A Valentine Wedding (29 page)

Alasdair’s step slowed. “Meaning?”

She shrugged. “I’m not sure what I’m getting at, but I don’t normally fall asleep in the middle of a ball. I thought …” she hesitated, then continued, “I thought I just felt ill because of what I’d overheard. But I wasn’t ill. I was asleep.”

Alasdair stopped at a low wall running alongside the narrow village street. He leaned against it, looking out over the rolling countryside, considering this. “What did you eat or drink at Almack’s?”

“Nothing. It’s hardly inviting fare.” She turned and hitched herself up on the wall beside him, swinging her long legs.

“True.” He frowned. “You and I drank the same wine at dinner. We ate from the same dishes.”

“Yes.” She shook her head. “Never mind, it was just something that occurred to me … that if they weren’t ordinary burglars, then maybe they could have arranged to put me to sleep.”

“I don’t know why I didn’t think of it myself.” He stared out across the wall. “But I don’t see how it could have been done.”

Then he turned and put his hands at her waist, scolding, “Such an indecorous creature you are, sitting on walls like a little girl! It’s a wonder you don’t still have torn petticoats.” He lifted her down, shaking
his head. “The wall’s covered in moss. Turn around.”

He twisted her and dusted off the back of her orange skirt with a degree of vigor, then his hand paused, traced the curve of her backside, kneaded the firm flesh beneath her skirt.

“Alasdair, we’re in the middle of the village!” she hissed, pulling away. “Don’t do that!”

“But I like to,” he said simply.

“Satyr!” Emma accused. Then her attention was caught by the sound of carriage wheels. “Here’s the chaise! For pity’s sake,
behave.”

Alasdair merely chuckled.

Maria descended from the carriage in a breathless sweep of chatter. “Such a well-sprung vehicle, I do declare. I’ve never had such a smooth journey. And not the slightest moment of alarm crossing Finchley Common, although I do so dread highwaymen. Did you enjoy your drive, Emma love?” She beamed upon Emma and Alasdair.

“Yes, it was lovely,” Emma said, lying through her teeth. It had been one of the most uncomfortable drives of her life. “My horses have the softest mouths.”

Maria’s nod conveyed knowledgeable understanding of this important issue, although she had never held a pair of driving reins in her life.

“This afternoon we’re going to ride to Stevenage,” Emma continued cheerfully. “To rest the chestnuts. But come into the inn, now. Nuncheon is waiting for you. And there’s a bedchamber where you may refresh yourself first.”

“Oh, how pleasant. What a pretty village this is.” Maria entered the inn, as always prepared to be
pleased. “I own I would like to wash my hands and comb my hair. Come up with me, love.”

Alasdair remained behind in the stableyard. “Everything all right, Jemmy?”

“Aye.” Jemmy dismounted from Phoenix. “Traffic’s summat chronic, though. Couldn’t ’ardly get through Barnet, it was such a press.”

“It should be quieter now we’re out of London. You’ll find Sam in the kitchen when you’ve stabled Phoenix and Swallow. Make sure they give us a good team for the next stage.”

“They’ll not fob anythin’ but prime-goers on me, guv,” Jemmy declared, spitting into the straw at his feet.

“No,” Alasdair agreed with a half smile. He went into the inn.

The four horsemen were at this point passing the gibbet at Fallow Corner. “You’re certain they’re heading north, Paolo?” Luiz slouched in his saddle like a sack of potatoes. He was a dreadful rider and disliked the exercise intensely.

“I followed them to the Islington toll. They bought tickets for the next three stages on the turnpike.” Paul sounded as irritable as he felt. He had hoped to have this business over and done with by now, instead of which he was chasing over the open countryside after a procession as long as a Roman triumph.

Luiz grunted and slumped deeper in his saddle. “We make better time than a chaise,” he offered. “And they’ll be stopping to change horses.”

“At Barnet, probably,” Paul muttered almost to himself. “We’ll pick up their tracks there.”

He glanced sideways at the other two men, who rode in silence, with impassive expressions. Their English was sketchy and they were under strict instructions to maintain silence except when they were alone. The minute they opened their mouths, they’d give the game away. But Paul liked the look of them otherwise. He knew the type and they made good servants in business of this kind. They had the solid brute demeanor of those without either imagination or conscience. If they were told to murder, they would do so. If they were told to hurt, they would do so without compunction.

Barnet was a hive of activity as the turnpike traffic from both the Holloway road and the Great North road converged. Paul rode into the stableyard of the Green Man to make inquiries.

A weasel-faced ostler stared at him pityingly. “Nah, we ‘avn’t ’ad no northbound traffic changin’ ’osses ’ere.” He sucked on a straw as if considering the issue. “ ‘Course, we wouldn’t expect none neither, seein’ as ‘ow the Green Man don’t do business wi’ northern traffic. We only does the southern.” He delicately picked a wisp of straw off his tongue, adding with great condescension, “Thought everyone knowed that.”

Paul controlled the urge to check the man’s insolence with his whip. He turned his horse to ride out of the yard.

“Eh, guvnor …” a voice peeped up at him.

He looked down at a scrawny urchin trotting along beside him. “I could tell you where the northerners go.” The child held up a grimy hand.

Paul took out a penny. “Well?”

“The Red Lion, guv.” The child jumped up, hand outstretched for the penny.

Paul tossed it to the ground and rode back to the street.

At the Red Lion, he struck gold. The inn servants did not recall a chaise with two women passengers, but they did recall a curricle driven by a lady in an orange habit, accompanied by a gentleman. They had stepped into the inn for half an hour to take refreshment before continuing to Potters Bar.

“What now?” Luiz asked, easing his aching back. “We rest a bit here?”

Paul glanced up at the sun. It was beginning its downward slide to the west. “No,” he said. “We’re in no danger of running into the back of them. We keep going.”

Luiz muttered and took the tankard of ale handed up to him by a potboy. He drained the contents in one long gulp. “How long d’you think these beasts can keep going?”

“Well change them at Potters Bar.” Paul was impatient but Luiz was having his tankard refilled and his fellow travelers were doing likewise. He was thirsty himself, but perversely refused to quench his thirst. He had his sights set on his mission, and pride would not permit such trivialities as hunger, thirst, and fatigue to be considered.

“Eh, Paolo, don’t be so sour,” Luiz chided. “We’ll get the woman … pick her off easy. Whatever inn they’re at tonight, we’ll winkle her out of there.”

Paul’s nostrils flared; his mouth grew small. He knew Luiz spoke the truth. They’d done much harder things in their time. And their quarry and her
protector couldn’t know they were being pursued.

“Lemonade!” Emma said suddenly. She reined Swallow in to a walk and turned to Alasdair, riding beside her. “Lemonade.”

“Lemonade?” he queried. “What about it?”

“I had some … last night … at Almack’s,” she said impatiently. “When the duke of Clarence was proposing … or at least I think that was what he was doing. He wasn’t too clear. He was certainly proposing something.”

“I hope you set him right,” Alasdair commented dryly.

“Yes, of course I did. I left him … but you’re not listening to me.”

“I am. Lemonade.” He raised an inviting eyebrow. “Tell me about it.”

“Paul Denis brought me a glass … just before I told him that I wasn’t going to marry him … that I wasn’t going to marry anyone, is what I said, so as to let him down gently, you understand.”

“I understand,” he said rather more aridly than before. “You seem to have had rather a busy evening putting off suitors. Was he brokenhearted?”

“No.” Emma glared at him. “Can’t you keep to the point?”

“My apologies.” He bowed slightly. “Denis brought you a glass of lemonade. You drank it?”

Emma frowned. “I was drinking it and then Princess Esterhazy took him away and the duke arrived. I think I must have lost interest in it at that point. Then, of course, I escaped to the retiring room to avoid the
duke and … well, you know what happened then.”

“Mmm. To my cost.”

“Well?” she demanded.

“Well what?”

“Alasdair, how can you tease like this?” she exclaimed, quite out of patience. “There are all these desperados intent on torturing me so that the duke of Wellington won’t win his spring campaign, and all you can do is make mock!”

She touched Swallow with her heels and the roan leaped forward, breaking into a gallop.

Alasdair kept Phoenix back. His teasing facade was just that. The puzzle pieces fitted so neatly he couldn’t understand why he hadn’t picked them up before. Charles Lester had warned him that the enemy had learned Emma had the document. Paul Denis had walked into his life, made a beeline for Emma, and Alasdair had merely seethed with pure masculine jealousy and completely ignored the very real possibility that this plausible, seeming-French gentleman had much more than fortune hunting at stake.

He could have kicked himself for his stupidity. His utter blindness. He’d been so wrapped up in Emma he hadn’t looked further than the end of his nose.

Emma, when she realized he hadn’t followed her, drew rein and turned Swallow. She rode back to him and saw instantly from his expression what he was thinking. “You’re cross with yourself?”

“Mad as fire,” he agreed.

“But it doesn’t matter now. He didn’t succeed last night, and now we’re well away.”

“That I doubt,” Alasdair said softly. “That I doubt.”

“You think he might be following us?”

“I think that Monsieur Denis, or whatever his name is, is too clever and too determined to let you go without a fight. Too much is at stake.”

“Bui if we got out of London without detection …” she said uncertainly.

Alasdair’s expression was grim. “We can always hope.”

It was clear he didn’t have much faith in hope. They rode in silence for a few minutes, then Emma said with determined cheerfulness, “Well, you’ll have to make sure we have adjoining chambers at the inn tonight. My bodyguard will need to stay very close.”

“I had it in my mind to suggest that Maria share your bed and Tilda sleep on the truckle bed,” he said with seeming seriousness.

Emma looked aghast. “What protection would
they
be? And they wouldn’t be any fun either,” she added.

Alasdair did not smile. “Do you still remember how to use a pistol?”

“I was almost as good a shot as you and Ned,” she averred, her competitive spirit as always coming to the fore.

“I’m not so sure about that … however, I’m interested in how good you are now.”

“It’s been a while,” Emma confessed, seeing that there was no hope of lightening his mood.

Alasdair swung Phoenix off the road and into a field. He dismounted and reached under his saddle for the pair of pistols. “All right, let’s see what you can do.”

Emma dismounted. “Even if I were a dead shot, I don’t possess a pistol.”

“That can be remedied.” He pulled a white handkerchief from his britches pocket and tied it to the low
branch of a sycamore tree. It fluttered merrily in the wind.

“Try it at ten paces.” He handed her one of the weapons.

Emma regarded the dancing handkerchief with misgiving. “It’s a moving target,” she protested.

“I doubt Denis will stand still for you,” Alasdair pointed out aridly. “Live targets are rather less accommodating than wafers at Manton’s shooting gallery.”

Emma was obliged to acknowledge the truth of this. She examined the pistol for a minute. It had been a long time since she’d held one. She could hear Ned’s voice telling her how to feel the gun’s weight, to judge how to distribute it in her hand.

“Feet a little further apart,” Alasdair said, behind her. He put his hands on her hips, steadying her. “Now, try.”