Leslie Lafoy (35 page)

She closed her eyes and willed the sharp pang to pass, reminded herself that children should come from promises of forever. Carden didn’t love her and hadn’t promised her anything more than an affair. There was no forever with him. She’d known and accepted that reality when she’d stepped into his arms. And she had to accept that it was for the best that there would be no children, either.

She felt him move, heard the door latch click open, and found the courage to open her eyes and take his hand, to smile and pretend that her heart wasn’t aching.

*   *   *

Something was niggling at her; he’d caught a glimpse of the ephemeral shadow in her eyes as they’d come into the house. It flickered there again as they reached the top of the stairs and started down the hall. Was she having second thoughts about going to his room? he wondered. About actually making love with him in a bed? Good God Almighty, why? They’d already … Fully clothed.

That was the problem, he decided. She was anticipating—no, dreading—the deliberate removal of their clothing, the peeling away of all the layers and letting him see her naked. And of her seeing him naked, too. He smiled, knowing that it wasn’t going to be the awkward process she thought it would be and that by the time he had them both stripped she wasn’t going to feel anything but overjoyed at the freedom.

“Let me peek in on the girls,” she whispered, pulling her hand from his and stopping at the girls’ bedroom door.

“For God’s sakes, don’t wake them,” he warned even as she turned the knob and pushed it open a crack. He held his breath, willing her to look quickly and then close it.

Instead she pushed it wider and started forward. “Where are you going?” he whispered, alarmed and catching her arm to stay her.

“Mrs. Miller has fallen out of bed,” she explained softly over her shoulder. “If Camille wakes up and can’t find her doll, she’ll cry.”

“If you wake her,
I’ll
cry.”

Her smile could have lit a ballroom. “Wait for me here.”

Hell, he wasn’t about to go anywhere without her. He held his breath again as he watched her silently glide across the room, pick up the doll and tuck it back under the covers beside the soundly sleeping Camille. The sigh of relief caught in his lungs when she bent down and feathered a kiss to the top of his littlest niece’s curly head. For a second there was only the sensation of tightness, of a breath held unnaturally, and then it twisted into a palpable ache that spread through him like liquid fire, igniting a ravenous, demanding need.

She moved silently back toward him, smiling softly, unwittingly fueling the fire already consuming his every intention for patience and slow seduction.

“There,” she said quietly, easing the door closed. “That didn’t take long, did it?”

“An eternity,” he confessed, sweeping her up into his arms and starting down the hall. Laughing, she draped her arms around his neck and stretched up—intending, he knew—to kiss his cheek. He turned his head and met her lips with his own. The touch was soft and tender and her sigh tore like a gale wind through what was left of his resolve.

Kissing her deeply, greedily, he blindly opened the door to his room and carried her inside. He was kicking the door closed behind them when the back of his head exploded with a searing, world-obliterating pain.

C
HAPTER
20

His groan ripped through her in the same instant that she felt the strength, the spark, in him go out. As he crumpled to his knees, Sera desperately rolled out of his arms, frantically scrambling to catch him, trying to break the last of his fall.

“Carden!” she sobbed as his weight overwhelmed her and drove her down and back. “Oh, God. Carden! What’s happened?” she cried, wrapping her arms around his shoulders as they collapsed to the floor together.

The pain encircled her upper arm, hard and biting, and she
knew.
The scream caught in her throat, lodged behind her thundering heart, as she was hauled, struggling and gasping, from beneath Carden’s still form.

“Hello, Feenie,” he snarled, dropping her on her feet and then yanking her around to face him. “Remember me? Gerald? Your husband?”

She had never forgotten him; how he looked, how his hands bruised her flesh. How afraid he’d always made her feel. What he smelled like when he’d been drinking. The memories were all there, still the same. Except now she hated him with every fiber of her being.

“Aren’t you going to ask why I’m here?”

She moistened her lips, drew a steadying breath, and answered evenly, “I already know.”

“Good. That will save us some time.” His grip on her arm tightened. “Where are your pictures?”

She wouldn’t cower, wouldn’t cry out or beg him to stop hurting her. Never again would she give him that satisfaction. Never. “In the conservatory,” she answered through clenched teeth. “In oil pouches in a wooden crate at the foot of the chaise.”

“Then let’s be about getting them,” he snapped, flinging her toward the door. “Go.”

She stumbled and caught her hem, tearing the fabric and scattering beads as she staggered into the solid oak panel. Catching herself with her hands, she instantly pushed herself back and squarely onto her feet. She wrenched open the door, then stepped aside and whirled on him. “I just told you where they are,” she declared. “You don’t need me to retrieve them for you. Just take them and leave.”

He laughed, darkly, unevenly, and so quietly that her skin crawled. “I’m not going anywhere without the goose that lays the golden eggs.”

Suppressing a shudder, she held her ground. “And I’m not leaving this room with you.”

He lifted his arm and her blood ran cold. “Your compliance, Feenie,” he said blithely, pointing the muzzle of the pistol at Carden’s head, “or I’ll put a bullet in your lover’s brain.”

Shaking, chilled to the marrow, Sera tried desperately to get her mind to work, to see a way out that protected Carden. A shot would make noise and rouse the house. A sane man wouldn’t risk it, but she wasn’t sure that Gerald would put sanity before spite and vengeance. He might shoot Carden whatever choice she made. Unless he didn’t have the time.

She bolted, sprinting for the stairs, past the girls’ room, her hems up around her knees. Only a vile curse and the heavy thud of footfalls came in her wake. Choking back a sob of relief, she raced on and started down the stairs, struggling to breathe in the confines of her corset, her gaze fixed on the foyer table below, on Carden’s walking stick.

Gerald was closing on her. Even over the pounding of her heart, the rasping of her breath, she could hear him, feel him, and smell him. The impact came just as she reached the last step, the momentum propelling her off her feet, forward and down.

She heard herself cry out and then perception slid into a haze. A crash, a jarring pain rippling through her body, the breath leaving her lungs in a single hard rush, the panic of not being able to drag another one in. Her brain screamed that breathing didn’t matter, that she’d broken free of Gerald’s hand and that she had to move while she could.

Her gaze raked the floor even as she brought her hands under her shoulders and pushed herself up. The table had been overturned. Gerald was trying to right and raise himself. Wood splinters, flowers, china shards, water, the little silver tray. And by the front door, Carden’s walking stick. She scrambled toward it, her skirts and hoops tangling with her legs, her desperation catching high in her throat.

The tray crashed and china crunched and Sera lunged for the stick. She caught it with the barest tips of her fingers and dragged it into her grasp just as her ankle burned with the pain of Gerald’s furious grip. In the vaguest way she realized she was being hauled back from the door, that she was being flipped from her stomach onto her back. The larger, clearer reality was the hiss of the metal as she cleared the sword from the scabbard.

Kicking at him, she sat upright and swung the blade, not caring what part of him she struck as long as he paid a price in pain. The blade whirled as it sliced air and hummed as it sheared through the cloth of his jacket. It sang as it opened the flesh of his shoulder.

He swore and jumped back, releasing her ankle, and Sera swung the blade again, madly determined to drive him further. It whirled and sang again and the lower half of his pant legs sagged, his flesh parted and the white of bone flushed red.

He roared and she brought the blade back, preparing to strike again. But he didn’t back away; he stepped to her and she screamed in rage as his hand clamped around her wrist. She kicked at him, tried to pull herself from his grasp and accomplished nothing. He squeezed her wrist and turned it until her hand opened and her salvation clattered to the floor.

And then she was flying up, her wrist, elbow, and shoulder on fire, the foyer a blur. When the motion stopped and the bright edge of pain faded, her back was pinned to his hip and chest, held there with the iron band of his arm encircling her waist. Ahead of her, filling the passage that led to the rear of the house, was Sawyer. And Monroe. Both wide-eyed, gaping, and nightshirted.

She twisted and kicked, trying to break free, and she saw quick flashes of white as Carden’s men started forward. The cold pressure of the muzzle at her temple froze them all.

“Thank you,” Gerald sneered. “Gentlemen, you will move aside and let us pass.” He bent to press his chin against the side of her head. “And if you fight me in the slightest way, I’m going to put a bullet into the old man. Or maybe the other one. Do you have a preference, Feenie?”

Gulping what air the arm around her midsection allowed, she met Sawyer’s furious, helpless gaze. “Do what he says,” she instructed. “And when we’re past, go see to Carden.”

“Ah, ever the self-sacrificing lover,” Gerald growled in her ear. Her stomach roiled at the stench of alcohol. “Gentlemen,” he barked, pushing her forward. “Move to your right. Keep to the wall and your hands up where I can see them.”

“Take me in the lady’s place,” Sawyer offered.

“Move!” Gerald snarled.

Sawyer and Monroe obeyed, slowly, reluctantly, and Gerald half pushed, half carried her into the vacated opening, turning, always keeping the muzzle to her head and her body between him and Carden’s men.

A movement on the stairs caught her eye and she looked up and past Sawyer and Monroe. And into the terrified gazes of Amanda, Beatrice, and Camille. Behind them stood Anne, her hand over her mouth and her face as white as her night rail.

Sera’s heart wrenched. She couldn’t reassure them; to do so would draw Gerald’s attention to them and put them at risk. And so she smiled for them bravely and did what she could to keep his awareness sharply focused on herself. “Can you not move any faster?” she snipped. “I swear to God you’re the slowest kidnapper in the history of crime.”

Mercifully, he reacted as she’d hoped he would. “Do anything stupid, gentlemen,” he snarled, “and I’ll kill her. Or you.” And then he spun around, dropped her fully to her feet, and shoved her ahead of him. “Get your sweet ass to the conservatory and don’t even
think
about trying to get away.”

She went, grateful to lead him away from the girls, to give Sawyer and Monroe the chance to reach Carden and tend his wound. Oh, dear God, please, please let Carden be all right.

“Gather it all up and be quick about it,” Gerald snapped, shoving her toward the chaise. Her foot caught again in her hems. More fabric tore, more beads spilled. Catching herself, Sera hiked the tattered remnants of her skirt and went where she was supposed to go, did as she was ordered.

Scooping up the paintings she’d begun to sort, she haphazardly stacked them and dropped them into the top of the opened crate, atop the oilskin pouches that held the rest of her collection. A flicker of white by the door caught her eye as she worked and her heart went into her throat and tears welled in her eyes.
No, not me,
she silently railed.
Don’t worry or risk for me. Take care of Carden.

Afraid that Gerald might also see their follower, she ignored the pain in her wrist and hefted up the crate, boldly, defiantly lifted her chin, pinned his obsidian gaze, and asked, “And where would you like this hauled, my dear husband?”

“Out the back,” he snarled, motioning with his head to the rear door of the greenhouse, the muzzle of the pistol trained on her chest. “There’s a hack waiting in the alleyway. Go straight there and don’t drop anything along the way.”

More beads spilling around her and the wormy old wood of the crate crumbling in the palms of her hands, Sera complied, kicking her skirts ahead of her to keep from tripping over the uneven hem. She half hoped the crate would fall apart in the center of the yard—just for the satisfaction of making Gerald fear for the safety of his precious damn golden eggs. The bastard. If it did fall apart … Even if it was the last thing she ever did, she was going to pick up a sliver of wood and drive it through his black heart.

But the crate held and she made her way across the yard without a chance of escape or vengeance. The gate at the rear was open and beyond it, sitting in the alley just as he said, was a rented hack. Its door stood open as well and she didn’t wait to be pushed or told what to do. She placed the crate on the floor and slid it inside, her gaze darting from one end of the alley to the other, looking for a place to go, someone who might come to help if she screamed.

It wasn’t a heavy blow, but her head snapped forward just the same. And then snapped even more violently back. Her scalp burned and her eyes watered as he twisted his fist tighter in her hair. “Get in.”

She didn’t have a choice, didn’t have to make any more effort than to lift her skirts. Gerald did the rest, hefting her up by her hair and her arm and shoving her forward. She fell across the crate as he released her and she scrambled up to pack herself into the farthest corner of the rear-facing seat. The door slammed shut and the carriage shot forward, pitching Gerald into the opposite cushions. He swore and righted himself. Glaring at her in the darkness, he laid the hand holding the pistol in his lap and reached behind him with the other.