She laughed again, less forced, less brittle. More his secret Josienne. “You don’t give up, do you?”
“On you? No, never. You have my word as a lying, thieving, conniving bastard of a rack.”
Her hand snaked down his bare back, trailed goose bumps behind it. “If you caught me, you’d be bored.”
It was Van Gast’s turn to laugh. “No, love. No one could be bored with you. Especially when you’re giving me heart attacks or trying to get me killed. Now, much as I am greatly enjoying the view your dress is giving me, how do we get it off?”
“Van, shouldn’t we be—”
He stopped her with another kiss, not slow this time. Hungry, insistent. He’d waited too long, in too much doubt. “Sod should,” he said at last, when he got his breath back. “Less talking, more being naked.”
She didn’t say anything else but stepped back a pace and reached behind her. Slowly, button by button, she undid the dress, let it slide first over one shoulder, then the other. She was a shape in the dim light, all soft curves and taut muscles. Moonlight made tempting shadows across her shoulders, delving between her breasts as the dress slid farther.
He didn’t, couldn’t, wait any longer. She was here, and with him, laughing up at him, kissing him as though her heart would burst with it, her hands tangling in his hair and pulling him closer. Butterfly Josie, just waiting to be pinned. She fell back against the wall, her lips on his throat, and he followed, pinned her there. He wanted to say it all then, but she left him no breath for words, no breath for anything but this, no room in his head for anything but her.
They never made it as far as the floor.
* * *
Rillen stopped to kiss Ilsa’s hand. His lovely Lady Laceflower. It was all so perfect. Van Gast and Josie in the cells ready for his little plan, and they would play their part. He had the threat of the bond to make sure, in case they tried anything, like a real escape. The look on Van Gast’s face, the way Josie had scrambled from it in terror—he thought it would be enough.
By midnight the Yelen would be his to control. Estovan would be his, and so would a lot of illicit money. All these traders, all these merchanters, each had paid a consideration just to be here, not to mention at least three deals he’d seen struck tonight. The money was even now winging its way down to the strong room next to the dungeon. Guarded by rock, and Yelen guards and dungeons of a fearsome reputation so no rack would ever try to get in. Several of the richer traders, not trusting the counting house, used the strong room to hold their wealth, their gold and more precious items, the safest place within a hundred leagues. Supposedly. By midnight, the worth of the city would be in that room.
Not for long—by dawn it would be out of the palace and his. Oh, so sorry. Those racks, tried to escape, took the money. Here, I have one to hang to show you. The other got away. No, we didn’t recover your money.
Only the other rack would be floating facedown in the Est River, one body among many the city produced in the night. Estovan would be chaotic for a time, but one man would lead. One man was the natural successor to the sadly “shot by the racks during their escape” Yelen councilors. One man who already had control of the guards, and therefore the palace, the licensed docks, the area around them, the place where all the real money was made.
Ilsa blushed as his lips brushed the back of her hand.
“Perfect,” he said. “All so perfect, thanks to you.”
Her sly smile broadened, so at odds with the naïve look of her. Such a shame she was so obviously a Remorian. But maybe—yes, maybe even that wouldn’t be a problem. For him, for the Yelen as would be, nothing would be a problem.
“How long?” she asked, and he knew what she meant.
“Josie will be dead within hours. Suitably tormented first. Either she’ll take the bond, or Van Gast will. You never did say why it was you hated her so much.”
A single gasped word stopped her dead. “Ilsa?”
Her smooth copper-bronze skin turned pale, her eyes widened so far that Rillen could see white around the dark irises, and her mouth quivered with unsaid