Cates, Kimberly (36 page)

"Silver and gold and emeralds. I come at a high price."

"But you're selling the silver. Why? It makes no sense!"

"I will earn every bracelet, every bit of silver or gold a hundred times over in the time to come! He said that if I would allow him to come to my bed, he would surround me with treasures fit for a queen. Isabelle, Queen of the Barges!"

She gave a mocking laugh. "How far I've fallen from his grace, the duke. However, I took my merchant at his word. He'll receive the appropriate bills for my purchases as expected, and will never need to know that instead of twenty place settings of silver there are only two sets in the drawer. As for the other accoutrements for decorating the household—men see nothing beyond the end of their own nose when they are amorous. He'll never notice how many things he paid for that never appear."

"But that still doesn't explain anything. Why not keep the things if this merchant is supporting you?"

"Because I need money."

"Then ask him for it—"

"He's not a fool, generous as he is. He'd ask what it was for. And I hardly think he would agree to supporting a haven for fallen women just to amuse me."

"A—what?"

She tossed her head in defiance. "I'm using whatever I can scrape together to finance a house to replace Angel's Fall."

Adam staggered back a step, stunned. "You mean that you—that all this—"

"You don't need to gloat over what a fool I am. No one is cursing this as idiocy more thoroughly than I am."

"But why? Why would you do such a thing?"

A faraway light came into the courtesan's eyes, and she fingered the emeralds as if they held some secret too painful to bear any longer.

"I was barely fifteen the night my mama squeezed and powdered and pinched me into a plaything for
le Comte de Rouette.
I wished most devoutly to die."

Adam fought a sharp jab of sympathy, rage.

"If there had been any place I could have run away to, any place I could have found haven, I would have done so. But there was not. My fall from virtue was as unavoidable as it was brutal.
Le comte
was not a gentle man."

Adam didn't want to feel that sense of kinship with this woman, not when Juliet might be in danger. But he was all too aware how narrowly his own sisters had missed such a fate—missed it by the depth of their father's purse, and the generous spirit of the legitimate half-brother who had embraced them when he had every reason to ignore their very existence.

"I left
le comte
with a token to remember our affair by, however. My maid's sewing shears embedded in his flesh."

"You killed him?"

"No. Only stabbed him in the thigh. I only wish I'd had better aim, so I could have saved other girls from my fate. I was frightened out of my wits. You see, he'd tired of beating me and decided to go after my mother."

"He was a sick son of a bitch! Tell me where he is and I'll kill him for you."

She shrugged one elegant shoulder. "Such heroics are hardly necessary. He's been dead these many years. And my mama might as well have been. She's never spoken a word to me since that day. I had ruined everything by not becoming
le comte's
mistress, you see."

She met Adam's gaze, sharing with him a moment of complete understanding. Two people battered by the fates, two fighters who had clung to life tenaciously if not honorably. Two who questioned whether the victory had been worth the price they'd paid. Yet both of them had been changed forever by the compassion of a naive angel who had made them believe in goodness, in beginning again.

"Isabelle, I..." Adam's voice roughened. "Forgive me for judging you. Hell, it's like fighting with shadows, never knowing who is responsible for trying to attack Juliet. I have to ask you. Do you want to be this merchant's mistress?"

"It's what I am,
ma doucette.
At least this way, the others will not have to suffer going back to such a life."

"Neither do you. I've already enlisted my brother's help. We've found the perfect place away from the city, far from the mobs and the poverty and the dirt. It's a huge rambling house, with fields and gardens. Gavin is drumming up enough sewing through his philanthropic friends to keep the lot of you busy until the millennium. He's finding teachers in the arts and all manner of enjoyable things as well, so it will not be all drudgery. All that's needed is a headmistress to keep the unruly chits in line. Someone older, wiser."

"Insufferable man! It's evil of you to mention a lady's age." But her relief gave Adam a glimpse of the girl she must have been, spirited and lovely and brave. "I fear my merchant is destined to be quite brokenhearted."

Isabelle chuckled, shaking her head. "Look at us. Two confirmed cynics racing off to tilt with dragons with no weapon to wield against them but Juliet's dreams. It's abominable. I wonder which of us feels like the biggest fool?"

"I do. Somewhere between wanting to throttle Juliet and haul her back to Northwillow nailed in a barrel, I fell in love with the woman." Adam drove his fingers back through his ebony mane, scowling.

"Mon ami,
it cannot be that bad! Your face is like a man confronting some grave calamity."

"It just occurred to me that if you are not the one responsible for that fire, someone else is. And I don't have the damnedest idea where to find them."

"Surely they must be satisfied now? The house is in ashes."

"Is that kind of venom satisfied with consuming bricks and wood? Or once it's had a taste of victory does it need to strike deeper?"

Isabelle shivered. "We will keep her safe among us, Sabrehawk. No one would dare strike at Juliet while she is in the earl's house. You'll hunt down whoever dared to harm her. And when you do..." A hard smile lifted Isabelle's lips. "You will show her enemy the peril to be found at the point of Sabrehawk's blade."

Chapter 19

Twilight dipped the scorched rose petals in purple dye, softening the desolation left in the lire's wake. Juliet wandered through the forlorn garden, the flowerbeds she'd tended so lovingly trampled beneath the heedless feet of those who had battled the flames. Yet here and there amid the crushed plants brave new shoots poked their fragile green heads, a testimony to the fact that there was new life preparing to blossom beneath what seemed utter ruin.

She knelt next to her patch of foxglove, the tall stalks of flowers bent and broken. But she tucked fresh dirt around the half-exposed roots and used the ribbon from her hair to bind the stalks upright.

Who knew? They might just heal, heal the way her heart had been healing in the hours since she'd ridden away from Glenlyon House.

She tingled with anticipation, her gaze straying again to the gate beating a soft tattoo against the garden wall as the breeze swayed it to and fro.

Where was Adam? It seemed as if she'd been waiting for him an eternity, planning out what she would say to him, reveling in imagining what it would be like to have him draw her into his powerful arms, take her mouth fiercely with his own.

If he could forgive her for the ugly things she'd said, was there some chance that he would ask her to marry him? Or was it cruel even to think of tethering a wild bird of prey like Sabrehawk to one hand? Would she be condemning herself to the hell of watching him grow restless and unhappy, his eyes filled, not with love for her, but rather an unslakable thirst for far-off places and mad adventures that sent raw sensation searing through every nerve?

True, he was rebuilding Angel's Fall. And his brother believed that Adam loved her. Yet how could she be certain until she looked into her weary warrior's eyes? Until she could gently strip away the last veils that hid his heart, to see the truth within?

She sank down, the ground cool beneath her, the grass soft. Maybe Adam had been detained at whatever business he had gone to tend. It was possible that he wasn't coming here at all. The shadows were beginning to lengthen, and it couldn't be wise to remain here with darkness coming. She hated the whisperings in her ear of all the threats she'd received, the vileness of them, the cruelty.

Whoever had burned the house had surely achieved their goal, and could no longer have any interest in hurting her, could they? Yet there were other dangers in the street that her experiences at Angel's Fall had made all too clear.

She stood up. No, it was better to retrieve the mare and return to the earl's establishment. There, she could wait for Adam all night if need be.

The sudden snap of a twig behind her made her heart catch in her throat. Heat flooded her cheeks and her pulses tripped in anticipation as she whirled around expecting to see Slade's towering frame, that rugged face struck with surprise.

"Adam! I've been waiting..." She stopped, pressing her fingertips to her lips in dismay as she saw not Sabrehawk's mocking dark eyes, but rather, the ghostly smear of Barnabas Rutledge's angular features, his black frockcoat fluttering in the breeze.

"Mr. Rutledge," Juliet said, fighting back her disappointment and trying to summon up a smile. Tension eased out of her, for Rutledge had ever been the most solicitous of neighbors, so concerned for her, always hovering with that worried expression in his sunken eyes. Now he looked exhausted, a little ill, a bandage wrapped about his left hand.

"Miss Grafton-Moore." He sketched her an awkward bow. "Forgive my intrusion, but I saw you from the window of my shop. Allow me to tell you how sorry I am for your misfortune. I know this house meant a great deal to you."

Juliet cast a glance toward the burned hulk. "I did love this house. But I discovered there are other things far more important." She glanced down at his hand. "You injured yourself, my dear friend. Let me look at it."

"No! No, thank you." He thrust his hand behind his back as if to hide it. "I—I already came over and—and gathered some herbs for a poultice, the way you insisted I should whenever I wished. It's a trifling wound. Nothing to concern yourself with considering your own great trouble."

Juliet patted his arm. "You have never been any trouble. My only friend in this neighborhood for so long."

"There were so few people I could speak theology to. Your company was the greatest of gifts." Rutledge cleared his throat. "I just wanted to tell you that you will be sorely missed. And I wanted to return these to you." He rummaged in his pocket with his uninjured hand and drew out a handkerchief-wrapped bundle.

She took it, unfolding the fine white cloth. A gasp burst from her lips as two golden lilies spilled into her hand, their diamond centers winking up at her.

"The links I pawned from my mother's necklace!"

Rutledge shuffled his feet, ill at ease. "I remembered your face when you surrendered them to me, the pain, the loss. The least I can do is to return them to you. Consider them a gift."

She closed her fingers over the bright petals, pressing her fist to her heart. "You're so very kind." She stood up on tiptoe and brushed that parchment-dry cheek with a kiss.

Rutledge's face suffused with color, his voice trembling. "No, you are the one who is kind, Miss Juliet. One of God's rare innocents, far too good for this world. I would do anything in my power to protect you."

She'd never heard such passion in the pawnbroker's voice, and she ached a little, remembering his stilted marriage proposal. She'd thought his heart was not engaged, but perhaps she had hurt him worse than she'd believed?

As if aware how much emotion he'd exposed, Rutledge turned away from her, clearing his throat. "When do you leave the city?"

Juliet smiled. "I won't be leaving at all."

Rutledge wheeled around, his long face drawn in lines of confusion. "But the house—it is ruined. And I know that you have no money, or you would never have pawned the bits of your mother's necklace."

"True. But Adam—" She blushed. "Mr. Slade is helping me to recover."

Rutledge's eyes widened, his complexion taking on an even more sickly cast. "Slade? That vile libertine? You cannot mean to accept anything from such a man!"

Juliet felt a wave of protectiveness squeeze her heart. "Mr. Slade is not at all what he seems. He is generous and kind and—"

"He is no such thing!" Rutledge cried in alarm, his fingers fluttering in agitation.

"He has offered to rebuild Angel's Fall for me."

"Rebuild it? Is he mad? No, he doesn't want to lose his nursery of depravity, a veritable banquet of women to sample! It grieves me to have to tell you the truth about him, but there can be no help for it. It is my duty to warn you."

The pawnbroker straightened as if expecting a blast from a firing squad. "Miss Grafton-Moore, I have seen this man engaged in—in acts of the utmost depravity with my own eyes."

"Mr. Rutledge—"

"It's true. I swear it upon my soul! I witnessed Slade cavorting with some sinful woman in the garden house the night of the fire. The two of them were naked and writhing." Hot spots of color stained Rutledge's gaunt cheeks. "There can be no mistaking him, though I cannot say for certain who his wanton partner was. I regret to offend your modesty this way, but—"

Juliet's face burned. How on earth had the pawnbroker seen? Through his window? A shudder worked through her at the thought of the gaunt man watching the garden at Angel's Fall, prying with those strange intense eyes.

She was sick that anyone had glimpsed the searing intimacy she and Adam had shared. But the joining of their bodies had been a thing of beauty, not some sordid spectacle. She lifted her chin. "Mr. Rutledge,
I
was the woman in Adam Slade's arms."

The pawnbroker stumbled back as if she'd cudgeled him, his eyes hot with disbelief and horror. "No! It cannot be! You—you are an angel! You would never debase yourself."

"I have never experienced anything more beautiful. Sacred. I came to the garden tonight to wait for Adam. But it seems he has been detained."

Rutledge clutched his throat in his bandaged hand. "This is my fault. This horrible thing! God forgive me for not having the courage to save you before... but I loved you! I was loath to take such drastic steps...."