The Wicked Deeds of Daniel Mackenzie

Daniel had never seen a woman look so terrified. Violette Bastien stared up at Daniel with dark blue eyes wide with fear. Wariness lurked behind the fear, like that of an animal who has been repeatedly kicked.

Daniel softened his grip on her shoulder. “Easy, lass. I’m not going to hurt you.”

“Then what the devil are you doing here?” Gone was the French with the Russian tinge, gone was the French itself, even the faintest accent she’d had in London. She sounded English through and through, and not well-bred English. London, south of the river, if he were to guess.

“Ah, Mr. Mackenzie,” Daniel said in a mocking tone. “How good to see you again. And that you’re unhurt after I whacked you over the head with my finest vase.” He rubbed his temple. “What was the damned thing made of, eh? Granite?”

“I’m sorry,” Violette said stiffly. “I never meant to hurt you.” They stood in deep shadows, but her pupils were pinpricks of shock. “You frightened me.”

“That was obvious. I remember you not minding me kissing you in your upstairs room. Not so downstairs. Or did you change your mind when your maid hit me with that sandbag of a bolster?”

“I never meant to hurt you.” The words softened as she repeated them. Violette lifted her hand as though to touch the still-closing wound on Daniel’s temple, but she stopped herself. “I swear to you.”

“It’s all right; ye only stunned me senseless. I’ve had ladies slap me before, but never with such vigor.”

Violette took a step back, letting out a heavy breath, some of the paralytic fear leaving her. “Well, you had no business kissing me like that. I’m not a doxy.”

“You’re right, lass. No business at all.” Daniel moved to her again. “But we were alone, it was night, and finding a woman who understood engineering excited me. It was your genius with the machines that did it. I tried to behave well, but once I’d seen your wind machine, I couldn’t resist stealing another kiss from you.”

The frozen terror eased further from her eyes at this speech, Daniel was glad to see, but the wariness remained. “You were after more than kisses, Mr. Mackenzie.”

“Aye, I don’t deny that.” Daniel ran his gaze over Violette’s body, not well hidden under the formfitting coat and cotton blouse. She still took his breath away.

Finding her, the triumph of it, beat through him. He wanted to catch her in his arms, push her back against the dirty bricks of the theatre, and find his relief with her.

“You are a beautiful woman,” he said, making himself stay in place. “Says so on your poster, doesn’t it? A beauty that drives sane men to madness, gentle men to duels. That’s brilliant, is that. I bet the punters come flocking.”

Violette gave him a sharp look. “You are mocking me, Mr. Mackenzie.”

“I am indeed.” Daniel stepped beside her and held out his arm in his tailored coat. “Let me escort you home, Mademoiselle Bastien, if that is your name. Even if it isn’t your name, I’m pleased to escort you anyway. There might be ruffians about.”

“This is a respectable part of town.” Violette’s chin came up. “The only ruffian in it is you.”

Daniel burst out laughing. “A shot to the heart, but accurate, lass. Dead accurate. Still, even respectable gentlemen might lose their minds when they come face-to-face with the stunning beauty of Princess Ivanova.”

Daniel kept his arm out, expecting her at any moment to turn and run, or at least look about for something else to hit him with before she went. Then he’d have to follow her, because damned if he’d let the woman he’d tracked halfway across the Continent slip from his grasp again. He’d found her, and he was keeping her.

Daniel hid his jolt of glee when she slid her fingers under the crook of his arm. “Very well. But only because it is darker out here than I thought.”

Got her, Daniel’s mind sang as they turned together out to the main street.

Ian’s direction of Marseille had brought Daniel here, and almost immediately he’d seen the advertisement that the clairvoyant Countess Melikova and her assistant, Princess Ivanova, the deadly beauty, would speak to an audience at a concert hall.

Walking in late to the performance, Daniel had beheld on the stage a middle-aged woman in black with a gold brocade turban, and the upright form of Violette, wearing a long black veil that concealed her face and hair. But he’d known she was Violette. He’d recognize that enticing body and sensual voice anywhere, didn’t matter how much she hid her face or what accent she put on.

“The bit of hair you let us glimpse behind the veil was blond.” Daniel touched a dark curl that fell over Violet’s cheek. “Clever. If smitten gentlemen waited for you at the back door, they’d strain their eyes for a woman with flaxen hair. Only I was on the lookout for the real Violette Bastien.” He winked at her. “Except that Mademoiselle Bastien doesn’t exist either, does she? Is the Violette real? Or were you christened with another name?”

“It’s Violet,” she said in a firm voice.

“No surname?”

“It was a long time ago.”

“Hmm.” Daniel drew her a little closer. They walked slowly down the street like any courting couple, avoiding carriages with clopping horses and the little steaming piles that the clopping horses left behind.

Plenty of people strolled about—friends arm in arm, couples, businessmen walking from clubs back home to their families. None paid any attention to Daniel and Violet, except for a glance at Daniel’s Mackenzie plaid kilt. Daniel was the exotic creature on the street at the moment, not Violet.

“I commend you and your mother on your performance,” he said. “Well done. The phosphor-luminescent balls were a nice touch.”

Violet shrugged. “People expect to see tangible evidence of the ether.”

“No machines tonight?”

“My mother doesn’t need them as much as I do. I don’t have her gift.”

“Gift,” Daniel repeated, remembering the performance. “Aye, she has quite a good one. She’s masterful at telling people what they wish to hear.”

“Do not be so quick to dismiss her, please. She is always spot-on, and not only using what I tell her. What about what your own mother said to you through her? My mother was right, wasn’t she? And I told her nothing. I didn’t know you would be here—I thought you were . . .” Violet faltered, her fingers tightening on his arm.

“Deceased?” Daniel supplied. “Departed? Shuffled off this mortal coil?”

“Yes.”

Daniel heard the catch in her voice, and he took heart. “Poor lass. No wonder you ran from England.”

Violet loosened her grip again. “But my mother was right, wasn’t she? About your mother?”

Daniel shrugged. “Near enough.”

“Well, there you are, then.”

Daniel couldn’t stop his laughter. “Violet, sweet love, the gossip about my family and my crazy mum is common knowledge. Everyone who hears my name knows my mother tried to off me with a knife when I was a tiny babe, before my dad threw me out of the way and stopped her. Then Lady Elizabeth Mackenzie was dead. Did she kill herself, or did her husband, Lord Cameron, do it? People have speculated for years. Now, if your mum had given the correct answer to that riddle, then I would have been impressed. Only my dad knows the truth.”

“You’re saying my mother’s a fraud,” Violet said stiffly.

“A very good one. So are you, love. The best ones always get away with it.”

Violet gave him a haughty look. “We have been questioned before. Put through rigorous tests by other mediums, not to mention scientists and priests. We’ve passed every time.”

“As I said, the best ones always get away with it.” Daniel put his warm hand over hers. “Now, did you bring your machinery with you? And would you let me have a look at it? I was interrupted before I could examine it to my heart’s content last time, by being nearly done in.”

“That’s why you’ve come to Marseille, is it? For my machines?”

He enjoyed the dry skepticism in her voice. “Certainly. That, and I like Marseille. So much history—you know it was once a Greek colony? Then the Romans obligingly left us plenty of ruins to wander through, and there’s the Chateau d’If, where Dumas imprisoned poor Monte Cristo. One of my favorite novels as a boy was the Count. Have you been out to see the prison close to? It’s chilling.”