Chapter 6 #2
The notion filled her with a burst of annoyance. “Really?” Ellie snapped back.
Dawson’s eyes focused—and promptly widened. “Not you!”
He tripped back with automatic fear—and then caught himself, looking around. The hall they stood in angled away from the lounge and was currently deserted.
She could see the moment the professor realized that he was facing down a single young woman, and not even a particularly big or threatening one. The sordid notion that he might be able to get the better of her crept transparently across his features.
Ellie found herself contemplating how a physical confrontation between her and the fellow in front of her might turn out.
She admittedly lacked both Constance’s knives and her jiu jitsu—but then, it was Dawson.
Even with the natural advantages of his gender, Ellie questioned whether it would really be that much of a struggle.
“And are you here all on your own, then?” Dawson prodded nastily.
“Nope,” Adam replied, stepping around the corner and clamping a hand onto his shoulder.
Dawson jumped with a strangled yelp.
Adam reached around the professor to open the nearest door and shoved the man through it. Dawson fell inside, arms wheeling. Adam followed him, Ellie at his heels.
They stood in a reasonably large broom closet. Shelves along the walls were lined with towels and cleaning compounds. Mops and buckets leaned haphazardly in the corner.
“Look what you found,” Adam commented to Ellie as he studied Dawson.
“I more or less tripped over him,” Ellie admitted.
Dawson tugged pompously at his ill-fitting waistcoat. “I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that the pair of you would turn up here. You turn up everywhere else you aren’t supposed to be. Why not India as well?”
“Having a nice vacation?” Adam asked with a wolfish grin.
“Not at all, actually,” Dawson returned obliviously. “I’m quite certain I’ve picked up malaria. I’ve been feeling absolutely wretched. And the food doesn’t at all agree with my constitution. It’s been most unpleasant.”
“How about your friends?” Adam’s voice lowered dangerously.
“Friends?” Dawson echoed. “Who on earth are you—oh. Did you mean Mr. Forster-Mowbray? He hasn’t come along.
I gather his father isn’t too pleased with him after that fiasco back in Egypt.
Classic case of poor management, that, but I suppose that’s what you get when you lean on relations instead of allowing more clearly qualified individuals to take charge of things.
Now, if someone with a stronger university background had been assigned to lead the project—”
Ellie barely reined in her impatience. “Why are you here?”
Dawson pointed his nose in the air. “I hardly see why I need to explain myself to the likes of you.”
Adam’s eyes twinkled with dark mischief. “I’m not sure he’s really here for anything. I think he just takes up space.”
Dawson bristled. “I am a professor emeritus of the University of Saint Andrews…”
“We’re probably wasting our time even talking to this guy.” Adam began to steer a slightly bewildered Ellie toward the door.
“I am a critical part of this mission!” Dawson called after them indignantly.
“That right?” Adam tossed back as though only half paying attention.
“I will have you know that I was specifically requested to come lend my expertise to this endeavor,” Dawson asserted defensively.
Adam raised his eyebrows in a poor imitation of being impressed. “Were you, now?”
Ellie bit her lip to keep herself from laughing out loud.
“Well, some mere colonial administrator can hardly be expected to know about the relevant ancient history and linguistic problems posed by such an expedition,” Dawson elaborated self-importantly.
“Suppose not,” Adam easily agreed. “Borthwick must have been real glad when you turned up.”
“He is not the most effusive person, but I believe my value will become clear enough as things move along,” Dawson returned, brushing at the lapel of his dinner jacket.
Ellie wondered if he realized that he had just mindlessly confirmed that he was working with the secret police chief.
“And just how long has he had to appreciate your value?” Adam dryly pressed.
Dawson frowned. “Three days?”
“Somebody wired you guys in Egypt?” Adam guessed.
“It was a telephone call, actually,” Dawson returned with a conceited frown. “One can hardly trust these sorts of matters to the wires.”
Ellie considered the number of operators required to connect a call from London to Cairo, all of whom would have been capable of listening in on it.
She refrained from commenting.
“Has Borthwick been a part of your order for long?” Adam casually prompted.
“What—him? He hardly knows anything about the ancient world.”
“Then how’d he become interested in the Brahmastra?” Ellie cut in impatiently.
Dawson waved a dismissive hand, apparently unconcerned to learn that his enemies knew the name of the arcanum that he had been sent to India to find.
“Word of it popped up in one of his intelligence networks, and the colonel could hardly leave something like that simply lying around for anyone to pick up, could he? The thing might be used to start a revolution. Thankfully, he at least knew enough about what was going on to reach out to—”
Dawson clamped his mouth shut, his eyes finally narrowing with suspicion.
“Pretty sure it was Aldbury,” Adam offered helpfully.
The professor crossed his arms over his chest defiantly. “I know what you’re doing. You can’t make me tell you anything!”
Adam took a step toward him. The loose, lazy way he moved gave the lie to the civilized veneer of his formal dress. “Pretty sure I could,” he drawled.
Ellie wondered if the room had just grown a little hotter.
Dawson scrambled back until he bumped up against a shelf of linens, arms splayed out to grip the stacks of towels.
Adam tilted his head as he contemplated the sweating academic. “What do you think, Princess?”
“I think we need to know where Borthwick has gone with the manuscript,” Ellie replied—finding that she was rather enjoying this.
“Couldn’t agree more.” Adam had come close enough to Dawson that he now glared down at him with a looming air of obvious threat.
Ellie frowned. “Though I can’t say that I approve of torture.”
“What about just a little torture?” Adam tossed her a wink.
The gesture sent a shiver of wicked delight coursing down her spine.
She was fairly certain she understood Adam’s strategy, and it was a perfectly good one. Dawson had the fortitude of a mayfly. Just the threat of a bit of physical coercion would surely be all they required to get him to crumble like a dry biscuit.
“I suppose I could allow just a touch of it,” Ellie conceded, playing along. “If it was for a very good reason.”
“I won’t talk!” Dawson squawked. “You wouldn’t dare!”
“I’m thinking we start with his fingers,” Adam mused.
“Only the little ones,” Ellie cautioned, choking back a laugh.
“Those are my favorite anyway,” Adam cheerfully agreed.
Dawson made a gurgle of terror as he tried to press himself through the shelves.
The door to the broom closet swung open.
Ellie whirled to see a lean, dark figure in a plain black suit and bowler hat framed on the threshold. His coldly familiar aquiline features sent a bolt of instinctive fear through her.
Ellie greeted him levelly. “Mr. Jacobs.”
Jacobs answered by pointing a pistol at her.
Adam’s eyes moved from the gun to Jacobs’ face. “I was wondering when you might turn up.”
“I suppose it was too much to hope that I’d get through one bloody job without you two involving yourselves.” Jacobs’ voice dripped with irritation and disdain.
“And where have you been?!” Dawson slid toward Jacobs, pressing against the wall to stay as far from Adam as possible. “You’re supposed to be on security! What use are you if you can’t keep the more important members of this expedition safe?”
“Here now, aren’t I?” Jacobs returned without looking at him, the pistol steady in his hand.
“Make a habit of checking the broom closets?” Adam prodded.
“I heard you from the hall.” Jacobs shot a disdainful look at Dawson. “This one’s loud.”
Ellie had to allow that. She would certainly have been able to hear Dawson’s self-important monologuing through the door if she’d been passing by.
“Bring your friends along with you?” Jacobs casually demanded.
With a jolt, Ellie realized he was talking about Constance and Neil. She opened her mouth to bluff him… and remembered with a sick jolt that she couldn’t.
Because Jacobs would know.
Jacobs smiled thinly. “That’s answer enough.”
Ellie took a step back, her words tight. “You can’t kill us.”
Adam set a warning hand on her arm, but Ellie knew it was true. They had learned back in Egypt that Jacobs was only working for the Order of Albion for some obscure purpose of his own—one involving justice.
Whatever that meant to a man like Jacobs.
Somehow, Ellie and Adam were tied up in how he was meant to achieve it. The Smoking Mirror had shown him that—and only that. Jacobs had no idea what role they were meant to play.
Nor was he particularly happy about it. Ellie was painfully conscious that there were likely limits to just how far his grace would extend.
“I could still take your knees out,” Jacobs snapped with exasperation.
Like that one, Ellie thought grimly.
“That’d make a hell of a mess.” Adam’s tone was deceptively light, but Ellie could feel the ready tension in him as he held her arm. “Lots of stained towels. Probably a whole lot of people out looking for whoever’d done the shooting.”
Jacobs’ jaw tightened. “Out in the hall, Professor,” he ordered.
Dawson inched around Jacobs as though loath to approach the man, then scurried through the door like a startled pill bug.
“You’ve almost got my sympathy for being saddled with that guy,” Adam commented. “Almost.”
Jacobs’ smile was thin. “I’ll say hello to Dr. Fairfax and Miss Tyrrell for you.”
He stepped back and slammed the door.
Adam raced over, immediately rattling the knob. It didn’t budge.
“He’s locked us in?” Ellie surmised.
“Bastard,” Adam cursed, thumping the door with his fist.
“Could we break it down?”
Adam’s mouth curved into a smirk. “I do have a bit of a knack for kicking through doors.”
Ellie’s cheeks flushed as she recalled how Adam had burst into her washroom back in British Honduras, covered in muck and waving his machete.
At the time, she had been only peripherally aware of just how nicely his muddy shirt had conformed to the contours of his physique, being more concerned with removing him from the premises.
In memory, the incident took on a rather different tone.
Adam cheerfully shucked off his dinner jacket and tossed it aside. His bow tie and collar followed.
He opened the buttons at the top of his shirt, rolled up his sleeves, and ran a careless hand through his hair, disheveling the sun-kissed waves of it.
The changes shattered the illusion of a proper gentleman, leaving something deliciously disreputable in its place.
Ellie’s skin flushed. “Do you know,” she offered, carefully picking out each word. “It has only just occurred to me that there is no one else here.”
Adam stilled. His look shifted over her—all over her—and darkened with heat.
He took a step closer. Ellie could feel the warmth of his body through the fabric of her dress.
Three weeks, she thought wildly. It had been three torturous weeks since she had last put her hands on him.
Which was far too bloody long.
He lowered his head, his breath dancing over the sensitive skin of Ellie’s cheek. His hands clenched reflexively where they hovered just over her silk-wrapped hips. “He’s going after Constance and Neil.”
“Constance is extremely capable,” Ellie reasonably pointed out.
Her fingers itched to reach for the front of his trousers.
“Ellie…” Adam groaned.
Ellie’s moral compass warred with the lust raging through her veins as she gripped the front of Adam’s shirt.
“I’m gonna try to bust the door,” Adam declared, staring down at the curve of Ellie’s décolletage.
“Yes, I suppose that would be sensible,” Ellie returned.
“You’re probably gonna have to let go of my shirt.”
Ellie forced her hands to unclench. She faced Adam, blood pulsing hotly, breath short.
Adam forced himself to turn away with an irritated grumble. “Right.”
He faced the door, readied himself, and lashed out with a furious kick.
The door didn’t budge.
“Ow!” Adam bit out, hopping uncomfortably. “Ow ow ow ow…”
“What’s wrong?” Ellie demanded, hurrying over to him.
“Damned thing’s bolted! Who puts a deadbolt on a goddamned broom closet?”
“Are you hurt?” Ellie pressed.
“These shoes are useless for kicking things,” Adam complained.
He kicked off the polished dress brogues in question, throwing his socks after them—which had the effect of making him look even more bloody enticing.
Ellie forced her attention back to the room before she gave in to the urge to pull him down onto the floor. An intriguing idea bloomed to life at the sight of the racks of cleaning supplies. “Do you know—I am quite certain that some of these compounds can be combined to create a little explosion.”
“Princess…” Adam warned.
“How else do you propose we get out of here?” Ellie challenged.
Adam yanked on a cord dangling from the ceiling. A trap door fell open.
Ellie stared at the black mouth it revealed. “What’s up there?”
“I’m guessing the attic.”
Ellie uneasily recalled the swirling black forms they had seen by the gable outside. “Didn’t it look as though there were bats roosting up there?”
“Little bats,” Adam assured her. “Perfectly nice ones. Nothing like the last bunch. And if they’re up there, that means there’s a vent we could kick out and crawl through. You go first.”
Ellie eyed the trapdoor dubiously. “Must I?”
“It’s easier for me to boost you up than haul you in,” Adam pointed out.
Ellie considered what having Adam boost her through the trapdoor was likely to involve. Her cheeks heated again—along with a few other places.
The pleasant promise of that fizzled against the far less enticing notion of climbing into a bat-infested attic.
Adam flipped over a bucket, setting it down as a step, and extended his palm. “M’lady?” he offered with mock gentility.
“Oh, fine,” Ellie conceded, tugging up her skirts and giving him her hand.