But no. He was cruelly handsome, darkly charming. He exuded such ruthless sensuality it made her nervous to walk beside him. He was surely not a good man.
So was he a spy for the de Guignards? Had someone who had seen the Reaper run from her bedroom reported her? Was Mr. Lawrence seeking information only she could give him?
But no, for, still smiling, still suave, he said, “Last night I believe you had a lump in your mattress.”
“How do you know that?” she asked in a low, incensed undertone.
“Perhaps I’m the Reaper.”
“No, you are not.” She didn’t know how she could be so certain, but she was.
Raul Lawrence laughed deep in his chest. “Then perhaps I’m a friend of his. Because only he or a friend of his would know where exactly you hid him.”
“That’s true.” So was she wrong in her reading of his character? Again, she thought hard and long, because she had to get this right. A man’s life—her life—depended on it. “Or perhaps you work for Prince Sandre, and have taken him and have tortured him to make him reveal that information.”
“If Prince Sandre had taken the Reaper, you would be currently inhabiting the royal dungeon,” Mr. Lawrence said flatly.
Already she knew enough about the de Guignards to believe that. Glancing once more at Prince Sandre and Lady Fanchere, she thought their conversation was winding to a close. Certainly Prince Sandre had noticed that she was walking with a man, and was not pleased, for while he listened to Lady Fanchere, he watched them with a frown.
“Can you pass a message to the Reaper?” She kept her voice low and urgent.
“Keep walking, Miss Chegwidden.”
She forced her feet to move.
“Smile as if we’re old friends exchanging minor recollections.”
She fixed a smile on her face.
“And . . . yes, I can.”
“Prince Sandre has a scheme to trap him the next time he rides.” Quickly, she outlined the plan.
“Thank you, Miss Chegwidden. You’re most helpful. I promise this will reach his ears. And now”—raising his voice, Mr. Lawrence said—“Mrs. Andersen said she’d rather be hung for a sheep than a lamb!” He laughed aloud.
Her voice quavered when she laughed, but she did laugh, and wasn’t surprised when Prince Sandre spoke behind her.
“What a pleasant surprise to find you two know each other.”
“Your Highness.” Mr. Lawrence turned in simulated surprise. “We do indeed know each other. One of my father’s estates marches across the estate where Miss Chegwidden’s father was rector.”
Prince Sandre smiled with chilly intent. “Then you are old friends.”
“Acquaintances, rather. Miss Chegwidden is far too proper a lady for me.”
Prince Sandre seemed to like that thought. “She is, isn’t she?”
“But it’s good to hear an English voice in this strange land.” Mr. Lawrence bowed. “Since I live so close, I frequently visit Aguas de Dioses, so I hope to see you again, Miss Chegwidden.”
“And I you, Mr. Lawrence.” She smiled and inclined her head, and acted the lonely expatriate as if she’d been born to the role.
“Are you homesick?” As Mr. Lawrence left, Prince Sandre slipped into his place on the promenade, walking at her side as if they were two normal people in society.
Yet Emma looked around and saw people staring. Lady Fanchere had returned to the chair she had vacated earlier, and watched with a smile. The best society of Moricadia were watching and gossiping about the prince and Lady Fanchere’s foreign companion, and Emma hated to imagine what kind of speculation ran rampant in this room . . . and beyond. “I do miss England,” she said. “But Moricadia is a country of unsurpassed beauty, and I’ve enjoyed my stay here.”
“Your diplomacy is exemplary.” He looked ahead and smiled, as if she’d passed some unexplained test. Still in that congenial voice, he said, “I forgot to ask you last night—did you enjoy your trip to the lower city?”
“My trip to the lower city?” Emma stopped, turned to him, stared.
People walked around them as if they were pebbles in a stream.
“It was very good of you to set that child’s arm. What is her name? Elixabete? So sad that she lost her father tragically.”
Emma was horrified at this demonstration of the reach of his knowledge, and afraid he knew what Damacia had said about him, and that he would take action against her.
But he laughed amiably. “Come, Miss Chegwidden, I am the prince, after all, and it is my business to know everything that goes on in my own country.”
No. It really isn’t.
Who in that tenement courtyard was one of his spies? Which one of those ladies at the well had sold her soul to keep her children fed?
Emma glanced around, for the first time uneasy in this place.
Who in this room was one of his spies? Who watched and listened and reported any unusual activities to the prince and his henchmen? The thought made the back of her neck itch. “Your Highness, I just did not realize that you would trouble yourself with something so unimportant. Now, if you would excuse me . . .” She sounded abrupt, she realized, but he didn’t know her. Perhaps he thought her always so tactless.
She walked away from Prince Sandre, going against traffic, blundering past ladies trailed by their maids, and gentlemen so surprised they dropped their monocles.
She had no one else to blame but herself for this conundrum. She had chosen to rescue the Reaper. She had sat up in bed, knowing full well she was revealing herself in an enticing way, and she had attracted the attention of the most powerful man in Moricadia.
Now she had to pay the price. And she would do it gladly, because now Prince Sandre was moved to confide in her—no, brag to her—and she might be the one to save the Reaper from vengeance at the prince’s hands.
Prince Sandre trailed Emma to Lady Fanchere’s side. “You’re taking this too seriously. To not discover what my people are saying and doing is to neglect them.”
“I’m not one of your people,” Emma said.
“I would like to change that,” he answered.
Oh, God. She wasn’t ready to move at this speed.
He caught her hand. “Do I repulse you?”
“No! Not at all. But you’re a prince and I’m only a servant.”
He tugged her closer. “I’m a man and you’re a woman.”
A woman who was very unused to such attentions, and yet quite aware that he sounded as if he were reciting a line in a play he had acted many times.
She pulled free. “Your Highness, to speak so to me is inappropriate.” Conscious of Prince Sandre watching her intently, she turned to Lady Fanchere. “My lady, you expressed a wish to walk outside. We should find Lady de Guignard and proceed so that you both may enjoy luncheon all the more, and your rest this afternoon.”
Lady Fanchere smiled as if amused by Emma’s careful planning. “As always, Emma, you’re the perfect companion.”
“Perhaps I might join you in your walk,” Prince Sandre suggested.
But Lady Fanchere was firm. “Tomorrow you may join us, Sandre. Today is our first full day here, and time for us ladies alone.”
Prince Sandre’s eyes flashed with impatience, but he sounded pleasant enough when he said, “Enjoy your day, then, and I look forward to tomorrow.”
Chapter Eighteen
Lady Fanchere watched Prince Sandre walk away, then took Emma’s arm and headed toward the door. “Come on. We have to find Aimée.”
“Yes.” Because Aimée had a sensible attitude about Prince Sandre, and Lady Fanchere had a militant gleam in her eyes.
They marched out the door, through the square, and to their hotel. There they found Aimée sitting in the lobby, looking miserable and worried.
Uncharacteristically, Lady Fanchere seemed not to notice. She put her hand under Aimée’s arm and hauled her to her feet. “Come on. We’re going to Madam Mercier’s establishment.”
&
nbsp; Aimée’s eyes lit up. “Shopping?”
“Yes. Come on, Aimée! You know I treasure your advice in these matters.” Lady Fanchere walked back out the door, energized in a way Emma had not yet seen.
“What are we shopping for?” Aimée asked.
“Clothes for Emma.” Lady Fanchere led them down the street, then up toward the upper city.
“What? Why?” Aimée hurried to catch up with Lady Fanchere.
“Why do I need more clothes?” Emma smoothed her hands over the skirt of her gown, the gown she had treasured. The gown she had worn for two whole days without tearing or covering with soot.
“You can’t go to the palace dressed like that!” Lady Fanchere said.
Aimée took a breath. “Eleonore, why would it matter what she wears when she goes to the palace? She’s merely your companion.” Aimée cast an apologetic glance at Emma.
Emma nodded, not at all offended. Aimée’s frank assessment needed to be said.
“That is not true.” Lady Fanchere swung to face them both, stopping them in the middle of the street.
“Emma, I suspect you know I was speaking to Sandre about you.”
“I thought perhaps that was the case.” Emma bit her lower lip. “My lady, he came into my room and I begged him to leave, told him it wasn’t proper. I’ve done nothing of which I should be ashamed.”
“I believe that, Emma; however, sometimes, when a man is rich and spoiled, a girl doesn’t have to do anything to attract his attention. In your case, Sandre saw you in your bedclothes—”
“I wish he hadn’t!” Emma said fervently.
“—and was charmed by your beauty and your modesty,” Lady Fanchere finished. “I told him that you were a young woman of admirable character and I would not have him seducing you. He assured me his intentions were honorable.”
“Honorable?” Emma’s heart sank. How bad a situation had she created? “What do you mean?”
Lady Fanchere spelled it out. “If you are amenable, he would like to spend time with you with the intention of discovering whether the two of you could make a match.”
“A match!” Aimée’s blue eyes went wide with horror, and she put her hand over her heart.
“A match. Do you mean . . . to marry?” This was not what Emma intended when she had hidden the Reaper in her bed, nor when she thought to encourage Prince Sandre to tell her of his plans. This was serious.
Lady Fanchere smiled, her eyes dancing. “You look stunned.”
“I am. You must know I am.” Emma almost choked. “I’m a . . . a paid companion!”
“Eleonore, have you lost your mind?” Aimée was almost shouting. “Emma can’t marry the prince!”
People on the street turned to look.
Emma tucked her chin close to her chest and wished fervently to be elsewhere.
“Shh, Aimée. Be quiet.” Lady Fanchere took their arms and led them up the hill once more and into a small, elegant shop.
A stylish female of middle age, dressed all in black, looked up from bolts of silks, satins, and cottons. Her eyes lit up, and she hurried forward. “Lady Fanchere, Lady de Guignard, welcome. Welcome! What can I do for you?”
“Madam Mercier, this is Miss Chegwidden.” Lady Fanchere indicated Emma.
Madam Mercier assessed and dismissed Emma with one glance. “Hmm. Yes?”
“I want you to create a new wardrobe for her.”
Madam Mercier looked to Aimée for guidance.
With a matter-of-factness that seemed foreign to her nature, Aimée said, “For what reason, Eleonore?”
“No. Please, Lady Fanchere.” Emma was squirming with guilt, with embarrassment, with the desperate need to escape this rapidly escalating situation.
“Don’t be silly.” Lady Fanchere put her arm around Emma’s waist and smiled at Madam Mercier, the kind of smile that imposed a noble will on a person of lesser station. “You should think of Miss Chegwidden as my daughter, one I wish to prepare for her first series of balls and parties.”
Emma objected: “You’re not old enough to be my—”
“Yes, I am,” Lady Fanchere snapped. More calmly, she looked into Emma’s eyes. “Yes, I am, and I want to do this. It will be fun, something I’ve dreamed of doing all my life. Indulge me.”
What could Emma say to that? “I appreciate your kindness and will never forget the debt I owe you, Lady Fanchere, but—”
Lady Fanchere wasn’t interested in buts. She said, “Good! Then, Madam Mercier, let us see what you have in mind.”
Madam Mercier exchanged another telling glance with Aimée, then bustled forward and tapped her chin as she circled Emma, staring as if she were a mannequin. “Yes. Yes. She’s young. Good hair. Excellent figure. The eyes . . . hmm. Witch’s eyes. Stormy. Unpredictable. The color changes with her mood. In medieval times, she would have burned. Lady Fanchere, I will make Miss Chegwidden lovely. Er . . . what amount should I . . . ?”
“Spare no expense,” Lady Fanchere instructed.
Madam Mercier curtsied again, and again, and Emma saw the glint in her eyes. She had just stumbled into a gold mine. She hustled toward the back room.
“Eleonore, what are you doing?” Aimée asked fiercely. “You wish to present Miss Chegwidden—an innocent!—to Sandre?”
“Sandre is not so bad as you think, Aimée, and even if he might be, he is of an age—thirty-five—to look for a wife. Certainly I have urged him in that direction. Additionally, he’s in the enviable position of not needing to care whether his intended is wealthy or titled.”
Emma had never meant anything so much in her life as when she said, “I am neither, and this honor would be too much for me.”
“You’re of respectable birth and have shown yourself to be resilient, kind, and intelligent, all requirements for a princess,” Lady Fanchere said.
“Don’t mislead Emma. She deserves better than that!” Aimée faced Emma, her eyes bright with indignation. “Sandre can’t get a bride who’s wealthy or titled because none of the nobility of Europe will have him. He’s like Henry the Eighth of England—after you’ve killed enough people, no one wants to lose her head to you. Sandre has a reputation for consorting with criminals and scoundrels in the name of profit. Not that nobility doesn’t consort with scoundrels, but the scoundrels grovel to them. The criminals bow to them. Sandre will bow to anyone to keep his gambling houses going. Furthermore, the nobility of other countries have learned from the French Revolution, and at least pretend a concern for their common people. Here the misery is so great, Sandre’s policies are an embarrassment to us all.”
“Aimée, your grief over Rickie’s death has unhinged your mind.” Lady Fanchere’s eyes shimmered with tears, and she looked like what she was—a woman torn between two loyalties.
“I am not unhinged; I am . . .” Aimée caught her breath. “Look, Eleonore, Madam Mercier is waiting with a bolt of cloth in her arms. I think she wants to consult with you.”
Lady Fanchere stared at Aimée.
“Go on.” Aimée shooed her away. “You worry too much.”
Because Lady Fanchere loved her friend and cousin, and trusted her, she walked to Madam Mercier and engaged in an intense conversation about style.
In a low, rapid voice, Aimée said, “Don’t do this, Emma. I beg of you. Eleonore wants this because of Sandre. She hears the rumors about him, but she doesn’t want to believe them. She wants to think he’s a decent man, but more and more she’s had to face that he isn’t. She has urged him to marry, believing the love of a good woman would bring him back from the brink of damnation where he now teeters.”
Emma kept her eyes down, her hands folded, and spoke as softly. “That’s a big role for one woman to perform.”
“Exactly. Now he wants you, and you’re a good woman, just what Eleonore wanted for him. Dear girl, don’t take this badly. I’m going to be blunt, but I know Sandre. I know men like him, and I know the worms that twist and turn in their minds.”
Aimée was talking
about Rickie, Emma could tell.
“Yes, Sandre is attracted to you because of your pretty face and lovely manners. But more than that, he wants you for your virtue, because you’ve never had another man and he won’t have to try to satisfy you. He wants you because you have no fortune or nobility, so you will be grateful for the elevation. He wants you because you have no family at all and few friends here, and he’ll have complete control over you. Emma”—Aimée took Emma’s hands in her own and looked into her eyes—“you are better off poor and alone than trapped in a marriage with that man.”
Aimée gave desperately earnest advice, no doubt learned from some horrible experiences in her past, and she made Emma want to cry. But nothing changed the facts: Emma had to stay and play this game to its end. The Reaper’s life depended on it—and who knew how many other lives depended on him? To Aimée, Emma said, “My lady, I take your advice in the spirit in which it was given, and I do believe you. I will do everything I can to avoid this fate, but right now, circumstances compel me to stay here.”
“Do you need money?” Aimée asked urgently. “I can give you money to return to England.”
“It’s not that.” Emma glanced at Lady Fanchere, still engaged by the couturiere.
“Oh, of course.” Aimée’s eyes filled with tears. “It’s my dear Eleonore. She has confided her previous infertility and her fear she cannot carry this child, and you feel responsible. You are such a kind girl!”
What could Emma say? No, it’s not that? Because it was that. But it was also the Reaper, and Damacia, and Elixabete . . . and after a lifetime of being the vicar’s daughter and then a repressed and oppressed paid companion, this was Emma’s one chance to live passionately and fully!
In the end, she said nothing, but tried to look modest and concerned, and she must have succeeded, because Aimée sighed and dabbed at her eyes with a handkerchief.
And when Lady Fanchere called, “Emma, come here. Madam Mercier is ready to fit you now,” Emma wanted to die of guilt.
At the same time, while she spoke to Lady Fanchere and listened to Madam Mercier’s suggestions, her heart beat heavily in her chest, because all she could think was . . . would he return tonight?