Twelfth Night Secrets (20 page)

“This was left for you, my lord.” The footman handed him a folded paper and then turned to move off. As he did so, Tom swooped down and reached to take a cup off the tray. Julius intervened swiftly. “That is
not
for you, young Tom. And I’m sure you know it.”

Tom flushed guiltily. “I just wanted to try it.”

“So did I,” his sister said stoutly, not to be outdone.

“Well, you aren’t going to.” Harriet spoke up.
“And if you give Judd any trouble, he’ll bring you straight home. Do you understand?”

Her tone was unusually harsh, and they looked at her in surprised discomfort. Harriet never threatened them.

“Your sister asked you a question,” Julius said quietly. “It would be polite to answer. Do you understand what she said?”

They both nodded, chastened. Judd gave the Earl a nod of approval, but Julius didn’t notice. He frowned at the paper he’d just unfolded. The message was short and to the point. He folded it up again and tucked it inside his coat. What could be so urgent that Marcel needed to meet him this morning? The rendezvous would be easy enough to reach during the hunt, and he could slip away without difficulty. The hunting field was notoriously chaotic, but nevertheless, it was most unusual to call for a meeting in public and in full daylight.

The Huntsman blew his horn, and the horses and dogs moved down the driveway, the hunters falling in behind the Master until they had crossed the narrow lane at the end of the long driveway and into the first stretch of fields.

Harriet was torn. She did not want to ride with
Julius, but she couldn’t leave the children, and it seemed he was going to honor his promise. They kept in the middle of the field of hunters, and the children quickly forgot their discomfiture, cantering between Harriet and Julius. A small ditch brought triumphant cries of exhilaration from them as they jumped it, and Harriet forgot for a second who was riding alongside her and turned to exchange a grin with Julius. He returned it, and she fought angrily with herself for a moment.
God damn the man.
For one betraying moment, she had thought she was sharing that private moment with Nick. And Julius hadn’t had the decency to realize it, to pretend he hadn’t seen her smile.

Grimly, she set her sights on the first covert.

Julius rode for the most part in silence, keeping a close eye on the twins as they entered the wood. The hunt was packed closely together at this early stage of the morning, and their ponies were restless, but they seemed capable enough of controlling them. And Judd was there, watchful and ready to intervene. Julius relaxed his vigil and allowed his horse to fall back a little. He glanced at Harriet. Her profile was set, that pointed chin at a grim angle.

What in the devil’s name had happened to him? He knew he could not lie to her, but he deeply regretted
saying anything to her about her brother’s death. Keeping secrets had never been a problem for him; his life depended upon it. He hadn’t been forced to tell her the whole truth. He could have left her with the part he’d given her, that he had not personally killed Nick.

And yet he had not been able to help himself. For the first time that he could remember, his heart had ruled his head. He wanted to be with her, to make love with her, to learn her through and through, to discover every little thing about her, and he could not do that if she did not know the truth, know it and understand it. She had to understand him as he understood her. She had to know what made him the person he was, why he did what he did. And never before had he felt like that about anyone. So what did that mean?

But it was a rhetorical question. He knew the answer even if he had not acknowledged it. He loved Harriet Devere. And he had never expected to love anyone in that way, never expected to allow anyone to get that close to him, to get inside him the way she was. It had happened imperceptibly, as he’d become acutely conscious of her presence, as he’d watched her, entranced by her laughter, her smile,
the little gesture she made with her shoulders, the ready wit, the glorious sensuality of her body. It had crept up on him until suddenly the truth had burst upon him, what the French so aptly called
un coup de foudre.
But what the hell was he to do about it? By revealing himself to her, it seemed that he had destroyed any feelings she might have held for him . . . any feelings she
could
have for him.

Harriet felt his gaze. It was like a magnet drawing her towards him, forcing her to acknowledge him. Slowly and against her will, she turned her head to meet the intensity in the black eyes. He mouthed, “Trust me. Please.”

Why should she trust him? He was a traitor; his life was based upon lies. And yet . . . and yet there was nothing Harriet wanted to do more. Her soul yearned to trust him, to give herself to him again, as wholeheartedly as she had done the night before.

She turned her head away from his gaze in a sharp negative.
No. I cannot.

He had a lot of work to do, Julius thought grimly. And he was going to need some help. The Huntsman’s horn shattered the tense silence, and the children, riding just ahead, shrieked with excitement. The hunt sprang into life, riders urging their mounts into a gallop. Hooves thundered through the wood, horses jostling for position. The horn sounded again, and the hounds in full cry raced for the clear ground opening ahead through the trees.

“Come on, then.” Julius brought Casanova up with the children. “Give them their heads. I’m right beside you.” They needed no further encouragement, and the ponies surged forward, Julius keeping an easy pace beside them. Harriet caught up with them as
they emerged from the wood, still positioned in the middle of the hunt.

“This way,” she called, gesturing with her whip to the side. “We’ll take the gate over there instead of the hedge. It’ll put us ahead of the field. I’ll give you a lead.” She turned Ladybird away from the jostling riders heading for the hedge and galloped to the gate. Julius followed, the children’s ponies on Casanova’s heels, Judd on his sturdy cob keeping up the rear.

Harriet was already opening the gate as they reached her. “Hurry,” she instructed, drawing Ladybird to one side so that they could precede her through the gate.

“I wish we could have jumped the hedge.” Tom looked longingly at the line of riders leaping the hedge.

“It’s too high for your ponies,” Harriet told him. “There’s a lower one across the next field. You can take that.”

“I’ll take Tom, you take Grace,” Julius said briskly. “We’ll meet in the far field.” Tom, with a whoop of glee, nudged his pony into a gallop behind Julius.

“Come on, then, Gracie, let’s beat them to it.” Harriet and Nick had always had friendly races to the next obstacle, and she was suddenly determined not to be outdone by the Earl. She touched her horse lightly with her whip, and the mare leaped forward. Grace
set her pony to follow, and they rode for the hedge. They were in the front of the field now, and Harriet felt the familiar surge of exhilaration. Catching the fox was the least important aspect of hunting; it was the wild ride of a long run that she loved, the sound of beating hooves in her ears, the whistle of the wind as she bent lower over her mare’s neck, encouraging her to greater speed.

Casanova was half a head in front of Ladybird as they approached the hedge. Mentally consigning the twins to Judd’s care, Harriet put the mare to the jump and sailed over a bare inch ahead of the gelding. She drew rein on the other side, panting slightly, laughing, her hair, escaping the confines of its braid, wisped out from beneath her plumed hat.

Julius drew rein beside her just as the children’s ponies came over the hedge. They landed neatly, Tom a shade ahead of his sister. “Bravo.” Julius congratulated them. “That was nicely done, both of you.”

Judd’s cob landed beside them. “I reckon another hour’ll do them, Lady Harriet.”

“Yes, of course,” Harriet agreed, ignoring the chorus of protests from the twins. They would be tired enough in an hour to go home with only a minimum of fuss. They’d still have a two-hour ride ahead
of them and would be exhausted by the time they reached the nursery.

Julius glanced up at the weak sun. It would be about ten o’clock, he reckoned. Marcel would be waiting for him in the spinney at half past eleven. The hunt had come to a halt. The hounds had lost the scent of the fox and were now circling and baying at the far end of the field, while the Master and the Huntsman conferred.

“Where will they draw next?” Julius asked.

“I don’t know. Probably Hobson’s Thicket,” Harriet returned. “They usually go there from here. What d’you think, Judd?”

“Aye, that’ll be next,” Judd agreed in his phlegmatic fashion.

They trotted across the field to catch up with the main body of the hunt. Julius had ridden this land many times with Nick and knew the ground almost as well as he did the countryside around his own home. His rendezvous with Marcel in the spinney was about half a mile from Hobson’s Thicket, he calculated. He would stay with them until the next covert had been drawn, and once the children had gone home, he would find a way to detach himself. He didn’t think
Harriet, in her present frame of mind, would attempt to keep him at her side.

They drew a blank at the next covert but had a good run to the third, where the children, protesting, were sent back with Judd. Harriet watched them go and then, without a word to Julius, rode up to her grandfather, who was in conference again with Jackson.

“Ah, there you are, Harriet.” The Duke greeted her. “Having a good morning, although the devil’s in the scent today. Jackson thinks the ground’s too hard for it to stay around long enough.”

“The runs are good, though,” she returned with a quick smile at the Huntsman. “The children have gone back with Judd.”

The Duke nodded absently. “So, on to Mill Bottom Field, Jackson?”

“Aye, your grace. We often find there.”

Harriet glanced around. Julius had not accompanied her across the field. She hadn’t invited him to, of course, but she was surprised nevertheless. No, more disconcerted, she amended with characteristic honesty. She could see no sign of him in the shifting throng of horses and riders. Her grandfather and
Jackson were leading the hunt on to the next covert, and she had turned her horse to join the parade when something caught her eye. Looking over her shoulder to the rear of the bunched crowd, she saw the raw-boned gray gelding picking his way around the edge of the field.

Where was he going? It was the wrong direction for home, but it was definitely away from the hunt. She let the crowd surround her and move on. Ladybird shifted uncertainly, whickering at the departing horses. With sudden resolution, Harriet pulled the reins and turned the mare away from the hunt, nudging her in the direction of the departing Julius. He disappeared through a gap in the hedge, and she set her horse to follow. Why, she didn’t know. She had wanted to be rid of him for good, and instead, she was following him. Maybe he would give her more evidence for his treachery, although she had more than enough to satisfy the men at the Ministry. But something spurred her on.

She went through the same gap in the hedge and saw him now at the far side of the paddock, heading for a small but dense crop of trees. Bluebell Spinney. So called for obvious reasons, but outside the early spring, it was as nondescript a place as one could
imagine. She hung back, not wanting him to know she was following. Not that it would make much difference to anything now, she reflected dourly.

He disappeared into the trees, and she trotted Ladybird across the paddock. Some distance behind her, she could hear the Huntsman’s horn as the hounds found again. Ladybird whickered, sniffing the air. She was a hunter born and bred, and riding away from that sound went against every instinct. Harriet soothed her with a pat on her neck and rode her forward. At the edge of the spinney, she drew rein, listening. There was an odd silence in the air, not even the cawing of a rook. And there were plenty of them nesting high up in the trees. And then she heard it. The clash of steel upon steel, ringing faintly from somewhere within the spinney.

Harriet nudged the mare forward, entering the dim shadows beneath the trees. The ring of steel was louder, but there were no voices, no other sounds at all. She followed what she could hear. The shadowy gloom lightened ahead of her, where she knew there was a clearing, which in spring was carpeted with bluebells. She dismounted and cautiously led Ladybird forward. Whatever was going on in the clearing, her sudden arrival could not be welcome.

The space between the trees grew wider, and she moved sideways into the shadows again as the clearing came into view. What she saw stopped her heart in her throat. Julius, still mounted, was fighting two men on the ground, men with swords and daggers who were slashing upwards at him. Casanova was bleeding from a wound on his flank, but he caracoled around the clearing, hooves flailing, as powerful a weapon as the wicked blade in Julius’s hand. But it was only a matter of time, Harriet thought, before one of those daggers brought Casanova crashing to the ground. And when that happened—