The Lady Who Came in from the Cold (6 page)

Ethan snorted. “That’s not an accomplishment.”

“It is too!”

“It isn’t. You don’t have to do anything to grow—it just happens.”

Owen’s cherubic face flushed. “I’m going to grow bigger than
you
. Then I’m going to beat you at wrestling and—”

“Boys.” Collecting herself, Pandora went over to join them. Softly, she said, “Don’t beleaguer your Papa when he’s only just arrived home.”

Marcus rose, his gaze cutting to hers. A vise gripped her heart. The warmth with which he’d greeted their children vanished. The eyes that met hers were cold and shuttered.

“Marcus,” she whispered.

“My lady.”

His response, chilly and formal, raised the hairs on her skin. At home, he always called her “Pandora” or “Penny,” the pet name he’d given her. In the past, he would greet her with a kiss, a touch, a gesture to show her that he’d missed her. Today, now, she was greeted with… nothing.

What did you expect? A loving welcome? Find a way to fix this.

Mindful of the children, she shaped her lips into a smile. “Boys, it’s time to start your lessons. You can visit with Papa at lunch.”

“But
Mama
,” the boys chorused in protest.

At least the three were in agreement upon something.

“Go on, now,” Marcus said. “I need to speak with your mother. I’ll see you all later.”

Reluctantly, their children tromped off, leaving them alone.

“We have to talk,” she began.

“My study,” her husband said curtly.

He turned, his back a wall to her as he led the way. She followed, her heartbeat measuring every step of the way. She sent up a desperate prayer.

God, if you can hear me, please let Marcus forgive me. I know I’m not good enough for him, but I vow I’ll change—turn over a new leaf, do anything at all—to win him back.

~~~

Marcus closed the door, sealing himself and his wife in the dark paneled room. He’d chosen his study because of the privacy it offered and because he conducted his business affairs there. Over the past fortnight, when his anger had finally abated somewhat, he’d come to the grim conclusion that he’d been far too gullible, too soft and trusting, when it came to his marriage. He’d been so smitten with Pandora that he’d let her run roughshod over him. From now on, he needed to approach his relationship with his wife the way he did other aspects of his life: with a cool head and unwavering authority.

He wouldn’t let himself be blinded by love. Not any longer.

At present, he was confronted with the unpleasant task of discerning the truth so that he could make decisions about the future.

He went to his desk. He leaned against the front edge, his boots planted solidly as he gazed down at her. Seated in a chair facing the desk, Pandora was as beautiful and sultry as ever, but she also looked… tired. There were smudges beneath her eyes, her cheekbones more prominent as if she’d lost weight. He steeled himself against concern, against her beseeching expression.

“Marcus, you have every right to be angry at me—” she began.

“Yes, I do.” It took willpower, but he managed to sound calm. “That is neither here nor there, however. The problem that lies before us is the future: that of our marriage and children.”

“If you can forgive me, I promise that I’ll do whatever—”

“You will be quiet and listen to me.”

At his tone, her indigo eyes went wide. Good. She needn’t think that she could manipulate him—as she’d apparently been doing for the entire length of their relationship. Icy fury gripped his gut. He’d no longer be her puppet, an unwitting toy in her games.

“I have questions to ask. You will answer them,” he said. “Based on your answers, I will decide upon our future. By the by, if I detect so much as a hint of a lie, I will begin divorce proceedings and scandal be damned. Do I make myself clear?”

Her throat worked, her cheeks paling. “Very.”

“Good. Let’s begin with your name. Your true name.”

“It’s Pandora,” she said.

At least she hadn’t lied about that.

“But Hudson wasn’t the name I was born with,” she added in quiet tones.

Anger surged; he tamped it down. “What is your real surname?” he said coldly.

Her lashes lowered, fluttered against her creamy skin. “I don’t know.”

“Don’t play games with me,” he warned. “What do you mean you don’t bloody know?”

“I mean I don’t know who my parents were.” Her bosom rose and fell; her eyes met his. “I was born a bastard. At the orphanage where I was raised, they told me my mother was a prostitute, and I was an unfortunate consequence of her profession. She left me there when I was a month old; I have no memory of her. Apparently, she told them she’d named me Pandora because I brought her a world of trouble.” She paused. “They gave me the surname Smith at the orphanage because no one knew who my father was.”

Shock percolated through Marcus. Of all the explanations he’d been expecting, it hadn’t been this. He stared at his wife—the very image of a fashionable lady—and couldn’t reconcile it with the past she’d just revealed. She was illegitimate… had been abandoned to an orphanage? Before he could recover, she went on.

“By the time I was ten, I was making my living as a flower girl in Covent Garden. No, that’s not precisely true.” Her lips pressed together before she said, “I sold flowers, but most of my earnings came from being a pickpocket.”

Witnessing what he had as an officer, Marcus didn’t think he could be struck speechless. Yet there he was. All capacity for speech… gone.

“I was rather good at it. Small hands, quick reflexes.” Her lips tipped up, but it wasn’t a smile. “Stealing kept my belly full, gave me a roof over my head at night. It wasn’t the easiest life, but it wasn’t the worst. Then I met Octavian.”

Marcus’ hands clenched the edge of the desk. He wasn’t sure he wanted to hear what was coming next. Didn’t like the quiver she was clearly trying to hide in her voice, the shadows gathering in her eyes.

“He was a spymaster for the Crown. He’d chanced to see me at work, and apparently I impressed him with my skills, my ability,”—her voice caught ever so slightly—“to survive. He offered me a way out of the gutter: a position on his team.”

“You were
ten
,” Marcus bit out.

“Close to eleven. And definitely,” she said, her tone flat, “wise beyond my years.”

“What business did this Octavian bounder have for a young girl?”

“At first, I mostly observed and ran errands. But Octavian was grooming me for bigger things. Given that he was a spymaster and bachelor, he couldn’t look after me. So he put me under the care of a couple named Harry and Flora Hudson.”

Her supposed parents, the in-laws Marcus had never met. The ones who’d apparently died and left her in a boarding school abroad.

Grimly, Marcus said, “The Hudsons were spies as well?”

She nodded. “Harry was an agent—and since Flora was devoted to her husband and refused to leave his side, she became one, too. Their good blood and Harry’s interest in archaeology provided the perfect cover for their espionage work. I traveled with them, and they trained me, raised me as their own. I owe them everything.” Her ivory throat rippled, her voice emerging in a whisper. “Harry was killed not long after Waterloo. A carriage accident. He’d fought so hard for peace and didn’t live long enough to enjoy it. After that, Flora lost the will to go on.”

Marcus’ chest clenched at the sheen in Pandora’s eyes. He couldn’t deny that she had been through much—so much that he could scarcely fathom it. At the same time, fury surged that she’d kept this—all of it—from him. That she hadn’t trusted him… that she’d betrayed the trust that he, like a great bloody fool, had given to
her
without reservation.

The galling truth was that he was weak where she was concerned. Even now, as she laid out the ignominious facts, the countless lies she’d told him, he had the inconceivable desire to take her into his arms. To tell her everything would be all right. To protect the vulnerability he’d sensed in her from the start.

He quelled the instinct and went to the window, putting distance between them. Staring out into the autumn garden, he tried to absorb some of its calm. The gilded serenity that was a universe away from his own seething turmoil.

“How long were you a spy?” he said.

“When I turned thirteen, Octavian judged me ready for missions. He gave me the code name Pompeia. I worked for him until just before I met you at the Pilkington Ball.” A hesitation. “Do you remember it?”

Of course he bloody did.

“Did you engineer that meeting?” he said curtly. “Was our marriage a part of your new disguise? A way to get out of the spy business?”

“
No.
Marcus,” she said, her syllables quivering, “please believe this, if nothing else: I fell in love with you from the first moment we met. I gave up espionage
because
of you. Everything I did was because I loved you so much and knew that you’d never love me back as Pandora Smith. I had to make myself a better woman for you—”

“So you lied to me because you love me?” His eyes sliced to hers. “Pretended to be a debutante—a pure and untouched
lady
to win my heart?”

Her eyes glimmered. She pressed her trembling lips together… but she didn’t deny it.

For him, that was the most painful truth in all of this. He wished she might have just stabbed or shot him instead. Because the thought of any other man touching her…

“How many?” He forced out the words.

A pulse leapt in her throat. “Marcus—”

“
How many?
”

“Three,” she whispered. “The ones named in the letter.”

Pierre Chenet. Jean-Philippe Martin. Vincent Barone.

The names, branded on his brain, blazed red-hot. Those bastards had made love to his wife, the woman he’d believed to be exclusively his. They’d known the sweetness of Penny’s kiss, the unspeakable pleasure of being inside her—

“It wasn’t lovemaking.” Her plea broke through his swirling vortex of agony. “It was… one time, with each of them. There was no pleasure involved—it was the opposite. Back then, I thought of it as completing a mission. It was the only life I knew. I didn’t think I…”—her voice broke—“deserved any better.”

He didn’t want to feel empathy for her. Didn’t want the maelstrom of emotion that accompanied the destruction of his world as he knew it. His much-vaunted self-control was already pushed to its very limit.

“That’s enough,” he snapped. “I don’t want to hear another word about your sordid past.”

She bit her lip but kept on talking. “The note you received was, as I said, from an old nemesis. He’s dead now. My past… it can die with him.” She came to him, and, stunned, he watched his urbane and glamorous wife go down on her knees in front of him. She took one of his hands in both of hers, her beautiful face turned up to his, her eyes glimmering. “I know lying about my past is unforgiveable, but since our marriage, I’ve been a good and true wife to you. All I’ve wanted is to make you happy. And we’ve been happy, haven’t we? If you could somehow find it in your heart to give me another chance, I’ll make you even happier. I’ll make amends, do whatever you ask…”

“Can you change the past?” he said hoarsely.

Tears slipped from the corners of her eyes, sliding down her cheeks.

Can’t think. Don’t want to feel.
He pulled away, rubbed his hands over his face. “I need time.”

“Please, Marcus—”

“Do not push me, Pandora,” he warned. “I will think on our future and decide what to do next. In the meantime, we will keep up appearances in front of the children. In public, you will play the part of mama and wife as if nothing has happened. And if you step one foot out of line, I will divorce you and to hell with the consequences. Am I understood?”

“Yes,” she said in a suffocated voice. “Marcus, I love you—”

“Do not say those words to me again,” he bit out. “Do I make myself clear?”

She flinched as if he’d physically struck her.

“Answer me.” Goddamnit, he hated himself for being a bastard. Hated her for pushing him into acting like one.

“Yes,” she whispered. “Very clear.”

Furious at her—at himself—he stalked out.

Chapter Seven

1817

Penny had always had a temper. Octavian had cautioned her about it; Harry and Flora had taught her to control it. From the latter two—Flora especially—she’d learned to channel her hotheaded tendencies and use them to her advantage as a spy. Consequently, as Pompeia, her trademarks had been boldness and derring-do, even in the face of great odds.

As a wife, however, Penny was learning that controlling one’s pique was a different matter altogether. Especially when one was married to a man as stubborn as her husband. After spending a glorious wedding trip at his cozy property in the Cotswolds, they’d returned to London. Which was when she realized that the honeymoon was over—both literally and figuratively.

Marcus returned to his routine. While he visited her bed every night and they breakfasted together, he was gone on business during the day, then off to his club after that. Occasionally, he escorted her to a social affair. Other than that, she found herself alone…
a lot
. She knew she needed her own routine, but it proved difficult to find one that didn’t drive her out of her skull with boredom or irritation. Two weeks of this and she was ready to burst out of her skin.

After a lifetime of poverty and danger, one would think that having idle time and too much money to spend would be a welcome change. It wasn’t. She’d rather be chased by enemy agents through the warren-like streets of the Marais than endure another visit with two-faced bitches who smiled at her politely and then wagged their forked tongues behind her back. Yet social torture and endless visits to the dressmaker seemed to be the cornerstones of the genteel female existence. Since Penny was determined to be a proper marchioness for Marcus, this would have to be her life, too.

Needless to say, this did not put her in the best of moods.

Now she turned on her bench at her vanity to face her husband. Standing in the doorway of her dressing room, he was austere perfection in his black silk dressing robe, his hair still wet and curling from his bath. Even casually dressed, he looked handsome and dignified… but that didn’t make his request—or more accurately, his
decree
—any more reasonable.