A Talent for Trickery Read online

  “Do they realize how many journals father kept?” Esther asked.

  “I don’t know. He was supposed to have made all of them available to Owen’s men when—”

  “So they don’t know.”

  “Likely not,” she admitted. The journals had been turned over just days after her father’s capture. He’d still been a mite…resentful of his new circumstances.

  “It will take considerable time to go through them all.”

  “More time than they have, I imagine. Once they realize the extent of their task, I’m sure they’ll insist on taking the journals back to London.” And if they didn’t insist, she’d find a way to ship the journals off herself and tell Owen to go fetch. She wasn’t eager to remove the books from the house, but it was preferable to risking Peter’s accidental exposure to the family’s true history.

  Esther shook her head. “Even a day or two of them here might cause problems. Peter is absolutely beside himself with the anticipation of talking to someone who knew Father.”

  Lottie blew out a small breath to settle her churning stomach. “I know.”

  For years, Peter had been fascinated with their father, or, more accurately, with the almost entirely fictional Mr. William Bales, devoted family man and respectable tradesman, who Lottie had created in an attempt to give the boy some semblance of a normal life. The only genuine similarities between their real father and the man Peter imagined to be their father was a first name and the ridiculous portrait in the parlor.

  Someday, Peter would learn the truth—that William Bales was actually William Walker, infamous swindler. But Lottie had always envisioned that day to be of her choosing and that it would occur sometime in the vague and distant future.

  She’d always thought they had plenty of time.

  She now had approximately twelve hours.

  Peter had agreed to go into the village for additional provisions—Lord knew the boy was more than happy to personally procure the freshest bread and best cuts of beef for their guests. And when he returned, she would explain that the gentlemen were resting from their long journey and would likely not emerge from their rooms until tomorrow.

  What the devil was she to do tomorrow?

  “What if they were to feign illness?” she suggested. “Something catching?”

  Esther shook her head. “The more catching, the more likely Peter is to insist you and I remove ourselves from the house and leave him to play nursemaid. You’d accomplish nothing but provide him with a captive audience.”

  “Damn it.” Lottie briefly squeezed her eyes shut. “This would be so much simpler if we had told him everything from the start.”

  “Everything?” Esther echoed in disbelief. “That we’ve changed our names because our father was a confidence man turned snitch and we don’t want anyone to know? That’s not a secret a child of six could have kept.”

  “We kept secrets at that age. We knew what father was before—”

  “Allow me to rephrase. It is not a secret a six-year-old Peter could have kept. It is not a secret we can be certain he would keep now.”

  Lottie opened her mouth to argue, but Esther held up her hand. “I adore our brother. You know that I do. But he is good to his very core, Lottie. He’d give the shirt off his back to a prince picking his pocket.”

  “He’s a pigeon,” Lottie translated dully.

  “God help us, he is the fattest of pigeons. A nearly perfect mark—well-heeled, trusting, and too proud and forgiving to make a fuss when he discovers the knife in his back.”

  “Peter is not stupid. Nor is he an angel.”

  “Not at all. Lord knows, there’s no one less pleasant to be around than Peter in a temper. But his general nature is one of generosity. He loves without reservation. If you tell him the truth now, when he falls madly in love with some little twit at sixteen, he won’t be able to stop himself from sharing every single secret in that enormous heart of his. And then it’ll be blackmail and threats. Men and women pounding on our doors demanding the money father stole from them.”

  “Or it’ll be father’s old comrades out for revenge.”

  Esther nodded grimly.

  “Right. You’re right.” She took another deep breath to steady herself and nodded. “We can do this.” They had to do this. “I’ll speak with Renderwell. Any stories they tell of Father will match our own.”

  “We couldn’t possibly tell them everything in a few short hours or expect them to memorize it.”

  “No.” She rested her first three fingers against the window frame and tapped them in an alternating drumming pattern. The light, rhythmic sound and movement always helped her to focus. “They needn’t memorize everything, only the basic facts. They can claim ignorance on the rest. How well do men doing business together know each other, really? Particularly if that business is of short duration. Say…six months, do you think?”

  Catching on, Esther nodded. “Long enough to take an interest in his children but not so long as to require a sustained interest.”

  “Right. There’s no need for them to remember and repeat everything we’ve told Peter. If they can remember that Will Bales was not a heavy drinker or gambler, that he was adventurous, and that he had a great love of horses, then they can create a few diverting anecdotes for Peter—trips to the races, riding the first underground railway, lively debates over investments.”

  That wouldn’t be hard. At least half of it was true. It was always best to keep a lie as close to the truth as possible. Her father had not been a heavy drinker or a gambler in the traditional sense. And he quite liked horses. Stealing them, specifically, but that was close enough.

  “Stories only loosely connected to our narrative,” Esther murmured thoughtfully.

  “Yes, and the looser they are, the less chance there is for contradictions to occur.”

  “Anything new will make Peter happy. It could work.” Esther jerked her chin toward the men outside. “Will they to do it?”

  “Lie, do you mean? Of course. Why wouldn’t they?” They certainly didn’t appear to have any philosophical objections to deceit.

  “But can they do it well?”

  “Not so well as a Walker,” she said frankly, not because she was proud of that, but because it was true. “But they manage.” They’d managed to fool her for four years, after all. They could certainly fool Peter for two days. “This can work. We’ll make it work.”

  Feeling calmer with a strategy in place, Lottie slipped an arm around her sister and stood with her at the window, silently watching the dwindling action on the front lawn.

  The horses had been unpacked and led back to the stables, but the men remained on the terrace, all three of them now. Their heads were bent together in conference, and Lottie could only assume they were formulating lies and plans of their own.

  Let them, she thought darkly. Renderwell could scheme to his small black heart’s content. She was not her father, and she was no longer a stupid young woman to be taken in by a silver tongue and handsome face.

  She’d not fall victim to his lies a second time.

  The men could stay until they found what they were looking for, until they accepted that what they were looking for wasn’t to be had at Willowbend, or until Peter began to grow suspicious. Whichever came first, provided none of it took longer than two days.

  Two days, and Owen Renderwell would be out of her life. This time for good.

  Lottie squeezed her sister lightly. “Esther?”

  “Hmm?”

  “I am not smitten.”

  Three

  Ordinarily, Lottie loved the night.

  During the day, Willowbend was filled with the commotion of everyday life. It seemed there was always someone stepping in or out of the room, footsteps thumping overhead, pots banging below in the kitchen, or voices filtering through the walls. The smell of ba
king bread and roasting meat filled the house and mixed with the heavy scent of lye in the maids’ buckets. Flittering birds and rustling trees outside created a constant dance of shadows across the floors and walls. It was endless. Lovely and heartwarming, but endless. No matter how hard one might try to find a quiet corner and moment for oneself, there was simply no escaping the light and sound and movement of day.

  But nighttime offered a world without distractions. A still and silent world that extended only so far as the light of a single candle.

  Lottie had always found peace in that small world and clarity in the solitude it afforded. She had spent countless hours at her desk in the dead of night, happily detached from everything but the book or work before her.

  But as she walked softly down the upstairs hall at midnight, what Lottie wanted most was for this particular night to be over.

  There would be no peace at Willowbend. Not until Owen and his men were gone.

  Slipping a key from her pocket, she came to a stop in front of Owen’s door and blew out a long, slow breath. Steadied, she unlocked the door and let herself in without knocking—in part because she didn’t want to risk the noise carrying down the hall but mostly because she didn’t like the idea of asking permission from Owen to enter a room in her own home. It was the principle of the matter, she told herself, and studiously ignored the fact that both the matter and the principle were just a little bit petty.

  After quietly closing the door, she took quick stock of her surroundings. Most of the familiar room was shrouded in darkness, but a crack between the drapes let in a thin stream of moonlight that cut across the bed and lightly illuminated Owen’s sleeping form.

  It didn’t surprise her to see that he’d retired still wearing his trousers and shirtsleeves. Her father had done the same, every night.

  Always be ready to run, my girl. Always.

  Lottie glanced at the foot of the bed and noticed Owen’s toes sticking out from under the rich green counterpane. At least he didn’t sleep with his boots on.

  Careful to keep the glow of her candle from disturbing him, she crossed the room and stood beside the bed. Although she was in a hurry to see her task done, she spared a minute to take in the sight of the invincible Lord Renderwell lying vulnerable in his sleep before her. His shirtsleeves were rolled up, exposing tanned and muscled forearms, and the fine cotton had twisted a little when he’d turned onto his stomach, causing the fabric to pull tight across his broad shoulders. His face was turned from her, but she could make out the hard outline of his jaw and the way his lashes, the same deep walnut color as his hair, sat lightly against his skin.

  Owen Renderwell didn’t look the least bit vulnerable in sleep, she decided. Something of a disappointment, that, but it made sense. A wolf in repose didn’t cease to appear threatening—it simply looked like something you shouldn’t wake.

  She frowned at that thought and kicked the bed. She wasn’t afraid of this man.

  “Get up.”

  He didn’t jump, as she’d rather hoped. Instead, he pounced, drawing a blade from under his pillow and coming off the bed in a movement so quick and fluid, the candle flame barely flickered. Before she could even think to dodge out of the way, the knife was two inches from her face, gleaming sharp and silver in the moonlight.

  She merely blinked at it. “Charming.”

  Owen blinked in return, the glaze of sleep lifting from his eyes. He yanked his arm back, spinning the knife in his hand to face the blade away from her. “God, Lottie,” he hissed. “You bloody well know better.”

  Admittedly, she did. She also knew he wouldn’t hurt her, half-awake or not.

  He glared at her a moment before turning away to set the knife on the bedside table. It bothered her a little to see the hand holding the blade tremble slightly, but it bothered her more that she should be bothered at all. What the devil did she care if she’d unnerved the man?

  “If you damaged my linens, Renderwell, you’ll pay for their replacement.”

  Another glare, this one more irritated than angry. “You used to be a bit more cautious.”

  On the contrary, she used to be a great deal more reckless, but she had no intention of sharing that with him. “And you. I could have done you in a half-dozen times just now.”

  “Oddly enough, I fancied myself safe here.”

  “Yes, that is odd. Particularly in light of that knife.”

  “Habit.”

  “Habit,” she repeated dryly. “You must pay your mistresses a fortune.”

  He drew his hands down his face, the very picture of an aggrieved man. “What are you doing in here?”

  “Retrieving your journals. Fetch a candle. If you want them, you’ll have to help.”

  “Fine.” Grumbling, he found a candle on the nightstand. “I’ll get Samuel and—”

  “No. There isn’t room.”

  “Room?” He lit the candle off her own. “Where are they, exactly?”

  Lottie strode to the far wall, took hold of a hanging tapestry, and pulled it back to reveal the striped wallpaper behind. “Here.”

  Joining her, Owen ran his hand across the wall until he found one of two small seams hidden along the edges of the stripes.

  “A door,” he guessed. “How very like the Walker household to have a secret room.” He held his candle aloft and glanced about the bedroom. “This house doesn’t appear old enough for a priest hole.”

  “And it was built by devout Protestants.” Crouching down, she pulled away the loose floor molding and searched for a small latch hidden on the exposed bottom of the door. “There was a maid’s room. Esther and I sealed it as soon as we arrived.”

  While Peter was still young enough to be distracted with toys and sweets.

  “And hung the tapestry to cover your less than expert work. Clever.”

  “Necessary,” she returned. Her father had taught her everything there was to know about removing complicated systems of locks from all manner of hidden doors, but he’d never taught her how to install such a system, nor the door. It had taken them weeks to finish the job. “Ah…here it is.”

  She flicked a latch, and a small panel in the door slid open in front of Owen, exposing an old lock.

  “You were thorough,” he commented, then frowned when she set down her candle and pulled a set of lock picks from her pocket. “Don’t you have the key?”

  “We couldn’t take the chance of it falling into the wrong hands. We threw it away.”

  “Thus ensuring only a thief could get in.”

  “Thus ensuring Peter could not,” she corrected, selecting the appropriate tool. She inserted it into the lock, pressed, and turned the way she had a thousand times in her youth, and she found herself perplexed when the door failed to open. There had been a time when picking a lock had come as easily to her as writing her own name; her hands could form the movements almost without thought. But it had been years since she’d last put the skill to use. Evidently, her fingers no longer remembered the correct steps.

  “What about the servants?” Owen asked after a moment. “Didn’t they notice a room go missing, or—”

  “The room was sealed off before staff arrived…” She grimaced when her second attempt to open the door failed. “From outside the county.”

  “No connection to the local villagers,” he murmured, stepping closer to better light the lock. “Less chance of gossip. For a time.”

  “Yes, and the tapestry is a priceless family heirloom. No one touches it but me, or Esther, if she was ever inclined to clean.”

  “People don’t always do as they’re told.”

  “Mrs. Lewis keeps everyone in line.” She clenched her jaw when she failed to open the door again. This was ridiculous. Lock picking was the simplest of skills. She wished she could tell Owen to step back. It didn’t help matters to have him looming over her like one
of those damned balloons. But she needed the light from his candle.

  “Have something on her, do you?” Owen asked.

  She shot him a hard look. “She’s a good woman. Let her alone.”

  “I’ve no trouble with your Mrs. Lewis. I do have some with how long this is taking, however.” He held out his hand. “Give me the pick.”

  She wanted to refuse him—she was a Walker; she could bloody well pick her own lock—but there was petty, and then there was stupid. Allowing pride to further delay Owen’s departure from Willowbend was most assuredly the latter.

  She gave him the pick and watched with some annoyance when the lock clicked open on his first try.

  “Thank you.” She smiled sweetly when he returned the pick. “I suppose that makes you the better thief.”

  Before he could respond, she pushed open the door, stepped inside the room, and held her candle aloft to light the contents.

  Owen followed but didn’t get far inside. There simply wasn’t space. “Oh, hell.”

  The room wasn’t large, no bigger than was needed to house a lady’s maid and her limited possessions, but nearly every inch of available space was filled with trunks, piled upon trunks, piled upon more trunks. All packed with her father’s writings. Even the space between the top trunks and the ceiling was stuffed with loose journals. There was scarcely enough room for the two of them to hold their candles up without setting the journals, or each other, aflame.

  Owen turned a tight circle. “Your father did not give us all his work.”

  “You don’t know that.” She suspected as much, but she had the right to disparage her father. He did not.

  “I can see with my own eyes, Lottie. Our notes on your father’s work wouldn’t cover a quarter of this.”

  “Of course they don’t. They… Oh, I’d forgotten.” She lowered her candle. “You didn’t help transcribe the journals, did you? Father and I worked with Mr. Bradley.”

  “And that changes things?”

  “Yes. These are all of my father’s journals. Every word he’s ever written about anything at all.” And her father had always had quite a lot to say about everything. “They’re filled with childhood exploits, sketches.” Bad ones. “Ciphers, random thoughts, poetry.” Dreadful, dreadful poetry. “Schemes, plots, even a political manifesto.”