Читать книгу The Uncompromising Lord Flint - Virginia Heath - Страница 14

Jess clamped her jaw shut and stared up into his handsome face. Much as she wanted to see each and every one of those people reap the justice they deserved, naming names now would eradicate the only collateral she had should Saint-Aubin come knocking. That list might well be her curse, but it was also the only bargaining tool she had to save her from his wrath. Losing her temper after being caught red-handed was not sensible. Attacking the irksome man who held her was stupid.

She could feel the warmth and strength of his big body through her nightgown and the odd tingling on her lips from being so intimately close to his. If only he didn’t smell so wonderfully sinful, she might be able to ignore those things. Now her body hummed with an awareness she did not welcome. Insufferable man!

Although as undeniably irritating as he was, so far, he was the only gaoler who had not chained her up. If she continued to fight him, that state of affairs would swiftly change. She already bitterly knew to her cost, escaping while clapped in irons was nigh on impossible. It had taken a small and unexpected army of gnarly English sailors to liberate her from Cherbourg in the dead of night, a stroke of good fortune she still couldn’t quite believe.

A stroke of good fortune that was giving Jess her first real shot at freedom and fresh air in over a year.

She breathed out all her frustration and fury, allowing her muscles to relax in surrender. There would be another time. Another opportunity. She needed to be less opportunistic and more strategic if she was going to escape Lord Flint. ‘I don’t know their names. I was never privy to that information. I simply know that the organisation is vast.’ Because it was worth a try, she offered him one of her mother’s smiles and felt her pulse flutter as her eyes dipped to his lips of her own accord. Mon Dieu! ‘As I have said, I was just the messenger, Monsieur Flint.’

His returning scowl could have curdled milk. ‘Define messenger?’

‘Translations mostly.’ As his hold had loosened, Jess gave a dramatic flick of her wrist and shrugged. ‘I wrote what I was told to write when I was told to write it.’ Largely true. ‘I have no idea what happened to the letters afterwards.’ She did now. They killed people.

‘Then why do you claim he wants you dead, I wonder? Seems like a gross overreaction for someone so insignificant.’

Jess hated that dismissive tone, the understated English sarcasm he did so well. She wished he would let go of her. Standing within the warm, inviting cage of his arms was distracting. Up close, this unusual, irritating aristocrat looked even more divine and for some reason her nerve-endings were enjoying the feel of his hands on her body. ‘Saint-Aubin does not like loose ends, Monsieur Flint. He will not rest until this loose end is securely tied.’

‘Or more likely, he will come to rescue you if you fail in your own valiant attempts to return to France.’

He thought she wanted to return to that hell hole? A team of horses would have to drag her there lashed to a cart. Death would be more welcome. But at least her performance was convincing despite her two failed attempts at grasping her freedom. Saint-Aubin’s spies might vouch for her outrage and that in turn might make him lenient. And Jess had more chance of harnessing the power of invisibility than hoping that monster might show her any mercy. If they found her here, wherever here was... ‘I do not want to hang, Monsieur Flint.’ But she would rather hang than suffer Saint-Aubin’s punishment.

Caught between the Devil and the deep blue sea. Odd—she had always wondered what that quaint British analogy meant and now, ironically, she understood it fully. Saint-Aubin was the Devil incarnate and Lord Flint the sea. Except Jess never expected she would need to actively resist the urge to dive in.

‘I doubt your dear papa wants that either.’

‘You do not know him as I do. I am better dead than in the hands of the English Crown. He will sacrifice me in a heartbeat.’ And he would enjoy it. In her mind she heard his manic laughter at her screams and shuddered.

‘A father doesn’t—’

‘He is not my father!’ She spat the words with too much venom, making the intuitive Lord Flint tilt his head and eye her in a detached, calculated way which showed him to be every bit the King’s man, out to catch a bigger fish and not at all the compassionate and reasonable man he purported to be. Whatever she said would be used against her in a court of law or at the hands of Saint-Aubin’s henchmen if they made her answer for her actions. Jess needed to play her pathetic hand of cards very close to her chest and keep her impetuous, errant mouth shut.

‘But he brought you up as his daughter, did he not? You grew up in his chateau.’ Lord Flint smiled rather smugly down at her. He had a nice smile, even smug it did peculiar things to her pulse, and she hated him for that more. ‘In Valognes. A sprawling estate, by all accounts, wealthy, too—but then Saint-Aubin is one of Bonaparte’s favourites and continues to support him despite his exile. We know that Saint-Aubin is the Boss’s supplier of brandy, just as we know that you ensured that same illegal brandy arrived safely in Britain. Dates, times, ships. You met him, didn’t you? Old Boney. You were there to see him pin a medal on your adopted papa’s chest after the Battle of Vittoria. I can assure you, our intelligence has been most thorough, Lady Jessamine. We know all about you. Which is why I fail to believe you are in any danger from Saint-Aubin. Your own dear mother is his