The Emperor's Conspiracy (5 page)

Charlotte shrugged, but she could see the fire in his eyes. She had touched something with her question, startled him. It intrigued her. “You do not go about in society, Lord Durnham, so I assumed you were involved in the government. In the war.”

“Perhaps I’m just an unsocial hermit.”

She laughed, and even to her own ears, it was breathless. Good grief! She’d better get a grip. She so seldom sparred with men who were not trying to flatter her, it was making her heady. She formed a rejoinder, then thought better of answering at all. She was not accomplished enough as a flirt, and she was usually too blunt.

He waited a moment or two for her reply, but when it was not forthcoming, he seemed to relax, as if he had dodged a bullet, and took up his teacup again.

Perhaps he was a spymaster. Or a diplomat. Charlotte could think of little else that would require such secrecy, unless she was mistaken in his reaction … She lifted her eyes to first Catherine and then Emma, and saw they were both regarding Lord Durnham with a good deal more interest than they had before.

“I must say, I never knew you worked for Whitehall,” Lady Holliday said. “You are very sharp to have worked that out, Miss Raven. It’s obviously a well-kept secret.”

“I didn’t say I worked for Whitehall.” Edward frowned at his sister.

Charlotte could not help leaning forward. “Oh yes, Lord Durnham, you did.”

“Stop baiting our guest, Charlotte. Lord Durnham obviously has no wish to talk about his duties for the Crown.” Catherine lifted a plate of beautiful little cakes and held it out to him.

He gave Catherine a look of hunted frustration, and Charlotte could see him considering arguing with her that he had no duties to talk about. He looked down at the plate, let it go, and took two cakes.

E
dward walked beside his sister while her three boys danced and ran ahead of them across the lawns. He was glad to be out of the house, and out from the knowing, laughing gaze of Charlotte Raven. The woman was confounding and annoying.

His work for the Crown was secret. No one knew what he did—the projects he undertook for the prime minister or the foreign secretary—but for a very small, select group. It was the only way he could be effective.

But Charlotte Raven had somehow guessed it, or found out.

“You should come home with me.” He had thought to be firm about it, but surprised himself when he spoke softly.

Emma looked up at him. “I will. But not now. I’m enjoying the company I have, and they are far more sympathetic than you.” She shaded her eyes with a hand to watch the boys.

“I’m sorry I was such a curmudgeon last night. It was not well done of me.”

Emma shrugged. “You were right. But I did love him, and truly, for many years, he was a very good husband. Yes, he risked our money, but we were happy. It’s only in the last three years that things have become bad. And I would never have thought he was capable of what he arranged with Frethers. Never.”

“I didn’t quite understand what you meant, when you told me that. I’m sorry. If I had, I would not have been half as stupid as I was.”

Her mouth pulled into a reluctant smile. “I understand. I was hard-pressed to believe it, myself. If it weren’t for Miss Raven—” She stopped, closing her mouth in a definite snap.

“What has Miss Raven to do with it?” He hadn’t meant the intensity of his question to come through, but Emma stopped and turned to him, her head a little to one side.

“She was the one who warned me about Frethers. If she
hadn’t, I’d never have confronted Geoffrey and discovered the truth.”

“And how did she know? That’s what puzzles me. How did a society miss like her know?”

His sister turned away, as if to watch his nephews at their game of catch, but he wasn’t fooled. She did not want to discuss this with him. Eventually she spoke. “Miss Raven’s secrets are her own. She revealed them at great personal risk to help me, and she has my steadfast loyalty for it.”

How had he never heard of Charlotte Raven before, but now, all he wanted was to know as much about her as possible? He was fascinated. And disturbed.

“I’ll warn you, Edward, as you once warned me.” Emma had turned to watch him, her face serious and knowing. “Charlotte Raven is not a woman whose life you can poke at without consequence. I know she has at least one powerful friend you would not like to cross.”

“What makes you think I’m the slightest bit interested in her?”

She laughed at him with genuine humor and walked away, shaking her head.

6

C
harlotte saw, from the way Kit stood, that he wanted her attention. He was almost straining toward her, like a dog held back on a leash.

She sometimes wondered who held that leash. Her or Luke. Maybe it was both of them.

She crossed the yard and came over to him, but walked past, into the stables, leaning into her horse’s stall and rubbing her flank. “You have a message?”

“Luke wants you to come to him later.”

She turned her head. “When?”

Kit shrugged. “He just said later. Whenever you can, I ’spect.”

She nodded, tried to make sure none of the disquiet she felt showed. “I don’t have any engagements tonight. We can go after dinner.”

Kit ducked his head and Charlotte thought she had probably hidden her unease better than he.

Luke was … not the same as he had been. Since she’d
ended his hopes of her returning, chosen to stay with Catherine, he’d become more and more difficult. More and more unpredictable. But even those early days, when he was still raw with disappointment, were nothing like now.

Whether it was the money, or the power, or the injury that afflicted him, it hurt to see him sucked slowly into a downward spiral.

She felt just like she had as a sweep, stuck in a chimney, with the slowly growing pain of a fire lit below her boots. Nowhere to go, trapped and helpless. Unless she went up, and then she’d lose skin.

Whichever the outcome, pain was assured.

But this was worse. She didn’t want to scramble away to safety, leave him behind. He deserved so much more. And he wouldn’t see—

“Who’s the nob, then?”

She stepped back from the door of the stall and frowned. “Lord Durnham, you mean?”

“Pro’bly. The one with the good horses.”

“Lady Holliday’s brother. He’s come to visit her.”

Was it her imagination, or did Kit relax at that. “Ah, well. Just wondered.”

“Kit, Luke hasn’t asked you to report to him on who comes to call on me, has he?” She didn’t need his answer; it was clear on his face as he ducked away, muttering about watering Durnham’s horses.

Oh, why did Luke do this to himself? Why did he torture himself with it?

And why did she?

Charlotte rubbed a gloved hand across her eyes. She’d never encouraged a single suitor. Not once.

She’d told herself they didn’t appeal. They were after Catherine’s money. Her dowry. All manner of excuses. But she faced the truth suddenly, with a fierce relief.

She did not encourage them because when she looked into their eyes, she couldn’t bear to think of them harmed or killed, even if they
were
just after her money.

And now that she was facing why she had shied away from the men of the ton like a marriage-shy rake, she also acknowledged to herself that Luke, the way he was now … Luke might just do it.

Might just kill them.

She dropped her hands to her side and skirted around Kit and Lord Durnham’s tiger, watering the horses and talking good-naturedly about the quality of his lordship’s horseflesh.

She’d thought to ask Luke to help her bring down Frethers, but had hesitated to do it. Now she understood her reluctance.

Frethers and his ilk required a fine hand, not a blunt instrument. And much though she lamented it, that is what Luke had become.

E
dward wondered what he was doing.

He was standing in the narrow access lane that ran between the houses opposite Lady Howe’s address, watching her house.

The lights were on downstairs, and Edward was not surprised they weren’t out tonight. There was very little on in London at the moment.

The heat pressed down on him even now, and the sun had only just set half an hour before, even though it was after nine.

He had only meant to go for a short walk after dinner. But his feet had led him here, and he wondered whether he should go up to the door and knock, or do the sensible thing and head back home to his study and the troubles that lay on his desk, waiting for him to solve.

The pity of it was that those papers did not hold even close to the same interest for him at the moment as the woman behind that door.

The side entrance of Lady Howe’s opened, the light from within the kitchen spilling out into a service alley just like the one he stood in, and two people stepped out.

Edward edged deeper into the shadows.

“I see you ’ave your sturdy stampers on,” a man said softly, as they turned right, onto the pavement just in front of him.

“I’m not walking to Tothill Road in heels or slippers, that’s for certain.” The woman’s tone was dry and amused.

Edward went still. He couldn’t move for a moment, as if shock and surprise had encased him in amber. Then disbelief, and something else, something darker, snapped him out of it, and he strained to watch them as they passed under a streetlamp. He was hoping, hoping he was mistaken.

They came under the weak glow, and the woman stilled. Stopped and turned, as if sensing his fierce concentration.

“Someone walk over your grave?” The man with her was young, dressed like a footman or stablehand would when off duty. He was no one Edward recognized. He spoke familiarly, but not with disrespect.

“Yes.” The woman shivered and took his arm. Let him move them along their way.

Edward was frozen to the spot, watching Charlotte Raven disappear into the night with one of her servants.

Then he looked around, to make certain there was no one else about, and began to follow.

7

L
uke’s headquarters in Tothill Road were in a gin house.

However, if any of his own men took too much of a liking to gin, they were gradually taken off duty. The loss of respect and power was not something many of them could contemplate, so Charlotte knew there to be a solid body of sober men keeping an eye on her when she came to this place.