Dangerous to Love (16 page)

Her eyes drifted to her “husband” as he moved aside to have a few words with Flynn. Julian was angry with her, and he had every right to be. By involving him in the
affair, she had pur his life in jeopardy. Wirhour his inrervenrion, relucrant rhough it might be, there was no saying how things would have turned out. If their positions had been reversed, she was not sure that she could have acted as generously as he. He knew the risks, and in spite of them, he had helped her. When she went to join him, there was a smile on her lips, and her manner was conciliatory.

Julian saw that smile and it did not sit well with him. Everything had turned out just as she wished it. If he hadn’t fallen in with her wishes, he had no doubt that beautiful mouth would be twisted with temper, hurling abuse at him.

The trouble with Serena, Julian reflected, was that she was too used to getting her own way. Her life had been too easy. There were too many people who doted on her—her brothers, Flynn, and from what he could gather, the man to whom she had once been betrothed. Even that boy whom she had met for the first time today!

How could she have allowed him to lay his hands on her and abase himself in such a manner—kissing the hem of her gown? She had blushed,
blushed
like a young silly schoolgirl. If it had been he who had dared to do such a thing, he could well imagine the upshot. She would have planted her foot in his face, and he would have thought the better of her for it.

He never would kiss the hem of her gown, of course. Not only was abasement not in his style, but the last woman he would humble himself for was someone like Serena. Proud. Defiant. Shrewish. She would pounce on any show of weakness and use
it
against him. She couldn’t win against him, of course, but that wouldn’t stop her trying. It was something to bear in mind.

Reaching for her hand, he raised it to his lips. “Happy, my love?”

She let the sarcasm pass. “More happy than I have a right to be,” she said, striving to sound as if she meant it.

Flynn’s eyes flicked from one to the other. Setting down his glass of champagne, he said, “Well then, I reckon you two lovebirds wishes to be alone.”

The smile on Serena’s face faded. She slanted a glance at Constable Loukas, noting that he was enjoying a quiet tete-a-tete with the parson. “You can’t leave yet, Flynn,” she said, giving him a look that she hoped spoke volumes.

Flynn’s answer was to yawn hugely. “Once you and the major gets settled,” he said, “send for me. In the meantime, I’ve got other fish to fry.”

Thinking of Lord Alistair, she nodded and whispered, “Be careful.”

Flynn was not sure what was going through her mind, but he knew that she hadn’t thought any further ahead than the next hour. Well, he’d wished, no, he’d prayed, for older and more experienced hands to take on the burden of Serena, and he wasn’t going to turn craven now. Raynor had married her, and whatever lay in her future was between the two of them. Still, he had not known how hard it would be to relinquish her, and relinquish her he must, if only for her own good.

The break, he knew, must be clean and absolute, with no half measures, or Serena would use him as a shield. She was Raynor’s now, and he was not about to come between man and wife. His eyes were burning when he slipped from the room.

Serena caught Julian’s sleeve as he made to move away. “Julian,” she said, her voice low and convincing. “Please?”

Though his expression was not very encouraging, she braced herself to go on. Turning slightly to keep her words from reaching the two elderly gentlemen on the sofa by the fire, she moistened her lips. “There has been
something I have been meaning to say to you, but there has not been the opportunity.”

He wasn’t going to make this easy for her. Looking deeply into his eyes, trying to convey everything in that look, an apology, gratitude, and remorse, she went on softly, “I have been wanting to thank you for what you did tonight. ‘Thank you’ sounds so inadequate, but I don’t know what more I can say.” She lifted her shoulders and let them drop. “I do thank you, Julian, from the bottom of my heart. I mean that sincerely.”

He smiled without warmth. “I’ll wager that almost choked you.”

She was ready to snap at him. He always had this effect on her, but the parson and constable coming up at that moment, she fell silent.

“There’s more to marriage than fine clothes and a fine setting. Remember your vows, my child,” were the parson’s parting words to Serena.

The constable was more forthright. “I’m a witness to your marriage, my dear. Remember, you may rely on me.”

“I’ll see you out,” said Julian. “Serena, I have a few things to see to. Why don’t you sample the culinary delights my chef provided for us? This won’t take a moment. All right?”

Serena wandered around the little office, her thoughts occupied with the parting words of both parson and constable. Though she and Julian had yet to discuss what their next step would be, naturally Julian would have no desire to let the marriage stand. As for witnesses and vows, a marriage that was not consummated was no marriage at all, not even in the eyes of the church.

The lump in her throat seemed to expand, constricting her next breath. Reaction was setting in, she assured herself. It was hours since she had last eaten. Remembering
Julian’s words to her, she went to the small gate-leg table which had been set with the best the house had to offer. Julian’s French chef was one of the drawing cards of the house, and she could see why.

There were soft roes of mackerel baked in butter, and truffles stuffed with herbs; oyster patties, and lobster rissoles; and a host of delicacies she could not begin to identify. The smell was tantalizing, if one had the appetite to enjoy it. She couldn’t eat a thing. She reached for a plain biscuit to nibble on. As she moved to the fire to warm her cold hands, her eye was caught by a paper, a letter or a note, which had slipped under Julian’s desk. She retrieved it and was about to lay it on the desk when the unmistakable scent of rose and cloves filled her nostrils. This was Lady Amelia Lawrence’s fragrance.

She could not tear her eyes away from that one-page epistle which seemed to have stuck itself to the tips of her fingers. As she scanned the lines, her cheeks burned hot. This was no billet-doux in the manner of her own innocent letters to Stephen. This was lewdness on a scale she could never have imagined.

She shouldn’t be surprised, not really. She had known what Lady Amelia was. It was all of five or six years since they had taken to avoiding each other, and when they inadvertently came face-to-face, they barely acknowledged the other’s presence. Captain Horatio Allardyce was the cause of their estrangement. She hardly gave Allardyce a thought these days. But remembering her own gullibility at the time still had the power to hurt her. He was her first love, and she had loved him with all the pent-up longing, all the desperation that only an adolescent girl could know. He had told her he loved her too. He wanted to marry her, and since her father would never consent to the marriage, they were going to elope.

Lady Amelia had put her wise to Allardyce. It seemed
that while he was courting Serena, he had been bedding the delectable and much more worldly Amelia. It was Serena’s dowry Allardyce wanted, so Amelia had told her. In those days, before the Cause had taken every penny they had, her dowry had been substantial.

No wonder Julian had behaved all evening like a lion with a thorn in his paw. He had an assignation to keep with Lady Amelia. He must have been straining at the bit to be done with her so that he could enjoy the carnal delights Amelia Lawrence described so graphically in her salacious letter.

Well, far be it from her to stand in his way. As though the letter scorched her fingers, she dropped it on the desk. Her eyes were sizzling when she quit the room.

This part of the house was not open to the public, and she saw no one as she quickly traversed the corridor to the staircase. She meant to retrieve her belongings from the little chamber where she had donned her borrowed finery, then she would find Tibbets and have him summon a hackney to take her home. At the very last, with all the dignity she could command, she would wish her “husband” long life and happiness and bid him a civil farewell.

As she was descending the narrow, dimly lit staircase, Tibbets appeared below her, bearing a silver tray and two pewter tankards. Just as she was about to call out to him, he disappeared through a door, leaving it open. Flynn’s voice came to her through that open door.

“She’ll be as mad as an ’ornet if she ever discovers my part in this.”

“Why should she discover it?” asked Julian. “As far as Serena knows, she has engineered everything to suit herself.”

This brought muffled masculine laughter.

“Ah, Tibbets, those are for my friends here,” said Julian.

Serena couldn’t begin to understand what was going on, but her suspicions were aroused. When Tibbets next appeared, she flattened herself against the wall. Damnation! Julian’s manservant had closed the door.
Now
what was she going to do? Her first act was to extinguish the candle in the wall sconce, plunging her part of the staircase into semidarkness. Then, with slow, cautious steps, she descended the stairs. When the door suddenly opened, and Constable Loukas and Flynn came out together, she froze.

“What happened to the real Lord Alistair?” asked Constable Loukas. “That’s what I want to know.”

“We got ’im clean away two days since, and that, my friend, is all you needs to know.” Then laughing together, they descended the stairs, leaving the door slightly ajar.

A horrible, unspeakable suspicion was beginning to take possession of Serena’s mind. When she reached the door, she touched it with her hand, and it moved inward a few inches. Julian and Lord Alistair were rising to their feet, having evidently shared a drink together.

“You overplayed your hand there,” said Julian.

“What? By kissing the hem of her gown?” There was not a trace of a Scottish brogue in Lord Alistair’s amused accents. “I thought it was a nice touch, myself. And your wife really is the loveliest, bravest lady that I have ever met. She could not know that we stood in no danger.”

Julian said something low and violent.

His companion laughed. “Now that I am here, I might as well try my luck at your tables.”

“No,” said Julian, “I’d rather you waited until Serena is safely away. There’s no sense taking unnecessary risks. And if she were to see you in a different role, she would know that things are not as they seem to be.”

Serena’s clenched fist connected with the door, slamming it hard against the wall. Both gentlemen swung to face her. “I’m afraid it’s too late for that,” she said, and she stormed into the room. Her first target was the man she knew as “Lord Alistair.”

“Why?” she said. “Why would you do such a thing?” Tears of mingled outrage and torment glazed her eyes. “I risked my life to help you, or so I thought. And all the time you were nothing more than a paid lackey of this scoundrel. God, and to think I liked and trusted you!”

“Leave us, Harry,” said Julian.

“No,” she cried out, her eyes never leaving the young man’s face. “Who are you? You owe me that much at least.”

“My name is Harry Loukas.” He glanced at Julian, and that hard look silenced him. He bowed and stepped past Serena, then went through the open door and shut it.

Drawing a long, tear-choked breath, Serena swung to face Julian. “They are related, I presume?”

“Constable Loukas is Harry’s grandfather,” he replied quietly. “I’ve known them both these many years.”

“Everything was a mockery, wasn’t it? Constable Loukas? The militia? The chase through the sewers? Damn you! Look at me when I talk to you!”

He had turned aside to pour a measure of brandy into a glass which he now thrust into her hand, curling her fingers around it. “Drink it,” he said.

She made no move to obey him, but stared at him with huge, anguished eyes. “The militia? How could you have managed the militia? It’s impossible.”

His expression was inscrutable. “There was no militia involved.”

“I saw them! I heard them!”

“No. You only imagined you did. Or perhaps Loukas arranged something. I don’t know.”

“Loukas!” she spat at him. “He is no constable, is he? He is another of your paid agents?”

He answered her without inflection. “He is, or was, a constable, now retired.”

He had raised the glass to her lips, forcing her to swallow some of the liquid. She slapped his hand away, and stood there staring at him, almost staring through him, as if he did not exist.

“Serena—”

“And Flynn? How could you have persuaded Flynn to deceive me? What hold do you have over him?”

He answered her gently, as though he were addressing a hurt child. “I didn’t persuade Flynn. He came to me, reminding me that I had an obligation to you.”

“What obligation?”

“To give you the protection of my name; to make restitution for my sins.”

She began to laugh, then checked herself when she heard the hysteria in her voice. “You’re not saying that you engineered the whole thing merely to make me your wife?”

“That’s exactly what I am saying.”

“I don’t believe you!”

“Nevertheless, it’s the truth.”

“Do you think I am a simpleton? There is something else behind this, something you are keeping to yourself.”

“What, for instance?”

“I don’t know, but I know a barefaced lie when I hear it.” She laughed. “What a stupid thing to say! You were all deceiving me, and I never tumbled to it.” Her voice cracked.

“I’m not lying to you now. Serena, don’t be too hard on Flynn. He acted from the best motives in the world. He is devoted to you.”

“A fine way he shows his devotion!” Pressing her fist to
her mouth, swallowing audibly, she moved away from him. She began pacing restlessly as her mind was deluged with a flood of conflicting impressions.

“But Flynn did not want to help Lord Alistair. After Loukas came to call? He tried to persuade me that it was too dangerous. And you”—she looked at Julian with loathing—”you had no knowledge of what we were doing. God, I had to remind you of the debt you owed me before you would agree to support our story.”