The Pleasure Trap (28 page)

“It will become my best friend.”

“See that it does. Where is Dexter?”

At the sound of his name, Dexter poked his head up from the other side of the bed and slowly ambled over to Ash. When he scratched Dexter’s ears, the dog purred like a kitten.

“Make sure he is with you whenever you leave the house,” Ash said.

He walked to the windows and shut and bolted them. “And make sure you lock your door behind me.”

“You’re…you’re leaving me?”

One brow lifted. “What did you expect?”

“I thought you would stay the night.”

A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth as he crossed to her. “You’ve got the wrong idea about me, Eve Dearing,” he said. “I’m saving myself for marriage.
Our
marriage, as you know very well. Just say the magic words and I’m all yours.”

Her mouth worked but no words came.

He gave her a moment, then dropped a careless kiss on her brow. “You’ll figure it out if you think about it,” and he strolled to the door and left her.

After he left Eve, Ash joined Hawkins and they made the rounds of the ground floor together, checking windows and doors, making sure that everything was as it should be. The house was too big to see to everything by themselves, so Ash made a note to have the servants see to it first thing in the morning. “And I want that scaffolding down,” he said. “It’s the easiest point of entry for an intruder trying to break in.”

The last thing Ash did was to assemble the night porters and impress on them the need for vigilance, using the pretext that there were many strangers in the area for the fair, some of whom would be from the criminal classes with their eyes on any grand house that was not well protected.

“They’ll rob us blind if they think they can get away with it.”

He wasn’t sure how seriously they took his warning and wished that he had a troop of soldiers under his command. Dereliction of duty had serious consequences in the army. He thought of offering them a bonus and decided against it. He didn’t want to stir up speculation or suspicion in case it got back to Messenger.

It was a good hour after he left Eve before he got to his bed, but he was too keyed up to sleep. He kept thinking about Eve’s story in the
Herald,
and the muscles in his stomach tied themselves in knots. To put a woman at risk for whatever reason went against his principles. And Eve wasn’t any woman. If something went wrong, if anything happened to her, he would never forgive himself.

One part of him wanted to give her a good shaking, but another part—the logical part—told him that her way was the one sure way of drawing the villain out, whoever he might be. What gnawed at him was that she’d set things in motion without consulting him.

Think of Harry. How far would you be prepared to go to catch his murderer?

He would do anything, give anything, except put Eve at risk.

He was seized by the wild notion of abducting her and carrying her off to his grandfather’s castle in Scotland, but that wouldn’t do for long. When they came back to London, he’d always be looking over his shoulder, wondering if Messenger was right behind them. Who could live with that?

Eve couldn’t have set her scheme in motion at a worse time. The fair would be noisy and crowded with people. Messenger would never have a better chance of getting to Eve than by melting into the crowd.

If only Ash had something solid to go on, but his mind was numb from going over all the details they’d discovered. There were too many bits and pieces to slot into their proper places. He needed to clear his mind, forget his preconceived notions, and start over.

It started for him at the symposium. He was determined to discover who had written those stories. His thoughts moved to Angelo, Lydia, Messenger, Eve and her fellow writers, the heckler. Other names came to him.

A theory was taking shape—imprecise, foggy, a startling change of direction that acted like a magnet on the pieces that had puzzled him for so long. He needed time to think about it, time to prove it, but—damn it all!—time was what Eve had taken away from him.

Time. What the devil was he doing in this lonely bed when who knew how much time was left to them? Eve had practically invited him to share her bed. Masculine pride was a sorry reward for what he had given up.

He got out of bed, dressed himself, and padded along the corridor to Eve’s room. She wasn’t asleep, either. She opened the door as soon as he knocked and called her name.

“I’m miserable without you” was all he got out before she dragged him into her room.

Their loving was different, slow, pleasurable, and almost entirely physical. In the aftermath, he wanted to talk. Eve wanted to sleep.

He kissed her brow. “What is it, Eve?” he asked. “What’s wrong?”

Her head moved restlessly on the pillow. “Don’t talk. Just hold me, Ash. That’s all I want, to feel your arms around me.”

He would have persisted in drawing her out if he hadn’t wanted to avoid upsetting her before the fair. She had enough to contend with without having to placate a quarrelsome lover.

Sighing, he gathered her in his arms. Gradually, their breathing evened and they slept.

Chapter Twenty-four

The locals called their fair “the greatest fair in England,” and Eve could see why. She had never seen such hordes of people milling about on the common or so many vendors selling their wares from booths and stalls. There were goldsmiths, milliners, drapers, clothiers, sellers of toys, books, medicines, and, on every corner, the marquees of cookshops and taverns with tables and benches strategically placed outside for the comfort of their customers.

Lady Sayers looked around her with satisfaction. “Not the sort of event ladies of quality should frequent,” she remarked gaily. “That’s what my late husband used to say. Do you know, I wasn’t interested in attending the fair until he said those words? After that, you couldn’t keep me away.”

Everyone laughed, except Ash. In his view, the late Lord Sayers knew a thing or two. There was a darker side to the fair. Prostitutes, pickpockets, and pimps were there in force. The puppet shows were blatantly bawdy, as were the strolling actors and mimers who performed their pieces whenever two or more people gathered to watch. On the far side of the common, roped off from the tents and booths, a ring had been set up, and the roar from the spectators as the pugilists battled it out drowned the din of musicians and the hawkers who shouted their wares. Happily, no ladies were allowed to go beyond those ropes or his little crew would be demanding entrance.

As an afterthought, her ladyship added, “The crowds will thin out when it begins to get dark. That’s the time I like best. The rowdies at the fight will wander off to some tavern to celebrate, or drown their sorrows, as the case may be, and the place will be left to the locals.”

It was early evening, with the gold-shot sun dipping toward the horizon, and the party from the Manor included several acquaintances and friends from the symposium. This was Ash’s doing, thought Eve. He had her hedged about by stalwart men-at-arms dressed up as gentlemen of fashion.

Her gaze touched on each gentleman in turn. Philip Henderson had turned up with that charming, intelligent Miss Rose, and Amanda was ignoring her as though she were one of the painted ladies who made eyes at every gentleman who strolled by. Dr. Braine was there, much to her surprise, looking more like a schoolmaster than a doctor as he lectured Liza on, Eve suspected, her latest gaffe. Leigh Fleming was firmly sandwiched between her aunt and Lady Sayers, which would suit him fine. If there was a brawl, they would protect him. Poor Leigh, he was a bookworm, not a fighter. She doubted if he even knew how to load a gun. There were others she did not know, and others she could not see, but she was sure Hawkins would be hovering nearby. Reaper, Ash had told her, was keeping an eye on Hill House.

Angelo—she couldn’t think of him as Messenger—would never get near her. That was the trouble. Her plan depended on her appearing to be an easy target. If he sensed a trap, he wouldn’t show himself.

But if she could read his thoughts, she’d have him!

Oh, Lord, she wasn’t that brave. What if she got into his mind and never got out of it? A few seconds was all she could stand. Her perception went beyond the words that only she could hear. She could read his character, and what she read made her feel that she’d bathed in a cesspool.

Ash’s voice jerked her from her thoughts. “In the meantime,” he said, “keep your eyes peeled for pickpockets. Don’t let anyone get too close to you.” He dropped his voice, and for Eve’s ears only went on, “And while you’re at it, stop staring at those painted ladies or you may find yourself embroiled in a nasty war of words, and you wouldn’t want to hear their words.”

She made the effort to appear as though she hadn’t a care in the world, knowing that if he guessed how frightened she was, he would whisk her back to the house and bar the doors.

“I know how to win a war of words,” she said, and she patted her bulging reticule.

“Your pocket pistol?”

“Need you ask?”

He would have laughed if Liza had not gasped and dashed to one of the booths with the other ladies hot on her heels. He relaxed when he saw that they were only ogling the bonnets that were cunningly displayed on a long table, a lure to draw unsuspecting shoppers into the marquee where the more expensive stock was laid out.

These ladies, he thought acidly, had the instincts of puppies. Every new toy had to be investigated. And the thing that got his goat was that they didn’t buy a thing. They wanted to see the wares in all the booths before they made up their minds.

Philip Henderson joined Ash and said conversationally, “I read Miss Dearing’s piece in the
Herald.
I hope you both know what you are doing.”

“It was Eve’s idea. Had I known beforehand what she was up to, I would have stopped publication. It never occurred to me that she was setting herself up as a target.”

Philip looked skeptical, but he did not press the point. Miss Rose had returned to the fold, and he gave his attention to her.

Ash’s eyes scanned the crush. He wasn’t the only one keeping an eye on things. Constable Keble was standing under the awning of one of the cookshops, signaling to two burly fellows who nodded and began to trail a flashy gentleman in a green coat.

He didn’t know why he didn’t feel confident. Everything that could be done to protect Eve was in place, and not only Eve but Lydia, as well. Not that he expected trouble in that quarter, but it paid to be cautious. Reaper was at Hill House, keeping an eye on things, and Anna was there, too.

But if his theory was right, Lydia was the last person who was in need of protection. All the same, he reminded himself, it was only a theory.

Dusk had taken a firm grip on the May Fair, but the encroaching shadows were held in check by a profusion of hanging lanterns at every booth and stall. Business wasn’t as brisk as it had been earlier in the day and, as Lady Sayers had predicted, the crowds had thinned, but there were still plenty of people waiting to take in the dancing once the fiddlers in the bandstand struck up a tune.

“Don’t look round,” said Liza, “but I think Anna’s boy is watching us.”

“What?” Eve’s head came up.

“I caught sight of him in the trees just now on your left, but she—I mean, he is as nervous as a deer. Something has frightened him off and he’s not there now.”

Eve glanced surreptitiously in the direction Liza had indicated. She could see what had frightened Nell. One of Keble’s mounted officers had emerged from the trees and had stationed himself in front of a dense hedge of hawthorns.

She turned back to Liza with a sigh. They were sitting at a trestle table outside one of the more respectable cookshops, with a good view of the bandstand, refreshing themselves with punch and macaroons. Some of their party were close by or slightly apart, conversing with acquaintances who had stopped to pass the time of day. Others had wandered off.

Her eye was caught by Ash, who was at the other end of her table, conversing with Jason Ford. Ash had used Mr. Ford before, and Eve wondered if Ford had been hired to keep an eye on her. On the other hand, Liza might have invited him along to make the doctor jealous. Poor Liza. She’d get no joy there. Dr. Braine was one of those who had wandered away.

To the question in Ash’s eyes, she replied by shaking her head. Nothing was troubling her, no voices or visions. If Messenger was here, she could not sense him.

Liza took up where she’d left off. “What’s to become of a boy like that when Anna goes home to Cornwall? He can’t speak, or he doesn’t want to. He prefers animals to people. You can’t get him to sleep in a bed or stay indoors. He prefers the barn to the house.” She put down her tankard with a soft thud. “We’ll all be going home to our own comfortable lives in another week or two. What’s to become of Nell then?” She shook her head. “I meant to say Neil, of course.”

Eve had watched the emotions play on the younger girl’s face, and she felt a tide of affection well up inside her. Liza was so much more than showed on the surface. She was a debutante. Her ball was only a week away. Decorators were hard at work, sprucing up the picture gallery for the great event. She should be giddy with excitement. But here she was, worrying about Nell. Liza was far from perfect, but in the things that really mattered, she was pure gold.

She squeezed Liza’s hand. “Neil has a champion now. Look at the time and care Anna gives to her donkeys. What do you think she is going to do with them when she leaves here?” She nodded. “Yes, she’ll move heaven and earth to take them with her. Do you think she’d leave her boy behind?”

Liza did not look convinced. “I hope so, because he can’t stay here. It’s too dangerous. You know what I mean. If only he would stay hidden, but he comes out after dark—oh, not showing himself openly, but like tonight, watching from the shadows.”

Nell was a sad case, thought Eve. She had nowhere to go, no family to take her in. She was like a wild creature that was only half tamed, not a predator but a predator’s prey.

If others worked out who Neil was, she knew what would happen. They’d discover that he was really the girl who had escaped from Bedlam and send for the keepers.

Not if Ash had anything to do with it. He’d promised he would demolish Bedlam brick by brick before he’d let Nell go back there. And if he were appointed to the board of governors, Nell’s case, she was sure, would be thoroughly investigated, and not only Nell’s. It was in Ash’s nature to protect the weak and defenseless.

“Where is Dexter, by the way?” Liza asked.

“He’s at the Manor with Andy. Lady Sayers said that no dogs were allowed at the fair, and I can see why. Dexter would have a great time chasing off those mimers and actors.”

“Poor Andy. He’s missing the fair.”

“No. He was here earlier, and he knows I’ll reward him well for his trouble.”

Liza laughed. Eve smiled, but her thoughts had taken a dark turn. She felt distinctly uneasy, knowing that Nell had been drawn to the fair just when they’d set a trap for a murderer, a man who had good reason to fear Nell, too.

In spite of Ash’s warning not to stare, she began to scrutinize every male in her vicinity. No blinding revelation came to her, but she sensed something, just as she had at the symposium. Blocking out the sounds of the fair, she listened with her inner ear.

She was so out of practice that at first she hardly knew what was happening. All she received were insubstantial impressions, something moving at the edges of her mind. She centered on those impressions. Feelings—they were scarcely thoughts—like wisps of ribbon touched her briefly: amusement, derision, superiority.

He knew that she was well guarded, but that only made the game all the more interesting.

She was reading his thoughts.

She clutched her reticule to her bosom in a death grip. The shape and weight of her pistol should have reassured her, but her knees were knocking, quite literally, and she pressed them together to stop her legs from trembling. She deliberately thought of Antonia and how she had found her on the quarry floor, and that steadied her as nothing else could.

The fiddlers struck up for a country dance, and the crowd fell back as a troupe of May dancers stepped lightly through the path they’d made and mounted the steps to the bandstand. More lanterns were lit, and Eve and Liza joined Ash at the edge of the spectators to watch the performance. Others in their party gradually filtered back.

Miss Claverley’s eyes kept straying to Eve.
She senses my unease and is concerned about me,
thought Eve. There was no point in worrying her aunt. She would only get in the way if she took it into her head to help, so Eve nodded and smiled, then gave her attention to the dancers.

Behind her bright smile, however, her mind was still occupied with Angelo, and some time passed before the dancers got her undivided attention. The girls in their white dresses, twirling around the floor of the bandstand with their handsome partners, were just like the debutantes at a ball. Just like the dancers in her dream.

It
was
her dream, yet it was different. There were no glass doors giving onto the terrace.
Where were the glass doors? Where was the terrace?

Her doubts subsided as quickly as they had arisen. It was just like her aunt had told her. Her dream was not an exact replica of what she would find. It was a map, and she should look for signposts. As she watched the May dancers, she knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that she had arrived at the first signpost.

Her breathing slowed and she inhaled a long, calming breath. She could have sworn that she smelled her mother’s fragrance, carnation with a hint of clove. Another wisp of ribbon touched her, not briefly but winding itself around her, protecting her in a haze of love.

Antonia.

Then the ribbon floated away.

She turned her head and smiled into her aunt’s troubled eyes.
All is well,
her smile said.
I know what I’m doing. Antonia is with me.

The worry lines on Miss Claverley’s brow gradually relaxed. She gave a little nod, but she did not smile.

Eve turned back to watch the dancers. She had come to the first signpost, and from this moment on, all her senses would be alert to her danger. It wouldn’t be long now before she came to the second signpost.