Devil in My Bed (24 page)

“I’m going to vomit,” she said calmly.

Wilhelm stepped to one side and kicked a heavy copper chamber pot over to her. The harsh clang nearly made her weep. Still, she managed to sweep her hair carefully out of the way before she heaved.

Nothing much came of it. When had she last eaten?

Yesterday. Breakfast with Aidan. Oh, Aidan, my love! For a moment tears of weakness and loss threatened, but she blinked them back. She might have been groggy but she knew better than to cry in front of the monster. He had dozens of ways to make the tears worse.

And he liked to use them all.

Disliking the feeling of looking up at him, she tried to stand. The room spun and she nearly reached for the chamber pot again, but she managed to keep her feet as long as she pressed her back to the wall.

It was whitewashed stone, cold and rough. She could feel the dry, elderly lime wash flaking off beneath her touch. She let the stone steady her while she tried to collect her thoughts and string them into something resembling sense.

Wilhelm had found her. He’d taken her someplace where comfort was not an important component.

He’d thrown her in here on a pile of blankets and had been thoughtful enough to provide her with a chamber pot.

It seemed she was going to be here for a while.

And no one even knew she was missing.

Yet she could not allow panic to overwhelm her. Wilhelm could be managed . . . somewhat.

“How did you gain entrance to Brown’s?” Keep him talking. Be reluctantly impressed by his cunning. Let him feel he had the upper hand.

Which, in fact, he did.

He gave her a smile closer to a sneer. “In the classic manner. I, my dearest wife, am a member. Someone in my ancestry must have felt that rathole was worth it. Oh, I’ve been a little lax in my dues, but that was easily forgiven with a mention of my prospects of marriage.”

Oh, Wilberforce, you don’t know who you let through your doors.

“I followed Critchley to Brown’s after I found your locket in his quarters. I didn’t know why he was watching the club but I was willing to linger. I can be very patient when it suits me.”

He’d been waiting for her in the hallway outside Aidan’s room. “How did you know where I was hiding? I could have been anywhere in that building.”

He dusted at a speck of old plaster on his sleeve. “I knew you were on that floor because I saw you there myself.” He casually toyed with his cuff. “Such a pretty little girl. She was hiding in that window for nearly an hour. Whatever were you up to to neglect her for so long?” He shot her an accusing gaze from beneath his brows.

Whatever were you up to? Don’t blush. Don’t look away in shame. Don’t even let a stray moment of memory arise.

And for pity’s sake don’t let any love for Melody show! She held his gaze with unconcern. “Children can be troublesome,” she agreed distantly. “I’ve never been terribly interested in them.” All true. I was more interested in survival.

When lying to Wilhelm, it was best to speak the truth as much as possible. His uncanny sensitivity to others’ weaknesses made him a formidable opponent. A twisted sport of flattery and attachment, then cruel betrayal. She knew the game well.

How silly she’d been to believe she could escape it forever.

“You’ll understand if I must leave you now?” He tugged his weskit straight. “I’m to be wed soon. Don’t you wish to congratulate me?” He tilted his head and smiled slightly. So handsome.

She would kill him where he stood had she a weapon to hand.

“I’d invite you to the wedding, but you’ll be far too dead to attend.”

Her fate, it seemed, was sealed. Oddly, she was numb to the fear. Perhaps it was a muscle too long overused. Perhaps he’d simply worn that mechanism out.

He spread his hands, encompassing her prison with enthusiasm. “So very grim, isn’t it? I must say, I always longed for a dungeon of my very own.”

Wilhelm’s smile widened and he leaned toward Madeleine confidentially. “When I was a boy, I watched my caged bird die. I stopped feeding it, stopped giving it water. It was fascinating watching it get weaker and weaker, until its tiny feathered chest didn’t move again. I’ve tried it with all sorts of creatures, but nothing has quite had the magic of that first event. Perhaps you will give me that, sweet Madeleine.”

He laughed in delight. Always laughing, always smiling, always false Wilhelm—it made her quite long for Aidan’s honest severity.

“After all, I can hardly be accused of your murder. You’re already dead, if you recall.” He gazed at her tenderly. “You’re going to die very slowly, and I’m going to watch.”

He reached into his waistcoat pocket and withdrew the gold locket resting there. He didn’t open it, but only let it spin in the air, glinting in the dim light like a warning. “Won’t you die with this token of my affection about your neck?”

Madeleine recoiled from the pretty thing. “I will not don your leash and collar again!” She spat the words at him, unable to contain her revulsion any longer.

He merely laughed again. “Adieu, my pet.” He put the locket back into his waistcoat pocket and chuckled. “Pet. A perfect term for you. Now, I shan’t be back—or at least, you won’t see me again. But rest assured, I will be watching you.” He blew her a kiss. “But then, you knew that already, didn’t you, pet?”

As he opened the door, he turned back. “By the way, such a pretty child. Too young to be mine, I’d say.

You have been a naughty creature, haven’t you, wife?”

With that he was gone. She heard the key turn in the lock. It sounded through the empty room like a church bell tolling a death.

She closed her eyes, listening. Nothing.

He was still out there. She could feel him. She gazed at the door where there was a freshly drilled spy hole, not even attempting to hide her fury. If he was watching, let him see that she was no longer the fearful girl she had once been.

She had spent her life trying to be someone who was wanted—the perfect daughter for her parents, the perfect wife for Wilhelm, the perfect mistress for Aidan, even the perfect mother for Melody. All the years she’d spent being what they all desired her to be—and where had that gotten her? Alone in an attic with a madman, that’s where!

Well, bugger that.

If she had to claw her way through the bricks using nothing but her fingernails, she was not going to spend her last moments being the perfect prisoner!

Aidan woke with the scent of her in his sheets. Soft and subtle, yet all the more seductive for it.

He smiled sleepily.

Madeleine.

That brief flare of intense happiness was followed by an equally intense shock of truth. She was gone.

Worse yet, in fact, the woman he had wanted for his bride had never truly existed.

Rolling over, he found he’d thrown himself onto the bed fully clothed. His mouth was dry and his head pounded. Unfortunately, he’d not had a thing to drink to earn such a state. Pity.

With an effort, he rose to sit on the edge of the bed he’d so recently shared with her. Her scent clung to him. She was everywhere around him. Her wrapper and gown remained neatly folded on the chair. Her valise still sat against the wall beneath the window. Upon his dresser was a hairbrush and beneath it on the floor glinted a lost pin, the sort that women used to fix their hats to their hair.

He shut his eyes against those reminders, although he knew perfectly well that in his study there were more. Even now he could picture her sewing box on the sofa where she’d been stitching tiny clothes for Melody, who had spent the night in Colin’s rooms.

Melody . . . who was not his daughter. A different pain, that. More of a deep ache, like after a terrible blow—though he’d never been struck quite that profoundly before.

He rubbed one hand over his face. There was a great deal to do today, or rather, things to undo. He ought to tell his man of business not to vacate the house—although by the slant of light through his windows, it was a bit late for that.

And precisely how did one “undo” a special license? It wasn’t as though he were going to get that bribe back. Perhaps he ought to hang onto it, in case he found another heartless liar who wished to dupe him.

He was stalling. He didn’t want to open his eyes. He didn’t want to face the life that now lay before him.

He didn’t want to face his life without her—and he hated himself for such weakness.

On the other hand, he hated her more.

Madeleine walked the perimeter of the room slowly. Wilhelm would be watching, of course.

At least in this stone attic there could not be more than one spyhole.

The day after the Incident, she had woken to find Wilhelm in her rooms at Whittaker Hall, preparing them for her imprisonment. She had once tried to change the awkward arrangement of the dressing screen only to have him furiously insist that she return the room to exactly as she’d found it.

He’d stopped even pretending to desire her and left her alone every night. Yet he had seemed so ardent when he’d pursued her and proposed.

She had understood when she’d found the spy holes drilled through her walls, carved into the pattern of the ornate woodwork.

What had sprung from Wilhelm’s suspicion and mistrust—for he’d been so terribly afraid she would betray him—transmuted into his own personal obsession.

Wilhelm had discovered that he liked to watch.

In her bedroom at Whittaker Hall she’d found the peepholes all over her chamber. She’d eventually hit upon the method of using a smoking bit of wood to find the drafts. They had been everywhere, even positioned behind the screen where she used the chamber pot! Locked in her room, under guard by a burly footman, her only means of defense had been to do nothing personal until after the sun set and she’d blown out all the candles.

Now, however, her intention was not to frustrate Wilhelm’s perversion but to defeat him by surviving.

Better yet, by escaping.

But how to get out? There was only the one door.

She could feel him out there, could feel the creeping sensation of his gaze upon her. Her stomach turned. She’d been so close to being free forever!

She shivered and pulled her racing thoughts from the abyss of panic. Think!

There wasn’t much to the chamber. It wasn’t part of any servants quarters. No one would ever tolerate such a place, not even the poorest scullery maid. Nor did it seem to be any sort of storeroom. There was a massive fireplace, long unused. The chill threatened to turn her inward shivering into something entirely more physical. There was no candle or lantern. Fine. Wilhelm would have to be satisfied with the gloomy light filtering through the grimy panes to light his observation.

The window was large with many panes. At some point, someone had wished for large amounts of light in this chamber. The panels of glass had once opened, it seemed, although now they were soldered shut by years of grime. She pushed against the latch with all her might but could not budge it.

Outside the filthy glass—

Her breath caught. Outside the window was a strangely familiar view. It looked just like the view of the garden through the window in Aidan’s chamber, only from a higher elevation!

Good God! Wilhelm had trapped her in the attic of Brown’s Club for Distinguished Gentlemen!

Her knees went weak and she almost laughed aloud from relief. Help was only a few yards away!

She threw back her head and screamed. “Help! Aidan! Colin! Wilberfoooorce!” She began to dance about the room, stomping and shouting. “Come and get me, Aidan! I’m up here! Come and find my hiding place! One, five, two, four, nine, six, eleven, ten!”

Breathless from her cavorting, she halted in the center of the room and listened eagerly.

The only sound aside from her own panting was the clear sound of Wilhelm on the other side of the door.

Laughing with delight.

Cold fear hit her belly like a dash of icy water.

Are you sure these walls are made of stone?

Oh sweet heaven, no.

The same reason that Melody had not needed to be unnaturally silent, the very reason why hers and Aidan’s pleasures had not been overheard—the club’s sturdy fireproof construction would be the death of her.

In panic, she ran to the window and struggled once more to open the latch. No use.

She leaned her forehead against the cool panes, nauseous with the sudden, inescapable realization that she might, actually, in fact, die.

“Oh, Aidan, I’m so sorry,” she murmured. More than anything else, that would tear at her as she slowly died here. What she had done to Aidan’s heart—twice!—was the worst thing she had done in her life.

With a shaking hand, she cleared the inside of one pane. She could dimly make out the back garden through the outer filth. She was immediately above Aidan’s apartments, then.

She turned her back on the empty garden. No help would be had from that quarter. No one would see her from down there. What had seemed a blessing when she was trying to keep an active child unseen was now a curse, for no one ever ventured into that sodden place.

She shivered, as much from fear as from the chill. The blocky, prisonlike feeling of the room oppressed her. What sort of place was this room? It had not the graceful proportions of the rest of the club. She could not imagine why someone would wall off a portion of an attic thus—unless it were for some nefarious purpose. Was she not the first prisoner to be held here? Was this a piece of Brown’s darker history, perhaps from a time of unrest or perversion?

Don’t be an idiot! You’re just frightening yourself further!

Finally, she spotted the answer. In the wall, higher than her head, she saw the hooks. Heavy iron hooks, spaced evenly in a horizontal line from one side of the room to the other. On the opposite wall there were an equal number of identical hooks. If one tied a cord from a hook on one side to the other, each line would parallel perfectly.

Parallel cords. Of course!

She almost laughed, despite her grim situation. She was in a laundry drying room. The window was to let in light and fresh air. The solid walls and door were merely a reflection of the general building quality of Brown’s.