C. Harris - What Darkness Brings

“Namely?”

“I keep his secret, I keep my life. I choose to destroy him. . I destroy myself.”

Sebastian searched her strained face, noting the new lines of anger and determination that bracketed her mouth. He had never discovered the nature of the documents Yates held, but there was no doubt in his mind that they were powerful indeed.

He said, “Did Jarvis tell you he was behind tonight’s attack?”

“No. But what other explanation is there? Those men made it obvious their purpose was to kill me. Not Yates. Me. But once they’d shot Yates, they let me live. ‘You know our orders,’ I heard one of them say. I think Jarvis gave strict instructions that they were to kill either me or Yates-but not both of us.”

“If the French are still convinced that Yates killed Eisler and stole the blue diamond, they would be very careful not to kill the only two people who might know the current location of the stone.”

“True. But then, why not kidnap me, the way the men at Covent Garden sought to do? Why not take me, force me to hand over the diamond, and then kill me?”

He studied her pale, beautiful face. “I don’t know. Have you managed to learn anything about the agent tasked by Napoleon to recover the French Blue?”

She shook her head. “My friend claims not to have been told. From what he said, I suspect the individual involved is English, although a second person was recently dispatched from Paris to assist him.”

“Him?”

“Or her. My contact did not specify which.”

She fell silent, her gaze drifting back to Yates’s pallid face.

Sebastian reached out to take her hand in his. “I’m so sorry, Kat,” he said. “I know how much Yates had come to mean to you.”

She drew in a deep breath that shuddered her chest. “In the past, I never allowed myself to be frightened. But. . I’m frightened now.”

He tightened his grip on her hand. “I will always stand your friend, Kat. Always. No matter what happens.”

Her gaze met his. “Will you, Sebastian? And if Jarvis was behind this?”

“I told Jarvis a year ago that if he harms a hair on your head, I’ll kill him. That hasn’t changed.”

“And what will it do to your marriage, do you think, if you kill your wife’s father?”

He said nothing, but there was no need. For they both knew the answer to her question.

Charles, Lord Jarvis, was with the Regent in a gaming hell near Portland Place, his bored gaze fixed on a spinning roulette wheel, when Sebastian walked up to him and leaned in close to say, “I understand you made a visit to Cavendish Square this evening.”

Jarvis shifted his gaze to the Prince. “You refer, I take it, to my condolence call on Yates’s devastated young widow?”

“A condolence call? Is that how you would describe it?”

“You would describe it differently?”

Sebastian studied the big man’s full, arrogant face. “A year ago, I warned you that if you made a move to harm Kat Boleyn, I would kill you. Understand this: My marriage to your daughter changes nothing. If I discover that you were behind tonight’s attack, you’re a dead man.”

Jarvis turned to look directly at him, the gray eyes that were so much like his daughter’s narrowed and hard. “Likewise, I presume you understand that your marriage to Hero in no way protects you. You interfere in any way with what I deem necessary for the preservation and prosperity of the realm, and I will eliminate you. Without hesitation or regret.”

The two men’s gazes met, clashed.

Sebastian gave a slow, measured bow and walked away.

Hero returned to Brook Street to find Devlin sprawled in a worn leather armchair beside the library fire, his gaze on the glowing embers, the black cat stretched out on the hearthrug beside him.

He looked up when she paused in the doorway. A nearby brace of candles cast a harsh pattern of light and shadow across his lean features. “Have you seen your father?” he asked.

“No; why? Have you two been at swords and daggers again?”

“Something like that.”

She went to rest one hand on his shoulder in an awkward gesture of comfort. “I heard about Yates. I’m sorry; I know you liked him.”

He covered her hand with his own. “He was an interesting man. I’d like to have known him better. And now. . he’s dead.”

“Kat Boleyn was unharmed in the attack?”

“Yes.”

“Thank goodness for that, at least.” She hesitated. “Surely you don’t think Jarvis had something to do with what happened tonight?”

“Honestly?” His head fell back, his gaze meeting hers. “I don’t know.”

She could feel the anger and determination that twanged through him. And she knew the heartache and deep disquiet of a woman who loved two men-a father and a husband-who hated each other.

She said, her voice quiet but steady, “He’s my father, Devlin. I cherish no illusions as to what manner of man he is. But I still love him dearly.”

“I know.”

“And it doesn’t make any difference, does it?”

“It does. But. .”

“But not enough.” She moved to scoop up the black cat and cradle him against her for a long, silent moment. Then she looked up. “I’m going to bed. Are you coming?”

A soft whisper of ash falling on the grate filled the sudden hush in the room.

He said, “Do you want me?”

“Yes.”

Their lovemaking that night had an edge to it, a raw desperation that hadn’t been there before.

Neither spoke again of that day’s events, or of the shadow it had cast between them. But the awareness of it was there, as was the knowledge that the woman to whom Sebastian had lost his heart so long ago was now free.

Saturday, 26 September

Sebastian’s dreams took him many places. To a wild, windswept Cornish hillside overlooking a rocky cove; to hot, fever-racked nights beneath a West Indian sky aglitter with a universe of unfamiliar stars; to a dry, sun-blasted land of smoke-blackened walls and vacant-eyed women and the desiccated, bleached bones of long-dead men.

But that night, Sebastian dreamed of demure ladies in gowns of heavy velvet and brocade, their wimples white in the spring sunshine. He wandered crushed-gravel paths shaded by leafy chestnut trees; breathed in the scents of lavender and apothecary roses, vervain and lemon balm. Climbing the steps to a broad, freshly swept terrace, he entered a graceful sandstone house, its leaded windows unshrouded by ivy or cobwebs or the grime of ages.

The flagstones beneath his feet were well scrubbed and unbroken, the newly whitewashed walls hung with rich tapestries and crossed swords. As he moved down the passage, he heard the distant lilting notes of a pipe, a child’s laughter, a man’s chanting voice suddenly hushed. And he awoke with a start, legs swinging over the edge of the bed as he sat up, the icy air of the pale morning biting his naked flesh.

“What’s wrong?” asked Hero sleepily, rolling over to lay a hand on his arm.

“There’s something about Eisler’s house that has been bothering me for days now.”

She sat up, her dark hair tumbling about her bare shoulders as she hugged the quilt to her against the cold. “What about the house?”

He pushed to his feet. “Something in the proportions of the rooms is off. I can’t quite put my finger on it. But I want to take another look at it.” He glanced back at her. “Care to come?”

“Do you think Perlman will agree to let us search the house again?”

Sebastian smiled. “I don’t intend to ask him.”

The door to the crumbling old Tudor house in Fountain Lane was opened by a sour-faced woman in black bombazine and a yellowing cap. She was as stout as her husband was lean and a good fifteen to twenty years younger, with thick, bushy gray brows, a bulbous nose, and small dark eyes half-hidden by fat, puffy lids.