“What? What do you mean, David isn’t coming home?”
Peter let out a sigh and turned to look at her. “I’m sorry, Lorna. David is dead.”
He watched the color drain from her face. “Dead?” She stared at him as if she did not believe what he’d said.
“He was caught taking something from the palace, the penalty for which is death.” He would never tell her the horrible way David had died.
Lorna sat quite still, staring at him. Then a long, agonizing moan came from the depths of her being and she collapsed against the side of the carriage. She sat, not crying, just moaning with the terrible pain gripping her heart.
“David was trying to help me,” Peter admitted softly. He fumbled with the handkerchief in his hand, looking at it as though it were some odd object. “He knew about the financial trouble the company is in and he thought he would be able to help by taking one of the Empress’s scents, which we could then duplicate.”
Lorna suddenly stiffened, her eyes blazing. “Just as that odious Lydia Nightsong did! Damn you both to hell!” she shouted. “I’ll kill that evil woman with my bare hands. I’ll kill her, I tell you, if it is the very last thing I ever do...I swear I will.”
Peter closed his eyes, trying to let the sound of the carriage wheels drown out his wife’s voice.
Lorna seethed. “It was that horrible woman who put the idea into your head before you left to find David. I know you saw her.”
“Stop it, Lorna. Lydia had nothing to do with what happened. David wanted to help when he learned of the company’s near bankruptcy. It was his concern for you and me and the children that led him to do what he did.”
“And you said nothing to dissuade him?” she accused.
He passed his fingers across his brow. It was true, he hadn’t tried to prevent David, but then would Lorna herself have done any differently? She was too accustomed to money to ever be without it, at whatever risk. “I tried to point out the dangers, of course. There was nothing more I could do.”
Lorna turned on him. She started to argue, but a terrible sobbing poured out of her as she collapsed against him.
It made him uncomfortable, to have her in his arms like this, yet he put a consoling arm about her shoulders. The long weeks overland and at sea had taken the sharp edge off David’s death, dulling it to a gnawing ache. He suddenly thought of Lydia again. He had to see her.
“I must go to the office,” Peter told Lorna as the carriage pulled up the curved drive of their Nob Hill mansion.
She clutched his arm. “Peter, please.”
He saw the need in her eyes, the pleading, but tactfully he eased himself away. “We’re almost broke, Lorna. I’ve made some contacts on my way from China. I can’t allow them to get cold.” He felt her grip tighten. “I’ll be back as soon as I can get away, I promise.”
“Forget the company for today, Peter. While you were away I made some arrangements for money.”
“I told you I didn’t want you to go to your family,” he said sternly. “I got us into this mess and I will get us out.”
Tears filled her eyes, but her voice went hard. “You are going to her, aren’t you?”
Peter got out of the carriage, helping her down.
“You are going to Lydia,” she said again. “I can see it in your face.”
“I will be home as soon as I can.” He got back into the carriage and rode off down the drive, leaving Lorna alone, staring after him.
Lydia was alone in her office when Peter walked in. The moment he got close to her, inhaled her haunting aroma, and saw her exquisite beauty, the old weakness grew inside him, making him tremble with desire. He looked at her and found himself once more in that shabby Chinese village, rescuing a shy sixteen-year-old girl from the amorous fumblings of a young lout in a bamboo grove.
“Thank you for coming to meet the ship,” Peter said. Anger tugged at the corners of his mouth. “I didn’t expect you to invite the Frenchman as part of my welcoming committee.”
Lydia put aside the accounts she’d been studying. “Nor did I expect to have to share your homecoming with your wife.”
“That was accidental. My secretary told her.”
Lydia found herself smiling. “We should do something about our efficient secretaries. That is precisely how Raymond happened to join me on the dock.” She came around the desk. The grief of David’s death was etched on Peter’s handsome face, but she could neither think of anything to say nor know whether she should say anything at all.
“A drink?” she asked, motioning toward the liquor cabinet in the corner of her beautifully appointed office.
Peter shook his head, gazing deep into her eyes.
Somehow, she found herself in his arms, crying over his loss. “Your cable...David....”
“He is dead, Lydia. Executed. You know the Chinese.”
“Oh, dear God. If only they had listened to us. Ke Loo....”
“It wasn’t Ke Loo,” Peter said. He told her of his meeting with David and how David failed to do what Lydia had once succeeded in doing. “The Empress was quick to punish him.”
Lydia began to shake, suddenly remembering the night she and April had fled the Dragon’s palace and had seen the head of the concubine who’d helped them escape, impaled on a pole in the courtyard.
As if reading her mind Peter said, “I buried David intact in the American legation cemetery.”
“Peter,” Lydia wept, groping for some words to comfort him, knowing there were none.
He let her cry for the both of them. After a moment, he tilted her face up to his. “We’ve lost them, Lydia. Your daughter and my son. We’ve lost them. I don’t think April will ever return now.”
Lydia sniffed back her tears and frowned up at him. “But I received a cable from her just today. It said she is coming home and would let me know when to expect her.” She fumbled in her pocket and handed him the message.
Peter read it and shook his head. “I don’t understand. David told me April had been restored to her royal station as Ke Loo’s daughter...a Manchu princess. David was going to try and force April to leave with him, but....” He sighed. “I wouldn’t put too much hope in that cable, Lydia, unless April is coming on orders of the Empress—and we know what that means. No, dear, I’m afraid we’ve both lost. April is where and what she has always wanted to be. I think it would be best if we just tried to forget.”
“April can’t remain in China, Peter. We both know that. She has as much of my blood in her veins as she does Prince Ke Loo’s. The Dowager Empress will never forget that, regardless of how many privileges and honors she grants the girl.” She forced back the tears. “I know her well, Peter. Believe me when I say that April is more me than she wants to accept.” She looked at the cable. “No. April will come home. Maybe not tomorrow, but she’ll come home.”
CHAPTER TWO
China — 1894
April told herself something was wrong. The signal had not come, which meant that the Empress’s soldiers were still watching the escape route. If the way had been unguarded she and little Adam would have been on their way to Shanghai harbor an hour ago.
She heaved a sigh, and in the darkened room rose from the window-seat and lifted Adam onto her lap. “I’m sorry, darling,” April said as she hugged her three-year-old son. “We won’t be leaving tonight