The Countess Confessions (18 page)

T
wo days had passed since Iris’s interview with the earl. Now she found herself traveling with his valet in a public coach. As if they had known each other for years.

She dreamt of a warm bath, a clean bed, and privacy. During her years of service as a lady’s maid, she had grown spoiled. She’d eaten good meals, worn Emily’s cast-offs, and had no cause to travel farther than to Lord Fletcher’s estate. Most assuredly she was not forced to share a carriage with ill-mannered passengers who broke wind, gossiped about their family to strangers, and trod on her toes.

Winthrop did not appear pleased with their class of company, either. But he managed to be polite when a dowager asked him to hold her hat with ostrich plumes that poked his nose. And he kept his patience with the little girl who kept pulling a thread in his jacket until the cuff came unhemmed.

“I can stitch that up easily,” Iris said softly, not wanting to make a fuss.

“So can I, my pet.”

My pet?
She thought he was being snide, a young man talking about sewing and using an endearment in the same breath. But once inside their room at the inn, he took out a needle and thread, repaired his cuff, and asked immediately what she would like for supper.

“I think, sir, that before we settle on our food we should come to agreement about our sleeping arrangements.”

“I told you not to worry. Your virtue will not be compromised by my doing.”

Iris closed her traveling bag. “What does that mean? That you think I might lose my wits and compromise myself?”

He gave one of his sly smiles. “I’d never suggest such a thing. Not that it hasn’t happened before, you understand. But you can trust me to stand strong.”

“How self-sacrificing of you. Can I also trust you to sleep outside the door?”

“Oh no. That would look peculiar. I shall sleep behind the dressing screen. There shall be no temptation for either of us that way.”

Iris nodded, undecided whether he had dealt her an insult or a compliment. Was he hinting that he found her a bit attractive? Attractive enough to mention temptation. As for her, she found him an impossible man to fathom. All this intrigue and then stitching up his cuff as if he’d graduated from a lady’s academy.

“How did you learn to sew like that?” she asked, still standing in the middle of the room.

“What do you mean?” He pulled off his spectacles. She stared into his eyes in surprise. He became a different man without those glasses. He seemed younger, unguarded. Not unpleasant to behold at all.

“I was only curious how you learned to sew that well. Like a tailor. Was that your previous occupation?”

Perhaps he or his father had worked on Bond Street, fashioning jackets for gentlemen. Such experience would be an asset to a valet. That would explain why Winthrop and the earl always appeared elegantly dressed. It was in the detail. Coat buttons aligned like rows of little soldiers. A pristine neckcloth handled as delicately as a christening gown. Oh, what a skill, all right. To be able to alter one’s identity with a needle and thread as deftly as Lady Fletcher did with her cosmetics.

“No,” he said, laughing as if she’d embarrassed him with her observation. “I was never a tailor, miss.”

“I should be proud to admit if I were—”

“An army surgeon,” he said.

Iris lowered her bag to the floor. “Oh.”

“Let me get that,” he said, hurrying toward her. “Why don’t you sit by the window? Keep an eye on who’s about.”

A surgeon? What a dreadful spy she made. Those strong hands had sawed off bones on battlefields. Fancy her picturing him in a shop. “I can’t do this,” she said, moving to the chair. “I’ll be hopeless.”

“Why is that?” he asked over his shoulder.

“I was convinced that you had worked on Bond Street. It appears I have a better imagination than I do instincts.”

He hefted her trunk to the table. “What on earth have you packed in there?”

“Everything. A lady’s maid has to be prepared.”

He sat down at the other end of the small table, withdrawing his handkerchief to sweep off a thin layer of dust. “‘Everything,’ meaning?”

She swallowed and stared at his glasses. “Most of my personal belongings. Books, mainly. The accessories I have used for masquerades.”

“Genuine costume balls or your mistress’s escapades?”

She bristled. “I beg your pardon.”

He leaned across the table and studied her so intently she felt as if he were dismantling her piece by piece. “I should be begging your forgiveness, miss . . . Iris. We must practice using each other’s first names. And you are right to be offended. What the countess did for previous entertainment is only his lordship’s business.”

She gave him a glance that said she agreed. He was smiling at her now, but in a confidential manner. Iris gathered her wits. Surgeon and spy he might be to her virgin maid, but she had not survived a childhood of cruel abuse from relatives without developing her own strategies to survive. She would make that much clear. The last time she had been physically assaulted was the day she’d come to realize she had to depend on herself.

“Surely, sir, we don’t need to play man and wife when we are alone together?” She dropped her voice, jerking her head meaningfully toward the door. “Or do you think someone’s listening?”

“They aren’t going to learn much if they are,” he said in a stage whisper. “We are an ordinary husband and wife traveling to fill our new positions. You’re fortunate there was no sketch made of you to be nailed on tavern doors.”

“Lady Shalcross is fortunate that she was in disguise,” Iris said worriedly. “It’s her safety that concerns me.”

“His lordship will watch out for her, Iris. The viscount is the intended victim. Keep your head.”

“I don’t intend to lose my head.”

“That’s the spirit.”

“Are we really going to sleep in the same room together?”

He unbuttoned his waistcoat. “Three nights until we reach the castle.”

Iris looked at him in chagrin as he removed his coat. “And what of our arrangements once we are there?”

“The arrangements have already been made. We have a room in the servants’ quarters that gives us immediate access to the private stairs to the upper floors.”

“One room?”

He hung his coat over his chair and reached for her hand. “It will only be an act, Iris. We are to do a job.”

Knowing that didn’t help the tingling nerves that jumped from her wrist up her arm as his hand touched hers. She recalled his nimble fingers plying a needle. His steady eyes unsteadying her, perceiving things about her that she knew could not be proper. The valet to an earl and spy.
He can have his pick of any maid he wanted, and some ladies, too,
she thought.

“Are you proficient in the use of any weapon?” he asked her out of the blue.

She blushed. Here she sat imagining he had seduced her with his stare when his mind had moved on to practical, if disturbing, matters.

“The pistol?” he asked, nodding in approval before she had even answered him.

“No. Daggers.”

He slid his hand from hers. She felt another forbidding tingle; this time it was because
she
had startled him, and neither he nor his master seemed the type of man easy to unsettle.

“You’re talking about a knife as in chopping carrots or onions,” he said. “For a minute there you gave me a fright. Imagine a dagger in your delicate hands.”

“A lady’s maid does not chop vegetables,” she replied, smiling at his confusion. “I meant what I said. I am proficient in the art of throwing knives and using a dagger, although I’ve never had cause to injure anyone. Neither has my mistress, but she’s a better throw than me.”

He nodded in obvious condescension. “Village sport, I assume. It’s unusual that ladies are allowed to participate.”

“Oh, I’m not talking about throwing a dart,” she said, letting a patronizing note sneak into her voice. “I have a few skills of my own, sir. Mr. Rowland taught us to throw using an apple on his head as a target.”

D
amien woke Emily early the next morning by reaching under the pillow and withdrawing a long white rectangle imprinted with an illustration. “My card!” she said, astonished enough by his discovery to forget her nakedness. She sat straight up to confiscate it from his hand. “I thought I had that hidden. Are you playing tricks on me, Damien?”

He narrowed his eyes in speculation. “Passion? I presume this was meant to crop up in number seven’s reading. Is it a keepsake for you of what should have been?” He lifted his brow in speculation.

“Is this your way of forcing me to make a false confession? You know how susceptible I am when I’m half-asleep.” She was susceptible to him at other times, too, but this was
not
a welcome awakening. How could that card have reappeared under her pillow by itself?

“Am I going to find a cricket bat in your trunk?”

“If you continue to be unpleasant, I might wish I’d brought one.”

He retreated from the bed, tossing the card across the table. “I suggest you get rid of this before anyone else sees it and makes a connection between a certain countess and a larcenous fortune-teller.”

She reached for the dressing robe twisted around the bedpost. He did not make an effort to avert his gaze as she turned to draw on the wrapper.

“I didn’t make a fuss like this when you told me you wanted to marry another woman.”

“What I told you was that I’d sooner kiss the innkeeper’s arse than kiss her at the altar. She belongs to the past. And so should these cards.”

“I’ll admit they’ve been a nuisance. I know they could be dangerous in the wrong hands. But those cards brought us together.”

She turned again, finding him directly behind her. “Pardon me if I don’t appreciate your hidden reminder of another man.”

“You’re wrong,” she said softly. “I don’t feel anything for Camden.”

“That’s not what you wrote in the letter you planned to give him at Lucy’s party.”

She stared into his eyes. “You lied to me. You promised me you burned the letter before you could be tempted to read it! Oh, Damien, you are a—”

“I didn’t read it,” he said, looking contrite. “I started to, but at the time I didn’t realize how important a part you and Camden would play in my life.”

“Camden isn’t a part of our lives.”

And, yes, she had kept the card, as if it would help her to keep Damien. It reminded her of his heroic intervention in the tower. And what she wished they would come to feel for each other in time.

Passion.

And love.

And a marriage not in name only. She had grown more confident since their wedding. She wanted a true marriage at any cost.

•   •   •

The middle-aged merchant pushed a path through the passengers boarding the stage, jostling Iris from her preoccupied worry and up against a little boy. “Move, move, move,” the merchant said, giving her another jab with his elbow. “Woolgathering women and children cannot be allowed to hold up the line. Some of us have business to conduct.”

Iris was debating whether to answer or overlook this rudeness when, to her relief, Winthrop appeared. She didn’t know where he had come from, but he took her hand and pulled Iris back into her place.

Iris would have protested this physical display, but she could not find the words to express her gratification. Who would have thought that the earl’s valet had such a sense of himself? A presence, that’s what Winthrop had. Even the merchant seemed disinclined to argue his own superiority. Built on the slight side and bespectacled, Winthrop could hold his own.

“Do get inside the coach,” he said with a practicality that ended her musings. “I shall be watching him to make sure he does not insult you again. Besides, we’ll reach the castle before evening. You won’t have to put up with bad-mannered travelers after that.”

No,
Iris thought.
Only secret assassins and traitors who think it their duty to destroy the fabric of all I hold dear. What about my mistress?
she wondered.
Is the earl kind to her? Had Emily managed to conduct herself like a proper young lady?

Winthrop nudged her arm. “I’ve received some good news,” he said quietly.

“Oh?”

“The others are doing well.”

“Even—”

He frowned. “Mr. Rowland has made remarkable progress, if that’s who’s on your mind.”

Iris pressed her lips together and turned to the window. She felt guilty that her first thought had not been about Michael. What had happened to her? What would happen to all of them in the end?

•   •   •

Damien walked Emily halfway to the carriage, insisting that she wait inside while he settled the bill. She complied without argument. She was dying for a chance to eat the bacon and scones she had wrapped in a cloth and tucked inside her reticule. Damien had purchased a bottle of wine for the journey. Emily had never indulged in spirits before supper. But after the way Damien had indulged himself in her last night, she realized she would have to adjust to his worldly tastes or fall by the wayside.

Such a sacrifice,
she thought, hiding a smile. Not to worry that her mortal life was in danger. Damien made her die a little every time he took her to bed.

She did not intend to become a wallflower wife, even if one glass of wine would go to her head, and she would surrender her dignity at his demand. She would respect her rank as the Countess of Shalcross and hope to leave her rustic habits behind. The prospect made her wistful for Michael and her father, who would be lonely without his children, for all his complaints. Emily couldn’t believe how much
she
missed her beloved Iris, who had not asked for any of this and was likely at this moment cursing Emily for dragging her into this life-or-death intrigue.

“My lady? A moment, please.”

Emily turned at the carriage step to the mop-capped young woman who had addressed her. Damien had warned her not to look anyone in the eye or engage in a conversation during which she might be recognized. He wanted her to conduct herself in an aloof manner—except when they were alone, and his sensuality knew no limits.

“My lady, pardon me, but I believe you dropped this.”

Emily’s heart pounded as she glanced down at the card the girl held half-concealed in her apron folds. Good heavens, it was an unholy thing. Had it grown wings that it could appear to her detriment again? To think she had kept the card as a rueful memento of how she had met her husband, who assumed it was a token of her lost love. One day she might admit the truth to Damien, but not until she felt confident he would not mock her.

“You may toss it in the rubbish,” she said quickly. “It isn’t mine.”

“Are you sure, my lady?” The maid studied her in anxious silence.

“Yes, I am quite sure.”

“But I saw it fall from your person. I swear I did. The gypsy peddlers sell such items to ladies who are newly married and seeking secret methods to ensure—”

“Then perhaps my maid bought and tucked it away where I did not notice it. More likely it belongs to another passenger. Card games are played for entertainment here at the Sign of the Raven, aren’t they?”

“Not with cards like this. It looks a little naughty, don’t you think?”

Emily refused to look at either the card or the woman holding it. “I don’t think about things like that, and neither should you.”

“If your maid bought it,” the girl chattered on, “I hope she didn’t pay overmuch for the thing. It gives me a queer feeling. I hesitated to pick it up.”

Emily wished that she hadn’t. The card must have become caught in the mantle she had thrown over her arm during Damien’s rush to travel in good light. “Dispose of it, please. My husband will not want it in my possession.”

Which was an apt word to describe what had happened to her since the night the Earl of Entitlement had disrupted the dullness of her life. She felt another pang of homesickness, of nostalgia for the hapless romantic she had been and was still, sadly, at heart.

“You’re sure you want me to get rid of it?” the maid asked again. “It might have—”

“Oh, just give it to me,” Emily said, tugging it from the maid’s hand. “I will pass it along to someone who appreciates it.”

•   •   •

Late evening had fallen by the time they reached the next inn. Damien and Emily took supper in their room, washed, and went straight to bed. It was a chilly night, despite the fire in the grate. Emily had inched closer to her husband, not only to absorb his heat, but because the heavy anchor of his arm around her waist made her feel safe. She was drifting off with her chin on his chest, lulled by his slowing heartbeat. His was a strong pulse, steadier than hers. Now, suddenly the rhythm of his pulse changed. Her breath hitched as he opened his eyes and stared at her.

His face looked angular and alert in the dark. A shiver ran over her skin. “Damien,” she whispered, “weren’t you invited to a game of cards in the colonel’s private—”

He raised one arm from beneath the sheets, his hand brushing her breast, and put his finger to her mouth. “Ssh. Not a word.” He pulled her against his chest. “The door,” he said under his breath.

The door?

She peered over his sinewy arm to the doorknob. Had it just turned? How could he have been disturbed by such an indistinct sound when he was falling asleep? All she had heard was his heartbeat.

Before she could put together another rational thought, he grasped her by the waist and rolled them to the edge of the bed and onto the floor in a tangle of bedding. His body broke the impact of her descent. Then he was on his feet, grasping a sheet to knot around his hips. She was left to huddle under the blanket that he dropped for her.

The doorknob turned again. This time she heard it, too. It seemed, impossibly, that Damien had disappeared. His shadow on the wall vanished from her view. He could not have melted into the furnishings. Was there a secret exit from the room? Would he leave her alone on the floor? She strained her neck to see around the bed.

Heavens, he was crawling half-naked to the side of the door, the sheet spread beneath his body, presumably to protect him from splinters. What a sight. Those chiseled muscles moving with sinuous grace, his lean torso and hips twisting with a purpose that reminded her of his agility in bed.

He turned his head. She swallowed a gasp. The knife clamped between his teeth prevented him from uttering the warning that glittered in his eyes. She drew back beside the bed, listening. Now she could hear the thudding of her own heart. If whoever had turned that doorknob managed to gain entry, he would not encounter an empty room or even a sleeping couple, but an angry, naked, knife-armed man who clearly did not take well to an intrusion of his privacy.

The door creaked as if the person on the other side had decided to force entry. Were two intruders trying to break inside? A maid would have knocked or used her set of keys. Of course, it could be a drunken guest who’d mistaken Damien’s room for his. It happened often at house parties and crowded inns. Sometimes a room was left unlocked for a liaison.

But it could also be that one of the conspirators had recognized Emily, despite all the efforts Damien had taken to protect her. She looked up at the glass and saw his bare body crouched beside the door.

She couldn’t cower naked on the floor, hiding uselessly, acting as helpless as a pudding while he fought to protect her. She stretched her arm to the hearth and reached backward for the handle of the brass shovel. It burned a little from being left close to the fire.

But she ground her teeth, grasped the handle, and prepared to jump up the instant that the door burst open.

It never did.

There was another furtive rattle at the knob, followed by receding footsteps and then quiet. Damien and Emily rose in unison. He blinked when he saw her, hair streaming over her bare breasts and hips, a coal shovel held above her head, her belly smudged with soot.

“Good God,” he said, removing the knife from his teeth. “I have never seen such a sight in my life.”

•   •   •

He stared. He couldn’t help himself. If Aphrodite had launched an attack against Hephaestus when she was banished to Hades as his bride, she would have paled in comparison to Emily. The fire blazing at her back, the deep shadows of the evening, did nothing to dispel the image. “I assure you, Emily, that your state of undress would do far more to distract an intruder than a hearth utensil.” The moment would be forever emblazoned on his mind. She was a goddess who deserved his worship.

She lowered the shovel. “I was not about to hide under the bed while you were set upon by assailants.”

“Assailant,” he said in a clipped voice, searching for her robe. He resented the bastard for terrifying her. “I heard only one pair of boots at the door.”

“Perhaps it was the colonel coming to invite you again to cards. Perhaps he’d had a few too many and—”

“Those were not the boots he was wearing,” he said as he came up beside her. He helped her into her silky Chinese robe. His gaze lowered on her breasts before she covered them from view. “Maybe we should dress at night and stay dressed for the remainder of the journey. I don’t want any other man seeing you like that. Whether he is a friend or enemy.”

She stared at his back as he walked to the dressing screen, his disregard for propriety as fascinating to her as ever. “The thought occurs to me that I don’t wish to share you with other women, either,” she said, the admission startling her perhaps more than it did him.

“What?” He pulled his shirt from the screen and faced her, unconcerned by his blatant state of undress. “What women?”

“I know you wanted to marry another woman. I thought I wanted another man.” She took a breath. “But we were wed so quickly there wasn’t time to discuss whether you will take a lover during our marriage. I know it’s done. I detest the practice. Infidelity destroys a woman’s heart.” And even though her mother had not deliberately betrayed her father, she had broken his heart.

He put on a fresh shirt, regarding her in irritation. “I have more than enough on my hands, what with preventing an assassination and protecting you, than to even consider taking a lover,” he said. “Do you intend to take one, detesting the practice aside?” he asked, pulling on his trousers.