Her Defiant Heart (56 page)

"I had really hoped you would not be so stubborn." He reached forward and made a grab for Jenny's ankle. She recoiled, trying to evade him, but he caught her calf. His hand slid over her leg and tightened around her ankle. When she kicked at him, he grabbed the other ankle as well and dragged her closer. "That's enough," he said when she took two quick swings at him. He was able to elude her each time, helped immeasurably by the fact that the manacle limited Jenny's left-handed reach.

Jenny continued to struggle for several minutes before she exhausted herself. Stephen never called for John Todd to assist him. He enjoyed her struggle, even allowed it to go on when he might have subdued her. There was a certain pleasure in forcing her to yield. Her small gasps, the mewling sounds she made at the back of her throat, made him think of a lover. He told her that.

"Get off!" she said pushing at his shoulders.

"You are so predictable." When he laid the pad of his thumb against her lower lip and rubbed lightly, Jenny bit him hard.

"Did you predict that?"

Swearing, Stephen got off the bed. He gave her no time to collect her breath before he swooped. One arm at her back, the other under her knees, he held Jenny over the tub. The length of chain reached, but only just, and the shackle pulled at Jenny's wrist. "This is your doing. You know it is." He lowered her into the water.

In the adjoining room, John Todd shuddered as Jenny's cries were silenced. "Jesus," he whispered. "Shut the panel, Amalie. We don't have to watch. We'll be able to hear."

"No." Amalie placed her slender fingers over the knob on the panel to keep Mr. Todd from closing it. "I want to see what he does. How long do you suppose he can keep her under without drowning her?"

"Jesus," Todd said again. "You want him to hurt her, don't you?"

"She tried to kill me. I don't care what he does to her. I don't know why you do. You should take a page from Stephen's book. He knows precisely what she needs. Look at his face. Sadistic bastard. He's enjoying it. Do you have that in you, John Todd?"

He ignored her question and shrugged off the hand that came to rest on his shoulder. "Listen to me, Amalie, if he kills her there won't be any money for you,
and
you'll have a body to explain. Let me stop Stephen. He will do more than ruin your plans. He will ruin you."

Amalie remained quiet. She watched Stephen lift Jenny out of the water and drag her to her feet. The girl was so weak she needed Stephen's assistance to stand. Her limp and matted hair dripped water over her bare arms. Her shift, nearly transparent with the wet, clung to her. She pressed the manacled hand to her mouth as she coughed and choked. Her breath rattled.

"Mother of God," Amalie whispered. She reached blindly for John Todd because just then she only had eyes for the curve of Jenny's belly. "She's pregnant."

"What?" Todd leaned forward to take in the same view.

"She's pregnant. I should have suspected it when she didn't keep her breakfast down. Lord, but this girl sets my teeth on edge."

John Todd did not wait to find out what Amalie wanted him to do. He was running from the room even as Stephen was lowering Jenny back into the water. He pushed open the door and crossed to the tub in three long strides. "She's pregnant, Bennington," he said, shoving Stephen out of the way. He yanked Jenny out of the tub. "You keep at this and she'll miscarry. Most likely die, too. That's not why I brought her here. That was never part of the plan, not
my
plan." He laid Jenny on the bed, turning her on her side, and covered her shivering body with a blanket.

"None of this was your plan," Amalie said. "Not the way I remember it." She stepped in the room from the hallway and shut the door behind her. In her right hand she held a derringer. It was leveled at John Todd's chest. "I don't know how I could have been so mistaken about you," she said quietly, a frown creasing her brow. "We've known each other so long... shared so much... why didn't it occur to me that you might have a tender heart? That's it, isn't it? You feel something for her."

"Amalie," Todd said, watching her carefully. He thought about reaching for his weapon and then reconsidered. Amalie would kill him before his derringer cleared the concealed holster. "I don't want her to be hurt because we can't afford it. I don't feel anything for her... not the way you think. I saved you, didn't I? I did not let her choke you. Lower the gun, Amalie. Do what is reasonable."

Stephen backed away from John Todd, making certain he was out of Amalie's line of fire. "I don't know why you want to share anything with him," Stephen said softly, his eyes darting from one to the other. "Surely his usefulness is over. The money should be yours, Amalie. You deserve it. You thought of everything. John Todd is the brawn, not the brains."

Amalie stared at John Todd. The corners of her mouth turned down. "Stephen's right, you know. I can't depend on you if you've gone tender hearted on me, and it seems that you have. I told you to let Stephen handle her as he saw fit. You interfered. Do you think I care if she's pregnant? It was an observation, not an excuse for you to become involved."

"Amalie." He said her name patiently. He did not plead, and perhaps that was his mistake, but he had no time to reflect on it as Amalie pulled the trigger. John Todd died where he stood.

The fist that Jenny pressed against her mouth prevented her from screaming when Todd's body slumped to the floor. Stephen dragged his eyes away from the dead man and stared at Amalie. The falling out between partners had been swift and final. He did not question Amalie's resolve when she tossed aside her spent weapon and quickly recovered John Todd's concealed one.

"Do not think of crossing me, Bennington," she said with icy calm. "I was a lot more sentimental about Mr. Todd than I am about you."

Stephen raised his hands, palms outward, and shrugged. "I understand. What should I do with the body?"

"Take it to the cellar. Use the back stairs."

"Do you think anyone heard the shot?"

"Above the music in the salon? Not likely. Someone would be here by now if they had."

Stephen lowered his hands as Amalie tucked the derringer into the sleeve of her gown. "Is she really pregnant?" he asked, jerking his thumb at Jenny.

"Yes. A recent realization. I'd have told you if I'd known earlier. Her belly's thickening."

"I don't want the child."

"I realize that. It would be a complication."

He nodded. "What can you do about it?"

"Nothing... or everything. Are you familiar with Madame Restell?"

"By reputation."

"She advertises herself as a midwife, but I'm sure you realize she's an abortionist. I send my girls to her when they get in trouble. Her little French female pills cost dearly, but she guarantees their efficacy."

"What do you want me to do?"

"Nothing tonight; it's too late. But tomorrow morning I want you to pay her a visit. Don't go to her brownstone on Fifth. She will turn you away. Her offices are on Chambers and Greenwich Streets. Tell her I sent you and that I assured you she could help. Bring the pills back here. I'll see that your fiancée takes them." She ignored Jenny's low, keening cry. "Don't give it another thought, Stephen. You'll never have to be a father to Christian Marshall's bastard."

* * *

Christian Marshall sat in the rocker in Jenny's suite. His head rested wearily against the ornately scrolled back of the rocker. His eyelids were heavy, shuttering the expression behind them. In his arms he held young Beth Turner. Her pale blonde hair was almost white against the dark fabric of Christian's jacket. She was fingering one of the buttons on his black satin vest.

Susan quietly motioned her daughter to come and sit on her lap, but Beth shook her head stubbornly. "Uncle Christian's sad, Mama," Beth whispered. "He needs me."

Susan and Scott, sitting opposite him on the chaise, glanced simultaneously at Christian to see if he heard their daughter's rather loud aside. He had. There was the slim suggestion of a smile playing at the corners of his mouth.

"She's fine where she is," Christian said. "And she's right." He looked down at Beth's blonde, curling hair and ruffled it with his fingertips. His smile faded so completely that it might never have been.

Susan's heart went out to him. She busied herself, raising a glass of red wine to her lips in the hopes of hiding the pity she felt. Trust Beth to see what she and Scott had missed. Yes, he was sad, deeply so, yet until Beth had pointed it out Susan had only sensed the anger.

With Christian, it lay just below the surface, held there by the sheer force of his will. It was the silent, imploding kind of anger, terrible and terrifying to look upon because one could not help but imagine that it would not remain contained. His jaw ached from the almost constant clenching and unclenching. He could not relax. His stomach roiled. There were faint shadows under his eyes from lack of sleep and tiny white lines engraved at the corners of his mouth. A glass of wine rested on the table beside him, but after one sip he had shown no interest in it. There was the need to keep a clear head, of course, but it was just as true that nothing he ate or drank since Jenny left seemed to have any texture, color, or taste. As a result, his weight had dropped nearly ten pounds, and the hard lines of his face were as defined as if they had been etched by acid.

Christian winced slightly as Beth moved in his lap and accidentally kicked his wounded leg. "It's all right," he said when Scott moved to take Beth from him. "She didn't mean to do it." He massaged his leg long after the pain dissipated. The soothing, absent gesture was almost second nature to him. "Do you think Jenny and I will have a little girl?" he asked quietly, shifting his eyes to a point on the far wall. Copper threads in his dark hair shone in the gaslight.

There was no way to answer his question. "Is that what you want?" asked Scott.

"A girl would be nice. My family runs to boys, though."

"Boys are nice, too," said Susan for lack of anything better to say.

Christian's slight smile surfaced briefly. "I suspect I'll take whatever I get." He looked down at Beth but spoke to her parents. "Why haven't we found her?" he asked softly, almost cautiously, as though afraid to admit failure aloud. "What the hell has happened to Jenny?"

Scott heard Susan's breath shudder through her. His wife was very close to tears. He reached for her hand and squeezed it reassuringly. "I wish I had the answers," he said. "God, how I wish it."

"I keep thinking we're overlooking something," said Christian. "I was convinced early on that Stephen or William Bennington would eventually lead us to her."

Scott nodded. "We all felt the same way. None of us could have anticipated that William's routine at the bank would never vary. And Stephen... he's certainly made no unusual moves. If he's worried about losing any part of Jenny's inheritance, then he's drowning his sorrows in the arms and thighs of some—"

"Scott," Susan said reprovingly, pointing to their daughter. "Have a care what you say."

Scott ducked his head guiltily and mumbled an apology. "There's been no hint at the hospital of anything concerning Jenny," he went on. "If Stephen or William are involved, I think I'd have picked something up by now. They'd seek Morgan or Glenn out, wouldn't they?"

"That's what I thought," said Christian. "I just don't understand where it's gone wrong. William is coming and going as if nothing's happened. One would think I never confronted him about Jenny's disappearance. Stephen appears to be unaffected by anything save Amalie's girls. And the hospital has given us no clues. We have exactly what we had in the beginning: an embroidered handkerchief still smelling faintly of chloroform and no idea to whom it belongs."

"We have a plan," Susan reminded him. "The day after tomorrow, and with that bit of luck we deserve, we'll have evidence that Stephen and William are stealing from the bank."

Christian was silent for a long time. His arm stole around Beth's waist, and she burrowed against his side, instinctively sensing that it was Christian who needed the cuddle. He wondered if he would ever hold his own child. For a moment, that thought made it difficult for him to breathe. "I only care about the bank because Jenny did," he said at last. "I'd let William and Stephen walk away from it if it meant having her back." He raised his eyes to Susan and made no attempt to blink back the thin veil of tears. "I want her back, Susan. I want Jenny here again."

Chapter 16