One Night of Sin (45 page)

When Kurkov followed with the two of diamonds, it meant that the prince was also out of spades. He might still have had a heart in his hand, but nothing high enough to beat Alec’s king, so Alec held onto his hearts for use later. He still wasn’t worried, having yet another high trump card, the queen.

Still, the other team was crafty. He and Drax would have to be careful.

Sixth trick; Tallant’s lead. The other team played the suit of clubs. Alec had none and took the trick, king and all, with his mighty little three of hearts. A bit nerve-racking, but he was having fun.

Seventh trick; Alec’s lead. Noting that only the four of diamonds had been played so far, and seeing the high ones safely nestled in his hand, he didn’t even resort to hearts this time. Instead, he took the trick with his ace of diamonds.

They had now claimed six of the tricks of this hand to Kurkov’s one, and the prince was beginning to look nervous.

If there was any question left, they turned a corner in the eighth trick, when Kurkov led with what was apparently his strongest card, the jack of hearts.
Not bad, not bad,
Alec mused, watching as his friend followed suit with the ten. Couldn’t beat a jack, of course. Tallant contributed the nine of hearts.

Alec let them agonize for a moment, then, with a half smile, set down the queen of hearts. He had been paying close attention and now knew that he held the only hearts left in play. Unbeatable advantage. Kurkov leaned his mouth against his fist; Alec noticed that the prince’s left eye began twitching.

If only Becky could see this!

The next few hands rolled out swiftly, but the upshot was that while Alec’s hand favored hearts, Drax obviously held a lot of diamonds, and Kurkov clubs, leaving Tallant with a useless mix of middling cards. All of them could feel the one-eyed nabob seething.

Drax won the ninth with the king of diamonds, but Alec still had the queen of that suit and used it to claim the tenth.

Across the table from him now, he could see sweat running down his partner’s face. Drax was flushed and boyishly tousled. The sight of him reminded Alec of their days back at Eton. The inseparable four back then had made a winning crew team.

Eleventh trick: his seven of hearts cleaned up.

Twelfth: with a mere six, Alec put the rest to bed, his heart pounding.

And in the final trick, the thirteenth, the last card on which everything counted, without which they must fall back into endless hours of neck-and-neck frustration, Drax led off with the queen of spades. He stared at Alec after he had thrown it down.

Tallant cursed, casting the jack of spades away.

Alec gingerly put down the jack of diamonds and slid it away from him.

Kurkov muttered a curse in Russian and ended with the ten of clubs.

Drax proclaimed victory with a barbaric yell, both he and Alec on their feet, reaching for each other across the table, embracing heartily.

The next thing they knew, their audience had woken up and they were being carried on the shoulders of the men who had come to watch the game. Champagne burst out everywhere. The thunderous cheering awoke the Regent, who came out swaddled in his satin dressing gown to congratulate them.

But the greatest victory of all was the moment Alec had so long waited for, when he finally held the deed to Talbot Old Hall in his hands.

Waiting beside the table as Kurkov completed the paperwork, signing the house over to him, he accepted the scrolled document with a certain measure of awe. He had actually done it. His heart soared; he couldn’t wait to give it to Becky.

Drax cleared his throat at Alec’s silence, offering his hand to Kurkov with perfect gentility, despite their rivalry for Lady Parthenia’s affections. “Well played, Your Highness,” the earl said. His nudge jarred Alec out of his wonderment with a silent reminder that it was still too soon to let Kurkov realize anything was amiss. All must appear normal for just a little while longer. Though it seemed like too much luck to hope for in one night, Westland still might be waiting on the docks with the constabulary ready to take the prince into custody when they got back.

Kurkov shook Drax’s hand with a visible twinge of reluctance. “Not well enough, obviously.” Then he turned to Alec, his gray eyes narrowing. “Alexei, your famous luck seems to have returned just in time.”

“So it has.”

Alec held Kurkov’s icy gaze without flinching, but as he dutifully shook his hand, he gave an inward shudder to think of how close he had come to plunging a carving knife in the man’s chest. He would have enjoyed doing it, too, except for the consequences.

No matter. Soon Kurkov would belong to the authorities, and once they had him behind bars, Alec intended to pay the prince a visit in his cell. Then they were going to have a little talk about his threats against Becky. But that moment was still well in the future. For now, he would take no such reckless chances.

Kurkov released his hand and excused himself with a cynical snort, as though he only wondered now why he had wasted his time on all this.

With a gleam of cold satisfaction in his eyes, Alec watched the war hero pivot with martial precision and go prowling off to nurse his defeat with a flask of vodka.

Drax and he looked at each other in discreet relief.

Mikhail had had his fill of English company for one night.

It vexed him to no end that he himself had dealt the insufferable Alec Knight his astonishing winning hand. Mikhail hated losing, even if he could afford the loss. As for that ratty old farm, well, the rogue was welcome to it. For his part, he was glad to be rid of the cursed, haunted, crumbling pile. How devastated his little bitch of a cousin would be when she found out she had been kicked out of her home for good. The thought pleased him greatly.

Having demolished the old gatehouse to destroy any lingering evidence of Dmitry Maximov’s imprisonment there, and having ordered his Cossacks to bury the corpse on the heath in a place where no one would ever find it, Mikhail was not worried in the slightest about new occupants taking up residence in the place, especially not a thoughtless pleasure-seeker like Alec Knight.

Still, smarting from defeat at the hands of that impertinent coxcomb, he was bloody glad to set foot on solid ground again, and gladder still to spy Sergei standing on the torchlit dock waiting for him. Through the wet gray mist of dawn, Mikhail could just make out the comforting shape of his waiting carriage. He was exhausted, a little dry-mouthed from drinking all night, and eager to return to his rooms at the luxurious hotel. He could well use a few hours of sleep, and then, perhaps, when he was rested, he would call for Eva and nurse his wounded vanity a bit—as long as the Westlands didn’t find out.

As his top man strode down the wooden-planked dock to meet him, Mikhail smirked in the direction of the winning pair some distance away. The two rakehells were being cheered all over again as they stepped off one of the small rowboats conveying the Regent’s guests from the graceful yacht back to dry land.

“Don’t look so eager, Sergei,” he said sardonically as his top Cossack bowed. “I lost by the skin of my teeth.”

“No matter, sire. I have an even better prize for you.” Sergei flashed a quick, fierce smile. “We’ve got the girl.”

Mikhail drew in his breath swiftly, violence flaring to life in his eyes.
“Where?”

“We’re holding her in a secret place outside of town. Come, sire. I will take you to her.”

Racing home in the flashy equipage he had won, a showy, dark blue coach with gilt trim and six white horses, Alec stood on the driver’s box handling the ribbons while Drax hung on for dear life beside him, laughing uproariously and still swigging champagne.

“The springs on this thing are better than those on my curricle!”

Alec barely nodded, paying his foxed whist partner little mind. Most of his eager attention was fixed on his destination: the villa. Careening through the misty dawn at breakneck speed, he could not make the horses gallop fast enough to carry him to Becky. Oh, when he laid eyes on her again, he was going to catch her up in his arms, twirl her around in a circle, and give her the biggest kiss the world had ever seen. He could not wait to see her face when he put the deed to the Hall in her hands.

As the coach clattered noisily over the cobblestones only a block away from the villa, one thought made Alec frown, and that was the fact that, just as he had suspected, Westland had not been inspired enough by Becky’s testimony to send police to the docks to arrest Kurkov, as she had hoped.

Well, perhaps he had not read it yet, Alec thought. Perhaps Westland still needed more convincing.

In any case, now that she had officially reported the crime, Alec intended to remove her to a safer distance until Kurkov was shackled and caged. Perhaps he’d take her all the way to Hawkscliffe Hall to meet his family while the authorities finished the job of bringing the blackguard to justice. He had wanted to move her earlier, but she refused to leave his side.

As they went barreling around the final corner to the villa, Draxinger’s laughter stopped abruptly.

Alec felt his innards turn to ice.

It was barely six
A.M
., but the street outside his house ahead was filled with a throng of neighbors and onlookers milling about with grim faces, a few constables urging everyone to go back to their homes. Half a dozen carriages were parked willy-nilly in the street.

“Oh, Jesus,” Drax breathed, turning waxy white.

Windows were broken, the front door hung open, and lights burned on every floor. Black smoke wafted out of an upper window, as though they had just managed to put out a fire. Numb with dread, his stomach churning queasily, Alec halted the coach and jumped down on legs that felt rubbery.
This can’t be happening.
In spiraling horror, he ran through the crowd, hearing small snippets of low-toned conversation that turned his blood to ice.

“—two men killed inside—”

The neighbors fell silent when they saw him coming.

“Sir, you can’t go in there,” said a constable, blocking his path.

Alec shook off the man’s hold violently. “I live there! What’s happened?”

“Draxinger!” a tense, feminine voice shouted.

“Parthenia?” Drax uttered as the duke’s daughter ran to them. “What are you doing here? What’s happened?”

“Officer, let them pass,” she ordered the policeman. “Oh, Piers. Lord Alec.” She shook her head. “They’ve taken Miss Ward.”

Alec was already running into the house. His mind a whirl of pure horror and fear, he paused on the threshold to scan the scene frantically.

Everywhere bustling constables hunted for clues. Alec smelled charred carpet and then saw a trail of blood on the hardwood floor. He spotted Westland and Count Lieven, too, angrily giving orders, but he ignored them, his gaze homing in on the surgeon bent over a motionless figure on the ground.

Fort.

No.
Ashen-faced, Alec walked to his fallen friend’s side. “Is he alive?” he choked out.

“Barely,” the surgeon said, not looking up from his work. “He’s lucky they left ’im for dead. Lift him,” he ordered his assistants. The burly young medics heaved Alec’s unconscious best friend onto a stretcher and took him away.

Alec’s mind reeled.

“Knight,” a deep voice called weakly.

“Rushford!” He raced into the next room and flung himself down on his knees by Rush’s side. The future marquess was also bloodied, his arm and head bandaged, one eye blackened.

The doctor attending him searched his black bag for laudanum.

Rush clutched his arm. His dark eyes were glazed with fear and pain. “I’m so sorry, Alec,” he forced out weakly with a hard swallow. “They took her. We tried to stop them. There were too many. It was—Eva. She led them here.”

Murder leaped into Alec’s eyes.

“Come, my lord. We must take you to hospital.”

Alec struggled to absorb the news of Eva’s treachery as Rush was placed on a stretcher and taken away.

The room was spinning. “Somebody send for my brothers,” he ordered blindly. By God, together, the lot of them would unleash hell on Kurkov for what he had done. Through swirling fury, he felt someone shaking his shoulder hard.

“Alec, do you hear me?”

His chest heaving, he turned to find Draxinger searching his face anxiously. Parthenia clung to the earl’s arm.

“We have to find her!” Alec wrenched out, then his voice dropped to a fierce but agonized whisper. “Oh, God—I’ve let her down. I’ve failed her—so badly, Drax. I’ve got to find her—” He couldn’t have won the whist and Talbot Old Hall with it only to lose Becky herself.

“Alec, listen to me! You can’t go out looking for her. You’ve got to
stay here,
” Drax said emphatically. “They will contact you. They’ll have to.”

Never had Alec been so grateful for his friend’s cool-headed nature, for Drax’s steadiness at the critical moment helped reel him back from the brink of mindless fury.

“Why?” he demanded in a hellish tone.

“Parthenia, tell him.”

With a surge of will, Alec seized back his equilibrium and listened with excruciating attention as Parthenia quickly explained about Nelyudov’s mission and the charge of treason hanging over Kurkov’s head.

“Then, you’re right,” he whispered when she had finished. “Kurkov does need her alive. She’s his only bargaining chip.”
Thank God.
He shut his eyes briefly, struggling to sort it all out despite the chaotic fury pounding in his temples.

If Eva had led the Cossacks here, then Kurkov would soon know it was he who had been helping, hiding, protecting Becky all along, that it was he who had killed two of his men. As soon as the prince knew the truth, Alec had no doubt Kurkov would want his blood.

A trade.

Yes, he thought, flicking his eyes open, with fiendish zeal taking hold of him. He would offer up his own life in exchange for Becky’s release. He would die in her place without thinking twice. It was far better than living, knowing he had failed her.

CHAPTER

SIXTEEN

F
ear had tangled her sense of direction, but Becky believed that the old abandoned cottage where they had brought her lay in the same remote countryside where Alec and she had gone horseback riding on that pleasant day more than a fortnight ago.

That day seemed now to belong to another life, another person.

For hours her whole existence had been demarcated by the broken stone walls and crumbling mortar of the ruined cottage, half reclaimed by vines and weeds. For how many years the place had lain untouched, she could not guess. It had not even been scavenged by the poor; it felt like a place cursed.

Around it, the light woods resounded with morning birdsong. From where Becky sat, her back aching, her hands bound with coarse rope, she could see through the glassless, gaping window, a large crow standing on a squat tree trunk amid some daisies and other scraggly wildflowers. The bird’s raucous cawing grated on her nerves, already worn raw. Beyond the stump where it perched, a winding dirt road led down the steep hill through the shady woods. Faintly, very faintly, she could hear the rhythmic pounding of the surf.

The room where she was being held contained nothing but a rough, rotting table and a long bench in somewhat better condition for having been pushed up against the wall. Beneath her feet the cracked flagstones lay covered in dust; a large brown spider went scuttling by. Above her, through the great hole that gaped in the roof, the sky had changed from dawn’s thick gray to luminous heaven-blue, like Alec’s eyes.

The thought of him gave her strength and at the same time threatened to undo her cool composure. Her tears had ended. Enough hours had passed to harden her terror into cold, stoic rage.

But beneath it, behind her outer impassivity, she was worried sick about Alec, and about Fort and Rush, as well. The latter pair had fought so bravely against the Cossacks, to no avail. Becky had given herself up when she saw they were going to be killed.

As to Alec’s fate, she could only agonize, not knowing what had become of him. Was he alive or dead? Had he killed Mikhail on the boat, as planned? Had he been arrested or killed in turn by the Regent’s guards? She could not allow herself to contemplate the possibility that he was dead.

No, it weakened and rattled her too much, and right now she needed all of her strength and all of her wits to hold her own against the madwoman tormenting her.

Becky now knew how the mouse felt when the cat caught it, crippled it, and played with it before having it for supper.

“It’s not nice to go around telling lies about your guardian, dear Becky.”

“I never told a single lie about Mikhail. He’s the liar.”

Crack!

Lady Campion dealt her another cutting blow across the face with her riding crop. “I detest children who tell lies.”

Becky refused to be bowed. “I am not a child.”

“Yes, you are. You’re just a pretty young thing, aren’t you? So, so pretty. Do you know what this is, Becky, my girl?” she purred, holding up a glass vial of some thick clear liquid.

Becky closed her eyes for a second. “No.”

“Oil of vitriol. A concentrated form of sulfuric acid. There are vitriol attacks in London all the time. A vial like this is thrown at someone, leaving them blinded, you see, burned, and horribly disfigured. Watch.” Roughly, Eva tore part of the sleeve off Becky’s gown and brought the remnant over to the table. She put a drop of vitriol on the cloth, and very soon the acid ate a hole right through it. “Imagine what it could do to this lovely complexion,” she murmured, trailing her gloved fingertip down Becky’s cheek. “I wonder if our beautiful Alec would still want you with your face melted. I’m afraid not, because, well, just between us girls, he is rather shallow, isn’t he?”

Becky glared at her but refused either to flinch or to beg for mercy.

Suddenly, the sound of galloping hoofbeats could be heard approaching up the dirt road.

“Ah!” Lady Campion put the stopper back in the vial of acid and glided over to the window. “He’s come!” The baroness turned to Becky with a spiteful gleam in her dark eyes. “Now you’re in real trouble.”

When the baroness hurried out to greet her lover, pulling the thick weathered door shut behind her, Becky drooped forward on the hard bench, trying to rally herself to face Mikhail. Her heart pounded with sickening force. Her shoulders ached from having her arms bound behind her. Parched with thirst and coated in dust from the road, she was bleary with exhaustion and woozy from Lady Campion’s gleeful abuse.

She heard Mikhail’s voice and pulled deeper into herself, remembering in terror his long-standing threat of rape. The door banged open and there he stood, huge and hard-eyed and every inch as terrifying as she remembered him. She swallowed hard. Mikhail prowled into the room, looking her over as though she were a valued bit of merchandise. Becky flinched when he grasped her chin, lifting her face.

He inspected it, took note of the welt on her cheek, and then turned his icy stare on Eva. “What have you done to her?”

A chill ran down Becky’s spine as she picked up the note of danger in his voice. The baroness, unfortunately for her, had not yet learned to recognize the subtle signs of his displeasure.

Her tone blithe, she was still preening over having found Becky for him. “Yes, well, she was a little obtuse, so I decided to soften her up for you a bit.”

Mikhail’s swift backhand sent her reeling. “How dare you strike my blood kin?” he thundered at her as she fell back against the broken wall.

“But—Mikhail!” Eva’s face turned ghastly white, her eyes dark and staring. She bore the red imprint from his blow on her cheek, along with a look of utter disbelief.

“Get out of here,” he growled. “Go and fetch me Alec Knight.”

He’s still alive!

“Bring him here—alone. Tell him we have her, and that if he wants to see her alive again, he will surrender himself immediately. I don’t like being humiliated.”

“Oh, Lady Campion, don’t,” Becky uttered, though she knew it would only bring her more pain. “They’ll kill him! I know he threatened you, but surely you know he didn’t mean it. Alec would never hurt a woman. If you ever cared for him at all—”

“Silence!” Mikhail roared at Becky. “You, go!” he ordered the baroness.

Lady Campion staggered to her feet and inched toward the door with a look of lingering bewilderment. To her credit, she attempted to stand up to him. “Mikhail, I got you the girl,” she pointed out. “Don’t be reckless! Isn’t it enough that your brutes already cut down Nick Rushford and Daniel Fortescue?”

“I’ll be the one to say when it’s enough.” He rose and stalked over to her. She stepped back, cowering. “Eva, you will see this through. After all, you’re the one who started it, didn’t you? You got yourself in over your head, and now you will do as I say. Unless you want to hang for kidnapping, I suggest you do as you’re told. Bring him. Alone.”

She fled.

A moment later the baroness streaked past the window on horseback. She had no sooner gone off on her mission than Mikhail closed the moldering door and pivoted to face Becky, who was seated on the long wooden bench with her hands tied behind her back.

He lowered his chin as he walked toward her; his gray eyes gleamed with brutal pleasure. “Now, then, little cousin. You and I have some unfinished business to attend to.” He grasped a handful of her hair and pulled her head back, then touched her bruised lips with the pad of his thumb. “So fair,” he crooned.

Becky’s face drained. His steely touch made resistance futile as Mikhail pushed her back slowly, inexorably, until she was lying on the bench, shaking with fear.

“I told you I’d teach you a lesson you’d never forget. You’ve had this coming for a long time.”

She began fighting him, struggling to escape his rough taunting attempts to kiss her, but when he reached down to unfasten his breeches, terror overflowed Becky’s mind. “No! Mikhail, don’t. Oh God, please—” she wrenched out. “Wait—I beg you!”

He wrapped his hand around her throat in a warning grip. “Shut up and spread your damned legs. You spread them for him, didn’t you?”

“That’s what I’m trying to tell you.” She cast about for some means to deter him. “Lord Alec—he gave me the French disease!”

He paused warily, studying her with scorn.

“You know his reputation as a libertine!” She forced herself to hold his stare, praying he’d believe her.

Mikhail’s lips curled in a sneer. He left his breeches fastened, but Becky’s relief was short-lived, for he continued to hold her down. Instead, he reached for his pistol.

“Fine. Have it your way.”

Oh, no.
Now he was simply going to shoot her.

But to her bewilderment, he unloaded the gun with a cruel smile, spilling out the metal ball onto the table. It rolled away, plopping onto the floor, where it stopped in a crack between the flagstones.

“No matter,” he whispered, lifting the side of the gun to her lips. “Kiss it,” he ordered.

She jerked away uneasily as he rubbed the gun against her mouth. Her heart pounded, then she gasped as he pressed it between her legs, warming the cold steel of the long hard muzzle against her inner thigh. Becky’s eyes widened with revulsion as she realized what he intended. She screamed and fought him with wild violence, trying to kick the weapon out of his hand. Mikhail laughed and slammed her back down onto the bench in a supine position. “Shh, lie still. You’re only making it worse for yourself.”

Their struggle was so fierce, her horror so encompassing, that she barely noticed the rider who arrived. Mikhail was laughing, trying to force the gun inside her when a frantic knock rattled the moltering door.

“Your Highness! A word, sire! I implore you!”

“What is it?” Mikhail barked.

Urgent words in Russian followed. The tone was dire, but the only word she recognized was “Westland.”

She had no idea what the Cossack had said; all of her awareness had contracted into the small circle of terror that centered around Mikhail and his horrific, degrading assault. She was not even aware that she was crying. Instinct had taken over, and all she could focus on was the need to fight him off.

But then, after whatever magical words the Cossack had uttered, Mikhail let her go, cautiously lowering his hand from her throat. Becky had been reduced, however, to such primitive fury that she snarled and kicked at him again as he withdrew.

He turned and slapped her across the face. “Sit down!”

Already unbalanced, Becky pitched back against the stone wall and banged her head so hard that she fell onto the bench, knocked out cold.

“Nelyudov has come?” Mikhail echoed ominously.

“We didn’t realize it at first. He went in too quickly. It was dark.”

“Westland received him?”

“Yes, Your Highness. They spoke for some time, and Lady Parthenia was with them. The Westlands must have discovered our presence somehow, because Nelyudov came out after us. He killed Boris and Yuri, and captured Vlad, but I got away.”

“There is only one reason the Czar would send his top assassin after me,” Mikhail murmured, recalling the lack of communication from his co-conspirators back in Russia. His heart began to pound. He suddenly felt a trifle ill, but managed to maintain a veneer of calm. “The plot has been discovered.”

“It’s worse than that, sir. Nelyudov had called up the local garrison to seize you. After he attacked us at the Westlands’, I went to the hotel, thinking you’d be there after the card game. They had at least twenty dragoons, heavily armed, waiting there to ambush you.”

“Damn it!” Mikhail punched the door, bloodying his knuckles. He felt as though the walls were closing in on him. “That little bitch in the next room must have gotten to the Westlands’ somehow, despite all our efforts. Alec Knight probably helped her.” He stared coldly at his men. “This is your doing. You were supposed to find her and stop her before any of this happened. You’ve failed me.” He walked away from them, his temples throbbing.

His remaining Cossacks exchanged uneasy looks.

“I will question Rebecca myself to learn how much she’s told them.” He examined the broken skin of his knuckles. “Well, then, it would seem the game has ended,” he said in a cool tone after a moment.