No Ordinary Mistress (Entangled Scandalous)

Other books by Robyn DeHart

A Little Bit Wicked

A Little Bit Sinful

A Little Bit Scandalous

No Ordinary Mistress

a Masquerading Mistresses novella

Robyn DeHart

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

Copyright © 2014 by Robyn DeHart. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.

Entangled Publishing, LLC

2614 South Timberline Road

Suite 109

Fort Collins, CO 80525

Visit our website at
www.entangledpublishing.com
.

Edited by Alethea Spiridon Hopson

Cover design by Heidi Stryker

ISBN 978-1-62266-469-6

Manufactured in the United States of America

First Edition March 2014

To my Entangled family, Alethea and Gwen, thanks for being a writer’s dream team. Someday we’ll all sit down together and the margaritas are on me!

And as always, to my sweet Paul, the love of my life, you are the inspiration behind all of my happy endings.

Prologue

J
une 1812, Paris

Emily Masterson lay quietly on the small bed. A screen separated her from her partner who, by the sound of everything, had already awakened and was moving about their small flat. The rich aroma of his tea steeping permeated the little privacy she had in their dwelling. She noted every one of his steps, though he moved quietly.

Despite the long months of training she’d had in London at the prestigious and extremely well-hidden Seven academy, despite the grueling physical training and the brutal mental conditioning, despite all that, she had not been prepared for the intimacy this particular assignment created.

Oh, yes, her instructors had warned that agents assigned together often became quite attached to one another. And Harrison, the head of the Seven himself, had even warned that the intimacy of sharing an assignment sometimes led to physical intimacy as well. So, in a sense, she had been warned. It was simply that she had not been prepared to experience that closeness herself. She had worked very hard to not be a woman of high emotions. Instead, she was tough and analytical. She did not allow sentimentality or physical desire to control her.

So why then had she allowed Remy to kiss her the night before?

She was not one to lie abed all morning, but she wasn’t ready to face him yet, not until she allayed any girlish foolery from their shared embrace. There had been attraction between them since the academy when he’d been one of her instructors. She’d assumed, though, that nothing would happen between them because they were on assignment. They were professionals, and having a physical relationship would only create additional problems.

A chair scraped against the wooden floor, and paper rustled. Remy sat at the tiny excuse of a table with his tea and newspaper. She could not afford to fall into some schoolgirl fancy; they had been tasked with uncovering who had assassinated the prime minister. Failing her first mission for the Seven was not an option, especially for the sake of some heartfelt emotions.

…

Remington Hawthorne whistled as he approached the rented rooms he shared with his fellow member of the Seven. He and Emma Masterson had been on this particular assignment for the past month, and though the assignment itself wasn’t challenging, keeping his hands off Emma was testing every bit of willpower he possessed. Last night he’d failed that miserably. This morning he’d waited as long as he could to try to offer her some explanation for his kiss, but she’d been asleep, so he’d left to follow a lead.

Remy had been shot, taken captive, and hit over the head more times than he could count—physical danger was all part of the job. But he’d never experienced physical desire on any of his assignments, and damned if this wasn’t proving to be worse than any bullet wound.

As much as they both denied it, there was a deep attraction between the two of them. Working so closely on this assignment in Paris had only brought them closer. He’d first met her when she’d gone to the Academy and he had been the one to train her in defense techniques. She’d been the most intelligent spy he’d ever trained, male or female. What she lacked in physical strength, she more than made up for with her cleverness. He’d recognized then that she was attractive, but never thought they’d work together. But here they were in Paris trying to uncover who had assassinated the Prime Minister. They worked closely, slept in the same room, though in different beds. So far, though, he’d been able to resist temptation.

Until last night.

He bent and entered the door, closing it behind him. Their room was comfortable enough with two beds, a writing desk that sat beneath the only window, and a screen where they could get dressed. Emma stood across the room at her makeshift dressing table. She turned at the sound of his approach. “Remy.” She chewed at her lip. It was then that he saw the piece of parchment in her hand.

“New orders come in?” He nodded to the note, relieved he wouldn’t have to account for his behavior.

“Not precisely.” She folded the paper, turned back to her dressing table, and began straightening her belongings. Earbobs and hairpins, her hairbrush; she handled each item nervously. “It is instructions for me only, as it would happen.” She looked at him over her shoulder.

She was so damned beautiful, and the intimacy of them here together only made it harder for him to keep his distance. Normally, when he stood in a bedchamber with a woman holding a hairbrush, one or both of them was nude.

“An assignment only for you?” He plucked the parchment from the table and unfolded it. The encryption took him a moment. How could they ask such a thing? He met her gaze. “You intend to follow through with this?”

For one heartbreaking moment, she met his gaze, and he saw torment in her eyes. He saw the fear and anxiety and something else as well. Maybe guilt. But she turned away from him and busied herself again with her trinkets. “It doesn’t appear that I have a choice in the matter.”

“Emma, you always have a choice,” he said. He put his hand on her upper arm, the contact of her bare skin against his palm tempting him to pull her close. She swayed toward him, just for an instant, and drew in a shuddering breath, like she was drawing strength from just that simple touch. “When you agreed to be a member of the Seven, did you even think this was an option? Did you sign up thinking you would be asked to seduce someone for information?”

She looked up at him, a frown marring her perfect features. “Of course not.”

“Then ask them to come up with another solution, or we’ll come up with one together.”

“Why?” But before he could answer, she wrenched herself away from him and paced to the far side of the room. When she turned around to face him, anger poured off her in waves. “Why should I have a choice when no one else does? Because I’m a woman?” She shook her head. “I knew going into this that there were more men in the Seven who didn’t think women belonged among them than there were those who accepted us. But you?” Her voice cracked. “I thought you were different. I thought you knew I was capable, that I could do this job as well as any man.”

“This isn’t about you being a woman,” he said, though he knew that was a lie. Of course it was; it was not acceptable for a woman to be asked to seduce a mark for information. “They’re asking too much of you.”

“If the assignment were reversed, if you were the one being asked to seduce a mark, would we even be having this conversation? I don’t think so.”

“That is not significant.” Tears formed in her eyes, and she turned away from him, bracing her hands on the table. “Answer me this, Emma. Do you want to follow through with this assignment?”

“Of course not,” she whispered. “But it was the assignment given. And I made a commitment.” She was quiet for several moments. “I cannot afford to lose this position.”

“Marry me,” he said, not even believing the words had come from him.

“What?” she whipped around. Her eyes widened, her mouth opened. Despite her normal self-reliance and steadfast independence, for once, he read vulnerability in her expression. As though she wanted him to rescue her. 

Somehow in the midst of his impulsive proposal, he’d led her to believe he was in love with her. It was understandable, they had the physical attraction, but that meant nothing when it came to matters of the heart. He didn’t love Emma, hell, he didn’t even believe in romantic love. He desired her, and he obviously felt some sort of need to protect her, but none of that meant anything more. But suddenly, he was afraid she might love him and that her expectations for his proposal might be very different from his own.

“Marriage would be a sensible arrangement for both of us,” he said. “Obviously, you are concerned about supporting yourself. I have more money than I need. And I don’t have a wife yet. Marrying me would solve this problem, save you from having to seduce the Comte, and provide for you so you wouldn’t need a paying position.”

For a moment, she merely blinked at him as she processed his words. Then her hands clenched and unclenched around the edge of the dressing table. “Have you completely taken leave of your senses? Do you even hear what you’re suggesting?” Her eyes narrowed. “Is this because of the kiss?”

“Of course not. Damnation, Emma, if you think I’ve proposed to every woman I’ve ever kissed—”

“I did not mean to imply such a thing.”

“I offered you a solution, a way out of seducing the Comte.” He held up a hand. “Nothing more.”

“No,” she shook her head. “I will not marry you. I don’t need you to save me or provide for me. I have been trained in espionage, and I have been given a task to complete.”

Marriage was a valid solution to the problem. Her refusal to admit it meant one of two things—either she’d lied, and she did want to follow through with the assignment, or she thought the idea of marrying him far worse than seducing a portly Parisian. Her rejection stung, he wouldn’t lie, but only because he wasn’t used to hearing no. He was an earl, and people rarely told earls no. If she didn’t want his help, then so be it. With abrupt movements, he grabbed his coat off the hook where he’d only just hung it. “I’m going out.”

“Where are you going?”

“To follow a lead I found earlier.” He nodded to the parchment on the floor by her feet. “Looks as if you’ll be too busy to assist.”

Chapter One

Two years later

August, 1814, London

Emma couldn’t breathe.

If she stayed in this closet for much longer, she was certain to expire, or at the very least, faint. What little air there was clogged her nostrils and coated her tongue. She was going to suggest the housekeeper air out the closet and beat the dust from every item, assuming she survived this encounter. Her charges were long in bed, and Lady Comfry had taken laudanum for a headache and probably wouldn’t awaken until tomorrow afternoon.

Emma took advantage of the sleeping household to come into Lord Comfry’s study and poke around to see if she could find anything of use. When she heard men’s voices coming, she sneaked into the storage closet in an attempt to hide herself. Now it seemed she’d play witness to a secret meeting with Comfry and some other man.

Despite the dust tickling her nose, she could not step outside of the small room else she’d reveal herself to the very men she watched. Through the tiny crack in the door, she could clearly see her employer, Lord Comfry, but could not see the man to whom he spoke. And she did not recognize his voice, but their hushed conversation concealed their tones. Three months before, she had been assigned to Lord Comfry’s townhome, a governess to his two children. So she taught the children, all the while absorbing every word spoken in the house, especially those of Lord Comfry himself. He was suspected of treason, specifically of feeding information to the French.

For the last three years, she had worked for the Seven. That didn’t include the eight months of training she’d endured at the prestigious and extremely covert Seven Academy. Ever since that nightmare in Paris, she’d requested to work without a partner. She never again wanted to be in the position of having a partner tell her how to do her job. Or of being tempted by such intimacy.
So she resigned herself to a string of governess assignments, gathering intelligence and keeping to herself.

This was her fourth solo assignment since returning to London. So far, she had gathered all of her information into books and sent them to her director supervisor, whom she only knew as Johnston. Though she’d met him on several occasions, she’d never learned more of his name than that. In her opinion, nothing Lord Comfry had done thus far had seemed out of the ordinary behavior for a wealthy, entitled Lord of the Realm. He was selfish, arrogant, and rude. But wasn’t that typical of a man of his position? Certainly every aristocrat she’d worked with in the Seven behaved in such ways. Nevertheless, she had her orders, so she complied.

He obviously had something to hide else the covert meeting would not be happening. If he was, in fact, working against the Crown, he wasn’t working alone. Everyone in the Seven knew there was one person who was in charge. The worst traitor in all of London, but no one knew his identity. All of the Seven worked for that one cause. Taking him down would destroy the empire of spies he’d built, and thus destroy the intelligence making its way to France.

“You’re not listening, Comfry,” the other man said. “Management is displeased with your actions, not to mention your contributions. Do you have the information you were tasked with? Or any of the money you owe?”

Lord Comfry sat, fidgeted with his desk drawer. “I haven’t yet acquired any of the information, but I’m still working on it. I have some of the funds. If I could simply have more time.”

“More time.” The man chuckled harshly. “You asked for more time last month, and it was granted. You’ve had more than enough time to follow through with your end of the bargain. What seems to be the problem?”

“My contacts have not come through with the information, but I believe we’re getting close. As for the money, I have my family, a wife who likes pretty things, children, a governess, and a household to keep. There are funds needed for all of that. I can’t pay you everything, but I have some for you here.” He opened another drawer and withdrew a box that jingled with coins. He set it on top of the desk and pried it open.

“Coins?” the man asked, his tone dark and chilling. “What sort of fool do you take me for?” The man leaned forward over the desk. Emma could not make out his face, but he wore a gold ring on his right hand. The crest was unfamiliar—a spider with a symbol on its back. “We do not take payments in petty coins.”

Lord Comfry came to his feet. “Tomorrow. I’ll get you the funds tomorrow. Come back then, or I can meet you somewhere. Your house.”

The man laughed, a cruel sound. “You know you cannot come to my house for this. Don’t be an idiot.”

So they knew one another well enough to be social outside of this arrangement.

“And my contact. He assured me he’d return with my information at the end of the week. I can go to him, retrieve what he has thus far.” Comfry came around the desk and walked toward the door that led out of the study and into the corridor. He was now out of her line of sight, and all she could see was the back of the other man. He wore a typical great coat, one precisely like every other wealthy man in London. His hair, cropped short, was a muddy brown, and he was not particularly tall in build, but broad and stocky, obviously athletic. In short, he could be any man on the street.

The man followed him. “I don’t think that will be necessary.” He grabbed Lord Comfry, and there was a gruesome gasp as her employer slid to the floor.

She sucked in a breath and pressed her hand to her mouth to keep from screaming. Through the crack, she saw the stranger walk past toward the office door. She strained to hear the soft click of the door closing behind him, not daring to breathe until she heard it. She counted to ten and then opened the door slowly. The other man was gone, but Lord Comfry lay on the floor, his hands gripping his side, blood pooling onto the floor behind him and through his waistcoat. His eyes were open in horror. She knelt by him, her heart pounding in her chest.

Dear God, what was she supposed to do? Three years as a spy, and violence still rattled her. Doubt reared its head, reminding her she had no place in the Seven. She ignored it as she always did.

She swallowed her nerves and leaned over his body, stifling the urge to recoil from the blood seeping through her gown where she knelt. Her mind raced through the brief medical training from the Academy. Staunch the blood. Pressure to the wound. She whipped the shawl from around her shoulders and compressed it into a ball and tried to staunch the bleeding, but she could tell from the amount of blood he’d already lost that there was nothing to be done. Lord Comfry’s breath came in wheezing gasps, and it took her a moment to realize he was trying to speak. She leaned in close to him, straining to hear. “What is it, My Lord?”

“The men,” he said hoarsely. “Book…”

She shook her head. “What?”

“Penni—” he said, and then his eyes rolled upward, and his head fell backward.

“Pennington Hall?” she asked, but she knew the question was futile. Lord Comfry was dead.

She rocked back on her heels and blew out a breath. She would never have the stomach for death. Which was all the more reason she had to keep her wits about her. Her suspect, Lord Comfry, was dead. He may have seemed like a typical Lord of the Realm, but the typical lord was not murdered in his own home.

Emma pushed herself to her feet. After using her shawl to carefully wipe Lord Comfry’s blood from her hands, she blotted at the blood on her dress. Thank goodness for her sensible black gown. The blood barely showed. Then she crossed to the fireplace and tossed the ruined shawl into the blazing fire. She wouldn’t be here when the body was found, and her absence would be suspicious enough. She had to get out of here, tell Johnston what happened. Without another thought, she fled out into the darkness of the London street.

As she made her way through the busy London streets, Emma concentrated on the facts she’d seen and heard while hiding in the closet. Those were the details that would be important to Johnston. When she reached one of the busy thoroughfares a few blocks from Lord Comfry’s house, she hired a hackney. Lord Comfry had wanted to tell her something about men and some book and Pennington Hall, his estate outside of London. If he was, in fact, working against the Crown, perhaps the evidence was there. She’d seen him write in the same book several times over the last few months, though she hadn’t seen it in the last week. Naturally, she’d tried to get her hands on the book herself, but she’d never seen it out of his hands. Perhaps that was the book he mentioned. Now that she thought about it, his behavior had been increasingly erratic over the past week. He’d been nervous and jumpy. He’d spent hours at a time passing the length of the hallway from his office to the library. Did that journal contain the information she needed? If so, he must have hidden it at Pennington Hall.

The rig halted in front of the nondescript townhome, and she gave the driver money and then skirted the front entrance for the back. She knocked three times, as was their signal, then waited. No sound. Again she knocked, and still there was no answer.

Johnston could be out, but she needed to get a message to him, and it was far more secure for her to leave it for him here herself than to trust a messenger. She withdrew a pin from her hair and slipped it into the lock. A few maneuvers later, and the latch clicked, the door opened. It was dark inside, not unexpected since it would seem Johnston was out for the evening.

She made her way up the rounded staircase and down the corridor to his study. She’d been in the room many times before, the first being the day she’d accepted his offer to join the Seven. That had been more than three years before and little had changed. The floorboards creaked under her steps as she entered the room, and then her feet hit something, and she fell forward. She caught herself, bracing her weight on her hands and landing in a wet, sticky substance that coated her palms. Blast the darkness.

She felt around the floor, trying to determine what had caused her to stumble. Her hands molded the object in front of her; it felt disturbingly similar to a leg. She jolted backward, quickly realizing that what she’d tripped over was Johnston himself. She brought her palm, covered in liquid, to her nose. Acrid copper and rust.
Blood
.

Now she had the blood of two men on her palms and clothes.

She swallowed against the bile rising in her throat. No need to leave him a message now. Tears pricked her eyes, but she willed them away. Johnston had been her contact for years. He was the sole constant in her life of drifting from mission to mission. She wasn’t close to him. She hadn’t made
that
mistake since her disastrous first mission in Paris. She didn’t even particularly care for the man, but his death shook the foundations of her existence. In the twisted labyrinth that was the world of spies, he had been her trail of breadcrumbs. Now there was only one other place to turn. It was time to seek the assistance of Harrison Carlisle, the head spy of the Seven.

Try as she might, she could not still the tears once she sat inside the hack to Harrison’s house. She let them fall freely, knowing they’d end soon and she could once again resume her calm exterior. No one would blame her for the emotional outburst; she’d witnessed one murder then stumbled, literally, onto another dead body. After Paris, all of her assignments had been relatively calm ones, essentially her gathering intelligence. Tonight, though, she certainly felt the part of the spy, though she hadn’t had the security of a partner. Then again, she’d declined any assignments requiring a partner.

Once the rig rolled to a stop, she climbed the stairs and kicked against the door else risk getting bloody hand marks all over the earl’s doorknocker. The door opened, and the butler frowned sternly. “We do not take kindly to street urchins banging on the door for handouts.”

She pushed past the butler and stepped into Harrison’s townhome.

“Miss! His lordship is otherwise engaged,” the butler said.

“This is of vital importance.” It was then, in the light of the corridor, that she saw the full impact of the blood on her hands. Bright red stains covered her palms and streaked the upper side of her hands. The butler noticed them as well, and his brows rose slowly. She swiped her palms on her dress.

“It would seem you have an emergency,” the butler said. “This way.” He led her down the corridor and then down a staircase to a large room. A table sat in the middle of the room and four men sat around it.

“Sheldon, I told you I didn’t want to be disturbed,” Harrison said from the table.

Emma stepped around the butler and walked forward. “I insisted,” she said.

“Ms. Masterson, I didn’t realize.” He stood and took a moment to look her over. “Good God.” He motioned her forward. “You are safe within these walls. These are—”

“Other members of the Seven,” she said. “Yes, I recognize them.” And she did. Remington Hawthorne, her former partner, sat directly to Harrison’s right; her heart thundered at the sight of him. As much as she didn’t want to, she drank in the sight of him. After the night she’d had, he was a welcoming face. She resisted the urge to run and fall into his arms. She knew from their work together, those arms would be strong and secure. They hadn’t been lovers, but it seemed only a matter of time. As much as they both denied it, they shared a deep attraction. She hadn’t seen him since he’d left Paris two years before. Since he’d left her in Paris, believing the very worst of her.

He came to his feet, but stopped short of walking toward her. She forced her gaze off him. The other two men were Lord Brentwood and Bailey Fenton. The latter was the liaison between the Seven and the Prime Minister himself.

“Very well,” Harrison said. “First, I must ask, is that your blood or someone else’s?” He nodded to her hands, his voice calm.

“Someone else’s. Johnston has been killed,” she said, doing her best to keep her tone unaffected. Crying in this room would literally destroy her career. There were still several members of the Seven who believed espionage was no place for women.