Sins of a Virgin (31 page)
Instead, he settled for honesty. His eyes skimmed the creamy perfection of her skin with appreciation before returning to her face. “Einhern is a bastard.”
Her walk was provocative as she moved to the washbasin and rinsed the paint and rouge from her face. “But a truthful one.”
Gabriel recognized a gauntlet when he saw one, but he was more than willing to pick this one up. “I don’t judge you based on what he said.”
She laughed as she wandered into her dressing room. “Whyever wouldn’t you? Ignoring the facts is simply delusional.” She emerged carrying a sage green gown.
“I don’t ignore facts. I simply assign them their correct value.”
“Shall I tell you how many more men there are like Einhern? How many other men I lured away? That I let kiss me and fondle me?”
“I think I’d prefer not to know.” Anger pounded between his temples at the thought of her being forced to endure what she did, but he held it in tight check. “But if you need to tell me, I’ll listen. It won’t change my opinion of you.”
She regarded him with a mixture of fear and pity, then whirled away and pulled her dress over her head, the hem rippling around her feet.
“How many soldiers did you save by eliminating Einhern?” he asked, stepping behind her to fasten her buttons.
She remained silent, but she trembled under his fingers.
“If you’re going to take credit for all the wicked things you did as a spy, you must also take credit for the good.”
“Life isn’t a scale, Gabriel.” The fight had gone from her voice. “Good deeds don’t cancel out the bad.”
He turned her slowly toward him. “You did what needed to be done.”
“I also accepted the repercussions.”
“I think you hide behind them.”
She flinched away. “Enough. You may not like who I am, but claiming I’m something I’m not won’t change anything.”
“Neither will letting the past define you and hiding from new risks.”
That sparked her temper. “I wouldn’t call this auction fearing risk.”
“I would. You’re afraid to discover if you’re anything more than a wanton. You refuse to give yourself the chance to find out.”
She planted her hands on her hips, a flush sweeping into her cheeks. “I have known myself for twenty-four years. How long have you known me? Slightly more than a week?”
“And it’s enough to know you’re better than this.”
“Better than what? Better than making a fortune? Better than arranging my life so I can live comfortably? What would you have me do instead? Marry? A man who will desert me for the next pretty face and lush body?”
“Not all men are like that.” If he married Madeline—and he could no longer reject the idea out of hand—there was no way he’d be tempted to look at another woman. Hell, he wasn’t even married to her and he already feared no other woman would ever interest him. How could he settle for someone else when he’d already tasted perfection?
“Congratulations to your future wife then.”
“Why won’t you consider marriage?” Suddenly, nothing was more important to him than her next words.
“Have you ever eaten something that makes you ill, and afterward you can’t stand the sight of it?” Air escaped her in a rushed breath. “My father was a poor actor and an even worse gambler. When we had nothing left to sell to pay his debts, he sold my mother. He forced her to whore herself to pay off his debts. He said the men would kill him otherwise. When he left us, she had no other choice but to keep earning money that way. Tell me why I’d want to place myself in that situation?”
Madeline’s shoulders were straight and her face calm, but her eyes stared with remembered horror. Gabriel knew she wouldn’t welcome his touch, but at the same time he knew she needed comfort. He wrapped his arms around her.
Although she stood as if steel ran the course of her spine, tremors shuddered through her. “I often wonder why she agreed that first time. Did she still have feelings for my father or was she trying to protect me?”
Gabriel’s hands smoothed small circles over her back.
He expected her to remain rigid until she’d regained enough control to push him away, so when she melted against his chest as if she no longer had the strength to stand, a moment passed before Gabriel gathered his wits enough to tighten his hold.
“She gave up everything so I wouldn’t have to be like her.” She snorted, but the sound emerged more like a choked cry. “After all she did, I couldn’t even manage that one simple thing.”
“Do you think she wanted you to die on the gallows?”
“I—”
“Your life may not have been the one she would have chosen for you, but I think she, of all people, would have understood.”
“Why do you keep trying to convince me?” When she tilted her face toward him, anguish shimmered in her eyes. “Neither of us want anything more to come of this.”
So she kept reminding him. Yet each additional second he spent in her company made his reasons seem more insensible. He felt like he was going mad, but it was a glorious madness.
“Just let it go,” she whispered.
“I cannot.”
“Why?”
“Because I see what you refuse to see.”
“And what is that?”
“You—”
The door opened and Campbell strode in. His gaze turned glacial when he spotted Madeline in Gabriel’s arms. “Einhern is ready to talk. Come, Madeline.”
Gabriel dropped his arms and she fled to Campbell’s side. Gabriel watched her leave, an odd dissatisfaction burning in his chest.
He wasn’t even sure what he would have said if he’d been allowed to finish. Something half-witted and trite. Anything that would have eased the emptiness and pain in her eyes.
And he would have meant every damned word, heaven help him.
He followed them to the study.
Einhern sagged in one of the chairs as if he’d been deflated. His face was chalky, and when he raised a hand to his hair, it shook. But as Maddox had promised, except for the purple bruise on Einhern’s chin that Gabriel had put there himself, neither the room nor Einhern showed any signs of violence.
“How did you discover Miss Valdan’s location?” Campbell asked.
Einhern wiped a glistening smear of sweat from his upper lip. “I received an anonymous letter. It claimed to be from someone who was as bitter toward her as I am—was,” he amended with a frightened glance at Maddox. “They said this Madeline Valdan and the woman I had known as the Countess d’Moriet were one and the same. They sent me money, told me her location, and said the rest was up to me.”
“Why did they contact you?” asked Gabriel. The whole thing was far too convenient.
Einhern’s hands twisted in his nightshirt. “I may have voiced my opinion of her a time or two when I was drunk.” His voice was whiny, begging for pity, but his eyes traced Madeline’s body with sickening lust.
Gabriel stepped between them, shielding Madeline. She’d had to endure the monster once before, she shouldn’t have to go through that again. “Yet you accepted the proposition. You tried to kill her three times.”
“But I didn’t succeed, so no harm done really.”
Gabriel’s fists tightened as he thought of Madeline’s nearly lifeless, blue-lipped body as he carried her from the river. Her whimpers as he stitched closed her wound. Her desperate motions to put out the fire. “Attempted murderers hang just as surely as the ones who manage not to bungle things.”
“It’s not my fault things went wrong. My plans—”
“You wouldn’t know a plan if it crawled into your bedroll.” Madeline stepped to Gabriel’s side, her eyes blazing.
He should have known she would never cower. Even from a monster such as this. If it wouldn’t have ruined her performance, Gabriel would have kissed her.
“That’s ridiculous, you—”
Maddox coughed.
“—you woman,” Einhern finished, his nostrils flaring.
“Even a
woman
like me knows not to write a letter warning the person I’m about to attack.”
Einhern’s brows lowered. “A letter? Did someone warn you? It was that imbecile Toole, wasn’t it? Or the man I hired at the theater?”
“The note, you fool,” supplied Maddox.
“I don’t know about any note—”
“The one you left on my doorstep.”
“I’ve never been to your house before.”
Maddox cleared his throat.
Einhern flinched, his breath wheezing in rapid puffs. “No need for that. I’ve been answering your questions.”
“Yes, but I expected truthful answers.”
“They are, I swear!”
“Then what do you know about Paris?” Madeline asked.
The man’s eyes widened, his surprise unfeigned. “Enough trickery! I won’t let you entrap me again. I know nothing of Paris. I dealt with you in Berlin.”
“Curse it all.” Madeline’s dark words were barely audible. Her fingers clamped on Gabriel’s arm.
Gabriel covered her fingers with his own. “Are you all right?”
“He’s telling the truth. He’s too short to be the man who threatened me at the ball. And if he didn’t know about Paris, that means—”
Gabriel didn’t need her to finish the sentence.
Einhern wasn’t the only one who wanted her dead.
M
adeline hadn’t meant to go to Gabriel’s mother’s house. She’d meant to send a polite and regretful excuse, explaining that obligations kept her away. Yet here she was, ensconced in the cozy parlor while Beatrice bustled about in her comfortable way, pouring tea and heaping a pile of biscuits onto Madeline’s plate and preparing a plate for the Runner outside who’d escorted her. Gabriel’s mother moved with the simplicity of a woman secure in her own home and her own skin.
Madeline, for all her training, couldn’t withhold a longing sigh.
“That came from the depth of your soul.”
Madeline’s lips curved wearily. “I’m just tired.”
Beatrice studied her. “From more than the auction, I should think.”
Ah, it was so tempting to share everything, to unburden herself to another woman. But it had been far too long since she’d had any female friends, and she found herself uncertain how to go about it. Yet even if she knew, Madeline could hardly share the root of her problem—Gabriel.
While she floundered for a response, Beatrice moved on to soothing chatter about the weather and the antics of her pupils, giving no indication she noted Madeline’s halfhearted responses. Madeline only had to chuckle at amusing stories, and let herself be distracted from the turmoil in her mind.
The butler glided in a few moments later with a calling card on a silver tray.
Beatrice glanced down at the card, her story cutting off abruptly. She lifted the card off the tray and ran her finger along the edge. “He’s early today.” She nodded at the butler. “I’m not at home, as usual.” She set the calling card on the table and hurried to the window, careful to stay to the side so she couldn’t be seen from below.
Madeline glanced down at the card on the table. Her breath caught.
The Marquess of Northgate.
Even though she knew it was unbearably rude, she rose and stood next to Gabriel’s mother.
“There. That tall man in blue.”
Madeline couldn’t see Northgate’s face as he walked away, but there was power and grace in his movement, much like his son, but also a hesitance in his step as if he didn’t wish to leave. “Has he come here before? If he’s bothering you—”
“No!” Beatrice grimaced ruefully and started again in a more subdued tone. “He isn’t bothering me. In fact, if I were a better person, I’d tell my butler to send him away for good rather than taking his calling card every day.”
“Every day?”
Beatrice walked back over to the settee and picked up a large lacquered box from the table next to it. Inside, in neat little rows, were hundreds of calling cards. “He has called on me every day since the proper mourning period for his wife ended.”
“When was that?”
“Almost one year ago.”
“He’s come every day for a year and you haven’t allowed him entrance?”
Beatrice nodded, picking the card back up, her lingering caress of the card speaking volumes. “As I said, I should tell him not to call. It would be easier for both of us, but I cannot bring myself to do so. Each afternoon I tell myself I will send him away once and for all, but every day I fail. Silly, is it not?”
No. Far too familiar. “Do you know what he wants?”
Beatrice placed the card neatly in the box and replaced the lid. “To claim me or see if that is a possibility.”
“Is it?”
“I—no. If I married him, everyone would know that he’s Gabriel’s father. The resemblance is too great. I forced Gabriel to be a bastard all his life. I won’t force him to publicly bear the title.”
“You hardly forced him to be a bastard.”
Beatrice patted the couch next to her. “Come here and sit. I forget that you’ve only heard Gabriel’s version of the story.”
Madeline complied, a guilty fascination refusing any other option.
“I was a governess for the Marquess of Northgate’s brother. One summer Matthew came to visit. Although he was tall and handsome, I was too sensible to fall for him. After all, he was a marquess, and I only the governess. But it was summer and the weather fine so there was a constant supply of picnics and games. The children were of course invited with me as their governess. And although Matthew and I tried to ignore each other, we could not. No more than we could stop breathing. The marquess was already engaged, an arranged match to the daughter of a rich merchant. His family needed the money. His father had long since gambled the family deep into debt. We loved each other. Truly. Passionately.” She closed her eyes. “It was glorious. A time out of time.” She paused. “Perhaps I shouldn’t burden you with the details of all this.”
Madeline couldn’t bear for her to stop. “Please, I want to know.”
Beatrice smiled. “It does feel good to talk about him. Mrs. Huntford is an honorable widow, not a fallen governess. I can hardly share the details with my friends.”
Madeline blinked, concentrating on swallowing the tea in her mouth. She’d forgotten Beatrice wasn’t truly Mrs. Huntford. That it was a role she’d chosen to protect herself and her family. She’d been playing that role for far longer than Madeline. Yet she was so sure of herself. Had she become used to pretending to be Mrs. Huntford or had she maintained her own personality despite the pretense?