To Wed a Scandalous Spy (31 page)

She didn't want to wake Myrtle. She only wanted to reassure herself. Randolph's death had to upset Myrtle. She was such a saltbox that one sometimes forgot how fragile she truly was.

Willa stuck her nose into the room, then crossed to the giant curtained bed. Tiptoeing to the slit between curtains, Willa hooked one finger into them to take a peek.

She did not expect to see the intrepid little elf sitting tailor-fashion in the center of the bed, picking through a giant box of chocolates. Myrtle popped a bonbon into her mouth and cut her eyes at Willa.

"Hop on in. If you want one of these you had best hurry."

Willa sat on the edge of the mattress. "You should be ashamed. I've been so worried. Victoria thinks you are on your deathbed."

"Oh, I am. I've been on my deathbed for years. Boring as hell, deathbeds. Can never lie there very long before I get a bug in my bustle."

"Aunt Myrtle, you astound me."

"Sweet pea, when you get older, you'll stop playing their games and play your own. You shall see. Of course, you're smarter than I was. You married money young. You'll have all the fun I didn't have until I met my Beauregard." She looked unbearably sad for a moment. Then she snickered. "Beauregard would have loved this next bit."

"What next bit?"

"The bit where I change my will. They're still dancing downstairs, you know."

"Change
your
will? I thought Basil was Nathaniel's heir?"

"Oh, he's the heir to the title and the estate. And Thaniel is certainly wealthy." Myrtle gave a small evil smile. "But I'm wealthier. Much wealthier. Without my money, and with his gambling problem, Basil will be nothing in a few years. Land-rich, cash-poor." She snickered again. "I cannot wait to see Daphne's face."

"Now, Aunt Myrtle. I don't like her, either, but if she has been counting on this inheritance, don't you think it is unfair to withhold it?"

"She has never been in my will. Only Randolph. I held Randolph on my knee when he was a baby. I loved that boy to pieces."

The faded blue eyes dimmed further behind unshed tears. "And do you know what that bitch Victoria did? She killed him. She killed him as surely as if she had tossed him from the Tower with her own hands."

"But I thought it was his heart—"

"Yes. His heart. His heart that his physician warned him about last winter. His heart that should never have made the journey to London in the spring. His doctor told him not to, that he couldn't take the strain of travel."

Myrtle narrowed her eyes. "But Victoria couldn't miss the Season, he said. Victoria insisted on coming to the balls and the soirees and salons, even if it killed her husband to do so."

She drew out her minuscule scrap of lace and dabbed at her eyes. "And it has. It's killed him dead."

"I am so sorry."

Myrtle sighed, then shook her head. "Everyone dies, sweet pea. I have seen so many family and friends die in my lifetime. Randolph was in pain, every breath an agony. It was a mercy."

"I see."

"And all that is left is the living. And the money. With Randolph passing, I must contact my solicitor immediately. Besides, it is my money to do with as I please."

"I suppose," said Willa doubtfully.

"Well, what about you? You and Thaniel—Nathaniel. Don't you want some?"

"No," Willa said firmly.

"Not a bit of it?"

"Not one cent. Not if it means you must die first."

"Why, sweet pea, I do believe that's the nicest thing anyone's said to me in years."

"Well, don't get all slobbery on me. Can't bear sentiment," Willa snapped in a perfect parody of Myrtle herself, which sent the elder lady off in a flood of cackles.

"Oh, Willa, you do keep a body young."

"Good. Stay with me and you shall live forever."

"You know, for the first time in years, I wish I could. I truly would love to see how you turn out, pet." She peered at what Willa had in her hands. "Did you bring me something?"

"I brought a book I thought you'd like." Willa showed her the worn volume. "It's one of my favorites."

"Oh, sweeting, my eyes don't work as well as they used to."

"I was going to read it to you, anyway," Willa assured her. "It's a translation I did myself, so you likely couldn't decipher my crabbed little notes in the margins."

Myrtle tilted her head to look at it more closely. "What is it about?"

"It's a marvelous fiction, full of adventure and intrigue." Willa opened the small book and began to read.

" 'Every ruler needs a few men he can count on…' "

«
^
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The fortunate thing about training to be a spy was that one learned so many useful skills.

The man outside Reardon House crept quietly to the coal chute on the side wall. A nice bit of flammable rag, a quick strike of his flint and steel, bend, lift, throw—run. He wasn't fast at all after all he'd been through recently, but it mattered little. By the time his little present caught, he'd be out of sight, poised for his next move.

He let the lid of the chute down gently, silently, and stumbled down the darkened alley behind the mews until he was lost in the shadows.

Such a handy skill.

Nathaniel had been staring into the fire in his study for hours but had found no answers in the flames. He had been prepared for Randolph's death for some time, so why was it so shocking? Obviously, he'd been unable to conceive of a world without his stepfather—

"My father, damn it!"

He would not trouble himself to use the proper address ever again. No one was left who cared, anyway. Randolph had been the only father, the only example, the only hero, Nathaniel had ever known. That was a good enough definition for him.

He rubbed his head, his mind drawn back to that day so many years ago. He'd been trying to annoy Simon into a fight—God, what a poisonous snot he had been as a young man!—but Simon had simply walked away.

So Nathaniel had followed him. Simon hadn't been much older himself then and had perhaps not been as careful about being trailed as he ought to have been. It had not been easy and Nathaniel had nearly lost him a half-dozen times, but that only made him work harder. He'd been a lazy lout. If it had been simple, he likely would have quickly become bored and gone on his way. Simon's very elusiveness inspired Nathaniel's curiosity until nothing could have stopped him.

Nathaniel had seen Simon approach a building, then pass directly past the front door. Then he'd followed the older man down an alley and watched him clamber easily up a wall and disappear through a window.

The route was much harder than it looked. Thinking back, Nathaniel was surprised he hadn't fallen to his death trying to figure out the hidden handholds and false window locks.

Then he'd been inside the club, in a storage room. His own audacity had sobered him so that he decided that he would only look around in order to find another way out. He would have gone back out the window if he dared, but he didn't.

It was when he'd been poking around the shabby hallway that he smelled it. Randolph was fond of a certain mix of tobacco that he had blended just for him. It had a distinctive sweet smell. Nathaniel followed it, realizing that he had found the place where his father spent all his time.

When Nathaniel caught a whiff of tobacco smoke coming from under a seemingly featureless wall, he knew there must be a way in.

He hadn't found it then, nor for years later. Not until last year had he found his way into the secret office of the Liars' spymaster. But he'd never forgotten the sense of frustration and betrayal that he'd felt, being locked out of that secret office.

Then he'd been forced to wander the club, hiding from footsteps, listening at doors, before he dared go further. That's when he'd made his discovery.

His father was a Crown spy. A hero. A fascinating, admirable, glittering hero.

From that point on, all Nathaniel had ever wanted to do was earn his father's respect. He'd turned his back on his peevish, wastrel ways without a moment's hesitation. His father was a hero, and he would be one, too.

So he improved himself in every way he could imagine, improving his mind, training in sports, horses, shooting—any skills that seemed useful for a spy. Then he waited to be invited into the Liar's Club—into that secret office.

It took some time before Nathaniel realized that his father had never noticed the change in him.

But Lord Liverpool had.

Weary of the past, Nathaniel took a deep breath—

Smoke?

He ran to the closed door of his study and flung it open. Thick, choking smoke was filling the hallway beyond even as he watched. "
Fire
!" he bellowed. "
Fire
!"

Then he was up the stairs and into Willa's bedchamber in a matter of seconds. He threw Willa's wrapper to her. "Quickly! Don't spare the time to dress!"

She ran after him, after swiftly throwing on her nightdress,
then
the wrapper. Burning to death tended to pale next to having a stiff breeze blow her wrapper askew!

Nathaniel ran through the house, making sure everyone was roused and making their way outside. He pushed Willa after them. "Go to the back garden and wait for me," he shouted over the confusion. "I must see that the maids in the attic are all cleared out."

As she stood in the damp yard with the other female occupants of Reardon House, she tried not to let the enormous amounts of smoke billowing from the open doors and windows worry her.

"You'd best not die, Nathaniel Stonewell," she muttered fiercely to him through the walls of the house. "I have plans for you." Without taking her eyes from the doorway through which he disappeared, she crossed the yard to join Myrtle, Victoria, and a clinging Daphne.

"Is it very hazardous in there?" Daphne asked, her eyes on the house. "Do you think he's in danger?"

Willa saw how pale the blond woman was and how her anxiety was betrayed by chewing on her lower lip. So, cool, remote Daphne cared after all. Willa could not feel jealous, for Nathaniel paid no attention to Daphne at all. Poor Daphne.

Then Willa remembered Nathaniel's cool dismissal of her earlier in the evening.

Poor Willa.

It seemed years but was likely only minutes before Nathaniel emerged from the smoky depths of the house with the female servants. They came coughing and sooty, but they all came safe.

Willa flung her arms about him. "I know it couldn't have been the jinx this time," she told him with a watery smile.

He set her on her feet without a word to her. "It was merely vandals," he told the throng. "They dirtied the wallpaper, but there was nothing irreplaceable lost."

As the relieved household made its way back inside, Willa looked around. "Where is Mr. D—Mr. Porter?"

Nathaniel looked grim. "I'd say halfway to the docks by now. He wrapped the burning linen tightly enough to keep it smoldering for hours, then tossed the lot down the coal chute. If it hadn't rolled off the coals onto the kindling, we'd still be trying to put it out."

Willa frowned. "What makes you so sure it was Ren Porter?"

Nathaniel waved a hand in the general direction of the dining room. "Well, he—"

Willa plunked her hands on her hips. "Did you even check his room, or did you just leave the poor man to burn to death?"

Abject horror turned Nathaniel white beneath his smudges. The breath left his body in a rush, and he could only stare at her in dismay.

He bolted back into the house, taking the corner so fast that the carpet buckled and slid beneath his feet.

He heard Willa calling for him to wait, but he wasn't planning on slowing down until he had proved to himself that he hadn't left a lung-sick man to die from smoke inhalation.

The rest of Nathaniel's run through the house was a blur, but he was vaguely aware that his following was growing. More voices and footsteps rose behind him at every room he passed.

He flung open the door to Ren's chamber, letting it resound with a crash against the wall.

There was no one in the bed, no one in the still-smoky room. Nathaniel sagged gratefully against the doorjamb. At least he didn't have that on his consc—

"Is it over?" A creaking voice came from the curtained window embrasure.

In two long strides, Nathaniel crossed to the window and yanked open the draperies. Ren Porter was sprawled half on the window seat, half angled out the window. The cold night air was streaming over him, but his face and body were wet with perspiration.

"Good God, man! You'll catch your death!" Nathaniel hauled him back into the room. "You there!" He gestured to a footman. "Get those pots steaming again! Build up that fire."

"Oh no," Ren protested faintly. "Not more fire."

Nathaniel wrestled Ren gently into the bed again. "God, I'm so sorry I left you here. I thought—"

Ren coughed, then sent Nathaniel a wry, haggard grin. "You thought I'd given it another go?" He snorted. "Reardon, it's all I can do to use the chamber pot right now."

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." Nathaniel rubbed his face. "I could have killed you!"

"I kill you. You kill me." Ren shrugged. "I'd say we're even."

"You don't want me dead any longer?"

"Well, I wouldn't mourn you, but no, I don't think I feel quite so murderous anymore." Ren stared at him for a long moment. "To be truthful, I have my doubts about your treason."

Nathaniel straightened. "If you would keep those doubts to yourself, I would greatly appreciate it."

Ren's eyes narrowed. "Hmm. I thought as much." He glanced at the industrious footmen. Then he stroked one hand over the counterpane. "Nice
cover
," he said meaningfully. "I used to have one very much like it."

Nathaniel's lips twitched. Ren's file had revealed that on his last mission he'd been playing the disillusioned young lout ripe to be recruited for a bit of treason. "Thank you," he replied. "I can arrange for you to have another if you'd like."

Ren's gaze flew to his. He took a deep breath; then another. "Not—not yet."

Nathaniel nodded once. "I understand."