Sweet Revenge (8 page)

“
Quickly
, goddamn it! ” He rushed to the window and checked the back garden. Seemingly satisfied, he turned. “Then hide in the pantry. Don’t make a sound.”

At the moment, he seemed like the lesser of two evils, so she decided to do as she was told.

Tucking the mask in his pocket, Saybrook hurriedly retrieved the pistols and dropped them close by the body. Gritting his teeth, he yanked the knife from the dead man’s back and rolled the body over. “God forgive me,” he muttered, cutting several quick jabs into the fast-cooling flesh before lodging the blade between two ribs.

What was he doing?
she wondered, casting a sidelong glance at the macabre scene.

After reordering a few of the other fallen objects, Saybrook rose awkwardly to his feet.

“Open up! Open up!” A fist pounded on the kitchen entrance, rattling the locked latch.

“I’m coming!” Glancing down at his bloodied trousers, Saybrook gave a wry grimace. “I won’t have to exaggerate my own ineptitude,” he added under his breath.

Shooting back the bolt, he flung the door open. “Don’t just stand there,” he snarled at the four guards who were staring in bewilderment at the carnage. “The chef has escaped. I tried to stop him but the damned fellow is as skilled as a butcher. You and you”—he jabbed a finger at the two closest men—“go after him. He fled through the garden. But have a care—he’s armed and dangerous.”

As the pair headed off in pursuit, Saybrook quickly turned to the remaining men.

Crouched in the darkness, Arianna listened to his orders, growing more mystified by the moment. He was saving her from the wolves.
But why?

Through a crack in the door, she saw Saybrook grab the nearest man by the arm. “I want you to carry a message to Mr. Basil Henning, at number six Queen Street—and do it with all haste,” he barked. “Tell him that Lord Saybrook needs to see him immediately, but say nothing of what has happened. You are to wait and escort him back here. Understood?”

“Yes, milord!”

Milord?
She frowned, feeling even more disoriented.

Saybrook waved the man on his way, and then addressed the last man. “And you are to remain with the Prince Regent. Lock yourself in his chamber, draw the curtains, and admit no one until I come and tell you otherwise.” He paused for a fraction. “Is that clear?”

The man snapped a salute.

“Go!” he ordered.

Drawing a deep breath, Saybrook waited for several long moments before approaching the pantry. He opened the door a touch more but did not enter. “I assume you have female clothing hidden in your room.”

“Yes,” answered Arianna in an equally low voice.

“Get dressed. And pack up any traces of your disguises,” he said curtly. “Be quick about it. When the moment comes, we will have to move fast. In the meantime, stay quiet as a church mouse.”

Arianna didn’t waste any time with questions. Gliding past him with quick, silent steps, she slipped into the shadows of the bedchamber.

“Who the devil are you?” he growled.

“I could ask the same of you, sir.”

He made a face. “A far more pressing question for both of us, Miss Smith, is why Major Crandall, late of the Horse Guards and Lord Grentham’s senior staff, is lying dead on the kitchen floor.”

“T
his way—and quickly, damn it.” Wrapping his long fingers around her arm, Saybrook shoved her past the upturned corpse. “You moved fast as a snake earlier.”

Arianna tore her gaze from the slashed shirt linen and pooled patterns of viscous red. Bile rose in her throat but she forced down her momentary nausea with an acid retort. “For which you should be bloody thankful.”

“I’ll compose a suitably sentimental ode to your audacity later.” He inched the door open a fraction and made a rapid survey of the garden. “Let’s go.”

Saybrook stumbled on the uneven gravel but quickly steadied his stride and cut through a narrow gap in the ornamental plantings. Despite the labored hitch of his gait, he moved with surprising speed. Arianna found herself hurrying to keep pace.

Hugging close to the leafy shadows of the ivy-twined wall, he led the way to the side gate, which gave access to an alleyway.

“Left leads past the mews and out to Welbeck Street,” she murmured as he ventured a peek through the wrought iron bars. Her first day of employment, she had scouted out the area, making a mental note of how to disappear in a hurry. “Right goes straight to Wigmore Street. It’s shorter, but there’s usually more traffic.”

“Which means a greater likelihood of finding a hackney,” he said, more to himself than to her. “We’ll chance it.” He shifted his weight, leaning a shoulder to the painted metal. His coat covered the rent in his trousers, but she saw that the wool was growing wet and sticking to his knee.

“Your leg—”

“Sod my leg,” growled Saybrook. “You ought to be far more concerned about your neck.”

She bit back a sharp reply. His face was deathly pale, accentuating the Stygian shadows beneath his hooded eyes.

The gate creaked, and in another moment they were turning the corner.

“Aren’t you afraid that we’ll attract attention?” demanded Arianna. His hand was still clamped like a manacle around her arm. To emphasize her point, she gave a small shake of her canvas satchel. “You are limping, and ladies aren’t often seen carrying such bags.”

Saybrook reached around and plucked it from her grasp.

“Don’t be an arse,” she protested in a low voice. “You’re having trouble enough hauling your own carcass to the next crossing. What I meant was, I would draw less notice on my own.”

“Arse?” His grip tightened. “I was an arse to accept this . . . this . . .”

This what?
Arianna waited for him to finish, but he merely sucked in a breath and looked up and down the street.

“If any of the guards spot us,” he added, after hailing a hackney, “I shall say that I saw you walking past the house and wish to detain you as a possible witness.”

“I still say that you should let me go ahead on my own,” she pressed. “We can choose a place to meet up later.”

He answered with a curt, mirthless laugh. “I may be an arse, but I’m not an idiot,” he added. “Though given my earlier incompetence, I can hardly blame you for thinking me a bumbling fool.”

Whatever else he was, Mr. De Quincy was no fool, thought Arianna. She had merely hoped to catch him off guard.

“It was worth a try,” she replied coolly.

“You’ll have to do better,” said Saybrook, helping her none too gently into the hired carriage. He climbed in after her and collapsed in an inelegant sprawl beside her.

She could feel heat emanating from his body.
Fever? Anger? Or some dark, drug-deranged emotion that she could not name?
It bothered her that she was having such a difficult time figuring him out. Men were, in her experience, primitive creatures, ruled by three basic lusts—power, money, and sex. That made them rather simple to understand.

But Mr. De Quincy was proving an exception to the rule. Which made him dangerous.

Slanting a look through the grimy glass panes, Arianna reminded herself that she had survived for years by outwitting men who posed a far greater threat than her captor. It should be easy to escape his clutches—she would just have to pick the right moment. One twist, one lunge, and she could surely outrun him, leaving her free to pursue her own quarry.

Let De Quincy chase his own specters. All she cared about was the ghosts from her father’s past. Step by step, she was coming closer to the truth. So close she could almost taste it.

“Turn here!” Rapping his knuckles on the trap, Saybrook called out a few more commands.

As Arianna watched the buildings roll by, she forced herself to quell the flutter of unease in her belly.
Where was he taking her?
At present, he seemed reluctant to turn her over to the authorities.

But that could change in the blink of an eye.

She had better seize her chance to run, and soon.

The wheels clattered to a halt on the cobblestones, and once again Arianna let herself be hustled down an alleyway and through a garden gate. The terraced grounds were far fancier than Lady Spencer’s haphazard layout. Formal hedges of trimmed yew flanked pristine paths of white gravel, their precise symmetry blurred by a profusion of colorful flowers.

“Where are we?” she asked abruptly.

Saybrook brushed by a trellis of climbing roses, stirring a sudden, overpowering sweetness in the air. For an instant, she was dizzy, disoriented. The lush floral fragrance seemed so insanely at odds with the metallic smell of death still lingering in her nostrils.
Silk and steel.
Seeing the swirl of soft pinks darken to deep red, she choked down a burble of hysterical laughter.

Don’t panic,
she chided herself. Not when she could still salvage victory from the jaws of defeat.

Shaking off the strange light-headedness, Arianna tried to concentrate on memorizing the layout of the gardens. There was a second gate ahead, just past a small storage shed discreetly hidden from the main house by a screen of holly trees. The door was partly open, revealing sacks of manure and an assortment of terra-cotta pots—

Without warning, Saybrook whirled and shoved her inside.

“Sorry.” The click of the padlock punctuated the apology. “I need to arrange things inside the main house.”

“Bloody bastard,” she hissed, thumping her fists against the oak planks.

“I suggest you remain silent, Miss Smith. You’re a good deal more comfortable in there than in one of the Horse Guards interrogation chambers.”

His reply only fueled her frustration. Kicking at the clay shards underfoot, she muttered several words in Creole under her breath.

“Look, you ungrateful wench, I’ve put my neck on the chopping block for you,” he snapped. “The least you can do is refrain from insulting my manhood.”

Arianna clenched her teeth.

“And in case you are wondering, all the sharp implements are kept elsewhere. So resign yourself to spending the next little while inside. If you’ll notice, I tossed your valise inside with you, so you are not entirely stripped of creature comforts.”

“It’s dark in here,” she muttered, squinting at the thin slivers of light coming in through the cracks. “And it stinks of
merde
.”

“I seem to recall that you prefer the dark,” said Saybrook. “As for the odor, would you prefer the smell of death?”

“How long do you plan to keep me confined in this cesspool?”

“Hard to say,” he replied. “In the meantime, there’s a small potting bench built into the back wall. “I suggest that you sit quietly and contemplate the error of your ways.”

She ground out another oath.

“Rather than spend your time cursing me to the devil, you might want to think about this—it was
you
, not
me
, who Major Crandall was trying to kill. Would you really rather take your chances on the streets of London, with no idea of who else might be hunting for you?”