She crossed her arms. “Why would I?”
“Why, to keep digging your grave, of course.” He squatted down to pick up a handsome-looking volume. How fitting! With a laugh, he held it up to her. “Crime and Punishment. I don’t suppose you’ve read Dostoevsky?”
“That depends. Does he write in French?”
With a sigh, he dropped the book. It was mildly aggravating to observe that she looked fetching coated with a layer of dust. She was dressed like a governess whose employer inclined to lechery, her black hair scraped into a tight chignon, a shapeless gray gown encasing her from chin to feet. But the drab pleats could not disguise the generous curve of her hips when she shifted her weight. Nor could her hair be tamed by pins. A dark lock had escaped, and unfurled along her throat like a suggestion: touch me here. Meanwhile, her pique made her eyes brighten to the shade of sapphires.
Touch her, indeed. One of her cheeks bore a smudge. He very much wished to remove it for her. With his tongue.
He turned away from her to make a frowning study of the stained glass. A seasoning of lust would make this grim wait more bearable, but he could not allow it to distract him.
Ludicrous proposition. She was a criminal, the object of his blackmail. He’d never lost his head over a woman who wasn’t an equal. Wit and intelligence were what charmed him. A woman of spirit.
She fit that bill too closely.
Well, he would simply not allow her to become too charming. “More servility,” he instructed as he turned back. “And far less cheek.”
“There’s no need for me to be servile,” she retorted. “She already treats me as though I’m a street sweeper—or worse!”
“Enough,” he bit out. “You are not here to argue—only to obey. Do you understand? You have a great deal to lose—your freedom, above all. Do you imagine I could not have you jailed by nightfall? If Peter Everleigh has not noticed the absence of those letters, a telegram will suffice to alert him. Then, perhaps, you will envy the street sweepers.”
She did not so much as flinch. But all the life, the charm and fire, disappeared from her face. The smile she gave him was somehow disturbing. It was emptier than space.
“Of course, you’re right,” she said. “Forgive me, Lord Palmer. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
He gritted his teeth against the absurd urge to temper his harshness. Every commander knew the value of discipline in the ranks. “Good. Now start afresh with her. Go to her rooms; see if she has gotten clean water for her bath.”
“I will, if you wish it. But she’ll promptly rebuke me for confusing an assistant’s duties with those of a maid. Better to let her rest for an hour, don’t you think? She didn’t sleep well last night, and you know how exhaustion wears on the temper.”
He considered that. “Fine. After lunch, then, you will apologize. Once that’s done—”
“Lord Palmer.” Her smile now looked more genuine. “Forgive me if I venture that an Everleigh Girl knows how to placate and ingratiate herself better than you do.”
He supposed that was true. With a grunt, he looked over the room again. What a peculiar mind had created this monstrous chimera of a house! The same mind, no doubt, had been responsible at one time for hanging that tattered banner in the corner. The shaggy lion looked half the size of the unicorn it was rearing to fight.
“This is the newest part of the house,” she said, “if you can believe it.”
“I can’t, in fact.”
“The eighth Baroness Hughley had a great admiration for the Gothic. The style, she felt, was a perfect representation of man’s yearning for the heavens, and all the lofty aspirations thereby entailed.”
He snorted. Florid and a bit vague. “What aspirations are those, pray tell?”
She spread her hands. “You ask the wrong woman. I’m quoting a book of family history. The highest I’ve aimed is a good salary and a bed of my own.”
He smiled against his will. “I’m not sure I believe that.”
She linked her hands at her waist. “Ah, well. You know us criminal sorts.”
No, he thought. He was not sure that category began to capture the first thing about this woman.
Stop. He forcibly redirected his attention toward the books, resuming his prowl through the piles. Meanwhile, she sank to her knees, rooting through volumes. “One of these,” she began, then trailed off. When she spoke again, she sounded frustrated. “So many in French!”
“It’s an old library,” he said. “Latin and French tended to rule the day.”
“I didn’t guess it was so important.”
He glanced up and caught a strange look on her face, almost of despair. “Important for what?” he asked.
She sighed, then picked up a book and flipped through its pages. “For being a—” Something thudded onto the floor. “Proper lady,” she finished absently. “Look at this!” She picked up the object, revealing it to be a small dagger with a curved blade.
He whistled. “Hand me that.”
It was a very fine specimen, indeed. The crystal hilt lent it surprising heft. He rubbed his thumb over the blade. An intricate geometric design had been engraved into the steel. “One of these Hughleys was a nabob,” he recalled. “Stole vast fortunes from Indian princes.”
“The seventh Baron Hughley, that was.”
He looked up, surprised. “Clearly your conversations with Catherine haven’t all been quarrelsome.”
She shifted her weight, looking discomfited. “She did tell me a bit. And as I mentioned, I found a book last night—the Hughley history. Rather interesting what a family can achieve with pots of money at its disposal.”
When she wrinkled her nose like that, she looked very young. Someone’s daughter, he thought, oddly startled. Someone’s sister? He flipped the dagger in his hands, causing her to gasp. “Where is your family?” he asked her, and then flipped the knife again, simply to enjoy her reaction.
“Slash your wrist,” she said, “and there will be no wedding.”
He flipped the knife into the air over his head, catching it again by the handle. “I was a soldier, Miss Marshall.” Surely she remembered that. She had quoted the damned poem at him, hadn’t she?
“Do soldiers play with knives?” she asked. “I thought only fools did. Fools who have yet to get cut.”
He gave her a dangerous smile. “But you see my face. I’ve certainly been cut, in my time.” He hurled the knife across the room.
Thunk. Impaled in the door, the blade quivered musically. Wide-eyed, she looked from his face to the blade, and back again.
“I’m on friendly terms with sharp objects,” he told her.
She lifted her brows. “How very good to know.”
Her dry tone caused an odd feeling to prickle over him. He recognized it, after a moment, as embarrassment.
Good God. Had he just been showing off for her? What in heaven’s name ailed him? If he wanted admiration, he need only take a walk in public. Half the country still wanted his autograph. An astonishing number of women claimed to carry his likeness in their pockets, some blasted sketch they’d clipped out of a newspaper.
But not Lilah Marshall, he suspected. Nor Catherine Everleigh. Here was irony! He found himself closeted with the only two women in England who did not fawn on him.
Catherine saw him as a nuisance—a gatekeeper to untold collectibles. What did Lilah see? A bully, no doubt.
His pride disliked that. His vanity disliked it. He had grown rather accustomed to playing the hero. It so conveniently spared him the need to create another role for himself. But he had a feeling that whatever Lilah saw was far truer . . . and no cause for pride.
He waved her toward the door. “Go on, then.” Seducing her was one thing. Caring for her opinion was far less acceptable. “If not to disturb Catherine, then to prepare your . . . placating.”
“Yes, my lord.” Picking up her skirts, she made for the exit—pausing by the door to look again at the knife. “It’s a very fine dagge
r,” she said. “Perhaps you shouldn’t leave it embedded like this. It might damage the blade.”
“The blade is steel,” he said curtly. “Stronger than you can imagine.” He would not be lectured by a woman on weaponry.
“Very well.” But instead of leaving, she faced him again. “I did find out one thing that may prove useful. Miss Everleigh is lonely.”
Clearly she thought him dull-witted. “Yes. You told me as much. Friendless, you say. Any other insights? If not, that will be all.”
She acknowledged his sarcasm with a pull of her pretty mouth. “What I mean is, she wants a champion. Her brother disapproves of her participation in the business. He was furious when their father left her a full share. Everybody heard of his objections.”
“You’re right,” he said. “Everybody heard of that.”
“Listen,” she said curtly, in a tone that said, you dolt. “She is enamored of the Hughley women—did you know that? They were scholars and artists, and wives and mothers to boot. But what she likes is how their husbands supported their interests. She longs for that kind of support.” She paused expectantly.
Indeed, it was a useful piece of information. He gave a curt, grudging nod. “All right.”
She smiled, looking far too satisfied with herself. And she still wore that damned smudge—a provocation in itself.
He heard himself say, “Of course she wishes for a husband who admires her. What woman doesn’t? But I thank you for the obvious tidings.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Forgive me. Of course you’re right. We women are very predictable.” Then, with a surprising show of strength, she yanked the dagger out of the door, hefted it once in her hand, and threw it.
The blade flashed by him. It came so close that he felt the flutter of air displaced by its passage.
Thunk.
Speechless, he turned. The knife now pinned the ancient tapestry to a mortared joint in the wall. It pinned the eye of the lion to the wall.
That was a happy accident. Surely.
“Oh, look,” she said from the doorway. “It seems a woman can surprise you, after all!”
For the second time in a quarter hour, the door slammed soundly shut.
CHAPTER SIX
Dinner that evening started at the unconscionably early hour of half seven. “Country hours,” the housekeeper had said. Lucky thing that Lilah had brought The Lady’s Guide to Refined Deportment, which contained an entire passage on the curious schedule kept at country estates. Otherwise, she would have had no idea what to make of Mrs. Barnes’s remark.
As she set out from her room, she took a wrong turn. The house was larger than one realized when viewing its facade. The two stories extended very deep, the result—Lilah had learned from the volume of family history—of an extension joined to the rear of the Tudor structure by Baroness Hughley the fourth.
Alas, Baroness Hughley the fourth had grown up during the English Civil War, an experience, Lilah gathered, that had left her with a fervent appreciation for confusion and hidey-holes. Peculiar passages and odd, twisting halls distinguished the rear extension, and it was one of these passages that led Lilah not to the dining room, but to a peculiar, secret half floor, more of a short hallway really, where she found herself lingering in startled delight.
Upstairs, the residential apartments opened onto a corridor furnished with the typical suits of armor and marble statuary. But this hall looked to have been borrowed wholesale from some eastern potentate’s palace. Turkish carpets blanketed the flagstones. Handsome carved screens concealed the plaster walls.
The auction house had pretensions to grandeur. But beyond the marbled public rooms, it was, after all, a place of business, marked by bare floors and workaday furniture. Never before had Lilah found herself in a place that spoke so strongly of power and wealth—and she was at full liberty to explore. How diverting!
Somebody was occupying the area, for the wall sconces were lit. Checking her pocket watch (not strictly appropriate for evening attire, but Lilah had not forgone all her old habits; every dress she owned contained a hidden pocket or two), she discovered that enough time remained before dinner to allow a brief prowl. If discovered, she would simply claim that it was her duty, as Miss Everleigh’s assistant, to survey the area. These screens, for instance, might fetch a very good price at auction.
Four doors lined the short hall. Her hairpin opened them easily. The first room was a small, attractive salon, with dark wallpaper and large, handsome oil paintings depicting a string of Hughley scions and their hounds.
The second room contained a billiards table, the green baize visibly warped by time and the damp. A hint of ancient pipe smoke lingered in the furniture.
The third room was a very fine water closet, done in Moroccan tile.
The fourth room . . . ah! A fire burned low in the hearth, and on a low scrollwork table, a glass of wine sat, half-emptied.
She hesitated, one hand on the doorknob, unnerved by the depth of her curiosity. She was a practical woman. Pragmatism was a woman’s best advantage in the world. Lord Palmer was her enemy. Her interest in him was only . . . practical. She must learn as much of him as possible, the better to protect herself.
She walked into the room. The desk was littered with a variety of letters, many of them bearing diplomatic insignia. A curious group of correspondents—all of them Russians, some of whom she knew from their patronage of the auction house. Obolensky was a special emissary of the czar, whom Susie had shown through the Slavic collection during the party last week.
She nudged aside the letters. Beneath them lay a large map of London, on which somebody had circled the location of the auction house. Other areas had also been notated—neighborhoods that an aristocrat typically avoided. Mile End, St. George’s-in-the-East—these made up part of Nick’s territory, poor areas whose local bigwigs paid monthly tributes to her uncle.
Mile End. Who was the bigwig in Mile End? A Russian, wasn’t it?
She stepped away, frowning. What use had an English war hero for such interests? Were this a theatrical set, such props would have marked him as a spy . . . and not for England.
Dinner was predictably joyless. Palmer tried to lure Miss Everleigh to speak more of herself. She answered his attempts with enervated courtesy, not so much rebuffing his charm as presenting a mask of perfect indifference to it.
He turned the conversation toward Buckley Hall. Here, Miss Everleigh grew animated. As Lilah nursed a single glass of wine and forced down bites of overcooked venison, Miss Everleigh launched into a lecture on the furniture of the Sun King.
Lilah did not incline to paranoid fantasies. English viscounts did not trouble themselves with espionage, particularly not for Russians. Of course they didn’t.
Palmer noted her silence. “And how fare you, Miss Marshall? You seem tired. Did you set yourself too exhausting an aim?”
She gathered that was a subtle reference to her dagger throwing. “No,” she said brightly, “I was not taxed in the least. Is your arm sore, sir?”
It seemed there were two subjects, after all, on which Miss Everleigh would wax enthusiastic, the second being Lilah’s manners. “You might refrain from mention of bodily parts at the table,” she said icily. “I am surprised, Miss Marshall. I thought conversational politesse was the main talent for which my brother employed you.”
Lilah delayed her reply with a long sip of the Bordeaux. “Forgive me,” she said evenly. “It’s true, I find myself somewhat fatigued. I have never kept country hours before.”
These tidings sank into an astonished silence. “You have never been to the country?” Miss Everleigh asked at last, as though her ears might have deceived her.
“I’ve been to the seaside, miss. But only for the day.”
“Then you’re bound for pleasant surprises,” Palmer said. “The quiet, for one.”
“Yes, I noticed it last night.” Along with the immense darkness outside, which had terrified her, and driven her to stay up till dawn wi
th that book on the Hughley family.
As though he’d read her mind, Palmer said, “Miss Marshall made a study last night of my ancestors. Some ancient volume of family history, lying about in her rooms. Did you manage to finish it, Miss Marshall?”
She smiled at him. “First page to last.”
“A pity,” said Miss Everleigh. “Sleep might have equipped you to prove more useful. I trust you won’t fritter away tonight.”
Lilah bit her tongue. “No, miss. I expect I will sleep very well.”
“Excellent. Though I hope you will stir from your rooms at an earlier hour than you managed this morning.”
Lilah did not let her smile budge a fraction. She did, however, take the comfort of fondling her dinner knife. It was sharp, and there was satisfaction in knowing that if she chose, she could rid Miss Everleigh of that stray wisp of hair currently escaping her blond coiffure. It would hardly require the pause to take aim.
She felt Palmer’s eyes on her. She glanced over. He dropped his gaze to the knife.
She pulled her hand back into her lap.
The dimple appeared in his cheek. He was fighting a laugh. Clearing his throat, he turned and addressed some bland question to Miss Everleigh. More discussion of the Sun King.
Lilah sighed. It was the most vexing development imaginable that she should feel, at odd moments, a real liking for him. He was a bully and a blackmailer—but that made him little different from many acquaintances of her youth. Once she’d realized he had a purpose in stealing those papers other than to torment her, she’d found her anger hard to hold on to. It was the way of the world, after all; one did what one must to thrive. And she had been clumsy—all but begging to be caught as she’d hidden beneath that desk.
No, moral indignation would not have furnished her the key to disliking him. Not when he, unlike most of his brethren, spoke to her as a real person. Not when he caught her little jokes and laughed, albeit reluctantly.
He did not want to find her charming, either. That was obvious. A fine pair they made, struggling to dislike each other despite having every good reason to do so.