Shana Galen (22 page)

“I think we are about done here,” Foncé said.

“Do you want to do it, or shall I?”

Elinor swallowed. “By
it
, I assume you mean who is going to end my life?”

“This doesn’t involve you,” Lefèbvre said, pointing his finger at her.

“I beg to differ!” She stood, holding the parchment behind her to keep it from view.

“You kill her,” Foncé said. “I don’t have my tools, and we are short on time.”

Lefèbvre cracked his knuckles again and stepped toward her. At the same time, a cry of “Fire!” echoed. Both men started for the door, and Elinor took the opportunity to drop the parchment on the floor and slide it under the bed with her foot.

“See what that is about,” Foncé ordered. “It could very well be one of their tricks.” He gestured to Elinor, and she was gratified that at least she was considered part of the Barbican group by someone.

“Yes, sir!” Lefèbvre rushed down the stairs, and when Elinor turned back to Foncé, she found him staring intently at her.

“Did you know you have a knife in your hair?”

Elinor tried to reach for her coiffure, but she’d forgotten her hands were tied. Foncé did the honors for her, gently withdrawing the small dagger she’d secured there. It seemed she’d performed the task a lifetime ago, when it had been merely hours. With all of her flopping and running, her hair must have moved enough to make the dagger visible.

Foncé held the small weapon aloft so it glinted in the lamplight.

“It appears I have the tools to kill you after all.”

***

Upon reflection, Winn thought he might have done better to search for Elinor and forgo additions to his disguise. The fire he’d accidentally set spread quickly, and he found himself in the unenviable position of trying to gain entrance to a row of doors, all of which appeared to be locked.

He glanced behind him. The flames in the kitchen pumped like angry fists then raced like gleeful children up the walls to dance on the ceiling.

He was either extremely dedicated to his work, a complete idiot, or madly in love. Probably all three. A sane man would be heading for the exit, not deeper into the house. Trying to keep low, a rather difficult task considering his size and height, he moved along the corridor to face two more closed doors. He had just enough time left to quickly augment his disguise.

Hoping he’d be lucky—as though that ever happened—he tried one of the door handles. Locked. He tried the other. Locked. Who locked all the doors in a house? Bloody hell. He hated breaking doors down. He was definitely too old for this sort of thing

Winn stared at the doors.
Which
one? Which one?
He didn’t have the time or energy to break into all of them. He said a little rhyme in his head his daughter had enjoyed when she was younger, and pointed to the door his finger landed on.

He took three large steps back, inhaled slowly, then ran for the door, leading with his shoulder. He rammed it, bounced back, and shook his head. He examined the frame, saw he’d done some damage, and stepped back again. He eyed the door, noting curls of smoke had tiptoed down the corridor.

With a groan of dread, he rammed the door again. This time he separated it enough to kick it in. He was inside the room and stumbling about in the darkness. His shoulder hurt like the devil, but he ignored the pain and looked for a dresser. A promising shape loomed across the room, and Winn approached it, smiling when he saw it was a highboy. Beside it were two pegs, and on one hung a hat. With ribbons. Perfect.

He found some shoes, yanked his boots off, and stuffed his feet in them, wincing with pain. Hobbling, he made his way to the looking glass. He looked like a man wearing a woman’s hat. He needed something more…

Ear bobs! He tied a pair on his ears and checked the looking glass again. Better. But what was Elinor always putting on her cheeks? She didn’t want him to notice, so he pretended he didn’t. Ah, there. Rouge. He stuck his fingers in it and rubbed it in a circle on his cheeks and then his lips. He shrugged at his reflection. Not bad. He was the ugliest woman he’d ever seen, but he thought he might pass, considering the smoke and confusion.

He rubbed his hand on the mantel to rid his fingers of the remaining rouge, and ran for the door.

He promptly tripped over his shoes and had to climb to his feet again. How the devil did women walk in these things? Small, dainty steps, he decided.

Now to find Elinor. Winn tripped and stumbled up the steps, onto the ground floor, and into the dining room. Without pause, he flung open the door to the drawing room. “Fire!” he screamed in a womanly voice—or as close as he could manage. “The kitchens are on fire. Run!”

There was a long moment when no one moved and no one spoke. Winn half expected them to go about their conversations as though he hadn’t spoken. And then pandemonium erupted. Women screamed, men cursed, and people climbed over one another to reach the exits.

Winn waited until they’d filed past him, and then started for the stairs.

But not everyone had fled.

***

“I think I shall start with your mouth,” Foncé said. “I would like to cut out your tongue, so I do not have to hear another word from you.”

Elinor was wise enough not to speak.

“Then again, I do so like the sound of screaming. If I cut out your tongue, I won’t hear your pleas for mercy when I cut you here.” He drew the blade of the dagger across her chest, causing a string of pain and a bright line of blood to appear. It was a shallow cut, but it hurt nonetheless.

“Or here.” He flicked the dagger at the front of the gown, tearing the thin material and exposing a swath of her pale abdomen. The dagger flicked again, and another smiling red mouth appeared. Elinor choked back a scream. She wanted to keep her tongue as long as possible.

“Now that is pretty.” Foncé wielded the knife again before boots thumped on the stairs.

“It’s true!” his second-in-command wheezed, doubling over to catch his breath. “The kitchens. Fire.”

“Damn it! I don’t have time for this.” Foncé thrust the dagger at his lieutenant. “Kill her.”

***

“Who are you?” asked the guard standing in front of the stairs leading to the upper floors, leading to Elinor. Above, all was still silent. No one had thought to warn the girls working upstairs.

“Chambermaid,” Winn said in a ridiculously high voice. “I must warn the girls upstairs.” Winn risked a glance at the man and saw he looked skeptical. Bloody hell. What was he to do now? Women always needed help, and men seemed to enjoy helping them, so he added, “Can you help me?”

“I…” The man hesitated, and Winn considered that perhaps it was only
attractive
women men enjoyed assisting. Foncé’s man leaned closer, scrutinizing him, and Winn decided he’d better not take a chance.

“Oh, dear! Look at that!” he screeched, pointing behind the man. When the guard turned to look, Winn kicked him. The man fell against the stairs, and Winn fell on him, ramming his head into the wooden slats. As the man’s eyes drifted closed, Winn muttered, “That’s for thinking I wasn’t pretty enough.”

He jumped over the unconscious man and continued quickly but cautiously up the stairs to the first floor. A woman appeared at the top, and Winn yelled, “Fire! Run!” The woman rushed past him, not seeming to care he was going in the wrong direction. He took the stairs two at a time, reached the landing, and turned in a circle. Where was Elinor?
Where
was
Elinor?

At the end of the corridor, the door leading to the attic flew open, and a short, stout man emerged. He was the image of the description Winn had been given for Lefèbvre. Winn jumped back, into the room the whore had just vacated, and closed the door all but a sliver. He peeked through the sliver as Foncé’s lieutenant ran past him and down the main stairwell. Winn darted back out of the bedroom, narrowly avoiding a collision with a couple running for the exit, and headed for the attic.

Thin wisps of smoke made the passage hazy, and Winn heard cries of alarm from below. The fire was spreading. Time was growing short.

He reached the door leading to the attic stairs and paused to listen. He thought he heard voices echoing down through the stairwell leading to the topmost floor. A male voice but no female. Winn would wager anything the male voice belonged to Foncé. But where was Elinor? Winn had been an operative for most of his life. A man like Foncé, a man who was so ostensibly an enemy of the Barbican group, was also
his
sworn enemy. A man like that must be dealt with. And for the first time in more than a decade of service, Winn paused. He did not care about Foncé at the moment. It was Elinor whose face he saw in his mind’s eye. It was Elinor he was here for, not Foncé. Foncé could hang. When Elinor was safe, Winn would deal with Foncé.

And if Elinor was not safe… Winn would destroy the entire Maîtriser group single-handedly.

He heard the thump of boots and looked over his shoulder to see the Maîtriser group’s second-in-command clomping along the first floor corridor toward him. Winn swore and grasped the first door handle within reach. The bedroom was unlocked, and he dove inside, not caring whether it was occupied or not. A quick survey told him it was not. He eased the door open and watched as Lefèbvre stomped up the attic stairs.

If Elinor had been an experienced operative, Winn would have known with absolute certainty she was in one of those attic rooms. The attic above was obviously the domain of the Maîtriser group.

But Elinor was not an experienced operative, and she might never have made it that far. She could be anywhere in the brothel. She could be bound in a room with flames licking at the door.

Winn wanted to pound his fist into something. He never should have allowed her to accept this mission. Panic rose hot and sharp in his throat. Fear and panic were part of any mission, but this time Winn could not manage to tamp them under control. This time they slammed into him, and his legs all but crumpled.

He could not lose Elinor. He could not.

Still uncertain as to what he would do, he threw open the door to the bedroom, just as he heard footsteps in the attic stairwell again. He ducked back and watched as Foncé emerged through the door leading to the attic.

Now Winn’s heart pounded with something much stronger than panic. It was the pounding of the hungry predator who has spotted his prey. It was the pounding of the heart of one who knows he has achieved victory.

Winn’s vision narrowed, and his mind focused. The smoke and the heat from the rising fire faded from consciousness. The rushing in his ears blotted out everything but Foncé, moving away, blissfully unaware. He made the perfect target. Winn started for Foncé. He would kill the man and be done with it.

And then he heard a woman’s scream.

***

Elinor knew the struggle was futile, but she wrenched her bound hands behind her back in a desperate attempt to free them from their bonds. There was no mistaking the glint in Lefèbvre’s eyes. He was going to kill her. Her one consolation was that he was not going to play with her first. This was a man who cared for efficiency.

He moved toward her, and she dove around the corner of the bed, falling to her knees and struggling to rise again. Lefèbvre was coming for her. “Stop running, and I will make this quick and painless,” he promised.

Elinor would have preferred to run and give herself a few more seconds of life. Unfortunately, she had the wall behind her and Lefèbvre before her. Trapped. But God help her if she would stand here and allow him to slit her throat. She waited until he was within arm’s reach, then dove across the bed, wriggling to the edge, using only her body.

A hand clamped about her ankle, and she screamed and kicked. Lefèbvre swore, and Elinor rolled away. The bed sagged with his weight as he climbed after her. Like a caught fish, flopping helplessly on a boat, she struggled to reach the other side of the bed. She could see the door to freedom, but the bed was so large, and her arms were caught in the sheets. She threw her shoulders to one side, freeing herself, but just as she would have rolled off the bed, Lefèbvre caught her and pulled her back again.

“No!” she yelled. He was above her and wielding the knife, and she kicked out with all she had, landing a glancing blow with her foot on the side of his head.

He recoiled, but Elinor knew immediately it was not enough to incapacitate him. Now he was angry. “You will pay for that,” he threatened.

The acrid smell of smoke flared in her nostrils, and she gasped for a breath of clean air. “This building is on fire,” she told him. “You should leave now, while you still can.”

“Good suggestion. Too bad you won’t be alive to follow your own advice.” He gripped her shoulder and raised the knife. Elinor kicked out, tried to dislodge his grip, but he held fast and managed to evade her thrashing feet. She watched the knife, watched the sharp blade come closer, and the faces of Georgiana and Caroline flashed in her mind.

Sweet girls. They knew how much she loved them.

Then she saw Winn’s face. Would he ever know? Would he ever forgive her for this failure?

She shut her eyes, moved her lips in a silent prayer, and heard the blast. Her body jerked as something thumped on top of her. She opened her eyes and stared at Lefèbvre’s shoulder. With a yelp, she bucked, throwing him off. He rolled slowly, and she spotted movement above and looked up.

The ugliest woman she had ever seen was peering down at her. She wore far too much rouge, large ear bobs, and sported half a day’s growth of beard.

“Are you hurt?” she asked. Elinor blinked. The woman was speaking in Winn’s voice. “Ellie?” The woman came closer, bent, and kissed her.

Elinor started.

“It’s me. Winn.”

Elinor blinked as Winn hauled her up. When she looked at him this way, his features arranged themselves in the correct order. “Winn? Why are you dressed like a woman?”

“Never mind that now, my love. We have to escape.”

“But Foncé…”

“He ran right past me.” Winn hauled her to her feet, and with practiced efficiency, freed her hands from their bonds.