Page 330 of From Rakes to Riches

“I can’t speak to delightful, but I am Mercy Goode.” Bewildered, she took the woman’s extended hand and gave the ghost of a curtsy. For a villainess, the Duchesse certainly did have a dulcet voice. One only made for gentle solariums and sedate rose gardens, not such turmoil as this.

“I have heard you are asking after Mathilde tonight.” The Duchesse watched her carefully from behind a mask the color of burgundy wine and gold. “Am I to presume that you are searching for the architect of her demise?”

“Hermurderer, yes.” Even though the woman apparently kept a tight rein on her composure, she thought she saw a reaction to the word.

Not a flinch, per se. But something close to it.

As the waltz ended, the two women took a moment to study each other while the shift in dance partners caused a din above which it was difficult to converse.

The Duchesse de la Cour was an incredibly elegant figure. Though uncommonly tall, her undeniable presence had less to do with her stature than the fine set of her jaw, the fullness of her lips, the sense of both wisdom and fragility emanating from her.

Could this woman bedecked in rubies and silk and swathed in an atmosphere of gracious courtesy be capable of murder?

Mercy didn’t have to look to see that her sister had appeared at her elbow. She could always tell when Felicity was near with a satisfying sort of click, like that when a puzzle piece found its place.

One could only call the Duchesse’s smile fond as she welcomed Felicity into their midst. “In her letters to me, Mathilde did not exaggerate your uncommon resemblance. I feel as if I know you two merely from your antics.”

“Letters?” Taken aback, Mercy said the word with more emphasis than it called for. “I was under the impression Mathilde came here toescapeyou. Or at least the scandal you caused.”

The Duchesse gave their surroundings a furtive glance. She gestured to a cozy cluster of furniture arranged in a shadowed corner by a billiard table that had evidently been abandoned in the middle of a game.

They drifted to it, the Duchesse sweeping a glass of champagne from a passing footman on her way.

Mercy sat with her back to the corner, noting the Duchesse did the same.

She wasn’t certain who the other woman was keeping an eye out for, but in Mercy’s case, it was certainlynotRaphael.

Not in the least.

“Tell me, Your Grace, have you come to collect whatever it was Mathilde allegedly stole from you?” she asked, spearing the woman with a look she imagined an inquisitor might employ.

“Mercy,” Felicity admonished in a whisper as she settled herself across from them on a high-backed chair. “Perhaps we shouldn’t be antagonistic just now.”

“It’s all right.” The Duchesse tipped her glass of wine back and drained half of it in two bracing swallows. After taking amoment to compose herself, she said, “Therewasa scandal with Mathilde and me...and it had to do with treasure, but not jewels or trinkets. Something infinitely more priceless.” She cast Mercy a meaningful look. “Is it not said that the heart is worth more than any fortune?”

“Love?” Mercy’s eyes peeled wide with sudden comprehension at the same time her sister gasped.

She regarded the Duchesse, recalling what Mathilde had said about her lover. Dark. Handsome. Mysterious. Foreign. Sensual...

The woman was all of these things.

Long lashes swept down behind her mask. “I am sorry if I have shocked you, I almost thought Mathilde might have confided in you about me, as you were to bring her to me. I can’t imagine what you must be thinking.” The Duchesse finished her wine with a morose sigh.

“I’m thinking you were both going to leave your husbands and run away together.”

“You would be right,” she nodded. “The ship you were going to conduct her to belongs to me. I am the Duc de la Cour’s second wife, and he has taken to his deathbed, as they say. I can’t think that it’s soon enough.” Her bitterness was not at all concealed by her mask.

“My stepson, Armand, has made my life untenable, and so I have taken the money that is mine and had arranged for Mathilde and me to sail to foreign ports indefinitely. I was going to help her set aside the medicines she took...the vices that were killing her slowly. We were each other’s safe harbor. Our lives were to be a grand adventure...and someone took that from us.” Her eyes went from a whiskey-gold to a fiery amber as her features hardened behind her mask. “I am here to find out who it was.”

“So am I,” Mercy said with fierce determination, making another scan of the room, wondering if her killer was part of the revelry. “I wish Mathilde would have told me about you, Your Grace, it would be easier to believe your story. To be certain you had nothing to do with her death.”

Felicity kicked her ankle.

“I understand,” the Duchesse said around another melancholy sigh. “It is hard for us—washard for us—as you might imagine. And because of where she came from...Mathilde did not trust easily.”

“Of course it was difficult; people are not very understanding, are they?” Leaning over, Felicity placed her cobalt glove over that of the Duchesse. Sapphires over rubies. “I am sorry you lost your love.”

Mercy allowed Felicity’s endlessly romantic heart to soften her own toward the idea of the woman’s innocence.

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