By Desire Bound Page 28

  "All right. I won't gamble with it. Choose your pass­word."

  "Why don't you?" he said.

  "Our enemies know everything about us," she mut­tered.

  "Then let me suggest—they can't know this—penance must be paid."

  * * *

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  He held The Eye of God in his hands—in the dark. A rough eight-sided stone that felt and looked like less than it was.

  Yet men had killed for it; women had lied.

  And because they had taken it, the balance had tipped to the other side.

  It wasn't easy to hide either. Darcie had drawn the shade on the door window, and doused the lights since he sat in the dark anyway.

  He ruminated on her cleverness.

  Probably this would be the only time he'd get his hands on the diamond. Probably, she'd never let it out of her sight from now on.

  Probably. And she'd look for somewhere neat to kill him, like that attendant she'd thrown off the train.

  Oh my good goddamn. All the things Darcie had done in the name of protecting him and sustaining their quest. It made him queasy, remembering.

  For all he knew, she was a professional thief and this was an elaborate hoax solely to get possession of the diamond. She wouldn 't scruple to kill him then. And blame it all on Lavinia.

  And there! The other thing that niggled at him: the woman Darcie described was not the mother he'd known.

  Lavinia was a hard-headed businesswoman, pure and sim­ple. She coveted The Eye of God because of its value split into individual stones, and what it would add to the bottom line. And the public notice it would bring to the firm. Lavinia had known just how to merchandise those things.

  If she couldn't have the diamond, she'd publicize the quest.

  And she had been a damn sight better at it than he had been. And a gentle mother when he was young. . .

  There was a knock at the door, two short raps, then one, repeated twice, as prearranged. He pocketed the diamond and moved to the door.

  "Who's there?"

  "Con—it's me. Penance must

  He slipped the locks and she eased in.

  "I guess that worked," she murmured, "but you have to pull down the table so I can see to the lights."

  He knew his way around the car by then, and he got the table, she groped for it, and set down the tray, and then she turned up the lights and locked the door.

  "We'll leave on the lights next time," she said, slip­ping onto her bench. "Well, it's chicken again. The usual accompaniments. I hope you're hungry."

  She didn't say a word about the diamond as she ar­ranged his plate, and they ate in silence, as they usually did. And then she would leave the tray outside by the door.

  "Con—I should hold the diamond. That only makes

  sense.

  He knew he couldn't stop her, except by force. And he weighed, in that split second, where that would leave him. Give her the diamond, and she could abscond for­ever. Keep it himself, and he might have to hurt her.

  Either way, he could be left dependent on strangers, with no way to know who was an enemy or a friend.

  Blast the power that had taken his eyes!

  "Maybe not," he temporized. "Especially if you'll be going in and out two or three times a day just to feed us. Maybe it makes more sense in my hands."

  "There's something weird going on here," she said suspiciously.

  "No, we're just being supremely cautious. Now that Lavinia's after us, I mean."

  He heard the rattle of the china as she cleared the table. Pulled the locks. Opened and closed the door and locked it again. Like she was using motion to cover her frustration, her anger, her dismay.

  Or else she was planning her next move.

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  Either way, he was keeping the diamond.

  He heard her fold up the table, and pull down her berth. They'd agreed that no attendants would make up the beds.

  "Have it your way," she said finally, and there was a shrug in her tone.

  "It makes sense," he said, and he too lay down.

  She lay angry and seething in the dark.

  He was acting so odd, like he didn't trust her. After everything that had happened, and all they'd been through. She felt like shaking him.

  But as she lay sleepless across the room from him, she understood that things were very different this trip. Now they had the diamond. And he had again lost his sight.

  What man wouldn't be bitter alone in the dark?

  She wondered why she thought they had forged any bond. She'd been nothing to him but a whore, in the dark.

  Now his attitude finally made sense. She already had her tithe and he was finished with her. When he claimed Pengellis-Becarre, he'd take a worthy bride, and The Eye of God would be the centerpiece of his return.

  And he wasn't giving it up, even to save his life.

  She couldn't believe everything she'd done for him, but that was the risk an adventuress took. Had she thought he'd be dependent on her forever? Or fall in love with her unceasingly demanding body?

  She didn't know what she had thought, except that she couldn't bear the idea that the thing was over—in every way.

  But not yet They still had to get to Paris. Make their escape. Return to England and successfully make their claim.

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  His claim.

  Damn. Damn. Damn.

  Blessed be . . .

  There was still that—and what it might mean.

  And they 'd yet to confront Lavinia.

  She took a deep steadying breath.

  One thing at a time.

  The story still wasn't over.

  The train passed through Munich, with a brief stop. Darcie reconnoitered the dining car and brought back lunch. She felt like a servant, a waitress. Less than her worth.

  Like the stone, with its hidden power that she'd seen.

  Maybe she too had covert powers she hadn't yet tested.

  She felt the evil eyes of their enemy watching them.

  "Con . . . ?"

  He was looking at the window, seeing nothing. She felt an abject wave of sorrow wash over her. What would he do, once they returned to London? He'd have to give over the running of the company to someone else. He could still be the hero, the figurehead. The blind Con Pengellis who'd once been a god.

  How did a man fall so far from grace? This was such unjust punishment. It wasn't fair. And it couldn't be fought on any terms that made them equals.

  She was the daughter of an itinerant miner, and he was the son of a wealthy diamond merchant, and a hon­orable to boot.

  Damn. Those discrepancies didn't matter in a desert. They mattered on a train going back to civilization. His civilization. She had been an interloper there.

  Oh, God—it was so complicated. The truth of it all

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  was she'd been nothing more than a camp follower try­ing to get rich quick.

  And while she supposed she had rights as Roger's wife, Con probably wouldn't want her anywhere near him when they returned.

  "Con?" she tried again. She hated these silences. This was not a man on a mission. It was a man who was thinking too hard and making assessments she was not going to want to hear.

  "Yes, Darcie?" Polite. Calm. Raging inside probably at this awful turn of fate.

  "It will be all right, when we get to England," she said. She didn't know what to say; he was such a stranger and now she walked in a strange land. And there was nothing she could say to crack his impassive mein.

  "You'll be safe," she added, hearing the desperation in her tone. "I'll make sure we're safe there."

  He smiled faintly, and she didn't like that smile. "I'm sure you will."

  Paris!

  A half hour to arrival at Le Gare du Nord.
/>   The conductor's voice echoed all up and down the sleeping cars.

  Make ready, all who will depart at the station . . .

  She was the one who packed. She felt his helplessness, his fury. And something else contained that she couldn't define.

  This was it, the moment. "I think we should get out as far from this car as we can."

  "You lead the way."

  He was too agreeable, too amenable.

  He didn't believe her—

  No! There was too much at stake. He had to believe her.

  She had two valises, wrapped in the fur and strapped together, so she could manage them with one hand.

  And she had him.

  "Do you need help, madame?" She jumped. An at­tendant? Or an enemy?

  "Non, merd." She needed it desperately. She held Con's hand as they shuffled to the next car, squeezing by irate passengers trying to debark.

  "Go on, Darcie, it doesn't matter."

  "I hate this new sensibility of yours. Why aren't you fighting? Why don't you believe me?"

  He supposed he shouldn't have been shocked. What could he hide from the Darcie of the dark who knew him so well?

  "Don't you dare not fight—" she said fiercely. For this—-for us, she didn 't say.

  "I feel like we can't escape it. I feel like I cheated fate and now—penance must be paid. What do you feel, Darcie? Triumph? That you've won?"

  "I just feel like getting out of here before they get us."

  "Right—they ..."

  He didn't believe her. He didn't believe her!

  She pulled him violently down the passage, not caring who he slammed into in her haste. Damn him. Damn him, damn him, damn him.

  She managed to get them three cars away from where watchers would expect them to emerge.

  Managed that, with all his reluctance and the passen­ger herd.

  And then the train whistle blew, and they had to get out.

  She stepped down warily at the next exit, peering out from the protection of the train.

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  "Oh my God," she breathed. "Oh dear God-Con . . ."

  They were waiting for them. They were right in front of the car she had chosen to exit.

  And, she thought, she shouldn't have been surprised Anything was possible. Con had said so, all those months ago, and they'd seen it time and again in the succeeding mondis.

  Anything was possible, and so there they were: Roger and her father—the living dead.

  "Welcome, my dear," Roger said. "Do hand over the diamond—or I will shoot you dead."

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  The train whistle wailed. The engine started up in a huge cloud of steam.

  "Run . . . !" Darcie screamed, dropping everything and pulling his hand. "Jesus, Darcie . . ."

  "Shut up ....'" Even though she knew it was futile, they ran, knocking into passengers, tripping over bag­gage-Roger was right behind them; her father pawing

  through their luggage.

  They just might make it, they just might ... if only Con had his eyes.

  She felt him fall behind her, heavily, pulling her down flat on her back.

  Roger had tackled him, and now he stood, covering them with his gun.

  "Resourceful, Darcie. You were ever that. Get to your feet, both of you. We won't make a scene."

  She had gambled on the fact he wouldn't. She scram­bled to her feet

  "Con? Are you all right?"

  "Yes." And humiliated. And a fool.

  Roger.

  And his accomplices.

  Thea Devinr.

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  Including Darcie.

  It made such sense. And Darcie had the diamond.

  And she told such wonderful stories, even the one about pretending to try to escape from Roger.

  So good. Good as it gets . . .

  He wanted to kill them all.

  "My father is here," Darcie whispered.

  "How neat," he murmured. It just tidied things right up. They'd used him, all of them; he was the dupe, the gull, the tool.

  They were all going to share in the cut from the dia­mond.

  Darcie too.

  By God . . . penance was being paid—

  "Come now," Roger said. "Lavinia awaits us."

  "It was all an elaborate hoax, wasn't it?" Con said. "From the moment I escaped, you had the thing planned."

  "More or less," Roger said. "Of course, Darcie's fa­ther conveniently died to give her an urgent motive to seek the diamond. There's nothing like greed. We had you covered on all fronts, until you escaped. And then of course, I had to die. We thought that might get you back to Goole. But in any event, things have worked out. You have the diamond, and we'll just cleave it tidily and sell it at a profit."

  "And Lavinia?"

  "Ah . . . Lavinia. She's getting old, Con. She's a little dotty. Keeps talking about its powers. Nothing worth lis­tening to. A few million pounds ought to quiet her down. Then of course, we do have the birth of the child to look forward to. Except"—he took Darcie by the elbow and turned her around— "I don't see any evidence of it, do I Darcie? There never was a baby, was there?"

  He shoved her away from him and she fell against Con.

  "Aren't you the sharp-witted bitch, my darling. Mother bought it, whole cloth. She'll be so disap­pointed. I don't think there's anything else. So that should answer your questions for now."

  She hated him. She despised Roger with a killing fury. A man who looked so much like Con and who was such a liar and a cheat.

  "What happens now?" she asked, barely able to con­tain her rage.

  "Why, we'll go back to Goole, my dear. And we'll sort out our lives."

  It rose up before them in the twilight, stark and eerie, a pile of stone and secrets, shrouded in silence.

  The trip had been excruciating. She had to face her father, face her own sins. The man she depended on, loved, cared for and carried, had been seduced by the stone.

  Ms big strike. She was to have been his foil. Hadn't he hammered it into her, the legend of the stone: And made her feel responsible for getting his share?

  Oh yes, he'd primed her well for the task. She'd had everything at her disposal: he'd bought her entree to the castle, outlined the quest, and gave her the mission. And then he'd perished, to enhance her mandate to carry out the task.

  Treacherous! Such a betrayal—of her love, her belief in him, in them—as partners, as a team.

  Her whole life was a lie, she thought, beginning to end.

  Or maybe her life had begun the day she rescued Con.

  She had no other allegiances here.

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  "You will give up the diamond," Roger kept telling her. "It will be mine."

  "Ours," Leonard Boulton added. "Such a clever Dar-cie, finding Con, and getting him there."

  Her heart was stone; he couldn't touch her anymore. She did not know this man he had become.

  "My dear," he chided. "There's no difference be­tween this and what we did to gain possession of the Colorado mines."

  She turned her head away. That was a long time ago. A long long time ago. It was the deal that had given him the wherewithal to come to England and instigate this plan.

  An uncut diamond worth a fortune in gold . . .

  She didn't want to think about it—any of it—or her part in it.

  She hadn't thought about it at all from the day they'd left Colorado; she'd never looked back.

  The mark of a gambler, depending on luck.

  "I know Darcie has the diamond," Roger went on conversationally. "There was never any doubt once we knew you two were together. She's very good at what she does, isn't she, Con?"

  "Most excellent," he said dryly. And oh, what she does . . .

  He felt the impotence of a man abandoned by fate. He'd lost everything. He couldn't defen
d against Roger and Darcie, who still had their eyes.

  Such a clever Darcie . . .

  And he hadn 't believed in the danger.

  He just hadn't thought it would come from his heart.

  "Are we there yet?"

  "We're in the park," Roger said. "You remember the park?"

  And all the dead trees, their branches begging heaven . . .

  "Almost there. Mother will be waiting."

  Ah yes, Lavinia, the other part of the equation.

  What about Lavinia?

  The carriage lurched to a stop.

  Coming home again, blind. Always blind to what was around him, even when he could see.

  Hands helping him out. Not Darcie.

  Roger's rough hands, pushing him. And the distinctive scent of the air, dry as dead leaves. Goole was dead. He'd never seen it, but it had always been so.

  "Clever of you to have brought him to Goole after you found him," Roger murmured to Darcie. "I'm ut­terly taken by your ingenuity. I had a treasure beyond price and I never knew it."

  "You should have stayed dead," she spat

  Good, Darcie. Good. That sounded so protective, so combat­ive. Darcie to his defense, white knight to a man immured in an endless night.

  The air changed as they entered the hall.

  Thick, stuffy, redolent of spices, bringing back the moments and memories. The portrait—that everlasting blasted portrait that made Darcie fall in love—it was in front of him, over the stairs, haunting him, the ghost of his former life, because he knew it was there.

  He heard footsteps. And then the starchy tones of the butler, as he took their coats.

  And then he heard a lighter step running along the balcony above him.

  And her voice: "Where is it? Where's the diamond?"

  Roger, speaking first. "Mother—"

  "I don't give a damn about anything else. Where is that stone?"

  And finally, a puzzle solved. He couldn't see, but he knew, and he wouldn 't pretend, so he said it boldly, out loud.

  "That's not my mother's voice."

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  They froze.

  Darcie plucked his sleeve. "Con, that's your mother." "That isn't she."