Suzanne Robinson (26 page)

Luke bellowed in rage and launched himself at Jowett. He tackled the man, sending them both crashing to the ground. Luke shoved himself up and aimed his fist at Jowett’s head, but the man didn’t move. Prim was beside him in a moment, tugging on his arm.

He climbed off Jowett and nudged him with his boot. When his attacker didn’t move, Luke gave him a harder shove, rolling him on his back. Prim buried her face in his shoulder at the sight of the knife sticking out of Jowett’s chest over the heart.

Luke heard running footsteps. He grasped Prim’s hand and pulled her after him, running across the roof and leaping to the next one. He stopped briefly when he heard Prim’s sob. Touching her wet cheeks, he kissed her forehead.

“No time to weep, Primmy my love. Not now.”

“I-I’m n-not weeping.”

“No,” he said gently as he wiped tears from her chin. “Can you manage that roof, love?” He pointed to the steep slopes of the next building. “It’s the last one, and then we’ll be at Leather Lane.”

Prim sniffed and wiped her eyes with her sleeve. “I can manage it.”

“That’s my brave little spinster.”

“There’s no need to call me names, sir.”

Luke grinned at the return of Prim’s usual lecturing tone and set off for the next roof. In a short time they were climbing down the side of a stable in Leather Lane. He could see Prigg sitting atop a hired carriage in the next block. Luke helped Prim jump down from a windowsill, and hurried her down the sidewalk toward the carriage. They were just about to cross the street when Mortimer Fleet stepped out of a doorway holding a pistol. In the light of a street lamp the metal of the gun gleamed, sweating in the drenched air.

“Never knew you to hide behind women, Nightshade.”

“I don’t,” Luke said as he thrust Prim behind him again.

“Sent that tart to fool me at the Knacker, didn’t you?”

“What’s wrong, Fleet? Did she do for your men? She must have, or you’d have the lot of them after us.”

Fleet turned red. “Never you mind. After I’ve finished with you, I’ll find her and settle the score.” He rubbed a purple knot on his forehead.

“But I’ve had enough of you two, no matter what
The Gentleman says” Fleet raised the pistol and pointed it at Luke’s heart. “Too bad I won’t get to try one O’ them poisons on you, but there’s no help for it.”

Luke felt Prim stir behind him. He squeezed her hand, then shoved her and whispered, “Run!”

She moved, but not as he had commanded. Before he could stop her, she darted in front of him. Fleet’s pistol followed the blur of movement. At the same time, Prigg shouted at the carriage horses and aimed them at the group. Luke sprang at Prim with a roar, sweeping her up in his arms and kicking Fleet’s gun hand at the same time. Fleet dropped the pistol and Luke kicked it into the street. Prim struggled in his arms, and Luke set her on her feet.

“You’re unhurt?”

She nodded, but he was already running, and Prim plunged after him. Fleet had stopped in the middle of the street and was searching in the darkness for the pistol. As Luke came after him, he spotted the weapon and jumped for it—into the path of the carriage. Luke shouted, but he was too late. Fleet grabbed the gun and tried to spring out of the way, only to fall under the hooves of the frightened horses.

Prim cried out and yanked on Luke’s arm. He allowed her to pull him out of the way as the carriage barreled past them. He wrapped his arms around her as Prigg fought the horses and managed to halt them. Over Prim’s head, he glanced at Fleet. The condition of his skull was enough to tell him that the man was dead. A door slammed nearby. Luke glanced up and down the deserted street.

“Primmy, we must get out of here before more of Fleet’s men show up. Can you walk?”

“Not with you squeezing me so that I can’t breathe.”

He loosened his hold on her and peered into her pale face. She was trembling, and her eyes were gleaming with tears. Badger came running up to them, out of breath but unhurt.

“I can walk,” she said.

Feeling her shake, Luke muttered, “Choke me dead if I’ll let you.”

He picked her up; she was too light. Hadn’t she been eating? Luke held her tight against him and ignored her protests. He set her inside the carriage, climbing in beside her and slamming the door. As the vehicle jostled into motion, he gathered her in his arms and kissed her. She was cold and trembling and tearful, and he had almost lost her. When he released her from the kiss, Prim sniffed and pulled away from him.

“You—you have a most familiar way of expressing gratitude, Sir Lucas.”

Luke shook his head. “You think that was gratitude?”

“A most understandable emotion.”

Shoving away from her, Luke slouched in the seat and glared at her. “Rot gratitude. And you don’t understand nothing, Miss Primrose blighted Dane.”

Prim was furious with Luke, a state of some permanence where he was concerned. They had escaped east London, left Badger and Prigg at Big Maudie’s, and continued to the deserted town house she now knew had indeed been his. After a night of exhausted sleep in their separate elegant chambers, Luke had been persuaded to seek out a doctor to attend his wounds. Vowing to send a message confirming his safety to Louisa and Tusser, he’d been gone over an hour, and Prim was still angry.

She was angry because she had spent endless hours afraid for his life. Never had she been so terrified, not even when she had seen murder done. If he’d been killed …

She was angry because Luke had scolded her for coming to his aid herself. Had she not proved herself
as adept as he at sneaking and deceit? But not one word of gratitude had he spoken to her when, by his usual circuitous route, they reached the house. Instead, he scowled at her and nursed some mysterious vexation of his own that he refused to discuss.

And most of all, she was angry with him because in a moment of impulse, he’d kissed her and made her more in love with him than ever. He’d even called her “love” and swept her into his arms and generally behaved like the heroes in her childish dreams. She would never forgive him for that.

Prim paced around and around. She was downstairs in the Italian Room, the chamber in which Luke had placed the treasures he’d acquired in Italy. He had refused to say when or why he’d gone to that country, but he had returned with exquisite mementos of the journey. Prim paused beside a pedestal table upon which had been displayed three bronzes formerly in the collection of the d’Este family. The finest was a dark metal replica of the Apollo Belvedere, the god’s arm outstretched, a curved bow in his hand. His hair and scanty robes were gold. Beyond Apollo stood a bust of Bacchus, its patina gleaming in the morning sunlight.

Prim touched the leafy headdress of the god’s wife, Ariadne, before her restlessness took her on another circuit of the room. All round her hung paintings by Titian, Uccello, Botticelli, and Raphael. Prim tried sitting down next to a table bearing a red jasper vase with the name Medici carved in it. She studied the lidded vessel, its gilt and enamel mountings, the massive
flared base. It was no good. She kept thinking of Mrs. Apple.

The woman had been in disguise the whole time she was at Beaufort. Mrs. Apple was an attractive young woman, not an old lady, and she was everything Prim was not—alluring, confident, an adventuress. Upon learning of Luke’s abduction, it had been Mrs. Apple who suggested the plan that ultimately succeeded. Mrs. Apple had braved the Laughing Knacker disguised as Prim. Mrs. Apple had supplied the men willing to take on those waiting to entrap her in the tavern. Prim had done nothing but follow her orders. While she was willing to play any part in rescuing Luke, she wasn’t at all happy about how Mrs. Apple referred to Luke in a most familiar and offhand manner. Humiliating as it was, Prim had to admit to herself that she was jealous of yet another woman who seemed to know Luke Hawthorne well.

Ah, well. Mrs. Apple was gone, off on some urgent business of her own. Prim would probably never see her again. Not that she wanted to see her again. Mrs. Apple had turned out to have lovely auburn hair, and green eyes that seemed always to be crinkling at the corners in merriment. She could do without Mrs. Apple.

Prim tapped her fingers on the table next to the red jasper vase and glanced at the delicately carved writing desk in front of the windows. Upon it lay a sheet of writing paper, and upon that, a gilt pen from the inkstand in the shape of a peacock. She had been writing a letter of farewell to Luke. The only way to prevent another threat to him or someone dear to her
was to leave at once. Swallowing her resentment of Mrs. Apple, she had borrowed a large sum from the woman. Luke would repay her. Prim could no longer afford to be too proud to take money from him.

Her few possessions, which she had taken with her on the precipitant flight from Beaufort, were packed in a small case waiting for her in the foyer. She had been forced to leave behind her dear little book of hours, but Luke would return it to her brother.

If she could write this letter of explanation, she could leave. Prim rubbed her damp palms against her skirt. She rose and went to the desk where she stood staring at the blank sheet of paper. The Italian Room was on the side of the house and looked out on a lawn with a fountain. Silver sprays of water shot out of it, and sparrows pecked at seeds beneath it. Prim sighed and glanced down at the paper again, then jumped at the sound of a rough voice.

“Curses on your head and black death on your heart, Miss Primrose blighted Dane.”

Prim whirled around to find Luke standing not two yards away, her traveling case in his hand. He dropped it, making her jump again.

“You was going to leave, sneak away and go off by yourself.”

Prim gripped the edge of her desk, her hands growing cold. The man in front of her was seething with a fury the force of which she had never experienced. It was as lethal as deadly nightshade, and it was in fact Nightshade himself who was stalking toward her. Quelling the impulse to sidle out of his reach, Prim lifted her chin and met his glare. His chin had
tilted down. His hair swung forward as he lifted his gaze and directed a look at her that would have made a Borgia retreat. He stopped less than a foot from her.

“Rot you, Prim.”

“Your language, Sir Lucas.”

“Rot Sir Lucas. You’re talking to Nightshade, the ruffian what you promised to stay. You lied to me, Miss Prim.”

“I—” Her voice broke under the strain of facing the calm fury of this barbarian. She bit her lip and tried again. “I have to go. I’ll always be a danger to you, to anyone near me.”

“Not if you’d open your mouth and tell me who did for Pauline Cross. I’ll settle him, and it will all be over.”

“Over?” Prim’s fear vanished and she stuck her face close to his, her voice growing louder with each word. “He almost had you killed.” Now she was poking his chest with her finger. “Fleet nearly beat you to death, and you were in a cage. A cage. If we hadn’t reached you in time, Fleet would have killed you. I’m not risking that again.”

She gasped as Luke roared and grabbed her by her arms.

“Bloody hellfire and damnation, woman!” He was shaking her now. “When are you going to realize I’d rather take a thousand chances with my life than risk never seeing you again?”

The words seemed to hang in the room over their heads. Luke stopped shaking her, and they stared at each other for a long time without speaking. His eyes were still glittering with frustration and anger, but as
she watched, something else flickered in them and was gone, mastered by his ruthless will. It was a brief, illusory flicker, a ghost of something, so vague that she might have imagined it. But she hadn’t. Prim’s eyes stung, and she didn’t bother to stop the slow well of tears even as she began to smile.

Luke was still holding her, frozen and rigid. His grip softened and he cursed. “It’s the sunlight. I should never have let you stand in the sunlight.”

She was still smiling at him while her tears trickled down her face.

He looked away. “Forget what I said. I can see that it don’t suit you. Me being what I am.”

“Luke Hawthorne, you are a fool.”

His head jerked back and he directed a sword-like stare at her. “Well, then, Miss Primrose blighted Dane. I might well be as big a fool as I can.”

He pulled her to him, placing his mouth on hers. Prim answered by slipping her arms inside his coat, wrapping them around him, and squeezing. At her response, Luke uttered a wordless cry of disbelief. He turned with her in his arms and sank to the carpet, trying to devour her. Prim felt his body align itself with hers, reveled in its firmness and urgency. His hair fell across her face, a teasing silkiness that echoed the touch of his fingers as they released her from her clothing and traced the outlines of her body.

She searched out his flesh, her hand skimming over the bandages that protected his ribs. Somehow his clothing loosened, and she felt heat and smooth skin. Without warning his mouth searched out her ear, and he began whispering to her—strange foreign words,
Italian, French, she wasn’t certain. His breath teased her and sent miniature thunderbolts of desire from her head to her feet. And all the while his hands gently touched her, never too quickly, never so slow that she grew fearful.