Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
Miss Vane had a rare talent for making catastrophe sound like a reasonable request. Paying her to write an article was one thing. Helping her flee her family and take rooms in a lodging house was another.
So why did he feel a quiet burst of triumph? As if Howden had misplaced a prize and Hugh had found it first.
He knew the cost of walking away. He’d done it once, on a bitter winter’s night, loneliness a cloak that failed to keep out the chill.
But he lived alone for good reason. He had a responsibility to his newspaper. To printing the truth. Not to a woman as reckless as her mother. A woman whose kiss still lingered on his lips.
“While I commend your spirit, Miss Vane, we can’t leave this theatre together.” He beckoned Charlotte. He would be in her debt, and that would cost him. “Take Miss Vane home with you. Leave now. I’ll meet you there within the hour.”
Charlotte arched a brow. “I can’t take her home unless you want half the ton gossiping about your plans. The Smythes are hosting next door, and everyone with a pulse and a pedigree will be there tonight.”
“There’s Mivart’s or the Clarendon,” Miss Vane said. “I could stay there if you’re willing to pay me an advance.”
Hugh looked at her. In that dress, every man in Christendom would want her. “You’ll not stay at a hotel.” There was an easy solution, but he was having a hard time suggesting it.
Good God. What was wrong with him?
He was a grown man, not some rutting fool.
“You’ll stay at The Sentinel tonight.” There. He’d said it. “You can have my apartment.” He’d take a chair in Pullman’s office. No need to dress it up as a grand gesture.
Miss Vane swallowed. “Your apartment? Won’t that be a terrible inconvenience?”
“A bloody inconvenience. But the alternative is worse for both of us. Now go before your sister puts paid to your plans.”
Charlotte shot him a pointed look before smiling at Miss Vane and ushering her towards the stairs.
Hugh drew a breath as he watched them go. There ought to be a law against an intelligent woman wearing a gown like that. He should put a mile between them. Hyde Park had benches. Surely one of them was less dangerous than his apartment.
He rejoined Montfort in the box. “There’s been a development. Charlotte’s gone, and I may have to take out a loan to repay the blasted favour.”
Montfort smiled faintly. “Charlotte rarely collects in coin. I’d prepare for humiliation. Might this development have something to do with the lady missing from the opposite box?”
Hugh looked across. Howden and Thomas Colworth were no longer watching the play. Howden’s gaze moved from Miss Vane’s empty chair to the door. The woman seated behind them grew restless and stood to peer out into the corridor.
“If you find me sleeping in The Sentinel’s doorway tonight, I’d appreciate a blanket and a quart of gin.”
“So your Miss Vane is making life difficult again.” Montfort glanced at the laughing fools in the stalls as the scene shifted from the solemn Tombs of Memphis to the comic interior of Madame Poupette’s house.
“She’s not my Miss Vane.” He’d make sure she wasn’t Howden’s either. He’d suggest someone calmer, but a woman who kissed like that was never meant for tame men. “And difficult hardly describes it.”
Montfort laughed. “I trust the elderly woman who’s just stumbled into the box isn’t your reckless little menace.”
He knew damn well it wasn’t. His had honey-gold hair, intelligent eyes, and breasts that would fill his palms. “My life would be simpler if it were.”
“You found her and gave her the letter? Was it as sinister as the black seal implied?”
He relayed what had happened in the corridor. “She’s currently a runaway, though at three and twenty the term hardly applies.”
Not just a runaway. His temporary lodger.
“You won’t want to hear this,” Montfort said, “but until they’ve caught Bellingham’s killer, The Sentinel is the safest place for her.”
Hugh had to admit, having her beneath his roof would ease his mind somewhat, and he couldn’t leave her in a lodging house.
“Then we’d better help Bow Street along.”
“We?”
“Put those talents of yours to use. Comb through Bellingham’s will at Doctors’ Commons. Then Howden’s. I need to know who owns the mine shares and why no one’s sold the land.” His gaze fixed on the opposite box. “Perhaps Italy was bait, and the dead peer is hiding in Staffordshire.”
If Bellingham knew, that would explain the knife in his chest.
Montfort gave a low hum. “If he is living under an assumed identity, he had reason to fear exposure.”
One buried scandal had a way of rousing another. “Howden brought up the duel,” Hugh said, though they both knew the old gossip still thrived.
The music took an ominous turn, all drums and violin tremolos. The lights flickered. The audience shifted in their seats, unease rippling through the rows. None of it matched the cold dread of being threatened with the noose for standing witness to another man’s crime.
“Saint-Clair was named as the footpad who stole Pemberton’s ring on the heath,” Montfort said. “A man can accuse a fugitive of anything.”
“Except innocence. We’re the only ones who know he didn’t kill Mallory.” Someone else had fired from the trees that day.
They sat in silence.
Four men, one dead body, and a story no one believed.
“Am I to bring my findings to The Sentinel?” Montfort said. “Or should I look to the nearest lodging house?”
“The Sentinel. Though by morning I may be regretting my generosity from a park bench.”
The apartment was dark but for the soft glow of the lamp in the drawing room and the fire’s amber embers. Miss Vane lay on his leather chesterfield, eyes closed, breathing lightly, a blanket drawn up to her shoulders, covering her scandalous neckline.
A bloody relief, all things considered.
Charlotte rose with a huff and ushered him back into the hall. “What on earth possessed you?” she whispered. “She can’t stay here. This is the first place her family will look.”
“What was I supposed to do?”
“Send her home the night you found her on your landing. Assure her you’d look into the matter and inform her when you’d uncovered the truth.”
Charlotte had a point. But Miss Vane had arrived with a pistol, a grievance and the scent of heaven, and he’d been fool enough to welcome the challenge.
“Bellingham trusted her. There was no way to put her mind at rest without questioning him further. She needed to be certain of Howden’s character.”
“It seems to me that she’s far more interested in yours.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“She asked about the duel.”
It came as no surprise. The woman had a talent for finding bruises and pressing until a man flinched. “She’s inquisitive and doesn’t know who to trust.” Him included, though she was asleep on his sofa.
Charlotte’s expression altered, the sharpness giving way to old hurt. “I know what it’s like to have the ton turn their backs. It took strength to crawl out of disgrace. Is that what you want for her? It’s not too late. I can take her home.”
He straightened. “It’s not my decision to make.” He didn’t want to hurt Charlotte, but she needed to understand the dilemma. “What if you’d been forced to marry the man who ruined you? Would you have chosen a life with a fiend?”
Charlotte shuddered, and he was sorry for it. “Howden seems a decent sort. There’s no proof he’s guilty of anything besides being dull. And you don’t know his father caused the accident or committed fraud.”
“That’s what we’re trying to discover.”
“Then you had better be there to pick up the pieces when this all ends badly. Lord knows she’s determined to begin a new life writing for your newspaper.”
He smiled to himself. “And who are we to tell her otherwise?”
Charlotte snatched her wrap off the stand. “I’ll send some clothes in the morning. She can’t investigate a crime wearing a gown and silk slippers.” She came up on her toes and kissed his cheek. “I trust you’ll do what is right.”
He locked the door behind her, responsibility settling on him with the turn of the key. Somehow, it was inevitable. He shrugged out of his coat, untied his cravat, and poured a drink. Then he sat by the fire and watched Miss Vane sleep.
Heat warmed him, from the brandy, the flames, or the strange peace easing the tension in his shoulders. He should rue the day she’d burst into his life wearing an ink-stained apron and a determined grin.
So why wasn’t he striding about his apartment, shaking her awake, showing her a frustration he didn’t feel?
Because he cared what happened to her, when he’d sworn to care about no one at all. She was more dangerous than a shot from a Henry Nock. And considerably harder to disarm.
A sweet hum left her lips, the sound rippling through him, hardening more than muscle. He dragged a hand down his face. God help him, this woman was no angel. Which made resisting her a damned sight harder.
He drained the glass and stood. The sooner he put some distance between them, the sooner he could feel like himself.
But he’d not leave her to sleep on the sofa.
He didn’t need to be an engineer to know there was only one way to get her to bed without waking her.
He crept closer, peeling the blanket away so he could carry her. The sight beneath rattled his composure. Smooth porcelain skin. The soft swell of her breasts rising and falling with each gentle breath.
Merciful Lord. Men had been ruined for less.
He slid one arm beneath her knees and the other around her back. She melted against him with a sleepy sigh, her cheek brushing his throat, the warmth of her body working through him like strong drink.
This was a bad idea. It had all the makings of seduction.
Her breath feathered his neck, warm through the loosened folds of his cravat, and every step towards the bedroom tightened the ache in his trousers.
He’d never wanted something he couldn’t have.
Miss Vane was born to torment him. She stirred in his grasp and threaded her arms around his neck, her fingers teasing the hair at his nape.
He reassessed his earlier thought.
Torture was a better word.