Page 39 of A Lady’s Handbook of Espionage

The building loomed before her. No windows broke the expanse of soot-darkened brick, just a door set flush with the pitted wall.

The portal to her own personal hell.

She’d memorised the address Favreau had given her. He always did love his games. His pageantry. All part and parcel of the monster’s modus operandi – wound them up and watch them dance.

Until she’d gnawed off her own limbs to escape.

This time, she wouldn’t be fleeing. She wouldn’t be submitting. This time, she would be biding her time, and she wasn’t going to leave until Favreau was dead.

Her fingers trembled as she pushed at the door. There were about a dozen of Favreau’s men sitting on the furniture scattered throughout the bottom antechamber of the building. A few were sitting and playing chess, and a few others were drinking.

“Lads,” she said with a smile. “I assume you’re here to greet me.”

Wordlessly, one of them came forwards to pat her down, divesting her of every single knife she had hidden on her person. So much for this being an easy kill.

Then he jerked his chin to the stairs. “He’s waiting for you. Fifth-floor flat.”

She turned and climbed to the top flat. The door was already ajar, the monster confident in the return of his prized pet.

The interior was a jarring contrast to its plain external walls, full of gilt furniture and paintings pilfered across the finest private galleries.

Favreau had a taste for opulence; his boltholes from London to Greece were furnished to his exacting standards.

He was sitting in the bedchamber, sprawled in a throne-like armchair by the fireplace, idly swirling a snifter of brandy. His sleeves were pushed up to his elbows. A fallen angel in repose.

God, she hated him.

“Welcome home, ma chérie . Temporary accommodations, you understand, until I can secure our travel.”

“And where might we be headed? Paris? Oslo?”

“So inquisitive. Some things never change.” He sighed and set the glass aside with a muted clink, the known precursor to violence. “Regrettably, I’m afraid the specifics of our destination must remain a surprise. You know how I adore my little mysteries.”

Isabel gave a slow perusal of their surroundings. “Well. You always did have a way with interior decorating. So garish and overwrought. We’re in London, darling, not Versailles.”

The blow caught her off guard. A bright starburst of pain exploded across her cheek. She staggered back a step, but his hand lashed out to seize her jaw. Fingers digging in.

“Still so spirited. So very brave, even now. But I was remiss, wasn’t I, in our time apart? I let you forget your place. An oversight I intend to remedy.”

She held herself pliant in his grip, willing stone into her limbs, into the frantic thrum of her heart.

Deny him his pleasure. Conceal your fear. Give no ground. Wait.

Wait.

“By all means,” she bit out, “remind me. Refresh my memory.”

Calculation and something darker flared behind his eyes, stripping away the last veneer of civility.

“You delight in provocation. In begging me for correction.”

“What can I say? I live to please.”

Favreau released her, as if her insolence was beneath his notice.

“You will please me, one way or another. I’ll have you obedient, ma petite sauvage .

” He rang the bell pull on the wall, and one of his underlings came to the door.

“I think our hellion could use a little rest. She’ll need her strength for my plans.

Use a double column tie with multiple constrictor knots, or she’ll pry it loose.

” A measured look at her. “She’s good at that. ”

He was the one who taught her how, after all.

The thug took her arm, pulling her none-too-gently towards the bed. He shoved her onto the mattress and wrenched her arms back to bind her wrists. She focused on her breathing as he threaded the free end through the slats of the headboard and began knotting it.

Breathe. Just another obstacle. We’ll get out, and then we’ll be ready.

And Louis Favreau will die bleeding.

Only when she was trussed to his satisfaction did the brute depart. Abandoning her to Favreau’s nonexistent mercies.

The mattress dipped as he settled beside her. One hand drifted up, fingertips dragging over her cheek. Over the fluttering pulse at her throat, pausing to press into the divot between her collarbones. An anatomist mapping the terrain of her body, contemplating how best to carve her open.

“Now then,” he said, “your future. Let us discuss it.”

“By all means, don’t keep me in suspense.”

“Still so impertinent. So convinced of your own cleverness.”

He lowered himself on top of her. She couldn’t breathe. Blackness crept into the edges of her vision. Pressure banded her chest and her throat, the roaring surge of her blood deafening in her skull. The cadence of ocean waves crept in.

“Did you miss me, mon c?ur ? Did you ache for my hands on you at night? For the sting of my blade?” His lips grazed her cheek. “You know what I want. How long will you suffer for your pride before you bend?”

Bend. Break. The distinction seemed academic.

“Never took you for the pining sort,” she said. “We were apart for a year, and there are plenty of women desperate enough for a warm bed. I should’ve thought you’d fill the vacancy quickly.”

“Oh, I kept myself well-amused,” he conceded. “But none of them were you. They couldn’t match your fire, your resolve. All of them ended up screaming under my knife. It was disappointing, Isabel.” A sigh, almost wistful. “So why content myself with pale imitations, hm? With anything less?”

A laugh clawed out of her. “How sweet. I didn’t know you cared.”

He cupped her throat. “I care very much. I care that you thought you could abandon me. That you sullied this body with another man’s touch.

” His fingers skimmed downwards. “Did he make you feel adored? Did he whisper endearments while he fucked you? Did he promise you were special? Cherished? And you believed him, didn’t you?

Let yourself imagine he could save you.”

His hand drifted lower, unbuttoning her dress and unfastening her front lacing corset to bare her breasts.

“Go to hell,” she hissed.

“Hell is my life without you in it, my love.”

Then his mouth was on hers. Devouring. Vicious and violating. She gagged, trapped there as he pillaged her mouth.

He wrenched back, breath ragged.

“I want to see my marks,” he said, tearing away her bandage. “I want to perfect it—”

He went still. A tremor chased up his arm where he gripped her, some animal tension coiling beneath his skin. Surprise and fury reflected in his beautiful features as he took in Ronan’s beautifully carved initials.

“What,” he said, precise and terribly cold, “the fuck is this?”

Vicious satisfaction lanced through her. She bared her teeth in a savage grin.

“What’s the matter, Louis?” The words were knives, honed to draw blood. “Don’t like seeing another man’s claim on your belongings? I begged him for it, you know. And he obliged. Beautiful work, isn’t it?”

A truth chosen for maximum hurt and to grind salt in the wounds. To carve away his smug superiority and leave him wild and bleeding.

No escape now. Just his body looming over her, caging her beneath him. His eyes incandescent with fury.

“You think you’re so clever. But it changes nothing.” A shift of muscle, his free hand delving into a pocket. He extracted his dagger. “I’ll just have to remind you of your place, won’t I?”

He paused, studying her through narrowed eyes, searching for some tell. Some flinch or fracture.

Isabel breathed through the panic. She’d endure this. Endure him. Outlast his rage and emerge on the other side. She had before.

He caressed the blade down her torso, tracing idle patterns. Teasing. Torturing. Intimately familiar with how to unmake her. How to inject the maximum of malice into the lightest touch.

“I’ll peel his marks from you until not a single letter remains. Until all that’s left . . .” His dagger traced the elegant swoop of an R, the curve of the L. “. . . is me.”

“Louis,” she whispered, almost tenderly. “You have to know that this time will be different. Tie me up, make me bleed. But this time, we end with you dead at my feet.”

Then she bent forwards and sank her teeth into his bottom lip. Blood flooded her mouth. She gulped it down and bit harder, until he jerked away with a curse.

His chest heaved as he stared down at her. Without a word, he raised a hand and wiped the blood from his mouth. Then he smiled.

“Yes,” he said. Reverent. Trembling with a perverse sort of joy. “There it is. That wildness is why I had to have you. That’s why no other woman satisfies me.”

Favreau pushed off her. He hid his knife, adjusted his cuffs and smoothed his shirt. Donning civilisation like a mask, the monster subsumed beneath a veneer of cool refinement.

“I have a few minor arrangements to make before our departure. Should you get it into your head to try something foolish that involves a knife anywhere on my body, it won’t end well for you.

I’ll have your agent taken apart, and you’ll stay strapped to my bed until you submit.

Cling to that, hm? During the lonely hours ahead. ”

And then he left the room, pulling the door shut behind him.

Isabel counted breaths. Heartbeats.

She shifted, the movement sending bright sparks of pain lancing up her arms as the knotwork constricted. Already she could feel the trickle of blood, the sticky damp of torn flesh.

But now was not the time for weakness. Now was the time to wait. She had plans to make, a weapon to find. No matter what happened to her, Favreau’s life ended tonight.

Now was the time to put the monster’s lessons to good use.

Isabel got to work on the ropes.