The Pretender
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THE PRETENDERBy
Celeste Bradley
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Chapter Twenty-five
Chapter Twenty-six
Chapter Twenty-seven
Chapter Twenty-eight
Chapter Twenty-nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-one
Chapter Thirty-two
Epilogue
SHE HAD A SECRET SHE'D DO ANYTHING TO HIDE.
Agatha Cunnington, a headstrong beauty from the country, has come to London in search of her missing brother James. The only clue she has is a cryptic letter signed "the Griffin." Agatha decides to disguise herself as a respectable married woman so that she can go about the city unnoticed. But for her charade to work she needs a suitable "husband," preferably someone tall, elegant, and rakish-someone like Simon Montague Rain.
HE HAD A SECRET HE'D DO ANYTHING TO HIDE.
Simon Montague Ram is a member of the Liar's Club, a renegade group of rogues and thieves in the service of the Crown. When someone begins murdering members of the undercover cabal one by one, Simon is given the mission to bring in the Griffin, one of his comrades who is suspected of betraying his brothers. Simon goes undercover and infiltrates the home of "Mrs." Agatha Applequist who he believes is the Griffin's mistress. Before Simon knows what's happened, he finds himself irresistibly drawn to Agatha's soft, feminine charms-and he is tempted beyond reason to break the first rule of the Liar's Club:
Never fall in love.
(Book One in the Liar's Club)
St. Martin's Paperbacks
THE PRETENDER
Copyright © 2003 by Celeste Bradley
Excerpt from
The Impostor
copyright © 2003 by Celeste Bradley.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information address St. Martin's Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.
ISBN: 0-312-98485-5
Printed in the United States of America
St. Martin's Paperbacks edition / June 2003
St. Martin's Paperbacks are published by St. Martin's Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.
To my sister Cindy, who is always there.
I must thank my husband, for being my best friend and foremost cheerleader and for putting up with being called "Fabio" at work.
I'd like to thank my daughters, for loving me even though I never remember to thaw out the good stuff for dinner.
Many wonderful women helped me with this book. Some writers, some patient readers. Darbi Gill, Robyn Holiday, Sherrilyn Kenyon, Cheryl Lewallen, Joanne Markis, Jennifer Smith, Alexis Tharp.
Everyone should have such friends.
The Liar's Creed
In the guise of knaves we operate on the fringes of the night, forsaking home, hearth, and love for the protection of all.
We are the invisible ones.
London, 1813
She had married Mortimer Applequist on April 7, 1813, in a moment of mingled exasperation and imagination. He wasn't much of a husband, being merely a name to offer up when people dived too deeply into her affairs. Still, in that he had suited Miss Agatha Cunnington very well indeed.
Until now.
On the outset of her journey, Agatha had been stalled and stymied more times than she could count. Every time it had been by some well-meaning soul trying to save her from herself.
As if a woman were incapable of purchasing a ticket and traveling from Lancashire to London without the supervision of a husband!
Upon announcing her "married" state, however, Agatha met with nothing but assistance and polite respect.
Truly, she should have made up a husband years ago.
Because she disliked leaving poor Mortimer as merely a name to spout when necessary, Agatha had spent many a pleasant moment on the journey visualizing him in precise detail. After all, he was her creation, was he not?
He would be tall but not bulky. Elegant but not foppish. Dark but not swarthy. If only she had been able to make his face come into focus in her imagination, she would have been entirely satisfied with her invented spouse.
Mortimer had become increasingly handy when she had arrived in town, allowing her to rent her little house—her very own!—-on respectable Carriage Square and hire a few servants.
Most important, Mortimer had allowed her to fully pursue all venues in her search for her missing brother, James.
But all of that would end today if she could not come up with some sort of plan.
The hall clock chimed the hour, and desperation began rising within Agatha. She turned to pace back up the front hall of her lovely new house, ignoring the rose-covered wallpaper and gleaming dark woods that had lured her to select it. With her arms folded tight and head down, she was lost in her scurrying thoughts.
Why was it the men in Agatha Cunnington's life were never about when she needed them?
She could dress up Pearson—no, too old and too stout. She could pass Harry—no, too young, just a boy, really. She'd given Harry the footman position as a favor to Pearson, but the butler's nephew could scarcely see over his two enormous left feet.
She needed a man, and she needed him immediately!
Simon Montague Raines, aka Simon Rain, paused outside the servants' entrance of the house on Carriage Square to check his disguise. His face and hands were blacked with soot, and the long brushes slung across one shoulder were believably well used. As well they should be, having been his bread and butter once upon a time.
His target's house seemed ordinary enough from the outside, with its tidy entry and scrubbed steps. It was amazing the corruption that could hide behind such a harmless facade. Vice, lies, even treason.
"Mrs. Mortimer Applequist," said the lease. Yet the rent was paid from a certain account that Simon had been watching for weeks. The account of a man who well knew the definition of treachery.
Simon should have sent one of his operatives in on this one and remained aloof and objective, as any good spymaster should.
But Simon had to admit to himself that this case had become personal. Someone was killing off his men. Men with identities so secret that they scarcely knew of one another's existence.
Only two men within the Liar's Club had the information necessarily to bring down its members one by one. Simon and one other. A man who hadn't reported in for several weeks. A man with a sudden increase in his account at the London Bank. A man who had, according to Simon's sources at the bank, paid well to rent and furnish the tidy little house before Simon.
With a grim smile, Simon hefted his brooms and prepared to play the hated role of chimneysweep one last time. All in defense of the Crown, of course.
The situation was becoming most desperate. Agatha had been combing her fertile mind for a solution all morning and still nothing had occurred to her. The rug in the front hall might never recover from her frenzied pacing.
Agatha turned to pace again—and ran full force into an obstacle that had not been there a moment before. Stunned, she staggered but didn't fall.
" 'Ere now, missus! You all right? Didn't see you coming."
Agatha blinked and focused her vision on the black expanse before her. Black coat, black vest, black hands on the sleeves of her dimity morning gown—
"My dress!"
She was set swiftly back on her feet.
"Oh, well, it were a close one. Had to decide if you'd rather dirty your sleeves or your bum when you hit the floor. Guess I called it wrong."
Agatha was being teased and rather freshly, too. Ready to let the fellow have it, she looked up—
Into the bluest eyes she had ever seen, in a face as black as midnight. Or soot.
Soot! All over her dress, right when she was expecting Lady Winchell—
Soot.
Chimney sweep.
Man.
She looked up again. Tall, but as lean as a greyhound. Just like Mortimer. Even the soot couldn't disguise his even features.
