Page 28 of Lyon on the Lam (The Lyon’s Den)

A s much as she had protested about his involvement, Tavie was glad to have Matthew over her shoulder as she rang the bell at Albert’s Mayfair home.

The door swung open, and the butler’s eyes widened. “Lady Burridge.”

“Fremont.” She stepped inside quickly, pulling Matthew with her, just in case the staff had orders to keep her from returning. Belinda scurried in behind him. “May I present Mr. Matthew Foster and my maid, Hubbard.”

It would be the last time Tavie called Belinda by her last name, but this house ran on formality, and Belinda would be treated better if the rules were followed.

The butler, whom Albert had hired not long after his second trip to France, stiffly nodded to each and then turned back to her. His gray stare had always reminded Tavie of a newly sharpened blade. “Is the baron expecting your return?”

“Likely not. But Mr. Foster and I have business with Lord Burridge. While we’re in the library, Hubbard will pack a trunk with my things.”

“Of course.” He led their party through the house. “I’ll show your maid up myself after you are settled.”

“No need.” Tavie made a show of delivering the key to Belinda. “Up the stairs, to your left, last door on your right. Select what you think I can wear every day and be sure to get the dressing set. It belonged to my grandmother.”

“Thomas will knock momentarily,” Matthew said as they entered the library. He gave the butler a cold stare. “My footman will make sure Hubbard and the trunk are safe.”

Fremont dipped his chin once more, and Tavie swore he grew stiffer each time. “I’ll ask Mrs. Hatch to bring a tray.”

“No,” Matthew barked. He drew a deep breath and exhaled. “My apologies, Fremont. Please don’t trouble Mrs. Hatch or the cook. We won’t be staying long.”

Once they were alone, Tavie rolled her eyes. “Calm yourself before you ruin everything,” she whispered. Still, she understood his reaction. In this house, shadowy things lurked behind every chilly corner and the quiet made your skin crawl. “We’ll be gone soon.”

The door to the library swung open, and Albert strode in.

He was arrow straight, as though his valet had sewn him into the patterned waistcoat and then pressed the coat while he was wearing it.

His shoes were so highly polished that they looked brittle, and it was a wonder he could breathe past the intricately knotted cravat. “Octavia.”

The only thing marring his appearance was a mottled bruise covering his left eye. His nose might have been swollen as well. “Albert.”

He sneered at Matthew. “Given our interaction yesterday, it’s not surprising to find you’re involved in this farce, but I thank you for returning my wife.”

The emphasis on the last two words was subtle, but it was there.

“She’s leaving with me,” Matthew snarled.

“God save me from male posturing,” Tavie muttered as she stepped between them. She kept Matthew at her back and faced Albert. “I am not some lost object to be returned, Albert. I am here to sort things between us so that I can move forward with my life.”

She emphasized the end of her sentence, mimicking him. If he appreciated the verbal parry, it didn’t show.

It never did.

“Your life? With him ?”

She hoped so. After all this was behind them, she prayed Matthew still wanted her. “That is none of your concern.”

“You leave my house in the middle of the night and run into his arms? You abandon me to do God only knows what with him, then return and announce that we should settle things ? That can only mean money, Octavia. And I will not pay a whore—not even to leave my sight.”

The words hit like sleet, but Tavie couldn’t afford to feel the pain. Not now. She would have to let Matthew take the brunt of it. She had asked him to let her take control of the meeting, to say her piece in her own words, but his agreement was costing him dearly. Rage radiated from him in waves.

And Albert knew that. She could tell by the gleam in his eye. He always played dirty.

She stepped as close as she dared and slapped him. “Says the man with two wives.”

He blinked.

“I’ve met Angeline and the children,” she said, careful to keep her voice even.

“We compared husbands.” He gulped, or at least she thought he did.

The fussy cravat shielded his throat from view.

“Mine, the baron I was contracted to like a cow at market. And hers, the charming widower she met in the company of the Comte de Abbeville.”

Albert took a step back, and Tavie advanced. It was easier to do with Matthew there. “Which was a lie then, but wouldn’t have been for long, would it? Not since you asked Mrs. Hatch to poison my tea. My only question is whether the maid you chose for me was part of the plot.”

He dropped into the nearest chair, wrinkling his suit. “You do not understand.”

She believed she did. She’d stayed up thinking well after Matthew had given her a bone-melting kiss and left her in the hallway outside her room.

“What? That Abbeville introduced you to a lovely girl with romantic notions, and that you fell in love?” Tavie paced to the desk and turned.

“That, having a choice between a dreary life following the rules and a love you never expected to find, and children you’d ceased hoping to have, you chose the latter?

” She walked to the door and drew a breath before facing him again.

“That Abbeville took that happiness and blackmailed you with it, ransoming Angeline and the children in exchange for low grain prices to feed the French army, which is now marching north on full stomachs?”

Albert looked very much like he was going to cry, which pricked Tavie’s conscience, but not enough to stop. She wasn’t finished yet.

“And that move north meant that Angeline and the children needed to be in London to be safe. The secret would be out, unless your first wife was already dead. And that her death might distract her father, whom you made a party to treason by selling his grain to Napoleon.”

“You’ll never prove it.” He squared his jaw in defiance, but there was doubt in his eyes.

“I can prove every word,” Tavie whispered, triumph and anger making her words tremble.

“I can leave here and go straight to Parliament. I can keep the title and watch you go to prison, or worse, and wave from the docks as Angeline and the children return to France in disgrace. I can take everything from you.”

“You’re not that cold,” he murmured. “Despite everything that’s passed between us, you’ve never been cruel.”

It felt good to finally hear him say it. “I want a divorce, Albert. As quickly and as quietly as possible, which I think Parliament will arrange, given the circumstances. I want my dowry repaid to me so I can begin rebuilding my life. And I want your contracts with my father.”

He nodded.

“When the time is right, I’ll host a tea for Angeline,” Tavie continued. “It might ease her way onto the hostess list. She deserves to be happy. So do the children.” She pinned him with another hard stare. “Make them happy, Albert. They are the only reason you are escaping the noose.”

This nod wobbled a bit.

“Fire Trudy so Angeline can choose her own maid, and send Hatch into retirement in Hampshire. The girl should have a staff who is more loyal to her than you.” She drew a deep breath.

Power was a heady thing, but this needed to come to an end.

“I’ll be a friend to Angeline for as long as she likes, but if she so much as sneezes oddly, I will be on my way to the prime minister at a gallop. ”

Tavie wasn’t sure how long she’d been bending over Albert, but he was slumped in the chair and her back ached.

She straightened and drew a breath, wrinkling her nose at the scent of stale tobacco.

“I think Belinda and Thomas have my trunk loaded by now.” She turned to Matthew and stifled a giggle as she met his shocked stare. “Shall we go?”

He offered his arm and escorted her from the library and then from the house. She never looked back, and she didn’t dare smile until they were safely in the coach.

Matthew’s lips twitched, and he finally broke into a chuckle. He looked behind them as he did it, as though he expected to see Albert running after them with a pistol.

Truthfully, Tavie did too.

“You were terrifying,” he said as he kissed her knuckles. “Remind me never to make you angry.”

“Never call me a whore,” she quipped. She had planned for her speech to be much more even tempered, but that word had sent her best intentions straight up the flue.

“Agreed,” Matthew said. “Though by the end of your remarks, I believe he was wishing that I’d shot him.”

The pity of London, and of traveling through Mayfair when most of the ton was still sleeping, was that it took no time to reach St. James Street, where another carriage waited.

“You really mean to leave me?” Matthew asked.

Though he’d balked at staying silent while she fought for her freedom, this was his least favorite part of her plan. She wasn’t fond of it either.

“Just until everything is settled.” The news of her divorce would be all over London before they knew it. If she remained in London, the gossip would tie Matthew, his business, and his family into the ruinous knot she was doing her best to unravel. “You know this is the right thing to do.”

“I think you could decide your own path wherever you are. Even in London.”

He kissed her then, long and slow but with a hungry edge that stirred her to life and made her forget where they were. When she pulled away, it was difficult to focus. It always was when they were together.

“Do not make this difficult, Matthew. Please. I want us to have some time to think.” If she stayed, if gossip pressed upon them, he would be forced to propose. She would go from Albert’s house to his with barely a breath in between.

“I’m not going to change my mind, Tavie. I love you. I have always loved you—almost always—and I always will.”

It was the almost always that concerned her.

She knew he said it in jest, but she’d also just escaped a man who was willing to kill her because she couldn’t give him a family.

Would Matthew feel the same when all his friends had children and grandchildren?

Would he grow bitter when he had to decide which distant cousin would inherit the family lands?

She knew it was foolish, but she had to be certain that their marriage was based on the truth.

She wanted to be his equal, not his prize.

They turned onto his street. Stopped at his house. Left his coach. The blue horizon stretched ahead of her.

She ignored the freedom for a moment longer and kissed him. She stole enough of his taste, his scent, and his strength to last her for the months she planned to be gone. “I love you,” she whispered.

She’d be able to close her eyes and remember the feel of his hair between her fingers. She could dream about him when she slept.

She’d done it for years.