Leslie Lafoy (4 page)

Leaning down, he trailed his fingertips over the seams joining the seat bench to the floorboard. It was tight and he knew even as he made his search that he wasn’t going to find anything in the course of it.

“The floor as well?”

Hearing the amusement in her voice, he leaned forward and checked the other side, replying, “I’m not going to provide you with the specific details.”

“I should hope not,” she countered, the distinct sound of laughter edging her words. “Not that I can’t very well surmise them on my own, you understand.”

“Oh?”

Isabella struggled to keep her smile suppressed as he straightened and met her gaze. “I’m well acquainted with the carnal possibilities in even the shortest carriage ride,” she assured him.

“Really.”

Oh, Lord help her; the way he cocked his brow and the dry, almost sardonic edge to his drawl were so … so … Appealing. If the one time in her life when she’d listened to the little voice of temptation hadn’t turned out so very badly … She swallowed down her suddenly skittering heart and somehow managed to blithely retort, “Of course. I simply haven’t made it quite the habit or the art form that Mignon did.”

His brow rose another degree. “But since you are a widow, those days—and possibilities—are past you now.”

She couldn’t decide if it was a backhanded invitation or an observation that she was, fundamentally and to his general disappointment, a woman with obvious moral standards. “They were past me while I was still a wife,” she admitted and then abruptly, firmly, took the subject in a less personal direction, saying, “I gather that you didn’t find anything in searching the floor? She might have folded it quite small.”

“Nothing.”

“Damn,” she muttered on a sigh, looking down at her lap. “Despite knowing better, I had hoped this might be relatively easy.”

He snorted quietly and said, “I know my acquaintance with your cousin was limited, but it was sufficient to form the distinct impression that Mignon never did anything in an ‘easy’ fashion.”

“No, sadly, she didn’t,” Isabella supplied, absently smoothing the persistent wrinkle in her skirt. “Her life would have been much happier—and longer—if she had. In a great many respects, she seemed to go through her days trying to make as many enemies as she possibly could. In my kinder moments I often felt very sorry for her.”

Barrett pursed his lips and considered the woman in the opposite seat. What would Mignon have said about her? he wondered. That she was naïve and altogether too honest and trusting? That she was, despite her moments of bravado and resolve, too sentimental and kindhearted for her own good? That Isabella Dandaneau stupidly put being a good person ahead of self-interest?

The carriage slowed and maneuvered to the side of the roadway, signaling the end of their ride and his pointless musing. As they were drawing to a halt, he leaned forward and grasped the door handle, sternly reminding himself that there was no reason to know any more about this woman in a personal sense than he had her cousin. Once Isabella got her hands on the missing half of the map, she was going to be nothing more than a flash of disappearing skirts.

No, he amended, as he vaulted down onto the walkway in front of his house, that wasn’t entirely true. Or honest. She’d promised, in exchange for his help, to write the authorities a letter exonerating him in Mignon’s death and her actions so far suggested that she was, above all else, an honorable woman. She’d write that letter.

And be gone within the same instant as she handed it to him, his more cynical side added darkly. If the authorities didn’t believe a word of what she wrote … If they had questions he couldn’t answer … If she turned up dead after leaving him … His stomach a tight and frigid pit, his mind numbly staring at the crumbling edge of the abyss, Barrett managed to summon a polite and courtly smile as he handed her down onto the public walkway.

Gesturing up the walk that led to his front door, he let her lead the way and desperately tried to marshal his wits as he followed in her wake. No matter how he looked at it, he was buggered six ways to Sunday. If he let her walk away to pursue Lafitte’s treasure on her own, he stood a damn good chance of quickly regretting it. If he tagged along with her in the quest, he was going to regret that, too.

She was trouble. A different kind of trouble than Mignon was, certainly, but trouble nonetheless. Just what exactly she’d end up doing to him, putting him through, he couldn’t even begin to imagine. But the heavy sense of dread and doom was undeniable. It was much like the feeling that came with looking out over a river gorge and knowing deep inside that it wasn’t meant to be bridged, that you were pitting yourself against the will of God.

Isabella slid a quick glance up at him as he reached around her and opened the door of his home. His brows were knitted, his lips compressed, and his jaw a hard granite line. The light in his dark eyes wasn’t angry, though. No, more troubled and pensive, she decided as she stepped into the foyer. Not knowing what to do from there, she stopped and openly surveyed the portions of the house visible from the entry.

“You have a lovely home,” she ventured. “It’s so English. I like it.”

Gesturing for her to unbutton her redingote, he then set about removing his own wrap and took up his end of polite conversation, asking, “Are your homes so different in Louisiana?”

“I’ve noticed that English houses, no matter how large, tend to have a very structured and tight feeling to them. Ours, on the other hand, tend to sprawl in a rather indolent manner and blur the lines between indoors and out.”

“My friend Carden is an architect,” he replied, taking the light coat from her shoulders. Hanging it on a wall peg beside his, he added, “I’ve seen illustrations of your homes in one of his books. As I recall, there seems to be a fondness for what the author called verandahs.”

“My own house had two of them,” she provided, trying—and failing—to keep the sadness from tightening her throat. She swallowed and forced herself to smile. “One on the main level and one on the second. Both wrapped the entire house.”

“This way, please,” he said, indicating the stairs that led to the upper floor.

Isabella gathered her skirts and started up, acutely aware that he was following on her heels, his hand not touching her, but hovering protectively near the small of her back. It had been such a long time since any man had made even the smallest effort at gallantry. Those who had made it the cornerstone of their lives were all gone. Those who were left—

“You used the past tense just a moment ago,” he observed, gently interrupting her thoughts. “I gather you no longer own that house?”

The tone of his question implied that it had been sold and she’d moved on of her own volition. “It was burned to the ground by the Union Army,” she supplied as the horrible memories of that night played through her mind. Reny. Nigel. Bartholomew. Their desperate insistence that she leave first. The three shots as the flames had leaped high and the bluebellies stood in the yard and laughed. Isabella took a deep breath and shook her head to dispel the memory. “The land on which it once stood is still mine,” she added, forcing herself, yet again, to move on. “Until they take it for unpaid taxes, of course.”

Barrett winced at the stoic resolve evident in her voice and regretted his part in stirring what were obviously painful memories. The Americans and their war. It had been over for the better part of a year now, but he should have remembered it and known that Isabella Dandaneau was likely to have suffered in the course of it. Feeling the need to say something comforting and apologetic, he offered, “I know that words are of very little consolation,” as they reached the top of the stairs. “But I’m sincerely sorry for your loss.”

“What’s done is done,” she said tightly—almost as though by rote. “What’s lost is lost. You can’t dwell on what was.”

“A healthy attitude.”

“Well,” she replied, looking up at him and arching a dark brow, “it’s either find a way to go on or lie down and cry yourself to death. And since I’ve seen quite enough of death in the last six years, it’s really not a difficult decision to make.”

Not for the strong, he knew. The weak never saw the choice and the cowards pretended there was only one.
An interesting woman, this Isabella Dandaneau,
he thought as he gestured absently in the direction of his bedroom door. He watched her move off.
She has secrets. Dark secrets.

Her abrupt halt, her gasp, instantly brought him from his musings. Turning his head to see what had alarmed her, he found the door to his room standing wide open. Beyond it, the contents lay in complete shambles. He quickly put himself between her and the room while drawing the pistol from the small of his back, and then strode forward to the threshold.

No one was there; whoever had ransacked the place was apparently long gone. But to have gotten in to do their damage … His heart in his throat, he turned on his heel and raced to the staircase and started down, yelling, “Mrs. Wallace! Cook!”

He was aware of both Isabella following on his heels and of the unnatural stillness of his house. He should have noticed it the instant he walked in. Jesus! If something had happened to the two women … Older. Trusting. Defenseless. He’d find and kill the son of a bitch. “Mrs. Wallace!” he bellowed as he scrambled into the kitchen. “Cook!”

Isabella’s hand was already on the pantry doorknob when he, too, heard the thumping sound. “No,” he whispered harshly, catching her wrist and drawing her back. “I’ll go first. Stand aside.”

She nodded once, crisply, and took two small steps back. It wasn’t as far as he would have preferred, but it was far enough to be out of his and immediate harm’s way. He flung the door wide, instantly vaulting into the dimly lit space with the muzzle of his pistol sweeping across it.

The shelves were in perfect order and his housekeeper and cook were neatly wrapped in sheets, bound, gagged, and lying in the center of the floor. And apparently, judging by the way they were kicking the base of the cabinets, relatively unharmed.

“Thank God,” he murmured, tucking the gun away and dropping to one knee beside Mrs. Wallace. At the edge of his vision he saw Isabella kneel beside his cook. Reaching up his sleeve, Barrett withdrew his knife and slashed the gag and then the cording that encircled his housekeeper’s arms and legs.

“Here,” he said, blindly extending the knife toward Isabella, “use this.”

“Thank you, but no,” she replied quickly, quietly. “I carry my own.”

Stunned, he looked over just in time to see her slip a stiletto into the side seam of her skirt. Deliberately setting aside his wonder and all the questions that came with it, he put his own knife back up his sleeve and then set about helping Mrs. Wallace free herself from the linen wrapper.

“Who did this?” he asked as he helped her roll onto her back and then rise to a sitting position. “Can you describe him?”

“There were two, sir,” she supplied, shoving her disheveled gray hair off her forehead. “Judging by the sounds, one was tying up Cook when the other dragged me in here.”

“Came in through the back door, they did,” Cook added as Isabella helped right her. “Said they had a delivery of ice. The lying dogs.”

“What did they look like?” he pressed.

“Can’t say that I saw their faces clear enough, sir,” Cook replied. “I wasn’t wearing my spectacles since I was doing the laundry and that tends to fog them over.”

“The one who surprised me dropped a sheet over my head from behind when I was in the parlor,” Mrs. Wallace contributed, still working on repairing her coiffure. “I had no idea he was there until that moment. I’m sorry, sir. Have they stolen everything?”

Barrett rose to his feet and extended his hands. “I have no idea and, frankly, don’t care if they did. Have you been harmed in any way?”

“Aside from the fright of it all, no, sir,” she provided, accepting his assistance and gaining her feet. “They were quite careful in how they tied us.”

Watching Isabella competently get his cook on her feet, he continued his questioning, asking, “What did they sound like? English? French? American?”

“The one that said they were here with ice was English,” Cook answered. “Not a man of quality, though. I never heard the other one speak so I can’t rightly say what he was.”

“Neither did I, sir.”

Barrett sighed in frustration and moved on to his next concern. “Did you hear them leave?”

“Yes, sir,” Cook hastily assured him. “Some time ago. They weren’t here for long. They went directly upstairs, banged about, and then left straightaway, going out the same way they came in.”

Isabella inched backward to better take in the scene before her. The two women were physically rumpled, but otherwise quite composed. If any one of the three other people in the room was visibly shaken from the ordeal, it was, surprisingly, Barrett Stanbridge. He raked his fingers through his hair, utterly destroying the style, and then expelled a long hard breath and squared his shoulders.

“It’s not safe for you to remain in the house, ladies,” he said firmly, motioning them all to precede him out of the pantry and into the kitchen proper. As they complied, he went on, saying, “I want you both to pack a bag for an extended stay away. If you have someplace you’d prefer to go other than a comfortable inn—with family, perhaps—please let James know and he’ll take you there. When I believe the danger’s past, I’ll send for you. Consider this a paid, well-earned holiday.”

“Yes, sir,” Mrs. Wallace replied, dropping a quick curtsy. “We’ll see to it immediately.” And, true to her word, she started for the servants’ stairs, calling back over her shoulder, “Come along, Edna.”

Cook—Edna, apparently—gave Barrett a curtsy of her own and obediently followed after her, leaving Isabella alone with him in the warm and humid room.

His gaze dropped to the side of her skirt for a second and then came back up to meet hers as he said, “I’m going out to the carriage house to speak with my driver. I’ll be back shortly. Don’t leave this house.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” she assured him. “I’ll be upstairs when you return.”