Never Wager Against Love (Kellington Book Three) (4 page)

But, hopefully, I’ll get that kiss I’ve been longing for
in the meantime.
  She banished that unwanted thought then turned to him.  “All
right,” she said grudgingly.  “You may come along, but I am in charge of this
mission and you must do whatever I tell you, for both our sakes.”

“My mind is intrigued by the mere notion of following your
every order,” he said as he gave her one of his most charming smiles.  “Shall
we set out?”

“Merlin isn’t of a mind to travel, my lord.”

“It’s Arthur, and he’ll do just fine.”

With that, Arthur moved his horse into a canter and Merlin quite
obediently followed.  “I take it we’re on the trail of the Marleys?”

“Their real names are Frederick Mortimer and Portia
Cassidy.  The trail has grown cold, but I have a better idea of where to go.”

“I look forward to catching up to them,” said Arthur. 
“Wherever they may be.”

*                    *                    *

Cheapside, London

Portia Cassidy hurled the small chest across the room, where
it hit the wall with a resounding thud. 

“Careful, love,” drawled Frederick Mortimer.  “Wouldn’t want
to risk losing a very lucrative reward by destroying that chest.”

Portia looked around the shabby sitting room of their safe
house.  As promised, the home was in a neighborhood known for its discretion. 
Very few, if any, peers resided in that part of town.  It was a needed
precaution for their contact who couldn’t be seen with them at any cost.  In
order to limit Portia and Frederick’s exposure to the outside world, the house
had been stocked with everything they might need as they waited for further
instructions.  The servants were well-paid for their discretion and efficiently
performed their duties while only rarely appearing.  Yet, despite the
adequacies of the arrangement, Portia continued to pace, her displeasure at
being cooped up very much in evidence.  In contrast, Frederick lounged in a chair
by the fire, sipping a glass of port.

“How can you be so blasted calm?” she asked.  “That bitch
gave us fake papers.  And without the real ones, the chest is useless.”

After stealing the chest from the Riverton house party,
they’d discovered important papers were missing from it.  When they’d kidnapped
Lord Arthur and ransomed him for them, Vanessa had handed over the documents. 
But the ones she’d given them had been forged.  They’d been told by the person
who hired them that the papers were in code which could only be deciphered with
the chest.  But after poring over the documents since reaching the safe house,
they’d discovered they’d been tricked.

“The chest may be useless with these papers,” said
Frederick.  “But it will prove invaluable when we recover the real ones.  And
don’t forget….without the chest, Vanessa won’t be able to make sense of the
documents.  We haven’t seen the last of her, pet.  Nor her of us.”

“We should’ve taken her hostage then killed her when we had
the chance,” Portia said, to test his reaction.  “No one else would’ve thought
to forge those papers.”

Frederick simply raised an eyebrow and took another sip of
his drink.  “Making our escape was hard enough.  It would’ve been close to
impossible if Kellington had been screaming for our blood.  You saw them
together.  The man was halfway to being in love with her.”

“And she was more than halfway to feeling the same about
him.”

There it was,
thought Portia with grim satisfaction.
Just the slightest hesitation before Frederick raised his glass again.   He
thought he could hide his feelings, but he couldn’t shield them from her. 
Never from her.

“There’s nothing more we can do tonight,” she said, as she
turned away from him and slowly began walking toward the door, her hips swaying
from side to side.  “Why don’t we retire and start anew in the morning?”  She
reached the door, then turned to him over her shoulder.  “After all, there’s
nothing to be done about Vanessa Gans tonight.”

She left the room.

Frederick sat deep in thought for a moment, then finished
his drink and followed her.  There was nothing more to be done about Vanessa
Gans for the moment.  But a reckoning would most surely come.

CHAPTER TWO

Throughout his life, Arthur had spent a great deal of time
thinking about the
Romany
woman’s prediction for him, but never so much
as in the week since he’d met Vanessa.  While he normally wouldn’t put too much
faith in Sofia’s claim to be able to predict the future, he had to admit she’d
come rather close to the mark with Ned.  Just as foreseen, he had gone overseas
and faced a great deal of danger through his work with the Foreign Office.  And
with Jane, Ned had found the love of his life.  While thus far, none of Lizzie’s
predictions had come to pass, he had no doubt that if any woman would one day
speak before Parliament, it would be his sister.

Although he shuddered to think just what it was she would
say.

However, Sofia had been completely off the mark about Hal. 
He couldn’t imagine his youngest brother telling anyone to avoid alcohol,
unless it was to win some kind of wager with his friends.  Or, perhaps, if he’d
been knocked insensible about the head.  But even then the concept was rather
far-fetched.

As for Liam’s future that the course of true love wouldn’t
run smoothly, well, that was akin to predicting a great ball of fire would rise
in the east to begin each day then set in the west.  When did love ever run
smoothly?  It was one of the reasons Arthur had spent so much time avoiding
it.  That, and the feeling he had that the woman he loved would one day be lost
to a villain’s bullet.

Until he’d met Vanessa, he’d never really had to worry about
it other than as an abstract concept.  But now he’d met a female who affected
him like no other woman he’d ever met.  And since her work continually exposed
her to danger, it made sense that she might be in a situation where she’d be
shot.  The very thought of it made his stomach clench.  It didn’t mean he was
in love with her.  He’d be similarly upset at the thought of any person of his
acquaintance being shot. 

Wouldn’t he?

If Sofia’s prediction was true and the woman he loved would
be shot, perhaps Vanessa would be spared if he didn’t fall in love with her.  Of
course, the best way to ensure that would be for him to leave now and never
look back.  But he couldn’t bear the thought of her riding into danger
unprotected.  It would be ungentlemanly to abandon her, no matter how much she
claimed she wanted him to leave.  He’d stay, but he’d safeguard his emotions.

He looked at the woman who’d been riding beside him for the
past two hours.   She had a light coating of dust on her and a smudge of grime
on her nose.  While she’d rather ruthlessly re-tucked her hair under her hat,
some of the vibrant red tendrils had escaped and were curling about her neck.   She
was enchanting.   Arthur halted his wayward thoughts and forced himself to think
about the task at hand.  “Where exactly are we going?”

“To consult with someone who might know how to decipher the
papers.”

“The real ones from the chest?”

She nodded and a bit of sunlight made her hair gleam. 
Arthur tried to ignore the effect. 

He didn’t succeed.

“I should be quite upset with you,” he said gruffly.  “Mortimer
and Cassidy were holding me hostage.  If they’d known you’d given them a fake copy
of the papers, they could’ve killed me.”

“I considered that,” she said as she stroked Merlin’s neck. 
“But the chance of it occurring was quite small.  Had they discovered the
deception, they wouldn’t have dared to kill you because they still needed leverage
to get me to give them the real documents.”

Arthur stared at her stroking hand, then blinked in a futile
attempt to get the images the motion conjured out of his head.  “But there was
still a chance it could have happened.”

She looked just the slightest bit sheepish.  “Yes, I realize
that.  But you should know how glad I am that you were released relatively
unharmed.  Although I feel compelled to say that if you’d listened to me and
left the entire business alone, you never would’ve been placed in harm’s way in
the first place.” 

“That’s one of the poorest apologies I’ve ever heard in my
life.”

“That’s because I wasn’t apologizing,” she said with one
last pat for Merlin’s neck.  “And if you are to accompany me, we must get something
straight.  I will be the only one to take any risks from here on out.  You must
stay safely away from any action that occurs.”

“That is completely unacceptable,” said Arthur more
forcefully than he’d intended.  “I will not let you put yourself at risk,
sweeting.”

“That is entirely beyond your control, Lord Arthur, and I
would prefer that you keep your endearments to yourself.  Come, I want to go a
few more miles before nightfall.”  Then she kicked Merlin into a gallop and for
once the animal obeyed. 

*                    *                    *

Shortly before sunset, Vanessa surveyed their surroundings. 
The last village they’d passed was at least five miles behind them.  They
wouldn’t reach another until well after dark.    There was a hill to one side
of them and forest on the other.  Both offered adequate cover from the road,
but the hill seemed to also have some protection from the elements.

“This should do for tonight,” she said, as she walked Merlin
toward the gentle slope of the hill.

“Do for what?” asked Arthur.

“To sleep.  Kellingtons do sleep, don’t they?”

“We are known for taking full advantage of a bed.  We also,
from time to time, sleep.  Why are you taking Merlin up that hill?”

“It’s where we’re going to spend the night.  And by ‘we,’ I
mean your horse and me.”   “Is there an inn up there?” asked Arthur dubiously. 
          

“Of course not.  But there appears to be some flat ground
just above that rise, which should afford excellent cover.  I don’t think we’re
being followed, but one can never be too careful when sleeping out of doors.”        

“I imagine that would be so, but surely there must be an inn
if we press on.  Or we could go back to the one we passed an hour ago.”

Vanessa made an indistinct noise, which sounded suspiciously
like a snort.  “I do not have the time to go backward, sir.  You, of course,
are free to sleep wherever you wish.”

“Why Miss Gans, I thought you’d never ask.”

Vanessa hoped the growing dusk hid the flush which
immediately flooded her face.  “That was not an invitation to indiscretion, as
you very well know.  I only meant that if you are incapable of spending the
night under the stars, you may go back to the inn.  However, I will not wait
for you in the morning.” 

“But I was not concerned for my own comfort,” said Arthur,
biting back a smile at her obvious attempt to make him quit. 

“I assure you that I require no such coddling,” she said, as
she very pointedly dismounted by herself.

“Quite.  But I was worried about my horse.  Poor Merlin has
grown quite accustomed to a well-appointed stable.  Clean hay, fresh water.  It
sounds quite inviting, now that I think of it.  What I wouldn’t give for a bed
of hay.”  What he wouldn’t give to lie next to her in it.  Arthur dismounted
then began unsaddling his horse.  The area in which they’d chosen to spend the
night was a patch of flat grass halfway up the hill, which was sheltered from
the wind.   “If we sleep here, what shall we eat for dinner?”

“I will be eating a bit of cheese, some bread and an apple. 
I don’t know what your meal will consist of.”  Then, as the silence lengthened between
them, she added “Don’t tell me you didn’t bring anything.”

Arthur hated looking like a fool in front of her, but if he
had any hopes of eating, he had to confess.  “I already ate what little I
brought.  Had I known we’d be pressing on this far I might’ve packed more.  But
I’m not in the habit of providing my own meals.  That’s what cooks are for. 
And inns.  And civilization.”

“I suppose I can share my meal with you tonight,” she said
rather grudgingly, as she tied Merlin’s reins to a tree.  She reached to take
off his saddle, but Arthur was there first.  As his fingers grazed hers, she
jumped back as if stung.

“Please, allow me,” he said with a grin.  “Think of it as
earning my share of the meal you had the foresight to pack.  And to think that
all I have to do for half a chunk of cheese and some dried-out bread is to
curry both our horses.”

“Perhaps this will dissuade you from continuing on the
journey.”

“What kind of man would I be if I let a little work and starvation
take me from your side?” asked Arthur, as he saw to the animals.  “Do you only
have the one apple?  Our horses deserve the treat, even if I do not.”

“I brought food for the horses,” said Vanessa, as she cut an
apple in two and handed one half to Arthur.  “They are most deserving, after
all.”

“And I am not?”

“I did not say that, my lord.”

“Nor did you deny it, Miss Gans.  At least if I am to be
found wanting it is in favor of two warriors such as these.”

Arthur watched Vanessa feed the apple to Merlin with one hand
as she stroked his neck with the other.  Normally unfriendly to anyone other
than Arthur, Merlin was quite literally eating out of her hand and nudging her
gently with his head.  Arthur was of a mind to tell his animal to stop being so
fresh when he remembered he needed to keep his distance from the delectable
Vanessa.

With that in mind, Arthur scouted the best place to sleep
for the night, preferably far from temptation.  It had been many a year since
he’d slept out of doors as a child, and even then it had been on a soft bed
roll and within walking distance of the manor.  If he recalled correctly, the
meal had been served by footmen.  On a table.  With proper linens and china. 
He wasn’t looking forward to sleeping on the ground, but he wasn’t about to admit
that to Vanessa.  He did have some pride, even if it was being steadfastly
eroded.