“But so would Denise.”
Ryan laughed. “That’s debatable. You know as well as I do that she’s spoiled and willful and can be quite trying. We’ve had our arguments, believe, me. And I don’t want a wife that I have to constantly spar with. With a plantation as large as BelleRose to run, I won’t have time.”
“So you take a mistress.”
“I may well do that,” Ryan assured. “But that doesn’t mean I want to be miserable when I’m with my wife.”
“You’re being impulsive, because you’re angry and hurt with Denise for saying no, even though you won’t admit it,” Corbett argued. “I remember how you were on the crossing over here. You hardly said a word. You drank more than usual. And the first few days after we got to Paris, you didn’t want to go to the cabarets at night. All you wanted to do was brood. That means you care about her.”
“I thought so, too—at first. Now I realize I was just stunned that anyone could be so frivolous about something as serious as marriage.”
Corbett could not resist sniping, “As you are doing to even think about marrying Angele Benet?”
“I’m not being frivolous,” Ryan corrected. “I’m quite serious. And whether you believe me or not, I gave this a lot of thought before I decided to do it.”
“It’s only been a little over a week since she was arrested. That’s not enough time. But I did notice when we were in Touraine your mind wasn’t on buying horses.”
“That’s only partially true. The horses weren’t as good as we were told, and you know it. But we’re going to Blois tomorrow to look there.”
Corbett wasn’t concerned with buying horses, continuing to focus on Angele. “And how do you even know there’s room for her on the ship? We’re sailing in two weeks.”
“No, you’re leaving then, as planned, but Angele and I will be going a week later on the James Munroe. There were no cabins available on the Victory. I’ve already made our arrangements.”
Corbett sneered and shook his head. “Well, you can just make mine, too. You aren’t going to send me ahead to break the news to Denise and Clarice that you’re bringing a wife home. You’re going to be the one to do that.”
“You won’t like the accommodations on the James Munroe. I booked the last cabin.”
Corbett was adamant. “I don’t care. There is no way I will go back without you.”
Ryan thought it would have been nice if Corbett could have smoothed the way. Denise would get over it, but Clarice might take a while. After all, she might consider Angele a threat to her authority but would soon realize she had nothing to worry about. The last thing Angele was qualified to do was take over a household, see that the servants did their job, plan menus for dinner parties, teas, balls, and all the other things that went with the Tremayne social life. His father enjoyed entertaining so those were extensive.
“All right,” he conceded, “but don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
“Anything is better than facing those women without you. Now, about dinner—”
Ryan had not intended to invite Corbett to join him and Angele but saw no way out. They had dined together every night they had been in Paris, and he didn’t want to hurt his feelings. And what difference did it make, anyway, now that he knew everything. “You can join us if you like, but you’ll need to freshen up a bit. I’m taking her to Au Petit Moulin. I’ve heard it’s very nice, and the food is good.”
“I saw the gown you bought her,” Corbett said, almost accusingly.
“Did she like it?”
“Oh, yes. She was going to take it with her when she was about to run away, but I talked her into staying.”
Ryan had been in the process of pouring himself a glass of wine but froze. “What do you mean she was about to run away?”
Corbett thought fast. “When I started asking questions about who she was and what she was doing in your room, she got upset and snatched up the box and ran out the door.” Seeing Ryan’s eyes flash with concern, Corbett embellished, “I ran after her and convinced her to come back so we could talk. That’s when she accused you of trying to trick her into working in your bordello.” Corbett pasted a concerned, worried look on his face. “Do you know what she meant by that, or is she just crazy?”
“No, she’s not crazy, and thank you for bringing her back.”
Corbett smiled, pleased with himself.
“As for the bit about the bordello, I thought we had settled all that.” He explained about the commandant’s immoral and unscrupulous dealings with the female prisoners. “But I took care of that. It won’t happen again to anyone else.”
“Then I can see why she was upset.”
“Yes, when she saw you and realized how late it was, she was probably afraid I wasn’t coming back—that it was a trick. Thanks again for keeping her here.”
Corbett turned toward the door so Ryan couldn’t see him scowl to think he probably should have let her go regardless of the consequences. “I’ll be glad to join you for dinner. I’ll go change.”
“Corbett…”
He turned.
“I’m going to trust you not to say anything to anyone—not even Clarice—about how I met Angele. I expect you to corroborate my story that she’s an orphan but her family was well respected and prominent in France. I plan to buy her a stylish wardrobe and some nice jewelry, because I want everyone to think her family had money.”
Corbett quirked a brow. “You’re going to that much trouble?”
“Yes. Because I know Clarice, and I know my father. If they find out the truth, they’ll judge her before they get to know her, and that’s not fair to her, them, or me. Now, do I have your word?”
With a curt nod, Corbett left to dress for dinner.
Ryan hoped he could trust him. Otherwise, there might be problems he did not need.
Just before seven o’clock, Corbett joined Ryan in the hotel’s smoking salon for a sherry. Angele was not mentioned. Instead, Ryan told about Francois DeNeux and how he had heard he was one of France’s best horse breeders. He did not confide that Angele was the one who had told him.
“We should be able to find some good stallions, as well as a few mares. And there’s time to get them to the dock before sailing date.”
Corbett chuckled. “Yes, it would be nice to return home with what you came to get instead of something you didn’t.”
Ryan let the remark pass. He was used to Corbett’s bent toward sarcasm and had learned to accept it…although he didn’t like it.
“Monsieur Tremayne?”
He glanced up to see the concierge. “Yes? What is it?”
“It’s the lady. She told the desk clerk she was to meet you. He didn’t think you wanted him to send her in here.”
“Of course not. Please tell her I’ll be right there.” Ryan was puzzled as to why he looked so shaken.
So was Corbett, who remarked as soon as the concierge walked away, “Did you see how nervous he was? What do you suppose is wrong? Maybe the gown didn’t fit, and she’s wearing that god-awful outfit she had on this afternoon.”
“I doubt that,” Ryan said tightly He tossed some money on the table and hurried out, annoyed that Corbett was right on his heels. He wished now he hadn’t invited him along even if it had hurt his feelings. He might make Angele more ill at ease than she probably already was.
Rounding the corner from the smoking salon, Ryan could see a woman standing at the desk but knew it could not be her…
But it was.
She turned, and his heart slammed into his chest.
She was, beyond doubt, the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.
Chapter Seven
In the near two weeks since Ryan had made his offer, Angele hadn’t seen him. He had gone to Blois, leaving Corbett behind to help her get ready for the voyage. She had been trying to slip away from him and finally succeeded the day Ryan was due to return. And now she knelt by her mother’s grave in the paupers’ section in the rear of the Père Lachaise
cemetery.
In the distance, the great double towers of the Cathedral of Noire-Dame, tricolors flying in the blue sky of France, could be seen. They were a startling white, framed by green chestnuts and oaks, guarding Paris with their brotherly strength.
Looping north and west in great bends flowed the sleepy Seine River, spanned by bridges.
It was a portrait of serenity, and Angele thought it a peaceful place for her mother’s eternal rest. Her deepest regret, however, had been that there was no marker on the grave. She’d had no money to buy one, and the city did not provide anything. The mound of dirt would eventually level out beneath the summer rains, and grass and weeds would grow to hide any evidence of a grave. It would almost be as though her mother had never lived, and Angele felt that a real tragedy. Her mother had lived, indeed, and a wonderful life it had been. She and Angele’s father had adored each other, and…
Angele pressed her fingertips against her eyes, holding back tears.
She loved her parents so much. And though she would probably never again visit either of their graves, she had found a way to buy a simple marker for her mother—even though it was, in a way, stealing. Ryan had given her money to buy trunks in which to pack her lavish new wardrobe, but she had bought cheap ones and had money left over.
Actually, she felt little guilt. Ryan did not seem to care about money. He had not only bought her expensive clothes but jewelry as well. One pair of diamond earbobs, she knew, would probably have provided her with food and shelter for years.
She was glad he had gone away, because she wanted time to think about what lay ahead. She knew she would have to submit to him as his wife, and, remembering how it had been with her uncle, her hands trembled as she reached to pluck a dandelion from the grave.
After it happened, she and her mother had never talked about it. She would have liked to. She wanted, needed, reassurance that her uncle was different from other men. She couldn’t imagine her father being so brutal, but even if a man were gentle, would there still be pain? She didn’t know but would soon find out, and fear crept like the ivy twining about the trees that lined the path through the cemetery.
She hadn’t meant for her mother to find out what her uncle had done. Shamed, humiliated, and terrified, she had hidden in the cellar. A servant going down to get wine for dinner heard her crying and told her mother. When her mother came, she made her tell what had happened. And that night they had fled together in the dark with only the clothes on their backs.
Eventually, after finding food and shelter wherever they could, they made their way to Paris. Her mother had to sell the earbobs she had been wearing when they ran away to pay for their passage.
Angele rocked back on her heels now, her new striped gingham skirt bunched about her ankles. The bow of the plumed poke bonnet tickled her neck, and she tugged at it to loosen. It was a cool day, and she had draped a fine cashmere shawl over her shoulders.
She had been in such a hurry that morning it was surprising she had managed to make herself presentable. But she’d had to rush in order to get away from Corbett. She still did not trust him and wondered if she ever would, because something about the way he looked at her sometimes made her flesh crawl. And try though she might, she had not been able to put his crude behavior that first day out of her mind.
She hoped that once she became Ryan’s wife and moved into the mansion at BelleRose, she might feel differently. She wanted everyone to accept her, and planned to do everything she could to make them. After all, once she left, there would be no turning back. Her future depended on Ryan, and though she didn’t love him, she planned to dig in her heels and stay, no matter what.
As she mused, a man carrying a shovel came walking up the trail to the paupers’ section. He saw a woman bent over a grave and squinted against the sun to see her better. Even from a distance, he could tell she was dressed in fine clothes. Probably rich. So what was she doing kneeling at a pauper’s grave? Surely anyone of means would not have kith or kin buried in such a place.
He continued on. He had another grave to dig for someone else too poor to be buried anywhere else.
Angele did not notice the man as he passed by. She did, however, hear the approaching carriage.
“Mademoiselle Benet?” The man holding the reins over a splendid black horse removed his top hat and smiled uncertainly.
She straightened and lifted the hem of her skirt above her ankles to keep it from dragging in the tall grass as she walked toward him. “Oui. I am so pleased you could meet me, monsieur. I was afraid you wouldn’t receive my note in time.” She had only been able to get away from Corbett long enough the day before to slip a messenger a few francs to deliver the envelope to the stone cutter.
“I am Wilfrin Montague.” He got down from the carriage. “I brought some sketches of my work. Do you see anything you like?”
She leafed through them and quickly seized upon the drawing of an angel, carved into a modest stone. “This one.” She gave him a slip of paper on which she had written her mother’s name and the date of her birth and death.
“Very good.” He put the paper with his others. “It should take me a few weeks, and I will put it in place myself.”
He told her the price, and as she counted out the money, he remarked, “It is so good of you to want to put a stone here. Few people do in this section, you know.”
Angele knew, all right, and if she had the means and the time would have had her mother moved. But she had neither, nor would she ever see the marker. She trusted the stone cutter, however. Besides, he had no way of knowing she was leaving France, never to return, so he would keep his promise.
He cast a glance up at the dark clouds gathering. “It looks like it might rain. Would you like to ride out with me? It’s a long walk back to the gates.”
She said she would be pleased. He helped her up into the carriage, and she cast one last glance of goodbye at her mother’s grave.
She didn’t see the man peering out from behind a tree perhaps fifty feet away.
Corbett wished he knew what Angele was doing. The sneaky bitch had almost gotten away from him, but he had been too smart for her. The day before, he had seen her slipping back up the stairs from the lobby. She was supposed to be in her room, claiming she had a headache. He had no idea what she had been up to and couldn’t find out. The desk clerk and concierge were no help. So Corbett vowed she’d not sneak off from him again.
He was watching her like a hawk soaring above a mouse, waiting for the right moment to strike. Ryan expected him to accept her and be nice to her, and Corbett knew it wouldn’t do for him to say anything against her that he couldn’t prove.
She had refused to go to dinner with him the night before, claiming her head still hurt, and he had arranged for soup, fruit, and baguettes to be delivered to her room. But he had hired one of the hotel’s baggage boys to keep vigil during the night, lest she try to leave.
This morning, when he had knocked on her door to ask whether she was ready to have breakfast and begin their final day of shopping for her luggage, she had again complained of a headache. Calling through the door, she said since Ryan was due back later in the day, she would go with him to buy the trunks if she felt better. If not, he could go get them without her.
Suspicious, Corbett had hidden outside a doorway just down the street from the hotel.
He didn’t have to wait long.
She came out and began walking hurriedly, purposefully, along the Canal St. Martin. He followed, keeping a safe distance lest she look over her shoulder and see him.
He was puzzled when she turned through the massive wrought-iron gates of the Père Lachaise cemetery. She passed the area of the well-to-do, buried in mausoleums resembling miniature mansions made of rock, or with tall, sky-reaching stones to mark their place of eternal rest. He assumed she was visiting a relative’s grave, but when she continued on, he began to think perhaps she was going to exit through a rear gate—till he saw that she was actually he
ading for what could only be the burial section for the poor. Few markers, sunken, untended graves, it was a very dreary place.
He stopped to get a rock out of his shoe, then stepped into a hole and twisted his ankle. Cursing softly, he stumbled into a stone grotto where there was a bench. He sat down to massage his ankle and allow the pain to subside, then followed in the direction Angele had gone.
By the time he found her; she was kneeling beside a grave, and he darted behind a tree to watch. Then the man in the carriage came, and Corbett silently cursed because he could not hear what they were saying. They didn’t talk long before the man took her arm and helped her into the carriage.
Excitement mounting, Corbett ignored his aching ankle and hurried as fast as he could after the carriage.
Not only had Angele met a man in the most remote part of the cemetery—a perfect trysting place—but she had also left with him. He felt a thrilling rush to think of what Ryan’s reaction would be when he told him. She was exactly as Corbett had suspected—a conniver, a schemer. She was obviously after the Tremayne money, and the man she’d just met might be in on it.
Maybe, he thought, imagination running wild, they planned to rob Ryan and then kill him. There was no telling what she was capable of doing. He might even be in danger himself.
But when would they strike? They were due to leave for Le Havre in the morning, and—
He had reached the gates and slowed in wonder.
She was walking briskly along, and it appeared she was headed toward Montparnasse. The man and the carriage were nowhere in sight, so what the hell was she up to?
She continued on, and he struggled to keep up. His ankle was throbbing. It was also starting to rain. They were going to be soaked, but she kept on going, seemingly oblivious to the weather.
The Abbaye Val-de-Grâce loomed ahead with its two-tier façade and dome modeled after St. Peter’s in Rome. Angele was, Corbett realized with a start, returning to where she had been caught stealing reticules. Then it dawned she was actually headed for the catacombs. Rounding the corner of Place Denfert-Rochereau, she lifted her skirts and plunged right into the woods and the embankment leading to the underground stone quarries.
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