‘No! I can’t.’ The girl wrested free of Marianne and flung herself at him, grabbing him about the knees in supplication. ‘I can’t ever send word again. There’s something else. This time, he threatened to kill me if I betrayed him.’ Her eyes were wild now, the terror of that threat washing over her anew.
Vennor raised her to her feet. ‘Then why did you?’
‘I couldn’t go to the police. They’d never believe me. It wouldn’t be worth the risk to tell them. And if I ended up dead a week later, they wouldn’t think anything of it. Whores die all the time. But you’re different. You’re above the law. You listen to people like me. If I end up dead, you will know why.’
No. Not on his watch. Vennor made a split second decision. He nodded to Marianne. ‘Help her dress, help her pack. Have her downstairs in five minutes. I’ll make the arrangements with Delilah. Five minutes, I mean it. We must hurry.’ He’d take her to Mrs Broadham’s for the night and in the morning she could take a coach out to one of his estates. There’d be a cottage there for her; she could take up a new life and a new name in the country, or wherever she chose, but she would not die here, not if he could help it.
* * *
Marianne watched the dark streets rattle past. Delilah had found them a hack. They’d left Elise at Mrs Broadham’s with instructions for the morning coach and some money, but they were not going home, not going back to the Russian embassy’s fête, not back to Mayfair. They were going to the Vigilante’s lair, the little room in the old warehouse. She was glad of it. Her blood thrummed with the thrill of a good night’s work. She couldn’t have gone back to the party and pretended all was well. She wouldn’t have fooled anyone, least of all Inigo who would have had every secret out of her in five minutes flat. She and Vennor needed time to be alone, to sift through the information they’d been given and to decide what to do about it.
Vennor was quiet until they reached the tiny room, but energy and tension rolled off him in waves big enough to drown out the silence. He knew something. What could he know? When it was all boiled down, their information made a rather weak tea, like Mrs Broadham’s used leaves. A man who had killed before was planning to kill again. It was certainly something worthy of following up on, but it also had a needle-in-a-haystack quality about it. There was no name, no proof.
Vennor paced the room, a manic quality to him as she said as much. ‘I wish we’d got more.’ Marianne shook her head. ‘I don’t know how we begin to find such a man.’
Vennor halted, his blue eyes fierce flames in the lantern light. ‘You’re wrong there. We have enough to test my theory. I know who the man is, at least I think I do.’ He pushed both hands through his hair, gripping his skull. ‘I think there’s a very good chance it could be Hayes.’ He held up his hand to stall her protest. ‘Hear me out. It is admittedly a new idea. It came to me tonight when Elise took such fright at the sight of your hair. She thought he’d sent you to her as a way of letting her know she was caught.’
Marianne sat down slowly on the bed. She did see and she didn’t. ‘You’re basing this all on a wig. I’m not the only redhead in London.’
Vennor laid out his case like a barrister before the bar. ‘No, but you’ve made it plain you do not return his favour and Hayes has just returned from two years abroad. The timing works and he meets her physical description.’
‘As does much of the male population of London.’ Marianne tried to wrap her mind around the idea. ‘This is Viscount Hayes we’re discussing, London’s most spiritless bachelor, the very definition of lukewarm. He’s perfectly boring, not a scandal to his name, or a vice. He’s hardly the sort to...’ She let her voice trail off. Vennor would fill in the omission. Not the sort to engage in the things that had been described in that room, things she hadn’t realised people engaged in as practices of intimate play. Tonight had been eye-opening in several ways, some of which had repulsed her, but some of which had been quite titillating.
Vennor raised a blond brow. ‘What do you know of Hayes’s proclivities? A ballroom is just a stage of another sort where everyone is at their best.’
‘He did kiss me once,’ Marianne answered. ‘It was hardly the stuff of dreams.’
Why had she not thought of that before? In a ballroom everyone wore masks. That certainly put a different slant on things. She’d always felt so safe in a ballroom, surrounded by people she knew. But did she really know them at all? She was still grappling with Hayes visiting a brothel for riding crop role play.
‘He has to. Who would let their daughters marry him if anyone knew?’ Certainly not her father, Marianne realised. He would have to be told and that would officially end any pretence towards an engagement. ‘Hayes is supposed to be one of the good people, boring but good.’
‘He hides it well,’ Vennor murmured, his thoughts running far ahead of hers. What did he see that she’d missed?
‘There’s still the issue of murder. Not just once, but twice. Even if he has vices, I can’t imagine him as a murderer.’
Vennor gave a harsh chuckle. ‘It’s always the quiet ones. Besides, it doesn’t sound as though he actually did it. He hired people to do it for him and he’s willing to hire someone to do it again.’
‘Because he was unsuccessful the first time?’ Marianne wasn’t keeping up.
‘No, because he was and now he wants to finish it.’ Vennor’s hands gripped the table, fingernails leaving marks.
‘All right, I’ll bite.’ Marianne leaned forward. ‘Who does he want to kill?’
‘Me.’
Chapter Nineteen
‘You?’ Marianne was incredulous just as he’d been when he’d started putting the pieces together. Incredulity made it easy to discard what was right before his eyes. ‘Do you think he’d kill someone over a courtship gone sour? I doubt I mean that much to him.’ She worried her bottom lip, thinking. ‘It just seems extreme, that’s all.’
Vennor sat down beside her on the bed and reached for her hand, taking comfort from the ability to touch her. ‘You mean that much to me.’ They laughed together in the dim room and he felt a smile creep across his face despite the seriousness of the situation.
‘We’re different, Ven.’ Marianne leaned her head against his shoulder. He liked the ease with which her body responded to his, sometimes sensually, but also with a casualness that bespoke long comfort. She laced her fingers through his in their old familiar gesture. ‘I don’t think anyone in the world will ever care for me the way you do, or see me the way you do.’
‘Nor I you.’ Vennor sighed. ‘Inigo thinks you’d be the perfect Duchess for me.’ What would she think of that? Did it ever occur to her that perhaps they ought to do something about the way they felt about each other? There were obstacles, of course, but what if he were free from his obligations? They were self-imposed, after all. What if he set aside his quest to find the killers? Or what if he had found them...? That was the thought driving his suppositions tonight, his willingness to explore the incredulity that Hayes might be hunting him. If it were Hayes, if he could put an end to the nightmare that had haunted him, what might be possible then? It seemed as if the whole world was on the verge of opening up.
‘Inigo may think what he likes. He doesn’t know everything. Perhaps he’d feel differently if he knew I mean to be a journalist; he’d be scandalised.’ Marianne dismissed Inigo’s comment. She shifted against him and his arm went around her in an automatic gesture. ‘I am more interested, however, in why Hayes wants to kill you.’ She yawned, a reminder of how late it had grown. ‘Please explain.’
Yes. Back to work, back to the reason he’d dragged her up here instead of taking her home. He needed to try his hypothesis out on someone who would give it a fair hearing. And, he just plain needed her. He would be honest with himself about that. He had not wanted to share her with anyone just yet. ‘Not meaning to bruise your ego, but I think it would have to be driven by more th
an just his ardour for you.’ Vennor gave his thoughts time to assemble. ‘If it is him, it wouldn’t be the first time he’s done it.’
He felt his body begin to shake with suppressed rage as he let the realisation he’d held at bay throughout the interview steal over him. ‘After all, that would make him responsible for my parents’ deaths.’ He forced himself to choke out the last word. It had to be said.
‘No! Oh, God. How could someone we know do such a thing?’ Marianne’s hand was at his back, stroking, soothing, even as she rocked with him, murmuring her own disbelief. Her horror would be different to his. She’d danced with the man, given him attention; Hayes had touched her, been in close proximity to her. Vennor shuddered with the knowledge of it. If he was right, never again would he let that man within a mile of Marianne. ‘That’s just it, though, Ven. How could he do it?’
‘He didn’t do it, exactly. He didn’t hold the weapons. He sent others to do it.’ He’d sent the hired men Elise had recommended without knowing what was intended. He felt Marianne cringe.
‘To order murder is perhaps even more callous, to treat life so cavalierly as to dispose of it with the flick of a hand. It truly disgusts me.’ Marianne met his gaze, her initial horror replaced by anger. ‘It would disgust most people. So what would prompt him to want to destroy an entire family? And to want to do it badly enough to wait three years before finishing the job?’
‘Revenge. Reward.’ Those were Vennor’s two immediate assumptions. They were what motivated most of the crimes he saw. In Hayes’s case, the reward must be great indeed if he’d been willing to wait for it. How disappointed Hayes must have been when his thugs reported he’d not been with his parents that night. Another thought occurred. ‘It would have been premeditated. He knew all three of us meant to attend the opera that night.’
‘But then you didn’t, forcing him to spend two years abroad, licking his wounds and celebrating only a partial victory.’ Marianne’s dark eyes moved in thought. ‘Whatever he wants, he needs you out of the way, the dukedom out of the way. Killing your father wasn’t enough to get it. What do you have? What do you control?’
‘Cornwall, but only in part. The others control plenty of it, too.’
‘But Richard Penlerick was the one everyone in the circle looked to,’ Marianne whispered. ‘Hayes would have seen him as the leader.’ Yes, that was true, but Vennor could not imagine what Hayes would want with Cornwall. Hayes had lands and interests of his own. Unless he was wrong about that. They talked a little longer, going over possibilities, but making no significant headway. There was too much they didn’t know yet. ‘Inigo is looking into Hayes’s background. He volunteered to do it this afternoon when I mentioned the man had proposed to you. Maybe we’ll know something very soon. Inigo works fast.’
What if he was right and it was Hayes? How would he prove it? Or should he not worry about proving it and simply challenge Hayes to a duel of honour? That would be one way to decide things. Another way was always the Vigilante. As the Vigilante, he could choose to dispense whatever justice he chose. If he was right, he would have discharged his self-imposed obligation. But what if he was wrong? What if he’d forced these pieces to fit together because he was desperate for forward momentum? So desperate to have this resolved that he was seeing truths where they didn’t exist? It would almost be worth it to be wrong, if it kept Marianne safe. If it was Hayes, the man was using Marianne for some nefarious purpose, his regard for her was non-existent and that put her at risk. A sour suitor was one thing, a man bent on revenge was quite another. One could be anticipated, the other could not be overestimated as to the lengths he would go, especially if he’d killed before, violently, brutally. Images of his parents swam before his eyes, bodies on a dark pavement, twisted and lifeless.
‘Shhh, Ven. I can hear you thinking. There’s nothing more we can do about Hayes tonight.’ Marianne kissed his cheek, soft and alluring. This was not one of her casual touches. She moved over him, straddling his lap, her skirts rucked up about her thighs. She kissed him again, on the mouth this time, her hands a feather-light frame at his face. ‘Perhaps I might take your mind off it. The brothel was instructive but brief. I might require some additional tutoring, but I think I got the gist of it.’
Her hips moved against his, and he felt himself rising in answer. This was where he had to be strong for both of them. ‘Marianne, we should not risk it again. There are consequences.’ He began to make the argument, wondering if he sounded as uncommitted to that position as he felt. He wanted nothing more than to roll her beneath him and take her, to let his body lose itself in the peace of her until it forgot Hayes and his treachery.
She gave him a coy look that surpassed even the most skilled of courtesans and he went from merely aroused to madly rampant. ‘What I have in mind is quite safe, I assure you.’ She kissed him one more time and slid to the floor between his thighs, her hands working his trousers loose. ‘It looked rather enjoyable for both parties from what I saw at Delilah’s.’ Her eyes glistened dangerously as his member sprang free.
Vennor swallowed hard. She was teasing him. Surely she didn’t mean to... Her hand grasped his shaft and he groaned. Yes, she did mean to. She circled him with her thumb and forefinger, her strokes slow and exploratory. He released a breath, letting himself relax into her touch. It was heavenly to be touched like this by Marianne. She glanced up from her provocative position, hair gathered over one shoulder, looking like an exotic Titian painting—Eve Tempting Adam, or something of that nature.
‘You’re enjoying this.’ She gave a satisfied smile. She was enjoying this, too, Vennor noted. ‘I like touching you.’ Her hand came down his length, burying itself in the blond nest of hair at its base. ‘You are hard where I am soft,’ she murmured. Her other hand drew a line up his thigh. ‘What else is in your nest, I wonder?’
Vennor gasped as her hand found his sac. She tested it, weighed it, before gently giving it an experimental squeeze that left him hoarse with the erotic pleasure of it. ‘That’s a very sensitive spot for a man,’ he rasped, a little shiver taking him. This was starting to be a little less relaxing and a lot more stimulating.
She ran her hand back to the tip of him, her thumb stroking his head, finding the milky bead of moisture at its slit. She held his gaze and raised her thumb to her mouth and sucked. ‘You’re salty, Ven. Like the Cornish sea.’
Good Lord, he was going to spend himself right here, brought to climax by words and a licked thumb, so intense was his arousal. I ought to do something, came the last vestiges of reason from the depths of his mind, but they were no match for Marianne’s seduction. Her gaze held his for a moment longer as she issued the single most provocative instruction a woman ever uttered to a man, ‘Lie back.’ Her hands gave him a gentle push and she bent to him, her mouth taking his length in full.
This was heaven with an edge, pleasure with a precipice, and she was driving him towards it with her hands at his thighs, bracing them apart, and her breath warm against his furred junction; little moans of delight escaped her as if she were savouring the finest of delicacies. That he was the finest delicacy was enough to drive him wild; add to that the wicked teasing of her mouth and he was a primed powder keg. She licked up the length of him and he plunged his hands into the fiery depths of her hair, desperate for an anchor against the surging waves of his desire. At his tip, she sucked hard, her teeth nibbling in delicious nips that brought him close once more to the shore of release—no, not a shore, his pleasure-drenched mind argued. A crashing cataract. Soon, oh, very soon, his release would roar over the falls. The precipice was indeed nearing.
He felt his body tighten, the muscles of his thighs shuddering against the strain. His hands gripped her hair in warning, wanting to give her time to decide. Hands were all he had for words had long since failed him. He was reduced to groans and shivering exhalations of moaned pleasure. Marianne gave a final, long tug at his tip and rocked bac
k on her heels, her hand closing about him. But it was the rapt expression on Marianne’s face that held his attention as his body spent itself, exhausted at last. This had mesmerised her. He had mesmerised her. There was utter joy in that, in knowing that, for the moment, he’d been enough for her. He closed his eyes, letting that knowledge take him away.
* * *
He must have slept, but not for too long, he thought. When he awoke, Marianne was curled against his side, warm and soft; his trousers were still undone, his member relaxed, his mind still in a state of sated peace. She moved against him, awake and in tune to his own wakefulness. He threaded his fingers through her hair, combing through the curls. ‘I haven’t thanked you for tonight, for coming with me.’ His voice had almost returned to normal. ‘You knew all the right questions to ask; you got her to open up.’
She traced an idle circle around the aureole of his left nipple. ‘We make a good team. Think what we could accomplish here.’ She smiled.
‘I have been thinking about it,’ Vennor ventured carefully. These thoughts were somewhat new-formed. ‘We’ve talked before how a charity basket doesn’t bring lasting change, just sustenance for the short-term. I’ve been thinking that the Vigilante is a little of both sustenance and change, but not enough of the latter.’ He played with her curls, lifting them and dropping them in a rhythmic fashion. ‘When I cleared out the insurance men, I effected change. I made it possible for people to earn their livings. But when I stop a mugging, I only make a difference for that person in that moment. There’s no long-term change from that. Even with the insurance men, what happens if I leave? They will come back and the change will be erased. The change has to be something more than the Vigilante’s physical presence.’ It made sense when he spoke it out loud. He could feel Marianne nodding against his chest as he continued, his words bringing ideas to life.
The Confessions of the Duke of Newlyn Page 16
