To Taste Temptation (Legend of the Four Soldiers #1)

To Taste Temptation (Legend of the Four Soldiers #1) Page 7

Sam frowned. “Do you—”

“Mr. Hartley, I believe we still have the shoemaker’s to visit,” Mademoiselle Molyneux cut in.

Sam broke eye contact with Thornton to look at the ladies. Rebecca was watching him with confusion in her eyes, Lady Emeline’s face was blank, and the old lady merely appeared impatient. “My apologies, ladies. I didn’t mean to bore you with the reminisces of long-ago events.”

“I apologize as well.” Thornton made another beautiful bow. “It was most pleasant meeting you—”

“Might I have your address?” Sam asked hastily. “I’d like to talk to you again. Few remember the events of that day.”

Thornton beamed. “Yes, of course. I, too, enjoy reminiscing. You may find me at my place of business. It’s not too far from here. Only continue down Piccadilly to Dover Street and you will find me. George Thornton and Son, Bootmakers. Founded by my father, don’t you know.”

“Thank you.” Sam shook hands once again and watched as Thornton made his farewells to the ladies and walked off. His red hair could be discerned in the crowd for some time before he disappeared.

He turned to Lady Emeline and offered his arm. “Shall we?” And then he made the mistake of looking into her eyes. There was no way she wouldn’t have figured it out. She was an intelligent woman, and she’d heard the entire conversation. But he still felt a sinking in his chest.

She knew.

MR. HARTLEY WAS in London because of the massacre at Spinner’s Falls. His questions to Mr. Thornton had been too pointed, his attention to the replies too intense. Something about the massacre of the 28th Regiment bothered him.

And Reynaud had died at Spinner’s Falls.

Emeline placed her fingertips on his forearm, but then couldn’t restrain herself. She gripped the muscle of his arm in clenched fingers. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

They had started walking, and his face was in profile to her. A muscle in his cheek twitched. “Ma’am?”

“No!” she hissed at him. Tante and Rebecca were right behind, and she didn’t want them to hear. “Don’t pretend to misunderstand. I’m not a fool.”

He glanced at her then. “I would never think you a fool.”

“Then don’t treat me like one. You served in the same regiment as Reynaud. You knew my brother. What are you investigating?”

“I...” He hesitated. What was he thinking? What was he hiding from her? “I don’t want to bring up unpleasant memories. I don’t want to remind you—”

“Remind me! Mon Dieu, can you believe that I have forgotten the death of my only brother? That I would need a word from you to make me think of him? He is with me every day. Every day, I tell you.” She stopped because her breath was coming too roughly, and her voice was beginning to tremble. What idiots men were!

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “I did not mean to make light of your loss—”

She snorted at that.

He continued over her interruption. “But credit me with some sensitivity. I didn’t know how to speak about your brother. About that day. My sin is one of stupidity, not deliberate maliciousness. Forgive me, please.”

Such a pretty speech. She bit her lip and watched as two young aristocrats sauntered by, dressed in the height of fashion. Lace spilled from their wrists, their coats were made of velvet, and their wigs were extravagantly curled. They probably hadn’t yet attained their twentieth year, and they walked with all the arrogance of money and privilege, confident in their place in society, confident that the woes of the lesser classes would never touch them. Reynaud had walked like that once.

She looked away, remembering black, laughing eyes. “He wrote about you.”

He glanced at her, his brows raised.

“Reynaud,” she clarified, although she could hardly be speaking of anyone else. “In his letters to me, he wrote about you.”

Mr. Hartley stared straight ahead. She saw his Adam’s apple dip as he swallowed. “What did he say?”

She shrugged, pretending interest in the window of a lace shop as they passed. It had been years since last she’d pored over Reynaud’s letters, but she knew the contents of every single one by heart.

“He said that an American corporal had been assigned to his regiment, that he admired your tracking ability. He said that he trusted you above all the other scouts, even the native Indians. He said that you showed him how to discern the difference between the native tribes. That the Mohicans wore their hair in a bristle at the top of their head and that the Wy-Wy—”

“Wyandot,” he said softly.

“Wyandot were fond of the colors red and black and favored a long piece of cloth worn in front and back—”

“A breech clout.”

“Just so.” She looked down. “He said he liked you.”

She felt the movement of his chest against the back of her hand as he inhaled. “Thank you.”

She nodded. There was no need to ask what he thanked her for. “How long did you know him?”

“Not long,” he said. “After the Battle of Quebec, I was attached to the 28th informally. I was only supposed to march with them until they reached Fort Edward, help scout the way. I knew your brother for a couple of months, maybe a little more. Then, of course, we came to Spinner’s Falls.”

He had no need to say more. Spinner’s Falls was where they had all died, caught in the cross fire from two groups of Wyandot Indians. She’d read the accounts that were written in the newspapers. Few survivors of the massacre actually wanted to talk of it. Fewer still were willing to discuss it with a woman.

Emeline inhaled. “Did you see him die?”

She felt him turn to stare at her. “My lady—”

Emeline twisted a ruffle at her waist until she felt silk tear. “Did you see him die?”

He blew out a breath, and when he spoke, his voice was tight. “No.”

She let the bit of fabric go. Was it relief she felt?

“Why do you ask? Surely it does no good to hear—”

“Because I want—no, I need—to know what it was like for him at the last.” She glanced at Mr. Hartley’s face and knew from the slight indent between his brows that he was puzzled. She gazed sightlessly ahead as she tried to find the words for her thoughts. “If I can understand, perhaps feel, just a little of what he went through, I can be closer to him.”

He was frowning harder now. “He’s dead. I doubt that your brother would want you to brood thus over his death.”

She chuckled, but it came out a dry exhalation of air. “But as you say, he is dead. What he would or would not want no longer matters.”

Ah, now she had shocked him. Men were sure that ladies were to be shielded from life’s harsh realities. Men, poor dears, were so naive. Did they think childbirth was a stroll before luncheon?

But he rallied fast, this strange colonialist. “Please explain.”

“I do this for myself, not Reynaud.” She puffed out a breath. Why did she even bother? He wouldn’t understand. “My brother was so young when he died, just eight and twenty, and there were many things left undone in his life. I have only a finite number of memories of him. There will never be any more.”

She stopped, still gazing sightlessly at the street ahead. He didn’t speak. This was a personal matter. She shouldn’t talk about it to a comparative stranger. But he’d been there in that foreign place where Reynaud had died. If only in a small way, he was part of Reynaud.

She sighed. “There was a book of fairy tales we used to look at together as children. Reynaud loved those stories. I can’t remember what they were about exactly, but I keep thinking if only I could read it again...” She was suddenly conscious that her conversation was meandering. She glanced up at him.

Mr. Hartley stared back, his head tilted in interest toward her.

She waved a hand impatiently. “But the book is neither here nor there. If I can find out how his last hours were, then he lives just a little longer in my memory. It doesn’t matter that they are awful moments, do you see? They are Reynaud’s moments, and thus precious. They bring me closer to him.”

He bowed his head as his brows drew together. “I think I understand.”

“Do you? Do you truly?” If he did, he would be the first to understand her. Not even Tante Cristelle could fully comprehend her need to find out everything that had happened to Reynaud in his last days. She watched him in amazement and with a dawning awareness. Maybe he truly was unlike other men. How odd.

He looked up then and caught her eye. That sensuous lower lip curved. “You’re a frightening woman.”

And Emeline realized to her horror that she could come to like Samuel Hartley. Come to like him too much. She hastily looked straight ahead and took a deep breath. “Tell me.”

He no longer pretended that he didn’t know what she asked. “I’m trying to find out why Spinner’s Falls happened. The Wyandot didn’t find our regiment by accident.” He turned to look at her, and she saw that his eyes had hardened to iron—strong, determined, and resolute. “I think we were betrayed.”

Chapter Four

The old man was dressed in dirty rags. It hardly seemed likely, so Iron Heart thought, that such a one would hold the key to marrying a princess.

But as he started to turn aside, the old man caught his arm. “Listen! You will live in a marble castle with Princess Solace as your bride. You will have silk clothes to wear and servants to wait upon your every need. All you must do is follow my instructions.”

“And what are your instructions?” Iron Heart asked.

The old wizard grinned—for naturally he was a wizard to know so much. “You must not speak for seven years.”

Iron Heart stared. “And if I am unable to do this?”

“If you utter one word—even one sound—you will be returned to rags and Princess Solace will die.”

Now, this may not seem such a wonderful bargain to you or me, but remember that Iron Heart was presently employed as a street sweeper. He looked down at his feet, shod in tattered leather, then over at the gutter where he would make his bed that night, and in the end he did the only thing he could. He agreed to the wizard’s price....

—from Iron Heart

Tonight the moon was curtained by clouds. Sam glanced at the sky as he paused beside a dark doorway. The moon was waning, anyway, so even when it came out from behind the clouds, its light was thin. He welcomed the thick shadows. It made the night perfect for hunting.

Sam slid now into an alley, moving swiftly past a bundled shape hunched against a wall. The bundle didn’t stir, but a cat sitting by its side paused in her bath to watch Sam with glowing eyes. There was a row of fine stables farther on, nearly twice the size of the ones behind his own rented house. Sam snorted. What did one man need with so many beasts?

A light appeared at one of the stable doors, and a short, sturdy man holding a lantern emerged. Sam froze, drifting back into the shadows. The man set his lantern down on the cobblestones in the mews while he dug in a pocket; then he withdrew a long clay pipe and lit it from the lantern’s flame. Puffing contentedly, he picked up his lantern again and disappeared around the corner of the stables.

Sam grinned. He waited a moment more and then followed in the man’s wake. There was a wall here with a gate, separating the mews from the back garden of the house, that was his target. He passed by the gate. It was too exposed, too likely to have a guard or a lightly sleeping groom nearby. He continued into the shadows beneath a tree that overhung the wall. Eyeing the bricks, he backed a pace and then leapt. The wall was about eight feet tall, and he was just able to fling his arms over the top. Swiftly, he levered himself up, rolled over the top, and landed in a crouch on the other side. He didn’t pause but used his jump’s momentum to run along the wall and duck under a bush several paces away. Here he dropped to the ground and lay on his belly, carefully watching the dark garden.