Lord and Lady Spy (12 page)

Adrian closed his eyes, knowing Sophia had just usurped Cordelia’s duty as a hostess.

“Y-yes. Of course,” Cordelia stammered.

And just like that, Adrian found himself leading Sophia into the Hayes’s dining room. He cut her a sidelong glance. Her chin was high, her smile bright, but the hard press of her fingers on his arm told him Cordelia had wounded her. He knew, now, how much Sophia wanted to be pregnant. Did Cordelia know as well? Was that her way of sniping at his wife? He’d always known the two women were not the best of friends, but he never thought much of it. He’d seen their interactions as little more than womanish squabbles, but now he felt Sophia’s pain at Cordelia’s thoughtlessness. And he felt a stab as well. Unlike his brother—blessed with two healthy sons—Adrian had no children to carry on his shoulders or bounce on his knee.

Adrian glanced at Edward—pudgy, balding, and pale—who took his place at the head of the table. Adrian had no ill feelings toward his brother. He didn’t care one way or another about Edward, though Adrian knew their mother tended to favor Edward. Adrian could hardly blame her, though, when Adrian resembled his traitorous father so completely. Even at the age of eight, Adrian had known his mother’s marriage to his stepfather represented a desperate attempt at a new start. Edward was the tangible proof of that.

Adrian took the seat offered him and looked around the table. Besides the host and hostess and he and Sophia, there were three other couples. It was unfashionable for a husband and wife to sit beside one another, so he was between two women and across from the other. Sophia was similarly situated. Adrian tried not to notice how the men on either side of Sophia smiled at their good fortune.

Surely they would bore her in a matter of moments. Seated across the table from him, in her formal gown and gloves, Sophia looked the perfect viscountess. But he had seen her only a few hours ago easily dispatch two dangerous men. It was
that
Sophia—the woman with blood on her gown and a dagger in her hand—he wanted to get alone.

The first course, a white soup, was served, and Adrian tried to focus on something other than his wife. “Have you heard from Mother, Edward?”

Edward sipped his soup and nodded. “They are still in the Lake District. She says London in the summer is unbearable and plans to stay away as long as possible.”

This was news to Adrian. He rarely saw his mother and had not known she was out of the city. In fact, he’d expected to see her and his stepfather here tonight. Apparently he knew more about operatives in Munich than the whereabouts of his own family.

Well, part of his family.

He glanced at Sophia. Her gaze had been on him, but it slid away quickly.

For once, he knew exactly where she was.

But it pained him that he’d grown so distant from his mother and had no relationship with her. He had always thought a career as an operative with the Barbican group was more important than anything else. But now he saw how isolated he’d become—from his mother, his brother, his wife…

“Oh, the Lake Country sounds just wonderful this time of year,” the woman beside Adrian gushed. The oversized feather in her hat poked him in the eye. “Have you ever been, my lord?” She touched his sleeve and smiled.

“No.” He looked down at her hand, and she quickly removed it. Across the table, Sophia smiled and tilted her head as a gentleman wearing a blue coat and a spill of lace down his chest enthralled her with a tale. The man’s hair looked like a rag upon his head, but Adrian surmised it was supposed to look fashionably tousled. He looked down at his own dark blue coat, simple cravat, and buff breeches. He thought of his boring, untousled hair.

Surely Sophia wasn’t interested in a fop like the man beside her. But then he’d never through she cared much for fashion, and she was undoubtedly the most fashionable woman in the room tonight. So perhaps he didn’t know her at all.

What the bloody hell was wrong with him tonight? He felt as though his world had been turned on its side. He was a bad husband, a bad brother, and, he supposed, a bad son.

He’d been a good spy, and at one time that had made up for the rest. But he wasn’t a spy anymore. Yes, he could win his place in the Barbican group back—he
would
win it back—but would that be enough anymore?

Dinner dragged on for several hours, with partridge, cheeses, trifle, and more. Adrian ate mechanically, not tasting his food and making little conversation. The meal was torture. Worse than the time he’d had two toenails pulled out by two French agents who hoped to get information out of him. They hadn’t. But seated across from Sophia, able to see her, hear her, and not touch her was just about enough to break him.

Finally the meal ended, as expected, with port and cigars. Adrian escaped the dining room as quickly as possible. The ladies were in the drawing room, playing cards, but when Adrian peeked in, he didn’t see Sophia.

No doubt she wasn’t missed by Cordelia.

Sophia wouldn’t have left without him, but she’d probably slipped away to avoid Cordelia. Where might she seek respite? Nowhere any of the members of the dining party might find her. She’d spent much time in their garden at home of late, so he headed for his brother’s garden.

The garden was small but lush. The fragrance of roses and some other flower he could not determine—perhaps dahlias—crept over him. And the faintest hint of orange… The moon was full in the sky, the evening warm but breezy. He made his way along the path, noting some of the flowers had been trampled, no doubt by his young nephews.

In the center of the flowers and shrubs, Sophia sat on a bench, head bent as she rolled her neck from side to side. When he saw her, the tension in his neck drained away. He knew she heard him approach, but she didn’t move as he stepped behind her and put his hands on the long column of her neck. He began kneading her tight muscles, and she hissed in a breath. “Relax,” he said.

Her shoulders slumped, but she was still on edge. “What happened to port and cigars?” she asked.

He smiled. “I had some earlier at my club. Spent all day there.”

“Hmm. Sounds like an uneventful afternoon.”

“What happened to whist?”

“I play it all the time. Ah, yes. There.” She sighed with pleasure when his fingers dug in. “I wanted a moment alone.”

“And I’m interrupting your solitude.”

She hesitated. “I don’t mind.”

He continued to massage her. He’d thought it would be amusing to play the old game with her, now that they both knew it was a lie, but he found it less than entertaining. “Is this how it’s to be? We pretend even when we’re alone?” He sat beside her.

“How do you want it to be?” She gazed at him.

He shook his head. “I bloody well knew you were going to ask me that.”

She smiled. “You were far too hard on Hardwicke this afternoon, Agent Wolf.”

He grinned at her. So she didn’t want to play games either. “And you were too soft,” he said, remembering the meeting with Jenkinson’s associate.

“You don’t have to scare people to get the answers you want.”

“And you don’t have to flirt with them, either.”

“I wasn’t—”

Adrian held up a hand. “I don’t want to fight with you. I don’t want to talk about Jenkinson.” He wanted to know the woman he’d married. He wanted to be a decent husband, host a dinner party, discuss the day’s plans over breakfast—even if those plans included fighting off thugs or questioning suspects. Unable to express all of this, he said, “I want us to be husband and wife.”

A line appeared between her brows. “How do we do that?”

“Hell if I know.”

She laughed, leaned back, and looked up at the stars. “I don’t know who I am with you,” she said after a long silence. “I don’t know if I’m Lady Smythe or Agent Saint.”

“Why not Sophia Galloway?”

“I don’t know who she is anymore.” She looked from the sky and met his gaze. “Maybe I never did. I’ve been pretending to be someone else for so long, I don’t know who I really am.”

“Yes.” Adrian thought of the meeting with Melbourne. “When I was retired from the Barbican group, Lord Melbourne told me that as Agent Wolf, I’d invented a thousand identities for myself. Then he said,
who
are
you, Adrian?
I still have no idea how to answer him.”

“We’re spies,” she said simply. He could feel the warmth of her body now they’d been sitting beside one another for several moments. He could smell her citrus scent above that of the flowers. “We’re whoever they tell us to be.”

That was true enough. He thought of all the disguises he’d worn, all the identities he’d invented for himself. Sophia had done the same. “What’s the most outlandish part you ever played?” he asked, the impulse to know something more about her taking over.

“A pirate,” she said without hesitation. “I had a peg leg and an eye patch, believe it or not.”

He stared at her. “I don’t.”

“Well, the man I was trying to get information from did. He not only told me what I needed to know for the operation, he told me where to find buried treasure. One of these days, I may even go dig it up.”

Her laugh was infectious, and Adrian found himself smiling.

“How did you manage the peg leg?”

“Good balance.” She stood, pulled her leg under her dress, and hopped on one foot. “I had the peg attached to my knee and wore a long, wide frock coat. I hopped around like this.” She demonstrated, managing to remain surprisingly fleet-footed. “And I talked like this—
argh, matey
!”

Adrian shook his head. “That’s horrible.”

She plopped down beside him. He tried not to watch the neckline of her dress, but he feared—hoped?—her breasts might spill out with the next sudden movement. “Your turn.”

He raised his eyes. “Hmm?”

She shook her head. “I probably didn’t even need the pirate costume.” She put a finger under his chin to keep his eyes on her face. “If I’d just walked in with a low neckline, I could have distracted the man into revealing the information I needed.”

He frowned, his gut tightening. Jealousy, hot and venomous, surged through him. He knew his next question would anger her, and he was going to ask anyway. “Was that ever one of your assignments?”

She rose, plucked at a pink rose on a nearby bush. “Distracting a man into revealing information? Of course. I wouldn’t have been a very good operative if I hadn’t used every means at my disposal.”

She was being evasive, which only made the jealousy burn hotter. “
Every
means?”

She turned, and even in the dim light of the moon, he could see her eyes flash. “Just say what you mean, Adrian. Have I ever seduced a man as part of a mission? Is that what you want to know?”

He tightened his hands on the bench, feeling the cold, hard stone under his rigid fingers. “Yes.”

“Yes, I’ve seduced my share, but—”

“Never mind.” He was on his feet before she could finish. “I don’t want to hear this after all.”

He made to move toward the house, but she caught his arm. “If you’d let me finish, you pig-headed man, I was going to say I never bedded any of them. Flirt? Yes. Lower my lashes coyly? Yes. Promise all manner of perverse pleasure? Yes. But I never followed through. I’ve never betrayed you. I’ve never betrayed our marriage vows.”

He wanted to believe her, but she was trained to lie.

“Why would I lie to you?” she asked. “I’ve lied to you for years, and our marriage is falling apart. I don’t want to lie anymore. I want one person in my life with whom I can be myself. One person with whom I can be honest.”

He let out the breath he didn’t know he’d been holding. This was no facade. He could look in her eyes and see the truth of her words. Sophia
had
been faithful to him. This beautiful creature standing before him, this woman whose beauty and vibrancy he’d taken for granted, had been only with him.

She was his wife.
His
.

He reached for her, but she sidestepped. “What about you?”

“Me?”

She looked down, kicked at a withered purple flower—hell if he knew the name of it—fallen on the walk. “I don’t expect you to tell me you’ve been faithful. I know that’s too much to expect, but be honest with
me
. Do you have a mistress? Have there been many other women?”

What the bloody hell was she talking about? Mistress? But then could he blame her for reaching that conclusion when he’d thought the same of her?

“Don’t look at me like that. I’m no innocent miss, and I think we’re well past pretending we follow the rules of society and don’t discuss such unseemly topics. Be honest with me, Adrian.”

It was the use of his name that had his heart clenching. He saw the hurt in her eyes, the expectation of what she thought he would say. “I’ve been faithful to you.”

She frowned, and he understood her doubt. Like she, he was a trained liar. He took her hands, looked directly into her eyes. “I don’t have a mistress and never have had. There haven’t been any other women. Only you since we married.”

She gaped at him. “But surely you’ve had opportunity.”

“And because I’m a man I can’t resist?” He was not his father.

“But I—I haven’t been much of a wife to you this last year. I assumed you would go elsewhere.”

She really didn’t know him at all. Tonight that would change. “I did go elsewhere—Madrid, Lisbon, Berlin. I worked, and yes, I met beautiful women. But I always knew I was your husband. I do not take vows lightly.”

He could see by the bewildered look on her face she didn’t know what to say, what to think. “Thank you,” she finally stuttered. “This is more than I expected.”

“Because you don’t know me. You don’t know…” He paused, tempted to shield this part of him. But then they’d go on as before, and she’d never know him. “You don’t know what my father did.” He stalked past her and shrugged out of his coat. It was cooling off, and he could see Sophia’s skin covered in goose flesh. “Here, put this on. That dress is too flimsy.” He draped the coat over her bare shoulders. “Seductive as hell, but flimsy.”

“I think that was a compliment.” She sat on the bench they’d abandoned. Her hand went to her neck, a gesture he now knew indicated she was conflicted. Finally, she said, “You’re mistaken, Adrian. I do know about your father. I know all about him. I know we never talked about him. I could tell the subject pained you.”