Virginia Henley (42 page)

As she raised the heavy brass candlestick, intending to smash the lock, she was grabbed from behind and the weapon forcefully wrenched from her hand.

Adam Savage wrenched the weapon from the dark intruder in the shadows of the temple. He was stunned when he looked down into the face of Antonia. A muscle in his jaw twitched. He had almost felled her with a brutal blow.

Tony stared at him aghast to be caught red handed.

His voice was as icy as his eyes. “Wouldn’t it be easier to use the key?” He took the lock, inserted an iron key, and unlocked the heavy door.

She held her breath at what would be revealed as he picked up the lantern, but he did not swing back the massive door. Instead he thrust the lamp into her hands. She imagined both his cold contempt and his hot anger.

“Seek your room, mistress, we have work to do here.”

She heard the footsteps of his approaching men and fled back to the house before he could shame her further. With trembling hands she removed the dark cloak and paced the room. She dreaded what he would do to her. The last words she had flung at him had been a threat. “Have a care, Savage. If I open my mouth about you, I could have you swinging on the end of a rope!” Now he had caught her trying to gather evidence against him. She was tempted to flee. The stables held scores of horses, one was even hers. But dawn had arrived. Servants would be awake. She would be easily apprehended. And where would she go? Lamb Hall would be the first place Savage would seek her. She swallowed hard, trying to gain courage.
She’d stay and face him. If he began to brutalize her, she would scream for John Bull.

Tony caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. She picked up her brush to try to improve her appearance. The girl in the mirror stared back at her defiantly. What was the matter with her? She was a woman, wasn’t she? She would fight him with a woman’s weapons. She would seduce him! She bit her lip, wondering just how she would go about it. In Venice she’d had the tempting gold tissue bodice that displayed her breasts so beautifully, to say nothing of the transparent gold pantelets. The best she could do was a nightdress. He’d never seen her in one. In Ireland they had come to each other naked every night. She took off all her clothes, then donned the white cambric nightgown with its dozen tiny buttons at the neckline. She took the brush up again, stepped before the mirror, then sighed heavily. She thought with envy of the exotic veils that Lotus Blossom must possess.

She brushed slowly, noticing the silken mass now reached her waist. She saw her cheeks blush at her intimate memories. They were so abandoned when they made love, Adam always became entangled in her hair, as if the black tendrils reached out possessively to bind him to her, while tendrils of his long black hair wound about her throat.

When she heard a noise at the door her breath became short and her pulse speeded up crazily. She almost jumped out of her skin as his voice came from behind her. She whirled to face him and saw that he had entered from his own bedchamber.

“I’m sure you have a logical reason for being at the temple in the middle of the night. Why don’t you share it with me?” His voice was deceptively soft, like dark velvet.

Tony decided to confess all and throw herself on his mercy. If she became a supplicant she would be able to close the distance between them and touch him. Always before, one touch had been enough to ignite his hot lust.

“I—I was trying to see the guns … the weapons you have been smuggling into France,” she whispered, taking a tentative step toward him.

“Guns!” His voice rent the very air, stopping her in her tracks. His gaze swept over her as if he were seeing her for the first time. How unbelievably young she looked. The prim white nightdress with its tiny buttons made her look virginal, and in truth she was touchingly innocent. What the hell must he look like to her? Dangerous, sinister, frightening! She actually believed he was gunrunning.

She caught her breath as her eyes fell upon her open journal on the chair beside where he stood. He picked it up immediately.

“No! You cannot read that. It’s personal, private!”

He quickly scanned through it. “My name is on every page.”

“They are my private thoughts about you. In all conscience you cannot read something so personal. You cannot violate my privacy!”

“You know me to be conscienceless. You’re afraid I’ll violate you, not just your privacy. Pray be seated, Lady Antonia, while I learn your innermost thoughts.”

Tony wanted to fly at him to tear the journal from his hands, but she dared not. She knew the brute strength of those hands. She sat down upon an elegant Hepplewhite chair she had chosen with loving care and watched with flaming cheeks as he dropped into its identical mate. He stretched out his legs, then withdrew his ice-blue gaze from her as he began to read.

The journal was a revelation. Each entry started out hating, cursing, and reviling him, but ended up loving, almost worshiping him. The thing that startled him was the evil deeds she laid at his door. His character was so black, he became amused. He did not offer her the indignity of laughing aloud at her words, however. No hope of keeping his drug smuggling from her. She knew all that and suspected
worse. Some pages labeled him an opium addict, others an assassin or just plain murderer.

He was the whoremaster of all time. He kept a concubine and had fucked his way through London’s society matrons from Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, to Lady Melbourne and her daughter, the exquisite Countess Cowper. Only the fact that he’d been out of the country for years saved him from fathering Lady Bessborough’s illegitimate children, he had no doubt. Yet in spite of the fact that he spent every afternoon anointing his conquests with the honors of his manhood, Antonia obviously adored him. She was madly in love with him and cursed him as ten kinds of villain because he hadn’t asked her to marry him.

Tony had romanticized him into some sort of dark archangel who was wicked as sin, and totally irresistible because of it. Poor Antonia, she was in for a devastating disappointment. He was a reformed man who leaned decidedly toward good these days, rather than evil. He hated to burst her bubble but he intended to do just that. She had led such a sheltered, restricted life with no outlet for her passionate nature. Repressed to the point where she craved adventure, no wonder she had jumped at thé chance to act out a male role. She had been allowed the freedom to enjoy herself for the first time in her life. She had taken to adventure as a bird takes to flight, spreading her wings and soaring until she touched the heavens.

Trouble was she had become almost addicted to larger-than-life adventures. She had fought a duel, then escaped with him aboard the
Flying Dragon.
As a reward she turned the Carnival of Venice into a living fantasy for him as well as herself. In Ireland they had fallen in love, but had Tony fallen in love with the nabob, Indian Savage? Or the Leopard with its scarred face and wild, untamable nature? Or the nobleman, the Marquess of Blackwater? Could she love the man he really was? Could she love Adam Savage?

He put the book aside and came toward her. A small scream escaped her lips as he swept her up into his arms and held her high against his heart. The scream told him she was enjoying this new adventure. He boldly carried her to his chamber. The domed bed sat upon a pedestal, draped in sheer crimson panels. Thrown across the wide bed and spilling down to the black silk carpet was a cover of leopard skins.

Savage laughed at his own folly. He, too, indulged in fantasies. He gently placed her upon the bed, then pulled off his thigh-high boots and his shirt. Without removing his tight black breeches he lay down beside her. Her lovely green eyes were wide as she tried to anticipate what this dangerous devil would do to her. She gasped as his bold hand reached beneath the hem of her pristine nightgown, but he was content to let his hand caress her long, slim leg while he talked to her.

His husky voice sent shivers along her spine. “Tony, you know I’ve led a dangerous, corrupt life. No, let me finish. According to your journal you know that I lie, cheat, thieve, and smuggle. The things I do are unscrupulous, unsavory, and immoral. My activities are illegal, even criminal. I violate every law known to God and man.” He felt her stiffen. Imperceptibly she shrank from him.

“You know I am venal and mercenary, but I can see that excites you, Tony.” His hand moved up to her silken thigh to work its wicked magic.

“No! Please don’t do that,” she cried, trying to pull away from him.

“Tony, I enjoy being a villainous bastard, but more to the point, you enjoy it.” He took his hand from her thigh and began to unbutton the row of tiny buttons at her throat.

“No! No, I do not!” she cried emphatically.

“We both know better.” He laughed deep in his throat and Tony heard the evil intent in it. He had the entire row of buttons undone now, allowing his hands free access to
her breasts. He pulled aside the cambric and his calloused hands encircled her slender throat.

“It arouses you to know these same hands that touch every intimate part of your body have killed men.”

Her green eyes were liquid with loathing and apprehension. “Savage, stop this!”

“Savage,” he repeated silkily.
“Nomen est omen,
the name is the destiny! My very name thrills you to the core.” He slid her nightgown from her shoulders, revealing her breasts. His pale blue eyes licked over her like the flame of a candle. “The scar on my mouth is so sinister, it makes you wild with desire when it brushes across your nipple.” He demonstrated for her.

A moan escaped her lips and she was instantly horrified at herself.

His palm cupped her breast and she felt the heat flood from his body into hers. His lips brushed across her cheekbone and came to rest beside her ear. “I believe the thing that arouses your passion most is the fact that you imagine I am a rake.
You
imagine I am incapable of being faithful to one woman.
You
think me profligate, dissolute, carnal …”

Antonia began to tremble. He was aware of her slightest tremor.

“You’ve always had to be such a good girl. So virginal, lying here in your sweet little nightdress. But when you are in bed with me, you live out your fantasy of the angel and the devil.

The fact that I’m a libertine allows you to be promiscuous. Because I’ve had mistresses, you had to become my mistress. Because I’ve used whores, you want to become my whore.”

Antonia’s hand slapped him full in the face. She pulled her nightgown back up to cover her breasts and tried to flee from the bed. His strong fingers snaked out to encircle her wrist. “Tony, what’s wrong?”

“You lecherous swine.” She panted, anger almost choking her.

His intense blue gaze held hers. “Tony, you don’t want a dull devil of a husband who never breaks the law.”

“I do! I most certainly do!”

“God’s balls, you don’t want a husband who hasn’t the guts to commit adultery.”

“Yes, I do! That’s exactly what I want!”

“Look about you. All this can be yours in return for your sexual favors,” he tempted.

Antonia’s fury exploded. “You can take your bloody ostentatious Edenwood and shove it up your waistcoat. You are the most self-indulgent, arrogant male I’ve ever had the misfortune to know. You think your wealth can buy you anything, but it cannot buy me! My God, you are nothing but a Sybarite, decorating your servants with rubies, sleeping on a throne, buying yourself titles.”

“You actually prefer a man with morals?”

“I could love no other!” she avowed passionately.

He let go of her wrist. “Get dressed, Tony. I’m taking you back to London.”

She fled to the adjoining chamber. It was all over. She had had a narrow escape. She was the luckiest girl alive. The angels must be looking after her. Tony threw herself upon the bed. The floodgates opened and she began to sob. “S-sod the bloody angels!”

When she left her chamber she was wearing a tasteful cream linen walking dress with matching kid shoes. Her dark hair was twisted into a classical knot that lay simply on the nape of her elegant neck. From head to toe she looked every inch the well-bred Lady Antonia Lamb.

Adam Savage was waiting for her at the top of the magnificently curved staircase. His dark clothes were impeccably cut, his linen snowy. His bow was both polite and formal. They descended together and entered the immense kitchen.

“Women should be seeing and not hearing,” John Bull admonished Kirinda.

“Women should be seen and not heard,” Savage corrected him quietly.

“See? Excellency agrees with me,” John Bull said smugly.

Antonia swept him with a look of outrage that changed to contempt as it also swept over Savage. “Then Excellency is a bloody baboon!”

Suddenly she became aware of voices coming from the dining room. The conversation was in French. She doubted it was the servants.

“John Bull, please see that Her Ladyship’s traveling bags are brought down.” He turned to Antonia, gesturing for her to lead the way to the dining salon.

Three satin-clad gentlemen got to their feet the moment she entered.

Savage’s voice was smooth as silk as he said, “Allow me
to introduce our guests, dearest. This is the Comte de Barras … his lovely wife … his daughters.”

The French aristocrat kissed Antonia’s hand. “Madame Sauvage, I am honored.” His accent was heavy. Clearly he spoke little English. Antonia tried not to stare, but the women dripped Valenciennes lace; all wore ridiculously high, powdered wigs.

Adam Savage introduced her to the other two men. “The Duc de Maine. The Marquis de Saint-Simon.”

Antonia wondered if she should curtsy.

“Enchantè,”
the Due murmured.

“Beautè du diable,”
the Marquis said, touching his fingers to his lips.

Adam Savage took a key from his vest pocket. “My sweet, unlock the temple for these two gentlemen. The things stored there belong to them. As soon as the de Barras’ finish their breakfast, I shall see them safely back aboard the ship.”

Antonia was disconcerted. What in the world was going on? The iron key in her hand was warm from being close to Savage’s body. Did he expect her to turn over the guns to these Frenchmen? She wanted to fling the key in his face, but the people in the room had such elegant manners, she felt compelled to act like a lady. Politely, as if she were in a trance, she walked from the salon. The Frenchmen followed.

Outside on the drive stood a dozen wagons. The Frenchmen spoke to a couple of the drivers, so obviously the wagons were theirs.
My God, the arsenal stored in the Greek temple must be formidable.

Antonia took a deep breath, inserted the key into the lock, then let the heavy door swing open. “Oooh.” The word came out on a sigh of appreciation as her eyes beheld the beauty piled before her. Exquisite Louis XIV furniture, gold-decorated Marot pieces, cabriole cabinets, and pier tables stood next to objets d’art, paintings, gilt
mirrors, carpets, and other priceless furnishings. It was like Aladdin’s Cave.

Cases of Sevres china and fine crystal sat beside a gleaming mountain of heavy silver epergnes, trays, tea services, silver plate, and the best Georgian dishes in ornate sterling. Why had that devil-eyed Savage let her think the temple held guns?

She sketched a curtsy to monsieur le Due, then marched back to the house. Thankfully John Bull was still presiding over the kitchen.

“Who are these people?” she demanded. “Where did the priceless stuff in the temple come from?”

“Ah, you are living under a stone. You did not know French aristocrats are being herded into prison like rats? These are the lucky ones. Others are being murdered in their beds by mobbers.” He inclined his head in the direction of the dining room. “Excellency brought that family across last night. He has been making three runs each week. They are bringing all their worldly goods before the mobbers smash or set fire to everything.”

It dawned on Tony that the Due and the Marquis had been brought over earlier and had come to collect the treasures Savage had stored for them.

“France is a most unhealthful place to be these days. These mobbers roam the streets screaming for ‘equality’ for everyone, but that can never be because everyone is not equal.” He shook his head. “We Englishmen will never understand the French.”

Savage’s broad shoulders filled the door frame. “Come, Lady Lamb, we are ready to sail.”

Her cheeks flushed. Why had she assumed the very worst of him? She was thoroughly annoyed. Why did she suspect he was amused?

“I’ve had no breakfast,” she said pettishly.

“McSwine’s culinary magic awaits you.”

A wave of nausea caused her to swallow rapidly. He
was
amused, the evil bastard!

She stayed away from him on the short voyage to London. Mr. Baines sailed the
Flying Dragon
so that Savage could look after Count de Barras’s family.

Tony felt seasick and she remembered the Bay of Biscay. She also remembered Adam Savage’s clandestine activities along the French coast. Why had it never occurred to her that he was risking his life to help people?

When she arrived back at Curzon Street, Roz took her to task for her sly behavior. “I see you’ve had a rapid recovery from your homesickness!”

Tony inwardly groaned. She was definitely suffering from some kind of sickness.

“Why did you go sneaking off to Edenwood? I’ll tell you why, Antonia. I believe you’ve formed an infatuation for your guardian. It’s a good thing Mr. Savage packed you straight back home. What you need is a husband. Someone with a firm hand and strict morals who will put a stop to all this racketing about. I shall speak with Mr. Savage about it.”

“I’m sorry, Grandmother, to have caused you worry,” she said contritely, but on the inside she wanted to shout and scream and throw a big, stinking tantrum. When she was in the sanctuary of her room she walked a direct path to her commode, took out her washbowl and was violently sick. She dipped the end of a towel into her water jug, then wiped her face. Her eyes met those reflected in her dressing-table mirror. Could she possibly be with child?

Part of her immediately denied it, but another part of her knew it was more than a possibility. Roz’s words still rang in her ears. “What you need is a husband.” Antonia began to laugh. “What I need is a husband. I shall speak with Mr. Savage about it,” she told the girl in the mirror. But the girl in the mirror wasn’t laughing. Her face was tragic. Silvery tears traced their path down her cheeks.

The next morning nausea again assailed her before she even opened her eyes. The thing that triggered it was the smell of bacon wafting up from the kitchen. Antonia was
well versed in the signs of pregnancy. Whenever women gathered for a social function it was ever a prime topic of conversation. Within the hour, however, she felt right as rain and was most grateful that the telltale affliction disappeared as quickly as it came.

Roz was off for an open carriage ride in the park with a gentleman caller. Before she left she extracted a promise from Antonia to attend Almack’s on Wednesday evening. Frances Jersey was a walking encyclopedia on eligible bachelors.

Tony prowled about the sitting room like a caged animal. Needing an outlet for her terrifying thoughts, she ran upstairs for her journal. She went back to the sitting room, sat down at the secretaire, and opened the diary. Instead of writing, she made the mistake of reading. God in Heaven, she had poured her heart out onto these pages. Adam Savage knew without a doubt that she was hopelessly in love with him. How humiliating! She flung the small journal across the room.

When Tony heard the doorbell, her heart sank. She was in no condition to face anyone. When Mr. Burke came to announce the caller she would tell him she would see no one. It wasn’t Mr. Burke, however, who entered the room, it was Adam Savage.

Conflicting emotions raged within her. She was torn between banishing him from her life forever and running into his arms. She did neither. She was distracted by the way he was dressed. He wore a shabby coat with no shirt beneath it. He was unshaven, his boots had seen better days, and he twisted a cloth cap in his hands.

“Tinker, tailor, soldier, sailor; rich man, poor man, beggar man, thief,” she said whimsically. She did not feel whimsical.

“Tony, I want you to come with me. Wear your bother’s things. Nothing fancy, an old riding jacket will do.”

She wanted to laugh in his face. Here he was, larger than life, issuing his orders. He had not the slightest doubt
that she would obey him without question. She searched his face. His eyes as always compelled her to do his bidding.

When she came downstairs she caught her breath as he came close to tower above her. When he touched her, she jumped as if she had been burned. Savage quickly gathered her lovely hair into a knot and pulled the cap over it.

He had a carriage waiting. She sat quietly as it turned into the Strand and headed toward the city. She didn’t question him. She knew he must have his reasons. Adam Savage wasn’t like other people. He lived by his own rules.

The carriage halted at London Bridge. They alighted and the carriage departed. They walked across the bridge to the far side of the river and suddenly they were in another world.

“You once asked me where I lived when I was a lad. I’ll show you,” he said cheerfully. The buildings were dilapidated. There were no houses, only hovels. Dirty, stinking, overcrowded slums. Row after row of these novels like rotting teeth were inhabited by men, women, and children dressed in rags.

The gutters ran with sewage. A mangy dog fought two large rats for a piece of offal. Tony clamped her teeth together to keep her gorge from rising. She saw that all the women and children were barefoot. Only the men wore shabby boots.

Businesses thrived. The people might be raggy and dirty, but they were not idle. At street level and down stone steps at cellar level were shops or holes-in-the-wall that passed for shops. They offered everything from gin to barley water, from fish heads to sheep’s heads, from lice-ridden wigs to dead men’s boots.

The very air was dank, the cobbles wet and slimy this close to the Thames.

“When the tide rises, most of these places are flooded,” Adam pointed out.

“I had no idea it was like this on the far side of the river.”

“Oh, it’s not just this side,” he said matter-of-factly. “I’ll show you Whitechapel.”

The narrow streets and alleys were every bit as squalid and filthy. Every corner housed a boozer, every boozer had a collection of drabs standing about outside in their tattered finery.

“Poverty isn’t always the result of idleness. The poor are paid starvation wages.”

“Some of those prostitutes don’t look any older than twelve or thirteen,” she said with dismay.

“Don’t waste your pity on them, darling. Save it for the little children. In St. Giles’s, close by the London Wall, there are several flash houses that sleep four to five hundred children. The older boys are trained to be thieves and the girls prostitutes, but the little ones are sold. Boys as young as four are sold to chimney sweeps to become climbing boys. Half of them burn to death, the other half are crippled. Little girls are made to stand barefoot in the snow selling matches. Little blue feet momentarily wring the hearts of fashionable ladies and gentlemen. The taste for children in bed, however, has spawned a thriving business.”

Tony looked at him bleakly, misery tightening her chest. How could she think about these things? How could she not think about them?

In Smithfields, behind the Tower, Antonia had to hold her sleeve over her nose because of the insupportable stench. They walked through ankle-deep cowshit left by droves of cattle being driven to the great slaughterhouse. Nearby butchers’ shops piled guts and offal directly into the street. “They wonder why typhus is rampant,” Savage remarked ironically.

Antonia didn’t know if she could take much more, but she doggedly followed where Savage led. “London’s population is one million. The poor make up three quarters.
They are faceless, anonymous, illiterate. Thousands of them end up in workhouses. Parliament allows workhouses to be built, then lets them to a manufacturer to supply him with cheap labor. All he has to do under the law is keep them alive. Poverty-striken parents contract their children to work in mills from the age of five. If they try to escape, they are manacled. They never see the light of day. They are undernourished and work fifteen hours a day and they die like flies. Fortunately the poor breed prolifically.”

Antonia’s hand moved protectively to her belly, thinking of the child she might be carrying. Savage glanced down at her and saw her tears like silver jewels. He was instantly contrite. “Sweetheart, you’ve had enough.”

With his strong arm at the small of her back he propelled her in the direction of St. Paul’s, where there was a hackney stand. When she sat down she realized how weak her legs felt. She leaned back against the scuffed leather seat and closed her eyes.