A Lady's Revenge (28 page)

Cora no longer cared to pursue their discussion. The thought of Guy with another woman did nasty things to her disposition. In a desperate attempt to change the subject, she recalled Guy’s comment about needing to speak with her.
Ethan.

She pulled at his coat, dislodging his fingers. “What was it you wanted to speak with me about? Did you learn something about Ethan?”

“No. What I have to say has nothing to do with your brother.” He uncurled from his loose-limbed stance. “When you are ready to leave, we will take a circuitous route back to Somerton’s town house. The closed carriage will afford some privacy.” His grim countenance and reserved tone put her on guard.

She rubbed her temples, questioning her ability to keep up with the constant tangle of events. Did she have the fortitude to fight this new threat, whatever it may be? Lord, she hoped so. Glancing toward the withdrawing rooms, Cora said, “Give me a moment, and I will be ready to leave.”

Guy followed her gaze and then examined the area. Satisfied with what he saw, he helped her down and turned toward the withdrawing rooms.

Cora’s heels dug into the carpet. “I can manage this on my own.”

Her attempt to stop his forward momentum failed. “I have no doubt.”

“Do not even think of following me into the ladies’ retiring room.”

He sent her a sideways glance. “Such a vulgar mind you have, Cora deBeau.”

Cora heard a rustle of fabric to her left at the same time Guy’s attention shifted behind them.

“Good evening, Lord Helsford,” a woman called out.

Guy slowed their progress until a woman in an eye-boggling combination of pomona green and pale pink sailed passed and then planted herself in their path. Bowing, he said, “Lady Meacham, what a pleasant surprise.”

“I’m sure it is, my boy. Introduce me to your lady.”

“My lady, this is Miss Cora deBeau. Miss deBeau, Lady Meacham was my aunt’s closest friend.”

Cora curtsied. “Then I like her already.”

Lady Meacham raised her penciled eyebrows at Cora’s bold declaration. “You knew Phoebe, young lady?”

“Indeed, I did,” Cora said. “My friendship with Lord Helsford spans many years.”

The older woman’s eyes narrowed on Guy. “And you are just now escorting this pretty lady around town?”

Guy inclined his head. “As much as it pains me to admit such a fault…”

“Phoebe would be none too pleased with your taking so long to come up to scratch,” Lady Meacham declared.

Uncomfortable with the woman’s assumptions, Cora said, “Um, my lady, I must beg your pardon, but I was on my way to the retiring room—”

Lady Meacham waved her off. “Go, go. I will stay here and keep the earl company.” Her lips thinned into a disapproving line as she gazed upon Guy. “Need to make sure he does not waste any more time.”

Cora nearly groaned on Guy’s behalf as she made her escape. A few feet from the ladies’ room, she peered back at Guy to see how he fared. Instead of resignation and an air of hurry-up-or-you-will-regret-it, she found his amused gaze on her, his head tilted at an angle that would indicate keen interest in his companion’s conversation. Cora frowned, unsure what to make of the scene and even more confused when Guy winked at her. Winked. As if this were all a great lark.

A man of his ilk—wealth, looks, title, and land—should understand the havoc one determined matron could mete out on an eligible bachelor. If she insinuated the wrong thing to the right person, he could be betrothed before the night was over. After the Chittendale debacle, he likely already was.

Shaking her head, Cora ignored the twinge of pleasure the thought provoked and hurried into the small room, incredibly grateful when she found the ladies, who were milling around, gone. She dropped onto a stool to rub away the dull ache at her temples.

Guy was a complication. He made her want things. Impossible things. Things that ceased to be within her reach the moment she learned how to pleasure a man, without taking any in return.

The oval looking glass propped on the dressing table beckoned her closer. The red, crescent-moon-shaped scar wrapped around her eye like an eagle’s talon closing in for the kill. She could still picture Valère’s gold-clad fist coming toward her, crashing into the side of her face, the warm trickle of blood seeping into her hair. She averted her gaze, unwilling to walk down the path of self-pity again.

Instead, she submerged her handkerchief in a nearby basin and blotted away the sheen of perspiration around her neck and in between her breasts. The cool water against her heated skin felt heavenly and helped restore her spirits. Somewhat.

She glanced at her reflection to ensure her coiffure was still in place, and then set off to join her self-appointed bodyguard. There was nothing for it. She could not wait until this mission was over to end this flirtation between them—or whatever this maddening desire to be with him every minute of every day was. Once Guy finished delivering his dreaded message, she would tell him no more kisses or caresses or mingled body heat or—anything.

She knew her thoughts were cowardly, but she couldn’t take the chance, not after having lost so much already. As things were, she would already suffer for the decisions she had made. Gathering her nerve, she pulled in a shaky breath before rejoining Guy and Lady Meacham.

A massive hand clamped over her mouth a second before she reached the door handle. She elbowed him in the gut and met with a wall of granite, the impact jarring her shoulder. Her assailant locked a crushing arm around her waist, forcing the air from her lungs as he lifted her off the ground. It all happened so quickly she had no opportunity to scream.

The brute half-carried her, half-dragged her back into the retiring room, shoving open a door she had barely registered earlier, which led into an adjoining bedchamber. When they passed the bed, she reached out and grabbed one of the tall posts, but he yanked her body so hard her arms felt like they were ripped from their sockets.

He opened another door leading out into an empty corridor. Seeing her opportunity for rescue slipping away, she tried incapacitating him one more time with a kick to his instep and a head butt to the nose.

“Damme,” he said under his breath, his hold loosening.

Cora surged forward with all her strength. It wasn’t enough.

The beefy hand covering the lower half of her face kept her head anchored to his chest, and her body slammed back into his bulk.

Then his other hand arced in front of her, she could barely see over his thick fingers, but she felt the blinding sharp pain searing through her shoulder. She stopped struggling.

“That’s a good girl,” the brute crooned next to her ear. “If you start squirming again, I’ll be tempted to use me shiv to carve up the other side of your pretty face.” He yanked the knife from her shoulder.

Black spots appeared before her eyes. The agonizing pain in her shoulder concerned her far less than her present lack of air. Her lungs burned with the effort to draw in a single breath. A cavernous black void seeped around the edges of her vision, and she slowly sagged against him.

“I thought ye might see it my way, missy.” Spittle sprayed the side of her face. He sniffed her neck and ran his tongue along its exposed length. “You’re much nicer than the wagtails down at the corner. Maybe when the guv’nor’s done with you, I’ll have me a better taste.”

Not until her eyes rolled back in her head did he loosen his grip. Cora sucked in big gulps of air, filling her lungs and bringing back her senses.

Without the clumsiness one would expect from a man his size, he replaced his hand with a sweat-soaked rag, securing it with a long strip of cloth tied at the back of her head. Tears pricked her eyes when her hair caught in the too-tight knot.

“Remember what I said about your squirming.” With that pronouncement, he hefted her up onto his shoulder and set off down the narrow corridor. Her arms hung limply down his back, and an occasional bead of blood dripped from her middle finger and splattered on the carpet behind them.

After the first rush of terror faded, Cora saw this for the opportunity it was. She had finally managed to flush Valère from his hiding place. She would have preferred doing so without being kidnapped, and definitely without being stabbed, but she gave the sacrifices no further thought.

She did, however, consider Guy. He would be furious once he found her missing. She wondered how long it would take him to realize she had been kidnapped and was not merely evading the scheming machinations of Lady Meacham. She imagined his terrible fear, his helplessness in the face of her disappearance. She imagined him searching for her in vain.

Her resignation turned to anger on Guy’s behalf. She reared up and put the full force of her body weight behind her downward momentum. Her elbow plowed into her captor’s lower back, eliciting a grunt of pain and a severe pinch on the back of her thigh. Cora winced but didn’t regret her show of ire. The action helped take the edge off her volatile emotions. She had to focus, to develop a plan before entering Valère’s hidden lair.

The brute’s thick fingers dug into the tender flesh of her leg, and Cora clamped her jaw shut, which probably saved her several broken teeth. Because in the next instant, the beast propelled her into the air and then let her crash down on his solid shoulder. The force of her own weight
whooshed
the air from her body, and the cracking sound of her still-healing ribs was the last thing she heard before darkness claimed her. The death grip she’d had on her dampened handkerchief loosened.

Five minutes.
Guy dropped his watch back into his pocket and glanced in the direction of the retiring room again. It felt more like an eternity since Cora skipped away from Lady Meacham’s none-too-subtle hints about matrimony.

The horrified look on Cora’s face had been the highlight of this evening’s affair. Now that he understood she was not put off by the prospect of marrying him, her escape had amused more than affronted him. She was so damned set on making sure his reputation remained untarnished, so society’s mamas would not set their sights on some other poor fool with a title.

If not for her inclination to tumble him through the air every time she was caught by surprise, he would have informed her that the
ton
already knew he was off the market. Until tonight, he had managed to stifle advancing mamas and acerbic voices without Cora being the wiser. He was rather surprised Chittendale had not received the message, being a connoisseur of gossip and all. But Guy realized he had not seen the marquess at any of the other functions they had attended, so perhaps he had only just returned to town.

He would have preferred to have spared Cora the scene, but she could no longer be in doubt of his commitment, even if she continued to fall back on old habits.

Speaking of which, where the hell was she?

“Did you get that, my lord?” Lady Meacham’s commanding tone cut through his musings.

If not for his growing apprehension for Cora, he would have fenced words with this woman who reminded him so much of his aunt Phoebe. The two were sharp-witted and motherly, both elements he had come to adore. But instead of engaging him in droll repartee, the older woman’s words had blurred into an incoherent murmur.

“Excuse me, my lady, but I must ask a favor of you,” Guy said, keeping the retiring room door in his sights. There was no way Cora could have left the room without his notice. Absolutely no way.

A spark of interest flashed across Lady Meacham’s rounded face. “Certainly. I would be happy to assist in any way.”

“Would you be so kind as to check on my companion?” He nodded toward the room. “She should have emerged by now, but she complained of a headache earlier, and I—”

Lady Meacham’s affable countenance turned cross. “You think she fainted or some other cock-brained notion? Women swoon to be caught by eligible young bucks, not to bounce their head off the hardwood floor.” She pivoted for the retiring room. “Probably just her monthly flux.”

She stopped abruptly and settled a disapproving eye on Guy. “You are not going to pucker up over the term ‘flux,’ are you?”

Guy raised a brow, somehow keeping his lips in a stern line. “Of course not. Use it all the time.”

The lady humphed and set off to check on Cora. Guy strolled to within a few feet of the door, each second ticking in his head like the Abbey Bells ringing at a funeral. Even with Lady Meacham’s incessant chatter, Guy had not taken his attention away from this chamber.

The door opened, and Guy’s breath caught—and released on a disappointed hiss—when the third lady who had entered and exited since Cora sought the shelter of the retiring room, emerged. The lady’s eyes widened at seeing Guy lurking so close to the women’s sanctuary. He nodded, and the young miss scurried away before he could ask her about Cora.

When the door opened the second time and Lady Meacham’s confused visage appeared, Guy knew something had gone wrong. Very wrong.

“She’s not there, my lord.”

Panic sucked the breath from his lungs. “She must be.”

Her lips thinned. “The room is quite empty, my dear boy.”

Guy wasted no more time. He sprinted the short distance separating him from Cora. She had to be in there. The alternative was too terrible even to consider.

“Lord Helsford! You mustn’t enter.”

Ignoring Lady Meacham’s admonishment, he breached the hallowed walls of the ladies’ retiring room. Yanking open the door, he nearly ripped it from its hinges. “Cora!”

A quick glance around the small room confirmed Lady Meacham’s assertion. A cold, tingling sweat covered his body. He shoved open a privacy curtain separating a chamber pot from the main room. Nothing.

He turned back to the small room and caught the lingering scent of jasmine. Closing his eyes, he pushed back the dread.
Think, Helsford!
When he opened them again, his gaze landed on another door adjacent to the chamber’s entrance. His throat tightened.

In two quick strides, he was through the portal and inside a bedchamber decorated in lavender and green and all manner of lace. Light filtering through a door left ajar on the far side of the room drew his attention. When he found the door led into an empty corridor, his heart plummeted. He knew in an instant she had been kidnapped, for Cora would never play so maniacal a trick on him.

Had Valère or one of his men spied on the women’s comings and goings all night until his quarry arrived? There was no other explanation. Ever a brilliant strategist, Valère could not have been so lucky to have chanced upon Cora pacing the lavender and green room while she plotted ways to free him of Lady Meacham’s marriage-scheming clutches.

Sick bastard.

A white object lying on the carpet caught his gaze. He rushed down the corridor. When he bent to pick it up, he realized it was a handkerchief. Correction: a
wet
handkerchief.

Guy’s upper lip curled in disgust and he made to flick the offending object away, when the scent of jasmine reached his nose. His pulse leapt. He inspected the silken square more closely and noticed Cora’s initials embroidered on one corner.

He made to stand, when something else caught his attention a few feet away. He rubbed his white-gloved fingers over the carpet, his heart thundered in his ears, and crystals shattered behind his eyes. He stared down in horror at the crimson stain.

No! Not again.
Goddammit, not again.