Chapter 12
Tackle: A mistress; also good clothes. The cull has tipt his tackle rum rigging; the fellow has given his mistress good clothes. A man’s tackle; the genitals.
A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue
Francis Grose
“His inner circle is certain King Louis will not rise again from his bed,” the agent spoke from the shadow of a shuttered patisserie. “We must discuss the plan.”
“Later,” Nick murmured. Through late-evening mist he watched a figure step down from a hackney two blocks in the distance. He stole a glance at his pocket watch, the only remnant of his recently abandoned genteel life that he kept on his person. A few minutes past the hour. A dash late. She was, as ever, a dash late.
“Are you certain about involving her?” The agent jutted his chin in her direction.
“She stays for now.” Nick valued the agent’s judgment, but he had the final say in this matter.
The agent nodded, conceding the issue. “I’m meeting with Villefranche two hours hence. You and I can discuss the outcome later in my rooms.”
The agent melted away into the sodden night while Nick’s gaze remained trained on Mariana’s brisk figure.
Even wearing the dress of a low-born, Parisian trollop, Mariana, with her efficient, determined stride, retained an ability to be purely Mariana. It never failed to inspire a measure of envy within him. To be purely oneself was pure luxury—a luxury he couldn’t afford. He wasn’t certain he even knew how anymore. Except . . .
He could still taste the salt of her skin on his tongue. He hadn’t entirely lost the ability to be himself.
Last night, he’d lost control and forgotten the first rule of this game: he must view her with professional dispassion, like any of his other agents. Which meant he mustn’t lick her spine all the way up her elegant neck. Never before had he come close to licking one of his agents. Of course, none of his other agents were Mariana.
It was a truth he continued to repress, because he needed her. Whoever had sent her the note from a Whitehall address was the key to the assassination plot. She was his opportunity to draw this person out, and he wouldn’t give it up lightly. He mustn’t forget that his primary role was agent of King and Country. Not as lover to his wife.
Now a city block’s distance away, her gaze locked onto him. A niggle of uncertainty persisted. Mariana . . . a spy? What was he thinking?
He pushed off the wall and set his feet into swift motion, closing the distance between them in five strides. He slid his arm into the crook of hers before curving a left and redirecting them toward tonight’s venue. From the outside, they must look like the devoted couple they weren’t.
“I see you’ve returned to the newly released prisoner look tonight,” she observed once their feet settled into a steady rhythm.
Nick brushed self-conscious knuckles across day-old stubble. “I was aiming for bohemian revolutionary.”
“A different costume every night?” He detected a caustic note in the question. “What are we to do tonight? And why am I attired like a Bartholomew baby?”
Nick couldn’t resist the tug of a smile. “I take it I have Francis Grose to thank for that bit of color?”
Mariana cleared her throat. He suspected he might have seen a blush pinking her cheeks in the light of day. “It’s another way of saying I look tawdry. I mean this dress, Nick.”
He didn’t need to look to know what she meant by this dress. “It’s necessary that you dress in this manner for your spy lesson.” He felt silly speaking those words aloud. “Unlike London, much of the intellectual life in Paris takes place in cafés. Tonight, you are my lorette.”
“Lorette?” she asked, her gaze hot on the side of his face. “Do I want to know?”
“Neither wife nor whore.” He hesitated. “Mistress.”
“So this is what we’ve come to? I am now your mistress? I’ve often wondered what skills mistresses possess that wives don’t.” A short laugh escaped her. “No one would mistake us for conventional. And, pray tell, what new skill am I to learn tonight? If last night’s lesson was duplicity and guile, tonight’s is”—She indicated the twin rounded mounds of her breasts with her free hand—“what?”
“Invisibility.”
Another laugh sounded, but this one possessed a fine, sharp edge. “In this dress? With my waist cinched tight and my breasts up to my ears?”
His gaze raked over her. “The latest Parisian style suits you.”
Blessedly ignoring that last bit, Mariana continued her complaint, “Pray tell, how am I supposed to be invisible when so much of me is visible? Besides, I thought the purpose of my spying activities was to make myself noticed by Villefranche.”
“Mariana, you’ve done admirably well in making yourself obvious to the man.” Her body stiffened at his side. “Sometimes you need to be inconspicuous in this game we’re playing. It’s important that you’re able to transition between being seen and unseen at will.” He paused. “You’ve never been a wallflower.”
“Let me make certain I have the facts straight. You think I will be unseen with my bosom exposed in this lewd manner?”
“What else will any male within a mile be able to see?” He came to a stop on the empty sidewalk and faced her. “But they won’t see you.”
Her eyes narrowed before she exhaled a soft, “Ah,” and kept the rest of her thoughts to herself.
Nick cleared his throat and held out his arm, indicating his readiness to resume their progress. “The intent of these spy lessons is to introduce some artifice into your dealings with the world.” He paused. “Your gaze is too curious, too assured, too aristocratic, and too direct.”
“You make it sound as if I’m entirely too much.”
It was true: she was entirely too much. But he wouldn’t confirm it for her. “An agent must make herself invisible at will. It could mean the difference between life and death in this game. You must commit to it.”
“So,” she began, “that was what you were doing when I spotted you just now? Making yourself invisible to the world?”
“Pardon?”
“And the man with you? Was he being invisible, too?”
Nick remained silent. Better to let her make her point.
“His bearded profile bore a striking resemblance to that of the croupier from last night.” Amber eyes, wide and unflinching, watched him for a reaction, and a smug, little smile tipped up the corners of her mouth.
She had him.
Nick weighed his next words and decided to speak the truth. “I trust him.”
“I thought no one could be trusted.”
“I trust him with my life.” He hesitated before adding, “And with yours.”
The words came out with a finality that brooked no argument. But Mariana wasn’t finished. “Uncle Bertie and Aunt Dot paid me a visit this morning.”
“Oh?” Nick replied, caution in the monosyllable.
“What does Uncle Bertie know about your activities on the Continent?”
A gusty laugh erupted from Nick. It was intended to make light of her question. Instead, it landed with a flat thud between them.
“Nick?”
“Why would your beloved Uncle Bertie know anything about your estranged husband?”
“There is something I need to tell you.” Mariana planted her feet and stopped them both in their tracks. “Uncle Bertie knows you’re alive.”
“Why would he have thought otherwise?”
“That was my first thought, too. But, Nick, he knew.”
“What did he know?”
“That you’re missing.”
“Anything else?”
“And now that you’re alive.”
“We’re talking in circles.”
“I seem to have confirmed to him that you’re alive.” Uncertainty and guilt hung about her. “I think I handled it wrongly.”
Her naked vulnerability reached out and grabbed Nick in the chest. “Mariana,” he said, low and insistent, “you did nothing wrong.”
“Then why does it feel so?”
“Too much information will endanger you. You’re going to have to trust me.”
She flinched. “That’s asking too much.”
“There is trust, and there is trust.” His eyes searched hers. “You know you can trust me.”
“Do I?”
“Yes.”
She focused on the wall beside them where miniscule beads of mist collected and fattened into round drops. Too heavy for the pull of gravity, at last, they fell in random vertical streaks to the ground. “You sound so genuine that I could believe you. I could even believe that you believe your words.” Her eyes, cloudy with emotion, met his. “It’s better if we don’t speak of trust.”
Her words, soft and clear, struck him square in the solar plexus. She’d spoken the truth; he didn’t deserve her trust. That was the trade-off he’d made a decade ago. By avoiding meaningful interaction with her all these years, he’d been able to avoid his culpability. Until now. He deserved her words. And more.
Yet, she remained silent and began moving, the click of their heels the only sound between them, as block by block the sidewalk became ever more crowded with an increasingly spirited Parisian nightlife.
Just shy of the entrance of a lively café, its patrons spilling out onto the street in small groupings, Nick pulled Mariana into a quiet alcove. The space was snug enough that he felt the heat radiating off her body. “There is something you need to know about this place,” he said, willing her to follow his lead and put their past aside for now. “It doesn’t serve traditional drinks.”
“That’s a relief after last night’s whiskey binge,” she said on a light note.
Even if it did ring a bit hollow, she was playing along. Good.
“This place serves absinthe. Have you heard of it?”
“The Green Fairy? Of course,” she said, blithe and dismissive.
“The Green Fairy comes in small doses,” he explained as if she’d never heard of absinthe, which, of course, she hadn’t. He did admire her bravado, though. “Under no circumstances drink it down in one go. It must be sipped very slowly. In fact, it would be best if you only pretend to drink.”
“I left my leading strings behind in London,” she snapped.
“Then you must know”—He paused, considering the best way to phrase his next words—“it produces a state of euphoria.”
“A state of euphoria?” Her head tilted to the side. She was intrigued. Blast. “Have you tried it?”
He nodded once, his eyes darting away from her too intrigued gaze. “And the feeling it produces the next day—”
“One of crapulence?” she interrupted. “After last night, I know something about that feeling.”
“It’s the very opposite of euphoric. Best to stay away. Agreed?”
~ ~ ~
Oh, how he willed her to agree.
“Perhaps,” she replied. That was all the satisfaction she would give him. She inhaled a steadying breath and backed out of the alcove, unable to tamp down an unruly smile.
The front door swung wide, and long, protective fingers curled around her hand. Giddy pinpricks of excitement wended their way across her skin from that small point of contact as he swept her inside the café and guided them past a cluster of haphazardly strewn tables. They ventured to the back of the café side by side, a genuine couple to the crowd around them.
“This café,” he said in a muted voice meant for her ears only, “is populated by indulged and moneyed sons looking to show off their educations and their lorettes.”
Without another word, they found two open seats at a long table that ran the length of the back wall. Mariana took the corner seat Nick offered and attempted to follow any one of several heated conversations swirling through air dense with cigar smoke and a certain humidity specific to enclosed spaces brimming with animated people.
“This is quite a public place,” she observed.
“Cafés are where individuals of like-minded, usually extreme, political persuasions congregate.”
Mariana’s voice emerged in a secretive hush, “These people are revolutionaries?”
“At one extreme.”
“Villefranche said the French like to live at extremes.”
“He’s not entirely wrong.”
Of a sudden, everyone in the café became suspect. “Won’t the wrong people know you’re alive?”
“They don’t really think I’m dead. The note you received in London was a ruse, I’m convinced.” Although, he hadn’t worked out why. “I’m simply unreachable for the time being.”
Mariana nodded and allowed her gaze to roam the room. She gave up on understanding what was being shouted around her. The French spoken was too informal and too fast. She leaned in close to Nick. “Translate his conversation for me.” She jutted her chin toward a young man with the wildest, reddest head of hair she’d ever seen, surpassed only by his complementing wild, red moustache.
“He is speculating whether the king’s new throne is solid gold or gold plated.”
“Does it matter?”
“To the French? Absolutely.”
Next, she indicated a fervent young man to Nick’s right.
“He is declaiming the merits of oil paints over watercolors. Watercolors speak of an artist’s lack of fortitude, substance, and gravity. They are an insubstantial and moral void.”
A half-smile lurked about Nick’s lips and responsively, nay, instinctively, she matched it. “Good to know,” she responded, but his attention had strayed away from her.
She tamped down a flicker of pique. Her rational mind understood that it was part of their act tonight. Still, it irritated her that Nick played his role so convincingly well.
Left alone to her thoughts, she settled back and soaked in the atmosphere. She couldn’t help feeling a little let down. She’d thought pressing matters of importance were discussed in the cafés of Paris. And, perhaps, they were. But not with her, a mere woman. Judging by the arrangement of the table, it was glaringly obvious that a woman was to be seen and not heard. The men sat flush up to the table—the better to hear one another and insert an opinion when necessary—while the women sat positioned slightly behind their men.
She formed a sympathetic bond with the other women, the lorettes, that transcended their cultural and lingual barriers. In London, women of her station would find a quiet nook and conduct their own conversations. These Parisiennes, however, remained glued to the sides of their men. Content to be displayed in an ornamental capacity, they maintained a specific disinterested mien that only French women could properly deploy. In fact, it was this French insouciance that managed to salvage their dignity.
The women’s attire snagged her attention. Indeed, Nick had been correct to send this crimson monstrosity with tonight’s instructions. It integrated her seamlessly into her surroundings with its cinched waist, revealing neckline, and garish color. She scanned the row of women clad like jewels in hues of sapphire, ruby, emerald, and amethyst, arrayed like a rainbow of sin.
Oh, how very moralistic, Mariana chided herself. Perhaps she should step down from her high horse. After all, she didn’t fully understand these women’s lives or livelihoods. It was a tough world for women with no means. She would do well to remember that.
Nick had been correct . . . again.
Even with their revealing clothing, or because of it, these women were invisible in every meaningful way. She shifted her body toward Nick, attempting to emulate their specific pose of sophisticated insouciance. But she had difficulty deciding where to place her hands. Her neck felt oddly angled, and she desperately longed to cross her legs. What looked entirely natural on the lorettes, felt entirely unnatural on her. It struck her that their entire demeanor and comportment was a subtle art form. It would take more than a single evening for her to become one of them.
A sudden touch pulled her attention toward her ungloved hand. The tip of Nick’s finger had begun tracing soft figure eights on the tender skin of her palm, tickling nerve endings that in turn sent signals across her body. The competing cacophonies of jangly music, shouted conversation, and riotous giggles were reduced to muted background noise when his finger began a feathery ascent up her arm to her shoulder before languorously descending to the tip of her middle finger. Her body longed to sway toward him like a cat, encouraging, even begging him to do it again.
Her eyes popped open. When had they drifted shut?
She glanced at Nick to find him still engaged in conversation with the other men. He hadn’t even broken conversation to stroke her. This was the sort of treatment these men doled out to their lorettes. It was like a statement of ownership toward a beloved object . . . or a favorite pet. By claiming her in this way, he was rendering her ever more invisible. Even if it was a role for one night, she couldn’t help bristling at the treatment. She most definitely wasn’t anyone’s pussy cat.
Nick repeated the motion, and her nipples tightened into hard buds. Her body didn’t seem to understand what her mind did. Of course, it was possible that her body simply didn’t care. The memory of another sensation came to her. One of his velvety tongue gliding across her skin. Oh, last night . . .
Mariana sat up straight and clasped her hands together. There would be no more of that.
A carafe of green liquid and a small accompanying glass appeared before her. The glass was topped by a sugar cube nestled within what appeared to be a tiny sieve.
Nick leaned back and cocked his head, so his lips almost brushed her ear. “Meet the Green Fairy.”
“Absinthe?” She abandoned her earlier pretense that she was well-acquainted with the substance. “How does it achieve that particular green glow?”
He inclined his head a fraction, and his serious gaze found hers. “Follow my lead.”
As she watched, he took the carafe in hand and poured the unearthly—there was no other word for it—substance over the sugar cube. As the liquid filtered through the sugar, the two substances melded together in the glass.
“We’re to drink that?”
She thought she saw a quicksilver smile flash across his well-defined lips, but she could have imagined it so seriously whispered were his next words. “Remember what I said. You must pretend to drink it.”
It wasn’t only the content of his words that riled her, but the way he spoke them as if he was telling her gently, but firmly, no.
Well, that wouldn’t do. It was time for her to remind him who she was.
Without a second thought, she reached for the glass. Nick’s hand shot out and closed around hers. She brushed him off and lifted the glass to her lips. Strong notes of anise met her nose. It wasn’t her favorite scent, but there was no turning back from here.
Her gaze met his above the rim of the glass—she had his full attention now—and her lips curved into a smile. “Vive la France!” she sang out and tipped her head back, downing the absinthe in one swift gulp before slamming the glass onto the table.