Elizabeth Thornton (31 page)

“Tell me what?” asked Abbie.

“You’ll only laugh.”

“I promise I won’t.”

Harriet hesitated, then blurted out, “That I love you.”

Abbie flattened her lips, but a moment later she began to laugh.

“You’re just like Daniel!” exclaimed Harriet wrathfully.

“What? Did you tell him that you love him too?”

“I hate you, I really hate you.”

“It’s nerves,” Abbie cried out as a pillow came flying. “Sheer nerves! Honestly, Harriet, I love you too.”

They were brought up short by a knock on the door. Harriet answered it. The elderly footman who entered shocked them both when he politely droned that Mr. Hugh Templar was waiting downstairs and wished to speak to Miss Vayle.

Abbie’s eyes flew to Harriet’s. “How did he know I was in your house?”

Harriet shrugged. “I suppose one of the servants told him.”

“You may tell him, Brewster,” said Abbie, looking at the footman, “that Miss Vayle is not at home.”

Brewster said apologetically, “It won’t do no good, miss. Mr. Templar said that if you refused to see him, he would search the house until he found you.”

Color was high on Abbie’s cheeks, and there was a militant light in her eyes. “In that case,” she said, “you may tell Mr. Templar I shall be down in a few minutes.”

When the footman bowed himself out of the room, Abbie went to the mirror and ran a comb through her hair. Harriet said, “I wonder what he wants. You don’t think—”

“What?”

“Maybe he knows something about George or the men who abducted him. Giles said that when he was riding in Whitehall this morning, he saw Templar coming from the Horse Guards. He’s still on the best of terms with his commanding officer, Colonel Something-or-Other.”

“Langley?”

“Yes, that’s it.”

Abbie looked at Harriet with a startled expression. “Then I’d better find out.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“No. He may not speak freely in front of you, but don’t be too far away in case I need you.”

She walked into the front parlor believing that she had a tight grip on her emotions, but when he turned at her entrance, all the anguish of betrayed love invaded every part of her as easily as fog penetrates a fortress. She could feel it in her fingers, in her belly, in her throat, behind her eyes.

Gritting her teeth, she fought against the pain. She’d
told herself time out of mind that she didn’t know this man, that the man she had fallen in love with was a figment of her imagination. She’d relived every moment of the indignities she suffered after he handed her over to Maitland. Her dreams were invaded by the sightless faces of the young men who had died in the house in Chapel Street. The stench of Newgate could never be washed from her skin. Any sane woman would want to drive a dagger through his black heart. All she wanted was to curl up and die.

Had it not been for George, she would have turned on her heel and run from the room. The last words she spoke to Hugh Templar outside the customs house in Dover had been a plea for help. She’d begged him, with tears running down her face, and he had walked away without looking back once. She’d promised herself she would never willingly speak to him again. Only her anxiety for her brother could make her go through with this.

She did not invite him to sit, but for George’s sake, she tried to maintain a neutral expression. “What is it you wish to say to me?” she asked.

He spoke easily and without embarrassment, as though nothing had happened between them. “I saw Colonel Langley this morning, and some interesting facts came to light.”

Her heart lurched, and she clutched the back of the chair for support. “What facts?”

He studied her for a moment. “Why didn’t you tell me that you didn’t write that letter to Michael Lovatt?”

This wasn’t what she expected to hear, and she said blankly, “What letter?”

“You know what letter! The one Miss Fairbairn wrote in her usual vague way, then signed with
your
name.”

“Oh, that letter.” He had no news of George. She didn’t know whether to be relieved or let down. “Olivia always signs my name to our business letters. Does it matter?”

“Of course it matters. It was because of that letter that British intelligence was convinced that you were trying to sell the book to the highest bidder.”

“I wasn’t.”

“No,” he said softly. “I realize that now.”

She didn’t want his approval; she didn’t want anything from this man. “Is that all you came to tell me?”

“No. Your maid has exonerated you as well. She told a very interesting story of how you came to have rooms in the attics of the Castle Inn. It was so farfetched that Langley didn’t believe it until I told him it was just like you to pass yourself off as a duchess’s servant.”

“How does that exonerate me?”

“Ballard’s body was found in a room on the second floor, but the odd thing is, the room was reserved in your name. But you didn’t reserve a room, did you, Abbie? You never do.”

Her head was buzzing with a confusion of thoughts, and she absently touched a finger to her brow. She had to tread carefully here. “A room was reserved for me? By whom?”

“We don’t know. Could it have been George?”

“Not to my knowledge. And anyway, I don’t see what difference that makes either.”

The difference was that he felt as though a millstone had been removed from around his neck. He’d entered Langley’s office that morning feeling disgusted with himself. He’d known he was going to try to get Abbie back, and he despised himself for it. She had lied to him; played upon his emotions; tricked him. And it didn’t make any difference. He still wanted her back.

He tried to convince himself that things would be different between them. She’d had too much freedom; she was too independent, too used to having her own way. He’d take her to his estate in Oxfordshire, well out of harm’s way, and keep her so busy looking after their children and digging in Roman excavations with him that she wouldn’t have time to get into trouble.

Then Langley had introduced him to an agent called Harris, who had just returned from Bath after checking out Abbie’s story. Langley had also shown him the letter that Abbie supposedly wrote. He’d recognized Miss Fairbairn’s writing at once and her convoluted style, and after reading it, he’d known, he’d
known
that he’d misjudged Abbie. All Miss Fairbairn had wanted was to bribe the fictitious Mr. Lovatt into getting back the books impounded by customs.

And that innocent letter had set off a train of events that resulted in Ballard’s death and the uncovering of a plot involving a notorious French spy and his English accomplices.

There were still many questions, but as the meeting with Langley went on, he’d begun to feel almost carefree. What it all added up to was what he’d originally thought: that George and Abbie had become involved in something over their heads, and they hadn’t known how to get out of it.

“What this means,” he said, “is that I was wrong to doubt you, and I see that now. If only you hadn’t kept secrets from me.…”

When he took a step toward her, she recoiled, and he halted. “Abbie,” he said, “you don’t need to hide anything from me anymore. You and George both have amnesty—you’re both safe. And the book is no longer an issue.”

Her gray eyes were wide and unfaltering in her pale
face, and he was suddenly conscious of just how fragile she was. He noticed other things. Her lips were colorless and there were dark smudges under her eyes. He hadn’t expected smiles, but he’d expected something more than this. She was as lifeless as a china doll.

This was his doing, he thought bitterly, and he would have given anything to erase the last two weeks. He would make it up to her, he promised himself, just as soon as this business with Nemo was cleared up. He’d take her to his estate in Oxfordshire and get the bloom back in her cheeks and the sparkle back in her eyes. They’d talk, as they’d never talked before. They’d make a new beginning, just as soon as this business with Nemo was settled.

He took another cautious step toward her. “Listen to me, Abbie. We still haven’t caught the mastermind behind all this. If there’s any danger to you or George, it will come from him. All I want to do is to protect you both, but George must first tell me all he knows. Where is he, Abbie? Where is George?”

His expression was so sincere, so like the old Hugh’s. If she hadn’t known him better, she might have been tempted to take a chance on him. But she would never trust him again.

“I don’t know where he is.”

“You told me you would hand over the book to him in Bath, but Langley’s people haven’t been able to pick up his trail.”

Her breath quickened. “Even if I knew where George was, I wouldn’t tell you. Haven’t you done enough to me? Do you know that the house is being watched even as we speak? Do you know I’m followed wherever I go? How can anyone live like that?”

He spoke calmly and slowly. “Yes, I know, and it’s for your own protection.”

“Then,” she flashed, her bitterness spilling over in spite of herself, “why aren’t they protecting me from you?”

“Look,” he said, “I admit I made a mistake. But I had no idea Maitland would take you to Newgate or that you would be so stubborn in your resistance. I thought you would be home in a few hours. But if you had told me the truth from the beginning, none of this would have happened.”

“The truth,” she flared, her voice shaking. “You’re a fine one to talk about the truth—
El Centurion
.”

In the long silence that followed, she could hear the clock on the mantel ticking, and the rumble of a carriage as it passed over the cobblestones outside the front door.

“You had that from Maitland, I suppose?”

“He gave me your file to read.”

“What file?”

“The one with your name on it.”

He raised a skeptical eyebrow. “He was lying to you, Abbie. There are no files on agents. It would be too dangerous if they fell into the wrong hands.”

“Really?” she scoffed. “Well, someone kept a file on you. It was extremely edifying, Major Templar. You should have told me you were a hero.”

He folded his arms across his chest and studied her with narrowed eyes. “I’m not ashamed of my war record,” he said.

She was doing exactly what she’d told herself she wouldn’t do. She was practically begging him to justify his actions when she knew there was no justification for what he’d done, not after they’d become lovers. And that
was the crux of the matter, not his war record, not his duplicity, pretending to be one kind of man when he was really another, but that he’d taken her as casually as he’d taken all those other women she’d read about in his file. She’d given him the gift of her love and he’d cast it aside like so much dross.

She was losing the struggle to hold back her tears. Horrified, she turned to run, but he stepped in front of her, blocking her path to the door.

“No,” he said, “I won’t let you run away from me. You brought this up, Abbie. If there is someone keeping a record on me, I want to know what’s in it. So what else did you read?”

She clenched her hands together as she struggled to hold back the words. She didn’t want to embark on this. It was too humiliating. The words came anyway. “Desdemona? Mercedes? Catalina? Does that jog your memory?”

He blinked slowly. “Who?”

“Don’t pretend you don’t know. It’s all in your file. You left a string of women behind you from Lisbon to Paris. Desdemona? Mercedes? Catalina? To name a few.”

He looked at her as though she’d taken leave of her senses, then, as enlightenment dawned, his shoulders began to shake. When he saw the pain flash in her eyes, he stopped laughing and let out a long sigh. “Those were the code names of my contacts. Desdemona was a priest, and Mercedes and Catalina were, if I remember correctly, the leaders of bands of Spanish guerrillas. The messages we exchanged were in the form of love letters, but that was only to fool our enemies. You’ve misunderstood, Abbie.”

Her smile was laced with acid. “And I suppose Barbara Munro is your sister?”

“Ah, no. That was not well done of me. I made a mistake there, which I’ve since corrected. Nothing happened, Abbie. I couldn’t … well, I wouldn’t … She’s not you, you see.”

She felt herself weakening, and that horrified her. “And what about Estelle? Is that another code name for one of your Spanish contacts?”

He regarded her through narrowed eyes. “Maitland has been thorough, hasn’t he? No. I would have told you about Estelle before much longer.”

“She was your wife?”

“Yes.”

She didn’t feel anything, she told herself; she wouldn’t allow herself to feel anything. She said coldly, “Is it true what Maitland told me—that you sent her home to Ireland to die of a broken heart?”

He was very still, very watchful. “What do you think, Abbie?”

“I think,” she said, “that it would be just like you.”

“You little hypocrite!” His voice was low and intense. “Are you trying to make me feel guilty? Well, it won’t work. Yes, I sent my wife home to Ireland. One day I may tell you about her, but not now.

“And if I did break my wife’s heart, and if I did take up with Barbara Munro or leave a string of women behind me in Spain, what difference would it make to us? Not the slightest difference. And you know why as well as I do.”

When he made a movement toward her, her nerve broke. With a squeal of fright, she dodged past him and made for the door. He caught her by the waist and spun
her to face him. She found herself imprisoned in the circle of one arm while he used his free hand to force her chin up. She braced for his kiss but it did not come.

Long moments passed, Abbie not daring to provoke him, so threatening did he seem as he loomed above her. Then the violence in his eyes died away.

“You little spitfire!” he said on a shaken laugh, and kissed her.

She slammed her fists into his ribs, and his response was to tighten his arms till she could scarcely breathe. She strained, she struggled, she squirmed, and the kiss went on and on. And because she couldn’t breathe, so she told herself, she stopped struggling and clung to him.

When he raised his mouth from hers, she let out a teary breath. He spoke against her lips. “I’ve missed you. I’ve missed this. Haven’t you missed me, even a little?”