Circle of Spies (37 page)

When the carriage neared Monument Square, he paused. “I am headed to Fayette Street. Where shall I drop you?”

“There is fine. I would welcome a short walk.” Expecting an argument, she clutched her shawl and prepared to defend her request.

But the doctor merely nodded and smiled. A few moments later the carriage rocked to a halt, and he bade her farewell as if it were no great thing for a woman to walk through the neighborhood alone.

She drew in a grateful breath when her feet touched sidewalk. With a parting wave, she struck out at a confident pace, praying her knees held up. Absent distractions, impressions crowded again. The blood on Barbara's apron, the sounds, the smells.

Shuddering, that grateful breath turned sour and weakness seeped through her legs. Perhaps a walk hadn't been such a grand idea. She should have had him drop her at her door. It would have been only minutes out of his way.

Rather than head back to the square and then down her own street as she would normally have done, Marietta latched her gaze onto an alleyway that would cut her walk in half. In those cloaking shadows she could indulge in a moment of lapsed composure. That promise spurred her faster, until her wobbly legs had propelled her well into the alley and she finally dared to halt, close her eyes, and let her shoulders sag.

In the next second a foul-smelling arm slammed over her throat and shoved her against the brick wall with enough force that her toes dangled off the ground. Eyes flying open again, she scratched at the arm and kicked. In vain, as her feet only managed to tangle in her skirts.

Brown eyes glared at her, malice flashing with the blade the man held up. Under his slouch hat his hair was straggly and unkempt, his beard frazzled. He bared his teeth. “Money. Where be yer money, pretty lady?”

She could only move her mouth and gasp for air, tugging at his arm. No, that was wrong. Brothers. Her brothers had taught her…the face, she should go for the—

As if he heard her broken thoughts, his arm released her, but before she could sag, he slammed her face to the bricks. “Money!”

Pain bit, and it tasted of blood. The smell of it filled her nose, and her vision blurred.

Money. Her reticule. Where was her reticule?

That gruff face. She knew that face.

The images flashed too fast, dizzying. Her bedroom, her drawing
room, a table in the library. Under her bed, wrapped in her shawl. Blood. Barbara. The hospital.

Faces, too many faces. Bearded, clean-shaven, leering. Nodding, smiling politely. Hands held out for money. Street corners. Her house. The fence.

There, by the soldier's cot. Pushed underneath.

A paint bucket. A brush in this man's hand.

“Where be it? Ye ain't got no fancy bag, but sure an a fine lass like you don't never go out withou' ye quid.”

The images flew too fast, spun and bobbed and wavered. A painter. Where was his name? Somewhere, but she couldn't…

“Hidden on ye, is it?”

“Stop!” The feel of his hands was too much to bear as they slid up her side. Or perhaps just the impetus she needed to replace shock with rage. She spat out the blood and knocked away the roaming hand, at least, though the one with the knife still hovered at her neck. “Please, I–I don't have it. I dropped my bag at the hospital and fled too quickly to remember it. Please.”

He sputtered, curses flying from his lips along with the spittle that spattered her face.

She winced and turned her face to the wall again, though that made the pain at her temple and cheekbone throb. “Please. Tell them I sent you to fetch it for me and keep whatever was in there. I believe I had five dollars, perhaps a—”

“Ye think me a fool?”

Doyle.
The name materialized in her mind, though she couldn't discern if it was his first or last. And hardly cared. “Doyle. Doyle, stop. Please.”

Stop he did, for half a beat before he pressed the blade to her throat. She squeezed her eyes shut. Bad idea, letting him know she knew him. And now that she had the name to put to the face, the rest came flooding in, pushing aside the irrelevant images. She knew where he lived—or had four years ago, when she had hired him to paint her fence and outbuildings the summer after she wed Lucien. She knew he had a sickly wife, and eight children all under the age of ten, at the time.

And when she heard the tap of wood on paving stone, the sick ball
dropped lower in her stomach. Risking a glance only proved what the sound had told her. Doyle had only a peg where his foot had been.

“Know me, do ye?” He stroked the blade over her skin. “Then I know ye too. And I might as well kill ye and then rob yer whole house.”

Never before had she stared down death—were waves of sorrow supposed to slam her? She was doomed to die the same death her husband had, a victim to a violent town and starving men, and she could think only that she had done nothing with her life. A waste of twenty-three years, with nothing to show for them but a fledgling faith too young to take wing.

Lord…be with Barbara and my family. With Walker and Cora and their children. Slade, be with Slade. Help him in his task when I'm gone. And…at least help me die with the honor with which I failed to live.

She lifted her chin and did her best to calm her frantic breathing. “Make it quick then, I beg of you.”

He hissed out a breath. Had he been…bluffing? Dare she hope? Her hand gripped her skirt, detecting something hard within her pocket—the fob. And she still wore Grandmama's necklace too, under her high collar. Either, both may appease this man, but was her life worth the trade of a legacy?

“You there! Unhand her!” Granddad Thad's voice pummeled the shadows, and the deliberate
click
of a cocking gun sent them fleeing.

Doyle muttered and backed away a step. When she opened her eyes, he was edging toward the cover of a large crate. Bracing against the wall to keep herself upright, Marietta turned her face toward her grandfather.

What a menacing picture he made, a giant silhouette at the end of the alley, his pistol extended and trained on her assailant. No shaking in his limbs, no uncertainty, no sorrow. “Drop your knife,” he commanded, voice low as a threat, “and stay where you are.”

Did he mean to haul the man to the authorities himself? Probably, knowing him. And he would do it, too, despite his eight decades.

The ruffian took off toward the opposite end of the alley, his peg tapping furiously with every other step.

Granddad gave chase, but he stopped first at Marietta and cupped her chin. “Are you hurt, Mari?”

She gripped his arm and clung. “Let him go.”

“I could catch him.”

“I know.” The ghost of a smile felt strange on her lips and made blood ooze into her mouth again. “But that man has eight children and no way to feed them. Please. Let him go.”

His gentle fingers turned her face this way and that. “Did he crack you in the nob, sweetheart?” He clucked his tongue. But he stayed where he was.

Relief made her legs go boneless, and she sagged against his familiar chest. “What are you doing here, Granddad?”

“I had a feeling.” Of course he did. “I didn't realize it would be you, here like this. And I don't much like seeing you with blood on your face.”

Did he have to mention it? She squeezed her eyes shut and held tighter to him.

“What were you doing out alone, Mari? Even in broad daylight, even in this section of town, you ought to know better.”

“I know. I'm sorry.” She did, and she was. And she was something else, something she couldn't quite put a name to. Something that made her tremble in the deepest depths of her being and want to curl into a ball and disappear to where no one would care if she laughed or cried in hysteria. She tilted her face up. “Will you take me home?”

Granddad uncocked his gun and slid it back into its place at his belt. Then he tucked her close to his side. “As if you need to ask.”

Devereaux charged through the front door before Norris could open it for him, letting the wood bang against the wall behind it. Let the slave close it again, or Osborne. He didn't care, not when his mother's note still burned his eyes.

Hurry. It's Mari.

A message uncharacteristically short and vague for Mother, and she had scratched a hole into the paper on “hurry.” “Mari” had been shaky and faint. When he had seen that, he had nearly throttled the
delivery boy and demanded to know what had happened. But a hired courier would have no answers.

“Mother! Mari!”

“Devereaux!” Mother's voice came from the stairs, and her figure joined it a moment later, rushing down the steps with a speed he hadn't seen of her in years. Tear tracks webbed her cheeks.

He ran to her, gripped her shaking hands. “What is it? What happened?”

“It's just like Lucien.” Mother's voice wisped and choked, fresh droplets spilling from her eyes. “She was attacked in our own neighborhood. She was attacked. Just like Lucien.”

“Attacked?” What did she mean, just like Lucien? All the blood in his veins seemed to gather, to pulse with too much force. Not like Lucien—it couldn't be like Lucien. “Is she all right?”

She had to be all right. Had to be. He couldn't lose her now, wouldn't. If he had to revive her himself, he would find a way. If he had to bring in the best doctors in America, if he had to give his fortune on medicines. Anything it took, but she
would
be his.

Mother tugged one hand free to wipe at her cheeks. And then, a simple move to shift the world, she nodded. “She is well enough. A few scratches and bruises, and she is shaken. Thad Lane was coming this way and intervened.”

A few scratches. His breath eased out, though his pulse still hammered. “Not too injured then.”

“No.” But still Mother sniffed and blinked back an onslaught of tears. Still she gripped his hand as if the world were ending. “I could have lost her. As quickly as we lost Lucien, she could have been gone, and I…she has always…I have been so ungracious to her, and yet she has always loved me. Simply because of the bonds of family. What if I had lost her, Devereaux? With that over my head?”

For a moment he could only stare, unable to process the words. Lucille Fortier Hughes never changed her mind about anyone. Never indulged in regrets. Could this have actually achieved that impossibility?

A wonder for another time. Now he stepped to the side and headed up the stairs, her hand still in his. “I must see her. Where is she? Her bedroom?”

“No, her drawing room. Mr. Lane just left to fetch Julie.”

Wasting no more time on words, he let go of his mother so he could take the stairs two at a time and then run down the hall to the blue-and-green chamber. The moment he stepped in, his gaze flew to the bright-red of her hair…and then fell to the even redder marks on her too-white face.

“Mari.” Her name barely made it past the tightening in his throat. His pulse pounded louder. Whoever had dared mark her flawless skin would pay. Oh, how they would pay. He strode to where she sat on the
S
-shaped conversation sofa he had always hated because he couldn't sit beside her. Dropping to a knee before her, he cupped her cheek and took in every discoloration on her alabaster complexion. None so disturbing as the hollow way she gazed at him.

May whoever did this rot. “Darling.” He leaned forward, determined to spark life in her eyes, and took her lips.

She pulled away with a wince. Only then did he notice the swelling of her lower lip, and the crack at its corner.

He bit back a curse. “I'm sorry. Darling, I'm so sorry someone hurt you like this. Tell me what happened.”

She averted her face. “There is hardly anything to tell. A man pushed me into a wall and demanded my money, of which I had none. He had a knife.”

“Why did you not give him your necklace? Your rings? You know better than to argue with ruffians.”

“I…I forgot I was wearing the necklace, and I'd taken off my rings before going to the hospital. But Granddad came just in time, and he had a pistol.”