Page 20 of A Lady's Past
No questions asked, Millie left the ballroom. She returned not five minutes later. “She is not in there.”
“Thank you. I will just have a look around. Perhaps you can entertain Lady Chervil. We wouldn’t want her to send out the alarm for her missing ward and cause a scandal.” When he could not see her in the ballroom, Jacques went to the garden.
A crisp bite to the night air warned of snow in the near future. France had its share of harsh winters, but when winter came to the English island, it chilled to the bone.
“I saw her. I know I did,” a man with a thick French accent said in a loud whisper.
Jacques backed into a corner where the Roman temple would shield him from their sight. He didn’t recognize the voice, but the hair on the back of his neck still stood on end.
“So many people. How can you be sure it was her? Besides, she could not have made it all the way to London. I’m sure she’s hiding in France and will turn up there in time. When she does, they will call us back to finish what we started.” The other Frenchman’s voice was familiar. Victor Caron had been a sergeant of the guard for Napoleon when Jacques had been captured, but had spent a lot of time in England over the past few years. He had a reputation with the ladies that was not at all favorable. Jacques had never liked him, even when Jacques had still been loved by his own government.
Could they have been speaking of Diana? Why would they look for her? Good Lord, the mystery just grew deeper, and he became more the fool with each press of the shovel.
Staying concealed was easy while Victor and his friend searched the gardens. Several couples had found niches and benches in the dense plantings where they stole kisses. As the men disturbed these assignations, angry words filled the garden.
They rounded the temple, and Jacques shifted to remain in the shadows. A soft gasp behind him alerted him that she was there, hiding. Backing into the dark corner, it was electric to be so close to her. He turned.
Despite the dark, her eyes shone with terror.
Even with whatever danger lurked, his need for her grew. His good sense told him to leave her to her fate. As she had said, she was nothing to him, and the fact that she was hiding from French agents could only mean trouble. His life had been saved by having good friends in England; perhaps this was his penance. “Trust me?”
The slightest nod told him she did trust him.
Nothing he’d suffered in the past few years had prepared him for his attraction to Diana. Not even Monique’s betrayal had taught him to steer clear of a lady with a past. Jacques lowered his head and drew her into his arms. Pressing her against the stone wall, he kissed her. Diana sighed against his mouth, and he dove inside. Their bodies fit like the edges of a fissure come together after millennia apart. Only by horrific disaster could they come back to each other. She was some part of him he hadn’t known was missing, and now he was complete. In that moment, he knew he would never let her go. “Mine.”
“You there. Who is that?” Victor demanded.
Her breathing was hard and erratic. The people he’d watched go to the guillotine had been scared like this. She feared for her life. As he remembered that sensation, anger rushed through Jacques like a blizzard. Whoever had caused this kind of terror in his Diana would pay. His lips against her ear, he whispered, “Trust me, and giggle.”
How she managed it, he didn’t know, but her impassioned chortle sounded like bells to him.
Jacques turned and kept her hidden behind his back. “Caron, what are you doing?”
“Laurent!Je cherche une dame.”
“You will have to find your own. This one is the daughter of an earl and I’ll not share her.”
Victor’s thin lips disappeared. He stepped forward. “If I had the power here in London, I would finish what we started in Paris, you coward. Now you’re nothing but a fortune hunter. At least at the guillotine you would have died with honor. Madam, you would do better to find a frail Englishman you can control.”
His temper near its limit, Jacques fought the urge to punch the ass in that narrow nose of his. The only thing keeping him in place was the need to conceal Diana. “You speak of honor, and all I saw was horrific injustice. There is nothing honorable about what is happening in France.”
“I could kill you here and no one would care. You are less than nothing in England. I would do it if not forced to leave my sword at the door.”
Jacques slipped his dagger from its hiding place inside his coat. The steel glinted in the torchlight. “You speak very bravely when you know I won’t allow the lady to be exposed to gossip.”
“I would not fear a fop like you regardless of the situation. You know nothing of what I can do, Laurent.”
His companion tugged his arm. “She’ll get away.”
With a smile, Victor said, “Take my advice, madam. This one is pretty, but nothing but trouble.”
The two rushed off, checking every bush and pillar until they returned to the house.
Jacques turned back to Diana and pressed her against the stone. His anger at Victor had done nothing to quell his need for her. “What do you think Lady Chervil will do if you do not reappear inside?”
After a stammer, she said, “Likely, she will assume I returned to Everton House, as I didn’t wish to come out to begin with.”
“Good.” He grabbed her hand and stormed through the garden toward the side gate. He pressed her into a shadowy space. “Do not move. I will find you if you run, Diana, and I will be very vexed.” Rushing through the gate, he flagged down his driver, who immediately made his way through the clogged street.
