Page 19 of Beneath the Devil’s Mask (The Hidden Hearts Collection #4)

“I see. Then perhaps you had better allow me…” He eased the pistol out of her grasp.

Anne’s hands were trembling so badly, she could not have resisted even if she had wanted to do so.

Mandell examined the weapon briefly, glancing at the cocking piece.

Whatever he saw caused him to roll his eyes, but he said nothing, slipping the small weapon into the pocket of his cloak.

“You don’t seem entirely surprised to see me, Sorrow,” he remarked.

“I’m not. I’m beginning to believe you are an evil genius set on earth for the sole purpose of tormenting me for my sins.”

“Sins you have yet to commit, milady.”

Anne chose to ignore this suggestive remark.

“What are you doing here? I cannot believe it is merely chance this time that—” She broke off, recollecting the number of times this evening she had fancied herself being followed.

It must have been Mandell all along. He had witnessed her reunion with Norrie, that private moment of tenderness and heartache, all played out before Mandell’s cynical gaze.

“Damn you!” she cried. “You have been spying upon me ever since I left Lily’s. How dare you!”

“Alas, you must forgive me, my dear. I am a jealous fool. I never dreamed this midnight rendezvous of yours would be with a child.”

Mandell jealous? Anne eyed him with disbelief. He spoke lightly enough, but with an odd grimace. That was the trouble with Mandell and his sardonic facade. One could never be sure whether he was serious or not.

“How did you even know I would be meeting anyone tonight?” Anne demanded.

Mandell groped beneath the folds of his cloak.

He produced a crumpled scrap of paper. You dropped this out of your purse at the theatre.

I pocketed it when I retrieved the reticule for you.

If you mean to engage in this sort of clandestine adventure, you ought to get in the habit of destroying your notes at once. ”

“I would have done so, but I never had the chance. No sooner had I received the message, then Lily—” Anne broke off. Why was she troubling to explain anything to Mandell? She continued angrily, “It makes no difference. You had no right reading my messages or following me.”

“Someone must keep watch over you, if you will persist in these midnight wanderings,” he said. “Who was the pretty child that draws you out at such a perilous hour?”

His question caused Anne to realize something. While he had been able to observe, he must not have been able to hear any of the whisperings between herself and Norrie.

“The child’s identity is none of your concern,” she informed him loftily.

“I suppose I can always make inquiries of your sister.”

“No!” Anne’s hauteur dissolved in an instant.

“You must not say anything about this to Lily or to anyone. No one must know that I have been here tonight. If Lucien ever found out that I had seen Norrie, I would never be able to get near her again. Please, my lord. If you have any decency at all, you will keep silent.”

Mandell regarded her through half-lowered lids. “My silence would have a price.” She might have known he would say something like that.

“Very well.” Anne raised her head with all the drama of a martyr about to meet her doom. “Take your payment then.”

She pursed her lips and closed her eyes, bracing herself to be assaulted as Mandell had done that night in the garden, the blood drumming through her veins.

The moment dragged out and she felt nothing but the wind ruffling her hair. When Mandell did kiss her, his mouth just brushed hers, the contact warm and fleeting.

Anne’s eyes fluttered open in surprise to find Mandell’s dark eyes glinting with amusement.

“Very sweet,” he murmured. “But a kiss was not what I had in mind, Sorrow.”

Anne’s cheeks flushed hot with embarrassment. “Then why did you take it?”

“How could I refuse what was so prettily offered? But I fear I must demand payment of another sort. I want to know what is going on. Who is this Norrie? I believe that is what you called her?”

Anne compressed her mouth into a stubborn line.

“We are not going anywhere until you answer me, Sorrow. We will stay here all night if we must. It will not bother me. I have always been a nocturnal creature by habit.”

Mandell leaned back against the gate, inspecting his nails, looking as disinterested as though he graced some boring afternoon tea.

Yet Anne knew he meant what he said. He was fully capable of holding her prisoner by Lucien’s gate until dawn if need be.

And despite the marquis’s negligent posture, she doubted she would get far if she attempted to flee.

“All right,” she conceded. “I will tell you whatever you want to know. But can we not continue this conversation elsewhere? I have already risked enough by lingering this long. If Lucien were to catch me, he can be so vindictive.” Anne shivered, drawing the ends of her shawl tightly about her. “Can we please leave this place?”

Mandell came slowly away from the gate. He undid his cloak, sweeping it from his shoulders. Before she could guess his intent, he draped it about her, engulfing her in the heavy black folds.

“Oh, n-no,” she stammered, finding the contact of the fabric, warm from his body, redolent with his musky scent, disturbingly intimate,

Mandell ignored her protest, fastening the cloak about her neck. “I want no confessions from a woman with chattering teeth. Let this be another lesson to you. Don’t attend a midnight revel so scantily clad.”

Anne started to inform him she was not in the least chilled, but until Mandell had gathered her up in the warmth of his cloak, she had not realized exactly how cold she was.

The garment, which came only to his knees, swirled to her ankles, nearly dragging the ground, enveloping her from neck to toe.

She should have refused to allow this. She wanted nothing from this man. But she was too tired to argue with him, too glad of the cloak’s sheltering folds.

“Thank you,” she said grudgingly.

“The pleasure is mine, milady.” Mandell steered her away from Lucien’s house.

They crossed the narrow street. At the end of the block, she could make out the lights of Clarion Way, and hear the clatter of carriage wheels, the distant strains of a waltz, the revelry that never seemed to end in London’s Mayfair district.

Mandell kept her to the side street, for which Anne was grateful.

The night shadows no longer seemed so formidable with Mandell at her side, the darkness almost welcoming.

They walked slowly in silence until they were a good distance from Lucien’s before Mandell demanded again, “Who is Norrie, Anne?”

“Eleanor,” Anne corrected. “Eleanor Rose Fairhaven. She is my daughter, my only child.” She pronounced the last words with a deal of pride, a deal of sorrow.

At Mandell’s prodding, she told him everything, from the very beginning of Lucien’s youthful infatuation for her, a strange passion that had turned to hate. She described the death of her husband and Gerald’s infamous will.

“Gerald always saw me as a helpless little fool. Although he disliked his brother, he left Lucien in charge of everything. My house, my fortune, even my daughter.”

Anne sighed. “It was all right at first. Lucien was too preoccupied with assuming Gerald’s title to do more than harass me in small ways—withholding funds, dismissing all my servants, replacing them with his own.”

“Small ways!” Mandell echoed. “Most of the ladies I know would be ready to kill if deprived of their favorite abigail.”

A sad laugh escaped Anne. “Even that was bearable. It was not until Lucien discovered he could distress me the most by threatening to take Norrie away that—”

Anne came to an abrupt halt on the pavement, shaking her head. “I cannot believe this wretched tale can hold any interest for you, my lord.”

“Go on,” Mandell insisted.

Anne moistened her lips. “I suppose I never believed Lucien would go that far, but one day last autumn ...” Her words trailed away, the glow of the streetlamps blurring before her eyes. The memory still had the power to devastate her.

“I was out visiting in the neighborhood. One of Gerald’s tenants had taken ill. Since he had become lord of the manor, Lucien always neglected such things. When I finally returned to the house, I knew at once something was wrong.”

Anne’s voice cracked. “The house was so still, the way a house often seems when someone has died. None of Lucien’s servants would meet my eyes. They all avoided speaking to me. But I did not have to ask. Somehow, I just knew. I went tearing up to the nursery.

“The place looked like it had been ransacked by a thief. All the drawers hung open. Norrie’s clothes were gone, her books, even her doll. I remember screaming for Norrie, calling her name. Oh, God. I thought I would lose my mind.”

She could not go on. Hot tears coursed down her cheeks and she was mortified to put on such a display of grief before Mandell. But when she glanced up at him, she was surprised to find his expression not unsympathetic.

“My regrets, Sorrow,” he said. “But I never seem to have a handkerchief about me.”

He caught her face between his hands, brushing away her tears with the tips of his fingers. Anne tried to regain control.

“I was crying that first night you met me. What a perfect fool you must think I am.”

“This is neither the time nor the place for me to show you what I think of you.”

His husky words and the feel of his hands upon her skin sent a tingle of heat through her veins. Nervously, Anne put his hands away from her, continuing with her tale.

“For a long time, I did not even know where Lucien had taken Norrie. Finally, I traced her to London. That night by your gate I was looking for Lucien’s house. This evening was the first time I had seen Norrie in months.”

“You have found your daughter at last. Now what?”

It astonished Anne that he could even ask such a question.

“I shall take her back from Lucien, of course,” Anne said fiercely.

“How?”