The Viscount's Dangerous Liaison: Regency romantic mystery (Dangerous Deceptions Book 3) Read online

  My woman, something deep and dark and primal inside him said. Mine. He rolled and she was under him, then she shifted and he fought to find some kind of control to pull away, only to realise that all she was doing was wriggling so they fitted together better.

  He had no experience with virgins beyond flirtatious kisses with a few fast young ladies on balconies or in hidden corners at balls, but he must be doing something right as far as this one was concerned, he realised hazily. Laura’s hands were pushing under his coat, finding the waistband of his breeches and she was making soft noises that were the most erotic thing he had ever heard.

  This had to stop. There was no way he was making love to her on the floor of a filthy cellar, but just a few seconds more…

  The door at the head of the steps banged open, spilling a shaft of light across the floor, mercifully just missing their feet.

  ‘Theo? Everything all right?’

  He got to his feet, yanked his coat straight. ‘Yes. Laura decided I was a Swinburn and took a swing at me in the dark with a bottle – ’

  ‘My best port!’ Perry leapt down the stairs and scooped up the bottle that lay on the floor with all the passion of a mother whose baby has been dropped.

  ‘Mrs Bishop! Kindly pass down a blanket or something for Miss Darke, she is getting chilled. Turn your back, Perry, Laura had to disrobe to give her clothing to Pitkin.’ He risked a glance at her but she had risen to her feet, draped herself in two hessian sacks and moved into the shadows at the foot of the steps. He would have to speak to her as soon as possible. As soon as they were alone. Reassure her that he had every intention of doing to right thing. Somehow. It seemed impossible, but he had to find a way. But he wished she would look at him…

  Mrs Bishop came down carrying what looked like a bed robe, bundled Laura into it and took her upstairs. Perry slid the bottle back into a gap in the rack on the wall, dusted his hands off and quirked an eyebrow at Theo who was brushing cobwebs and frayed bits of sacking off his coat. ‘Fell over, did you?’

  ‘I know what it looks like, but – ’ But what? What in Heaven’s name am I going to do?

  ‘No need to explain matters to me, old man, I’m not her father.’

  ‘You’re the nearest thing she’s got to a brother,’ Theo retorted. ‘I don’t blame you for asking. I just wish I knew how to get out of this coil.’

  ‘You’ll think of something. After all, Crow gave you a vote of confidence the other night,’ Perry said, turning to climb back up. He sounded suspiciously as though he was laughing.

  Oh yes, nothing funnier than a friend in love. If that is what this is… It has to be or otherwise why am I contemplating doing something utterly dishonourable by breaking a betrothal?

  Whatever came over me? I must be mad. Laura washed as best she could, given that the fire under the boiler had gone out in all the excitement and the water was cold. You know perfectly well, her conscience scolded as she looked in the mirror to see how much damage snipping off locks of hair to tuck under Pitkin’s cap had done. Lust, that’s what it is. Desire, plain and simple. I can’t even tell myself it was love just now – I just wanted to be skin to skin with him. He’ll think you a hoyden, a hussy. A round-heeled woman, she added, heaping on the coals of fire. One who falls easily onto her back. He’ll offer me a carte blanche next, I suppose, unless he found me hopelessly gauche and inexperienced.

  The sound of male laughter distracted her from the futile, miserable, thoughts. That wasn’t Perry or Theo. Had Mr Redfern called already? Then she recalled he had said someone else had arrived.

  She checked over her appearance in the mirror, decided that looking like a Puritan on the way to a funeral was perhaps overdoing the reaction to Theo’s kisses, took off the plain fichu and threw her new Norwich shawl around her shoulders. Someone would have warned her if the visitors should be avoided, so it must be safe to venture out, and she couldn’t stay in here hiding her blushes for ever.

  There were two strangers in the drawing room and, from the way everyone was behaving, they were old friends. She stopped in the doorway as they rose to their feet. One of the newcomers was a pale-skinned red-head with a sharp, intelligent face. Irish, she thought, from his colouring. Could this be the Duke of Calderbrook’s valet, Flynn? The other, dressed entirely in black with the exception of his shirt and neck cloth, was lean, tall, dark, with his hair clubbed back, emphasising the sharp bones and assessing eyes. Not the Duke, she was certain.

  With all four men standing the room seemed to contain an excess of masculinity. Perry stepped forward and took her hand. ‘Come in, Laura, and meet Viscount Ravenlaw – Jared – and Michael Flynn, Calderbrook’s valet, right-hand man and the source of the best gossip in London. Gentlemen, Miss Darke.’

  A valet sitting down with two viscounts and a baron? And one of the viscounts with a rapier propped against his chair? Her understanding of what happened in the world of the ton was clearly wide of the mark.

  ‘Gentlemen.’ She dropped a slight curtsey and took a seat in the semi-circle they had formed.

  ‘I wrote to Cal – that’s the Duke – to ask him about the Napoléon and whether he knew anything about gold and the French and instead of writing back he sent Flynn and Jared,’ Theo explained.

  ‘Cal is otherwise engaged making a spectacle of himself,’ Ravenlaw remarked, crossing one leg over the other and leaning back. He was possibly the most elegant man Laura had ever seen and, she suspected, one of the most dangerous.

  ‘Unkind,’ Flynn said with a grin. ‘Admittedly he’s fussing like a mother hen, but he is holding the basin and mopping the brow with admirable fortitude.’

  ‘Whose brow?’ Perry asked, looking baffled.

  ‘I suspect the Duchess is expecting a happy event,’ Laura suggested.

  ‘Exactly. No other woman has ever undergone this process, or so one would infer from Cal’s state of nerves. If I were Sophie I would have shot him by now, but then Her Grace is a highly superior female.’

  ‘She’s in love with him,’ Ravenlaw said. ‘Mystifying as that might seem to the rest of us. However, he did pull himself together enough to make some enquiries in government circles as soon as he got your letter, Theo, and he was sufficiently concerned to send the two of us instead of writing. This could be mere chance, a dropped foreign coin in the possession of a smuggler. Or it could be the clue that might solve a serious breach in the country’s security. Have you got the coin?’

  ‘In my strong box,’ Perry said, getting up.

  ‘Bring a magnifying glass if you have one,’ Ravenlaw called after him as he went out. ‘We need good light for this.’ He moved to the table in the window and took two small square envelopes from his inside breast pocket, shook a gold coin out of each and set them side by side on the table. One envelope was marked P, Laura saw, the other, L.

  Perry came back and handed the Napoléon and a glass to the Viscount who studied it closely for a minute, then lifted each of the coins from the envelopes in turn and held them against the piece from the tomb. ‘Ah. Now this is what we hoped.’ He handed the glass to Laura. ‘Here is the coin you found. Now compare it to this one.’ He lifted the golden disc from the envelope labelled P. ‘Look at the side with the laurel wreath. Can you see any differences?’

  Laura stared through the glass until her eyes watered. ‘No… Although this one – ours – has a little chip on one of the laurel leaves. See?’

  ‘That is not a chip. Look at this.’ He handed her the coin labelled L. ‘Keep the one from the tomb on the right so they are not confused. It is evidence.’

  ‘But this one has exactly the same fault. Look.’ She pushed them across the table towards Perry and Theo, keeping her right index finger on the one she had found.

  ‘You are right. The tip of one laurel leaf is missing.’

  Ravenlaw took back the coins and slipped the ones he had brought into their envelopes. ‘I need you to write a statement of where this was found and when, sign it and seal it up wit
h the coin.’

  ‘Are you going to explain?’ Theo demanded as Perry went off to the study for the second time.

  ‘When I am sure the tomb coin is secure.’

  Ravenlaw waited until they had composed a statement, all signed and dated it and then folded the coin inside, sealing it with Perry’s, Theo’s and Ravenlaw’s seal rings.

  ‘Right.’ Ravenlaw shook out the L coin. ‘The one labelled P was minted in Paris and is perfectly genuine. This one, and the one Miss Darke found, were struck in London at the Royal Mint. They are the correct weight of gold, they are perfect in every detail – except for that tiny flaw on the leaf. These are the coins that our agents in France receive.’

  ‘Spies?’ Laura asked.

  ‘Some coin goes to people you would term spies, enabling them to live their false lives in France. Some goes as bribes to corrupt officials or clerks in return for information. Large amounts are sent to the various groups plotting insurrection. In 1793 the Vendée region rose in revolt and although it was savagely crushed with a huge loss of life, the opposition is not dead. The British government feeds the flames with gold for weapons and printing and communications. There are agents fomenting unrest in the army and navy – I could go on, but you see the picture? It was thought to be a good idea to mark the forged gold so that we could, in some part, keep track of where it was going.’

  ‘And somehow one of these coins has found its way here.’ Laura nodded her understanding.

  ‘Could it be as simple as this being in general circulation, one of the local smugglers acquiring it in a transaction and then losing it?’ Theo asked.

  ‘It might be that. But the harbour at Blakeney, just along the coast from here, is one of the network of small trading ports where our agents come and go to the Continent. We always lose a few every year – they are careless or betrayed or they prove unreliable, but it seems that a higher than average number leave from Blakeney and are never heard of again.’

  ‘But surely the Channel ports and harbours are closer to France?’ Perry objected.

  ‘And therefore that much more obvious.’ Flynn, who had been sitting quietly to one side, spoke for the first time. ‘The East Anglian ports have a long history of coastal trade and, even though we’re at war with most of the Continent at the moment, the local men still keep up their connections across in the Netherlands, Denmark, even into the Baltic. They run small ships with modest cargoes of coal and wheat and so forth, crewed by men who know every creek and landing spot on the opposite coast.’

  ‘And the agents are being killed for the gold they carry?’ Perry looked grim.

  ‘Yes, or it could be that there is treachery involved – the agents are murdered, or handed over to the authorities and the gold goes into the French state coffers.’ Ravenlaw tapped one finger on the packets of coins. ‘Cal dropping into the Foreign Office asking about a gold Napoléon found a dozen miles from Blakeney got the attention of a small group of very worried men.’

  ‘And, besides Cal’s current preoccupation with family matters, it was considered that one humble valet and one viscount used to subterfuge and deception might have rather more chance of going unremarked than a duke. So, behold your latest recruits to the investigating force,’ Flynn finished with a mock bow.

  ‘There are other complications,’ Theo said. He explained Laura’s predicament and recounted the tale of the attacks on Will.

  ‘Miss Darke’s problems account for Pitkin’s masquerade,’ Ravenlaw observed. ‘But I cannot for the life of me understand why your curate was attacked when neither you, Manners, nor Theo, were assaulted. You were all three investigating the tomb, after all.’

  Something was niggling at Laura’s memory but she could not put a finger on it. Something Will had said…

  ‘Excuse me, my lord.’ Jed opened the door but remained on the threshold. ‘I followed those Swinburns and they went back to the Manor. And we’ve been out checking all around, they haven’t set anyone to lurk and spy.’

  He was followed closely by Mrs Bishop. ‘The girls have made up a room for Lord Ravenlaw and for Mr Flynn as well. They’ll take up hot water just as soon as you need it. I’ll have dinner on the table at seven, if that’s acceptable, my lord?’

  Laura glanced at the clock. It was only three. So much had happened since luncheon that she had expected it to be almost dinner time.

  ‘I think we need another look in that crypt,’ Ravenlaw said. ‘Before your curate and the Archdeacon put the cats amongst the pigeons.’

  ‘We could go now,’ Perry said. ‘We need lanterns.’

  Laura left Perry and Theo taking the other men out to the stables and went to the kitchen.

  ‘If the coast is clear then I am taking a walk,’ she said. ‘I am going mad cooped up in here, I need some fresh air and exercise.’

  ‘Is it worth the risk?’ Mrs Bishop asked. ‘You might be seen.’

  ‘By whom? The Swinburns have gone, Jed and the men have checked the area and I will stay on the footpaths close to the house, not walk in the lane.’

  Mrs Bishop sighed, but nodded. ‘Wear stout boots and take a weapon then,’ she advised ‘Here.’ She took a thin knife from a rack and handed it to her.

  ‘Thank you.’ Laura took it by the hilt with as much confidence as she could summon and tucked it into her reticule. Really, Mrs Bishop has a quite bloodthirsty side to her character. At least she had not insisted on Laura taking the shotgun with her.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Leaving the house felt like an escape to Laura. Not a flight from danger but from being smothered by over-protective men and from the presence of Theo who was occupying her thoughts obsessively.

  It is quite straightforward, she told herself as she went out of the garden gate into the copse that ran along one side of the grounds. He cannot break his engagement without compromising his honour and, for a gentleman, that is anathema. They fight duels and risk death rather than be dishonoured – what is a passing attraction to a woman against that?

  Besides, Theo was by no means perfect. He was over-protective, he had a recent past of thoroughly wild behaviour from what Perry had told her, and he was not dark. She had always considered that only a dark-haired man would do for her. Nor is his nose straight enough, she decided, cheering herself up with the frivolity of listing all his faults as she walked along the narrow path avoiding brambles and the occasional muddy spot.

  After five minutes she reached the point where the lane down to the coast road brushed the edge of the little wood and the footpath she was on descended for a few yards to meet it. She had planned to turn and skirt the wood in the opposite direction, but as she did so there was the rattle of harness and the creak of wheels and a gig drew up and stopped almost level with where she was standing.

  Laura moved back deeper into the bushes and peered between the overhanging branches at a one-horse gig with an unaccompanied woman driving it.

  ‘Tansy, don’t tell me you’ve gone lame! You only had a new set of shoes last week.’ The voice was pleasant, but forthright, and Laura moved a little closer, suspecting she knew who this was.

  ‘Oh, do stand still, you foolish animal.’

  The horse had clearly decided that its hoof hurt and that no human was going to make it any better. It was sidling and fidgeting and refusing to remain still as the driver jumped down and went to its head. Now Laura could see her clearly and she had been correct, this was Mr Hogget’s second wife – or scandalous mistress, depending on whose gossip you believed. She had missed the encounter that had led to Mrs Hogget being snubbed and snubbing her Aunt Swinburn in return, but she had seen the lady at a distance before.

  The horse tossed its head and jerked the reins from her hand when Mrs Hogget tried to lift its off-fore leg and, without thinking, Laura slipped from her hiding place, went down the path and took the reins just below the bit. ‘Stand,’ she said firmly.

  The other woman looked up, then smiled. ‘Thank you so much. Ah, here we are, just a
stone. There, that’s better, I don’t think it has bruised the foot.’ She straightened up and brushed off her hands. ‘I know who you are – you are the missing Miss Darke, are you not?’

  ‘I – ’

  ‘Goodness, do not fear for a moment that I’d betray you. I cannot stand the Swinburns, ghastly snobs that they are. And that rake Giles Swinburn is a complete wretch.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Laura believed her. ‘I would be most obliged if you do not mention to anyone that you saw me. I should have taken more care, but I was becoming quite distracted, shut up in the house with no fresh air.’ It was reckless, but something convinced her to take the risk, although quite what, she could not say. Theo will be apoplectic when he discovers what I’m doing.

  ‘Come with me to Blakeney. I had a fancy for a drive and to pay for some fish while I was at it.’ She studied Laura with a frankness that was attractive. ‘I know, put on this cloak.’ She rummaged under the seat. ‘Dreadful, shabby old thing, I keep it in case I’m caught in a rain shower. But it has a hood. If you take off your bonnet and tuck it under the seat you can pretend to be my maid. Do come. Unless, of course, you believe the gossip about me.’

  ‘I don’t care if it is true,’ Laura said, thrusting her bonnet under the seat and swinging the cloak around her shoulders. ‘But is it?’ she asked as she climbed up beside the other woman.

  ‘That Henry’s wife is still alive? Yes, it is. Walk on, Tansy. The poor woman is disturbed in her mind and is a danger to herself. Henry has her confined in one wing of the house with some very kind attendants, and she is tranquil most of the time, although deeply confused. But sometimes…’ She broke off. ‘Anyway, she has no idea who Henry is any longer. The doctors wanted to send her to an asylum, but he was so horrified by what he saw there that he refused.’