With This Kiss (36 page)

Expressions of appalled shock and stark disapproval greeted her confession.

To Julia’s surprise, it was Marianne who spoke first. “You’re doing this deliberately, aren’t you?” she cried. “You’re trying to undermine my courtship. You can’t stand the fact that I shall soon outrank you socially.”

“I wish you nothing but happiness, Marianne. My only concern is for your safety—”

“How could you involve us in another scandal?” Rosalind wailed, her florid complexion even redder than usual. “After everything we’ve done for you, Julia. How could you?”

“What will this do to
my
chances?” demanded Theresa. “At least Marianne has a beau. I’ll be ruined — all because of her. You cannot allow this, Father.”

Cyrus leaped angrily to his feet and turned to Morgan. “Can you not control your wife?”

Until that moment Morgan had been leaning casually against the marble mantel, observing the goings-on without speaking. Now he subtly shifted his posture, standing with his legs spread slightly apart, his full weight resting equally on the balls of his feet. His icy gaze fell directly on Cyrus Prentisse.

“Apparently not,” he replied. “It was my recommendation that Julia not issue the warning you just received. Not only did I deem it a complete waste of time, it struck me as foolish in the extreme to expect any sort of appreciation for the risk she was taking in openly exposing her connection to Lazarus.”

“Appreciation?” echoed Cyrus incredulously. “What of the risk she has subjected my family to? What of the scandal?”

“There will be no scandal if this discussion does not leave this room.”

“You cannot mean that you condone her activities. I warned you from the first that she was too high-spirited, too pampered and indulged. What she needs is a firm hand of discipline. If that task is beyond your capabilities, I would be only too glad to—”

“Before you finish that statement,” Morgan interrupted, “I would ask that you remember in whose home you are standing.”

Cyrus’s expression tightened. “Very well.” He nodded to his wife and daughters, who stood and assembled at the threshold of the room. As Cyrus shepherded them out, he turned to Morgan and haughtily intoned, “Let this matter be in your hands, Lord Barlowe. As you reap, so you shall sow.”

“Worthy advice for us all.”

A resounding silence filled the parlor as they left. Julia watched them go, lost in her uncertainty. Had she done the right thing in warning her family of the danger? Then again, how could she not have done so? It was preposterous to conceive her uncle as the arsonist who was terrorizing all of London, and clearly they had no intention of letting on that she was the anonymous Tattler. Still, a flurry of questions ran unanswered through her mind. What if it was Cyrus? What if it wasn’t?

Pushing them aside for the moment, she turned to Morgan and forced a tight smile. “Well, that was pleasant.” When he failed to reply to either her words or her tentative smile, she lifted her shoulders in a slight shrug and said, “At least I warned them.”

“Yes. So you did.”

He moved to the window and watched the Earl of Bedford’s coach pull away from his drive, a contemplative frown marring his features. Once the gates had been closed and securely locked behind them, he turned to her and gave a polite nod. “If you’ll excuse me.”

Morgan retreated to his study and spent the remainder of the day in conference with his secretary. Julia silently debated whether she should go to him and apologize for having disregarded his counsel, but that set a precedent she didn’t like. Then again, would it cost her so much to admit she might have been wrong? She was so dangerously anxious to please him, she couldn’t seem to think straight any longer.

With nothing to occupy her time, she roamed restlessly about the estate. The day’s post brought nothing but a few invitations and a letter for Morgan. She briefly adjourned to her room and attempted to focus on her column but found herself completely uninspired. Failing that, she moved out to the gardens. The day’s heat, barely tolerable earlier that morning, was now too oppressive to bear. Defeated, she drifted back indoors, feeling as wilted as the flowers she had wanted to gather.

At long last the afternoon faded into nightfall. Cook prepared a light supper of clear soup, poached fish, asparagus, beetroot, and boiled potatoes, followed by biscuits and an assortment of cheeses for dessert. Morgan proved as cordial a host as ever, but Julia found herself unable to feign an appetite. She toyed with her food, sending it back to the kitchens with an apologetic smile. She did, however, manage to drink the glass of cool, dry wine that was offered her, as well as the second. As unaccustomed as she was to spirits, she immediately felt the wine’s effect. She felt fuzzy-headed but relaxed, the restless tension that had gripped her all day temporarily allayed.

When Morgan adjourned to his own room after supper, she was left with no choice but to do the same. As it was too early for bed, she sprawled out in a tufted chaise, attempting to find distraction from her thoughts with a book. But once again her thoughts kept drifting. Was Morgan angry at her for openly defying him in warning her family about Lazarus? Was that why he wasn’t coming to her room? As she could find no other reason for his absence, she dismally concluded that that must indeed be the case.

A knock on her door interrupted her thoughts. At her call to enter, Morgan stepped inside. He wore a gray silk dressing robe. Judging by his bare calves and feet, he wore nothing beneath it. In his hands he carried two oversize brandy snifters, each filled with a generous splash of the amber liquor. As he moved toward her, a sensation of giddy pleasure and relief raced through her.

“I’m glad you’re here,” she said with a soft smile, privately embarrassed by the depth of that understatement. “I was just thinking of you.”

“Oh?” He set down the brandy and moved around behind her. Taking the book from her hands, he set it aside and began to gently massage her neck and shoulders. Julia closed her eyes and released a deep sigh. His touch felt heavenly. It was light, yet strong enough to soothe away all the knots and tension she had carried with her that day.

She had never been adept at the politics of relationships, being too forthright in nature. Thus she moved directly to the heart of what had been bothering her. “Were you very angry at me today?”

“Angry?” he repeated, a note of genuine surprise in his voice. “What made you think I was angry?”

“I didn’t see you all afternoon.”

“My apologies, princess. A score of mundane business matters required my attention. Nothing important, just loose ends that needed settling.”

“Then you weren’t upset that I openly defied you?”

He made a faint
tsking
sound with his tongue. “Did you?” he said. “That sounds rather dire. Why do I not recall it?”

“I’m referring to the fact that I acted against your wishes and warned my family about Lazarus.”

“Ah. That. I wasn’t aware that was direct defiance. I thought you were simply acting your own mind.”

“To most men they are one and the same,” she pointed out. “Particularly if those men happen to be husbands.”

“In that case I suppose I have a confession to make. Contrary to public taste, I have never been overly enamored with the concept of a dutiful, obedient wife. I encourage that ethic in my servants but not my wife.”

“I see,” she said, absurdly delighted by his reply. She was about to tell him so when she suddenly remembered something even more important that she had wanted to discuss with him. Breaking the gentle contact of his massage, she turned around, searching his face. “When we were down at the docks, I saw you pick up something from the ashes. What was it?”

“You saw that, did you?” He reached within the pocket of his dressing robe and passed a charred leather tassel to her. “It jarred a memory,” he said with a shrug. “When I dove after Lazarus two years ago, my hand brushed his boot. Later I remembered not only the quality of the leather but the feel of a tassel as it slipped through my fingers.”

“Lazarus wears Hessians?” she asked, instantly recognizing the distinctive tassel that hung from the front center of the boot.

He hesitated, then cautiously replied, “Perhaps.”

Her excitement at obtaining their first real clue to the man’s identity quickly waned. The tassel was far from conclusive. The expensive boot, generally worn by the upper classes, had been all the rage during the reign of the Prince Regent. It was still popular but less so now. It could have been worn by a member of the gentry, a servant who had inherited his master’s boots, or simply a patron of the tavern. Like everything else the clue seemed initially significant, but in the end it proved to be as amorphous as Lazarus himself, vanishing like a cloud of smoke.

Nevertheless, one question remained that had to be asked. “Was Uncle Cyrus wearing Hessians?”

“No, he wasn’t.”

Julia experienced a strange surge of both relief and disappointment. Although it would have been dreadful to discover that her uncle was indeed the man behind the horrific acts of arson, at least they would have found some closure. How she longed to find the man once and for all, to end it completely. Instead tomorrow would bring nothing but another day of anxiety and uncertainty.

“Tired, princess?”

She sent him a small smile and nodded.

Morgan wordlessly helped her undress, then shrugged off his robe and slipped into bed beside her. He must have sensed the depth of her fatigue, for he made no attempt to initiate lovemaking. Instead he cradled her in his arms, running his hands over her body in a touch that was infinitely soothing yet not at all sexual. In time she felt him drift off to sleep, his arm draped heavily across her hip. But despite the comfort his presence brought, Julia was unable to find any rest.

She felt worried and anxious, unable to stop revisiting the emotions that had plagued her earlier that day. A profound sadness over Henry and Annie’s brutal deaths washed over her. Tension regarding where Lazarus would strike next swiftly followed. Even petty little annoyances, like her family’s reaction to her warning, loomed large and threatening. Try as she might, she couldn’t put aside the vague feeling of dark foreboding that hung over her.

Was it nothing but fruitless worry that made it so, or some sort of prescience on her part? The question remained dark and unanswerable. And on that unfortunate note she at last drifted off into a restless and troubled sleep.

Morgan reined in his mount at the crest of Sheffield Hill. An early morning fog drifted around him. It was not a particularly enjoyable fog, in that it offered no relief from the heat that already filled the air. Instead it felt warm and grimy against his skin. Upon consideration, it was not thick enough to be properly considered a fog at all — just a faint mist that had been tinged yellow from the constant coal smoke and industrial vapors that hung in the air. The sticky warmth and offensive odor was not the weather’s only disadvantage. It also obstructed his vision enough to prevent him from seeing who had been following him for the past five miles since he had left his estate. He did, however, have a suspicion who it might be. Lightly tapping his mount’s flanks, he directed the animal into a narrow alley and waited for the rider who had been trailing him. Within moments a sleek chestnut mare appeared at the crest where he had earlier paused.

Leaning slightly forward, he called through the mist, “Over here, Julia.”

His wife spun about in her seat, an expression of startled surprise on her face. “Oh. There you are. I didn’t realize…” Her voice trailed off as she shifted uncomfortably in her saddle.

She was dressed in a pleated skirt of deep forest green that allowed her to ride astride. A pale linen blouse, sturdy brown boots, and matching gloves completed the ensemble. Her hair had been fashioned into a neat braid. A broad-brimmed straw hat festively adorned with silk roses and long streamers of peach and green ribbon added a pretty, feminine touch to her otherwise austere attire. She toyed with her reins as he studied her, looking as guilty as a child who had been caught stealing penny candy.

“Following me?” he asked.

A wry smile curved her lips. “That would be rather difficult for me to deny, wouldn’t it?”

“Why?”

“You mean, why was I following you?” At his nod her smile abruptly faltered. In a tone of flat resignation, she replied, “You’re going after Lazarus, aren’t you? You shouldn’t face him alone. I thought if there were two of us, I might be able to offer you some protection.”
-

Morgan wasn’t certain what he expected to hear, but that wasn’t it. He regarded her in stunned surprise. That Julia might want to offer him protection was completely unheard of… and absurdly touching.

“Even if I were intent on hunting Lazarus,” he said, “exactly how did you expect me to hunt him down?”

“Well, with the tassel you found yesterday…”

“I see.” He nodded, impressed at the scope of her thinking, if not the logic. “What would you have me do?” he asked. “Go door to door searching the entire city for a pair of Hessians with one tassel missing? That’s a rather ambitious undertaking — and a misguided one as well, I’m afraid.”

“I see your point,” she agreed after a moment, sending him a small, embarrassed smile. “It was a foolish notion on my part, I suppose.”

She gave a wistful sigh and focused her gaze on the horizon. They sat atop their mounts in silence, sharing an unspoken reluctance to leave. As the sun rose higher and shone brighter, the yellow mist burned away, bathing the city in the harsh light of day. There were many places where the sight of London waking up, rousing itself like a sleeping giant to devour a brand-new day, was nothing short of magnificent. Sheffield Hill, however, was not such a place.

It was a working district, and thus despite the early hour signs of life surrounded them. Laborers filled trolleys, carts, and drays, crowding the streets as they headed toward their employ. The hungry wails of infants, the shouts of angry wives, and the grumblings of weary husbands all blended together in a chorus of poverty and discontent. From their vantage point Morgan and Julia had a clear view of the slaughterhouses, tallow works, and tanneries. The by-products of those industries oozed into the river in a thick current of slimy sludge, blood, intestinal waste, and excrement.