Elisabeth Fairchild (34 page)

She gasped, rolling away from his touch, pushing down her skirts. “Please. You must not.”

He did not hesitate to draw her back into the hollow of his arms. She fit so perfectly, their bodies like lock and key, and he would risk opening the Pandora’s box of her, here, in that sliver of silvered moonlight with killers and conspirators snoring in the next room. The very danger of it heightened his desire.

She shook her head. He could feel her every movement against his chest as once again he lifted her skirts.

“It is a betrothal ball,” she whispered, her breath sweet upon his cheek. “I must be there.”

“Must you?” He moved closer, lips light against her earlobe, palm cupping the humid magic of her mound, “Why the urgency? Is it someone I know, about to take the plunge?”

His fingers slid home. His mouth silenced her moan. Her tongue met his as sweetly as ever he could remember. Gently, his movements as liquid as the fire of their kiss, hands cupping her buttocks, he lifted her astride the saddle of his thighs.

“We shouldn’t,” she said, even as the warm, wet heat of her cased him like a glove.

The weight of her hair cascaded onto his chest and shoulders as he shifted to better accommodate her. Her skirts drifted down about his legs, gossamer soft. Her breath sighed into his. He trapped her moan in his throat. Summer’s heat, she surrounded him, the taste of honeysuckle on his tongue.

The fabric of her bodice barred him from a complete melding of skin to skin. He adroitly slipped the strings she had just tied.

“Who means to tie the knot,” he whispered, rocking her, his breath coming faster,” as we go about the sweeter business of untying them?”

“I do.” She whispered sadly, lips brushing his.

Two words, so unexpected, he convinced himself he did not hear her aright. He raised himself on an elbow.

The warm weight of her slid away. He reached for her, his need chilled and confused, though not yet deflated.

“I am to be married.”

Quiet, her words, and yet they struck his ears like blows. Blood and body cooling, his breath swelled too big for the cage of his ribs. The darkness was his enemy. He must see the face that would voice such devastation.

Moonlight cut the darkness in two, separating them like the silence, a silence in which he grappled with the idea that another man would soon call her his own, another man would cradle her to sleep, another man claim her body.

“Stapleton, is it?”

“You know him?”

“It is my business to know things.” The whispered words came too harshly. “Do you love him?”

She dressed herself again, fabric rustling. Lips tight, he avoided voicing the question a second time.

“He is steadfast.” She said calmly. “A man of commitment.”

“You do not love him?”

A stifled sound from the darkness. Her breath took on a new rhythm. Did she weep?

“Given up on me, have you?”

For the first time she faltered, cleared her throat, leaned away from him, and said, voice small--distant, “I am not so independent a creature that I care to grow old ruined, alone--my children bastards.”

Children? Did she carry his child? His heart went out to her, for if so, he had ruined her. Silence wrapped them, troubled only by the snores of his compatriots, the ragged sound of her breathing, and the rapid thrum of his own heartbeat.

Very quietly, came the question, “Would you dissuade me?”

A sneeze sounded on the far side of the door followed by a mumbled complaint.

Speechless, he contemplated the darkness, struggling for the right words, honorable words. There were none. He fell back on an excuse worn shiny with use. It pained him to admit as it had never pained him before, but the lie, like all lies, slipped his lips smoothly enough. “I am the sort of man who sets things in motion,” he said flatly. “And then I move on.”

A sound. Did she moan? Silence claimed them, the bleakness of the room enveloping. A tearful wetness blurred her words when she asked softly, “Is your heart so disguised, Lord Gargoyle, that you cannot recognize your own true feelings?”

He bit his tongue, his mouth a trap sprung. Best for her, he thought, to marry a man like Stapleton.

He did not sleep--could not. He suspected she no more than dozed beside him, her back to his. Ironic--this, their last night together, forever, and all he could think of was how to rid himself of her.

He closed the lid on thought, on the last sliver of hope, on the deep well of emptiness within him, on the words that hovered like a knife blade against his aching throat--words of love, desire, persuasion. There was no hope for them. He had known it from the beginning.

When at last he knew she slept, her breath deep and even, he turned to curl himself around her, nestling his knees, his thighs to the backs of hers, one arm at her waist, the other pillowing her cheek, his nose buried in the fallen cloud of her hair.

He was the Gargoyle, and she the rain that wore away his scowls, the sun that beat upon his face, the moon that illuminated him in darkness. He knew he loved her. He knew he did not want to let her go, and yet the Gargoyle could not move, could not free himself from the edifice to which he pinned himself. It was his job, always, to stand watch, quiet and stone-faced.

Chapter Forty-Two

February 23, 1821

The Cato Street Loft

The light crept up on them, first gray, then violet, finally white. It seeped in through the ugly brown burlap at the window, making milky the dirty, fly-blown glass, illuminating dust and straw that hung in the air. The rude sacking on the floor was stained, and rough to the touch. Dulcie lay heavy and warm against an arm long gone dead beneath the softness of her cheek.

Akin to the numbness of that limb, he understood that though he held her she was not his.

Her skirts were rumpled about her legs, her petticoat showing, one stocking fallen down about her calf. Though he heard the others stirring he did not want to rouse her, did not want to disturb their little island of togetherness in this squalid and dangerous place.

She opened her eyes, lashes like smudged soot against a pale cheek. When he moved to loose his hold, she stayed his hand, twining her fingers through his, clutching his hand to her bosom. No words. Just the two of them curled together, hands clasped. He could feel her heartbeat, the rise and fall of her breast against his knuckles.

Boots clapped against wooden flooring on the far side of the wall. He rose. The door to the storeroom flew open. A rumpled Thistlewood poked in his unkempt head.

“Rouse her. She’ll be going down to the Horse and Groom with Brunt to fetch us a bit o’bread and ale.”

The door snapped shut, muffling garbled voices.

She sat up, combing her fingers through her hair. “Your opportunity,” Roger said, voice low.

She braided her hair, arms high. Memory rushed over him, another morning, in Manchester. “To leave,” he said gently.

“Yes, I must go.” Her fingers never faltered in their steady weave, creating order where there had been none.

Together they left the store room, together faced the others, listening as Thistlewood outlined the tasks of the day. Roger meant to go with Dulcie and Brunt, down the ladder, into the street for food at the Horse and Groom. He would distract Brunt, allow Dulcie to slip away.

Thistlewood had other ideas.

“Edwards! You and Adams fetch Tidd. There are two more arms caches to be brought here. And the box. Don’t forget the bloody box.”

Roger’s gaze followed Dulcie.

She rose to follow the taciturn Brunt, paused in descending the ladder to look his way, head and shoulders above the mean floor of the loft an instant of eye contact before she disappeared, perhaps forever.

They had both hoped for her potential escape, and yet now that it was offered he hated to see her go. So much, suddenly, had been left unsaid.

He went with Adams, as Thistlewood directed, to fetch Tidd, a family man with wife and daughters. Roger despised Tidd’s idea of parenting. He played the part of father with a cache of weapons hidden in the closets, while his wife, no better, stitched together bags for carrying away lopped off heads.

Tidd leapt eagerly at the chance to come away with them. “Wife’s a bit of a nag,” he explained.

Roger could stomach no more of them. “I’ll be parting ways with you lads,” he said as soon as they gained the high street. “That box I’ve promised Thistlewood needs fetching.”

“Box?” Tidd asked Adams as they walked away.

“The red one,” Adams gave him a nudge.

“Oh, that’s right! For our Duke’s dumpling!” Tidd’s voice faded as Roger turned his back on them. He paused when he reached the cross street, considering whether he ought to go back for Dulcie. He wanted above all else to know she was safe.

But, the fate of the minister’s hung above him, and he had much to do to assure their safety. He turned away from Cato Street, hastened to a room he kept in Fleet Street, under the name of Wards, hastily donning the outfit with which he customarily met Lord Harrowby, slicking back his hair, gluing a mustache to his lip. Bag in hand--additional clothes and a wig--he hailed a hack.  His mind ought to have been on the business at hand, but  Dulcie occupied his thoughts. Was she safe? Had she slipped away and run to the comfort of Stapleton’s arms? Worry tormented him.

Through streets crowded with traffic, he directed the hack to Grosvenor Square, hands sweating. Safely delivered, he rapped hard upon the door, only to be quelled by the butler.

“The Earl, my good sir, is not at home.”

Not home? Today, of all days?
“Where is he?” Roger asked urgently, mind fixing again on Dulcie. She ought to be home now, out of her orange girl rags, soon to wear a wedding dress.
Roger grabbed the man by his lapels. He knew even as he shook the fellow that his anger had less to do with the butler’s reluctance to speak than with the hard truths Dulcie had divulged.

She meant to marry. No violence he did to this man would change that. Nor would it get him the information he required. Frowning, he let go of the fellow, shaken by his uncharacteristic display of emotion.

“Your job, my good sir, mayhap your very life, is jeopardized do you not tell me where to find the Earl. I bring vital message from the Gargoyle.”

The doorman’s eyes widened. He blurted, “He’s gone to exercise his new mare.”

 “Gone where?” Roger insisted, blood racing. “Time is of the essence.”

In St. James’s Park he found, not the earl, but the earl’s groom, unmistakable in the Earl’s distinctive livery. The lad, much struck by the urgency of Roger’s insistence, stopped the Earl’s progress with a shout. The bay turned. A well-mounted Harrowby soon towered over Roger, the horse snorting and sidling with excitement.

“My lord, we move today!” Roger handed over an envelope, within it a detailed account of all he knew. “Castlereagh, Sidmouth and Bow Street must be informed at once.”

On his way again, red box tucked under his arm, Roger ducked into an alleyway to shed his mustache. As John Castle he emerged, blond wig, blond beard in place, mind teeming with all that he had set in motion. Harrowby’s servants were armed, two constables assigned to discreetly watch his residence. The same for every minister’s dwelling. An assembly would be called by Castlereagh informing them of their imminent danger.

Sidmouth, Roger meant to contact personally. He would want to hand pick a party of armed guards, to stir Bow Street into action, officers, constables and patrols to be delivered to Cato Street in the Edgeware Road.

The net must be carefully cast tonight, no sooner than half past seven, no later than eight, with enough armed men present to surround the place. That precise timeframe promised the best opportunity to gather them all, as the men assembled for the enactment of their diabolical plot. None should slip through. None but Dulcie.

He could not get her out of his head, for while he assumed she must by now have slipped safely away, he could not be sure. It worried him. He could think of no more dangerous place in London to be now, than the upstairs loft in Cato Street.

Brunt watched her too closely, his manner gruff, suspicious, impatient. He herded her about, sharp as a shepherd’s dog, beefy hand quick to clamp down upon arm or shoulder, words harsh when she fell behind. She could not slip away. The man’s back never turned. They fetched the morning’s food.

Reluctantly, she climbed again the ladder into the loft, a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. Could she not manage this simple thing? For in the grand scheme of things, it was simple, was it not? To slip away?

Not as simple as she had expected.

She busied herself distributing food, quiet among the men, head bowed, mouth closed, eyes downcast. She even tied a drab scarf about her waist that it might cover the most vibrant parts of the front of her skirt.

Twice she managed to slip down the ladder into the stable, her intent to make a run for it. Twice her attempts were foiled. And when she explained away her actions with nature’s call as her excuse, Thistlewood handed over a slop filled chamber pot and told her harshly, “Make good use of it. You are not going anywhere today, milky maid. There’s too much at stake. I’ll not have our plans spoiled by loose tongues in the eleventh hour!”

And so she remained, trapped in a room fast filling with the instruments of death, as a half dozen of the men came and went, making deliveries, reporting on the house they watched, excitement growing as the dinner hour approached.

Daylight dwindled and still Roger had not returned. The others began to question his lengthy absence.

“The box?” they asked. “Where would he lay hands on such a thing?”

“Think you he has been taken?” Thistlewood worried.

She shook her head, spread her hands, no help to them. She knew he busied himself rousing ministers, Runners and the Coldstream Guard, his day full of purpose, hers wasted. She resolved anew to make good her escape. He asked nothing more of her. She must find a way.