A Duke's Wicked Kiss (Entangled Select) (27 page)

God help me, how long can she fend them off?

Shahira ceased her growling and leaped around the tree where Suri was bound. Twigs snapped and leaves rustled. The cat rounded back and stood in front of Suri.

They weren’t alone, Suri could feel it.

A flash of white and Tanush stepped into view.

Terror streaked through Suri once again. “No!”

He held a hand up, palm out. In his other, he held Shahira’s leash and a bloody knife. “I will not harm you, memsahib. I have come to save you. You must be quiet. We are too close to the palace.”

Suri stared at the knife, her eyes growing wide in newborn fear.

He glanced at the weapon and knelt down. Stabbing the blade into the earth, he pulled it clean and stepped forward.

Suri didn’t know what she babbled, but she cried and begged and screamed his name in blasphemous contempt, damning him until he slapped a hand over her mouth.

“I will not harm you, but your loud calls will, memsahib. If you do not remain quiet, they will know you live and that the lions did not eat you. The beasts are making a meal of the sepoy who brought you here, but soon they will finish. There are cubs to feed and there is another pride of lions that have smelled your sweat and the fear it holds.”

Suri sagged against the tree.

He stepped behind her and she felt him cutting at the ropes around her wrists. Suddenly she was free, but her sockets and shoulders screamed with pain as blood rushed to the parts of her that had numbed. She rubbed at her bloody wrists.

“Come, memsahib. I must take you to Bombay.”

Shaking so hard she could barely put her head in her hand, she raised the other as he’d done to her in a signal to pause. “Where’s Ravenswood?”

When Tanush failed to answer, she looked up. Her blood ran cold at the desolate look that flashed through his eyes. There was no faking what she’d seen. “He’s dead, and you’re certain of it.”

Tanush looked away, his face stoic, his eyes suddenly unreadable. He gave a short nod. “I am to see you safely to Bombay. We must leave from here.”

She tried to rise but could not. Tanush reached for her, but she waved him off. With tears streaming down her cheeks, she looked to him. “Tell me what happened.”

He gave his head a small shake. “It is best to know that it is over, and he suffers no more. We must leave.”

She studied him while his words cut through each layer of her skin like a million little knives, filleting her until they found their way to the marrow of her miserable bones. In the heavy silence, the heated air around her came alive with the buzz of insects. In slow motion, she swatted at a fly. So this is it, came a numb thought. John is truly gone. Tanush watched her, unblinking.

From somewhere deep inside her miserable self, she found the strength to shore up her trembling legs. Rising, she leaned her back against the trunk of the tree and took in a breath to steady herself. “We must return to Delhi and collect my sister and her son.” Her voice sounded thick, as though she’d been drugged.

His brows furrowed, his eyes beneath them brewing black with concern. “An impossible task, memsahib. Delhi is under siege. The mutiny has begun.”

The utter calmness of his words jarred her senses awake. “Wha…what do you mean? My sister and her family are inside those walls.”

“The Resident conveniently left the gates to Delhi open. The sepoys stormed them this morning. Even if you could manage to get in, you would never make it out alive.”

Adrenaline surged through her. Suri stood and defiantly fixed her fists on her hips. “My sister is in there. So are her son and husband. I will not leave them—no, I
cannot
leave them and expect to live with myself.”

She looked up to the tall, slender man whom she now firmly believed had been loyal to John. When she looked closer, she found pain in his eyes. He would tell her one day how John died. He’d have to.

“Vámbéry did what he was told,” he said, as though he’d intuited her convictions. “All was over quickly. A knife to Ravenswood’s heart.”

Numb again, she stood silent for a while and then said, “You saw?”

He gave a slight nod. “I was witness to the whole thing, memsahib. Maurya ordered me to stand behind the screen with him and watch, which was why it took me so long to reach you. Maurya was testing my loyalty. It was the only way I could have any hope of saving you. I am sorry I was so late in arriving.”

A sudden, astonishing pain lanced Suri’s heart. “Watching your friend die must have been a terrible undertaking. I’m sorry.”

Tanush looked to the cheetah who continued to survey the underbrush. “She had not yet been sent on to the raj prince, so I set her loose. She is a loyal cat. She found you for me.” He looked back to Suri, the pain removed from his eyes. “Please, memsahib, we must be on our way.”

Suri dusted off her hands. “But not yet to Bombay. You must help me, Tanush. You’re a trained warrior, the finest in the land, so Ravenswood said. If anyone can get me and my family out of Delhi, it’s you. I have nothing…” She paused long enough to capture more air into her lungs and to wipe her nose and eyes. “Please, I beg you. I have nothing left without them. Ravenswood…” She simply could not say the words.

Tanush stared past her shoulder at nothing in particular for what seemed an eternity. “I have asked myself what Ravenswood would want of me.”

“And?”

“He would want what you want. I shall do my best to keep you safe.”

At Tanush’s words, her knees went out from under her. He was so quick, she didn’t have time to fall before he swept her up and held her in his arms in the same way he’d transported her to John.

“Reach under and remove the leash from my fingers, memsahib. Curl it on your stomach.”

“I can walk,” she said and wiggled free.

“We must take a route through the grass lining the Yamuna River. There are snakes, and you are in soft slippers.”

“Oh!” Before she realized what happened, she’d flung her arms around his neck and jumped back into his grasp.

…

Darkness settled in before they reached the Kashmiri Gate leading into Delhi. Better to try this entry, Tanush had said—the night would hide them, and this particular entrance was the quietest since the sepoys had entered through the main Delhi Gate.

The din of mutiny flowed like a filthy river over the wall surrounding the city. The cacophony scraped along Suri’s flesh, beaded perspiration along her brow, and set her hands to trembling. Tanush still carried her. How he maintained his calm reserve she hadn’t a clue, but her nerves were in shreds, and she was exhausted.

Sleep, he’d told her. How was she to sleep in Tanush’s arms when all she saw with her eyes closed was John—his battered body a sinful contrast against the silken decadence on which he lay.
Damn Ravi-ji to hell.
If she managed to make it out of here alive, she’d spend the rest of her life with that sorrowful image of John branded in her mind and soul.

And what of Marguerite and her family? Oh Lord, how she prayed they had hidden in the marble room. The way the door was built into the wall, no one would know the room existed…unless some of the servants were mutineers. Oh, she couldn’t think such thoughts.

When they neared the gate, Tanush lowered her to the ground and pulled her sari over her head. “Keep your head down and do not let go of the back of my kurta, memsahib. Once inside the gates, I know ways to get to the Chathams’s with the least detection.”

She nodded and sent up a silent prayer. As if Shahira understood, the cat slipped into the brush and disappeared.

“She will follow us in her own way, memsahib.”

Tanush used pure magic to move them through the streets filled with torch-bearing sepoys chanting and firing rifles in the air or at anything they saw moving. Fires dotted the city, thunder roared from cannons, and gunfire repeated in unending volleys, until Suri could no longer hear anything other than a loud uproar.

She stumbled over a body and, before she could scream, Tanush’s hand covered her mouth. Smoke clogged her throat and nose. She choked and wrenched his hand away, then clutched at it like a child. He said nothing, only dragged her through growth of jasmine and thick bushes that tore at the thin fabric of her sari. He maneuvered her past locked gates that he opened in seconds, through houses in shambles, and out the rear entrances.
Good God!

“We’re here,” Tanush murmured when they reached a high wall she’d not have recognized had her life depended on it. “Leave your sari.” He pulled the end off her head and helped her unravel the yards of tattered silk until she stood in only her choli and
lehenga
. By now, she didn’t question Tanush’s directives. She trusted he knew what he was about.

“I’ll hoist you atop the wall. Once there, lie flat and don’t move until I can help you to the other side.”

She nodded and stepped into his hands cupped on his knee.

“Now,” he said and catapulted her upward.

She scrambled onto the ledge and pressed her belly to the hard clay bricks while Tanush crawled up the wall with the ease of a spider. He slipped over to the other side and helped her to the darkness beyond.

There was no lamplight, no sign of life, only the noise outside the walls, the chaos lighting up the night like fireworks. Suri’s heart leaped to her throat.

Tanush pulled her along in the red-tinged darkness to the side of the house where the private rooms were located. He hoisted her onto another wall and dropped over with the ease of a cat. When he lowered her to the ground, she realized they were in the garden leading to her own chamber. He must have brought her here intentionally. They entered her room, and Tanush led her around an overturned chest.

The room was in chaos.

“Oh, dear Lord!”

Tanush pressed his long fingers to her lips. “Change your clothes, memsahib,” he said quietly. “On our journey, you must wear a sari and pass for a native, but you must choose something plain.”

Suri inspected her torn clothing. The small mirrors and beads on her choli hung at odd angles, the mirrors catching the red night sky. “How did we make it through without anyone spotting…oh, the sari hid the mirrors.”

“Do you have anything which won’t draw undue attention?”

“A simple blue cotton sari is all I can think of.”

He nodded.

“But I must find Marguerite first.”

His fingers went to his lips again, hushing her. “No. You must change first. We will not come back this way.”

“I…I don’t know if I can find much of anything in the dark, but I’ll try.” She picked her way through the mess on the floor to the armoire with its doors hanging open. She dug through what clothing wasn’t scattered about. “I think I found something.” She took the sari and matching choli and
lehenga
to the garden and viewed them by the light of the fires in the sky.

“Change quickly, memsahib. Keep the sari folded. You can wrap it around you once we are back over the wall.”

“We’re going back over the wall?”

He grabbed her hand and hauled her out the bedroom door toward Marguerite’s and Harry’s chamber.

Their rooms were in shambles as well. A single oil lamp that had not been knocked over still burned in their dressing room. Tanush guided her toward the light. Suddenly, he stepped in front of her, shielding her. “Don’t look.”

Some base instinct caused her to push around him. Harry lay sprawled on the floor with a dark gash across his throat, his eyes blank.
Oh God, oh God!

A nightmarish rant climbed up her throat but, before it tore loose, Tanush’s hand muffled her screams. Standing behind her, he circled his other arm around her waist and held her from rushing forward. He lifted her up and swung her away from the gruesome sight. Her feet flailed about.

“Stop it!” he ordered in a fierce growl. “If you want to live, you must control yourself. I told you not to come here.”

She nodded behind his hand and forced her screams inside the depths of her tattered sanity. When he set her feet back on the floor, she peeled his fingers from her mouth. “I’m going to be sick,” she muttered.

He swept her away from Harry, bent her over at the waist, and held her steady. “Anywhere,” he murmured. “It no longer matters.”

When she’d finished casting up bile from a stomach that had sat empty for hours, he picked up a shirt off the floor and cleaned her face and mouth, then grabbed a tipped vase of flowers standing cockeyed against the wall. He swirled the vase and liquid splashed about inside. “Rinse your mouth with this. The flowers were fresh so the water will do.”

She rinsed her mouth and spat back into the vase. She looked at Tanush in the dim light, but all she saw in her mind’s eye was the image of Harry…wonderful, sweet, cherubic Harry. She buried her face in Tanush’s kurta and wept great heaping sobs.

A crash of something outside the room followed by muffled male voices and Tanush stiffened. He took her by the shoulders. “Memsahib, we are not alone. We must leave here.”

She backed away, picked up another shirt from the floor and swiped it over her face to dry her tears. She sniffed. “I have to find Marguerite and Jeremy. They are my family. I cannot leave without knowing. You have a knife. We need to get to the marble room. Maybe they’re locked in there.”

“Come then, but close your eyes until I tell you to open them.” He lifted her in his arms and headed toward the dressing area and—oh God—over Harry’s body. “You may open them now.”

Despite the cold monotone of Tanush’s voice, she knew he suffered, but he’d been trained for this very thing. She couldn’t have trusted anyone more.

Except for John.

He set Suri down and pressed a panel on the back wall of the dressing room. It opened with only a whisper of a sound. Suri stared at Tanush wide-eyed.

Lifting the oil lamp, he motioned her inside and closed the door behind him. He spoke softly. “This secret corridor leads to the marble room. You will be safe there while I search for your sister and her son.”

Hope sprouted in Suri’s heart. “I believe they are already in there.”