Unmasked (2 page)

“What’s your name?” he asked. His voice was a little rough.

She gave him a small, secretive smile. “Molly.”

Nick laughed. It was a good choice for a place like the Vulture but he doubted it was her real name.

Molly moved a little closer to him. Her slippery satin thigh pressed gently against his leg and once again he felt desire as hard and hot as a punch in the gut. Damnation. He had always considered himself to have iron self-discipline but the only iron thing about him at present was his erection, which was swelling with each provocative slide of Molly’s satin skirts against his thigh.

“And who are you?” she whispered in his ear. Her voice was low, slightly husky. Her breath tickled his cheek.

Nick cleared his throat. “My name’s John.”

She smiled again, that knowing smile. “What are you doing here, John?”

“Looking for company.” Nick took a mouthful of the watery beer and appraised her over the rim of his tankard. “What about you?”

She gave a little shrug of her shoulders. The candlelight gilded the pallor of her bare skin, made it look smooth and tempting. There was a scattering of freckles over her shoulders and a tiny, heart-shaped mole above her collarbone that was already driving Nick almost mad with frustration. He found that he wanted to press his lips to it, to taste her skin. He shifted on the bench.

“I’m looking for someone, too,” she said.

“Someone in particular, or anyone?”

For a second Nick thought he saw some expression flicker in her eyes, too quick to read. Then she smiled. “Someone special, darling. Someone like you.”

Nick leaned toward her. One kiss would do no harm and he wanted it, wanted her, with a hunger that was already hard to control.

She leaned away. “Not so fast,” she said. “There’s a price.”

There always was, with a whore.

Nick raised his brows. “You charge for your kisses?”

“I charge for everything, darling.”

The curve of those red lips was very seductive. Nick ran one finger down the bare skin of her inner arm, tracing the curve. He thought that he felt her tremble just a little and admired her skill. The cleverest whores were the ones who seemed innocent.

“And if I want to take something on account?” he murmured.

Her eyes were veiled behind the mask. “It’s against the rules.” She put her hand on his thigh. “Let me persuade you to open your purse.”

Nick caught her chin in his hand, turning her face up to his. “Let me persuade you to break the rules,” he murmured.

He felt her go very still beneath his touch, like a wild animal freezing in the face of danger. For a moment Nick thought that he could read abject terror in the depths of those dark eyes and he started to draw back. He wanted no part in coercing an unwilling woman and he understood all too well how some of these girls were obliged to play a role that they hated just to earn enough money to survive.

But then Molly put a hand on his nape and pulled his head down so that his lips touched hers. The surprise held Nick still for a moment as he absorbed the sensation, the touch and the feel of her. Again he sensed a hesitation in her before her lips parted a little and softened beneath his. Her tongue tentatively touched the corner of his mouth, then slid across his lower lip in sweet invitation, and he felt a sudden helpless rush of desire, like the first blindingly hot passion of his youth, so strong it made him ache, so unexpected it shocked him. He had never felt anything so raw for any woman, and certainly not for Anna. Fierce need smashed though him and in that instant he forgot his scruples, forgot his memories, forgot even why he was there, and pulled her to him and kissed her deeply until he was panting and she was, too.

When she tore herself from his grip he was so wrapped up in the taste and feel of her that for a moment he was completely disorientated. Then he saw that she had moved a little way away from him along the bench. Her face was averted and she had a hand pressed to her lips. Nick could see she was shaking slightly. The downward curve of her neck looked so vulnerable that he felt a powerful surge of anger and protectiveness and lust inextricably jumbled into one. Her closeness and her apparent defenselessness unleashed a sudden wave of memories of Anna, terrible, tormenting memories so sharp that they cut him to the core. He had not been there to protect his wife when she needed him. He had failed her in so many ways.

He put his head in his hands for a moment to try to clear his mind. He could not think about this now. He should never have touched the girl and sparked the tangle of memory and desire that had captured him.

With deliberate intent he wiped out the memories and, when he straightened up, he saw that Molly’s attention had drifted and she was staring across the room. He followed her gaze toward the door and saw that his cousin, Robert Rashleigh, had come in and was standing preening himself like a displaying peacock. In a white wig, silver cloak, gold breeches and scarlet shoes, he drew all eyes.

The conversation in the tavern fell to a murmur then rose again as men resumed their drink and sport. Nick suddenly became aware that beside him the girl was rigid, upright, vibrating with a strange kind of tension he could not understand. Her attention was riveted on the flaunting figure of the Earl.

“Excuse me,” she murmured, and slipped from the seat beside him. She walked straight across to Rashleigh, put a hand on his arm and indicated to the tavern servant to bring him a drink.

Nick’s eyes narrowed as he watched the interchange between his cousin and the whore. He felt a fool now for his unrestrained response to her. Evidently he had been without a woman for too long to fall into lust so hard and so fast. Molly, in contrast, had forgotten him already for she was at the door, gesturing to Rashleigh to follow her out into the night, no doubt to a set of rooms nearby. There was no sign of reluctance in her now. The appearance of hesitation earlier must have been only for show—or because she had not really thought Nick worth her time. Her apparent vulnerability and defenselessness had been no more than figments of his imagination. Nick’s jaw tightened as he saw her give Rashleigh the same tempting, secretive smile in parting that she had given to him.

He watched as Rashleigh drained his glass of wine in one gulp and ordered a second, which he dispatched the same way, his eyes on the door the whole time. Nick guessed that the girl had asked Rashleigh to give her a few minutes in which to prepare herself before he joined her in her bed. He got to his feet. It was time to spoil his cousin’s party. He started to move toward Rashleigh with deliberate intent.

Rashleigh looked up and their eyes met. For a long moment they looked at one another and then Rashleigh turned away abruptly and hurried out without a word. The tavern door crashed on its hinges as it closed behind him. The candles fluttered in the wind and half of them went out. Men cursed as they knocked their drinks over in the dark. Nick blundered across the room and found his way to the door. He was not going to let Rashleigh get away from him now.

The alleyway outside was pitch-black. The tavern sign was swinging in the rising breeze and creaked overhead. Nick stopped, his eyes adjusting to the darkness. He listened intently but could hear no sound of movement. He could not tell which way Rashleigh had gone but he was determined to find him and confront him with Hawkesbury’s accusations before Rashleigh gave him the slip and tumbled into bed with that willing little harlot.

Then he saw the glimmer of something in the gutter at the end of the lane, where the narrow passageway joined the high road. His breath caught. Turning, he shoved open the door of the tavern and shouted inside, “Bring a light!”

The landlord hurried to do his bidding, a flaring torch in his hand. Nick could see a fold of the silver cloak, all muddied now from the dirt of the gutter, gleaming bright in the torchlight.

The customers were piling out of the alehouse, scenting trouble. Another lantern flared, showing Rashleigh lying on the ground, his face paint smeared, his wig askew. One of his hands lay outstretched as though clutching after something that had eluded him. Nick could see a knife protruding between his ribs. It was buried to the hilt. Beside him lay a blond wig and a black velvet mask.

Images filled Nick’s mind of Anna, lying there in the gutter in his cousin’s place, limp, broken, her life drained away. He saw her blue eyes clouding over in death and felt the familiar tide of sickness and guilt wash through him. With an immense effort of will he forced the images from his mind and looked dispassionately down at his cousin’s tumbled body. Rashleigh looked undignified in death. His face had fallen and crumpled in on itself. He looked weak and dissolute and pitiful. Nick searched his heart and did not feel a scrap of sorrow. The world was a better place without the Earl of Rashleigh.

The breeze stirred the edge of Rashleigh’s silver cloak and stirred, too, the scrap of paper that had been clasped between his fingers. It fluttered free and Nick bent to pick it up. It was a visiting card and on it was printed the flaunting symbol of a peacock in gold. Nick frowned. He had seen that device before. It was similar to the coat of arms of his old school friend Charles, Duke of Cole. He turned it over. On the back was written the words
Peacock Oak,
the estate in Yorkshire where Charles had his country seat.

Nick saw the inn servant at the front of the crowd, his face thin and terrified in the flickering light. He walked over to him.

“You were standing near to Lord Rashleigh when he was talking to the girl,” he said. “Did you hear anything they said?”

“Are you the law?” the servant demanded.

Nick thought of Lord Hawkesbury and wondered what he would make of this mess. “Near enough,” he said.

The servant shook his head. There was the sweat of fear on his upper lip and he wiped it away with his sleeve. “He asked if there was a place where they could talk and she said to wait a few minutes and then to follow her across the street. That was all.”

Nick held out the card with the golden peacock on it. “Have you ever seen that before?” he demanded.

The inn servant held the card up to the light, peering at it. Then he recoiled, and pushed it back into Nick’s hands. He cast one, fearful glance over his shoulder.

“That’s Glory’s calling card!” He turned an incredulous look on Nick. “Have you not seen it, sir? It’s been in all the presses. Glory leaves her card when she robs her victims!”

A hiss went through the crowd, a strange indrawn breath of fear and excitement, for there was only one Glory and she was the most infamous highwaywoman in the country. Everyone knew her name. No one needed an explanation.

Nick straightened up. “Well, I’ll be damned,” he said softly.

He remembered the touch of the girl’s lips on his. She had kissed like an angel. He felt part shocked, part incredulous, to think her a criminal and a murderer. It seemed impossible. He had thought her honest and even now some instinct, deep and stubborn, told him she could not have killed Rashleigh, though the evidence was right in front of him. The wig, the mask, the knife…And his cousin’s fallen body that reminded him so sharply, so heartbreakingly, of Anna….

He thought about the strange tension he had sensed in the girl when Rashleigh had entered the room. She had recognized the Earl. Perhaps she had even known him. She had told Nick that she was waiting for someone and that someone must have been Rashleigh himself. All her actions that evening must have been calculated. She had lured Rashleigh outside to kill him in cold blood.

“Shall I call the watch, sir?” The landlord was at his shoulder, his face strained and sweating in the half-light. “Powerful bad for business, this sort of thing.” He saw Nick’s face and added hastily, “Terrible tragedy, sir. Friend of yours, was he?”

“No,” Nick said. “Not my friend. But he was my cousin.”

The landlord gave him a curious glance before beckoning the bar servant over with a message for the watch. Nick knew he should go directly to tell Lord Hawkesbury what had happened but he lingered a moment longer, his eyes scanning the dark warren of streets that wound away into the dark. He thought fancifully that the faint, incongruous scent of flowers still seemed to hang in the air. For a second, above the creaking of the inn sign, he thought that he could hear the tap of her heels, see a flying shadow melt into the darkness of the night. He knew he would never find the girl again now.

Word of the murder was rippling through the crowd. People were gathering at the end of the street to peer and point and whisper at the sight of the infamous Earl of Rashleigh dead in the gutter. And beneath the whispers ran the words “It was Glory. Glory was here. She did it, it was her…”

L
ORD
H
AWKESBURY
was not amused.

When Nick and Dexter Anstruther were ushered into his presence the following morning he was clearly in a very bad mood indeed.

“This is the most godforsaken mess, Falconer,” Hawkesbury barked, leaning back in his chair and steepling his fingers. “Murder and sedition on the streets of London, the whole capital stirred up by the deeds of this vagabond criminal! It’s in all the morning papers. They are treating her like a heroine for ridding the country of scum like Rashleigh. The whole point of you heading Rashleigh off was to prevent this sort of incident. Instead you spend a jolly half hour with Glory in a tavern and then allow her to wander off and stab your cousin!”

“Quite so, my lord,” Nick said, wincing. He reflected that Hawkesbury’s mild complexion was a poor guide to his choleric disposition. “But whilst there was, no doubt, a long list of people who wanted to murder my cousin I do not believe we could have predicted that one of them was apparently a notorious highwaywoman.”

“You couldn’t even recognize a notorious highwaywoman when you saw one,” Hawkesbury grumbled, drawing toward him Nick’s written statement from the previous night. “Thought she was a harlot, I see.” He looked up. “How old are you, Falconer? Two and thirty? You sound as naive as a babe in arms!”