Chapter Two
“What did you think of them all?” Augustine, Lady Ashley—or rather Gus, as she was better known to her friends—snuggled into the red leather squabs of her town coach, the Carlisles’ dinner party over.
The lady was Inès’s friend of many years and a beauty with black hair and green-gold eyes.
She’d given birth to her third child, a boy, in late September and had insisted that she would attend this dinner party to help introduce Inès to Society.
She had brought baby Phillip and his nurse with them and was eager to get back to their accommodations in the hotel in Richmond proper.
Kane—Lord Ashley, Gus’s husband—had been unable to travel up from London for this evening’s event, and so it was just the two ladies in the cab.
Outside, however, Gus’s ever-present guard rode beside the carriage. “Meet anyone you found intriguing?”
Inès rolled a shoulder and fingered the collar of her pelisse. The man with the limp? She should not ask, should not want to learn more. “I enjoyed meeting Giselle’s new husband.”
“Carlisle. A good man.”
“What is he? Comte? Vicomte? Chevalier?”
“A marquess, as we say here, and from a long line. I know not how many preceded him. Kane will know.”
Kane was an earl in his own right, and as an Englishman who had grown up surrounded by his peers, he would know these technicalities.
“Giselle is happy,” Inès said with the warmth that suffused her. “She deserves it.”
“And with a child to come, she is ecstatic.”
“The loss of her little daughter three years ago was a tragedy. That child was her saving grace after all her challenges with her despicable husband and, later, Vaillancourt in France.”
René Vaillancourt was the deputy to Joseph Fouché, head of French security. Both were scourges upon mankind, as they spied and seized Frenchmen off the streets and invaded their homes. All for the despicable offense of resisting the new emperor, Bonaparte, and his band of supporters.
Inès swallowed the sour taste in her mouth, for she’d had personal dealings with the dreaded Vaillancourt.
“I know,” Gus said with sympathy. “I see your memories, dearest. Trust me, they fade with time and peace. You will have both here. I promise you.”
Inès managed a smile, painful as it was.
Her dear friend whom she had known since youth had joined with their other mutual friend, Amber, now Viscountess Ramsey, to bring her out of France.
They had worked to get her out as her friend only—not as an agent.
Inès knew that Gus knew she had worked for Amber as a direct report in Paris.
She had helped Gus one day there, carrying a message to a prearranged meeting point.
But that was all. Inès would not tell her more.
Amber would not tell Gus more. And Gus would not ask for more.
It was a rule that such information about each agent’s individual hierarchy was not to be shared among those in Scarlett Hawthorne’s network.
However, it was common knowledge here in London and in Paris that Amber had tried to elude the evil machinations of Vaillancourt, and that she had succeeded only when the man she loved more than life itself carried her from Vaillancourt’s house, never to return.
Inès felt an affinity in that for Amber. For Gus, too, Inès was sympathetic because Gus had been seized by Vaillancourt along with Kane. Both had escaped his wrath, fortunately.
Inès had been fortunate when she needed to escape Boulogne.
She’d sent word up the chain of her command, all agents who had been recruited by and worked for Ashley, his team, and his supervisor, a woman in the City, Scarlett Hawthorne.
That lady was a rich merchant, who had inherited her family’s export-import business years ago.
With her contacts throughout the Continent, Miss Hawthorne ruled an espionage network that even the London government envied.
Inès had worked directly for Amber for many years. After Amber had left Paris with her new husband, Ramsey, Inès had continued in various roles for the past three. Now, here in England, she had a new venture.
She caught a breath and clutched her hands together. If she were to succeed here, she would have to stop catching herself, mid-terror.
She gazed at Gus with a sigh. “Forgive me. I do not know how to live without fear. France is such a dictatorship. Fear is a part of everyone’s life there.
” Watching every person for the smallest move, the tiniest mistake that could herald her end, was a dastardly way to live.
But she had. All for a good cause. A great cause.
One she had triumphed at. She smiled to herself and killed the joy so that Gus would not think her daft.
Gus reached over and squeezed her hand. “Time, good people, and laughter are the means.” She tipped her head, a grin upon her lips. “Now that you are here, I know you will want a quiet life.”
Inès searched her friend’s large green eyes. Gus could not know what she’d been doing these past few years. Only her report knew that. And he would never tell. Not even when her world had crashed around her and she’d had to leave Boulogne or die.
“Quiet, yes. A house of my own. A small staff so that I can host luncheons and little garden parties.”
“Perhaps a man to call your own? One with whom you can share—”
“I don’t want a man,” she said with too much haste and a bit of a lie.
She’d take the man in her garden…and get her red garter ribbon back.
But no. Instinct told her she might not be able to handle him.
He was too assertive, too charismatic, and yes, truly, she’d had enough of male arrogance in Boulogne from military officers and in Paris from Vaillancourt.
She would need a man hopefully as no more than a friend, but he would be special.
Useful. “No, no, Gus. I want to be prudent, wise. What’s more, I have enough money to live on my own.
I would like to pace myself, make my reputation as a Society maven. ”
“I apologize, Inès. I rush you. I don’t mean to overlook what you want.”
“I know you don’t, Gus. I just need to find my own way.
” She blew out a breath, her thoughts of her man in the garden alive in her mind.
“I must read Debrett’s, learn all these titles and means of address.
It’s frustrating, embarrassing, really, not to be able to talk to people without their names. ”
Gus laughed. “I know exactly what you mean. I was the same way when Kane and I arrived. But he was my helper. I will be that for you. Did that happen tonight? Did you speak with someone whose title you did not know?”
“A tall gentleman with dark-brown hair and stunning purple eyes.”
Gus shook her head and laughed. “I’m afraid I know only my husband’s eye color. Where did you talk with him?”
“Oh, in the Carlisles’ garden.” Inès lifted her skirts to reveal bare legs, her slippers on.
“I was free of so much, including my stockings, which are now somewhere in Giselle’s garden.
No one else came upon us. I escaped for a respite.
I imagine he did too. We conversed, and he insisted I attend his family’s ball next Friday. ”
“Oh, that is Halsey. A striking fellow. An earl, so he is properly Lord Halsey. Simply Halsey to most. Evan to his friends.”
“Have you accepted his invitation for his ball?” Must I be in his presence and further lured by him? Mon Dieu, I pray not.
“Yes, for all of us. You too. I hope you don’t mind. It is the way here, with houseguests, for all in the house to attend whatever function they are invited to. Was he rude? If he was—”
“No, no. Not rude. Assertive.”
“Ah. I see your problem.”
That was what Halsey said. “Am I so transparent?”
“Of course not, Inès. But I know you and what you’ve been through.”
“Not all of it,” she countered, her hands twisting the wool of her pelisse.
“For good reason, and I do not want for you to break rules by telling me. But I do know that Vaillancourt threatened you.”
Had his men seize me and threaten to throw me into Chateau Pierrefonds’s oubliette. “I had to leave France.”
Gus reached over and squeezed both her hands. “You did. Whatever that man said or did to you, we understand why you told your runner you had to escape. But you are here now and safe.”
“Safe? From Vaillancourt?” Perhaps temporarily. But safe from my own failure to do his will? Ha! I could hope I have the courage.
Gus sat forward. “Listen to me, Inès. He will not have you. Scarlett and Kane will not allow it.”
Inès grimaced and considered her hands in her friend’s grasp. “How can they be sure Vaillancourt will not send his minions to find me?”
“I suppose,” Gus said with calm demeanor, “that you have not noticed how all of us have guards around us at all times?”
That thrilled and disturbed Inès, all at once. “No! How?”
“They are hired. Trustworthy. Constantly reporting to Kane. Some to me. Some to Ramsey and others to Amber. A few to Baron Fournier and his wife, the Princess of Baden.”
She gave an astonished laugh. “Wonderful. I am grateful. When did you start that? How?”
Gus grinned. “You know well that those of us who were in Europe three years ago and began Scarlett’s new group there are fugitives from Fouché and Vaillancourt.
Most of us now are married and have children, babies, really.
Kane and Scarlett would not allow anyone to hurt them or use them to their own ends.
Our protection squad is a large and growing unit of Scarlett’s network.
Each man is an expert at his job. You need never fear anyone will hurt you.
So you see,” she said as she patted Inès’s hands and withdrew to her corner of the squabs, “you can enjoy your freedom, my dear.”
Inès let out a breath. “I will have to learn that, if I can.”
“You will get used to it!” Gus paused, looking as though she was assessing what she could do for Inès. “In fact, we can start to look for houses tomorrow, if you like.”
“Oui! Let’s do that.” Inès had arrived in London two weeks ago after three weeks of being chased along the coast of Normandy and across the Channel. Gus knew little of that. Inès had not shared the frightful details.
“Marvelous.” Gus waved the topic away. “We can look at a house not far from us. It is furnished and you won’t have to do much to make it your own.”
“Très bien. I rely on you and Amber, too, to help me establish my place in Society.” Inès needed to find those who would assist in her plan.
Unwittingly, of course. And after a certain point, she would cut them out.
No one would ever know about her plan. No one, not even her friends, Gus and Amber, would know beforehand.
I pray to God they never learn.
She pushed back into the squabs. For if they ever learned what she did, if they became involved or even tried to stop her, they would suffer. Even Scarlett Hawthorne could not save them.
A filthy business you are in, Inès.
Deadly.