Portrait of Seduction (21 page)

After an indulgent second to get his heart rate back under control, Oliver crept through to the laundry and found a spare livery. He quickly donned a coat and trousers over his plain clothes. From down the hall he could hear the echoes of Greta’s theatrical sobs. He wondered whether waking the whole house was part of her plan, although with Maria Lucca still out of the city, her staff would be minimal. With any luck he would simply be mistaken for another member of the household—at least at first glance. His loose disguise could endure no further scrutiny.

Oliver slipped up the servants’ stairs that led from the kitchen, moving silently toward the middle of the building. If this townhouse was structured like the Venners’ at all, he would find the great hall on the second or third floors—the public rooms. Door after door, he checked with a patience that belied how tightly his nerves stretched. Any minute he expected a thundering call from the guards in the floors below.
Intruder! We have an intruder!

His patience paid off when he silently opened the door onto a massive art room. Christoph and Ingrid used a comparable space for their ballroom, but perhaps Maria Lucca had no such need. She could, after all, host elaborate balls at the duke’s Residenz. She filled her own home with artwork, not people.

With the room located, Oliver pulled a burlap sack out from inside his shirt and slipped back downstairs to find Greta.

Greta grew more worried with each passing moment. A stern-faced butler named Georg seemed the least likely to believe her story. The other three men, all former soldiers if their bearing and brawn were any indication, appeared all too happy to believe creeping marauders roamed the streets, ready to attack young widows.

“We’ll check the boundaries of the property. You stay here.”

“Of course,” she breathed. “
Danke schoen.
”

But the butler stayed.

He eyed Greta with a narrow, intense stare. “What did the man look like, again?”

“The streets were dark, sir. All I recall clearly is that his shirt was filthy.”

“And you were walking alone at night?”

“Coming back from midnight Mass, sir. I pray for my husband’s soul every night.”

She was really praying for deliverance. Her brain screamed promises she knew she would never keep. Promises about being a good girl and never taking such chances again.

Hands too quick to see looped over the butler’s head, covering his face with burlap. Greta’s heart leaped into her throat and stayed there, even after she recognized the attacker as Oliver. The two struggled. Oliver leaned his weight against the inside of Georg’s knees, forcing them to buckle. Less than a minute passed before he had the man incapacitated. He tied rope around the butler’s neck, securing the burlap in place. Greta could hardly believe what she witnessed, even as his strength, speed and skill reminded her of those frantic moments in the opera.

No,
she
had been frantic. Oliver had been the same as now—perfectly in command. Calm. And lit up from the inside by the contest.

But what had she done? She had led Oliver to this place, where shoving a butler into a closet was just another step toward achieving an end.

Greta had already been nauseated with fear. Now regret churned in her stomach as well.

Oliver held out his hand. “Come now. Quickly.”

They were past the point of turning back. Clasping Oliver’s fingers and following him into the dark corridor, she could only hope he would forgive her come morning.

Together they stood at the threshold of Maria Lucca’s art room. Greta knew she should move forward. This was the easy part. Simply slip inside and take back the offending forgery. But her toes were roots growing into the carpet. Much like realizing how much wrong she had asked of Oliver, she was struck in the face with the desperation of her actions. All this to protect her uncle, her cousins, their family future. Even knowing the stakes was not enough to quiet the harping voices.

Scandal. Jail.

Life as she’d hoped it would be…all at an end before the sun rose on a new day.

Only Oliver’s whispered command gave her the strength to take a step.

Strange, but she exhaled with a renewed sense of calm. Oliver had far more to lose. Yet he was there with her. No matter what happened in the minutes, hours, days to come, they shared these moments. That, coupled with the love they had made, meant Greta’s memories, at least, would never be void of excitement.

Selfish, wicked girl.

She entered the great hall. Darkness made it impossible to discern the boundaries. Walls could be ten or a hundred feet away. Only an intangible sense of vastness told her of its size. The space no more felt like a closet than Oliver’s hand felt like a broom handle.

“Stay here,” he said softly against her nape. “We’ll need light.”

His hand had been her only measure of safety. Then he was gone. It was a supreme test of Greta’s nerves to stay exactly where he left her. She concentrated on keeping her breath low and quiet, avoiding thoughts of what would happen if someone discovered her whereabouts.

A flicker of light preceded Oliver’s return. He held a small candle, one no bigger than his pinkie finger. The tiny flame wavered with his every step, but it was enough to create a halo of light around his torso and face.

“Quickly now,” he said. “Which one?”

Greta followed him to the nearest wall and stayed close behind as they made a quick survey of the room. She needed only a few glimpses of color and form to know that each painting was exquisite, priceless, and certainly not her ill-fated forgery. Her heart pounded and her palms grew damp as they turned the last corner. Still nothing.

“It’s not here,” she said. “Uncle said it would be here.”

“We’re running out of time. We have no way of continuing a search.”

Greta’s throat closed. She had been able to hold off complete hopelessness with the idea that finding the painting would make this risk worthwhile. But to come away empty-handed?

“It must be somewhere.”

Oliver snuffed the candle with his fingertips. “I’m sure it is. But this is a bad idea gone very wrong. We must get clear.”

He took her arm, pulling her back toward the doorway. A noise in the hallway changed his course. They shuffled quickly to the nearest wall and pressed close, deeper into the shadows.

Voices carried down the corridor. One she recognized as Georg, the butler. “Wake the others, then check upstairs. They have to be here somewhere.”

Oliver left her alone in the dark once again. She listened with every measure of concentration but could find no trace of his silent footsteps.

Georg held a candle in front of his chest as he entered the great hall, but again Oliver was there. He grabbed the man from behind and clamped a hand over his mouth. Whatever hold he used must have been incapacitating because the butler did not struggle.

“Where is the painting newly delivered for Maria Lucca?” Oliver whispered. “If you call out for help, I will be forced to break your leg.”

A low grunt dragged Greta’s attention to the pressure Oliver applied with the sole of his boot against Georg’s lower calf. Any sudden move would snap that bone. Oliver slowly loosened his fingers until the butler could speak in a muffled voice.

“A painting?” he asked. “Is that why you’re here?”

“Where is it?”

“It was retrieved by a man from Leinz Manor two days ago. That’s all I know.”

“Then I’ll be leaving now.” He forced the man to his knees and pressed a knife against his nape. “Keep your eyes forward. Don’t move.”

Oliver motioned for Greta to go. Carefully, silently, she stayed close to the shadows lining the room, out of Georg’s sight. Quiet footsteps might ensure that Maria Lucca’s people thought Oliver worked alone. She tried to swallow but her throat was too dry. When she reached the door, she checked the hallway before quickly slipping outside. Oliver pushed Georg until he lay face-down on the floor, then snuffed the candle and exited.

Faster than she thought possible, Greta fled down the corridor and down the stairs. Soon Georg’s voice boomed after them. He shouted to the other members of the household staff, his footsteps pounding after them.

Greta had no notion of where she ran, but soon Oliver took the lead. Had he ever been in Maria Lucca’s home before? He seemed to know exactly where to go. Left, right, right again—she could only trust that he knew the way out of her monumental folly.

“Here.”

He tugged her arm and dragged her into a tiny crevice between two kitchen cupboards. She thought it must be a dead end, but soon he had opened a window above her head.

“Is that how you got in?”

“No, we’re improvising. You out this way. I’ll meet you on the side of the Rathaus that faces the river. We’ll retrieve the horses from Venner’s stables and ride to your family estate tonight.”

“Tonight?”

“We need to find that painting, yes? And it’ll be best if neither of us is in town come morning. We’ll sort the details later.” He bent at the waist and threaded his fingers together, forming a step for Greta. “Out. I’ll be right behind you.”

Greta planted a silent kiss on his forehead. Without another thought, she boosted up to the window. Her dress was a nightmare of fabric catching on the sill, but soon she freed herself and wiggled outside.

Only when she was halfway out did she realize how completely she had trusted Oliver. The window could have been four floors above the ground and she would have gone anyway. The drop was not a long one, but she landed on her rear in a clump of rhododendron bushes. The perfume of their crushed blossoms clouded around her as she assessed her body for damage.

A quick glance up toward the window showed no sign of Oliver. He said to meet him, which meant he likely had another exit in mind.

If anything happened to him…if he were caught…

The nausea that had churned and bubbled in her gut became nearly too much to bear. She swallowed and swallowed, pushing hard against her stomach to staunch the urge to gag.

“Such a fool,” she whispered to herself.

But she could not stay. Oliver could take care of himself. He was the most capable, resourceful man she had ever known.

Fleeing the scene as if that would banish her regrets, Greta crawled out of the bushes and ran into the night. Her footsteps and her erratic breaths were the only sounds at that hour. She did not stop until she slammed into the north wall of the Rathaus, her lungs pumping with furious vigor. She turned and pressed her back flat against its stucco surface. A few more steps. Just a few more.

She found a few stacked crates. Insects, rats, even beggars—nothing scared her. Not after what she had just done. She snuggled into a dark corner, her heart finally crawling down out of her throat. Now she simply had to wait. She would wait for Oliver to meet her.

And if he did not appear?

She cried into her hands—quiet, racking sobs. Something terrible had happened to her. A quest for a little more excitement in her life had turned into a farce unlike any folly ever committed by a human being. He had to make it out. He had to make it out so she could apologize.

Oliver slipped under a table and through a narrow opening between two chairs. There he crouched low, his respiration and heart rate steady. What was this wretched delight surging to the tips of each finger and the end of each toe? Surely he was the most ridiculous hedonist who had ever drawn breath. Only an idiot craved the vividness of such a moment.

He waited until the nearest thump of boots against marble raced out of earshot. He had doubled back through the kitchen, hiding now in the servants’ dining area. Crawling another few inches, he was back within sight of the butcher’s block. The open window above it waited for him.

The bright blaze of a torch—three torches, actually—along the outer garden wall kept him still and silent. He wanted to escape, but he was not willing to do so at the expense of assaulting anyone else. What he had managed against the butler, restraining him without hurting him, was not something he would be able to infinitely repeat. Stealing a forgery was one thing, but doing someone genuine injury on Greta’s behalf was a line he would not cross. He would be patient and clever. Escaping could be done without the need for violence.

But patience was not a luxury when he heard the braying of two hounds. A spiking chill shot up his spine. He thrust the fear reaction to a corner of his mind, then shuffled in a half crouch toward the servants’ stairwell. Up he went, floor after floor, until he reached the topmost level. They would be expecting him to escape through a ground-floor window. Oliver had other plans.

After prying open a half door that led to a small room, he found what he was looking for: a panel in the low ceiling that led to the roof. First he stripped the borrowed livery. Then he undid the latch, used the nearest chair to boost himself up, and breathed the fresh air of an early-autumn Alpine night.

Stars above his head shone with the brightness of Roman candles against a pure black backdrop. He inhaled, then slid onto his stomach. With the access door closed behind him, he kept low against the roof and headed south.

The span between Maria Lucca’s residence and the nearest building was only a few feet. He sprang across the chasm, his legs propelled by the heady rush of the evening’s close calls. He crossed another roof, then another, as he ran along the row of town homes. How he would get down remained a mystery but he kept moving, away from the searching servants. Any insomniac who happened to look out his window at that hour might catch the silhouette of a man running across the rooftops.

Oliver smiled to himself at the thought, wondering when, exactly, he had lost his mind. Perhaps at the opera. Perhaps when he’d first kissed Greta. Most certainly when he’d taken her virginity.

Another closely packed building. Another chasm. But between the buildings climbed a sturdy carpet of ivy. A trellis that had perhaps once supported flowers had been overrun by the woody vines. He tested the ivy, then turned onto his belly. A few attempts in the thick blackness finally yielded a firm foothold. Knowing the trellis or the ivy vines could give away at any moment, he kept hold of the roof and closed his eyes. One deep breath.

He let go.

The trellis held. He moved quickly, shimmying down the untrustworthy supports. Barbed leaves cut his hands. A splinter jabbed into the meat of his palm. But he did not stop. The momentum of his rapid downward climb kept him focused on the task of descending. No stopping. No doubts.

A piece of the trellis gave way beneath his boot. He shifted to the left, but the stumble tipped his balance. Although he managed to descend another few feet before gravity took hold, he still fell from a story and a half. Cobblestones knocked the wind out of him. His ankle turned beneath his weight. He winced and gritted his teeth. The night was still remarkably quiet, and he could no longer hear hound dogs over the rush of blood in his ears.

He pulled himself up and gingerly tested his ability to walk. Yes, he could walk, but running to the Rathaus was out of the question.

That need for patience again. He had not thought of himself as an impatient or impetuous man for years. Discipline had guaranteed good results—respect and stability. Perhaps Christoph had been right. He was hiding, not just from the world but from his true nature. He
liked
this, pain and grunting, shuffling steps and all.

The sun had barely started to lighten the sky when he made it back to the center of town. Just the barest touch of the approaching sunrise reminded him of the morning he had come to Greta’s room. The thought of her waiting against the Rathaus wall kept him walking, even when the agony of each step made him lightheaded.

“Oliver!”

Greta’s whispered shout cut through the fog. He blinked, then closed his arms around her shoulders. She was already there against him, holding him.

“
Lieber Gott,
I was so worried!”

She tried to pull him out of the street, but he hissed and stumbled against her. “Wait,” he gasped.

“You’re hurt?”

Oliver only nodded.

With a determined expression, she became his shoulder to lean on as they limped back toward cover. Sweat slicked the skin down his back. His knees wobbled like an hour-old colt. Greta helped him sit against the wall.

“You wait here,” she whispered. She brushed a kiss against his forehead, just as she’d done before climbing out the window. “I’ll bring the horses.”

“No, it’s too dangerous.”

“You said we need to leave town, and I agree with you. We must get to Leinz Manor and find that painting. My family and the Venners will make up some story concerning our whereabouts.”

“But Maria Lucca’s men are back there, looking for us.”

“I’ll be quiet.”

He grabbed her hand before she could flee. “
Bitte,
don’t go.”

“Can you walk? Run? Make it out of town of your own power?”

The excitement of their adventure and Oliver’s escape was beginning to fade. Pain had taken its place. He sighed heavily. “No.”

“I’ll be back in ten minutes.”

She was gone. Oliver could only watch her go, her black pelisse blending with each shadow. He leaned his head heavily against the wall. The bite of mortar and brick against his skull took his attention away from the throb of his ankle, so he pressed harder. How long had she been gone? How long could he sit there until some early riser spotted him?

He closed his eyes, distracting himself with images of Greta stretched nude atop her counterpane. She was a witch, surely. Just the thought of her grabbed his insides and twisted. Even with the sizzling pain of his ankle, he was fool enough—crazy enough—to think that the regard in Greta’s eyes would be worth any risk.