Scandal in the Night (28 page)

This was news to Catriona. “Six months after the fact? He must have been hurt more badly than I realized.”

“Yes.” This time his look was grim, and perhaps even guilty. He looked away and frowned. “I don’t think he was ever able to return to active duty.”

There was something he was not telling her. “What happened, Thomas?”

Thomas was not to be swayed from his purpose. “I was about to ask the same of you. I saw you go into that fire, but I never saw you come out. And Birkstead swore he hadn’t seen you, but I know he lied.”

“That night?” So Thomas must have found the lieutenant while she had burned the soles of her feet escaping across what was left of the roof. “How funny that he should have told you the truth. No, he didn’t actually see me.”

“What happened, Cat? How did you do it? How did you get out?” he asked. “For the life of me I could not find out. I asked every peddler and beggar from one side of the city to another. I ran Mina to ground in Ranpur, only to be told that I was an undeserving jackal, but that she knew nothing of you, as she had been sent by her mother to return to Ranpur to the house of her husband.”

It had been a diversion, a brilliant conceit of the begum’s that Mina and her grand retinue of bearers and palanquins, painted elephants and their shaded howdahs, would leave first thing in the morning. Amidst all the stir of Mina’s preparations, Catriona and the children had slipped quietly out of the Balfours’ compound in a nondescript, closed oxcart, bound in the opposite direction, to the southwest for the begum’s sister in Rajasthan. “Surely that wasn’t all Mina said?”

“She also said that I had been a fool, and that I didn’t deserve you. I told her she was wrong.”

Oh, yes, Mina was wrong. It was Catriona who did not deserve steadfast Thomas Jellicoe. “She told me I was a damned fool as well.”

“Yes, she would.” He smiled, but the warmth didn’t reach all the way up to his eyes. The steady probe of that green gaze told her there would be no more evasion. And perhaps it was time.

“What happened, Cat?”

It was past time for the truth. “What happened was that I fell in love with you. And the lieutenant did not like it.”

*   *   *

The lieutenant, in the long run, had only liked himself. He had not especially cared for Lettice, he had openly disliked Cat, and he had certainly hated Tanvir Singh. But the lieutenant had not let anything so insubstantial as his personal feelings stand in the way of his ambition. He was ambitious for power and control. And he meant to get both by marrying the resident commissioner’s well-dowered niece, Catriona Rowan.

He had used every means at his disposal—underhanded and overt—to try to cozen her into favoring his suit. He asked to sit next to her at dinners though she refused to speak to him. He sent flowers though she fed them to the goats. He smiled charmingly, always publicly solicitous for Miss Rowan’s health and comfort, though he said filthy, unrepeatable things under his breath that only she could hear.

She had taken savage delight in thwarting him.

But when his patience wore as thin as his alleged charm, when she had continued to ignore his increasingly blunt propositions, the lieutenant had resorted to intimidation.

The night before the fire, the night she had first kissed Tanvir Singh, it had been the lieutenant, and not the wily spy, who had stood in the dark and listened. It had been the lieutenant who gathered secrets about her.

She had been cocooned in a bubble of happiness that night, as she walked the mare back through the cantonment’s iron gates. She had felt protected by her secret, buoyant with the thrill of her first kiss, and the excitement of something deeper and more important than infatuation.

And suddenly there he was, Lieutenant Birkstead, waiting for her on the path in all his handsome, blond glory, idly smoking on a cheroot. “Well, well. Our adventurous young Miss Rowan finds her way home at last.” He took a deep draw of his smoke and stepped in front of her, casually barring her way with his scarlet, uniformed body. “Out in the world gathering experience, were you, my dear? Consorting with the natives?”

His voice had been snide and dark, and veering toward aggressive, and Catriona knew a threat when she heard it. She backed away into her horse’s neck. She had absolutely no desire to speak to the man, and less to be trapped into an encounter with him. But she had also learned that he liked nothing more than when she ran away from him—he liked the excitement of the chase, the thrill of the hunt and capture.

So she had stood her ground. The mare was protection enough—the animal grew fractious and haughty in the lieutenant’s presence, tossing her head and showing her teeth, and nickering ominously. The lieutenant stopped well clear of Puithar’s reach.

The horse’s good sense and protective instincts gave Catriona courage. “It is common knowledge that I visit with the Princess of Ranpur and her mother the Begum. And that I do so with my uncle’s permission. So it is no concern of yours, Lieutenant.”

“Is is not? Because speaking of your uncle, Lord Summers, you’ll find that he considers me an excellent prospect as a son-in-law. Most excellent. Told me so just today. So you’ll want to watch yourself, my dear. I’m a tolerant man, but not particularly partial to other men’s leavings.”

Catriona had felt the first thrust of the jackal’s verbal assault, but she wasn’t about to concede any ground—if he smelled blood, he would only chase her harder. “Aren’t you? I would have thought you particularly adept at such a scenario.” She turned and let her gaze rest meaningfully on the part of the residency where her aunt’s rooms lay.

Birkstead barely had the grace to flush—a wash of higher color appeared momentarily on his gilded cheek, before his arrogance chased it away. “Careful, little mouse. Don’t involve yourself in business you know nothing about, when you’ve got so much trouble of your own. I doubt your uncle would like to hear of how you just spent the past half hour, pushed up against the outer wall with your skirts rucked up to your ears by a native
boxwallah
of dubious character.”

The threat struck her like a sharp, well-aimed dart, sure and lethal. But she kept still, kept quiet, and kept her distance, letting him spew his dirty insinuations into the night while she wondered what it was that he wanted this time. A kiss? A grope the likes of which he thought he’d just seen? She had refused him all before and managed to keep her distance. But he was clearly becoming impatient.

Catriona let out more of the rein between her clenched fingers to surreptitiously give Puithar her head.

Birkstead did move back half a pace when the mare tossed her head in his direction, but he held his ground as well. “I’ve rather liked your little game of superiority and unavailability.” He slid her one of his condescending smiles. “It made you seem unattainable, a prize worth having. When now I find you’re rather
too
easily attainable. That your protests and virginal posturing are all for show. You know, my dear, it won’t do for you to be secretly panting after the natives. You’ll need to curb that deplorable tendency after we wed.”

“Just as you need to curb your deplorable tendency to pant after other men’s wives?”

He laughed and tilted up his chin to blow a careless stream of smoke into the night around her head. “You’ve got some spark and fire, I’ll give you that. You’re not quite the pale little dishrag of a girl you like to let people think, are you?”

It was everything she could do not to strike him then—a ringing slap against the broad flat of his cheek that would leave a livid swath of red skin like a warning flag of temper flying across his face. A mark that would proclaim, to any and all who came near,
This man is a worthless bastard.

But she didn’t strike him. He was too full of suppressed violence for such an action to be met without retaliation. So she clenched the palm that still itched to hit him as hard as his words had hit her, into a fist so tight it tingled, and tried to stare him down. “You must want money rather badly, Lieutenant, to go to all this trouble for a girl you don’t even like. Gambling debts, is it? Or is keeping other men’s wives expensive?”

He flashed her that all-too-charming, golden-boy grin. “Surprisingly economical, really. As is bribing servants to keep track of people who are important to me.”

“You’re disgusting.” She wanted to spit the invective at him.

“If I am, you’d better get used to it.”

“Never.”

“Never is a very long time, mousie,” he said with mock severity. “And I
know
things. Things you don’t want anyone else to know.”

His words stole over her like a killing frost, riming the inside of her lungs. It was suddenly painful to draw breath, the same as when she’d contracted the pleurisy years ago in Scotland.

“Ah. That got your attention, didn’t it? Very good. You’re almost quivering with your curiosity.”

It wasn’t curiosity. It was dread. Mortal dread.

But Birkstead had smiled at her discomfiture. He took one last draw on his cheroot and exhaled a plume of self-satisfaction into the night, before he ground out the stub with the toe of his boot. “It will be quite the catfight, getting you into bed.” And he laughed at her, his darkly blue eyes glinting with predatory delight. “I’m quite looking forward to it. Just be sure not to give it away beforehand like a slut.”

His casual cruelty made her lash out. “Like you?” Or her aunt Lettice. There seemed to be more than enough sluts to go around.

He laughed still. “Jealous of Lettice, are you?”

“No. What I am is disgusted.” And afraid. She scrambled up into the saddle, so she might have the advantage of Puithar’s height to give her some distance from the vile man. “Don’t speak to me again. Don’t even act as if you know me.”

But he hadn’t listened. He had laughed. “I’ll speak as I like. You’re mine, mousie. And the sooner you understand that, the better off you’ll be. Don’t make me do something you’ll regret. Because you know I will do whatever is necessary to bring you to the altar.”

He had turned and ambled off into the dark, leaving his threat lingering in the air like the stench of his cigar.

And he had continued to do just as he pleased. He had gone on doing it until he had ruined everything. Until he had destroyed her more effectively than if she had let him hit her.

It was what they all did—men—they did as they pleased.

And she’d had enough of it.

Chapter Sixteen

Catriona had decided to do something about Lieutenant Birkstead at the next available opportunity in Saharanpur, but that had not worked out at all well. It had, in fact, ended in murder.

And it had been her fault, if not her hand that did the deed.

It was she who had stirred the hornet’s nest. It was she who had been insistent and adamant and convinced of what was right. So damnably sure. And so utterly wrong.

It had seemed such a straightforward sort of thing to do, to go to her uncle immediately, and simply tell him that she was not interested in the lieutenant’s less than attractive offers. She had already tried begging off all social engagements that were most likely to bring her into contact with the lieutenant—with no protest at all from her aunt. But the damn man had a way of insinuating himself into the residency. That night had not been the first time he had taken her unawares on the pathways, or the stairs and corridors. It unnerved her, his easy, unrestrained access to her life. It unnerved her that despite her antipathy, he still seemed to take her eventual capitulation for granted.

And so she had resolved to put an end to it as soon as possible, before she had time to think and change her mind or become intimidated. She found Lord Summers in his library, where he often smoked a cigar and enjoyed a brandy before he and aunt Lettice embarked upon their social rounds.

She had not even hesitated on the threshold. “Good evening, sir.”

“Catriona.” He had welcomed her with a kind smile. “Come and sit with me.”

She returned his smile, and crossed to the cane-backed armchairs where he reclined. “You seem to be in a rather expansive mood this evening, my lord.” He would be in less of one when he heard what she had to say, but there was no avoiding it.

“Indeed, I am, my dear. And so will you be. Come and sit with me for a moment.”

When she had seated herself in the chair across from him, Lord Summers took up her hand. “I cannot tell you what a pleasure it has been to have you as part of the household. What a help you’ve been to Lady Summers, and a wonderful influence with the children. I don’t know when we’ve had a happier time.”

His words were a welcome balm to her soul. And she agreed with him—she had never had a happier or lovelier time. With the exception of Lieutenant Birkstead’s attention, her time in Saharanpur had been a delight. And there were so many other pleasures to outweigh the lieutenant. Pleasures that she would be free to pursue once she put Lord Summers straight. “Thank you, sir. It has been a joy to know my cousins.”

“And I know they feel the same. Arthur has told me you’re more accomplished than any
three
riding instructors he’s ever had. Quite a compliment from a young lad, I might add.”

It was thoughtful of her young cousin to give credit to her rather than Tanvir Singh, who had always been kind enough to speak with the boy and give Arthur the benefit of his instruction and advice. “Arthur has become a very good rider. Very good, steady hands.” Arthur would grow to be an exceptional man someday—Catriona firmly believed a man’s character was revealed in the way he treated both his servants and his animals.

Her uncle-in-law pinked with pride, but was not deterred from his original point. “And as loath as I am to part with you—”

“Then you shall not.” Catriona spoke quickly to stop Lord Summers from following his intended path, but he was in too genial a mood to take heed of any warning in her tone.

“But I cannot be so selfish.” He smiled and patted her hand. “And it is a comfort to know you will not go far. Perhaps we will even manage to keep you with us at the residency.”