Kit wished him luck. She couldn’t believe Jack would tell him anything, even under such pressure, but she wasn’t about to wait to find out. She’d remembered Jack’s saddle pistol. Pray God he kept it loaded. As she wriggled back through the dunes, she heard her husband’s voice.
“You’re Lord George Belville, I take it?”
Kit wondered what her erstwhile suitor would make of that. She hurried toward the horses, protected from sight by the dunes.
His gaze steady on Lord Belville’s malevolent eyes, Jack inwardly cursed himself for a fool. He should have taken the time to learn why Kit had wanted to tell him about Belville. She’d been uneasy enough to mention him in the first place. He should have trusted her instinct. Now Joe was dead. And God knew how he, and George and Matthew, were going to get out of this without ending in the same state.
“How do you know who I am?” Belville’s honeyed tones had become a snarl.
“You’ve been identified by someone with a direct connection to the High Commissioner. You could say that person has his lordship’s ear.”
Jack heard George, beside him, choke. Carefully, he weighed up the odds. They weren’t encouraging. Belville had only two pistols, but he could see the butt of a smaller gun glinting in the man’s waistband. Presumably, he also had a knife somewhere about him. Even if he missed one shot—and why should he, he’d plenty of room and they’d no cover—he’d still have a weight advantage over either George or Matthew in a knife fight.
Keep talking and pray for a miracle seemed the best bet.
“Who is this person? This intimate of the High Commissioner’s?”
Jack’s brows flew. “Ah—now that would be telling secrets, wouldn’t it?”
Belville leveled his pistols. “I don’t believe there is such a person.”
Jack shrugged. “But how did I know you? We haven’t met before.”
The barrels wavered. Belville stared, eyes narrowing. “Who are you?”
Out of sight and sound, Kit’s fingers closed about the small pistol tucked into the pocket in Champion’s saddle. She let out a sigh of relief. If only she could get back in time.
As she scurried into the dunes, she heard Belville’s voice, angry and demanding. Clearly, he hadn’t liked being known. Jack’s voice answered, smooth and confident, which only seemed to wind Belville’s spring tighter. Kit forced herself to take care twisting through the dunes, praying her husband’s glib tongue wouldn’t get him shot before she made it back.
“Let’s just say I’m someone with an interest in the traffic.” Jack kept his eyes on Belville’s. “Perhaps, if we talk, we might discover our interests are complementary?”
Belville frowned, clearly debating the possibility. Then he slowly shook his head. “There’s something damned odd about your ‘traffic.’ You sent a man out tonight—Henry and I would like to know what he was carrying. There’s no other traitor in Whitehall bar us—Henry’s quite sure of that. Which means you’re running a double deal, one which may well rebound on Henry’s and my necks.” Belville smiled, a chilling sight. “I’m afraid, dear sir, that your days in the profession have come to an end.”
So saying, he raised both pistols.
Ten feet behind him, Kit skidded to a soundless halt in the sand, eyes wide and terrified. She jerked Jack’s pistol up before her, clutching it in both hands. Screwing her eyes tight shut, she pulled the trigger.
An explosion of sound ricochetted from the cliffs. Both Jack and George rocked back on their heels, expecting to feel the searing pain of a bullet somewhere in their flesh. As the veil of powder smoke drifted past on the breeze, they looked at each other and realized neither had stopped a bullet. Matthew reached them, equally astonished to find both unharmed. In amazement, they all turned to stare at Belville.
His lordship’s pasty complexion had paled, a look of incredulity stamped across his fleshy features. Both pistols were smoking but pockmarks in the sand at Jack’s and George’s feet bore evidence that he’d not raised his weapons far before discharging them.
Bewildered, Jack looked into the man’s eyes, only to find them glazing. As he watched, Belville twisted to the right and collapsed in a heap on the sand.
Facing them stood Kit, now revealed, a smoking pistol in her hands, her eyes enormous pools of shock.
Jack forgot about Belville, about missions and spies. In a split second, he’d covered the space between them and wrapped Kit in his arms, crushing her to him, furious and thankful all at once. “Damn woman!” he said into her curls. “How the hell did you get here?”
He felt weak, shock and relief offsetting his anger that she was there at all. As he reached for the gun, hanging from her limp fingers, he swore softly. “What the hell am I to do with you?”
Kit blinked up at him, thoroughly disoriented. She’d just killed a man. She wriggled in Jack’s arms, trying to peer around his shoulders to where George and Matthew were bent over Belville’s body. But Jack held her firmly, using his body to shield her. “Be still.”
With no alternative, Kit did. Almost immediately waves of nausea swept through her. She paled and swayed into Jack’s embrace as faintness dragged at her senses.
“It’s all right. Breathe deeply.”
Kit heard the words of comfort and did as she was told. Gradually, the world stopped spinning.
Then George was beside them.
Jack held her tight, her face pressed to his chest. Beneath her cheek she could feel his heartbeat, strong and steady, very much alive. Tears started to her eyes. Annoyed at her weakness, Kit blinked them away.
One look at George’s face was enough for Jack, but he had to know and Kit had to hear. “Dead?”
George nodded. “Clean through the heart.”
Jack stifled a ridiculous urge to ask Kit whether, among her many odd talents, she included pistol shooting. Even at such close range, a clean shot under pressure took skill. And courage. But he had no doubt of her reserves of that quality.
The resigned overtones in each man’s voice brought Kit’s head up. She stared at Jack. “Didn’t you want him dead?”
To his exasperation, Jack couldn’t come up with a convincing affirmative fast enough to allay her suspicions. Instead, her shocked gaze compelled him to stick to something like the truth. “It would have been more help if we could have got him alive, but,” he hurried on, “in the circumstances, Matthew, George, and I are perfectly happy to be alive. Don’t think we’re complaining.”
Jack couldn’t tell what she was feeling; her eyes reflected a turmoil far deeper than his own. To his relief, George came to his aid.
“Matthew says a body put in here will be taken out to sea.”
Jack nodded. A disappearance would be easier all around. Bodies had to be explained, and explaining Belville’s would not help their mission.
“Joe—we have to find Joe!”
Kit’s voice jerked both her listeners to a sense of their duty.
“No!” came from both of them.
“I’ll take you home,” Jack continued. “George will deal with Joe.”
But Kit drew back as far as he’d let her, shaking her head vehemently. “But he might not…No. We have to look now!”
Both men registered the note of hysteria in her voice. They exchanged troubled glances over her head.
“Come on!” Kit was tugging at Jack’s arm. “He might be dying while you argue!”
Neither Jack nor George held much hope for Joe but neither felt confident of convincing Kit of the fact he was almost certainly dead already. With a sigh, Jack released her but retained a firm hold on her hand. Together, the three of them mounted to the cliff and approached the hillock.
A pathetic bundle in worn clothes was all that remained of Joe. The sand about was stained with the blood that had poured from the gaping wound in his neck. Kit stared. Then, with a convulsive sob, she buried her face in Jack’s shirt.
George checked but there was no vestige of life left in the huddled form.<
br />
Kit struggled to draw breath. For weeks, she’d been Jack’s lookout, playing smuggler without a care in the world. It had all been a game. But Joe’s death was no game. If she’d still been with Jack, she would have died. Instead, Joe had gone. Any possibility of feeling remorse for killing Belville disappeared, run to ground along with Joe’s blood. She’d avenged Joe, and for that she was glad.
The sudden rush of emotions weakened her to the point where Jack’s arms were the only thing holding her upright. He sensed her draining strength and swore.
To Jack, the sight of his murdered lookout was a scene from a nightmare. Of course, in his worst nightmare, the huddled figure was Kit. The fact that it was Joe who had died muted the shock, but it was still very real. Badly shaken, he swung Kit into his arms, drawing comfort from the warmth in her slim frame.
George looked up. “Matthew and I will sort this out. For the Lord’s sake, get her home. And don’t leave her alone.”
Jack needed no further urging. He carried his silent wife down to the horses and set her on Champion. He swung up behind her and settled her against him. “Where’s your horse?”
Kit told him as they negotiated the climb to the cliff. Jack rode to the trees and tied the mare to Champion’s saddle before setting a direct course for the Castle. His one aim was to get a brandy into Kit and then get her to bed. She was already shivering. He’d no experience of deep shock in women, but he fully expected her to get worse.
As they traversed the moonlit fields, Kit struggled to find her mental feet. She’d killed a man. No matter how she viewed that fact, she was unable to feel anything like guilt. In the same position, she’d do it again. He’d been about to kill Jack, and that was all that had mattered. As Castle Hendon loomed on the horizon, she accepted reality. Jack was hers—like any female of any species, she’d kill in a loved one’s defense.
“We’ll have to do something for Joe’s family.”
The sudden comment brought Jack out of his daze.
“Don’t worry. I’ll deal with it.”
“Yes, but…” Kit went on, unaware she was babbling all but incoherently.
Jack soothed her with reassurances. Eventually, she quieted, as if her outburst had drained her remaining strength. She sagged against him, comfortingly alive. Jack concentrated on guiding Champion through the darkening fields. His mind was full of conflicting emotions. The moon was setting; it was full dark by the time he clattered into his stables.
He shouted for Martins. The man came at a run, tucking his nightshirt into his breeches. Jack dismounted, then lifted Kit down, ignoring Martins’s shocked stare. His wife’s breeches were the most minor of the concerns pressing for his attention. He left Martins to deal with the horses and carried Kit to the house. He let them in through a side door. A single candle waited on the table just inside. Jack ignored it. He carried Kit straight to her room.
Once there, he stripped her of her clothes, ignoring her protests, handling her gently, like a child. He grabbed a towel and rubbed her briskly, over every square inch, until she glowed. Kit grumbled and tried to stop him, then gave up and lay still, slowly relaxing under his hands. He left her for a moment, stretched naked on her bed, her coverlet thrown over her. When he returned from his room, he was also naked and carried two glasses of brandy.
Jack slipped under the coverlet, feeling Kit’s satin skin warm against his. “Here. Drink this.”
He held the glass to her lips and persevered until, under protest, she’d drained it. He drained his own in one gulp and put both glasses on the table. Then he slipped down into the bed beside her, gathering her into his arms.
To his surprise, Kit turned to look up at him. She put up one hand to draw his head down to hers. He kissed her. And went on kissing her as he felt her come alive.
It hadn’t been his intention, but when later he lay sated and close to sleep, Kit a warm bundle beside him, he had to admit his wife’s timing had not been at fault. Their union had been an affirmation of their need for each other, of the fact that they were both still alive. They’d needed the moment.
Jack yawned and tightened his hold about Kit. There were things he had to think of, before he could yield to sleep. Someone had to take news of Belville’s death posthaste to London. It sounded as if “Henry” was Belville’s superior in the spying trade, and presumably worked somewhere in Whitehall. Whoever Henry was, they needed to make sure of him before Belville’s disappearance tipped him off. Could George go to London? No—whoever went would need to explain Belville’s death. He could take responsibility for his wife’s actions; no other man could.
He would have to go, and go early.
Jack glanced down at Kit’s curly red head, a fuzz in the darkness. He grimaced. She wouldn’t be pleased, but there was no help for it.
The vision of her, his smoking pistol in her hand, came back to haunt him. He hadn’t known what he’d felt when he’d seen her standing there and realized what she’d done. He still didn’t.
No husband should have to go through the traumas she’d put him through. When he returned from London, that was something he was going to explain.
Chapter 28
When Kit woke and saw the letter, addressed to her in her husband’s scrawl, propped on the pillow beside her, she groaned and closed her eyes. When she opened them again, the letter was still there.
Damn him! What now? Muttering French curses, she sat up and broke the seal.
Her shriek of fury brought Elmina hurrying in. “Ma petite! You are ill?”
“I’m not ill—but he will be when I get my hands on the bloody high-and-mighty High Commissioner! How dare he leave me like this?”
Kit threw down the letter and flung the covers from her legs, barely noticing her nakedness in her anger. She accepted the gown Elmina, scandalized, threw about her shoulders, shrugging into the silk confection before she realized it was one of those he’d bought her. “What’s the use of these things if he’s not even here to see them?”
Her furious question was addressed to the ceiling. Elmina left it unanswered.
By the time Kit had bathed and breakfasted, very much alone, her temper had cooled to an icy rage. She read her husband’s letter three more times, then ripped it to shreds.
Determined not to think about it, she tried to submerge herself in her daily routine with varied success. But when evening approached and she was still alone, her distractions became limited. In the end, after a lonely dinner, seated in splendid solitude at the dining table, she retired to the library, to the chair by the fire, to stare broodingly at the vacant chair behind his desk.
It wasn’t fair.
She still had very few clues as to his purpose, but her suspicions were mounting. She’d helped him gain control over all the smugglers in the area—she didn’t know why he’d needed that but was sure it had been his objective in joining his Gang with her small outfit. Despite her constant requests, he’d refused to divulge his plans. Even when she’d threatened him with exposure, he’d stood firm. Then she’d saved them from the Revenue, nearly dying in the process. Had he weakened? Not a bit!
Kit snorted and shifted in her chair, slipping her feet from her slippers and tucking her cold toes beneath her skirts.
His reaction to the latest developments was all of a piece. He’d hied off to London, to smooth things over regarding Belville’s death, so he’d said. Kit’s eyes narrowed, her lips twisted cynically. He’d slipped up there. Their story for public consumption was that Belville had disappeared, presumed a victim of the treacherous currents. She wished she knew who Jack was seeing in the capital. Doubtless, they were getting the explanation she’d been denied.
Kit sighed and stretched. The lamps were burning low. She might as well go up to her empty bed. There was no getting away from the fact that her husband simply didn’t trust her, was apparently incapable of trusting her.
Full lips drew into a line; amethyst eyes gleamed. Kit put her feet back into her slippers and stood.
Somehow, she was going to have to make clear to her aggravating spouse that his attitude was simply not good enough.
With a determined tread, she headed for bed.
When Sunday dawned, Kit found herself both husbandless and filled with restless energy—the latter a natural consequence of the former. Flinging back the curtains, she looked out on a fairy-tale scene. The green of the fields was dew-drenched, each jeweled blade sparkling under a benevolent sun. There was not a cloud to be seen; the birds sang a serenade of joy to the bluest of skies. A glint appeared in Kit’s eye. She hurried to the wardrobe. It would have to be her inexpressibles; Jack had been overly hasty in divesting her of her riding breeches and Elmina had yet to mend them.
Clad as a boy, she slipped from the still sleeping mansion. Saddling the chestnut with her convertible sidesaddle was easy enough. Then she was riding out, quickly, lest the grooms see her, heading south. She reached the paddock where Delia was held. The black mare came racing at her whistle. It was the work of a few minutes to transfer the saddle, then she turned the chestnut loose to graze in unwonted luxury, while she and Delia enjoyed themselves.
She rode straight for the north coast, passing close by the cottage, a black arrow speeding onward. When they pulled up on the cliffs, exhilaration pounded in her veins. She was breathing hard. Laughter bubbled in her throat. Kit held up her hands to the sun and stretched. It was wonderful to be alive.
It would be even more wonderful if her hideously handsome husband was here to enjoy it with her—only he wasn’t. Kit pushed that thought, and the annoyance it brought, aside. She cast about for a cliff path.