The Mercenary Major by Kate Moore Page A

breaking that one with a vengeance. But no softness, no heat had tempted him like this. He tightened his hold on her and adjusted the fit of their bodies with no regard for the ache he would suffer when their embrace ended. Abruptly, she pulled away.
    They stood staring at one another, making no attempt to hide the disorder of their breathing or their persons. In her eyes was the consciousness of who she was, who he was, and where they were. She backed a step away and took a deep breath.
    “You have fearless eyes, Miss Carr,” he said.
    “Excuse me, sir.” She turned and fled.
    “A bandit’s first lesson, Miss Carr. Know when to run,” Jack whispered after the girl disappearing down the stairs.
     
    If Letty felt any dissatisfaction with Lady Montford’s party, it was only that she had not seen Jack and Victoria speak as they had at the theatre. Furthermore, Jack had danced with the wives and mothers of his friends rather than with the young ladies he might have partnered. He was observing the letter but hardly the spirit of their agreement. Still, as she watched her niece with Richard Kindel, Letty smiled. Katie was actually meeting the young man’s gaze and had spoken to him prettily and without her usual constraint. Beside Letty, Charlotte was in raptures.
    “Look at her, Letty,” Charlotte said. “She’s talking. It’s just what I dreamed.”
    Charlotte had repeated her delight several times and Letty was on the point of introducing some other idea for her sister-in-law’s consideration, when Charlotte said, “I’m so grateful. Where would we be without you, Letty?”
    Letty refrained from answering that question, choosing instead to dwell on the success of the evening. “A few more occasions such as this and the girls will be well established. I should think we can have a ball for them by early . . . December without worry.”
    “Early December!”
    Letty looked away. “Oh, I think so. Easily.”
    “Not sooner?” Charlotte asked, her voice barely audible above the music and the talk.
    Letty shook her head. Her sister-in-law’s face wore such a look of profound disappointment, of longing hopelessly for what was not to be, that Letty wanted to shake her. “Charlotte, do you remember what Walter did when I left the hall to come to London?”
    Charlotte’s light-brown eyes expressed a vivid recollection of the event, and she shuddered once, a delicate little tremor. “Oh, Letty, I couldn’t endure it. He raged so. He broke his hand on my lovely table. He threatened to . . .”
    “Yes, but . . .” Letty kept her eyes locked with Charlotte’s, willing her sister-in-law to remember the important details of her husband’s anger.
    Charlotte’s brows drew together in a frown as she made a visible effort to understand what Letty was suggesting. “But . . . he . . . didn’t . . . He didn’t stop you. He didn’t come to town.”
    “And he won’t come now,” said Letty. “He’ll rant and storm over to . . . Edward Carr, and kick things, but he won’t stop you. So bring the girls, and we’ll carry on just as we planned. You can stay for weeks.” Letty held her breath. Nothing was less certain than the possibility that Charlotte would defy Walter. She was watching Katie again, and at that moment when all Letty’s plans were in doubt, Katie smiled up at her partner.
    Charlotte reached out and gave Letty’s hand a squeeze. “We’ll do it. We’ll come to you at the end of the week.”
    That sentence, uttered with more resolution than Lady Dorward customarily showed, was the first Victoria heard when she returned to the ballroom. Fate liked irony, she supposed. Why else would Lady Dorward defy her husband now, now that Victoria knew how very dangerous the supposed Jack Amberly was?
     
    Jack found Gilling waiting up for him, but no sign of his other friend.
    “Hengrave’s bolted, sir,” was the corporal’s terse report. “And left his finery here.”
    Jack began to ease himself out of the