The Untamed Bride

Seven

December 14

Grillon’s Hotel

Feeling sartorially better equipped to face the days to come, Deliah joined the three men for dinner in the suite’s sitting room. Tony and Gervase had just joined Del; they all exchanged nods, then took their seats so Cobby and Janay could serve the first course, a delicate chicken broth with small dumplings.

They were silent while they supped. Tension rippled between them-a certain frostiness on Deliah’s part, countered by Del’s studiously arrogant refusal to notice. Tony and Gervase, meanwhile, were exercised over the mission, as was Del; glancing at their faces, Deliah read their mounting frustration.

When they set down their spoons, Gervase spoke. “We haven’t seen anyone who isn’t English.”

Tony humphed. “We haven’t even sighted the man hiring.”

“Larkins, from all descriptions,” Del said.

“Ferrar’s man?” When Del nodded, Tony went on, “I wonder if we’d gain anything by watching Ferrar.”

“We’d have to find him first,” Gervase pointed out.

“I had Cobby ask if he’s been seen at White’s.” Del grimaced. “They said no, and the address they had for him was from years ago-a lodging house in Jermyn Street. He isn’t there, and the landlord hasn’t heard from him.”

Gervase shrugged. “If he’s using Larkins, then watching Ferrar won’t help us. And linking Larkins to the hirelings won’t materially advance our cause.” He nodded at Deliah. “Given you can identify Larkins as the man who shot at Del in Southampton, we can nobble Larkins any time we choose, but unless we can link Larkins and his lethal activities to Ferrar’s letter, we have nothing to implicate Ferrar.”

“Unless we can prove Larkins is acting under Ferrar’s direct orders, then Ferrar will simply deny any knowledge of Larkins’s doings, no matter what Larkins says,” Tony stated.

“Indeed. And it’s Ferrar we want.” Leaning back in his chair, Del looked at Gervase, then Tony. “I have to question whether there’s any point in us remaining in town.”

Cobby and Janay arrived with the next course. They waited while the pair efficiently cleared the table, served them from platters of meats and a tureen of vegetables, then, with everything in order, retreated.

Deliah decided to state the obvious. “London has a large supply of ruffians Larkins can hire to do his master’s bidding. Even if those we caught today warn their fellows, it’s likely Larkins will be able to find enough men to keep us busy here for at least a few more days.”

Del nodded. “And by dallying here, accomplishing nothing beyond running down the stocks of local louts, we give Ferrar time to build up his forces by bringing in more cultists-fighters he’ll deploy only when he needs to.”

“When we, or more likely our other three couriers, force him to act outside the major towns,” Tony said. “Even in the major towns, if the target’s moving he won’t have time to recruit. He’ll need to use his cultists then-they’re his only mobile force.”

After a moment, Gervase said, “We’re getting nowhere here. I vote we send word to Wolverstone, and tomorrow head into Cambridgeshire.”

“I second that.” Tony straightened. “We move-we force his hand. He must know by now that you’re not intending to deliver the letter to anyone in town, but he can’t risk you handing it on, so once you’re on the road he’ll have to make a bid for it, one he won’t be able to plan, and for that he’ll need his own troops.”

Del nodded. “And once we’re on the move, his attention will focus on the scroll-holder itself. That’s his real goal, the thing he needs to seize.”

“True,” Gervase said, “but if the opportunity presents, he’ll still take either you or Deliah as hostage for the letter.” Across the table, Gervase met Deliah’s eyes. “You’ll need to remain on guard.”

She nodded, but added nothing else, instead listening as the three men discussed the possibilities, then made plans to leave the next morning, with Del and Deliah and their combined households making a great and noisy show to ensure they were noted and followed.

“The scroll-holder?” Gervase cocked a brow at Del.

“Is safe.”

When Del said nothing more, Tony grinned. “Our journey to Cambridgeshire is sounding more promising by the minute.”

Deliah belatedly put two and two together. “I think my room was searched this afternoon.” She looked at Del. “Nothing was taken, but perhaps they were looking for the scroll-holder.”

“They who?” Del’s dark eyes pinned her.

The tension, which had waned, ratcheted up again.

“I don’t know who. I can’t even be sure anyone searched. The things in my drawers were moved, and the bottles on my dressing table, and I’m sure my gowns hanging in the armoire weren’t in such disarray. I didn’t leave them like that, and Bess-my maid-never would.”

“Bess wasn’t here while we were out?” Del’s expression had turned grim.

“I sent her on some errands.” Deliah raised her brows at him. “There was no reason for her to stay in and watch my room-the scroll-holder isn’t there.”

She, Tony and Gervase looked at Del.

He continued to stare at Deliah, inwardly railing, but helpless. Eventually he answered their unvoiced query. “My room hasn’t been searched.” Not yet. Cobby would have noticed and told him if it had been.

“Well, then.” Tony raised his glass. “To a more productive tomorrow.”

They clinked glasses and drank.

The men’s conversation turned to military affairs, then to sporting events.

Irritated by the renewed aggravation she sensed coming her way from Del, Deliah seized the moment when Cobby returned with the decanters to excuse herself and retire, denying any wish for tea and wishing them a good night. They all stood as she rose.

“I’ll see you in the morning, gentlemen.” With a regal nod, she left them.

Del watched the bedroom door close behind her, and felt some of the tension gripping him ease. Not, however, all of it. By no means all.

Resuming his seat, he let himself slide into a discussion of the latest boxing feats. At least outwardly. Inwardly…

She’d become an itch under his skin, even more so after last night. And she-it, whatever this was-wasn’t any simple sexual itch, one that dissipated after one scratch. Or two.

He doubted three, or even three hundred, instances of having her curvaceous body beneath his would cure his particular affliction.

She made him feel far more than he ever had. No other woman had ever been so provoking. It wasn’t simply her refusal to obey his orders, her steadfast antipathy to hiding behind him-her willful insistence on going into danger whenever and wherever she deemed it necessary-although all of that contributed to the emotions roiling through him.

In most situations he could see her point, even sympathize with it, but…

It was that but he wasn’t used to, that he had no experience in dealing with, coping with, much less controlling.

He didn’t like what she made him feel, didn’t approve of it, resented it, railed at it-all of which did no good. He was obsessed with her-and some part of him knew where that obsession was heading. What it was leading him to.

But while his mission was in train, he couldn’t think of that. Couldn’t think of what came later, after.

Eventually, the conversation died. The other two yawned, then stretched. Together they all rose and left the suite, strolling down the corridor. He halted outside his room. With relaxed good nights, Tony and Gervase went on to their rooms further around the gallery.

Del watched them go, then reached for the doorknob. His hand closed about it, but then he stopped. For what seemed an unending moment, he stared at his hand grasping the knob.

He wasn’t thinking-wasn’t even debating. He knew he should turn the knob, go inside and fall into his bed.

He couldn’t remember why.

Muttering a curse, he released the knob, turned and stalked back to the suite.

The door was still unlocked. He locked it behind him; Deliah’s maid would have come and gone via the door between bedroom and corridor.

Deliah should, by now, be abed.

He didn’t hesitate but knocked on her bedroom door.

He leaned against the jamb, waited.

Eventually, the door opened.

She stood in the doorway, no sign of surprise on her haughty face. Her hair was down, rumpled dark red tresses caressing the shoulders of the ivory silk wrap she’d flung over a prim white nightgown.

Also of soft, sensuous silk.

Behind her, the bed was disarranged, the pillow dented. She had, indeed, been abed.

Beyond his control, his gaze slid down, over the full mounds of her breasts, nipples peaking, down over the flat of her stomach and the swells of her hips, all the way down her long, long legs, outlined lovingly by the clinging gown. He was immediately, painfully hard. Aching to possess what he knew the silk concealed.

It took a moment to lift his gaze back to her eyes.

She coolly searched his face, then, imperiously, raised her brows. “What do you want?”

Her tone was even, direct, neither encouraging nor discouraging.

He gave her the truth. “You.”

For another unending moment, silence reigned.

Then he straightened from the doorjamb, stepped forward.

And she stepped back, allowing him in.

Deliah closed the door behind him.

This was madness, but what was she to do? Tell him no?

She didn’t think she could. Didn’t think her vocal cords would cooperate in uttering such a very big lie, not when her heart was turning cartwheels of anticipatory delight and her mouth was salivating in expectation.

Turning, she found him waiting. One arm sliding around her waist, he drew her to him.

She looked up, met his eyes as their bodies touched. Awareness streaked through her, but she hid it, suppressed it. Her hands rose, came to rest on his shoulders. Beneath her palms, the tempting warmth, the masculine hardness seduced as she watched his eyes search hers, then drift over her face.

Then lower to her lips.

Parting them, she drew in a shallow breath. There wasn’t anything she felt she should say. Nothing she expected him to say, to explain. He was a man of the world, and she…she could pretend to be his counterpart.

Would pretend, as his eyes touched hers again and, after a heartbeat’s hesitation, he lowered his head, to be taking this all in her stride.

Determinedly pretend, as instinctively she lifted her chin, met his lips as they stooped to hers, that her nerves weren’t skittering, that her senses weren’t poised to swoon, that her heart wasn’t tripping in double time.

He kissed her, and she kissed him. Familiar, yet not. Last night had been so urgent, so heated and driven; tonight, she sensed in him a greater attention, an intention to remain focused…on her.

On what he wanted of her.

Quite what that was she didn’t know. A thrill of expectation flashed, sharp and bright, through her.

The kiss grew hungrier, more demanding. She met him, matched his claims, his conquest, with her own needs, her own wants.

All entirely instinctive, but she had no other guide. She wasn’t innocent, not in the biblical sense, yet she’d never been this way before, had never needed as she now did before.

Had never wanted a man as she wanted him.

That simple; that complicated. Her want was a pattern of needs and desires, and as he wasn’t in any hurry tonight, and neither was she, he seemed content to let her explore-those needs, those wants, and him.

He let her undress him. His lips curved when she wrestled his shirt from him and then, the garment sliding from her fingertips, stared in wonder at the muscled expanse of his chest. Eyes wide, she dropped the shirt and spread her hands, palms to his hot skin.

And learned.

She explored like a wanton, freed of restraint, and he let her.

Encouraged her.

Until he stood naked in the moonlight, each heavy bone, the taut line of every muscle, gilded in silver, and she couldn’t breathe, yet still she took his member, erect and so flagrantly male, between her hands, stroked, closed her fingers, and lightly squeezed.

He stilled. She sensed the tension in him grow, tighten-to steel, fine and hard and unwavering. Her fingers, her hands, slowed.

His chest swelled as he drew in a breath. Then his hands rose to her shoulders, cupped, tightened-then eased. He drew off the silk wrapper she’d donned over her nightgown.

And slowly, deliberately, turned the tables on her.

He took his time, his lips returning to hers now and again, to sup, to send her senses spinning again. To woo her wits into compliance with his agenda-his needs, his wants, his desires.

His wish to learn of her. To explore her even more intimately, even more thoroughly, than she had him.

His hands traced, outlined, possessed. His touch imperfectly shielded by the fine silk of her nightgown, he cupped, stroked, tantalized.

Eventually-at last!-he divested her of the gown. Stripped it away with maddening ease, and equally maddening slowness.

A slowness that stretched her nerves taut, then set them quivering. That left her lungs seized, her breath a mere sigh, her wits scattered beyond recall.

Her senses were all his. His to command.

Expectation, physical anticipation, had never been so brittlely sharp, so exquisitely honed.

So attuned to his intention, his wish, his desire.

To know her. To have her. Ultimately to possess her.

With hands and fingers, with lips and tongue, he stroked, sampled, caressed. Until her breath shuddered and hitched, until her skin burned, until need was a molten ache low in her belly.

Until reckless abandon pounded in her blood.

When he sank to his knees before her, she had no idea what he planned to do. And no time to wonder, to guess and mute the shock, before he set his lips, his hot mouth, to her curls, then, ignoring her breathless gasp, he parted her thighs, and set his wicked tongue to her softness.

He licked, laved, probed, and her senses reeled. Fingers tangled in his thick hair, she fought to remain upright while her legs threatened to give way. He sensed it, caught one of her knees, bent and lifted it to drape her leg over his broad shoulder, balancing her there, his large hands cupping her bottom, the position keeping her thighs wide-opening her to an even more intimate campaign.

One he wrought with devastating effectiveness.

With ruthless thoroughness.

Experience told.

The assault on her senses stretched her nerves to the breaking point. Head back, eyes open but unseeing, she was struggling to even gasp, battling to remain afloat on the tide of his sensual mastery, and not let the waves of tactile pleasure pull her down and drown her, when, with one last, flagrantly explicit foray, he drew back.

Still supporting her, he fluidly rose.

Before her raised foot even reached the floor, he gripped her hips and hoisted her.

She only just managed to swallow a shriek. Suspended between his hands, her body felt taut, heated by flames licking over her skin and a fiery emptiness burning within. Clutching his shoulders, her thighs clamped to his flanks, she looked down to search his face-but he was looking down as he drew her hips to his.

In the instant she understood, she felt the broad head of his erection part her slick folds, and press in.

Surrendering to instinct, she lifted her legs, wrapped them about his hips. Tilted her hips closer, wanting, needing…

She lost her breath as he thrust in.

Arms locked about his shoulders, she let her head tip back, eyes closed, spine arching as he held her and steadily pressed deeper to fill her. Tiny thrills skittered over her skin; flickering showers of bright sensation skated along her nerves. Inexorably, relentless and intent, he drew her hips to him, held her there, locked against him, and pushed deeper still.

And then he was there, hard, hot, and impossibly large, filling her, completing her.

She dragged in a huge breath.

Lost it as, his fingers biting into the lush curves of her derriere, Del lifted her, drawing his rigid erection from the scalding slickness of her sheath, only to slide smoothly home again, to the hilt.

The moan she uttered was music to his ears. He set about gaining more.

Set about discovering how much more she could take. How much more he could take of her before surrendering to the inevitable, to an all-consuming, senses-stealing rapturous release.

She hadn’t been a virgin, was twenty-nine, and had lived outside England for a decade. A woman so richly endowed, so attuned to the sexual, so openly embracing and welcoming of the act as she’d proved to be, wouldn’t have lived those years in abstinence; there was no reason he need feel constrained by typical English sexual mores.

More need, in fact, given her adventurous nature, to use his experience of exotic lovemaking to lure and hold her.

He didn’t need to think further. He walked around the room, jigging her with every stride, making her clutch and moan anew, then he walked to the bed, braced his thighs against the side and set her down on her back on the coverlet.

He straightened. Took a moment to look down at her, hair wild and spread beneath her head and shoulders, her features stamped with blatant desire, her luscious body naked, wracked with passion, her skin delicate rose-tinted ivory, her breasts full and firm, nipples tightly furled, her white thighs spread wide, her long legs wrapped around his hips.

His erection sunk in her sheath.

He looked up, caught a glimpse of jade-bright eyes beneath her lashes. Saw her watching him.

Saw her breasts rise as she drew breath.

Sliding deep, snug within her, he set his hands to her breasts, filled his palms, possessed. Drew her nipples into throbbing buds, then ran his hands down her body, over her waist, her bare stomach.

Assessing, branding.

He bent his head and with his mouth, his tongue, swiftly followed the same path. Made her gasp and squirm.

She arched, lifted to him as he returned to pay appropriate homage to her bountiful breasts. When she was reduced to desperate, wordlessly pleading need, he straightened and filled his hands with the firm cheeks of her bottom, her skin flushed and dewed, heated and damp. Tightening his grip, he withdrew from the slick clutch of her body until he was almost free, then thrust deep again, harder, more powerfully.

Holding her hips immobile, he set up a driving, compelling rhythm.

She moaned, then sobbed, threshed her head from side to side.

He released her hips, unwrapped her legs from his hips and raised her calves to prop her ankles on his shoulders, then gripped her hips anew and held her steady as he thrust repetitively, penetrating even more deeply inside her.

Her breath came in panting gasps, her hands fisting in the coverlet as the tempo increased and he pounded into her.

She tightened, and tightened, spine bowing, muscles locking.

Then she came apart.

In a glorious, rippling cascade, release took her, caught her, wracked her, rocked her, shook her. Deliah had never felt anything so sensually profound. So primitive. As if her senses had shattered, disintegrated under the onslaught of sensation he’d wrought.

But even then he wasn’t finished with her. He continued to move within her, until she reached that curious state of floating.

Then he withdrew, leaving her strangely bereft, but only for an instant.

Shrugging her legs from his shoulders, gripping her hips, he rolled her onto her stomach. He drew her toward him until her hips were at the edge of the high mattress, her legs over the side of the bed, her toes barely touching the floor.

She lay there, boneless, and he filled her from behind.

Her nerves sizzled, stretched.

Passion flared anew as he withdrew and thrust into her. Her senses expanded, greedily taking it all in-the novel sensations of his groin meeting the vulnerable skin of her exposed bottom, his heavy balls brushing the sensitive backs of her naked thighs.

The hot, hard, heavy reality of his erection pushing repeatedly into her.

Excitement melded with a sense of vulnerability as he held her there, pinned, effectively helpless, and filled her body, relentlessly filled her senses and her mind with sensual delight, with mind-melting pleasure.

Desire rose and swamped her; passion erupted in a hot tide and swept through her anew. She wanted to move with him, to contribute, to take him, but his hold was unbreakable and his strength too great; he kept her still, immobile, and thrust ever more powerfully, faster and harder into her.

She tightened about him, instinctively seeking to hold, to caress.

Sensed him shudder.

Through his hands, through the rigid columns of his thighs pressing against hers, she felt the tension holding him tighten, then she heard him drag in a huge, broken breath.

Beneath her skin, fire raced and razed. Closing her eyes, she surrendered to instinct and continued to clamp and ease about him, using her body to intimately caress his as he con tinued to thrust into her…

He gasped, released her hips and leaned forward. Hands sinking into the coverlet on either side of her shoulders, he hung over her. His breathing was harsh and labored above her. His weight pressed her down as his hips hugged hers, pumped desperately-

And release swept him, took him as she clung, as she tightened about him one last time, and felt herself tipping, falling into the vortex of cataclysmic sensation, too. Into a whirlpool of sharp, bright feeling that coalesced and drew in, tighter and tighter, then exploded in a nova of incandescent heat.

Glory erupted, brilliant and bright, spreading and spinning about them, over them, through them, enfolding them in golden pleasure.

Slowly, inexorably, the glow faded.

His arms gave way and he slumped over her, coming down on his elbows, his chest rising and falling like bellows against her back, his breathing harsh by her ear, his body hot, malleable steel curved protectively over hers. His heart still thundered. She felt the evocative beat against her back, felt it where they joined, in the slick furnace between her thighs, in her still clenching womb. He was in her blood, in her bones, had sunk to her marrow.

The beat gradually slowed as they drifted back to earth.

Eyes closed, thoughts in abeyance, her body more his than hers, her cheek pillowed on the coverlet, she realized she was smiling.

She was a mass of contradictions.

Later, once he’d managed to summon strength enough to disengage and lift her, then draw down the covers and rearrange them both in her bed, Del lay back on the piled pillows, one arm behind his head, the other around Deliah as she slept the sleep of the pleasurably exhausted, her cheek pillowed on his chest.

He stared at the canopy and tried to make sense of her.

Not an easy task, given said contradictions.

Her nightgown, for instance. The style was prim and proper, as befitted a deacon’s daughter-her father was a deacon, he recalled. The gown’s fabric, on the other hand, was a testament to tactile sensuality. The Indians understood the arousing properties of silk, its inherently sensual nature. So, apparently, did Deliah.

Touching her through the garment-sliding, shifting silk caressing silken skin-had been as arousing for her as it had been for him.

That contradiction mirrored another-her oftimes prim behavior, her insistence on propriety, contrasting sharply with the experienced wanton she was. Or at least appeared to be.

Which left him with the last of the contradictions he’d thus far uncovered. She hadn’t been a virgin, yet every instinct he possessed insisted that beyond the basics she was-or at least had been-untutored and untried.

He hadn’t been in any condition to think much at the time, but he had noticed. Now he had the leisure to think back…she’d been startled-honestly taken aback, even shocked-when he’d used his mouth on her.

She’d been surprised when he’d lifted her, although she’d very quickly grasped the possibilities.

When he’d had her on her back…

Eyes narrowing, he replayed all he could. Accepted that his earlier conclusion regarding her experience had been wrong.

The heat of the moment, her eager, all but molten responses, had veiled the truth. All of the aforesaid-and doubtless all that had come after, too-had been new to her.

The only way he could reconcile the nascent, latent houri he knew her to be, that she’d proved to be in his arms, with the twenty-nine-year-old non-virgin with barely a sexual encounter to her name, was that somewhere in her past lay what was commonly termed “a disappointment.”

She’d loved some man, had given herself to him, perhaps only once, but for whatever reason-him dying at Waterloo would fit the timing-no marriage had come of it, resulting in her sojourn in Jamaica, presumably to lift her spirits.

He couldn’t imagine her going into a decline, but he hadn’t known her all those years ago. Yet given how tight she was, her last sexual episode prior to him was in her dim and very distant past. She’d been with no other man-been tempted by no other man-until, the previous night, she’d lost her temper with him.

She might be a nascent, latent houri, but she was the very opposite of a light-skirted lady.

That, to him, was no contradiction but a reassuring, potentially useful fact. A highly pertinent piece of intelligence given the direction he intended to have them head in-his “later, after.”

Regardless of having spent no real time dwelling on it, their mutual destination had already taken definite shape in his mind. That being so…

He glanced at her. Spent some minutes simply drinking in the sight of her, softly flushed in sleep, boneless in the aftermath of intense satiation, curled, trusting, against his side.

Her jade-green eyes were closed. Her luscious ruby lips…

Recalling his fantasies involving those sinfully ripe lips, he smiled. Lowering his arm, he slid his hand beneath the covers, found her breast.

Gently fondled, caressed.

And felt her rouse, waken, then sinuously stretch.

Smile deepening, he slid down in the bed.

There was no reason he shouldn’t show her more. Indulge her, and himself, further. Educate the houri hidden inside her, to her gratification, and his.

No reason at all that he couldn’t open her eyes further, couldn’t feed her curiosity.

And simultaneously satisfy his.

December 15

Grillon’s Hotel

Del returned to his room before dawn the following morning in a distinctly buoyant mood. Even though nothing about his mission had changed, he felt significantly more positive.

Entering his room, he closed the door, looked at the bed. Considered its neat, pristine state. Inwardly shrugged. Cobby had been with him too long to cozen; he would guess regardless.

Going to the bellpull, he tugged it, then continued to the dresser to set down the gold pin he hadn’t bothered replacing in his cravat.

Hand poised over the top of the dresser, he froze. Frowned.

Something wasn’t quite right, but he couldn’t pinpoint what was triggering the thought, the gut feeling. Lifting his head, he scanned the room.

When Cobby arrived, he was still prowling, frowning.

Closing the door, Cobby paused, brows rising. “Don’t rightly know which question I should ask first.”

“Don’t bother with the obvious. What’s bothering me is that…” Del looked around again. “I think someone’s been in here-that someone’s searched.” He waved a hand around the room. “See what you think.”

Cobby came deeper into the room, looked. Gradually, he, too, frowned. “Things are not quite the way we leave them-either you or me. Take the brushes on the dresser. They aren’t in any sort of order. Neither of us leave our weapons like that-even if they aren’t exactly weapons.”

Del ran a hand through his hair. “So I’m right. Someone has been searching. Who?”

Cobby pursed his lips. “Haven’t been many hotel staff about up here-just the maids cleaning, and me and Janay usually hang about then.” He darted a glance at Del. “Could it be one of Miss Duncannon’s people?”

“I can’t see how. She’s known them for years, and there’s no way the Black Cobra could have known she and I were going to travel together, that her staff would ever have any chance at the scroll-holder. He wouldn’t have had time to put his usual persuasions in place.”

The Black Cobra’s usual persuasive tactic was to get a family member into his clutches and use their safety to ensure their relative did as he bid them.

“You’re right.” Cobby nodded. “And I have to say they’re a straightforward lot. I haven’t had any qualms.”

“So it has to have been a member of the hotel’s staff. Spread the word to the others-we’ll need to stay alert while we prepare to leave.”

A tap on the door heralded a lad with a jug of steaming water. Cobby received it, then shut the door. He poured a basinful for Del as he stripped. “So what time are we leaving? You didn’t exactly say last night.”

Del considered as he washed. “Let’s say ten on the steps, ten-thirty away.” He towelled his face, then mopped his chest. “Pass the word to Janay. I don’t know how long it’ll take for Miss Duncannon’s household to get ready.”

“Oh, we heard we’d be leaving last night, so we’re ready. All of us. Just finishing up breakfast, the rest are, so as soon as you and Miss Duncannon give the word, we can go.”

“Excellent.” It was early, but Del had a definite appetite. “You can leave my clothes out, then go and rustle up breakfast. We’ll have it in the suite as usual. I’m starved.”

And so, he suspected, would be his charge.

As Cobby rummaged in the wardrobe, Del added to himself, “And then we can start out, and see what the day brings.”

December 15

Grillon’s Hotel

Sangay felt torn on the one hand, and desperate on the other. From the back of Grillon’s foyer, half concealed behind a palm in a big pot, he watched the flurry of activity as the colonel-sahib’s and the memsahib’s households prepared to depart.

He wished he could go with them. They’d been kind to him, all of them, even though they didn’t know him-not really. They’d all accepted him as one of their party. He’d been careful to avoid gatherings where they’d all been together, where one household might have said something to alert the other that he wasn’t theirs. That he didn’t really belong.

So far, the gods had smiled on him, something he didn’t understand. He was not acting honorably-he was being the hand, the tool, of an evil man-yet thus far the gods hadn’t struck him down.

Thus far the gods had left him to carry out the evil man’s instructions.

He’d searched, he’d done all he was supposed to, but he hadn’t laid eyes on any scroll-holder. He could guess what it would look like-his old captain had had similar holders for his maps and orders-but he hadn’t seen anything that might be it. And now they were all leaving.

He’d failed.

Despair dragging his heart into his thin slippers, he sucked in a breath and, with one last look at the almost gay commotion surrounding the three carriages lined up outside the hotel, slunk down the side corridor to the alley door.

He slipped out of the door, then cautiously made his way to the corner where he’d met the man before, praying with every step that the man wouldn’t simply kill him when he reported his failure. More, that he wouldn’t feel moved to have his maataa killed, too.

Nerves at full stretch, he rounded the corner. Nearly lost his brave face when, once again, he all but ran into the man.

“Well? Do you have it?”

Sangay fought not to squirm. He lifted his chin, forced himself to look in the direction of the man’s face. “I have searched all the bags, all the rooms, sahib. The scroll-holder isn’t there.”

The man swore, strings of bad words Sangay had heard often enough on the docks. Stoically, he waited for his punishment, for a blow, or worse. There was no point trying to run.

He felt the man’s irate gaze boring into him. Steeled himself. The man’s fists were clenched, hanging heavy at his sides.

“What’s all the activity?” The man tipped his head toward the front of the hotel. “Where are they going?”

Sangay pulled the answer from his skittering thoughts. “I heard they are going to some big fine house-a Somersham Place-in a country called Cambridgeshire. They hope to reach there by this evening, but they are worried about the weather-they say it is coming on to snow, and fear that that might hold them up, or at least slow them down.”

The man’s scowl grew blacker. After a moment he asked, “Are the other two men traveling with them?”

“Yes, sahib, but as I understand it, they won’t be in the carriages. They’ll be riding ahorse.”

“I see.”

The snarl wasn’t encouraging, but the man had made no move to lay a hand on him. Sangay started to wonder if the gods truly were watching over him still, despite all.

“So they’re leaving, and you’ve sighted no scroll-holder, no letter of any kind, and you’ve searched everywhere?”

“Oh, yes, sahib! I looked everywhere in every room, even the servants’ rooms. There was no scroll-holder or letter anywhere.”

“So one of them is carrying it with them. Fine.” The word was a rough snarl. “Either the Colonel or one of his two men would be my guess. So you stick with them, and you keep a close-a really close-eye on those three. They’ll put it down sometime, somewhere. When they do, you snatch it and scarper-got it?”

Sangay risked a frown. “Scarper, sahib?”

“Run like the dickens. Like the devil himself was after you-and remember that your precious mother’s continuing health depends on you getting away. Wherever you are, you lay your hands on that scroll-holder and you run-I’ll be close, watching, waiting. I’ll see you, and I’ll come and meet you.” The man’s lips curled. “Just like this.” He leaned close, putting his face close to Sangay’s. “Understand?”

Eyes like saucers, Sangay couldn’t even swallow. “Yes, sahib. I understand.” He would rather have faced a real cobra eye to eye.

The man seemed satisfied with what he saw in Sangay’s face. He slowly eased back, straightened.

Sangay inwardly trembled, but felt forced to say, “They might not put the holder down this day, sahib, not while they are traveling.”

“True enough. More likely they’ll put it down once they reach this house. It sounds like someone’s country house.” The man glanced at him. “Like a palace to you.”

“Apparently the man who owns it is a duke.”

“Is that so?” The man was silent for a moment, then said, “Likely it’ll be huge. You meet me there tonight, at ten o’clock, behind the stable there. There’ll be a big stable, for sure.” Once again, the man’s pale eyes locked on Sangay. “If you get the holder, you bring it there tonight, but even if you don’t lay hands on it, you come and meet me there, you hear?”

Sangay hung his head, forced himself to nod even as misery washed over him. His nightmare was still not at an end. “Yes, sahib.”

“You wouldn’t want anything to happen to your mother, would you?”

He looked up, eyes wide. “No, sahib! I mean, yes-I will be there. I don’t want anything to happen to my maataa, sahib.”

“Good.” The man tipped his head. “Now get back there before they miss you. Go!”

Sangay turned and all but fled. Back down the mews and up the alley, but instead of going through the side door and across the hotel foyer, he followed the alley to the street and peeked around the corner.

The flurry about the carriages was in full swing. Likely no one had missed him. Mustaf, Kumulay and Cobby each stood on the roof of a different carriage, stowing the bags that an army of footmen, under Janay’s directions, handed up. The women in their colored saris, bright shawls wrapped about their heads, stood on the pavement and pointed and directed and argued with Janay and the men over where this bag, that bundle, should go. The colonel and the memsahib stood on the pavement closer to the door, haughtily surveying and waiting.

They all had been so much kinder to Sangay than any other people in his entire life, and yet he’d have to repay their niceness, all their kindnesses, by stealing from the colonel.

Sangay felt as if dirt was being ground into his soul.

But there was no help for it. If it had been only his death to be feared, Sangay hoped he would be brave enough to tell the man no, but he couldn’t let his maataa be killed-and killed horribly, too. No good son could have that on his conscience.

Dragging in a breath, Sangay straightened, then, seeing the women start to enter the carriages, he hurried out and quietly joined the melee.