Sweet Deception (16 page)

“Emma.” He had no other words. Good God. He’d never imagined Pygmy thus. With her hair artfully swept up around her face, she stole his breath. Gone was her staid colorless day gown. Delicate lace caressed her bosom, which was accentuated by some sort of shiny green trim, while the rest of the dress floated around her figure, only hinting at the curves he knew lay beneath. How in the hell was he going to keep his mind on the half-truths he planned to weave?

“Please, come inside.” He offered his arm, which she accepted gracefully. Her satin slippers made no noise alongside the clicking of his booted heels on the stone flooring as they made their way toward the dining room but even had he been blind, deaf and dumb, he would
have known she was beside him—his entire body hummed with awareness.

“I hope you don’t mind, but I had the staff lay out a cold supper for us before excusing them for the evening,” Derick said as he guided her across the threshold with a hand to her lower back. He felt her shiver at his touch, felt the tremor through his own body. He hastily removed his hand.

Derick’s eyes lingered on Emma, dressed in all her finery. Then he glanced at the simple fare of meat, cheese, fruit and bread with a touch of regret. “While you deserve a feast served by footmen in full livery, the fewer ears to hear our conversation, the better.”

“I understand,” Emma murmured as she lowered herself into her chair. He’d placed it diagonal to his own at the head of the table, so that they might hear one another without shouting.

“Let me serve you.” He turned to the buffet to make selections.

Emma waited quietly as he filled plates and wineglasses for them both. Derick was glad of it. Most women would be blathering on about one thing or another. He was particularly impressed that Emma wasn’t. Knowing her, he was sure she must be brimming with questions, practically biting her tongue to keep them in.

As he bent over her shoulder to serve her, the heady scent of lavender warmed by flesh filled his senses. It stayed with him as he settled into his place. Sitting so near, Derick couldn’t miss the way the candlelight glistened on Emma’s exposed skin, how it glowed in her amber eyes. He swallowed a gulp of wine to alleviate the sudden dryness in his throat. He hadn’t anticipated the intimacy of such seating, thinking only of the practicality. Damnation. He was in for a long night.

He looked away as he took a bite of the smoked meat, focusing on his strategy. Emma’s curiosity would be to his advantage. If he set himself to only answering the
specific questions she asked, he would be both feeding into her preconceptions and ensuring that he didn’t give away anything more than he had to.

Although “had to” was a relative term. He didn’t
have
to tell Emma anything. At this point, it was more like taking a measured risk. The more she believed he confided in her, the more he hoped to gain her trust for his purposes.

“Well, then,” he said, turning in his chair so that he faced her as best as the table arrangement allowed. “What say we skip the small talk and get right down to why you’ve come.”

Emma, who’d just taken a sip of wine, coughed as she gave him a startled nod. She hastily set aside her goblet.

Measured risk or not, opening this door could place his current mission in jeopardy, so he’d best do what he could to minimize it. “Before you begin your interrogation,” he said, “I must insist on complete confidentiality. I wish no one to know of my past. It is my own personal affair.”

Emma nodded her understanding.

He leaned ever so slightly toward her, pinning her with his gaze. “I require your word, Emma, that you’ll speak of this to no one—not your brother, not your servants.” Derick smiled to ease his demand. “Not even your priest.”

Emma returned his smile with a tentative one of her own, but said solemnly, “Of course.”

He nodded. Living a life of deception, he found it ironic that he demanded—and trusted—her word. But some people took vows very seriously. He had a feeling Emma was one of them. It was the best he could hope for and still move forward. “Good.” Derick opened his hands, spreading them like an open book. “What would you like to know?”

Emma placed her napkin on the table, pushing her plate aside without having taken a bite and leaned
toward him in her eagerness. Derick suppressed a wry grin. He imagined she’d have rubbed her hands together if it wouldn’t have been completely rude.

“Had you already been recruited as a spy when you left England for France?”

Derick nearly laughed. “You do get right to the point, don’t you?” At Emma’s blush he murmured, “It’s a trait I find I appreciate.”

The smile that peeked at the corners of Emma’s mouth was both shy and a touch alluring.

He considered her question and decided to answer truthfully but simply. “No.”

Emma waited for him to continue. When he didn’t, she pursed her lips. She dipped her chin and widened her eyes as she crossed her arms in front of her. “If you’re going to give one-word answers, we’ll be here all night,” she warned. “Believe me, I can ask the most minute and tedious of questions if you force me to.”

Derick did laugh then. He couldn’t help himself. “Touché.” He leaned back in his chair to convey complete ease and openness, though in truth he guarded his words carefully. “I left for France only with the intention of seeking out my family.”

Emma frowned. “But…didn’t your mother’s family come over from Paris along with her?”

“Most, but not all,” he hedged. It hadn’t been his mother’s family he’d been seeking, though, had it? A shameful truth that he intended would never see the light of day. “I was young.” He shrugged lightly. “I had an overwhelming urge to see where I’d come from.”

“So you were already in France when the Treaty of Amiens broke down…”

He nodded. “Common knowledge,” he said, knowing it would irritate Emma. “You ask questions like a girl, Emma.” He made a waving motion with his hand. “Just floating your suppositions out there instead of coming
out and asking what you really want to know.” He gave her a lazy grin. “You’d have made a terrible spy.”

He found he liked that about her.

Emma huffed and her amber eyes narrowed on him speculatively. “Fine, then. You were detained, along with the rest of the British tourists in the country at the time. But you weren’t released with the majority. What happened?”

Derick cocked his head. “That is
not
common knowledge. How did you—”

Emma’s shoulders raised, ever so slightly. “Your mother told me.” She blinked, looking away. “After I hounded her for information about you, night and day,” she mumbled.

Derick leaned back in his seat, slowly, the controlled movement masking his shock. “How did my mother know what became of me?” He’d certainly never told her. Nor had he expected the viscountess would have cared a whit what had happened to her son. She certainly hadn’t paid him any mind when he’d been right in front of her all those years.

“She made inquiries, of course.” Emma frowned at him. “I assume she still had connections in France—and you
were
her only son, Derick.”

His skin prickled with unease. What kind of connections might his mother have had that would have known such potentially sensitive information?

Emma had noticed his hesitation. That wouldn’t do. He’d worry about his mother later. Tonight was about deflecting Emma’s curiosity regarding his past. And the best way to do that was to put her on the hot seat a bit, too. He leaned forward again, giving her a slow grin. “You say you
hounded
Mother for information? About me? Why ever would you do such a thing?”

Her blush made it obvious. Her childish infatuation with him must have run very deep. How had he not seen
it? He nearly snorted. He’d been seventeen, that was how. And he’d seen her as little more than an adolescent pest. But now…

Emma cleared her throat. “We were discussing what happened when you were detained,” she said pointedly.

Now she was an adult pest. His eyes raked over her. An incredibly distracting one.

“So we were.” Satisfied that the subject of the viscountess was closed, Derick considered. He hadn’t realized Emma knew of his detainment. Damn. He’d have to reveal a little more. “With my darker coloring—and this nose, of course—my French heritage was obvious.”

“Half French,” Emma corrected.

He let her believe what she would. “As you can imagine, tensions were high. Many of us, particularly young men, were held apart from the others. Loyalties were…questioned.” He nearly shuddered. That was as close as he would come to discussing those weeks of “interviews” that turned to interrogations—followed by extreme…intimidation.

“I was approached by the French. You see, they knew of my family connections. They also knew of my position in English society—that I would inherit a viscountcy one day.”

They’d thought it a great lark, hadn’t they? A coup of sorts, to have a full-blood Frenchman accepted as British aristocracy—a truth they’d learned courtesy of his sire’s brother, who’d become a high-ranking official in Napoleon’s government. “It made me the ideal candidate to spy for the French.”

“You refused, of course,” she said staunchly.

Derick blew out a breath through his nose, and yet her unwavering faith in him soothed a place inside of him he hadn’t even known still hurt. He hadn’t missed the snide insinuations and distrustful stares whenever he returned to England. People usually assumed the
worst. After all, everyone knew his mother was French, and he
had
been in France most of the war.

So why was Emma different? “What makes you so certain? Do you forget I have French blood flowing through my veins?”

Emma stared at him as if he were a prize idiot. “Well, for one, you wouldn’t be admitting it to me now. You know very well there’s no leniency for traitors, no matter how much time has passed since the offense was committed. You couldn’t expect me, as a magistrate—as an Englishwoman—to keep my vow of confidentiality if you’d betrayed our country.”

Ah. It was logic that convinced her, not any faith in him. What had he expected? Still, disappointment nettled.

“Besides,” she said, “blood doesn’t matter. It’s how we are raised that determines who we are.”

“Blood doesn’t matter? What rot. Just look at the successions of kings and nobility for ages. Or how some families are bad to the core.” Like his. “Blood matters above all.”

“
That’s
rot,” she said. “But that’s not what I meant. I meant that it doesn’t matter whose blood runs through your veins. It’s what you’re exposed to that makes you who you are. There’s great debate about the subject, of course, but I am a firm believer that John Locke is correct with his tabula rasa theory.”

Derick translated the Latin. “Blank slate?”

Emma nodded. “Precisely. He says each of us is born a blank slate, and our personalities, who we are, develop not because of who sired us but because of where and how we are nurtured. There’s no such thing as ‘bad’ blood or ‘good’ blood, only bad and good choices. So no matter what blood runs through your veins”—she pointed at him for emphasis— “you were raised here. You love England, the same as I do. The same as any Briton. You would never betray her.”

He scoffed. “How would you know such a thing?” She’d spent a few summers with him at best. Even the man who had raised him, the old viscount, had doubted his loyalties. “My own…father died thinking me a traitor,” he uttered, his voice harsh. Unexpected pain sliced through his chest, stealing his breath. God, he’d thought he’d dealt with these feelings, accepted them as a tolerable sacrifice for the choices he’d made. Emma’s gloved fingers slipped over his where they rested on the table. He tried to pull away, but she grasped tight, infusing his cold skin with her warmth. “Then he was a fool.”

Derick stared at her. Her face was open, her amber eyes bright with moisture—his pain reflected in her eyes. Christ.

“Stop looking at me so.” He pulled harder, this time successfully extracting his hand from hers. He shifted in his chair, putting distance between them.

Emma fisted her hand, slowly moving it back to her side of the table. After a long silence she said, “You asked how I know you love England?”

“Yes,” he said gruffly, glad the awkward moment had passed.

Emma leaned back in her own chair, seemingly lost in thought. Derick noticed her thumb moving against her fingers again. “When we were young, all you talked about was your home in Shropshire, the land, what you intended to do with it once you inherited. Every game we played featured you as a lord of the realm, the protector of hearth and home.” She shook her head and her lips twitched with a wry smile. “It was rather annoying, actually, and terribly unimaginative.”

He huffed. “Thanks.”

She shrugged. “As we got older, you would often speak of what you wanted to change when you took your seat in Parliament.”

Had he? He brought a hand to his temple, pressing.
He hardly remembered, hadn’t
wanted
to remember. So much had changed since then.

“But more than that,” Emma continued, “there was so much pride in your bearing, because you knew your place. When we were playing on Aveline lands, it was as if you treated it with reverence. As if you breathed it in. Much as I feel when I’m riding Wallingford lands. That’s how I know you love England. It’s a part of you. That’s how I know you would have died before serving the French.”

Throughout her recitation, Derick’s chest had tightened painfully. Emma remembered a boy he’d long forgotten. Had he ever been so innocent, so…deluded to the realities of the world? He brought his hand down hard on the table. “Well, you’d be wrong,” he said harshly, taking a perverse satisfaction in her sudden shocked gasp.

He was angry now—unreasonably so, a distant part of himself whispered. He struggled to rein it in, which was more difficult than it had ever been. It seemed as if his control over his emotions frayed more and more every day. It must be this place.

He glared at Emma. Or this woman. This girl who knew nothing about him but thought she knew everything.

“D-do you mean to say—” Emma swallowed, her amber eyes wide and her face gone pale. “Do you expect me to believe you agreed to spy
for
the French?” Her tiny hands had curled into fists on the table and she looked a bit shaken.