One Night of Passion (32 page)

But to Georgie’s dismay, the scene before her only worsened.

Mandeville pulled out a second pistol and aimed it at her father. “As I told my wife, I don’t intend to leave witnesses, Escott,” he said. “The Mandeville legend has survived in my family for the last one hundred years by ensuring that there are never any witnesses. My sincerest apologies.” With that, he fired another shot.

Papa fell beside the body of Mandeville’s errant wife.

With quiet efficiency, the man searched the pair until he found the packet of letters his wife carried.

“So you thought you could steal these from my desk and I wouldn’t notice? Bah!” he said to his wife’s still form. “These shall never see the light of day.”

The silence around the hunting lodge was broken by the sound of feet running down the path from the house. Mandeville rose from the carnage of his wrath, his eyes narrowed, his body taut as he awaited his next prey.

“Franklin? Franklin, where are you?”

Georgie nearly bolted from her hiding spot at the sound of her mother’s voice, but fear held her in place.

No, Mama,
Georgie tried to cry out, terror strangling her throat.
No!

Her mother burst into the clearing, her red hair falling out of its usually perfect chignon. She came to a stumbling halt, her gaze wild as she took in the atrocities before her.

“Non! Non!”
she cried out, reverting to her native French. Her keening wail tore at Georgie’s heart, pulling her from her hiding place, but suddenly the dark ominous man who had called himself Mandeville stepped forward.

Georgie shrank back at his menacing presence.

“Brigitte! Brigitte!” he said, pulling her from the tangle of bodies.

“Non! Non!”
her mother continued to wail. Then as if her mother sensed the darkness around her, she stiffened and pushed away from Mandeville.

When he tried to hold her still, she fought him in a wild rage. “Murderer! Murderer! Murderer!” she cried.

“Brigitte, my Brigitte, it is not what is seems. He drew on me. They were lovers,” he lied.

She yanked herself free from his grasp. “And your wife? How did she die?” Brigitte shook her head. “I know the truth. You are a traitor, and a murderer.”

Mandeville shook his head. “No! It doesn’t have to be that way.” He held out his hand to her. “Come with me, Brigitte. We will go to France. You and I. I depart on the morrow, as it is. We’d have money, position, and you would have the chateau you always wanted. Just forget this night, and come with me.”

Georgie held her breath as her mother stared first down at the body of her husband, then at that of Mandeville’s wife.

Her mother said nothing, just flew at the man, tearing and pulling at him like an animal gone mad. “Never. Never would I go with you, you lying monster.”

“So be it,” he pronounced with a devilish air of finality. He swept her aside, flinging her body against the stone porch of the hunting lodge.

There was a sickening crack and then Georgie watched her mother fall limp and still to the ground.

She closed her eyes tight, hoping that when she opened them, she would find herself back in the nursery and all of this was nothing but a bad dream that Ninny would chase away with a posset of warm milk.

Please be a bad dream,
she prayed over and over, until she thought she could hear the crackle of the fireplace and dear Ninny’s snoring.

But the fire she heard wasn’t coming from the great stone hearth in the nursery, but a much larger blaze. And when she opened her eyes, she discovered the hunting lodge was on fire. The horrible man was just tossing his wife’s body inside, before the flames drove him back.

Georgie couldn’t see her father’s or mother’s body, but guessed that he’d already consigned them to the flames.

“Mother?” came a voice over the carnage. “Mother? Father?”

Into the clearing came a young man, a few years older than Georgie. He carried a lantern much like the one she had purloined. “Father? Did you find Mother?”

“What are you doing here?” Mandeville barked. “I told you to stay home.”

“But I saw Mother leaving, and then heard you call for your horse—” he started to say.

Mandeville sent a shattering blow across the boy’s mouth, sending him reeling to the ground. “Never mention that woman. Ever.”

The boy glanced up and at the fire, and must have seen what had become of her. “Mother,” he sobbed, his hand reaching out toward the flames.

“Didn’t you hear me?” his father said, hauling him up to his feet. “Never say her name again. She betrayed me. Betrayed us.”

The boy’s lip quivered, his eyes never leaving the flames.

“Do you hear me?” Mandeville continued to rant. “She chose Escott over her family. She betrayed us.”

The boy shook his head.

His father caught him by the shoulders, turning him from the fire. “One day you will be the Mandeville. Then you will understand. We cannot let anyone betray us. And to remain safe we never leave witnesses. They must be dealt with so, or else all we hold dear is lost.”

He prodded the boy toward his skittish horse, and then mounted. Holding out his hand to his son, he said, “Come away, Byron. You must now learn what it is to be the heir to a legacy.”

The lad spared one last glance at the fire, and then took the proffered hand. He pulled himself up and onto the horse’s rump, his hands clinging to the back of the saddle, and the pair rode away.

The entire hunting lodge was now engulfed in flames. Georgie crawled from her hiding spot, moving ever closer to the blaze. “Mama,” she managed to whisper. “Papa.”

Suddenly there was a hand on her shoulder and she twisted around.

Another stranger stood before her, holding a lantern. “What happened here? Where are your parents, child? Where are the papers?”

No witnesses. No witnesses.
The words ran a chilling warning through her heart. She could only manage to shake her head at him.

His hand reached for her again. “Tell me what happened. Did you see anyone?”

“No,” she managed to whisper, sure if she told the truth that evil, horrible man, the very devil himself, would swoop back out of the darkness from which he’d come and take her away. “I didn’t see anything,” she sobbed.

Meanwhile, the man rushed up toward the house, his hand shielding his face as he tried to go inside, to see if he could save anyone.

But the heat and flames forced him back and he sank to the ground beside her.

“I’m too late,” he said, pounding his fists into the turf. “Damn him. Damn that Mandeville to hell. He’ll pay for this. If it takes me the rest of my life, he’ll pay.”

The
Sybaris

1800

Georgie leaned over and blew out the flickering light in her lamp. She shivered in the damp air of the hold, shivered at the memories that now lived anew in her mind.

She remembered. She remembered every bit of it. How had she forgotten for all those years? How had her fears kept the memories trapped away for so long? Now that she did remember, it was as if a great weight lifted from her heart. It buoyed her strength, her will, her resolve.

Shaking off the worst of the images, she considered what she must do now.

This was no longer just Colin’s battle. It was hers. And while he may be fighting it to save a nation, her reasons went far deeper.

She would wage this war to regain her soul.

Chapter 14

J
ust before dawn, Georgie realized Mandeville’s sloop was gone, as was the other vessel, leaving only the
Gallia
and the
Sybaris
sailing side by side.

She had spent the night pacing her cabin, trying to come up with a plan to subdue the French crew, but had discarded one idea after another.

As the sun started to spill over the horizon, Kit rolled over in her bunk. “Are you still awake?”

“Yes.” Georgie couldn’t stop Mandeville’s words from echoing in her ears.

No witnesses, Bertrand. No witnesses.

They didn’t have long before they’d reach port, and then all would be lost. Not to mention that with every moment, Mandeville was sailing closer and closer to London and back to his nefarious plans.

“If you don’t get some sleep, you’ll end up with one of your megrims. And from the shadows under your eyes, you’ll be in for a time of it.” Kit pulled her blanket back over her head.

Her sister was right. That was all she needed. One of her megrims. And she doubted either ship carried any willow bark with which to relieve her misery.

Certainly, there was nothing worse than one of her wretched megrims.

Wretched megrims
. . .

Suddenly Georgie’s skin tingled with gooseflesh. “Kit! That’s a perfect idea. A bad case of the megrims.”

Her sister peeked out from beneath the gray woolen coverlet. “You intend to give the French a headache?”

“In a manner of speaking.” she said, settling down on the bunk beside her sister and whispering the beginnings of her plan into Kit’s eager ear.

The hatchway above opened and let in a flood of sunlight, blinding Colin. His one open eye blinked, while the other just throbbed with pain.

He also had a devil of a headache, his ribs ached, but he consoled himself that nothing seemed to be broken. He’d mend with time—that is, if he had any left. With Mandeville aboard, there was little hope for any of them.

Even that hadn’t kept him from spending the entire night considering Pymm’s revelations about Georgie’s identity.

So much of it made sense now—why she wouldn’t tell him her identity, her adventurous spirit, but it also left a spate of questions. Why was she so afraid of him? Why had she fled her betrothal to Lord Harris? Obviously the union hadn’t been the love match his solicitor had assured him both parties found it to be.

Perhaps Pymm knew a thing or two about Lord Harris.

But before Colin got a chance to ask him, the ladder creaked and groaned as a guard lumbered down it, grumbling about the foul smell of the hold and how he was missing his morning repast.

“Do you think they’re finally going to get around to feeding us?” Livett asked, rising up from the floor and coming to stand by Colin’s side.

“One can hope,” he offered, though he doubted that Bertrand would waste the
Sybaris’
s plentiful stores on a captured crew.

If they were lucky, they’d probably get the
Gallia’
s weevil-laden fare. And though it wasn’t the most appetizing thought, food was food. If he was going to regain his strength, he needed to eat—there were Georgie and Kit and Chloe, as well as his troublesome brother, to see to safety.

And Mandeville to stop.

Then he’d make good on his promise to Bertrand and see the
Gallia
burned to the waterline.

How he was going to find a way out of his current predicament and do all that was an entirely different matter.

The guard stood at the bottom of the ladder, while Bertrand struggled down to the lower deck.

“This can hardly mean breakfast,” Livett muttered, turning away from the door.

At that point, Colin was no longer thinking of his empty stomach, but of the third person venturing down the ladder.

The slight ankles and trim calves could belong to only one person.

Georgie.

His heart thrilled at the sight of her. She was safe and sound. At least so far.

Bertrand held out his hand as she neared the final step and she took it, offering him that smile of hers that was guaranteed to melt even the stoniest of hearts.

“Thank you, Capitaine,” she murmured. “You are being most indulgent.” She allowed him to hold her hand for a little longer than was necessary, and as Colin watched the other man drool and gape over her, he vowed to sink every ship that Bertrand ever gained.

“
Oui,
of course,” the old fool stammered. “Any accommodations, madame, to see you in good spirits.” He huffed a bit more before he turned to the cell. “The surgeon? Where is the surgeon?”

Colin held out his arm to block Pymm’s path. “What do you want with him?”

Bertrand’s gaze narrowed. “None of your affair, Danvers. Stand back or I’ll have Brun bring that man out over your corpse.”

Colin stood his ground. “What do you want with Mr. Phillips?”

Bertrand began to bluster and posture some more, but Georgie intervened.

“I have need of Mr. Phillips’s services.”

What the devil was she up to now? Crazy, headstrong Georgie had some wild plan in the works, and Colin was sensible enough to fear for all their lives based on those suspicions. Her foray into the dangerous world of the Cyprian’s Ball was enough evidence for him to know she wouldn’t stop at anything once she’d set her mind to a plot.

He eyed her from head to toe. “You look well enough to me.”

“What is troubling the lady is none of your concern,” Bertrand said. He turned to Brun. “Get the surgeon out and then watch to see that he doesn’t harm Madame Saint-Antoine.”

Bertrand bowed once again over Georgie’s hand. “When you are less troubled, perhaps you will be able to dine with me again.”

“It would be my pleasure,” she said in her best purr.

The
capitaine
climbed up the ladder, making every effort to look the ready gallant, which was made all the more difficult when his belly barely fit through the hatchway.

“Please, Captain Danvers,” Georgie said. “If you could but spare me a moment of Mr. Phillips’s services, I assure you your kindness will be repaid in full.” Her gaze begged him to trust her just one more time.

What choice did he have with Brun standing at the ready, looking only too willing to add a few more lumps. So Colin backed away from the door.

After Pymm was hauled out of the cell and the door locked once again, Brun lounged against the wall.

Georgie looked from the brutish man to Pymm and then back to Brun. “Monsieur, if you would be so kind as to allow me some privacy with the doctor?”

The oaf frowned. “I was told to stay.”

“Yes, but my troubles are of a female nature, and it would greatly embarrass me to have to share them in front a man.”