‘Any single woman with gems like that is a beauty,’ Fitzwalter, a man in no need of a rich wife, observed cynically. ‘Didn’t know you were planning on a stay in town, Leybourne. Care to join us at the theatre tomorrow night? Thought we’d dine at Brooks’s and go on from there, finish up with some cards.’

  ‘Thank you, yes,’ Gray agreed, half his attention on Gabrielle.

  ‘Watch out, the cavalry’s arrived,’ Freddie said, nodding towards the door where five men in scarlet dress uniforms were entering.

  ‘That’s Turner and Appleton. I haven’t seen them since we left France,’ Gray said. ‘Excuse me.’

  He made to intercept his old comrades, but the room was now crowded and he was detained several times by acquaintances he could hardly push past and ignore. By the time he located the officers they had joined the group around Gabrielle and, it was clear, she knew all of them.

  ‘Now, let me see if I have learned everyone’s names correctly,’ she was saying. ‘Lady Ferris, Mrs Horton, Miss Platt, Lord Knighton and Mr Horton, may I introduce Major Lord Appleton, Major Carfax, Captains Sir James Grigson, Turner and Colney.’ She glanced round and saw Gray. ‘And I am sure Lord Leybourne is known to all of you.’

  ‘Colonel.’ The officers came to attention, although Appleton and Turner were grinning at him, old friends he had known too well for considerations of rank off-duty, even when he was one of them.

  ‘I’m a civilian now,’ he said as he shook hands and endured some brisk backslapping. ‘No need for the rank, I assure you. It is good to see you and we must catch up with our news another evening, I’ll give you my card. But I see you already know Miss Frost, whose aunt, Lady Orford, is my godmother.’

  ‘We often met Miss Frost when we were based in Pinhão,’ Appleton explained and made a gallant bow in her direction ‘She was the ornament of all the best dinner parties in the district. You were off on the Staff, as I recall. We got shouted at less and had the better port, I would make my guess.’

  ‘It is good to see you are all safe and sound,’ Gabrielle said. ‘Once you had left to chase the French out of Spain we had no idea what had happened to anyone, and then I had no idea which of my old acquaintances fought at Waterloo. I tried to check the casualty lists, but they were so long.’

  There was a moment’s silence when they all were clearly thinking of just what those lists in smudged black newsprint signified. ‘We’ve had a charmed life,’ Carfax drawled with a grin, breaking the mood. Then he sobered. ‘Except, of course, for poor Norwood.’

  The rest of the group, the civilians, had drifted away, taking Captain Colney with them. ‘Poor Norwood?’ Gray queried. ‘Major Andrew Norwood, the intelligence officer?’ He’d never quite taken to the man and now it sounded as though the major had not made it back.

  ‘That’s him,’ Carfax agreed. ‘He was pulled out of the river downstream of Pinhão just before we moved behind the lines.’ He flicked a glance at Gabrielle as though wondering what to say. ‘Been knifed in the ribs, very efficiently.’

  It was Gabrielle’s very stillness that told Gray of her distress. She had gone pale now and he recalled that Norwood had been the man who had involved her brother in the spying work that had led to his death. When she had spoken of the riding officer before she had been cool, almost hostile.

  ‘Perhaps an angry father or husband,’ she suggested, her voice unemotional. ‘He had a certain reputation, I believe.’

  ‘Er, yes. That could be it. Shouldn’t have mentioned it at all, not a fit subject for a lady’s ears,’ Carfax apologised. ‘Do you make a long stay in London, Miss Frost?’

  She answered readily enough and the talk turned to theatre and the opera, but Gabrielle was still pale, her eyes dark and shadowed, and Gray had a disturbing memory of the long, thin-bladed knife in her hand that day on the terraces, and the easy competence with which she used it. Had she blamed Norwood for her brother’s death and taken her revenge, a life for a life?

  He reined back the tumbling thoughts. Norwood had been a tough soldier and a big man. There was no way a slight young woman, even a fit and courageous one, could have overcome him, let alone dragged him to the river and thrown him in.

  But her staff would do anything for her, a little voice whispered in his ear. Anything. Oh, hell.

  * * *

  Gray thinks that I killed Norwood. He had gone very still, his eyes watchful despite the easy social smile on his lips. She had come to distrust that smile, it was his mask. She had betrayed too much when she had spoken of Thomas’s death, of the way Norwood had recruited and used him. His eyes had narrowed when Carfax had spoken of the knife wound and she, so foolishly, had shown off just how good she was with a blade.

  Gaby kept her chin up, her tone light and amused, and fought the urge to close her eyes as though to hide from that assessing, judging, look.

  I did not kill him, she wanted to shout. But I might as well have, her nagging sense of guilt amended. If she could have done so in those desperate, frantic moments, she would have, she knew that. But not in cold blood. She did not think she could kill anyone, whatever they had done, whatever they were, with premeditation.

  She dropped her fan, gave a pretended mutter of annoyance and dipped to pick it up, colliding with Lord Appleton and Major Turner, who both dived to rescue it. It gave her a moment’s respite, broke the temptation to give in, like a mouse held by a snake’s cold eyes, and confess all.

  The trance broken, she found she could breathe again. Gray had turned away and was saying something to Grigson about a sergeant they both knew who had lost a leg at Waterloo and was now running a successful posting inn on the Brighton road.

  Lord Appleton offered his arm. ‘Shall we take a look-in at the refreshment room, Miss Frost? I hear great things of the fruit tarts and we need to get there before Grigson or there will be none left.’

  Gaby laughed at the sally and at Sir James Grigson’s half-hearted denials of gluttony and found herself with both men as escorts to the supper room. It was easy enough to eat, especially when she found cheese tartlets and lobster patties. Tension always made her hungry rather than the reverse and neither man seemed to find her manner strained.

  ‘I will have a dinner party when I have my house and I have settled in,’ she promised. ‘If you are all still in London, you must help me with my house-warming.’

  That was greeted with enthusiastic acceptances and suggestions on what they might bring as house-warming gifts.

  ‘A basketful of kittens for catching mice might create more mayhem than the mice,’ Gaby said, laughing over Sir James’s fanciful ideas of what constituted a suitable present. ‘I do hope you are not serious.’ She felt the smile stiffen on her lips as Gray came to the table.

  He made no move to sit down. ‘I believe you said that you wished to return to Grillon’s by midnight, Miss Frost. If you have finished your supper, perhaps you would allow me to escort you?’

  She had said no such thing, she was sure of it. Gray, she supposed, had decided he must get to the bottom of Norwood’s murder sooner rather than later. Murder. Gaby had never thought of it like that. It had been self-defence, Norwood had been the aggressor.

  ‘Of course, how thoughtful.’ She managed to get some warmth into her tone, despite the cold finger of apprehension trailing down her spine. ‘Thank you, gentlemen, I look forward to being able to invite you all to dinner.’

  If I am still in the country and not fleeing back to Portugal...

  Gray maintained a flow of easy conversation as they walked back through the reception room. He stopped and introduced her to several of his acquaintances and behaved as though he had nothing more on his mind than making a leisurely departure from the party. By the time she had retrieved her cloak and he had sent a footman for his carriage, Gaby was ready to scream.

  He said something to the driver that she did not catch. It might have been an instruction to drive to Bow Street, it might have been an order to drive round and round in a circle until she confessed. Gaby made herself put her fan and reticule beside her on the seat rather than clutch them as an illusory safety barrier and leaned back, trying to appear merely slightly weary and ready for her bed.

  ‘Well?’ he said as the carriage moved off. ‘Are you going to tell me about Norwood?’ Gray had settled on the opposite seat, his back to the horses, even though there was room next to her.

  All the better to interrogate me, I suppose.

  ‘I did not kill him, if that is what you mean.’

  ‘So who did?’ Still the same even tone without either sympathy or accusation. Gaby found she had no idea whether Gray believed her or not.

  Chapter Twelve

  ‘Laurent killed Major Norwood. Must I tell you everything? It still makes me feel sick.’ The moment she had spoken, she despised herself for sounding feeble, but everything about it was appalling, from the realisation that Norwood would stop at nothing, including rape, to marry her and secure the wealth that Thomas’s death had left entirely in her hands, to the splash as two bodies had hit the fast-flowing river.

  ‘I think it would be as well, don’t you?’ She could not see his face, but his voice was that of a doctor telling the patient that a painful procedure was entirely for their own good. There was no reassurance that it would not be agonising. Nor was she under any illusion that she could bluff her way out of this. She might find Gray deeply attractive, he might feel the same about her, but that was not going to stop him finding out the truth, whatever it took.

  ‘Very well.’ Gaby took a moment, organising her words to get it over with as quickly as possible. ‘I was in the garden. I had just left Thomas’s grave where I had been planting flowers and dusk was falling. It was almost time to go in to wash and change for dinner. Norwood found me there and proposed marriage.

  ‘At first I thought it was genuine. He said all the right things, went down on one knee, even. He had always been attentive, rather more than was comfortable, but I had not thought him dangerous, merely insensitive. And of course I blamed him for encouraging Thomas to join the guerrilheiros. I refused him, politely, but he persisted. He got up off his knees, tried to kiss me, but I sensed this was a pretext, a display of affectionate ardour. When I moved from hinting to outright rejection to no effect it began to dawn on me that he wanted the quinta, the Frost Fire jewels he had seen at a dinner party, everything.’

  Gray muttered something under his breath, a quick curse, perhaps, but she could not see his face very clearly.

  ‘The more I refused, the angrier he became. He let something slip about Thomas and I realised that it might have been he who betrayed him, simply to leave me the sole heir. I threw that at him and he laughed. I had the soil from my brother’s grave on my hands and he laughed. I told him he was despicable, that I would write to Wellington, and he grabbed me, started to pull at my clothing, force me to the ground. I don’t know whether he was simply too angry to control himself or whether he thought that if he ravished me I would have no choice but to marry him.’ Gray made another sound and she broke off. ‘What did you say?’

  ‘Nothing. I think I was grinding my teeth. Go on. You had your knife.’

  ‘No, only a hand fork and that was blunt. I tried to stab him with it, but he twisted it out of my hand, threw it away and I screamed, even though I knew all the staff were at the back of the house, preparing for dinner. Then, suddenly, he was dragged off me. Laurent was there, dressed like one of the local farmers. Norwood drew a knife, went for him. They fought, right on the riverbank, and then they went in, both of them.’

  She sometimes woke out of a nightmare with the sound of that splash in her head, scrabbling at the bedclothes as she had scrabbled at the ground, trying to get to her feet, trying to reach Laurent. After a moment she managed to continue.

  ‘There was this huge splash, then silence, nothing but the sound of the river, and it was getting darker. I was going to run back to the house, get someone to help me launch the skiff, then Laurent came out of the bushes further down. He was cut, on his arm, his shoulder, his face, but he was alive.’

  ‘And Norwood?’

  ‘Laurent said they had been washed into a fallen tree only a short way downstream. He managed to keep hold of a main branch but the one Norwood grabbed was thinner and broke off. Laurent lost sight of him, but he knew he had got at least one serious blow home. That must have been the knife wound they found in his side.’

  ‘Did no one know Norwood was at the quinta? How did he get there?’

  ‘He rode and Laurent took his horse with him when he left. And, yes, I did check the saddlebags before I let him take it, so do not accuse me of being careless with secrets.’

  Gray merely grunted, which she supposed might have been a denial he had thought that.

  ‘No one came and enquired after him. But then, I doubt he went around announcing that he was setting out to try and entrap an heiress into marriage by whatever means.’

  ‘Taken at the worst you could be accused of being an accessory after a murder and of aiding and abetting a spy,’ Gray said.

  ‘Laurent was not a spy and I did nothing to aid the French cause unless you count perhaps improving the morale of one young officer,’ she said sharply. ‘And just what do you intend doing about it now you have me convicted?’

  ‘Nothing.’ Gray shifted suddenly, leaning forward and taking her hands. ‘Why, Gabrielle, do you think I do not believe you?’

  ‘You certainly sound like the counsel for the prosecution! Have you any idea how your voice drips icicles?’

  ‘Damn it, I am trying to get the facts straight, to see if there is any weakness in your defences we may need to strengthen. It sounds as though no one suspects anything and there is nothing that could connect him with you that evening. Certainly if his movements were not known, then no one is likely to have calculated that he went into the river from your property.’

  ‘You do believe me?’ It was an effort to keep her voice steady, but not, it seemed, a very successful one.

  ‘Gabrielle, darling. Of course I believe you.’ Gray pulled her into his arms. ‘Hell. Are you crying?’

  ‘No.’ She managed not to sniffle into his shirt front. ‘I’ve never spoken of it with anyone but Laurent. I didn’t expect it to affect me so...’

  Breathe. You are not going to weep all over him. Breathe.

  ‘You seem so strong, so decisive, that I did not think how my questions must have affected you,’ Gray said, his voice soft. He seemed to have his cheek against her hair, which was soothing, although the thud of his heart against her chest was anything but calming. ‘I was trying to be logical, methodical.’

  ‘You sound very much the senior army officer sometimes, especially when I cannot see your face,’ Gaby confessed, burrowing a little closer.

  ‘I’ve been an officer virtually all my adult life. You must forgive me if it takes a little time to change, become a civilian. Gabrielle—what are you doing?’

  ‘Smelling you,’ she confessed, her response rather muffled with her nose among the folds of his neckcloth.

  ‘I had a bath before dinner,’ Gray protested.

  ‘I know. You smell of lemons and spice and starch and warm man.’

  ‘And you smell of jasmine and rosemary and warm woman. It is somewhat arousing.’

  ‘I can tell.’ She was sitting across his thighs, after all, and not everything she could feel was muscle.

  ‘The sooner we find you a house, the better.’ His voice was a husky growl now.

  She stayed still, aware of how unfair it was to push his self-control so far. ‘You think I am safe now from any questions about Norwood?’

  ‘I am certain of it. If anyone had seen something, suspected it and had wanted to betray you, they would have done so long ago.’ His arms tightened around her. ‘I can see now why you are so very resistant to the thought of marriage.’

  ‘The fear of fortune hunters?’ Gaby sat up, then moved carefully to sit next to him, bracing herself against Gray’s shoulder as the carriage lurched. He seemed reluctant to let her go, but one of them had to move or they would spend the night driving round and round London and, tempting though that might be, it was hardly sensible. And she supposed that being sensible was the right thing, although it was hard just now to recall why.

  ‘No, it is not that, not the complete truth. I was not hiding anything when I told you why I do not wish to marry. It is not because of Norwood,’ she assured the shadowy figure opposite her. ‘Not every man who would want to marry me for what I have would be a venal as he was. But whoever it was, as a married woman I would lose control of everything that is mine, that I and my family have built. It would not matter whether I married a rich man or a poor man, a man who loved me or a fortune hunter, the effect would be the same.’

  ‘Would it not be worth it if you loved him in return?’ Gray asked. ‘What if Laurent came back, had not been killed, after all? We are at peace now. Would you marry him?’

  ‘I... No.’ Where had that come from, that certainty?

  ‘You loved him.’

  ‘I had strong feelings for him, although perhaps they were not love. I would never have become his lover if I had not cared for him, but I do not think I would love him now.’ The certainty was unsettling. ‘I think we would have grown too far apart.’ Gaby tried to work out why she was suddenly so definite. ‘We were young and in the strangest of situations, a world away from normality. I was grieving and he, I am sure, was homesick and exhausted by fighting. We were right for each other then. But not now, not for ever.’

  Not now when she wanted something else from a man, something...more? But Laurent had been brave and gallant and kind. What more could she want? Other than to make love with the man before her. The man who had interrogated her with such cool insistence and yet who promised her his silence and his understanding, promised her safety.