said, somewhat flustered. She quickly covered it up, and led him to one of the sofas near the window, just beyond the golden-pink light of the dying sun. He sat down near her, his leg warm through her skirt.
‘I am so happy to see you again, Mary, and looking so—well,’ he said.
Mary smiled at him shyly. ‘I know you must be very busy lately.’
‘So I have been, but I have thought so much of—’ Sebastian broke off and shook his head. ‘Mary, are you going to the ball tonight?’
She was confused by the sudden question, unsure of what she had really been expecting from him. ‘Of course.’ She tried to laugh, even though the solemn look in his eyes made her feel rather apprehensive. ‘Shall I save you a dance there?’
He smiled. ‘I will always want to dance with you, Mary. But I must warn you tonight to beware of your dance partners.’
‘Beware?’ Mary asked, even more confused. ‘La, Sebastian, but you sound most foreboding!’
He gave a rueful laugh. ‘I hope I am not such a Minerva Press novel. But we have lately discovered a few—facts about some of the Portuguese courtiers. It could be a dangerous moment soon.’
Mary thought of what she had found at the royal palace, of Teresa’s fear, and she was tired of never knowing. Of always being kept ‘safe’, by her father and now by Sebastian. It was maddening, the way they would never tell her anything! ‘Facts about Doña Carlota and her French friends?’
Sebastian studied her closely. ‘Perhaps, yes.’
His reticence, the lack of expression on his handsome face, suddenly made her rather angry. She had been working in this world for so long; surely she could be trusted to know the truth now, the full truth? Surely she could help?
Besid
es—she and Sebastian had been as intimate as two people could be. Why would he not talk to her freely now?
It made her doubt she could truly trust him once again.
‘Sebastian, please,’ she begged. ‘If there is danger here...’
‘You know you must be wary of Teresa Fernandes and her brother,’ he said, but that was all. He glanced behind her, almost as if he thought they would be overheard.
Mary slid her hands out of his. ‘You have said so before. But they have been kind to me and Teresa at least has surely never been dishonest with me. If she could help...’
‘Mary, please,’ he said, his voice low and tense. ‘I can tell you no more, not yet. Just, please, be careful of them. Stay close to me or to your father tonight.’
Nothing had changed, she realised with a cold sinking in her heart. Not really. Not where it mattered. She stood up and turned away from him, too confused to look at him any longer. When they had made love, she had never felt so close to another person’s feelings and needs, never been so sure of anything. Now she felt like a fool for him all over again.
‘I must change for the evening, Lord Sebastian,’ she said carefully. ‘Thank you for your warning. I will be most careful, as always.’
‘Mary...’ he said, his tone verging on angry, impatient. But he just took a deep breath and gave her a polite smile. He kissed her hand once more, but she could not bear the feelings his touch raised in her. ‘Look for me at the ball. I will be watching for you.’
She nodded and heard him leave the room, Adriana fluttering after him to the front door. When she was sure he was gone, Mary ran up the stairs towards her own chamber. At the window on the turning of the stairs, she stopped and looked down at the street. Sebastian was just climbing into his carriage and she caught a glimpse of the dying sunlight on his hair.
Why could he not trust her, let her help him? She wanted so much to be sure of him again.
She slowly turned away and made her way into her chamber, where Adriana had laid out her silk ballgown and the jewellery parure of cameos and pearls that had been her mother’s. It always made Mary feel more confident when she wore them, more sure of herself, as if her mother stood with her and helped her do her duty.
She could only hope the armour would help her tonight.
* * *
The music had already begun when Mary’s carriage deposited her at the front doors of the hillside villa of the Baroness Huelgos, a long, low, pale structure lit up by thousands of candles in the warm, dusty dark night. She slowly made her way into the ballroom, looking for her father, or Sebastian, or anyone she knew. The sky felt lower, heavy, as if rain was moving in on their party.
She glimpsed Doña Carlota and some of her ladies seated on a dais at the far end of the room, but Teresa was not among them. Mary went up on tiptoe, trying to see over the heads of the crowd around her, but she could see little. She made her way to a quieter corner and glimpsed Teresa beside the tall windows leading outside to the gardens. Teresa gave her a small wave, but her smile was strained.
Mary started to move towards her, when her hand was suddenly caught. She spun around, half-hoping it was Sebastian, only to find Luis smiling down at her.
‘Senhorita Manning,’ he said, bowing over her hand. He was as handsome as ever, as fashionably perfect in his dark evening dress, yet Mary was sure she saw something else in the depths of his charming, practised smile. ‘How lovely you look tonight.’
‘Thank you, Senhor Fernandes,’ she said, giving him her own practised smile. Perhaps if she could get him to talk to her, she could learn something. If she could then make Sebastian listen to her...
But he would not talk to her and she felt alone in the crowded party. Alone with a man whose touch made her feel nothing like Sebastian’s did.
‘I have not seen you or Teresa much of late,’ she said. ‘I imagine you have been kept very busy with new duties here in Brazil.’
His eyes narrowed a bit as he looked down at her. ‘Yes, busy indeed, thanks to men like your father and his friends. But surely we are never too busy for you. Perhaps you would care to dance with me now?’
Mary glanced past him to see Teresa watching her, her eyes wide. Then her friend vanished behind a wall of pale-silk gowns. Mary remembered what Sebastian had said, but surely a dance would not harm anything?
‘I would enjoy that, thank you,’ she answered. She took his offered arm and let him lead her towards the dance floor. His muscles were tense beneath her light touch and up close she could see the taut lines at the edge of his smile. A few moist beads dotted his brow, even though the tall windows of the ballroom wafted a cool breeze from the night outside.
It made Mary feel tense, as well, and she looked around in hopes of glimpsing Sebastian at last. But he was nowhere to be seen.
As they took their places in the dance, she took a deep breath and said, ‘I understand from Teresa you have long been very useful in the court of Doña Carlota.’
He smiled at her, a strange, taut, too-bright smile. ‘She is a great princess, though I fear often my fellow courtiers do not always know her full worth. If they had listened to her counsel...’
‘Her counsel?’
‘On the hasty removal from Portugal. I am afraid fear prevailed, rather than her own sensible view that a European monarch’s place is in Europe. Now it will be much harder to fix matters.’
‘Fix matters?’ Mary said as they swirled and dipped in time to the music. His hold on her was too hard, but she did not know how to break away yet.
‘Surely you cannot be as in the dark about the truth of things here in Brazil as you pretend, Senhorita Manning? Your father is a well-known diplomat, one of the architects of the plan to carry off Dom Joao to this godforsaken place and take over his rule. And you have been most friendly with Lord Sebastian Barrett, as well. I am sure you could tell us much—if you would.’
All Sebastian’s warnings echoed in Mary’s head. She could not look away from the glitter of Luis’s eyes. ‘My father does not confide in me, I fear. I would know little of what he said anyway.’
‘Now, we know that is not true. Come, Senhorita Manning, we should be honest with each other at last.’
The music ended with a flourish and Mary spun around to leave the dance floor. Luis grabbed her arm in a hard grasp, holding her by his side. The chill of her earlier frustration with Sebastian was nothing to the sudden, icy prick of her fear now. She knew she shouldn’t have danced with him, listened to him.
She tugged hard at her arm, but he held her tightly, dragging her with him to the edge of the crowd.
‘You must listen to me,’ he muttered close to her ear, all his old charm vanished in cold hardness.
‘Let go of me!’ Mary cried, attracting curious glances from a few of the dancers, but no one came closer. She tried to kick out at him, but her heavy silk skirts wrapped around her legs.
Then she felt a sharp prick against the bare skin of her arm, just above the edge of her glove. She glanced down, shocked that he would do such a thing. He held a small but lethal-looking dagger pressed to her, a tiny bloom of blood staining the white glove.
‘Don’t make such a fuss, Senhorita Manning. We are friends, are we not?’ Luis whispered. ‘Just come with me for a short time, listen to me. It’s very important that people like your father and your admirer Lord Sebastian listen to reason. The fate of so many depends on that. Once they do, you will be immediately released to their loving care.’
‘You can’t kill me here in front of so many of your own people,’ Mary hissed.
‘Perhaps not. But do you see my sister over there?’ Luis gestured towards Teresa, who was glimpsed through the swirl of the crowd. A tall, broad-shouldered man Mary did not know held Teresa by the arm and Teresa looked up at him with wide eyes and a pale face, quite unlike her usual laughing mer
riness. ‘You would not want her to be hurt either, would you?’
Mary swallowed hard and Teresa met her eyes. She shook her head.
Luis tugged hard on Mary’s arm, throwing her off balance on her delicate slippers and dangerously near to the knife.
‘My poor sister,’ he said with a theatrical sigh. ‘She has always been so admirable, too naïve in the world. Our parents told me to look after her, but she must know some things are more important. Napoleon cannot be resisted and Doña Carlota is the only one not foolish enough to think he can. Teresa protests now, but she won’t when we’re back in Lisbon and she is married to some French officer. But if she does not make it home because of her—mistaken friendships...’
Mary looked back frantically to Teresa, who was still held by the muscle-bound man.
‘Are you threatening your own sister?’ Mary gasped.
‘Senhorita Manning! Unlike your own countrymen, who bullied their way into my country, I don’t want to harm the innocent. But so much peril awaits those who are not careful—such as you and my sister. Some causes are larger than us all and sacrifices must be made. I hope you do see what I mean?’
Mary swallowed hard. Indeed she did—too well. Come with him, be bait to Sebastian, or this wild-eyed man could hurt her friend. His own sister.
He drew her with him out the doors and on to the terrace outside the house, beyond the lights and music. She had dangerously underestimated the deep divide here in Brazil between those who thought it best to stay in Brazil under British protection and those who wanted to return to Portugal, even under price of submitting to Napoleon. Perhaps she had been too distracted by her feelings for Sebastian, her own romantic dreams?
He pulled her down the steps, towards the narrow, winding path that led up into the hills where she and Teresa had explored only days before. He was too strong for her, lifting her off her feet. Panicked, she glanced back, but Luis was too fast, too determined. He had carried her far from the crowd. She could see no one, nothing at all in the growing darkness. There were only the wavering shadows of the wildness beyond the garden and the surge of the black sea below.
Harlequin Historical November 2015, Box Set 2 of 2 Page 35
