A Woman’s Innocence Page 18

  “Open it,” he said calmly.

  Her fingers shook as she spread the paper flat on the floor. They both bent over it, and by the light from the small window, they could see Lewis’s penmanship—and doodles and dots of ink mixed in.

  She held her breath, and stared at the paper as if it were a snake that could bite her.

  “That looks exactly like the coded letters he used to send information,” Sam said, satisfaction laced through his words. “He must have worked out the code like this. We have it in his own hand.”

  She let him take the paper and fold it away. She should be happy—this was proof that a court might pay attention to. Her brother had created a code to be buried in her letters and sent to the Russians. If the letter was intercepted by the military, it would simply look like her letter had been misdirected. Lewis had altered the letter with blobs of ink and filled in certain loops, making it seem like she’d doodled as she wrote. With just this single letter, there was no way to read the code. But Lewis had always sent a second letter of hers separately, and this one had tiny dots scattered beneath the words. When you compared both letters, the dots would show which filled-in loop helped form the coded alphabet, and the way to decipher the hidden message.

  Sam finally looked up from the paper and glanced at the mantel clock. “We must quickly put everything away. I had no idea how much time had passed.”

  By the time they had folded each article of clothing away and repacked the crate, they could hear distant voices down the hall. Sam swore softly.

  “Surely they’ll know eventually that we’re searching the house?” Julia whispered.

  “But they don’t need to know we suspect their master the most. Be ready to move silently.”

  Always it was Sam encouraging her, Sam who made it seem like everything would be all right. She watched him with his head bent to the crack in the door, his concentration intense. Didn’t he ever get nervous? How did he live every day with the knowledge that he might die?

  Yet it made every moment of life more precious. She stared at his back, thought of what his body had made her feel. She would never have known such absolute joy, were it not for the situation they were in. How could she hate anything that gave her Sam, even so briefly?

  He motioned to her and opened the door. Holding her breath, she followed him into the hall. Terror and excitement bubbled through her, every sense concentrated on avoiding detection. There were open doors down the corridor, and the voices came from there. Women’s voices, raised in laughter. Were the maids cleaning?

  Suddenly the voices got louder, and Sam opened a random door and ducked inside, pulling her with him, and closed it silently behind him.

  She put her mouth against his ear. “But they might be cleaning this room next!” They were both breathing heavily, overheated, and just the brush of his hair against her face made her feel out of control. What was wrong with her?

  “We’ll wait until they reach the room right next door. We should be able to pass them undetected.”

  He drew her into the corner, where a wardrobe blocked her view of the door. The shadows seemed to absorb them.

  “Do you still have Lewis’s paper?” She looked up at Sam to ask the question, but the rest of her words died as she gazed into his eyes.

  Julia gasped as he pressed her even deeper into the corner. She could feel every muscle in his body where it brushed against her. Her skin was so sensitive, and she wanted to groan at how little she could control herself. Surely he was only trying to protect her. His hands squeezed her shoulders and moved down her arms, and she barely restrained a moan. Before her endless days with him, she’d been so proud of how she’d reined in her emotions and her impulses. She had long ago decided that she would never do anything that she hadn’t given plenty of thought to beforehand.

  But ever since her constant exposure to Sam, it was as if every hard lesson she’d learned had been thrown out the window. Her mind and her body were consumed with him. She would be mortified if he found out how much she wanted to pull him down on top of her.

  “Don’t you understand what’s happened?” he said, his breath brushing her face.

  She couldn’t even remember what they’d been talking about.

  “This paper is evidence against Lewis, something we can actually use at trial.”

  “I know, but—”

  “And if he’s been this stupid once, he’ll be so again. We’ll find something more.”

  His body pressed against her lightly, swaying, and she swallowed heavily as if she couldn’t remember how. She stared into his face, saw eagerness and satisfaction, and realized that finding a clue had given him a victory that he relished. Eluding capture had made him even bolder. His gaze slid down her body, leaving her feeling burned in its wake.

  She remembered telling him their relationship existed out of time, that she was willing to take things as they happened. She hadn’t thought he really believed her. But by the heat in his eyes, the way his thumbs traced circles in her lower arms, he was showing her he wanted her to share in his feeling of triumph.

  Her breath picked up pace to match the beating of her heart. He wanted her. Avoiding danger together was intoxicating—but only because this was Sam.

  She needed to share everything she was with him. He pushed her hard against the wall with his body, then took her mouth in a hot, deep kiss. Her moan was absorbed by him, her tongue captured by his. He pressed his hands to her face, holding her to him as if he would never let her go. She reveled in the feel of his hard body against her, wished desperately that her breasts weren’t so well covered. She smoothed her hands down his chest, felt his heat through his shirt, absorbed the pounding of his heart with her palm.

  When she reached his trousers, she flicked open the buttons, felt his stomach muscles shudder against the back of her hand. He kissed her face, then her throat when she leaned her head to the side. He was pulling off her coat as she was tugging down his trousers. She felt his erection fall heavily against her stomach, and she took him in her fist and was rewarded when the breath left his lungs in a gasp. He put his hands on the wall on either side of her, as if he braced himself for an assault he was powerless against.

  She had the ability to make him lose himself, and she relished it, dropping to her knees to take him into her mouth.

  He was trembling against her, salty and hot and large in her mouth. When she finally pulled back to tease him with her tongue, he lifted her bodily to her feet, pinning her to the wall as he pulled the loose trousers down her body. His face was hard with barely controlled passion, and she loved looking at him.

  Suddenly he picked up her legs on either side of him, then buried himself inside her. She was pressed between the wall and his body, held there only by the weight of him inside her, and his hands beneath her thighs. He moved against her hard, and each time he pulled out, his hands were there from beneath, teasing at whatever his fingers could reach, making her mindless and yet aware of his every touch.

  Any moment they could be found, and that only spurred her to clutch him harder to herself, to take him deeper, to thrust her tongue within his mouth as if she couldn’t get enough of him.

  He climaxed before she did, shuddering between her legs over and over until her own desire hovered at the edge, tantalizing her.

  And he understood just what she was thinking, just how she was feeling. Though he gasped against her mouth, he continued to support her with one hand, the other reaching between them to caress her. She was slick and hot and so sensitive, still filled with the pressure of him. It only took a moment before the welcome explosion of pleasure enveloped her, consumed her. Only Sam had ever made her feel so alive, so aware of him as the only man for her.

  The only man she’d ever loved.

  Chapter 19

  Sam shakily set Julia down on the floor, and watched her stretch the stiffness from her legs. Feeling dazed, he took a hand towel off the washstand to clean her.

  “I’ve made a m
ess,” he murmured.

  He knelt at her feet, looking up into her face, wondering what emotion she betrayed with her fond look. In that moment, all he wanted to do was remain a part of her forever.

  A forever they’d never have.

  He had to stop these morose thoughts, he told himself as he finished with the towel and stared at the smoothness of her belly, the soft curls beneath, and what was hidden there. He could gladly bury his face there, absorb the scent and taste of her again.

  But he’d risked discovery to have her, and he couldn’t prolong the pleasure anymore. He helped her step into her drawers and trousers, then pulled them up for her. She was blushing when he did up her buttons, as if this were more intimate than what they’d just shared. She was so full of contradictions, so hard to predict.

  He stepped away from her to fix his own clothing, put the towel into his pocket, but didn’t break their shared gaze. He smiled. “Is this what you meant by ‘taking things as they happen’?”

  She grinned and stepped back into his embrace. He hugged her for a moment, then released her to go listen at the door. She waited silently behind him, her hand reaching to clasp his.

  “They’re close now,” he murmured, closing his eyes to better hear their voices and imagine the distance. “About to enter the room next to us.”

  “What good timing.”

  He looked over his shoulder at her and smiled. “I have an ear for these things.”

  “Just an ear?” she shot back.

  Hiding his laughter, he couldn’t help thinking that she was adorable as he used his fingers to blend in the streaks of cosmetics on her face. “Ready?”

  She nodded. When he could hear the maids enter the next room, he opened the door, silently closed it behind them both, then crept to the next suite of rooms. He judged how far away Lucy and Florence were from the door, then silently walked past, knowing Julia casually followed him. No one called out to them. Only when they turned a corner did they both let out a breath.

  Neither of them spoke until they were safely back in their private sitting room. While she collapsed with relief into a chair, he looked about suspiciously, knowing something was wrong.

  Her smile died. “What is it?”

  “Someone’s been in the room.”

  “I’m sure Lucy came to clean this morning. And look, she left a luncheon tray.”

  “That’s not it.”

  He went into his bedroom and she followed in obvious bewilderment. He opened several drawers in the chest. “My clothes have been disturbed. Lucy wouldn’t have done that.”

  Her face paled. “Lewis’s henchman?”

  He swept past her and flung open her bedroom door, but the room seemed undisturbed.

  He turned back to the sitting room and put his hands on his hips. “He came to see what we might have discovered. Luckily, I had my pistol with me. Yours is probably gone.”

  She shook her head. “I’ve taken to carrying it in my coat like you do. Didn’t you feel it?”

  He gave her a slow smile. “I was thinking about what was inside your clothes, not your pockets.”

  “Do you think he took anything?”

  “What was there to take? We had no evidence against Lewis—although we do now. And trust me, if I have to put it somewhere, I’ll hide it better than within this room.”

  “But that man is in the manor. He could be anywhere.”

  “I don’t think he’ll risk remaining inside for long. We’ll have the footmen patrol even during the daytime. I don’t think the henchman will risk hurting anyone else and calling attention to himself.”

  She shivered. “I never felt safe here as a child, and now it’s even worse.”

  They spent the afternoon going room by room through the servants’ wing looking for evidence against Lewis. Their investigation was tolerated by the staff. Julia kept expecting to find a stranger in every room, ready to jump out at them.

  They were often completely alone, due to the excited activity as everyone prepared for the dance that evening. The weather had cooperated, so the servants dragged tables and chairs outside. Every time Julia was in a corridor, she was passed by someone carrying lanterns or linens. She had not been allowed to attend the dance when she was young, and the ones in India were so stilted as to be boring.

  She felt an ache of wistfulness, especially when she entered the pantry and saw Sam. When she was young, her fantasies had been about the two of them entering the harvest dance side by side. She’d imagined him bringing her lemonade and then never leaving her side as he gazed at her with admiration and innocent longing. But she was a woman now, and knew that fantasies seldom became reality. A gardener wouldn’t have been taught the dances she knew. And she couldn’t dance with him now, not when she was in the guise of Constable Walter Fitzjames.

  Sam was now on the floor, peering inside a pantry cupboard, though he looked up when she came in. “Where did ye go? I don’t want ye wandering by yourself.”

  “Yes, sir,” she said, feeling guilty since she should be worrying about their attacker, not daydreaming about a silly dance spent in Sam’s arms. She cleared her throat. “The dance is tonight, sir.”

  “Perhaps it would be a good time to search the attic,” he said nonchalantly, sticking his head back inside the cupboard.

  Julia swiftly inhaled, but what could she say?

  Then he peered up at her again, a faint smile tilting the corners of his mouth. “But the servants will insist we attend their dance, won’t they?”

  Letting out her breath with relief, she gave him a crooked smile. “I’m sure they’ll insist.”

  “Especially the young maid Lucy,” he added.

  Frowning at him, she turned to give him her back, and saw Lucy blushing out in the corridor. Julia stood stunned as the girl laughed and ran away, her arms overloaded with a case of silver.

  “Oh God,” Julia moaned, and closed the door.

  Sam was silently laughing, and she wanted to kick him.

  “Maybe we shouldn’t go,” she said with a sigh. “After all, he’s around here somewhere.”

  “We’re going. Knowing we’re alone in the manor might make him bold.”

  That night, dinner was a hasty affair, with the noise level raised high as everyone talked at once. Julia found out that family members of the servants would be attending as well, and she saw Sam’s face when he heard the news. Would his mother be there? If he was worried, he showed nothing in his expression.

  She didn’t know why she was so excited, since she’d have to avoid Lucy and Florence most of the time. But the thought of lanterns in the trees and music in the air just made her giddy. She’d been to formal garden parties in London, but she sensed that the Hopewell Manor staff would not be full of the same bland politeness. When she overheard Frances discussing the dance with Sam as they stood before the hearth in the servants’ hall, Julia held her breath.

  He was playing Constable Seabrook. To her surprise, she’d begun to hear rumors that the staff believed he was courting Frances and wouldn’t miss the chance to dance with her. Lucy and Florence, who didn’t often leave Julia’s side at dinner, giggled as they watched the housekeeper. Lucy directed an encouraging look at Julia.

  Like a coward, Julia lowered her eyes to her cider and took a drink. Abig gulp, just like a man.

  An hour later, she stood beside Sam in the kitchen courtyard, looking out over the park on the west side of the manor. The lawn sloped down to a grove of trees, twinkling with lantern light now that the sun had set. Colorful streamers gently swayed in the breeze, and a village band of violin, drums, and flute was just warming up. Beneath a pavilion, tables were piled with food and drink.

  She sighed. “It looks wonderful.”

  Sam’s face was grim. “It will be an awkward night for us both.”

  She studied him carefully. “Maybe she won’t be here tonight.”

  “Frances?”

  “Your mother,” she whispered.

  He sighed.
“She always comes to the harvest dance, even if she feels poorly.”

  “It will be full dark soon.”

  “Not soon enough.”

  “We can wait until then to go out.”

  He hesitated, then looked away. “I heard that the Duke of Kelthorpe had musicians at the house party last month just for you.”

  She felt her face heat with a blush. “He knew I enjoyed music.”

  “He could have given you music every evening of your life.”

  Was he wondering about her regrets? There were none, at least not about Kelthorpe. “Music every evening would have become routine. Now, this night, any music I’m lucky enough to hear will take on a new significance. And it will be beautiful because of that.”

  When he spoke, his voice was husky, strained. “I’m doing my best to make sure this isn’t the last dance you’ll experience.”

  “I know you are,” she whispered. She reached to gently touch his arm and he pulled away. “Constable—”

  “Mrs. Cooper is expecting us both. Shall we go?”

  She bit her lip, not knowing what to say. Why did she feel the need to see the villagers in celebration? Was it because her parents had never let her attend the harvest dance? She’d been young, yes, but not as young as the village children who’d cavorted on the grounds while she’d watched from the windows. And then, after her parents had died, there was no harvest dance, nothing to celebrate. The estate had seemed quieter every year, until she could hear her own heartbeat as she wandered the rooms alone. Then she’d had to escape her pretty prison. She couldn’t regret that impulsiveness, even now.

  While she’d been gone, the servants had brought back the harvest dance, and she was glad.

  Most of the staff seemed pleased to see the two “constables” who’d been living in their midst these past few days. Julia had to smile at Frances’s continued uneasiness around Sam, although they fell into conversation readily enough. Julia stood beside them and looked around, trying to ignore Lucy, who remained nearby talking to Florence. Harold the footman was on the other side of the tables, watching Florence longingly.