There was no one else in the street.
Rafe and Hassan were racing up the cobbles before the woman’s next cry.
Her attackers, wrestling with her as, breathlessly protesting, she fought to beat them off, didn’t notice them approaching until Rafe grabbed one man by his collar, shook him until he released his hold on the woman, then flung him across the street. The man landed with a crunch against a wall.
A second later, courtesy of Hassan, his accomplice joined him.
Rafe turned to the woman. “Are you all right?”
He’d spoken in German, deeming that language more likely to be understood by any local or traveler. He clasped the gloved hand the woman weakly held out to him, took in her aging, yet delicately boned face. She was old enough to be his grandmother.
Beside him, Hassan kept an eye on the pair of louts.
The lady—Rafe might have been away from society for more than a decade, but he recognized the poker-straight spine, the head rising high, the haughty features—considered him, then said in perfect upper-class English, “Thank you, dear boy. I’m a trifle rattled, but if you’ll help me to that bench there, I daresay, I’ll be right as rain in two minutes.”
Rafe hesitated, wondering if he should admit to understanding her.
Her lips quirked. Drawing her hand from his, she patted his arm. “Your accent’s straight from Eton, dear boy. And you look vaguely familiar, too—no doubt I’ll place you in a few minutes. Now give me your arm.”
Momentarily bemused, he did. As they neared the bench outside a small patisserie a few paces away, the chef appeared in the doorway, a rolling pin in one hand. He rushed to assist the lady, exclaiming at the dastardliness of the attack. Others emerged from neighboring shops, equally incensed.
“They’re recovering,” Hassan said.
Everyone turned to see the two attackers groggily stagger to their feet.
The locals yelled and waved their impromptu weapons.
The attackers exchanged a glance, then fled.
“Do you want us to catch them?” one of the locals asked.
The lady waved. “No, no—they were doubtless some layabouts who thought to seize some coins from a defenseless old woman. No harm done, thanks to these two gentlemen, and I really do not have time to become entangled with the authorities here.”
Rafe surreptitiously breathed a sigh of relief. Becoming entangled with the local authorities was the last thing he needed, too.
He listened while the patisserie owner pressed the lady to take a sample of his wares to wipe out the memory of the so-cowardly attack in their lovely city. The lady demurred, but when the chef and his neighbors pressed, she graciously accepted—in German that was significantly more fluent and colloquial than Rafe’s.
When the locals eventually retreated, returning to their businesses, Rafe met the lady’s gray eyes—eyes decidedly too shrewd for his liking. He gave an abbreviated bow. “Rafe Carstairs, ma’am.” He would have preferred to decamp—to run away from any lady who called him “dear boy”—but ingrained manners forced him to ask, “Are you staying nearby?”
The lady smiled approvingly and gave him her hand. “Lady Congreve. I believe I know your parents, Viscount and Viscountess Henley. I’m putting up at the Imperial Hotel, just along from the top of this street.”
Suppressing a grimace—of course she would know his parents—Rafe bowed over her hand, and with the other gestured to Hassan. “We’ll escort you back once you’re ready.”
Lady Congreve’s smile widened. “Thank you, dear boy. I’m feeling quite recovered already, but”—she gripped his hand and Rafe helped her to her feet—”before I return to the hotel, I must complete the errand that brought me this way. I have to collect tickets from an office on the embankment.”
Rafe gave her his arm and they turned down the street. “Which company?”
“The Excelsior Shipping Company.” Lady Congreve gestured with her cane. “I believe they’re just around the corner.”
Half an hour later, Rafe and Hassan found themselves taking tea in the premier suite of the Imperial Hotel in the fashionable castle quarter of Buda. Lady Congreve had insisted. Rafe had discovered that his grande dame-avoiding skills were rusty. There hadn’t seemed any way to refuse the invitation without giving offense, and as he’d learned to his horror that Lady Congreve and her party were among the passengers due to depart on the Uray Princep the following morning, trying to avoid closer acquaintance seemed pointless.
He had to admit the array of cakes that arrived on the tea tray were the best he’d tasted in a decade.
“So you and Mr. Hassan were with the army in India.” Lady Congreve settled back on the chaise and regarded him. “Did you ever meet Enslow?”
“Hastings’s aide?” Rafe nodded. “Poor chap’s usually run ragged. Hastings has a finger in so many pies.”
“So I’ve heard. So you were based in Calcutta?”
“For the most part. In the months before I resigned and departed, a group of us were operating out of Bombay.” Rafe understood she was checking his bona fides, but he wasn’t sure why.
“So you’ve been soldiering for all these years, and have been a captain for how long?”
“Since before Toulouse.”
“And you fought at Waterloo?”
He nodded. “I was part of a compound troop—part experienced regulars, part ton volunteers. Heavy cavalry.”
“Who of the ton fought alongside you?”
“Mostly Cynsters—the six cousins—plus a smattering of other houses. Two Nevilles, a Percy, and one Farquar.”
“Ah, yes, I remember hearing about the exploits of that troop. And now you’ve resigned and are heading back to England?”
Rafe shrugged. “It was time.”
“Excellent!” Lady Congreve beamed.
Every instinct Rafe possessed went on high alert.
“It seems, sir, almost as if fate has sent you to me.” Lady Congreve glanced at Hassan, including him in the comment. “I wonder if I might impose upon you—you and Mr. Hassan—to act as my party’s courier-guide and guard? We left Paris with an experienced guide but sadly had to part with him in Trieste. Knowing we would be traveling on by riverboat once we reached here, I didn’t see any point in securing a replacement, but today’s events have demonstrated my error. It simply isn’t safe for ladies to walk these foreign streets unprotected.” Lady Congreve held Rafe’s gaze. “And as you are going the same way and, indeed, have already secured passage on the same boat, I do hope you can see your way to joining my party.”
By sheer force of will, Rafe managed to keep all reaction from his face.
When he didn’t immediately reply, Lady Congreve continued, “Our meeting does seem fortuitous, especially as you’ve taken the last tickets on the boat, so even if I could find any men as suitable, I wouldn’t be able to secure passage for them.”
Rafe inwardly cursed the clerk at the shipping office, who, of course, had recognized him and commented. Racking his brains for the right form of words with which to decline, aware of Hassan looking at him, waiting for him to get them out of this trap, Rafe opened his mouth … then shut it.
He and Hassan needed some reason that would explain their traveling on the river, some purpose that would make people accept their presence and not look too closely.
“And of course,” Lady Congreve went on, “I’m sure your parents will be pleased to know you’ve been able to extend me this small service. I will, of course, take care of all the, expenses involved and reimburse you for the tickets you’ve already purchased.”
Rafe recognized that she’d rolled out her heavy guns—his parents, no less. His gaze abstracted, distracted by a prospect he was still trying to define, he waved her last words aside. “No need for recompense. If we do as you ask …”
Refocusing on Lady Congreve, he wondered at the wisdom—and the morality—of involving her, however much at arms’ length, in his mission. The cultists throughout Europ
e would be watching for him and Hassan. As a pair of men traveling together, they were easy to spot—both over six feet tall, one distinctly fair, the other distinctly dark, both with military bearing.
But the cultists would, most likely, not look closely at two men traveling as part of a larger party.
Rafe glanced briefly at Hassan. “It might be possible for us to act as your guide and guard. We’ll be on the same boat regardless, and as you say, you won’t be able to add more passengers to the list.…”
Lady Congreve was clever enough to keep her lips shut and watch him vacillate.
Rafe remembered James MacFarlane’s body.
Remembered the scroll-holder he now carried strapped to his side.
Remembered that the closer he drew to England, the more cultists they would need to slip past.
And Lady Congreve was the sort of lady who, if she knew the details, would wholeheartedly support his mission.
He focused on her face. Should he tell her of his mission?
He opened his mouth, the revelation on his tongue, then remembered the other tickets she’d picked up. “Who else is traveling with you? You have four tickets.”
“As well as myself, there’s my maid, Gibson, who’ve you’ve met.”
The maid had been waiting in the suite and had taken her mistress’s coat and cane, then gone to order the tea. Rafe judged it likely Gibson, a woman of mature years, had served Lady Congreve for decades; there was an unspoken degree of empathy and loyalty between maid and mistress that suggested Gibson would fully support any decision her mistress made. No threat to his mission there. “And the other two tickets?”
“Another lady and her maid.” Lady Congreve tilted her head, regarding him curiously. “They would be included among the people you would guide and guard, if that makes any difference.”
Rafe knew ladies of her ladydship’s generation often traveled in pairs, providing company for each other on the journey, someone to share the sights with, to converse with of an evening. He imagined that any lady Lady Congreve chose to travel with would be much like her. Which meant there was really no reason he shouldn’t explain his mission, and, if subsequently, Lady Congreve stood by her offer of making them her courier-guide and guard, accept.
He drew a breath and met Lady Congreve’s gray eyes. “I’m inclined to accept your offer, ma’am, but first I must tell you what has brought Hassan and me this way.” He glanced at Hassan, who had raised his brows a fraction, but didn’t seem disapproving, then looked back at her ladyship. “If once you’ve heard our story you still wish us to take up the positions of your courier-guide and guard, then I believe we can accommodate you.”
Lady Congreve’s smile was triumphant. “Excellent! Now what’s this secret—?”
She broke off as the knob on the corridor door turned. An instant later, the door opened and a vision in a vibrant dark blue pelisse and a fur hat with a jaunty feather perched atop swirls of lustrous dark hair swept in.
“Esme—” The vision broke off, stared at Rafe, then glanced at Hassan. But her gaze returned to Rafe as he came to his feet, and she simply stared.
He stared back. He was only vaguely aware of another female—presumably the other maid—slipping into the room and closing the door; his entire attention, all his senses, had fixed, unswervingly, on the lady in blue.
The young lady in blue.
She was tallish, slender, and intensely feminine; an aura of suppressed—or was it controlled?—vibrancy all but charged the air around her. Her eyes, large and just faintly tip-tilted, were of an arresting shade of periwinkle blue made only more striking by her royal blue pelisse. Her curves were sleek, yet definite. He’d heard women with such figures likened to Greek or Roman deities; he now understood why. She was Athena, Diana, Persephone, Artemis—she seemed to be those constructs given life, just with sable hair and blue, blue eyes.
He felt as if he’d taken a clout to the head. Just as in battles when he was staring down Death, time stood still.
It took effort to restart his mind, to return to the real world.
To the here and now.
“Esme” she’d said, and meant Lady Congreve. She was the other lady, Lady Congreve’s traveling companion. A young lady her ladyship had taken under her wing.
The goddess had halted at the back of the chaise on which her ladyship sat. Lady Congreve raised a hand and gracefully waved. “Allow me to present Miss Loretta Michelmarsh, my great-niece. The Honorable Mr. Rafe Carstairs and his companion, Mr. Hassan.”
Rafe inclined his head. Stiffly. The goddess was a relative; that made matters worse.
Miss Michelmarsh, her gaze still locked on him, her expression oddly blank, bestowed the barest bob that would pass for civility.
“You’re just in time, Loretta dear, to hear the latest news.” Lady Congreve twisted around to smile at her great-niece. “Mr. Carstairs and Mr. Hassan saved me from two attackers in the street near the shipping office, and at my request, they’ve agreed to fill the positions of our courier-guide and guard.”
Rafe now understood the reason behind Lady Congreve’s triumphant expression and realized the trap he’d fallen into was of quite a different nature than he’d foreseen. He’d forgotten, the principal entertainment grandes dames such as Lady Congreve delighted in: matchmaking, preferably with those of their acquaintance.
Her ladyship knew his parents. She knew her great-niece. But he’d be damned if he’d allow her to matchmake him—even with a vision that brought to mind a pantheon of goddesses.
Aside from all else … dragging in a deeper breath, he forced his gaze from its distraction, and looked down at her ladyship, who was clearly waiting to gauge his response. “Lady Congreve, I regret it will not be possible for me and Hassan to act as courier-guide and guard for you during your upcoming journey.”
Lady Congreve regarded him, a frown forming in her eyes. “I understood, dear boy, that you had already agreed to fill the positions subject to informing me of the reason behind your current journey and my confirmation of the appointments subsequent to that.” She opened her eyes wide. “What on earth happened in the space of just a moment to change your mind?”
She knew. Rafe held her gaze, felt his jaw firm. “Regardless, my lady, on further consideration it will be impossible for me and Hassan to join your party.”
Lady Congreve’s eyes narrowed on him, something her niece couldn’t see. “Surely you aren’t reneging on our agreement because of Loretta?”
Yes, he was. While he’d entertained the possibility of joining forces with Lady Congreve, a lady in the latter years of her life and, he judged, with significant life experience, had been prepared to court the risk that through him she might be exposed to the Black Cobra’s minions, he would not, could not, even in his most reckless mood, countenance putting a young lady like Loretta Michelmarsh in any danger whatever.
He held Lady Congreve’s gaze. “There’s a certain degree of risk involved in being associated with me and Hassan, and while I would have considered, should you have been, agreeable once you were fully informed of that risk, accepting the positions you offered in your train, it would be unconscionable of me to continue with that arrangement while you have a young lady such as Miss Michelmarsh traveling with you.”
Loretta frowned. What was going on? Her first thought on sighting the tall, blond-haired man, clearly a military man—she could tell by his stance, the way he held his broad shoulders—was a simple, albeit dazed: Who was he?
Her mind had stalled at that point, her senses scrambling to fill in details, none of them pertinent to answering that question.
How bright the golden streaks in his sandy blond hair, how unexpectedly soft his eyes of summer blue, how absurdly long his brown lashes seemed, how deliciously evocative the subtle curve of his distinctly masculine lips, how square his jaw, how imposingly tall, how strong and powerful his long body seemed to be … all those observations flashed through her mind, and none helped in the least.
>
She’d felt adrift, her gaze locked on him, her senses … somewhere else. All thought had suspended and had remained beyond her reach, until he’d spoken.
His deep voice, its timbre, the reverberation that seemed to slide down her spine and resonate within her, shook her—enough to shock her out of her mesmerized state.
Bad enough. But apparently Esme had invited him and his friend to act as their courier-guide and guard.
Her immediate thought—the first rational one after her wits had returned to her—was that Carstairs and his friend were charlatans out to rob Esme … but then he’d refused the position.
Because of her. Why?
She listened as Esme artfully twisted Carstairs’s words, then invoked his honor as an officer and a gentleman, intent on browbeating him into acquiescing to being their courier-guide, apparently all the way back to England. She could have told Carstairs that he didn’t stand a chance of wriggling, out of Esme’s talons, but … the notion of having him squiring her around in the guise of their courier-guide filled her with an odd mix of anticipation and trepidation.
If just the sight of him could make her temporarily lose her grip on her wits, what would prolonged exposure—and closer exposure at that—do?
She couldn’t afford to be distracted, especially not now. She needed to get another vignette off to her agent tomorrow; her editor was waiting on it, holding column space for it.
Over the past six years she’d steadily developed a following with her little pieces published in the London Enquirer, three or four paragraphs of philosophical social commentary, a mix of observation and political satire, all delivered with a highly sharpened pen. The public had taken to her writings, but her abrupt departure from England had put paid to that endeavor; she couldn’t observe London society from abroad. But then she’d had the notion to continue in similar vein with her Window on Europe vignettes, and her public had happily followed her through her brief sojourns in France, Spain, and Italy.