A Daughter's Destiny (6 page)

“Get out!” Evan shouted. “What are you waiting for?”

Taking her grandmother's hand again, Brienne helped her out of the salon. Brienne tripped. In horror, she stared at the stack of heavy cases piled in front of the door. Someone had tried to barricade them within, knowing there would be no escape through the back door.

A bucket was shoved into her hands as she was whirled into a line forming in front of the salon. She handed her bag to her grandmother, telling her to take care that it was not dropped. The vase must not be broken.

Someone called orders to get the bucket brigade under way. Not someone. Evan! Where was Maman? Was she away from the smoke?

“She is safe over there,” Evan answered, although she was sure she had not spoken aloud. “Let's get this fire out!”

Brienne pushed her other questions aside as she worked mechanically. The cold wind sliced into her, but she ignored it and her chattering teeth. Water splashed her. She kept the steady rhythm of the buckets swinging back and forth as they were refilled. It no longer mattered that it was her home burning. It no longer mattered that they were fighting a fire that could destroy the whole neighborhood. It did not even matter that the fire must have been deliberately set. The only thing was the tempo of the buckets.

Empty … full … empty … full.…

Hands on Brienne's shoulders slowed her aching arms to a stop as the roof collapsed with the rumble of a dying beast. The fire vanished beneath it, then reappeared, weaker. It was almost vanquished. Some men from the watch ran toward the ruins and poured water onto the rims of the fire. If they could keep the flames from spreading, it would die within the ruins of L'Enfant de la Patrie.

An arm went around her shoulders, drawing her back so the watch could get more water. Looking up, she stared at Evan's smoke-streaked face. His fine coat was pocked with holes from embers. He must have stood very close to the fire. That was not a surprise. Evan Somerset would not give up, even when he could not win.

She sagged against him as he turned her to walk across the street that was littered with puddles. Her neighbors milled around, whispering as if they feared the fire would hear and attack them. She closed her eyes in despair. Somehow she would have to find a way to repay them for the furniture and dishes she had borrowed—the furniture and dishes that were now just glowing embers beneath the scorched rafters.

“Where is my bag?” she asked, standing straighter.

“Your grandmother has it.” He smoothed her hair back from her face. “Are you all right?”

“How can you ask such a stupid question? I wish this was a nightmare and I could just wake up and have all of this disappear.”

“And me? Do you wish I would disappear, too?”

She started to snap an answer back at him, but instead stared at the smoke of a dying dream. A dream that was as dead as the past, a dream that was as hopeless as her future.

“So now you see the truth, Brienne,” Evan continued as he turned her to face him. “The game, as Shakespeare put it so succinctly, is afoot. I warned you the attack on you by those sea-crabs would be just the beginning.”

“The beginning?” She shook her head. “It is over. There is nothing left.”

“You are still alive.” When she choked on her horror, unable to reply, he put his thumbs beneath her chin and tilted it toward him. “Mayhap you will listen to me now when I warn you that they will come back again and again and again until they get the vase or destroy you. Which do you think will happen first?”

Brienne turned away from him and the charred remains of what had once been her lovely salon. She tried to blink away the haze obscuring the edges of her eyes, unsure if it was from tears or the smoke. Her toe hit an uneven cobblestone, and she stumbled. Before she fell, she was scooped up into strong arms. She clutched the front of a linen shirt, and she again looked up at Evan's face.

She almost laughed. Not with amusement, but with the taint of despair. Evan had lost his aristocratic mien. Now he looked like an overgrown chimney sweep. Soot was etched into his skin, shading his face to reveal the strong angles he had hidden while wearing his charming smile.

“What is so funny?” he asked as he placed her on the seat of a carriage she had not noticed before.

Fury struck her like a spark, hot and painful. “I thought you said it was not your coach Grand-mère saw!” She edged over as he climbed in and sat beside her on the red velvet seat.

“It wasn't. I left orders with my driver to come and pick me up at four o'clock.” He pulled a gold pocketwatch from his water-spotted vest. Opening it with a click, he tilted it so he could read it in the last hints of light. “Which was more than two hours ago and after the fire started. You can rest assured that I was not lying to you.”

“That time.”

He grinned as he rested back against the cushions. His mud-encrusted boot pounded on the door in a signal to the coachman. “You are becoming more suspicious, Brienne. That is good, but, unfortunately, you are suspicious of the wrong person.”

“Why shouldn't I suspect you of causing me trouble? I have had nothing but trouble since—” She gasped as the carriage lurched, throwing her back into his arms.

When she began to move away, his arms tightened around her. Suddenly she wanted to be held, to be kept from the horror stalking her. Closing her eyes, she rested her face against his damp coat as he stroked her shoulder. For the moment, she did not care that Evan held her. She forgot her anger at his outrageous attempt to try to buy her assistance. All she wanted was to be safe with …

“Maman? Grand-mère?” It was easier to whisper when her voice was scratchy from the smoke.

“Don't fret, Brienne. I sent them to my house on Grosvenor Square as soon as the carriage first arrived around four o'clock. They are waiting there for you.”

“Your house? You really live on Grosvenor Square?” She drew back. If he had been honest about that, had he been honest about the rest? Seeing the twinkle in his eyes, she knew she would be a fool to swallow his story whole.

He chuckled as his fingers swept aside her tangled hair. “It is temporarily mine. As it shall be temporarily yours, if you are willing to accept my hospitality.”

“We have no place else to go.”

“Not quite a thank-you, but you are welcome.”

Brienne squared her shoulders as she met his gaze steadily. She had never met such a vexing man. “You know that is not what I meant. I am grateful for what you have done today.”

“But you wish I had never come into your well-ordered life.”

“Yes.”

He caught her chin in his hand, so she could not look away. The sparkle vanished from his eyes, and his voice became a low growl. “If it had not been me, it would have been someone else who was not as gentle with you.” When she winced, he edged his fingers away from the bruises on her face. “As you have seen.”

Lowering her eyes, Brienne said, “We will not intrude on you for long.”

“You are welcome to stay until you decide what you shall do.”

“I know what we will do. After all, there is nothing to keep us here in London with L'Enfant de la Patrie destroyed.” Her voice cracked on the last word, and she swallowed tears that were clogging her throat.

“You are leaving London?” He frowned. “Where are you planning to go?”

“Home.”

“Home?”

“Back to France. Maman has been asking me to take her back, because she wants to be buried next to my father. Until now, I have been able to talk her out of it. I was always too busy with the salon, but now it is gone.” A shudder ached along her stiff shoulders. “It is gone.”

Evan was surprised when Brienne looked out the window. He had guessed that she must be at the end of her strength, but her back was soldier-straight. When he put a consoling hand on her shoulder, a sob erupted from her. She pressed her face into her hands and wept. Gently he turned her against his waistcoat.

He sighed as he slipped his arms around her to discover that her sobs came from deep within her. He did not urge her to stop crying. She needed this. He did not know anyone who could have suffered what she had these past two days and not break. Nothing he could say would comfort her, so he said nothing. How could he tell her that it all would be fine? It would not be.

Someone else wanted that dashed vase. That person had shown that he was not afraid to risk the lives of three women to get the vase.

His hands clenched into frustrated fists against her back. That idiot may have overplayed his hand. If the vase had been in the salon, it would have been destroyed when the roof beams crashed down into the rubble. His lips tilted in a wry grin. Somehow, he was going to have to find a way to explain all of this to Lagrille's men and persuade them not to kill him.

He would rather think about Brienne's ebony hair draping over his arm. It was filled with cinders and had come loose from its chignon. He sifted his fingers through its satin sheen, sending the ashes falling onto his lap.

When she raised her face, he ran a finger along the path of her tears that had cleaned lines through the soot on her face. “We are almost to Grosvenor Square,” he murmured.

She put her hands up to her face. “I must look horrible.”

“You look like a bedraggled heroine who fought a brave battle to save her home.”

“I don't feel brave, just angry and scared.”

“You are brave. Don't let anyone tell you differently.”

“I want to find the ones who did this!” She sat straighter. “I want to make them pay for hurting Grand-mère and Maman. I want them to rot in prison. I want them to be drawn and quartered. I—”

He chuckled and placed his finger over her lips. “I did not guess you possessed such diabolical thoughts, Brienne. I am very glad that I had nothing to do with this fire.”

“Don't laugh at me!” Her obsidian eyes crackled like static in a wool blanket.

“I am not laughing at you.” His hand smoothed the soot from her cheek. “I cannot imagine ever laughing at such fervor.”

“Evan, I—”

His lips lowered over hers. He thought she might halt him, but she leaned into his kiss. As his arms tightened around her, he explored each contour of her mouth, not asking, but offering pleasure to let them escape from the horror.

Slowly, hesitantly, her hands rose to his shoulders. He smiled as he drew back enough to see the soft expression on her face. She wanted this as much as he did.

He captured her lips again, discovering each hidden secret and savoring it. His fingers tangled in her hair as he tasted her soft cheeks before his mouth sought its way along the smooth column of her throat. Eager need spiraled through him as her fingers twisted in his hair which fell over the back of his high collar. His whole body became a pulse, beating with the rhythm of her eager breath against his cheek.

Evan pulled back. Was he out of his mind? He had no time for this delight. He should be devising his excuses for Lagrille that would keep his own heart beating.

“Evan?”

Her sweet voice tempted him to put aside good sense again, but he said, “I half expected you to slap my face, honey, but you did not.”

“No, I did not.” She traced his jaw which had become scratchy with a day's growth of beard.

He caught her wrist and drew her hand away. Seeing her eyes widen in the thickening twilight, he chuckled. “You are a confusing woman. Do you hate me as you have asserted you do since I walked into your salon yesterday, or is this”—he brushed her lips with his—“is
this
real passion I taste in your kiss?”

Brienne tore herself out of Evan's arms. Wrapping her own around herself, she said, “You are taking advantage of my unsettled state. You know I should not be kissing you.”

“You should not?” He kissed the bare skin above her modestly scooped bodice. When she gasped as a quiver of pleasure raced along her, he smiled. “And why not?”

She fought to gain control of her errant emotions. “I do not know you well, Evan, and, what I do know, I must own that I do not like.”

He laughed and claimed her lips once more. Again the surge of ecstasy rippled through her. When his fingers tantalized her nape, she pulled away and slapped his face. He recoiled, striking his head on the carriage.

“I know what you want, Evan Somerset! Don't think you can seduce it from me.”

Rubbing the back of his aching head, he demanded, “How can I seduce the vase from you if you do not have it? Or do you?”

She slid to the far edge of the seat, wanting to put as much space between them as possible. “I thought so.” She hoped her retort covered her wounded dignity. She had been a fool to let him hold her when he cared about only one thing. And he must have guessed how his kisses had sent a thrill through her. She could not let him force her into revealing the truth like this again.

“You thought what? That I wanted to hold you simply because I want that dashed vase? You senseless woman!”

He grasped her shoulders and jerked her to him again. When he drew her mouth under his, the sweet fire was gone. Unfettered desire sought to persuade her to submit to his passions. Fear swelled through her, and her cry echoed in the recesses of his mouth. With a smile, he released her.

“That is an example of the way I do not want to kiss you, Brienne.”

“The way you do not want to kiss me? What are you talking about?”

“How silly you are to think that I want you in my arms simply so I can learn where the vase is. After all, if the vase was in the salon, looking for it now would be futile.”

“And you would not want to do anything futile, would you?”

“That is better,” he said with a warmer smile. “I like it better when you are snarling at me. It offers me a challenge to—”

“Cheat me out of a family heirloom?”

“Arguing is a waste of time, Brienne.” He rested back against the cushions, clearly not worried about soot staining the velvet. Folding his arms over his chest, he asked, “You don't know where it is, do you?”