Elizabeth Boyle (63 page)

“Well,” she began, “I thought our sweet little girl looked quite lovely in it, and it would be a shame if she couldn’t wear it again.”

“Madame, you would do well to remember that the woman in there is not our Adelaide.”

She nodded. “I know, but it is rather nice to have someone around the house again. And she is a pretty thing, so like our lost girl. And her young man. They are so much in love, I shouldn’t wonder that they’ll be married in this very house before Christmas.”

“Have you gone mad?” An incredulous Costard nearly choked on his words. “In love and married? That pair? They are agents playing roles to infiltrate our home and our lives. They are no more in love than they are engaged. I think the winter drafts in this house have addled your good sense.”

His wife’s gaze rolled upwards. “I’ve seen how she glances at him when she thinks no one is watching. And did you see his face when he saw her tonight?”

“There was plenty to see, I’ll agree with you there,” he complained. “If she had been our Adelaide, there would have been no going out in that indecent rag. Bah, what they call fashion these days. Mark my words, if there was anything in that man’s eyes tonight, it wasn’t love.”

“Bah, yourself, you foolish old man,” she said looking down the hall at the light flickering under the door. “That boy loves her, he does. He just might not know it yet.” At this she smiled and wrapped her meaty hand around her husband’s arm. “Just like you didn’t know ‘til I knocked you on the head and told you what for to get you to finally came around.”

Costard remained unconvinced, though experience had taught him that his wife was more often right than wrong in her assessments.

Hadn’t she been correct about the butcher and the Widow Henriot last spring? And her with seven children to feed! But just as his wife predicted, the crabbed old bachelor had eloped with the penniless widow.

“Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad,” he conceded, “to spend the rest of our years serving the two of them, if they do decide to stay.” He ignored his wife’s knowing smirk. “I never said she’s not a nice, polite one, and he seems to have a good head on his shoulders. Sharp too, that one. He’ll not let the Corsican shave our necks if there is trouble.”

“Well, they aren’t going to find anything in there tonight. I’m half tempted to tell them the old master never used that room after the comtesse died. What with all the trouble they are going through,” she said, wrapping her thick wool shawl tighter around her night rail. “Oh, well, it gives them more time to come to their senses. Come along back to bed, husband, so we don’t disturb their fool’s errand. Let them do their work, so come morning, we can continue to do ours.”

“I thought when you invited me up here, you had something a little more interesting in mind than this,” Lily said, as she climbed up from the floor where she’d been kneeling in order to peer under Henri’s bed. “Now what do we do, Webb? The journals certainly aren’t here.” She yawned and stretched before plopping down on the canopied bed. Their search of Henri’s bedroom had turned up nothing. Her eyes struggled to stay open, sleep pleading with her body to succumb to the comfort of the downy coverlet and soft mattress. “It’ll be morning in a few hours,” she hinted. “Suppose we continue searching then?”

Webb shook his head. “We can’t. We need to find them tonight.” He paced from one side of the room to the other, his gaze scanning the room, as if there were something they had missed.

With a huff of frustration, he sat down in defeat on the corner of the bed.

Reaching over, he shook her. “Lily, you can’t fall asleep. When you toured the house, did you see anyplace else where Henri could have hidden his journals? Someplace, anyplace?”

She rose up on one elbow. “What aren’t you telling me, Webb Dryden? I won’t be sheltered and cosseted from the truth. I get enough of that from my family.” She rolled over, until she was sitting upright next to him.

“I suppose you do,” he laughed, though it was a hollow sound. “You’ve proved yourself a powerful partner, Lily. I mean it. Your sister couldn’t have done better tonight, what with that business about the convent and running into Lucien.” His hand closed down over hers, and they sat there for a moment staring at each other. “You handled things with all the aplomb of a seasoned agent.”

She eyed him suspiciously. While she was thrilled to hear his praise, she gathered there was more to his words. Something he wasn’t telling her.

His fingers caressed hers. She shivered at the contrast between the cold bedroom and the heat of his touch. Without a word, he took off his coat and covered her shoulders.

Again a charged silence fell between them, like the tension and crackle of a coming thunderstorm.

Lily glanced away, unable to look into Webb’s dark blue eyes without thinking of how he’d looked at her earlier in the day when they’d kissed in the salon.

And how much she wanted him to kiss her now.

Somewhere in the house, they heard a door close.

Webb leaned over and snuffed out the candle, plunging them into shadows. In the street below, a lamp glowed, casting a flickering, pale light into the room.

“Shhh,” he whispered, his lips just a breath away from her ear, his arms enfolding her into his chest. “Stay still.”

As if she would want to go anywhere else. His warmth surrounded her.

For a while they sat there, enclosed in each other’s arms, listening to the silence around them. The house creaked once or twice, but besides their own breathing and the hammering of their hearts, it seemed no one else was about.

“Do you think they heard us?” she whispered.

“No,” he said. “If they had, they’d have come in to investigate.”

His hand stroked her bare arm, leaving a path of gooseflesh along her skin.

“You can’t change the subject on me,” she persisted. “What are you keeping from me? Our rendezvous with our ship isn’t for another fortnight, so why must we find the journals and leave now?”

Her hips bumped against the hardness of his thigh, her legs brushing against the lean length of his. The enticing silk dress, which before had seemed like a good idea, suddenly felt too thin. It allowed the heat of his body to scorch her senses, the intimacy of their touch as if they were almost naked.

Almost. But not really.

And the thought of her body, stripped of its thin silk barrier, pressed against him, their skin sliding over each other, made her breath come in a sudden rush of longing.

A passion so heated, so hard, so long in the waiting that she didn’t know how to control it, or whether she wanted to.

This was exactly what she’d planned when she’d chosen this dress and lit her hair and body with the fire of the de Chevenoy diamonds.

She’d wanted to start a bonfire. And now it threatened to overwhelm her senses.

Distract her from the secrets Webb obviously held as tightly as he held his heart.

“What is it, Webb, that you mean to protect me from?”

He turned his head away from her accusation.

“So I am to be protected?” She paused and ran her fingers over the white lawn sleeve of his shirt. “Who protects you, Webb? Who protects you from me?”

His eyes, dark with desire and then anger, gave away his emotions. He rose from the bed so quickly, she nearly fell off at the abrupt loss of his supportive frame. “This isn’t a game, Lily. Our lives are at stake.”

“So I’ve gathered.” She sighed as she brushed back a stray lock that had fallen over her face. “And when did you plan on telling me this rather noteworthy piece of information? Before we were arrested or on the way to the guillotine?”

To her surprise, Webb laughed. “I think you would have gathered that we were in trouble about the time Fouché and his thugs knocked the front door in.”

Not in the mood to be humored, she persisted. “Tell me, Webb. I need to know what we are up against, so I don’t make any mistakes.”

Mistakes that could kill you
, she thought, her brother’s dire words echoed back at her.

You’ll end up getting yourself, and who knows how many others, killed.

Webb turned his back to her, and in the shadows of the darkened room, Lily felt the weight of his burdens settle over her heart. She rose and went to him, stopping a few inches from his back. She reached out and let her hand fall on his shoulder.

He flinched at her touch, as if it seared through his flesh to his very core.

“Tell me, please,” she whispered.

When she’d all but given up that he would ever include her in his worries, he spoke, his words quiet and even.

“Bonaparte has ordered Fouché to find out everything he can about Adelaide de Chevenoy, then publicly discredit you. Hardly a surprise, but it appears our Corsican friend wants control of the de Chevenoy fortune. Fouché, on the other hand, is a more deadly foe. He wants the de Chevenoy secrets. Our secrets.” He turned and faced her. “Both men are used to getting what they want. And neither is averse to killing anyone who gets in their way. We haven’t any more time, Lily. If Sophia’s note is in the wrong hands or you are right about Troussebois, it is a matter of hours, or if we are lucky, days, before they will come for you.”

She swallowed. “And what about you? If you heard this much, they must have mentioned Adelaide’s betrothed.”

“I am to disappear as soon and as conveniently as possible.”

Lily didn’t have to ask about their mission, it was obvious that if the journals weren’t in Henri’s study or bedroom they would in all likelihood fail. For the diaries could be in a thousand places, and short of tearing the house apart stone by stone, they would not find them in time.

So their only choice was to continue to search until they were caught.

Lily hadn’t come all this way to die, at least not before she’d had a chance to live. And living meant seeing at least one of her dreams come true.

“Then, Webb, if we have only this night left, I suggest we use our time wisely.”

She stepped back from him and pushed the narrow silk bands of her gown off her shoulders. The silk fell in a soft heap at her feet.

L
ily stood naked before him. Not Lily, but a goddess, his goddess. Even in the meager light from the street lamp below, the sight of her fair skin, lush breasts, and graceful limbs stopped his breath.

Stunned by the vision before him, Webb reached out and slowly touched her cheek.

His eyes closed as her fingers slipped under his shirt to run up his chest. This was real, for there was no ignoring the fiery path her fingers traced across his skin.

Tonight she seemed intent on igniting every bit of kindling in her path, until she’d set his senses blazing.

No matter the consequences.

His mind reeled as she pushed his shirt up and over his head. It landed next to her gown.

This isn’t right
, his reason tried to convince him.

Take her
, his body screamed.
Take what she is offering, you fool.

She tipped up her head and gazed at him. Her soft, green eyes, so full of need, haunted his very soul. “I’ve always been with you. As you’ve always been in my heart.”

He leaned down to pluck up his jacket and cover her, but she placed her foot over it. “Lily, this is foolhardy. I can’t …”

“Make any promises? Offer your heart?” She reached up and plucked off her tiara, the diamonds winking at him. She tossed the heirloom onto the bed. Tipping her head, she shook out her hair and let it fall about her head and shoulders in a wild tumble. She smiled, moving closer to him, and stood up on her toes so she could whisper in his ear. “I wouldn’t want them if you did. I only want you. Now. Tonight.”

The witchery of her sensual offer curled down his spine.

They stood mere inches apart, Lily continuing to torture him with the pure pleasure of her touch. Her fingertips passed over the muscles of his shoulders, along the ragged, raised flesh of his scars—the gunshot during his rescue from the Abbaye, a knife fight in a Vienna alley, and his most recent injury when he was winged while slipping out of the Tuileries.

Her fingers traced from his shoulders down through the hair that formed a V the middle of his chest down to the top of his breeches.

She entwined her arms around his neck and brought her body up against his. The silken touch of her breasts nestled against his bare chest. Her hips swayed against him, their sensual cadence awakening a hunger in him he’d only imagined.

Her lips nuzzled at his neck. “Kiss me, Webb.”

He nuzzled her hair, inhaling the soft scent of lavender, his arms enfolding her. Then he bent his head so his lips could capture hers.

Lily melted under his tender assault. She’d felt his indecision and his struggle against taking what she offered, and she almost cried out in triumph the moment she sensed the change in him.

He started the kiss playfully, teasing her mouth, encouraging her to open up for him. When she did, his tactics changed, and his lips became hard and hungry, his tongue moving past her lips to challenge her own, gathering up her passion with the thirst of a man lost in a desert.

As if in answer to her long simmering passion, Webb’s hands joined his raid on her senses. One hand claimed a breast, reverently exploring with soft light caresses the curves and pebbled surface of her hardening nipple.

She arched toward his fingers, not wanting to miss a single moment of his touch.

All the while, he continued kissing her, until she could barely breathe. When she thought she’d have to gasp for air, he pulled back.

His dark eyes narrowed as he gazed down at her.

“Is this what you want, Lily. Do you really want me?”

She could only nod.

“No more of this nonsense about marrying that Saint-Jean fool, no more false fiancés, no more lies between us.”

For a moment she paused. If everything went according to her plans, there would be no more lies between them. At least she hoped there wouldn’t be any need for them.

She nodded again.

“Say it,” he said, his hands on her shoulders. “I want to hear your vow.”

A vow.
The words struck her hard. A mistress didn’t make a vow, not that she knew of. And if she wasn’t his mistress, then what was he asking? Did this mean more to Webb than just one night of passion? Did it?