Celeste Bradley - [Royal Four 02]

by Surrender to a Wicked Spy

  He turned to go, then he turned back. “My drawing, if you please.”

  Lady Cheltenham handed it to him silently. Dane looked down at the mild-faced young man in the sketch. “He wouldn’t have exposed your bankruptcy, you know,” he said conversationally. “He could hardly do that without bringing himself to unwanted attention.” He waved the drawing at them. “This man would simply have killed you outright.”

  They looked startled, but Lady Cheltenham raised her chin. “I should have preferred death to scandal.”

  Dane turned and left them there, uncompromising and unapologetic. How in the world could warm, open Olivia have sprung from that chill union?

  Olivia.

  It was time to talk to Olivia.

  “I’m here to speak to the prisoner.”

  The Royal Guard standing at attention only gazed at her uncertainly. He obviously knew who she was, which meant that he assumed she was an “intimate” friend of the Prince Regent’s, and wife of the lord whose hall he stood in.

  Olivia balanced the tea tray in her hands. “My Lord Greenleigh doesn’t dare send a servant in there. We have no idea who might be in league with the traitor. You will stay with me at all times.” She’d learned in the past week that it was best to inform, not request.

  She’d contemplated donning one of Petty’s uniforms, but after last night every person in the house knew her by sight, even the other guests’ servants. She’d noticed them all eyeing her surreptitiously as she’d entered Kirkall Hall with Marcus, still ridiculously clad in her blue silk ball gown.

  Now she was more respectably, if hurriedly, clad in the orange gown. The guard didn’t precisely eye her bosom in the low bodice, but she rather thought it didn’t hurt her case any.

  Finally, he nodded and unlocked the door for her. She entered to see Sumner standing at the window, gazing out mournfully. They’d taken his coat and his shoes as an added precaution. The chill of winter was already here in the north. Only a fool would run out badly dressed.

  Olivia set down the tray and stepped back. “You should eat and drink quickly. I must take the tray away again so you can use nothing for a weapon.” The last she said for the guard’s benefit. The fellow remained in the doorway, blocking the way but just out of earshot of a whisper.

  “Why did you attack the Prince Regent?” Olivia tried not to scream at the fellow. “Why have you done all of this to me?”

  “I couldn’t let you go through with it,” Sumner whispered back around a sip of tea, holding it cupped in his bound hands. “I had to get you away from him.”

  Olivia stared at him. “Go through with what? Bedding my husband?” she hissed.

  Sumner’s face took on a stubborn cast. “You think I don’t know, but I do. I know about the bridge and the offer and the reason you had to use those … things.”

  Olivia swallowed, appalled. “I fell into the water,” she protested faintly.

  He shook his head. “You jumped, just when he was riding by, just as we’d planned.”

  Mother. “W—we?” It couldn’t be that Mother had taken part in some elaborate plan—to what? Wed her off?

  She leaned forward slightly. “You’d best eat all that now,” she said loudly. “Who knows when you’ll eat next.” Then she pinned Sumner with her gaze. “What are you talking about? What does my mother’s matchmaking have to do with trying to kill the Prince Regent?”

  He picked up a tiny sandwich and popped it in his mouth hungrily. “I wasn’t trying to kill him. I only wanted to draw Lord Greenleigh back here before you worked your wiles on him and make him keep you away from His Highness.”

  She blinked slowly. “All along it has been you who was trying to drive us apart.”

  He shrugged, popping another sandwich into his mouth. “Having your husband repudiate you is better than ending up like your brother.”

  Her breath stopped. “My brother?”

  Sumner nodded sadly. “He actually found his own way out, away from the Debt Collector. Marrying that Hackerman girl would have paid everything off. He refused to participate and ended up in the Thames.”

  “Debt Collector?” Cheltenham’s debt was severe, she knew that. Something clicked inside her mind. All the things that had been wrong about Walter’s accident—murder. The way her parents had swept her up and turned her loose on Society in such a rush, using her to save Cheltenham—although Cheltenham had been poor for years. Another year or two likely wouldn’t have meant the loss of anything but a few more roof slates. Unless this “Debt Collector” called in the notes.

  “What does this man want?”

  Sumner blinked sadly. “To win the war for France, of course.”

  Oh God. She’d been aimed at Dane like an arrow.

  Someone must know about him and his … friends. She suspected and she’d only been with him for little more than a week.

  And what of their plans? What we need is the right woman.

  Time seemed to slow as Olivia worked it all out in her mind. Dane had aimed a netfull of women at George. Someone who owned Sumner and her parents had aimed her at Dane in much the same way. Cheltenham needs you! You must do this!

  “I’m the lure,” she said, her stomach roiling. How could she make Dane believe that she’d known nothing of this plan?

  Sumner blinked at her. “As if you didn’t know. You ought not to have raised your sights to the Prince Regent. I couldn’t allow it. I had to stop you.”

  Olivia turned blindly and headed for the hall. She had to find Dane. She had to try somehow to explain—

  The guard gazed at her curiously as she stumbled past him. “Would you like me to carry out the tray, my lady?”

  She halted, then nodded. “Of course. Thank you.”

  She stayed where she was while the guard went back into the room and bent to pick up the tray. While she watched in horror, Sumner brought his bound hands down on the back of the man’s neck.

  “No!” It was too late. The guard crumpled to the floor.

  Sumner nodded glumly at her. “Thank you, my lady. I would never have thought of it without you.”

  “Me? But I—”

  Sumner ran past her, out of the room, and down the empty hall.

  Olivia hesitated only a second. If she cried out for another guard, one might come in time or not. And if Sumner escaped completely, Dane would never, ever believe that she hadn’t helped him.

  Picking up her skirts in both hands, she ran flat out after the escaping valet.

  27

  Dane left the Prince Regent to his cooing new lady-love, striding from the east wing with Marcus on his heels. “Use Greenleigh footmen for outer guards and keep the Royal Guard close to the prince. I want someone at every mouse hole. No one is to see His Highness except the two of us. Even meals are to be carried in by the Guard.”

  “Right.” Marcus peeled away from Dane at the next corridor to carry out his orders. “See you back at the prisoner’s room.”

  But there was no one in the prisoner’s room except a very groggy guard.

  “I don’t know what happened, my lord. I was fetching the prisoner’s tea tray for your lady—”

  “My lady brought him tea?”

  “Yes, my lord. Then she forgot the tray and sent me back in for it … .” He blinked. “That was stupid of me, wasn’t it, my lord?”

  Dane shook his head. “My wife is safely in her room.”

  Marcus appeared in the doorway. “Bloody hell,” he said faintly. “Dane, Kinsworth just told me that Lady Greenleigh tricked the guard and escaped her room.”

  “So it gets better.” Dane swept past him, running. “There’s nothing else for miles. He’ll need a horse.”

  At the stables, it seemed he’d taken a horse, or two.

  Two horses gone, a traitor escaped, and Olivia was nowhere to be found. It was never a good thing when Dane couldn’t find Olivia.

  Sumner had ridden to a road where an unmarked carriage awaited him. Olivia watched from concealment as he
boarded the carriage.

  Who was that with him?

  Olivia stepped closer, leaving behind the better cover of the evergreens for the nearly bare trees closer to the road embankment. However, her orange gown blended beautifully with the autumn foliage. She could stand to get a bit closer … .

  The other face in the carriage turned toward her and her gaze was caught by the shadowed gaze of that pale face. In an instant, there was a glint of black metal raised to point at her.

  Her gut chilling, Olivia scrambled backward into the trees—but it was too late. A single shot rang out.

  Pain ripped through her thigh, knocking her backward onto the stony, leaf-covered slope. Everything went dark.

  Once the carriage rumbled away and the sound of the hooves and wheels faded, there was nothing but the blustering autumn wind in the foliage as it blew the orange and gold leaves to drift over the still figure on the slope.

  Leaving Marcus behind on Prince Regent watch, Dane took the largest of his footmen and pursued Sumner and the missing Olivia.

  The tracks were fresh and easy to follow on the old path. Dane rode quickly, but it was too late. There were only the two abandoned horses at the end of the path by the road and the fresh wheel marks of a carriage in the mud. They rode hard to catch up with the carriage, only to lose the trail at a nearby well-traveled road.

  She was gone.

  Dane left Lord and Lady Cheltenham’s chamber, for the second time nodding to the guard he’d placed at the door. They had no idea where Olivia and Sumner might have fled to. They seemed more appalled that Olivia had taken up with a servant than that she had deserted them to their fates.

  It was all a plot to get influence over him—a plot he recognized all too well.

  He’d been played masterfully. He’d thought her sweet and open, innocent in her enjoyment of what they had shared, responsive only to him. Yet, she did bring him the trunk of sexual devices—an odd act for a demure virgin. And she was in Marcus’s arms only days after the wedding—and then in the Prince’s room only hours after that!

  And then in mine—for the most amazing, profound worthless night of my life.

  He shook his head. He must stay focused on his duty. If he couldn’t, then he must step down as the Lion.

  And being the Lion was the only thing he had left.

  Marcus caught up with him in the hall. “Well, what did you learn? Do they think Olivia was kidnapped? You must send more men out after her, Dane!”

  Shaking his head, Dane turned away, moving slowly down the hall. He hurt inside, as if someone had torn out pieces of him with dull knives.

  “You want to believe the worst of her! Why?”

  Dane kept moving. Marcus followed, unwilling to let it go. “You know, I believe I’ve just deciphered you. You’re a coward. You think that if you let yourself care, it will make you as weak as your father. She left without even her cloak. Honestly, Dane, do you think Olivia is a spy?” Marcus’s tone said it was a ridiculous notion.

  Dane turned to gaze at his friend without expression. “Her parents have admitted they are in the employ of the Chimera. They have been acting on his orders all along. She was planted in my path in order to ensnare my heart, or at least my passion, all to influence me in favor of the French.”

  Marcus paled. “You cannot be serious.”

  Dane kept his gaze level. “It does cause me to wonder how someone knew precisely what I would want in a woman. The information must have come from someone who knew me well.”

  Marcus drew back. “Are you accusing me?”

  Dane tilted his head. “If the accusation fits …”

  “How very flattering.” Marcus narrowed his eyes. “But you’re forgetting someone, someone who knew you better than I ever could.”

  With a start, Dane realized Marcus was quite correct. There was one person who knew him inside and out once upon a time. His father.

  He rubbed his face. “Dear god, do you think the Chimera’s plans extend that far back?”

  “Why not? He’d been in the Liars’ employ in one capacity or another for three years. I hardly think he’s been sitting on his hands all that time.”

  The web of the Chimera’s intrigue spun around them all, tying them together and pulling them apart.

  She was cold. That was the first thing Olivia became aware of. Then she realized that her head was broken and her thigh was on fire.

  Or perhaps it was her head on fire and her thigh broken.

  Either way, it was all wrong. If she was hurt, shouldn’t she be in her bed in … Cheltenham … no, London … no, Kirkall. She ought to be in her bed at Kirkall Hall, with Petty bringing her soup and obsessing over Sumner … .

  Sumner …

  Sumner was a spy.

  She sat up quickly, then just as quickly rolled over and vomited. The dizzying whirl of the world didn’t ease, but she managed to pull herself away from the noisome mess.

  Until she tried to crawl. Hot agony raced up her thigh, blinding her. With a harsh cry, she collapsed again, black spots whirling in her vision. She lay there, breathing hard until the spots began to clear.

  With one hand, she reached down to inspect her leg. There was a bloody hole in her skirt. It was safe to assume there was also one in her thigh. She swallowed. Perhaps she could inspect it in a moment. She dropped her hand and let her head fall carefully down again.

  She was in the wood. Above her the nearly bare branches made a dark lacy circle against the gray sky. The wind made them sway … or at least she thought it was the wind. She closed her eyes before the movement disoriented her again.

  “I’ll wager that my pupils don’t match,” she murmured out loud. Her voice sounded odd against the whoosh of the wind and the crackle of the leaves beneath her.

  How long had she lain here? She opened her eyes again, but the sky told her nothing except that she wanted to vomit again.

  “I’ll beat the duchess yet,” she muttered. “Bother that Sumner. I’ll never be able to eat kippers again—and I like kippers.”

  She felt the back of her head. The knot was frighteningly large and coated in dried blood. Turning her head carefully, she looked beside her to see blood on a halfburied stone the size of a cheese. She was fortunate to be alive.

  So, she’d been here long enough to become thoroughly chilled and for the blood on her head and leg to clot.

  They must be looking for her by now.

  “Help! Help me, please!”

  Calling out made her head pound, but she clenched her eyes shut and clutched the rocks on either side of her to keep her bearings as the effort of her screams made the world spin again.

  No one came.

  Dane was brooding. No one could stand him, and he didn’t blame them.

  Lady Reardon was the first.

  “You scarcely knew her,” Dane protested when Willa buttonholed him in the library. She was a pretty woman, curvaceous and lively, with snapping blue eyes, but he found himself thinking that she was too short and that her hair was much too dark.

  She may have been small, but she made up for it in ferocity. “I may not know her well, but I know one thing, Lord Greenleigh, and that is that she loves you. Women know these things. There’s something very wrong about all this. I can feel it!”

  “So you want me to chase off after my runaway wife, is that it?” He folded his arms and squared his shoulders. She didn’t back down.

  He must be losing his touch. “I have duties and responsibilities you don’t understand, Lady Reardon—”

  She rolled her eyes. “Yes, yes, you’re the Lion, who protects the Crown, blah, blah, blah.” She poked him in the arm, hard. “Your lady is in danger and—”

  Dane caught her hand—a grievous offense to be sure, to grab another lord’s lady, but he didn’t care.

  “What do you know of the Lion?”

  She tugged her hand back and folded her arms. “I’m the granddaughter of a previous Cobra, you big lout. I’ll wager I know more about
the Royal Four than you do!” She narrowed her snapping eyes and poked him again, harder. “And if you grab me again, I’ll tell Nathaniel—and see if he won’t dust the floor with your arse, Viking throwback or no!”

  She turned and flounced furiously from the library.

  In the doorway, Marcus moved adroitly from her path; then he entered the library with his head turned as he gazed after her. “What did you do to Reardon’s lady?”

  Viking throwback? Did all ladies see him as some sort of marauder? Dane flexed his bicep to ease the primary poking spot. “I disagreed with her,” he said tightly.

  Marcus nodded sagely. “Oh. She thought you should be combing the countryside for Olivia?”

  Dane shot his friend a dark look. “Do not begin.”

  Marcus threw out his hands. “I have no issue with your decision … although when you think about it, she likely has some excellent intelligence information on the Chimera. It might be worth tracking her down for that alone.”

  “And it might be a ploy to drag me away from the Prince Regent again!”

  Marcus blinked. “Again? Wasn’t it you who dragged her away last night?”

  “A night for which I will undoubtedly pay for the rest of my life,” Dane said quietly. His anger wasn’t dependable. That was the worst part. He kept slipping into pain and loss and missing her lopsided smile and her husky laugh and—

  If he could only hold on to a solid foundation of anger, he could manage to think all this through.

  But George was the worst.

  “You’re a fool. An idiot. A great fair-haired waste of meat! That rat of a valet has kidnapped your lady and you immediately decide that she has run off with the bugger!”

  Dane took a breath. He must not kill the Prince Regent. He must not kill the Prince Regent. It would be very bad. “One of your own Guard said Olivia helped Sumner—”

  “Oh, goat shite! What are you listening to him for? The bloody Guard are hired for brawn and bravery, not for brains! I’m telling you that she wouldn’t leave you, not for money or love or a room of her own in the palace!”