The Wicked Deeds of Daniel Mackenzie (9 page)

“You are a beautiful woman,” he said, making himself stay in place. “Says so on your poster, doesn’t it?
A beauty that drives sane men to madness, gentle men to duels.
That’s brilliant, is that. I bet the punters come flocking.”

Violette gave him a sharp look. “You are mocking me, Mr. Mackenzie.”

“I am indeed.” Daniel stepped beside her and held out his arm in his tailored coat. “Let me escort you home, Mademoiselle Bastien, if that is your name. Even if it isn’t your name, I’m pleased to escort you anyway. There might be ruffians about.”

“This is a respectable part of town.” Violette’s chin came up. “The only ruffian in it is you.”

Daniel burst out laughing. “A shot to the heart, but accurate, lass. Dead accurate. Still, even respectable gentlemen might lose their minds when they come face-to-face with the stunning beauty of Princess Ivanova.”

Daniel kept his arm out, expecting her at any moment to turn and run, or at least look about for something else to hit him with before she went. Then he’d have to follow her, because damned if he’d let the woman he’d tracked halfway across the Continent slip from his grasp again. He’d found her, and he was keeping her.

Daniel hid his jolt of glee when she slid her fingers under the crook of his arm. “Very well. But only because it is darker out here than I thought.”

Got her
, Daniel’s mind sang as they turned together out to the main street.

Ian’s direction of
Marseille
had brought Daniel here, and almost immediately he’d seen the advertisement that the clairvoyant Countess Melikova and her assistant, Princess Ivanova, the deadly beauty, would speak to an audience at a concert hall.

Walking in late to the performance, Daniel had beheld on the stage a middle-aged woman in black with a gold brocade turban, and the upright form of Violette, wearing a long black veil that concealed her face and hair. But he’d known she was Violette. He’d recognize that enticing body and sensual voice anywhere, didn’t matter how much she hid her face or what accent she put on.

“The bit of hair you let us glimpse behind the veil was blond.” Daniel touched a dark curl that fell over Violet’s cheek. “Clever. If smitten gentlemen waited for you at the back door, they’d strain their eyes for a woman with flaxen hair. Only I was on the lookout for the real Violette Bastien.” He winked at her. “Except that Mademoiselle Bastien doesn’t exist either, does she? Is the
Violette
real? Or were you christened with another name?”

“It’s Violet,” she said in a firm voice.

“No surname?”

“It was a long time ago.”

“Hmm.” Daniel drew her a little closer. They walked slowly down the street like any courting couple, avoiding carriages with clopping horses and the little steaming piles that the clopping horses left behind.

Plenty of people strolled about—friends arm in arm, couples, businessmen walking from clubs back home to their families. None paid any attention to Daniel and Violet, except for a glance at Daniel’s Mackenzie plaid kilt. Daniel was the exotic creature on the street at the moment, not Violet.

“I commend you and your mother on your performance,” he said. “Well done. The phosphor-luminescent balls were a nice touch.”

Violet shrugged. “People expect to see tangible evidence of the ether.”

“No machines tonight?”

“My mother doesn’t need them as much as I do. I don’t have her gift.”

“Gift,” Daniel repeated, remembering the performance. “Aye, she has quite a good one. She’s masterful at telling people what they wish to hear.”

“Do not be so quick to dismiss her, please. She is always spot-on, and not only using what I tell her. What about what your own mother said to you through her? My mother was right, wasn’t she? And I told her nothing. I didn’t know you would be here—I thought you were . . .” Violet faltered, her fingers tightening on his arm.

“Deceased?” Daniel supplied. “Departed? Shuffled off this mortal coil?”

“Yes.”

Daniel heard the catch in her voice, and he took heart. “Poor lass. No wonder you ran from England.”

Violet loosened her grip again. “But my mother was right, wasn’t she? About your mother?”

Daniel shrugged. “Near enough.”

“Well, there you are, then.”

Daniel couldn’t stop his laughter. “Violet, sweet love, the gossip about my family and my crazy mum is common knowledge. Everyone who hears my name knows my mother tried to off me with a knife when I was a tiny babe, before my dad threw me out of the way and stopped her. Then Lady Elizabeth Mackenzie was dead. Did she kill herself, or did her husband, Lord Cameron, do it? People have speculated for years. Now, if your mum had given the correct answer to that
riddle
,
then
I would have been impressed. Only my dad knows the truth.”

“You’re saying my mother’s a fraud,” Violet said stiffly.

“A very good one. So are you, love. The best ones always get away with it.”

Violet gave him a haughty look. “We have been questioned before. Put through rigorous tests by other mediums, not to mention scientists and priests. We’ve passed every time.”

“As I said, the best ones always get away with it.” Daniel put his warm hand over hers. “Now, did you bring your machinery with you? And would you let me have a look at it? I was interrupted before I could examine it to my heart’s content last time, by being nearly done in.”

“That’s why you’ve come to Marseille, is it? For my machines?”

He enjoyed the dry skepticism in her voice. “Certainly. That, and I like Marseille. So much history—you know it was once a Greek colony? Then the Romans obligingly left us plenty of ruins to wander through, and there’s the Château d’If, where Dumas imprisoned poor Monte Cristo. One of my favorite novels as a boy was the
Count
. Have you been out to see the prison close to? It’s chilling.”

Violet stopped, skirts swinging. A man in a bowler hat pushed past them, growling a little. “Stop playing with me, Mr. Mackenzie. You came here to find me so you could drag me to the magistrates.”

Daniel made a show of looking around them. “Do you see me dragging you anywhere? We’re walking calmly through a reasonably thin crowd, and I’m escorting you home.”

“And once you get me there, and your hands on my machines—
then
you will send for the magistrates. You think me a fraud, an imposter. And I assaulted you . . .”

“Your crimes, they keep increasing, don’t they? If I’d wanted the magistrates on you, lass, I’d have contacted my uncle the police inspector, who would have contacted his colleagues in the French police, who would have had you and your mum arrested and locked away long before I arrived. Then I would have strolled in, rifled through your gadgets, and taken what I wanted.”

Violet’s widening eyes started to fill with fear again. “Then I don’t understand. If you didn’t find me to arrest me, why did you come?”

“To see you again.”
To feast my eyes on you.
Daniel tucked the lock of hair on her cheek behind her ear. His gloved hands didn’t let him contact her skin directly, but the heat of her came through the thin leather. “To look at you.”
To dream about having you.
“And to ask you why the devil you hit me over the head.”

“I told you. You frightened me.”

“There’s much more to it than that, I wager. You’re not a lass who frightens easily. You stood up to Mortimer and his mates and were disgusted by the lot of them. Me, the one gent that night who would never have harmed you, you looked at in terror before you reached out for the nearest weapon. I’m going to find out why.” Daniel traced her cheek one more time then pulled her back into walking. “You might as well trust me.”

“I don’t trust anyone.”

“That’s obvious. But you’re going to learn to trust
me
.”

Daniel felt Violet’s trembling, and he also felt her draw herself up, trying to master herself. “You are arrogant,” she said.

“That’s true, but is that the best you can do? I’ve been called far worse than that.”

“All right, then you are an insufferable, full-of-yourself, aristocratic prig.”

She kept her eyes straight ahead, a flush on her cheek making him want to kiss it. He settled for laughing again. “Not bad. But still not the best you can do. You, Mademoiselle, are a deceitful, cunning minx and a very talented liar. I heard you pinpoint every person’s greatest desires in that concert hall. You made them tell you everything you needed to know.”

Her flush deepened. “It’s part of the show.”

“It’s a rare skill, and one you exploit to amazing lengths. I’d love to know how you do it.”

Violet glanced up at him, the wariness back in her eyes. She might be deceitful, but she wasn’t sly. She was deceitful out of necessity, not enjoyment.

Daniel wanted to find out all about her, and not only because he was curious. Since the age of fifteen and his first tumble with a lass, Daniel hadn’t been short of female company. Women were his for the taking, whenever he reached out his hand. His uncle Mac laughed that Daniel was carrying on the Mackenzie family tradition. Women wanted the Mackenzie men—that was easy. In matters of the heart, however, the Mackenzies fought long and hard battles.

So Daniel was beginning to understand. Violet was different from his previous lovers, and not only because she was a few years older than Daniel or any more or less respectable than his usual sort of woman. Violet Bastien—or whatever her name was—was different because she was Violet.

Since he’d seen her standing in the dining room of her London house, girding herself to face Mortimer and his friends, Daniel had wanted her. Even now, he wanted to carry her off to his hotel, peel back her plain and sensible clothes, and discover the lush woman beneath. He wanted her in his bed, to scent her ready for him, to taste her skin and mouth, to feel her around him.

Daniel craved her, and he would have her before he left France.

The boardinghouse they reached was clean, neatly painted, and respectable. Lights glowed in the upstairs rooms as well as in the downstairs parlors. “Thank you,” Violet said, stopping. “I’ll go in alone.”

“Right you are.” Daniel released her and tipped his hat. “Good night, Miss Bastien. I’ll keep calling you that until I learn another name.”

Violet gave him a nod, her face softening. “Good night, Mr. Mackenzie. I truly am glad you are well.”

“Glad because I won’t come down upon you with the full extent of the law? You’re lucky I’ve got so much kindness in my heart.”

Violet’s glare returned with his teasing. “I
am
glad, for your sake. But you may think what you like. Good night.”

She spun away and made for the door to the boardinghouse, her head high. Her skirts swayed enticingly across her hips, her upright stride a joy to watch.

Violet didn’t look back at Daniel as she opened the door to the boardinghouse with a little jerk and walked inside.

She was good. She was very, very good. Daniel smiled at the closed door, tipped his hat again, and walked on down the street as though satisfied.

When he came to a narrow passage between houses on the opposite side of the street, he stepped into the shadows, drew out a cigarette, lit it, fixed his gaze on the boardinghouse, and waited.

Ten minutes, he gave her. Enough time for Daniel to make it to a main thoroughfare and hire a carriage to take him to his hotel.

After ten minutes had gone by, Daniel dropped the spent cigarette and ground it out under his boot heel. At the same time, Violet walked out of the boardinghouse again. She looked up and down the street, scanning every shadow, before she started walking back the way they’d come.

Clever lass.

Too bad for her that Daniel knew this city so well. As a boy, he’d managed more than once to follow his father to the Riviera, despite Cameron’s efforts to leave his son behind. Daniel had learned how to coerce others to get him to the Continent, and when he was a little older, to buy his own tickets and come himself. He’d spent many an evening surreptitiously following his father around Marseille, hurt because his dad would rather take up with fancy women than sightsee with his son. Therefore, Daniel knew exactly how to weave through the streets to reach the main avenue before Violet did. Again, he ducked into a doorway and waited.

She turned onto the street, walking briskly, determination in her stride. When Violet reached the doorway where Daniel hid, he stepped out in front of her.

“Now then, Mademoiselle,” he said, grinning at her. “How about we walk to where you really live?”

Chapter 9

He’d drive her mad. Violet’s heart thudded as she stared at Daniel, with his captivating smile, his warm eyes, and his uncanny ability to predict her every move.

Never let anyone know all about you
, Jacobi had stressed.
A person who knows your secrets has a powerful hold over you. If you never let yourself be known, you will always be
free.

Daniel was so tall. He stood, unmoving, not about to let her walk around him. Or he might, then catch her with his strong arm and pull her back again.

Violet wet her dry lips. “Why must you know? Surely it makes no difference whether I stay in this boardinghouse or that boardinghouse . . .”

“It makes a difference to you,” Daniel said. “Your key will work only in the right door, for one. And you’d keep all your things in one place, wouldn’t you? Unless you have a network of rooms all over the city. That is handy, I admit. I often keep several places at once for stashing things.”

She tried to put on a lofty look. “Why do you care, Mr. Mackenzie?”

“Because you do. And because I want you to get home safe. Now, come on.” He held out his arm. “If we debate in the street, that nice policeman over there will come and tell us to move on, or maybe arrest us for breaking the peace. And the police would be sticklers about finding out your name, your nationality, where you come from, why you’re here. Safer to walk home with me, isn’t it?”

Daniel held out his arm, so polite, so gentlemanly, but behind the courteous gesture was a man of ruthless intent. He wanted to know all about her, and by God, he was going to find out.

Violet made a noise of exasperation, turned from his extended hand, and started striding back the way she’d come.

Daniel easily fell into step with her, strong fingers coming around her arm. “So, did you bring it with you?” he asked.

“Bring what?”

“The wind machine. I want to borrow it.”

He was too close to her. Violet easily smelled the scents that clung to him—smoke, the remnants of whiskey, the musk of himself under his wool coat. The scents made her remember how he’d leaned to her in the upstairs room in London, how he’d tasted her mouth, how he’d stunned her with the brief, warm press of lips.

“Borrow it why?” she managed to ask.

“Because I’m working on something, and I want to see if it will help me. Or give me a clue as to what would. If you don’t want to let the thing out of your hands, you can come with it.”

“Come with it where?”

“Little town about twenty miles from here, down the coast. Have a friend who will let me use his workshop. How about it? Tomorrow?”

The man was maddening. Violet was curious now as to
what
he was building, and how he just happened to have a friend with a workshop twenty miles down the coast from where Violet was staying. Did he know that the workings of engines and devices fascinated her? How exactly to entice her?

Not being able to read him was a terrible disadvantage. When Daniel spoke of machinery, his eyes lost their predatory look, and his focus changed. That he was interested in her wind machine was plain. And he was right that she didn’t want to let it out of her sight, because it had been expensive to build, and she’d tinkered with it until it did exactly what she wanted.

“I can’t,” Violet said flatly as she strode along. She tried to set a swift pace so he’d grow bored and go away, but Daniel walked along beside her without even breathing hard. “I signed a contract with the concert hall. I have performances to do.”

“Not tomorrow, you don’t. I heard you tell the audience Saturday. Tomorrow is Tuesday. Plenty of time.”

“My mother needs me for her private consultations. The machine is handy then.”

Daniel shrugged, walking close enough to her that she felt the movement. “Make all the consultations for later in the week. I’m right that you handle all the appointments, aren’t I? She’d welcome the rest, I’d wager.”

“Blast you.” Violet clenched both hands now. She wanted to go with him, to see what he was building, to find out what on earth he needed her wind machine for.

But how gullible was she? If Violet went somewhere with this man alone, he could take her anywhere, do anything to her, and Violet could do nothing about it. She was as helpless with him as she’d been with Mortimer.

“Blast me all you want,” Daniel said. “But bring the wind machine. This will be interesting.”

He was so easy, so casual. As though Violet could throw everything to the wind and run off with him, instead of stay in the boardinghouse looking after her mother, doing the accounts, paying the bills, setting appointments. Her life was real life. Daniel’s was . . . a fantasy.

The eager girl in her, the one who’d been interested in life in all its variety, longed to go with him. The woman Violet had become advised caution.

“So it’s arranged,” Daniel said, meeting her gaze. “I’ll call for you tomorrow—with a cab this time, and tickets for the train. I’m not walking all the way to my friend’s workshop.”

“I haven’t said I’d go.”

“But you want to.” Daniel’s grin told her he knew he was right. “You’re curious. Think on it tonight, and I’ll call on you tomorrow. Either way, I want to borrow your device. Better you come with me to make sure I don’t damage it. Or I might take a liking to it and decide to keep it.”

Violet stopped abruptly, this time in front of the boardinghouse where she and her mother truly stayed. She hoped Daniel had no intention of following her in. Her landlady had a strict
no gentlemen
policy—fine with Violet—and she couldn’t risk them all being turned out.

“Must you always have everything your own way, Mr. Mackenzie?”

“Aye, I think so. For a long time I was an only child, and you know how spoiled they get to be.”

Violet ignored the glint of humor in his eyes. She was an only child herself, but she’d never had the chance to be spoiled. “You said you had a ‘wee baby sister.’”

“Aye, and a little brother even more wee. Best thing that ever happened to an only child, Dad marrying again and having more children.” Daniel shook his head. “The trouble those two can get into and blame on
me
is beautiful to behold. I’ll introduce you sometime. They’d like you.”

The offhand way he spoke about Violet interacting with his family—his wealthy, powerful, untouchable family—unnerved her. Such people had nothing to do with young women like Violet.

Violet hadn’t known much about Daniel before he’d turned up at her house in London, but since then she’d made it a point to find out as much about him and his family as she could. The Mackenzies were well known not only for their money and standing, but for the scandals they’d engendered. Not one of the four Mackenzie brothers had managed to marry without some kind of scandal, and the two older brothers—one of whom was Daniel’s father—had taken some of the most notorious courtesans in England as their lovers. One of the younger brothers, Mac, had become a painter, living the most open life in Paris. He’d even taken his young wife among the artists and their models, before she’d left him. The youngest brother was said to be insane, though he too was now married and had children.

Daniel was gaining his own notoriety. He’d taken a degree in Edinburgh so quickly that everyone remarked on it, and had traveled extensively through Germany and France in the years since, meeting inventors and eccentric scientists.

Not that he wasn’t decadent as well. Daniel usually had a woman with him, from all reports—never the same one twice—and the three-day-long crushes he hosted in whatever house in whatever city he happened to be living in were not for the faint of heart.

Daniel had plenty of money—his mother’s family had put a fortune in trust for their daughter, which Cameron had been unable to touch, and Daniel had inherited it. He’d always had a generous allowance, but came into the full money of the trust when he’d finished university.

As far as Violet was able to make out, Daniel was a man who lived as he pleased, did what he wanted, then moved on to his next interest, next town, next woman. The likelihood of Violet meeting his pampered little sister and brother was so small she didn’t bother to answer the suggestion.

But she made her decision. “Very well, Mr. Mackenzie. Call tomorrow morning at ten o’clock, and I will place my device in your hands. I will require a receipt. And its replacement if damaged.”

Daniel’s eyes warmed with his smile. “That’s more like it. I’ll be here.”

Violet gave him a nod and tried to step away, but Daniel’s strong hand closed around her elbow, keeping her in place.

“Good night, lass. Sleep well.” Instead of letting her go, he kept hold of her and brushed his thumb lightly over her lower lip.

The warmth in the touch made her shake. Violet had always held herself rigid, because she had to. Any bending or breaking would be disastrous for her.

Now Daniel stood close and merely touched her, fingertips sending a trickle of fire through every nerve. If Violet leaned into his tall body, she’d just fit under his chin. His large arms would come around her, pulling her close, keeping her safe.

The image of him holding her was so palpable that when Daniel removed his touch from her face, Violet was startled to find herself standing a foot away from him. So much empty space between them . . .

She cleared her throat. “I truly am pleased you’re all right.”

Daniel’s amusement vanished to be replaced by something dark and dangerous. “You know, lass, I think that’s the sincerest thing you’ve said all night.”

Violet pulled back, uncertain how to respond. She swallowed, trying to keep her voice steady. “Well, good night, Mr. Mackenzie.”

His gaze held her as solidly as an iron chain. “Good night, lass.” Even though he wasn’t touching her, Violet couldn’t move until he released her.

As he had at the other boardinghouse, Daniel stepped back and tipped his hat, then stood still, waiting for her to go inside. This time he didn’t smile, but watched her with his unnerving scrutiny.

Violet finally made herself turn away and walk the few steps to the house. Her hand trembled on the door latch, and she found the door locked.

A maid answered her knock immediately and let her in. The foyer was bone cold, but Violet was still hot from Daniel’s touch.

She went up the stairs, clutching the wooden railing for balance. Once inside her bedroom, in their little suite of rooms, Violet moved to the front window and lifted the curtain to look out.

Daniel was still there, scanning the windows, waiting to make sure she’d gone into the right boardinghouse this time. He saw Violet, broke into his smile, and gave her a lazy salute. Violet lifted her hand in farewell, then forced herself to let go of the curtain, cutting off Daniel from her sight.

Daniel arrived at precisely ten the next morning to be ushered into a dreary parlor on the ground floor. He’d had to talk swiftly to be admitted at all, but finally the landlady agreed that Violet could speak to him in the parlor, if they kept the door open, and he departed right away.

Two middle-aged ladies fled through a far door as he was let into the parlor from the hall—probably nothing masculine had walked into this room in a decade. He heard whispers and giggles from behind the cracked-open door, which he pretended to ignore.