Chapter Seventeen
Rain tapped against the stained-glass windows, the sound a low tattoo throughout the marble chambers of St. Katherine’s cathedral. Max leaned against a column at the far end of the nave, looking deceptively casual, but every muscle in his body was coiled tight.
Zed was late. Max popped open his watch. Two minutes and forty seconds late to be precise. Tucking the timepiece away, he looked at the crucifix hanging behind the altar. Jesus looked as impatient as Max felt. Catching Zed had fallen in his list of priorities. Right now, Colleen was laying her head down on her pillow, thinking he didn’t care. That problem seemed more important to rectify.
That’s what his heart said. His mind knew better.
He checked the doors and hallways that led into the nave, wondering where the trap would be laid. Just like Max, Zed would not be arriving alone.
A door squeaked open by the front entrance. Max’s body hummed, his restlessness spiking when he saw the slight, cloaked figure walk down the side aisle. A woman would prove a good distraction.
Her slippers made no sound on the stone floor. She stopped by the first pew and dropped to one knee before sliding onto the bench. She stared at the altar, the hood of her cloak covering half her face.
Easing around his column, Max searched the rest of the church. All remained still. He cocked a shoulder against the column and crossed his arms over his chest. He slid a hand into an inside pocket and gripped the butt of the pistol hidden within.
He was tired of waiting. “Are you here for me?” he called, his voice startling loud in the church.
The figure didn’t flinch. “Of course.” The voice was low, melodic, as soothing as a fire on a cold winter’s night.
It sent a shiver of dread straight down Max’s spine.
He took a step closer. “Do I know you?”
She laughed. “I would like to say intimately so, but, sadly, I’ve never had the pleasure.”
“Show yourself.”
“As you wish.” Gracefully, she lifted the hood, pushing it off her head, exposing a twist of glossy brown hair. Molly winked at him. “I’m not usually the one taking orders, but I’m open to new experiences.”
It couldn’t be. Max searched the corners of the church again, expecting Zed to appear at any moment.
He and Molly were alone.
“You are Zed?”
She inclined her head.
“How?”
Draping an arm along the back of the pew, Molly raised an eyebrow. “Don’t you really mean ‘why’?”
“I know why.” Making a quarter-turn, Max pinned his gaze on the shadows dancing beneath the lip of the front doors. His men or Zed’s—Molly’s—he didn’t know. “Greed, of course. The motive was always obvious. People are such grasping, common little creatures. It’s not surprising you’d be the same.”
“Hah! I’ve been leading you and your friends around by your noses for the past year. I’m hardly common.”
Max gripped the end of the pew. “You’re smarter than most, I’ll grant you that. But someone of true intelligence would understand that honor is worth more than money.”
“Now you’re just speaking nonsense.” She traced a pattern in the grain of the wood. “You don’t truly think your friends outside are going to help you, do you? My men have already identified each and every one of them and are disabling your force as we speak.”
They would try, Max had no doubt. But he trusted in the abilities of his friends. “How do you get men to kill, and die, so easily for you? Money and threats only go so far. Some of your followers, it’s as though they are in a trance.”
She shrugged, her cloak slipping off to expose a pale shoulder covered by a slender red strap. “If that’s what you want to talk about, all right. I discovered early on in life how easily men could be swayed. At first, just by spreading my thighs.” She wagged a finger at Max. “Your sex truly has no self-control when it comes to the snake between your legs. The secrets I learned were delicious.”
Max didn’t doubt it. Many a campaign had been defeated by a seductress. “Men can speak too freely, especially if prevailed upon by some pretty young chit. But I saw someone cut his own throat rather than betray you.” He raised an eyebrow. “I don’t care how sweet in bed you are, no doxy is worth that.”
She laughed, a light, tinkling sound. “Do you think that’s all I am to my men?” Leaning forwards, her eyes caught the flickering lights of the candles on the altar. “I am the alpha and the omega. The reason my men get out of bed in the morning. Earning my approval is their sole purpose in life.”
“You used your skills from the club, your authority as a dominating woman, to affect these men’s minds.” Max could see it. When a person submitted him- or herself, they made themselves vulnerable, physically and mentally. A mad-woman, talented in her craft, could use that susceptibility, bend it, until the people she dominated depended upon her for the very air they breathed. “Is that why you stayed on at The Black Rose? Lord knows you didn’t need the money. Why keep working there?”
“It isn’t work when you enjoy it. Besides,” she said, adjusting the strap of her gown, “one can never have enough money. The secrets I learned at the club, the men I brought into line under me, definitely made it worth my while.”
There was a scuffle, a groan, beyond the front doors. Max’s friends were close. Fascinating as Molly’s mental defect was, it was time to wrap up this chapter in Max’s life. “We have the church surrounded. You have to know the Crown won’t let you escape.” He cocked his head. “Why did you engage with us? Why not take your ill-gotten gains and buy a villa in Tuscany?”
She jumped to her feet, shaking with fury. “What gains? Six months ago, you and your friends laid waste to my network, froze half my net-worth.”
Yes, and if their calculations were correct, the remaining half was still more than most earls could hope to see in their lifetime.
She advanced a step. “I always return a favor. A cut for a cut. I owe you for the trouble you caused and it’s time that I delivered.”
She was mad. Max could see that in her eyes. He wondered if Liverpool would account for her illness when he decided her punishment. “My friends are waiting at the front door,” he said gently. “Come with us quietly, and let’s avoid further bloodshed.”
“Isn’t that sweet?” Running her palm down the ermine trim of her cloak, she smiled. “You think it’s your friends at the door.” She flicked her fingers in a shooing motion. “Well, go check. Let’s get that last bit of hope of yours out of the way.”
Max stepped back, uneasy, and glanced at the double doors. Of course, it was his friends beyond it, waiting in the narthex. Molly might have a lot of men under her control, but Max and his friends had all the resources of the Crown behind them. Liverpool wanted Zed caught; he hadn’t been stingy in the amount of men he’d sent.
“Go on.” She bit her lip, looking coy and girlish, and nothing like a criminal mastermind.
Keeping an eye on her, ready to pounce at the first sign of her flight, Max made his way to the doors. It was time to end this charade. Maybe once Molly saw she was surrounded she’d give up her delusions.
He flung open the left door, ready to ask his friends what had taken them so long. An unfamiliar male face stared back at him. Max frowned. Liverpool had many men. It could be someone Max hadn’t met.
It wasn’t until Max had convinced himself of that fact that he saw the arm the man had a grip on. The body attached to that limb was hidden behind the second door. With a tobacco-stained smile, the man tugged on the arm and Colleen stumbled into the doorway. Her face was pale except for the purpling between her left eye and temple. Her hair had long ago escaped its pins and flew about her head in a crimson tangle.
Instinctively, Max reached for her. The man holding her took a step back and pressed the edge of the blade he held with his other hand beneath her breast.
Max’s feet rooted to the ground. He swallowed, his mouth dry as the desert, and let his arms drop to his sides.
Understanding crashed on him likes waves, swamping his brain, making him dizzy. His friends wouldn’t be coming. If they’d been able, they would have rescued Colleen already. He was all that stood between the woman he loved and the vengeance of a lunatic.
“I must admit I don’t understand what it is you find appealing in her,” Molly said from behind him. “But I’m so glad that you do care. It makes it that much more satisfying killing a person when someone who loves them is there to watch.”