Shana Galen (23 page)

Elinor rubbed her arms, trying to restore circulation. “Did you capture him?”

Winn cupped her cheek with uncharacteristic tenderness. “No. I had more important matters to attend to.” His gaze slid to the bed, and she made the mistake of glancing in that direction. A pool of blood fanned out from Lefèbvre’s head and stained the coverlet. She thanked God the man’s face was directed away from hers. Winn grabbed her hand and pulled. “Let’s go. I started a fire in the kitchens, and while it makes for a good distraction, it’s rather indiscriminate about whom it kills.”

Elinor allowed him to pull her toward the door, but at the last moment, she broke away. “No. Wait!”

***

Winn cursed as Elinor ran back into the room, falling at the end of the bed. Had the smoke addled her brain? “Ellie, we have to go.”

“Wait. It’s here.”

“What is here?” Had she dropped a necklace or a hairpin? “We haven’t much time.” The smoke was thicker now, and he could hear the roar of the fire. It was climbing, hungry, devouring everything its long fingers touched.

“Got it!” Her hand shot into the air, clutching a piece of parchment.

“What is that?”

She handed it to him, and Winn skimmed the document. He felt a slow smile forming on his lips. He looked up and into the beautiful face of his wife, his partner, and now an agent for the Barbican group. “You bloody well did it,” he said.

She smiled. “I know.”

“I don’t bloody well believe it.”

Her smile widened. “I know.”

Winn tucked the paper in his coat. “You deserve a knighthood if we make it out of here alive and reach the prince in time.”

“Women cannot become knights.”

He took her hand and pulled her toward the door. “More’s the pity.”

“Really?” She sounded astonished.

“Really.” He was still grinning. His wife was really an operative. He could bluster and protest all he wanted, but he knew skill and talent and luck when he saw it. “We’re going to need some of your luck,” he said now, pulling her down the stairs. “If I’m not mistaken, our assassin is with the prince at this very moment.”

Elinor halted, her hand pulling out of his. “What?”

“I’ll explain later. Blue is waiting for us.” He threw open the bedroom door and stared at a wall of flame.

This was a bad sign. Winn need not tell Elinor that an angry barricade of hot flames posed a problem. He also need not tell her that going through the flames was their only option. They were on the highest level of the house. They could not exactly escape through the window.

“We’ll have to escape through the window,” Winn said.

“What?” Elinor rubbed her ears. The roar of the flames was deafening.

Winn pulled her back up the stairs, slamming the door closed behind them. “That door won’t hold the flames long. We can’t go through the house. The fire has probably already engulfed the lower floors.” He strode to the window and looked down.

Elinor followed. “We are on the uppermost floor! We can’t jump down.”

He struggled to push the window open. “We’ll have… to… climb… down…”

Elinor couldn’t see much, as Winn’s body blocked the view from the window, but she doubted there were stairs or a sufficiently sturdy ladder outside that window.

“You’re not afraid, are you?” Winn said with a grin.

“No!”

He stuck his head out the window and peered down then began peeling off his women’s garb, leaving it in a pile on the floor. Slowly, he became Winn again—light brown hair pulled back into a queue, emerald-green eyes teasing her, a man’s hard, solid body.

Elinor closed her eyes. This was no time for desire. Winn wanted her to climb out a window. Of course she was afraid! Why had she just said she was not? She had no intention of going out that window. She glanced at the door and saw black smoke gathering. She looked back at the window, rose on tiptoes to survey the drop, and felt her stomach plummet.

Elinor dug her fingers into her palm. She had not thought she would escape Lefèbvre, but she had. She had not thought she would ever be anything more than a wife and mother, but here she was. She was not going to permit a small drop to defeat her.

The fall might kill her, but at least she’d die undefeated.

“Blue!” Winn yelled. “Blue!” Winn pulled his head back in and yanked the bedclothes off the bed.

“What are you doing?” she asked, though she could clearly see he was fashioning a rope of some sort, tying it to the heavy bed, and knotting the sheets together. Did he really think she was going to trust yellowed linens and hastily tied knots with her life? A tongue of fire licked across the ceiling, and Elinor grabbed a handful of cloth and started to tie.

“Who were you calling?” she asked.

“Blue. Melbourne sent him to assist.”

Elinor glanced out the window at the empty yard below. “Where is he?”

“I don’t know. Maybe he went after Foncé. I hope he returned to Carlton House.”

“Why?” Elinor tested a knot she’d tied. It seemed sturdy. “Why did you say the assassin was with the prince? Are we too late?”

“We might be.” He threw the newly fashioned “rope” out of the window. Elinor watched it fall. It did not fall for nearly as long as she would have liked. The distance between the rope and the ground was still alarmingly large, even if she did manage to actually climb down the rope. Perhaps she should begin to encourage more tree-climbing in Caroline and Georgiana’s education. She could have used those particular skills at present.

“Did you read the missive?” Winn touched his coat, where he’d tucked the paper she’d saved.

Elinor felt her face color—from the encroaching fire’s heat, undoubtedly. “No, I…” Her French was abysmal, but she was certainly not going to jump to her death right after admitting such a failure.

“Foncé bribed the regent’s mistress. She’ll open a secret door to him at midnight while the prince sleeps. Foncé will have all the time he needs to murder the prince, carve him like poultry.”

“We have to warn the palace.”

“I agree.” Winn gestured to the window. “Do you want to go first, or shall I?”

“I think this is one instance where chivalry is best thrown to the wayside.”

Winn grinned. How could the man grin at a time like this? “Very well. If you slip and fall, I will attempt to remain chivalrous enough to catch you. Now, watch how I descend, and follow me.”

Elinor watched as Winn deftly threw one leg over the casement and then the other. It appeared he had done this a thousand times. She tried to watch closely, but he moved quickly and the night was dark. The heat from the fire howling behind her tended to distract her as well. Peering over the casement, she watched Winn descend. He gripped the bedclothes between his knees, wrapping an ankle around the edge to further secure himself, and then lowered himself with his hands. The sheets swayed precariously, smashing him into the building at one point, but he looked up, grinned, and continued his descent.

He really loved this.

She was scared out of her mind, her heart was racing, and she knew she was about to die, but she was also having the best night of her life. She did not want to be anywhere else—well, other than safely on the ground. But nothing could have prevented her from experiencing this exhilaration.

A boom resounded through the building, and the floor shook beneath her. The room began to slide, and Elinor grabbed the window frame for support. “Winn!” she called.

“The building is collapsing. Go now before it’s too late.”

Go
now. Go now
. Elinor nodded and sat on the edge of the windowsill. She put one foot out the window until she straddled it. She tried very, very hard not to look down. But she had to grope for the bedclothes’ rope, and she accidentally caught a glimpse of the drop below her. The world spun for a moment, and she closed her eyes.

She could do this. She would rather take her chances on the rope than sit here and burn to death. Taking a deep breath, Elinor opened her eyes and reached for the rope. Winn’s weight kept it straight, but she still had to lean down to grasp it. There was no avoiding the drop that way.

Winn had held the rope and jumped over the side of the window. She was not so confident. She could slide out, with both feet ahead of her, but what if she did not catch hold of the rope when she was through the window?

“Elinor, go!” Winn yelled. “Go, now!”

“All right!” She clamped her jaw tight, closed her eyes, wrapped her hands around the rope, and pushed off. For a moment, all she felt was nothingness under her toes. For a moment, all was silent, and she was floating.

And then she slammed into the building, and she had to remember not to release the rope or else she would fall. She tried to catch the rope between her knees, but her skirts, flimsy as they were, made the task all but impossible. And she was far heavier than she realized. It took all of her strength and then some to support her weight. Already, her hands were slick with perspiration.

“I’m at the end,” Winn called up. “I’m letting go. You’ll feel some give.”

“What does that mean?” She kept her eyes tightly shut. At some point she was going to need to start lowering herself, but she was loathe to release her death grip on the linen.

“Just hold on.”

The rope tensed and then relaxed, and she slammed into the building again. She shrieked, but she held on.

“Elinor, open your eyes.”

“No.” She shook her head. If she opened her eyes, she would freeze.

“Open your eyes and see how I descend the rest of the way. You’ll have to follow me.”

Oh, God. Oh, she was going to die. She opened her eyes and watched as he climbed, like some sort of spider, down the side of the building. She was doomed. She would never be able to duplicate that.

“Just catch hold of the nooks and outcrops in the building,” Winn yelled, jumping nimbly to his feet. “There are enough to see you safely to the ground.”

“All right.” But she didn’t move.

“Climb down now, honey.”

“All right.” She tried—she really did—to open one of her fists and force herself down the rope, but her hand had a mind of its own.

“Elinor, I don’t want to alarm you…”

Never a good way to begin a sentence.

“… but the building is swaying.”

Yes, she could feel it. She had thought it was her imagination.

“It’s going to collapse. You have to move now.” He sounded so logical, so reasonable. As though climbing down the side of a burning building on a flimsy piece of linen were the most natural thing in the world.

And then she heard the sound of a rip, and she jerked down.

“Elinor!” Winn did not sound quite so calm now. “Climb down. Now!”

This was it. This was the moment when it all went horribly wrong and she plummeted to her death on the hard earth below. This was the moment Winn would remember and think,
I
should
never
have
allowed
her
to
become
an
agent.

This was the moment.
Her
moment.

Elinor opened her eyes, unclenched her fists, and began a slow, clumsy descent. Her hands burned as her palms slid along the coarse linen sheets. She tried to slow her descent, but it seemed the whole building was bowing down on top of her, lowering her much faster than she wanted.

She had to stop imagining the worst.

“That’s it, Ellie,” Winn called. “You’re doing it.”

She was doing it. So why did he still sound concerned? Something fiery streaked past her head, bounced off the side of the building, and tumbled to the ground.

Elinor looked up. The building really was coming tumbling down on top of her. “Winn!” she screamed. She was going to die.
“Winn!”

“You’re almost there. Keep climbing,” he urged her. She still heard that edge of fear, but he sounded much more controlled than she felt. “You can do this, Ellie.”

She could. She
would
.

She lowered herself again, trying to ignore the way her feet flailed in the empty air under them. She had never thought she would appreciate the solid ground beneath her feet so much. She was almost there. She was almost—she looked down, and that was a mistake.

She was
not
almost there. She still had a long, long way to go, and she was never going to make it in time. Another piece of debris tumbled past her, followed by a broken lamp and several pieces of the roof.

She was too high. She was still too high. “Run!” she yelled to Winn. “It’s going to collapse. Run so you won’t be caught under it.”

“I’m not moving until you’re beside me. Climb down.”

“Idiot,” she muttered and lowered herself again. Slow and steady was the key, but she did not have the time for slowness, and the building was anything but steady.

Still, she kept climbing down, down, down.

A horrible, twisted whine sounded from somewhere deep inside the building. Elinor started, so shocked she almost let loose the rope. “What was that?” she murmured to herself.

“Elinor!” Winn called. “Jump!”

“What?” Surely he had not told her to jump. She looked down. She was much too high to jump…

“Jump!” Winn screamed. But he wasn’t looking at her. He was looking above her. She followed his gaze and saw the building was roaring with flames. The top floors had already caved in on themselves, and now the entire structure was bending over like an old man gripping his cane.

“Winn!”

“Let go. I’ll catch you.”

No!
No, no, no. She was too high. She’d kill them both.

“Ellie, let go.” This time Winn’s voice was strangely peaceful. It was as though he knew everything was going to be fine. She had little choice. She had to trust him.

Elinor closed her eyes and let go.

***

“You know you’re a bloody idiot,” someone said. Winn blinked up at the hazy dark above him. “You’re lucky nothing is broken.”

Was nothing broken? Winn was not quite so certain. Slowly, Blue’s features began to take shape. “Where’s Ellie?”

“I’m here.”

He glanced in the direction of her voice and saw her lying on a patch of grass and weeds. “How did we—?” Winn glanced back at what was left of the brothel. The charred building still smoldered as flames consumed the last of the rubble. It collapsed in on itself and toppled over.

“I pulled both of you out of there before you managed to flatten yourselves. You can thank me later.”

Winn had no recollection of Blue pulling either of them to safety. The last he remembered, he moved to catch Elinor, and her weight, multiplied by the length of her fall, sent them reeling. He’d managed to catch her and hold on, but then he’d gone down, unable to muster the strength to carry them out of harm’s way. “Why did you call me an idiot?” Winn asked, feeling surly.

“Because you almost broke your necks.”

“Do you have a better suggestion for rescuing her?”

“Yes.”

Winn waited, but Blue did not elaborate.

“Shouldn’t we be attempting to rescue the prince, instead of arguing amongst ourselves?”

Winn scowled at Elinor and noted Blue did the same. “I left him safely ensconced in his bedroom. With his mistress,” Blue informed her.

“You may have left His Royal Highness thus, but he’s not safe,” Winn said. He pulled the paper from his coat and handed it to Blue. “Lady Keating managed to pilfer this from Lefèbvre’s papers.”

Elinor stepped closer, watching as Blue read the parchment. “I need a code name,” she said.

“No, you don’t.” Winn wasn’t ever going to allow her to do anything this dangerous again. He’d almost lost her. He glanced at her, saw her irritated frown, and pulled her into his arms. Not caring that Blue was standing right beside them, he kissed her with a possessiveness strong enough that it surprised even him. She kissed him back, her hands wrapping around his shoulders as she sighed into him.

“Oh, Winn.”

He took her face in his hands. “I thought I’d lost you.”

She smiled up at him, an expression on her face he couldn’t quite place. She arched up and kissed him tenderly on the lips.

Blue cleared his throat. “There has been a ridiculous amount of kissing within the ranks of the Barbican group lately, and we have more important matters at hand.”

“Jealous?” Winn teased.

Blue gave him a mysterious look. All of Blue’s looks were mysterious, but this one looked calculated. “Not at all.”