The Pretender (33 page)

Her anger was gone and her knees were swiftly weakening when he finally raised his mouth from hers. She blinked up at him in dazed need as he dropped a swift peck upon her forehead.

Then he turned and strode from the house before she could blink.

Damn and blast. The thieving sneak.

Agatha rallied her senses and raced to follow him. She found Pearson waiting for her in the hall with her mantle and gloves.

"I thought perhaps you might wish a bit of breakfast after all, madam."

He serenely handed her a napkin-wrapped packet that smelled suspiciously like a bacon-egg-and-roll sandwich.

Agatha was delighted. "Pearson, if you weren't my grandfather's age, I'd marry you." She stood on tiptoe to peck his withered cheek.

"Yes, madam. I hear that a great deal."

"Why, Pearson! Was that a jest?"

"No, madam. Butlers are forbidden to jest. It is the law." He held the door open. "Mr. Applequist is now halfway down the block to your left, madam."

"Thank you, Pearson."

Quite encouraged with the thought of a new ally in her butler, Agatha set off behind Simon with a skip in her step and a mouthful of egg.

At first, Agatha's only intention was to chase after the rat-sneak-bastard and pin him down for a good neighbor-rousing row.

His stride was too long, however, and Agatha began to feel the effects of too much sedate city life. She decided to simply keep after him until he got to wherever he was going.

After several long blocks, he turned down a quiet street, then climbed the steps of an unassuming little house. Agatha scurried to catch up.

He was admitted immediately and disappeared within. Agatha hesitated. She wanted to catch Simon, but if he was doing some shady spy activity, she didn't want to be responsible for his discovery.

Perhaps she'd best wait and see what was about first. Her burning curiosity had nothing to do with that decision, of course. Still, it was too bad she couldn't get a peek into the house. She eyed the windows on the ground floor, but the draperies were all drawn.

She would have done the same, if her private life were so visible from the street, but it made it very difficult to sneak.

A movement caught her eye. On the second floor, the window coverings were being pulled back by a very efficient-looking woman in a nurse's uniform. Quickly Agatha stepped within the shadow of the building.

The room was too high to see into and Agatha could hear nothing, for the window was still closed against the early-morning chill.

Blast. Well, he had to come out sooner or later.

She had just settled into a hopefully casual position next to the corner of the house when the front door opened. She ducked around the edging stones, then peered carefully back out. Wait a moment. Was she trying to catch him or not?

Catch him, of course. But if she didn't reveal herself, what fascinating Simon secrets might she find out?

Simon stood on the stoop with the nurse.

"I know you have high hopes, sir. I'll do my best with him."

"All I hope for is that he be himself again, Mrs. Neely."

"Poor lad. I've been saying his name to him every hour, just as you asked, and reading to him as well."

"I know, I couldn't ask for better care. Now we must simply wait."

"Yes, sir. Will you be coming back tomorrow?"

"I'll try."

Simon turned to go. His gaze flickered past Agatha's hiding place. She ducked back quickly. Had he seen her?

After a breathless moment, she looked again. Simon was several lengths down the block, walking with that particular feline grace of his.

With a sigh of relief, Agatha fell into step far behind him. Really, he was quite handsome from the rear. One of her favorite aspects, in fact. And it was a lovely day for a walk. Agatha set herself to enjoy her outing.

An hour later, she was no longer so enthused. Simon had led her a pretty race, up and down the streets of Mayfair and beyond.

She had no idea where she was, her feet were aching, and she was beginning to get very hungry. Pearson's delicious roll was a distant memory.

Now Simon was traveling through a merchants' district. Drapers and clothiers, mostly, with the occasional tempting restaurant. Determined, Agatha resisted. It wasn't easy.

The walks were becoming more crowded as the morning wore on, and Agatha began to have trouble keeping track of Simon's blue coat and black hat with its matching blue hatband.

Suddenly she could not see him at all. Where had he gone? Agatha risked discovery to climb a set of steps and scan the growing crowd.

Nothing. She had lost him again.

And this time she had lost herself as well.

Simon tucked several pound notes into the man's hand and shook it. Then he donned his new brown beaver hat, which went quite nicely with his new brown felt coat and set off toward the Liar's Club with a chuckle.

His pursuer was likely even now searching for his blue coat in the crowd. He knew he'd lost them this time. It had taken longer than he had thought. They had stuck to him like a parasite when he had tried to lose them through exhaustion, then confusion.

The coat change was the oldest trick in the book but one of the best. The eye became accustomed to a certain thing, such as a color, and began to follow the color alone. Change the color, lose the tail.

He'd suspected a tail since he'd left Agatha's, for he'd long ago developed an instinct for them. He was fairly sure he knew who was responsible.

Damn, but Etheridge was a suspicious sort.

Whistling, Simon turned smartly into the club and clapped a yawning Stubbs on the shoulder. Playing Ethelbert was giving him a lovely break from his usual morning climb.

"Morning, Mr. Ra—I mean, Mr. Applequist."

"Good morning, Stubbs. Out early today, aren't you? Is Jackham about yet?"

"Yessir. He sent me out here to wait for you. He said it's a doorman's job to stand by the door."

"Good man. What would we do without you?"

"Yessir. Thank you, sir."

Simon stepped into his club with fresh purpose today. He had a new mission for some lucky Liar. It was time to get the goods on Dalton Montmorency, the distinguished Lord Etheridge and powerful member of the Royal Four, for the man was still something of an unknown quotient.

Simon hated unknown quotients.

Agatha approached the doorway through which Simon had disappeared. A young man of perhaps seventeen wearing blue-and-silver livery waited by the door but made no motion to open it for her.

There was no sign, not even the most discreet. The only marking the double doors held at all was a stylized bird carved on each. It had an outrageous tail whose shape rang familiar in Agatha's mind.

"Oh! A lyrebird," she said out loud.

The boy turned to glance at the markings as well. "Is that what it is, then? I thought it was only a pretty sort o' pheasant." He turned back to her. "Do you need direction, miss?"

"I'd like to speak to Simon Rain," she said cautiously.

"You mean Mr. Jackham, don't you?"

"No, indeed I do mean Simon Rain."

He eyed her suspiciously. "What d'you want Mr. Rain for?"

Just then a gust blew the parting in her mantle wide and the young man's eyes focused on her figure.

"Blimey!" His smile became a bit familiar. "You must be come for a job. Why didn't you say so?" He leaned closer. "Is it better than the snake act?"

He seemed honestly interested. Well, there were only two possible answers to that question. Agatha gathered her cloak tighter and nodded gravely. "Significantly."

"Cor." He seemed breathless with wonder. He ogled her for a moment more, and Agatha could almost hear the gears clicking slowly into place. "I's'pose you want to talk to Mr. Rain, now."

"Yes, thank you."

With a rather courtly gesture, the young man opened the door for her and bowed her through it. He took her cloak with a sort of reverence and hung it on a row of gilded pegs. Then he cleared his throat.

"If you'll please wait here, I'll fetch the owner."

The owner? Not simply a chimneysweep-thief-spy, then.

Agatha had every intention of following him directly to Simon, but when she stuck her head through the door after the boy disappeared through it, she earned herself a growl from the largest man she had ever seen. He stood before a vast chopping block with a rather intimidating knife in one mighty fist and an even more intimidating glare in his eyes.

She backed out quickly, then irritably perused the room in which she had been left. There were tables of different types, some low and small, some larger and round, with chairs all around. Dining tables? No, cards.

A gaming hell? The room was large, with different areas delineated by the placement of furniture. Over there, a place for relaxation with large overstuffed chairs. On this side, game tables and billiards. On the far end of the long narrow room there was a raised dais framed by velvet curtains.

It was unmistakably a stage. Ah, the snake act. How did one perform an act with a snake?

" 'Scuse me, Mr. Jackham, Mr. Rain. There's a woman out front wants to speak to the owner." Stubbs leaned farther into the room, as if to impart a secret. "She's a right looker, sir. Built like a dream come true, if you take my meaning."

Jackham looked as if he willingly took Stubbs's meaning, but Simon held up one hand.

"Jackham, we've gone over this. No working girls in the club."

Stubbs shook his head. "Sorry, sir. I didn't tell you, she's got an act. Says it's 'sig-ni-fi-cant-ly' better than a snake act. Talks like a right toff, she does."

Jackham gazed pleadingly at Simon until he had to laugh. "Fine, then. See what she's got. But if you hire her, make sure she understands the house rules."

"Oh, I will." Jackham was out of his chair with more speed than Simon had seen in months. Apparently, a crippling limp was nothing compared to profit.

Waiting a moment to be sure Jackham wasn't coming right back, Simon stretched out his legs before him and crossed them at the ankle. A yawn caught him unaware.

He wasn't sleeping well, even on nights when Agatha wasn't sneaking into his room.

The old dreams came, as always. Dreams where he watched his men die, one by one, unable to help them, knowing he had sent them to their deaths.

Ren Porter was there as well. Eyes open but unseeing, he had reproached Simon in silence, a statue in the midst of his nightmare.

But he was long accustomed to those sleeping journeys of guilt. They'd been with him for years.

It was the damned erotic visions of Agatha that haunted him to wakefulness. The recurring theme was very simple. She came to him and he took her.

Again and again, night after night, in every way known to man, and a few that he thought he might have made up from his own desperation.

Sometimes the act was rough and angry, his resentment at her power over him coming to the fore. Sometimes it was slow and languid, poignant enough to make him ache with loneliness when he awoke.

And he always awoke, damn it. Every damn time, just before he achieved his release. He'd be moving within her. She'd be crying out beneath him or above him, and he would be close, so damn close…

Then he'd snap to consciousness with a painful wrench, throbbing and panting, and unfulfilled. Next came the hours of sleeplessness—aching, sweating alertness that sometimes lasted until dawn.

Any more of this torture and he'd soon find it difficult to walk.

He shook off the spell and the coming yawn and stood. After listening for the tread of footsteps in the hall for a moment, he placed his palm over a carved rosette on the mantel and pushed.

Beside him, a narrow slit appeared between the fireplace and the bookshelves. Stepping through quickly, Simon noted that he'd best not get too fond of Agatha's cook, or he'd never make it into the dusty passage that led to his office secreted in the attic above.

Feebles was just plain exasperated. He'd followed the lady for near two hours, only to end up outside the Liar's Club. He could have walked here in not more than half an hour.

He shambled up to Stubbs where the young doorman leaned against the wall.

"Women, eh?" Feebles shook his head in disgust.

"Don't I know it," Stubbs replied socially.

"Mr. Rain know she's in there?"

"O' course. Told him meself."

"All right then."

Feebles stuffed his hands back in his pockets and turned away.

" 'Keep your eye on the lady,' he says to me," he mimicked in Simon's tones. " 'The lady must be kept safe.' Ha! That lady knows her way around, all right."

The bloody Magician could have told him not to bother, could have told him they were playing some sort of catch-me-if-you-can game.

Grousing to himself, shuffling his feet, Feebles headed back to his post watching over the house on Carriage Square.

When the door from the kitchens opened, Agatha was thoroughly prepared to deflect Simon's anger about being followed with a few recriminations of her own.

The man who emerged proved to be a grizzled fellow with a pronounced limp, who eyed her as if she were a piece of fish displayed on the salt. Agatha shut her mouth with a snap and gazed back at him warily.

Had Simon sent him out in the hopes of frightening her away?

"Well, then, let's have a look at you." He twirled a finger in the air.

Deciding to keep her mouth shut until she knew what was about, Agatha spun obediently. When she returned to her position facing him, the fellow's expression was decidedly more approving.

"Is that all your own? No padding and such?"

Padding? The very idea! "I should say not!"

"No need to get all shirty about it. Man's got a right to know what he's dealing with."

To tell the truth, although the fellow seemed to like her looks, he didn't seem altogether stirred by them. Deciding that her virtue was in no immediate danger, Agatha relaxed. Besides, with that limp, she could easily outrun him if she chose.

Feeling better, she managed to smile at him. He blinked, then rubbed his hands together.

"Well, you're a pretty lass, just as Stubbs said. But I must warn you, house rules say no whoring. If that's what you're after, you can keep walking."