The Nude (full-length historical romance) (45 page)

“He betrayed me,” she said finally.

Mr. Waver was unmoved.

The wild brushstrokes created an image that promised to be hauntingly beautiful. The woman Nigel had created from exotic dyes and crushed precious stones had a broken heart. The plants in the forefront wept with her pain.

“Why do you think the woman on the canvas despairs?” Mr. Waver asked after what seemed like a lifetime of grief.

“She is unloved,” was her quick answer. She stepped forward, raising the candle higher to study the scene more closely. The destroyed and discarded painting floating in the pond caught her attention. What did the painting within the painting mean? She ran her fingers over the textured brushstrokes.

“She loved,” Elsbeth amended her answer. “The love was not returned.”

“Ah,” he said. “Do you truly believe yourself to be the woman portrayed there?”

To that she had no ready answer. But how could she not be that woman? For too many years she’d loved Dionysus without having that love returned. And now, just as she believed she finally found love, this had happened.

“I suppose,” he said, “Edgeware painted this scene because he felt guilty. You loved him and he could not love you back?”

But that couldn’t be right. The painter felt the woman’s grief, actually felt it.

“You proved your love for Edgeware in so many ways. How could he not feel guilty?”

Guilt? Where was the guilt in the wilting ferns, in the dark background, or in the deadly still water in the pond? Mr. Waver must be blind. The painter didn’t feel guilt.

He felt unloved
.

From one moment to the next, her heart sank. She’d been the one withholding her love. She’d been the one inflicting pain on a wounded heart. She was the one who had become the monster . . .

“I need to find him,” she said. “I need to tell him that I love him. I need to tell him that I’ve always loved him …”

Elsbeth searched the far corners of the house, and still she couldn’t find Nigel. Though the band continued to play lively tunes, many of the guests had left, dispersed to spread the exciting news of Dionysus’s identity to the other ballrooms and clubs in London.

Her family and Nigel’s were closed up in a parlor located in the back of the house. Lauretta sat on a sofa next to Lord Ames, her hand tucked into his lap. Aunt Violet, sitting on a chair across the room, didn’t seem to mind. In fact, her aunt appeared to be deeply engrossed in a conversation with Lord Purbeck.

No one had seen Nigel.

“Ask Charlie,” Lord Purbeck suggested. “He went to talk with Nigel after that unseemly display in the drawing room.”

“His lordship is not in the house, my lady,” Gainsford confided a few minutes later. “Every member of the household staff has searched for him. No one knows when he left, but he is not within.”

“Have you seen Mr. Charlie Purbeck?” Elsbeth asked hoarsely, her heart stuck in her throat. “Has anyone seen Mr. Purbeck?”

“No, my lady. There was such a commotion, what with you announcing his lordship’s great secret. He could have left at anytime without notice.”

Charlie
. She provided the diversion and he took the opportunity to kidnap and—God help her—kill Nigel.

She drew a deep breath. He may still be alive. She refused to stand idly by and let Charlie win this battle without a royal fight on her part. “Fetch my cloak and have a carriage brought around.”

Gainsford paled. “But-but, my lady.”

“And have dinner served. I’ll not have the remaining guests neglected.”

Gainsford opened his mouth to protest again, but he must have seen her determination sparking in her eyes, for he shut his mouth and hurried away. A footman quickly arrived and handed Elsbeth her cloak.

“Where are you going?” Mr. Waver asked. He blocked her path to the front door.

“Stand aside, Mr. Waver. Charlie has Nigel. And I intend to save him.”

Mr. Waver refused to move.

“Bah!” Lord Purbeck growled behind her. “Charlie may be a stupid boy, but he would never hurt his cousin.”

“Stand aside, Mr. Waver,” Elsbeth said again, pitching her voice low.

“But we all just want to help, Elsbeth,” Lauretta said.

Elsbeth spun around and found Lord Ames helping Lauretta with her pelisse. Olivia, curiously without a male escort, already wore her pelisse and was fussing with her gloves. Aunt Violet, also ready to go out, had her arm securely wrapped around Lord Purbeck’s.

“I have distracted Papa, Elly, though I think he would join us if he knew,” Olivia said with an uncharacteristically determined grimace.

“Very well.” Mr. Waver still hadn’t moved out of the way.

“Where are you going?” he asked again. “We cannot rush into the night without a plan.”

When she started to protest, Mr. Waver raised his hand and lowered a quelling glance in the direction of Lord Purbeck. “Charlie, if he is indeed the man we need to be wary of, will not hie Edgeware to his bachelor rooms on St. James’s.”

“I’m not a fool.” She hesitated, not wishing to blurt out her plans in front of her innocent cousins and her husband’s friends. But there was no hope for it. “Mademoiselle Dukard.” A blush stung her cheeks. “I planned to speak with her to find out—”

“Ducky?” Lord Ames said.

“That horrid woman in Hyde Park, you mean?” Lauretta said. “I should think Sir Donald would know what
that
woman is up to.”

“I don’t have time for this. The carriage is waiting. I must go. Stand aside, Mr. Waver.” She pushed Mr. Waver to the side and threw open the door before the footman could do it for her. With her skirts gathered up in her hand, she charged down the steps and jumped into Nigel’s carriage while the hellish black steeds snorted at the lead.

Mr. Waver, Olivia, Lauretta, and Lord Ames followed, squeezing into the carriage, though it was not designed to carry more than four people. Lady Violet and Lord Purbeck both were intent on joining them, but there simply wasn’t room. Lord Purbeck shouted for his carriage to be brought around and demanded that they wait for him. Yet there wasn’t time to wait. Much to Elsbeth’s relief Mr. Waver rapped on the roof. “Mademoiselle Dukard’s cottage is a good place to start,” he said as the carriage swayed into motion.

Elsbeth sat back, her heart beating a dizzying tattoo, and closed her eyes.
Please, let me find him alive
, she prayed.
Please, don’t let him die
.

The carriage lurched as it came to a sudden halt.

“Stay with the women,” Mr. Waver said to Lord Ames. He already had the door open and one foot out. “I will go in alone.”

No one argued. Certainly not Elsbeth, who was feeling fairly certain that she was missing something very important.

Lauretta and Olivia were whispering. Vaguely, she thought they might be speaking to her, but she pushed the notion away.

She sighed. What was it that she was missing?

“I always thought Sir Donald was a milksop,” Olivia said, speaking much louder now. “I do approve of your new choice of beau.”

“Why thank you, Lady Olivia,” Lord Ames replied.

“And to learn that Sir Donald is as buried in debt as you are truly puts you on an even keel, does it not? I heard his debts came from a single gambling bet. Lady Constance told me just this evening that two rather frightening gentlemen had threatened his life while they were taking ices together just this afternoon. Most ungentlemanly to expose a lady to such individuals,” Olivia said. Elsbeth fought an urge to cover her ears with her hands. She needed to concentrate.

“Perhaps that was what he and Ducky were arguing about in the park?” Lauretta said. “Perhaps he was trying to get her to help him do something utterly wicked in order to keep the moneylenders from extracting payment in a more violent way.”

“What?” Elsbeth said, blinking as she opened her eyes. “What did you just say, Lauretta?”

“I was just wondering if Sir Donald wasn’t trying to get Ducky to—”

“Lord Ames!” Elsbeth leaned forward and grabbed his arm. “Go fetch Mr. Waver, now! I believe I know where Nigel has been taken, and I fear we don’t have much time.”

* * * * *

The horses pulled the carriage through the London streets at a harrowing pace as they raced toward the docks. A thick fog rolled in off the Thames and seeped through the windows of the carriage creating a damp chill Elsbeth could not seem to shake.

“This cannot be right,” Mr. Waver said, though he had obeyed without argument when Elsbeth had ordered him to give the driver the direction to his own warehouse. “You don’t still believe I am somehow involved, do you?”

“No, I don’t. But just like the night of the storm, he wants you to take the blame, Mr. Waver. Charlie can’t be blamed for his cousin’s death. He wouldn’t be able to inherit the estate if he were connected to either Lord Purbeck’s or the Marquess’s deaths.” The conviction in Elsbeth’s voice amazed even her. No one could wrest control from her. Not now, not when so much depended on her success. “Don’t you see? Charlie had been so insistent on proving your guilt, because you had been set up to look guilty.”

As soon as the carriage rolled to a stop, Elsbeth jumped down before the steps had been lowered. “I do hope you have a pistol hidden within the folds of that cloak, Mr. Waver.”

“I do,” Lord Ames offered as he produced a large weapon.

“Gracious,” Lauretta breathed, growing pale as her gaze fixed on the gun.

“Steady,” Lord Ames said, and supported her with his free hand.

“I, too, have a gun,” Olivia said. She held out an equally menacing weapon.

“Oh no,” Mr. Waver backed up. “I will not go in there with a woman waving a deadly weapon around.”

“Give that to me,” Elsbeth said, and snatched the gun away from Olivia. “You don’t know how to use this.”

“And you do?” Olivia protested.

“Yes.” Elsbeth didn’t explain how she and Molly had taught themselves the deadly art of gunmanship after a particularly brutal summer. She checked to make sure the pistol was indeed loaded before charging ahead. The creaking of ships rocking at the docks carried through the eerie fog. Whole ships and buildings had disappeared into the mists.

“This way,” Mr. Waver whispered. He took her arm and led her in the opposite direction toward a small door on the side of the long warehouse building that had appeared out of nowhere in front of them. Mr. Waver must have taken possession of Lord Ames’s gun. He dropped the pistol into a pocket and pulled out a key. Despite the dim light he had no trouble unlocking the door.

Elsbeth pushed the door open and stepped inside before Mr. Waver could dare protest.

“Drop your weapon.” Sir Donald’s distinctive voice echoed up through the rafters of the empty warehouse. His voice so startled Elsbeth that she nearly let the pistol clatter to the wooden floor.

“I said, drop the gun, Mr. Waver.” Sir Donald had barely glanced in Elsbeth’s direction. She pushed her hand into a fold of her cloak, concealing the pistol Sir Donald had obviously overlooked.

Sir Donald was standing on top of a wooden crate with Nigel motionless at his feet and Charlie bound up like Christmas goose on the floor beside them. A burly cutthroat stepped into view. A long knife balanced in one hand.

“Drop the gun!” Sir Donald bent down and dragged Nigel up from the floor. Nigel’s eyes were barely open. His head flopped against Sir Donald’s chest. Sir Donald pressed a jagged knife to Nigel’s throat. A thin ribbon of blood, Nigel’s blood, coated the length of the blade.

Mr. Waver gave Elsbeth a sidelong glance before letting his gun drop to the ground.

“Found these three wanderin’ about outside,” a second accomplice said. This one had a wicked scar bisecting the right side of his face. He shoved Lord Ames, Lauretta, and Olivia into the warehouse with one heavy thrust.

Lauretta and Olivia stumbled to their knees.

“We’ll have to kill them all,” Sir Donald said with a chilling calm. He dropped Nigel and leapt down from the crate. “Bloody, bloody nuisance. This isn’t working out at all how I’d planned.” He spun on his heel and glared down at Charlie. “I’ll still be taking the Edgeware family money, mind you. I’m owed that money. I would have never placed that damned bet if you hadn’t twisted my arm, telling me I couldn’t possibly lose. Which means I won’t be able to kill you. Damned bloody nuisance.”