A Private Duel with Agent Gunn (The Gentlemen of Scotland Yard) (4 page)

The tingle turned into a surge of desire that coursed through her body. Her knees would have buckled if he hadn’t kept her pressed firmly to the door. Slowly, he released her and fell back an inch or two. Glassy-eyed, they shared each other’s breath, neither able to find words.

“Madre de Dios.”
Blindly, Cate flailed about and threw the latch. To his credit, he stepped back and she opened the door. He exited the dressing room quietly—this man whose tongue had just ravaged her mouth in the most sinful way possible.

She eyed him cautiously. “By what name do you call yourself in London?”

It appeared their brief argument had captivated everyone in the salon. Cecil blurted out her answer. “Phineas Gunn?”

Her dressing room intruder approached her openmouthed dinner date. “Rather daring of you to carry on with a ballet girl, Burleigh. Hoping for a prenuptial fling?”

Cecil poked his chin out. “I am no more engaged to Daphne than you are to Muriel Villers-Talbot.”

“And according to Muriel, who so dutifully keeps me informed, your fiancée is in Paris, is she not? Purchasing her trousseau.” This man with a new name towered over Cecil. “At least
my
so-called fiancée hasn’t sent out the wedding invitations.”

Cecil glowered.

Torn between raising a brow or bursting into laughter, Cate pressed her lips together and tried very hard not to chuckle. Much to her dismay a rather loud snort
escaped. “Sorry to keep you waiting, Cecil. I’ll be ready in a dash.”

She opened the lid on a jar of cold cream and spoke to the wide-eyed miss in the mirror. “So, the Baron Burleigh is engaged.” Based on the few strained words between the men, it would seem Mr. Gunn was nearly spoken for himself.

She closed her eyes and ran the soothing cream over darkened eyelids. When attending soirees with Cecil, she had always assumed the raised brows were due entirely to her avocation. Obviously, there was another layer here. Cate used a soft cloth to wipe away the greasepaint.

If a man was a philanderer before marriage, what might a girl look forward to afterward? She almost felt sorry for the fiancée. Daphne, he had called her.

Though her experience with stage-door gentlemen could hardly be called extensive, she knew enough to be quite sure of one fact. Men didn’t change—not much anyway. They were either trustworthy or they were not. She hardly knew which one of the posturing males outside her dressing room was worse: Cecil Cavendish or Phineas Gunn, as he now called himself.

“Phin-e-as.” She whispered the name under her breath. New name, same old deceiver. A man who played false for a living could never be trusted. So why then did her lips still burn from the heat of his kiss?

She once believed they had met by accident on the Passeig de Gràcia. Lugging along two large hatboxes, she had given up on a cab and decided to walk to her aunt and uncle’s home. The fashionable avenue in Barcelona was as broad as the Champs-Élysées. A favorite place for aristocrats to display their riding skills and expensive carriages.

“
Perdón, señorita. Estoy . . . buscando la casa de Gaudí
?”

Shading her eyes from the low rays of the sun, she peered up at a magnificent horse and an equally imposing rider. “You are English,
señor
?” Drawing closer, Cate made out a charming grimace from a strikingly handsome man.

“Pardon my poor Spanish. I’m looking for a new residence designed by Gaudí. I believe it is on Carrer Nou de la Rambla—” Distracted, his eyes narrowed and shifted away.

Cate followed his line of sight to a teetering pony cart driven by a chubby-faced, curly-haired child that was traveling at a dangerously fast pace down the broad street. Wide eyes accompanied the girl’s panicked expression and whimpering cries. Cate’s heart accelerated even as the Englishman pressed his mount into action and overtook the out-of-control pony. Leaning far over his seat, he grabbed hold of the reins and slowed the animal.

Cate dropped her hatboxes and ran onto the boulevard. She positioned herself alongside of the cart just as the flushed child burst into tears. A tired old groom trotted up to join them.
“Madre de Dios, Madre de Dios. Gracias, señor.”

“If the child cannot control the animal, you’d best take hold of these.” With quite a singular glare, the gentleman on horseback handed the reins to the groom.

Cate replaced the Brit’s glare with a smile and translated. She added an eye roll and shrug. “
Inglés.”

The groom tugged on the pony’s head.
“¡Adelante!”
The elder man admonished the child gently, and led the pony and cart away. The little girl wiped off a tear and stuck her tongue out at them.

“Well done, sir,” she murmured. “Even if your damsel in distress thinks you a spoilsport.”

He had studied her a moment before dismounting. “You speak in a decidedly British vernacular. Are you a native of Spain?”

“A Spanish mother—and my father was an Englishman like yourself.”

“Was?”

“Both my parents were killed adventuring in South America.”

“Sorry to bring up a sad subject.”

“It happened quite some time ago.” She reached up to scratch the muzzle of his horse. “You have a magnificent mount, sir.”

“So I’ve been told.” Amusement flashed in his eyes, and something else. Something much more unsettling. There was a kind of intimacy in those liquid brown orbs—as if he understood her secrets, her most personal desires.

“His name is Bhai Singh, but he answers to Sergeant MacGregor.” The burr in his
r
and the soft
g
in
MacGregor
instantly brought out the Scot in the man.

He tipped his hat. “Hugh Curzon, here in Barcelona on business.”

“Catriona Elíse de Dovia Willoughby.” She smiled at his reaction. “It seems your horse and I answer to a mélange of names.”

“And which do you prefer?”

Actually, she preferred to change the subject. “You asked about Palau Guëll, designed by Gaudí. You are an architect?”

“I studied architecture at university. Love to have a look at those parabolic arches and hyperbolic capitals . . . under construction.” His eyes traveled over her gently. Not in a lascivious way by any means, but with definite interest. “I am fascinated by curves.”

She half smiled when she shouldn’t have. She should have said
buenos días
and pivoted on her heel. Instead, she offered her escort. “I live quite near Carrer Nou de la Rambla. Why don’t I show you the way?”

A sharp rap at the dressing room door snapped Cate out of her reverie. “So sorry, mademoiselle, but I had to repair a torn skirt.” Lucy, her dresser, swept into the room and finished unhooking her costume.

With her face cleansed of its theatrical mask, Cate dusted a bit of powder over her nose. Lucy added a pale brush of peach to each cheek and a tint of rose to her lips. “Just enough, not too much,” Lucy said. Cate undressed and slipped into a simple gown. Her dresser dug in the costume chest and added a smart velvet riding jacket and silk evening hat.

“You have a flair for styling, Lucy.”

The girl beamed. “Dancers can’t afford much finery. I do what I can to help the corps dress for their engagements with gentlemen.”

“If you can call them that.” She kissed the girl’s cheek and winked.

Hugh Curzon had acted the perfect gentleman that first afternoon in Barcelona. After rescuing the ungrateful child in the runaway pony cart, he’d gently prodded both packages out of Cate’s hands. She’d watched him juggle reins and hatboxes. “You’re sure?”

He nodded. “Lead the way, Miss Willoughby.”

His large red hunter ambled along behind as they spoke of the weather and points of interest. All the things people talk about when they don’t know each other well but might wish to know the other person . . . better.

When they reached her aunt and uncle’s residence, he
handed her one hatbox at a time. “The Güell palace is just around the corner.” She pointed down the lane.

He tipped his hat, turned away, then swiveled back. “Would you . . . have dinner with me tonight?”

She clearly remembered the flush of heat on her cheeks. “Regretfully, I have a dance lesson this evening. Besides, my aunt and uncle are very old-fashioned. I’m afraid they would insist on a chaperone.”

He arched a brow. “Dance lesson?”

“While I am here in Barcelona, I wish to study the Catalan dances—the zambra mora, bolero, fandango.” She remembered smiling up at him. “You are interested in the old gypsy dances, Mr. Curzon?”

“I am interested in you, Miss Willoughby.” He appeared to consider what she had just revealed to him. “And if you were not here in Barcelona, where might you be?”

She smiled. “Paris. I dance with the
Théâtre de l’Académie Royale de Musique,
monsieur.”

He stepped closer, his resonant voice huskier. “And if your aunt or uncle were by chance . . .
out
of town?”

“Then . . . I would ask you to meet me at nine o’clock in the square—the Plaça Reial.” She dipped a brief curtsy and slipped inside the courtyard. But she hadn’t missed the flash of light in his eyes. “I must go.
Talué, señor.
”

That evening, at dance class, she could not get his unsettling, deep brown gaze out of her mind, especially when she emulated Doña Marguerite’s sway and roll of the hips.

Cate opened her dressing room door and shut down the memories. All that lovely romance wasted on a professional liar. And the discovery came just days after she had given herself to him. Hugh Curzon—or rather, Phineas Gunn—was a British spy. A man who could not be trusted.

Chapter Three

“D
arling, forgive me, but you are a stunner.” Finn held the diamond to the light and twirled the stickpin between his fingers. A soft tap and click of the door latch meant his butler had entered the study. “Bootes, have a look at this. Note the exquisite, old European brilliant cut—near perfect clarity.”

“My word.” Bootes leveled his pince-nez on the bridge of his nose. “Something over ten carats, I wager.”

“Twelve and half,” he murmured. “A touch of azure in daylight, likely to move toward violet by gaslight.” The gem was set in a delicate nest of gold filigree. “This has to be a Tavernier diamond. Note the splendid workmanship on the setting. Downright vulgar as a tiepin, wouldn’t you say?

A wavering of eyelashes was all it took to read his butler’s opinion of the superior gem. “I see what you mean by garish, sir. Fitting, perhaps, for a Russian prince on holiday here in British Isles.”

Finn snorted. “A Russian prince would use this pretty bauble to pick his teeth.”

His man’s gaze narrowed, along with an uptick at the
edge of the mouth. A smirk was the closest one got to a smile from Bootes. He had always called his loyal manservant Bootes. At this moment, mesmerized by the glittering trinket, Finn could not recall why the sobriquet Bootes, nor could he remember the man’s real surname—Morton, was it?

Over the last few years, he and Bootes, who functioned as both valet and houseman, had developed their own informal parlance, a bachelor’s code of sorts. And Finn quite admired his butler’s ability to communicate without uttering a single word. The somewhat quirky manservant spoke volumes with the slightest tilt of his chin or shift in his gaze. A serviceable and, at times, amusing accomplishment.

“Has Hardy arrived?” Finn asked.

Bootes rolled his eyes up and to the left.

“Then is he dressing?”

The butler cleared his throat. “I believe so.”

They were late for the Beauforts’ ball. Phineas returned the gem to its diminutive case and rose from his desk. “Is my tie straight?”

Studying his neck, Bootes made no effort to hide his satisfaction with himself. “As it was when I tied it, sir.”

Finn sauntered over to Hardy’s room, where his brother kept a wardrobe of clothes in a bedroom he rarely slept in. His mind wandered from stolen diamonds to Catriona de Dovia Willoughby and his heart began to race, in a good way. Every powerful emotion he had felt for her and abandoned in Spain came roaring back to life last night.