The River of No Return Bee Ridgway (best free ebook reader .TXT) 📖

off lightly, half an eye on Julia. Julia smiled at her friend’s daring but was terribly distracted. She could not now rid herself of the image of Nicholas Falcott, his arm around a beautiful woman. The woman was spilling out of her clothes and kissing him, and he had a bottle of champagne raised high in his other fist. Was he that sort of man? A rake? He had been a bit of a roaring boy before he went to war. Bella clearly thought he still was.

Rake, dandy, Corinthian . . . it didn’t really matter what kind of man Blackdown was. Now she knew something far more important about him, something awful. Blackdown was involved somehow in a much larger world of time manipulation than Julia had dreamed possible. And he was bound up with his terrifying friend, the Russian count.

The kiss seemed distant now, like a dream that fades to nothing. Indeed, as she looked around her everything seemed dreamlike. Berkeley Square, Gunter’s, ices, pretty dresses . . . it was all just a passing vision and would be washed away with time.

Time.

Blackdown and his friend were able to manipulate time, like her.

She could barely make sense of what she had seen and heard during that amazing sojourn in the priest’s hole. It had been the Russian who pushed against her while she tried to stop time. But, thank God, the Russian hadn’t realized that she was his adversary. He thought it had been Eamon. She needed him to keep thinking that. For as long as possible.

The count was searching for “Ofans,” people with talents like hers, and the Russian wanted to stop them. In fact, he wanted to kill them. Blackdown wanted to stop them, too; he had even offered to end Eamon’s life right there.

But Blackdown wasn’t exactly the Russian’s bosom friend. He had been angry at the count, frustrated with him. There had been that tussle, when Lebedev had insulted her honor. Julia had discovered that it isn’t, in fact, pleasant to be the object of a fight between men. Especially not when the man who is defending you is trounced. The count had easily overpowered Blackdown, though Blackdown was tall and strong and a soldier.

Fear tickled up her spine. She had escaped Eamon, only to gain a far more formidable enemy. Julia allowed herself to concentrate on the Russian. He was a wiry, powerful man, well over six feet tall. But his physical strength was not what really frightened her. The Russian seemed coldly intelligent, and he seemed implacable. There would be no time to explain, were he to discover her talent. He would discover the truth, and then he would kill her.

Indeed, Blackdown must be a killer, too. He had said that the Russian had brought him home to kill the Ofan people. People like her. And he must be good at killing, in order to have survived the war in Spain. He had a scar on his face. His kisses had ranged from gentle to fierce. She wasn’t so much of a fool as to think that the passions of love and the passions of war were unconnected.

But love was not something she could allow herself to contemplate, not after what she had seen through the peephole. Thank God Blackdown thought she was just Julia Percy, just a girl with whom he had whiled away a luscious hour. Not even an hour. The fact that he had kissed her might even protect her, for perhaps now she was just one of many others in his list of conquests. A face in the crowd.

He did seem to have lost interest in her since that day. She had been whisked away from Castle Dar in that ridiculous traveling coach. The Russian and Nick had stayed behind to deal with Eamon and had not come back until late. Then the marquess had told her, quite formally, that after some discussion Eamon was content to allow her to accompany the Falcotts to London.

Since that moment Blackdown had kept a strict distance from her. He was never alone with her, and he never addressed her directly. While their entourage of coaches had made its slow way from Devon to London, the marquess had ridden his bay hunter rather than joining the ladies in the traveling coach. Indeed, it was only when Julia chose to ride Marigold for an hour that he had decided Boatswain needed a rest. He had bowed to her, his eyes remote, and had taken her place inside the coach. It had been a relief, in fact. She couldn’t think clearly when she was near him.

Now he had been out all night, doing God knows what while she lay awake worrying about the future. The future and the past and the present and all of time itself. Worrying for her very life.

“Julia? Julia.” Bella was peering at her. “Did I shock you so dreadfully?”

“What?” Julia realized that her steps had slowed until she was almost standing still. “What were you saying?”

“I was talking about becoming a lady of easy virtue. And you go meandering off into your own thoughts. What kind of friend are you? Are you so ready to see me sacrifice my good name?”

Julia frowned. Joining the demimonde; it was the fantasy of a silly child. “Don’t be ridiculous. It’s nothing to joke about. Just a few days ago I was wondering what I would do to keep body and soul together if I were forced to run away from my odious cousin before reaching my majority. Very little stood between me and just such a life.”

“But would you?” Bella’s voice thrilled with intrigue. “Would you really turn to prostitution, if the alternative were death?”

“No.” Julia raised her chin. “Of course not. I never would.” She looked out over the square rather than meet Bella’s eyes.

Bella hugged Julia’s arm close. “Liar liar, brimstone and fire. You would, you know. We all would.”

“I do not care for this conversation, Bella.” Julia’s scowl deepened.

“Oh, please.” Bella pulled Julia along briskly.