Don't Tempt Me (Fallen Women 2)

Harrison had devoted twenty years to climbing a ladder of power. Then, when he thought himself securely at the top, she had come along. In a matter of days, he’d fallen off—and this time there could be no climbing back.

Mrs. Dunstan snapped her fingers, drawing Zoe’s attention back to her. “That’s what he did, again and again,” the housekeeper said. “Snapped his fingers. ‘Like this she knocked me down,’ he said. ‘And I’ll knock her down. I’ll finish her, I will, like this.’ He snapped his fingers and ‘I’ll finish her,’ he said, ‘because she finished me.’ He drank and talked mad like that and finally he drank himself senseless. He fell onto the bed, dead to the world. Then I packed up and ran.”

“But he’s still here?” Marchmont said. “In London?”

“He knows where to hide,” Mrs. Dunstan said. “No one knows London like he does, and no one has the kinds of friends he has. He can hide right under your nose and you’ll never know. He knows everything, doesn’t he? Knows what you’re going to do before you do it. A proper servant, he is. And like a proper one, he’ll find a way to do it, whatever it is.”

Since Mrs. Dunstan could tell them only where Harrison had stayed last, there was nothing more for Marchmont to ask her. Zoe had nothing to add. He’d done a fine job of provoking the woman to reveal what she knew.

She told him so when they were back in the carriage and on their way home.

“She was right, you know,” he said. He looked out of the carriage window into the lamplit streets, where the pedestrians were merely anonymous dark figures, hurrying along the pavement. “It was a wonderfully well-run house. They did their jobs brilliantly. I took them completely for granted.”

“But that’s the way it ought to be with good servants,” Zoe said.

“I understand that,” he said. “But I know, too, that had I paid the slightest attention—taken an interest, however cursory—none of this would have happened.”

“You can’t know that,” she said. “Some people are simply dishonest. Many are corrupted by power. Harrison was no lord, but in his world, he wielded great power.”

“If he was corrupt, I should have been the one to discover it,” he said tightly. “Because I didn’t, I endangered your life.”

“That’s illogical,” she said. They were sharing the carriage seat. She drew nearer to him and took his hand. “You’re a clever man—much cleverer than you let on—but your logic isn’t good. If he’s gone mad, then his mind has become diseased. That’s no more your fault than the state of any wretch in Bedlam. If he hasn’t gone mad, then he’s evil. You didn’t make him evil. You didn’t corrupt him. That was the path he took. For the upper-level staff he hired the kinds of people he could corrupt. For the lower levels, he chose the kind he could bully.” She twined her fingers with his. “I told you I could manage a household. With the troublemaker gone, all will be well.”

“Nothing will be well until I see that man hang,” he said.

“The Bow Street Runners will find him,” she said. “You’re the Duke of Marchmont, and you’ve offered a large reward. They’ll ignore every other task in order to hunt him down. These are men who know London, you said. They must know it as well or better than Harrison does. It’s their business to know it. Finding people is their livelihood. He won’t get away.”

“No, he won’t.” His grip on her hand tightened. “I don’t care what it costs. I’ve doubled the reward. I’ll triple it if I have to.”

“They’ll find him,” Zoe said. “Leave it to them. We’ll go to Lady Stafford’s rout and count how many people step on our feet and how many elbows stick into our ribs. Shall I wear the lilac gown or the blue?”

“We’re not going to the rout,” he said. “We’re going home and you are not leaving the house until that man is in custody.”

Seventeen

For a moment, Zoe couldn’t form a thought, let alone speak. It was as though she’d plunged into a deep, cold well.

To be trapped in a house for who knew how long, after she’d only begun to taste freedom, and while everyone else about her was free—when she wouldn’t have even the companionship, such as it was, and the amusements, such as they were, of the harem…

Her heart was racing, and her mind raced, too, pointlessly.

All the past rushed at her in an icy wave of panic—the moment they’d taken her away in the bazaar…the voices speaking a language she couldn’t understand…the darkness…the men touching her…she, screaming for her father, until they gagged her…the drink they’d forced down her throat that brought strange dreams but never complete oblivion…the slaves stripping off her clothes—

She shook it off and made herself stare out of the window and breathe, slowly. This was England. She was in London, with her husband. She was safe, and all he wanted was to keep her safe.

He was upset, she reminded herself. When men were upset, their instincts took over, and their instincts were not always rational. Even she was disturbed by what had happened, though the danger was nothing to what she’d lived with day after day and night after night in the harem.

She made herself answer calmly. “I know you wish to protect me, but this isn’t reasonable.”

“Harrison isn’t reasonable,” Marchmont said. “We’re dealing with a man who’s either deranged or evil. You said so yourself. He thought nothing of brutally attacking a dumb animal. He didn’t care what a creature maddened with pain would do. He didn’t care who else might have been injured when the horses panicked. There’s no predicting what he’ll do.”

“There’s no predicting how long it will take to find him,” she said. “It could be days or even weeks. What if he comes to his senses and runs away from London, as he should have done? What if he falls into the Thames and drowns? His body might never be found. You’d make me a prisoner in Marchmont House indefinitely?”

“I am not making you a prisoner,” he said. “I’m making sure he can’t get at you.”

“It’s prison to me,” she said. “You ought to understand this. I thought you did. I was kept caged for twelve years. I lived in a vast house, larger than yours—a great palace with a great, walled garden. A prison is a prison, no matter how big or how beautiful.”

“It’s not the same.”

“It’s the same to me,” she said. “I can’t abide to be confined.”

“And I can’t abide risking your life,” he said. “Until we know he’s in custody or dead or abroad, you’ll stay home. You said the Runners would find him. You said they had every reason to do so. You were the one reassuring me about this. Reassure yourself.”

“You cannot keep me in the house,” she said.

“I can and will. Don’t be childish, Zoe. This is for your own good.”

“Childish?” she said. “Childish? I risked my life to be free. You don’t know what they would have done to me if they had caught me. I risked my life for this.” She waved her hand at the window, where the shadowy fig

ures hurried along the pavement, and riders and carriages passed in the busy street. “I risked everything to be in a world where women can go out of their houses to shop and visit their friends, where they can even talk to and dance with other men. For twelve years I dreamed of this world, and it came to be my idea of heaven: a place where I could move freely among other people, where I could go to the theater and the ballet and the opera. For twelve years I was an amusing pet in a cage. For twelve years they let me out only for the entertainment of watching me try to run away. Now I have my own horse, and I can ride in Hyde Park—”

“Only listen to what you’re saying,” he said. “Everything you want to do will expose you. Hyde Park is completely out of the question.”

“You can’t do this,” she said. “I won’t be locked up. I won’t hide from that horrible man. He’s a bully, and this is bullying, and you’re letting him do it. You’re letting him make the rules, because you’re afraid of what he’ll do.”

“He’s not making any rules, Zoe! I’m making the rules. You’re my wife, and on the day we wed, I promised to look after you—and you promised to obey.”

She started to retort, but paused.

She knew that keeping his word was a strict point of honor to him.

Everyone knows that he regards his word as sacred, Papa had said.

When she had promised to obey, she’d given her word, too. To fail to keep her word to him would be dishonorable, a betrayal of trust.

“I did promise,” she said. “And I shall obey.”

They traveled in silence the rest of the way home. All the while Marchmont’s gut churned.

He heard it over and over: the snap of the housekeeper’s fingers, and the words she’d repeated.

I’ll finish her, I will, like this.

The words echoed in his mind as they entered Marchmont House and crossed the marble entrance hall.