Page 47 of Lord Carlisle's Enticing Lure
“When he died and his protection, such as it was, ended, I went to my old friends, Augustine and Amber. Lady Ashley and Lady Ramsey now. They were as opposed to the new regime as I, and they devised a way for me to contribute to the cause of Bonaparte’s defeat.”
“How long have you been doing this for them?”
“Working for Scarlett Hawthorne? More than two years, first as a runner, then later doing drawings. I took an old map I drew for a French travel book and approached one of Fouché’s men.”
“Vaillancourt?”
She shook her head. “No. His assistant. I had heard too much from Gus and Amber about the canny nature of Fouche’s deputy, and I did not wish to tangle with him. My husband had dealings with Vaillancourt and lost. So I thought if I could influence one of his subordinates, I would do better. I did.”
“I don’t understand why you would take such a risk.”
She rose and paced before him. “What had I to lose? My parents were dead. My father killed for politics. My sister gone. My brother gone, too, for his own views. Sent to prison by none other thanVaillancourt. My livelihood was gone, the vineyard fallow. My staff killed by those who would have total power.
“I had to leave France. I could not bear the fear that they would come for me. They had taken my older sister and abused her. I heard many gruesome stories of how guards in the prisons used women and destroyed them. I’d had enough of that rash and cruel behavior from my husband. I could not bear the thought of going to a cell or guards or rape. Call me a coward.”
He cursed softly. “Never are you that.”
“Still…still…” She crossed her arms and shuddered. “I could not live every day with the possibility they would take me away to starve me or…or rape me. I nearly lost my mind at home, awake each night in terror. I could not go on.” She hung her head. “I would have gone mad if they took me.”
She whirled to face him, her eyes envisioning horrors he could not see. “I had one skill. I could use it. So I fled to Paris. I approached a man, an Italian, who still works there for Scarlett Hawthorne. When Lord Ashley lived in Paris during the peace, this man was his majordomo. He helped Ashley keep order and expand his network of spies.
“I knew Corsini well. He helped me escape the country, pointing me toward a man who smuggles people and goods in and out of France.”
Clive inhaled, satisfied finally to have the fuller explanation of her life. He’d take up this matter of her abusive husband in another way, another time. He’d not let her live with that as the template of how a man and woman should treat each other. He would move to his conclusion. “So now you have finished these last renderings of Brighton. We are here. So how did you plan to get them to your French smuggler?”
Her blue gaze dwelled on his, her hand clutching her diaphanous robe to her throat. “I would one day find a way to escape from you.”
His heart thundered in his chest. “And run where?”
“Back to Brighton. To the hotel. To wait for a message from someone who would place a few in French agents’ hands here in England or smuggle them back to France.”
“You had a man following you.”
“Hired by Ashley. He was my guard.”
“I hired another to follow you.”
“And there may have been yet another…” she said with a frown.
“You did not recognize any of them?”
“One man, ugly he was. With a beak nose, quite noticeable. Otherwise, I saw no one with any consistency. I was befuddled.” Triumph flashed across her face. “But that man who appeared in east Brighton at just the right moment was yours. Thank you. I have not thanked you. I should have.”
“You have no need to run from me.”
She raised her head to examine the wooden rafters. “I wish that were so. You’ve heard my tale. You know I must deliver these last drawings and paintings. It is my satisfaction. My revenge on them all. That is if, of course, the French take them all to heart and calculate incorrectly how to land here.”
He rose and went to her. Lifting her chin with two fingers, he traced her lower lip with his thumb. In his hands she turned sweet and soft. “You and I will return to Brighton. We’ll take two suites at the hotel, but I will be with you night and day.”
Acceptance had her swaying into him, and in her gaze stood joy in equal parts with fear. “I don’t want you hurt.”
“You know that the French will not stop hunting you.”
“Whoever it is that suspects what I do, they can try to stop me. But my work is done.”
“If Fouché and Vaillancourt know what you do for us, they will not stop.” He would not reveal what he knew about the amphibious land craft. He had no confirmation from Langley or Halsey that the French calculations of the landing levers were made because ofGiselle’s art. If he told her, he’d frighten her more. “I want you with me every moment.”
She flowed into his arms of her own accord, and Clive folded her close. “I want to be with you.”
