Fortune's Lady (8 page)

If only Freddy would come for her! But she had small hope of that. If Riordan couldn't find her, there was little chance Freddy could. Limping now, she came to a halt by a bench beside the stone wall and sank down on it gratefully. It was dark here; she would rest for a minute and decide what to do.

There was a light on upstairs in the house directly across from her. She imagined herself going to the front door and knocking. Dogs would bark, neighbors might look out their windows. After a long wait she would hear footsteps inside. The door would open. A servant, probably, in nightshirt and cap, holding a candle. “What do you want?”

The fantasy ended there because she couldn't conceive of a suitable answer. “Sanctuary!” she thought wryly, then sobered—a church! No, no, she didn't want sanctuary, she wanted a ride home. There weren't even any chairmen about at this hour, at least not here. She braced a heel against the edge of the bench and massaged a sore foot. Behind her a night bird bleated a monotonous two-note chant. She shivered, wishing she had a shawl. The moon had set behind the roofs of the houses; there was nothing left of it but a milky blotch among the occasional drifting clouds.

She had two choices. She could stay where she was all night, and at dawn she could set out to find a carriage. Or she could go west now toward lights and noise and people, and find a carriage. A third alternative suggested itself: she could return to the Clarion Club and see if by some miraculous chance Freddy was still there. This idea seemed so unlikely that she abandoned it and went back to the first two. Neither appealed to her. But staying here all night struck her as cowardly, so she chose the second. She dusted off her hands and stood up.

Glory be to God, a carriage! It was clattering toward her at top speed, but elation turned to alarm when it occurred to her Riordan might be inside. It was too late to run now. Her white dress was like a signal beacon; the driver began reining in the horses as soon as he saw her. The hackney had barely stopped when the door opened and a man jumped down. She relaxed slightly. It wasn't Riordan, it was an older man. Tall and very thin, with stooped shoulders and a—all at once she recognized Oliver Quinn. She stood stock-still and waited for him.

“Miss Merlin, please get in the carriage.”

No “Thank God you're safe!” or “I'm so sorry this happened,” just a sharp, ungracious order. If her shoes had had heels, she'd have dug them in. “I prefer to walk,” she told him icily.

“Walk! Don't be absurd, it's not safe. You could be attacked.”

“You should have thought of that before you set your hired rapist on me.”

Some emotion swept across his stern, priest-like visage, but she couldn't tell in the dimness whether it was anger, embarrassment, or amusement. After a pause he said stiffly, “I apologize for what happened tonight. It was not planned that way.”

She shook her head in disgust, then stared without seeing down the black street. An inadequate apology if she'd ever heard one, but it would have to do. She'd never had any real intention of refusing to go with him. “Very well, you may take me home.”

He took her arm in a civil grasp and helped her into the coach. They set off, and after a few minutes of stony silence Cassandra decided she would wait for him to speak first no matter how long it took; they could ride all the way to Holborn before she'd give him the satisfaction of opening the subject that was so patently on their minds. After a full five minutes, her patience was rewarded.

“I tell you again, I sincerely regret the events of this evening,” he said after clearing his throat a time or two. “Things weren't supposed to go so far. Mr. Riordan ought to have revealed his identity sooner, there's no question about that. I can't excuse his—”

“Mr. Quinn, our bargain is over.”

His mouth dropped open in surprise. “What?”

“Well, what did you expect?” she demanded angrily. “You lied to me and played a despicable trick on me, for reasons I can't begin to fathom.”

“I can explain.”

“I'm not interested in your explanation. I only want to be rid of you and your—colleague.” She spat the word venomously.

“Please listen. It was necessary to do what we did in order to test your loyalty. We had no idea whether—”

“Test my loyalty!”

“—you could be trusted to—”

“My
loyalty
!” Her fists clenched in impotent fury. “How dare you? There's no one more loyal to this country than I! I was born here. Every drop of my blood is English. I've come home after twelve miserable years in a country I could never call mine, and nothing and no one will ever force me to leave again!”

“I beg your pardon, but—”

“And anyway,” she added furiously, “it wasn't my
loyalty
Mr. Riordan was testing!”

“I've already apologized for Philip's behavior. It was inappropriate.”

She made an angry, inarticulate sound. Inappropriate!

“But I confess, I don't quite understand your agitation. After all, nothing really happened.”

Cass opened her mouth, then closed it and sat back in seething exasperation. It was pointless to tell him no man had ever taken such liberties with her before. Or, if that wasn't quite true, at least not in the same
way
Mr. Riordan had taken them— and never with such devastating results. “We appear to have different views on what constitutes ‘nothing,' Mr. Quinn,” she said with frosty dignity. “But never mind; as I said before, our bargain's over.”

He put his fingers together and pressed them against his lips in the prayer-like way he had. “I'm afraid it's not that simple.”

“What do you mean?”

“You can't break our agreement now; it's too late.”

She laughed without humor. “Nevertheless, I do break it. You'll have to carry out your devious little scheme without me.”

“You don't understand. You
can't
break it.”

“What do you mean?” she said again, frowning.

“Very simply, you know too much. You know me, you know Riordan, and you know who we're after. You have no choice now but to help us.”

“But I refuse.”

“Then you'll be arrested.”

She forced a laugh. Quinn stared back owlishly, and she realized he was serious. “You can't do that,” she scoffed.

“Of course I can, with the greatest ease. I can instruct the driver of this carriage to take us to Newgate right now, where you can be imprisoned for as long as I like, on any grounds I like. I most certainly have the power, Miss Merlin, and I promise you I'm not bluffing.”

For the second time in the same day, Cassandra called a man a bastard.

“I would do it in a minute,” he continued as though she hadn't spoken, “though certainly with great regret. Now, listen to me. You're angry and you feel insulted, perhaps even ashamed. For the third time, I'll tell you I'm sorry it happened. But it's over. It's time to get on with our business, which is a little more important than your hurt feelings. I'm prepared to double the money we agreed on before; you can consider it payment for services rendered, shall we say, beyond the call of duty.”

His cold-bloodedness appalled her. She was preparing to tell him precisely what he could do with his money when the carriage came to such an abrupt stop that she was almost thrown into his lap. In the next moment the door was yanked open and the enormous torso of Philip Riordan filled the portal. “Where the bloody hell did you find her?” was his gracious greeting.

How could she ever have found his angry, arrogant face handsome? wondered Cass, willing herself to sit still and not shrink away from his intimidating presence. She noticed with a mixture of horror and satisfaction the faint bluish bruise on the left side of his jaw—not, it was true, as noticeable as the one on the knuckles of her right hand, but definitely visible. She couldn't recall ever having struck anyone before, not even a childhood playmate.

“In Piccadilly,” Quinn snapped. “Miss Merlin has just been telling me she doesn't wish to continue in our employ.”

“Oh, she doesn't, eh?” He turned to her; their eyes clashed. In that instant Cass remembered every detail of what had passed between them, and there was a glimmer in the depths of his dark-blue scowl that made her afraid he was remembering, too. “In that case, I'll have to take her dolt of a cousin up on his offer to shoot me in the morning.”

Her hands flew to her mouth. “Oh God! Freddy called you out?”

He made her a low bow. “Freddy called me out,” he confirmed with an unpleasant smile. “On Hampstead Heath, no less. My choice of weapons. I suppose I'll choose pistols; I haven't fenced in weeks.”

“You can't!”

“Ah, my sweet, your concern moves me deeply. Don't worry, though; I'm quite a good shot.”

“Not you, you blackguard!”

He put his hand over his heart. “I'm wounded to the quick.”

“Damn and blast!” This was Cass's day for cursing. “You mustn't meet him! Oh, please, you'll kill him. He's no good at shooting—he's no good at anything!”

“Then he ought to be shot, the bleeding rotter.”

“
Will you listen to me!
”

“Philip, shut up. Miss Merlin, get hold of yourself. No one's going to shoot anyone.”

“Not true, Oliver. The man's challenged me in public. My honor's at stake. Indeed, my
honor
,” he insisted when Cass snorted in disgust. “Nothing could prevent me from meeting him. Nothing, that is, except…”

“What?” she cried in exasperation when he paused interminably.

“Except your solemn promise that you'll finish what we started tonight.” He grinned at her indrawn breath and hot rush of color. “You misunderstand,” he purred in a soft, intimate voice, as if they were alone. “I meant, of course, our business with Wade.”

“Blackmail!” she choked. She longed to hit him again.

“Do you agree? Yes or no, Cass, and be quick. It's nearly dawn; if it's no, I must go home and get my dueling pistols.”

She stared at him incredulously. She turned to Quinn, but his watchful silence told her he would offer no assistance. Her helplessness infuriated her. “I despise both of you,” she said in a high but steady tone. “You have my promise.”

Riordan studied her a moment longer, then jumped down from the carriage step into the street. “So be it. I'm off to declare my cowardice. Good night to you both.” He slammed the door and disappeared.

The hackney started up again. The driver must be one of Quinn's men, Cass speculated dully; he seemed to stop and go without orders. The rest of the way she was silent, her thoughts a chaotic swirl, and Quinn did not interrupt them with small talk. At the door to her aunt's lodgings he told her a coach would come for her tomorrow at four o'clock. She could tell her aunt and cousin she was taking tea at the home of the Honorable Mr. Philip Riordan. Then he tipped his hat and bade her good night.

There were no lights at Number 47. Cass made her way up the two narrow flights of stairs to her bedroom in pitch blackness. It came as no surprise to her that Aunt Beth hadn't waited up and that no one was about, not even Clara. She kicked off her shoes in the darkness and wondered dispiritedly what her life might have been like if her aunt or cousin or father or anyone at all had exercised a little control over her during the last few years. Perhaps her reputation would be intact today, not the shambles it indisputably was; an honorable man might even want to marry her. She sighed wearily as she stripped off the infamous white dress and crawled naked into bed. It was pointless to think about that now, and profitless to blame others for the circumstances she found herself in. She sandwiched her head between two pillows and prayed for sleep.

It came quickly, but didn't last. An hour later she was wide awake, staring at the ceiling, obsessively recalling the most humiliating moments of the evening. She saw Riordan hanging by his hands from a tree limb, innocently asking question after question about France, about the Revolution. And laughing at her all the time, she didn't doubt, delighting in her ignorance. She saw it so clearly now and cringed when she thought of it, but she couldn't stop thinking of it. Of course that wasn't the worst. She pulled the sheet up to her neck and tensed every muscle in an agony of mortification. She remembered with hellish clarity every caress, each murmured word, until the feelings they'd evoked before threatened to return and consume her again. Oh God! How could she have let him touch her that way? She made an anguished sound and rolled over on her stomach.

I loathe you, Philip Riordan,
she raged silently. You're a manipulator, an abuser of women—I wish Freddy had shot you!

I want to see you lose all control, Cass, all restraint.…
She groaned and put her hands over her ears, grinding her teeth. How horrible to think she'd have gone with him gladly, freely given her long-defended innocence to a common seducer! A man who didn't care anything at all for her, who saw in her nothing but a willing body on which to vent his lust.

She turned onto her side and curled into a ball, forcing herself to turn the indictment around. What had she seen in him? A willing body. A devastatingly skillful lover on whom she would gladly have vented her own lust. Perhaps she'd used him as much as he'd used her. After all, her ultimate goal had been to trick him. Never mind that she'd completely lost sight of the goal every time he'd put his hands on her.

Very well. She was as ashamed of herself as she was angry with Riordan. It didn't excuse what he'd done, though, not at all. And now she was supposed to
work
with him somehow, as if nothing had happened, while she met and cultivated the real Colin Wade. Her deepest wish was that the earth would open up and swallow either Riordan or her, it didn't matter which, as long as she need never see him again. But that wasn't going to happen; she'd given her promise to continue the ludicrous charade. The thought of meeting him tomorrow— today—made her wince with embarrassment. He was loathsome, despicable, a liar, the worst kind of—