Chapter Three

The steamcab stopped at one of Buffalo’s grand mansions. Situated on The Avenue near the traffic circle that bisected North Street, it boasted three tall stories and a stone facade. No sooner had the cab drawn up than a small army of steam servants spewed forth from the elegant front doorway.

Boyd climbed from the cab and stood like a minor god while they all bustled around him. The henchman preceded James from the rear door onto the sidewalk.

He saw Miss Delaney step out and stand on the curb in front of him, looking up at the building. She swayed on her feet; for an instant James thought she would fall down.

Instinctively, he stepped forward and caught her by the elbow. A tingle, akin to how he imagined lightning must feel, traveled from the point where his fingers touched her flesh up his arm and straight to his head.

He expected her to flinch—most women did, at contact with him. Instead she turned her head and gazed into his eyes.

Once again James caught his breath. It felt precisely like being punched in the chest. His heart stumbled and then recovered to beat double-time.

“All right there?” he asked.

She parted her lips to respond but didn’t—at least not in words, though he saw a wealth of answers in her eyes.

Hazel eyes they were, a hazy, peaty green-brown guarded by brown lashes. Set slightly tilted in her delicate face, they should have been bright with light and enthusiasm. Instead James beheld shadows, defiant strength, and banked misery.

Most certainly she was not all right. Nothing was, about this situation. If Miss Delaney occupied the place of Boyd’s doxy, it was against her will.

James experienced a rush of familiar feeling: protectiveness. A crusader at heart, he could not stand to see anyone abused, be it an animal or a fragile woman.

But he let go of her arm, telling himself she would not want him, of all men, playing her white knight. He had a job to do, nothing more.

“Come,” Boyd called as he might to a hound, and the whole knot of them moved off up the walk and through the grand doorway, James following at Miss Delaney’s heels.

Amazing what money could do, James thought as he gazed around the foyer. He didn’t know who had built this place or who owned it now, but the sheer ostentation of the building and fittings boggled his mind. Like the airship back at the waterfront, he found it difficult to reconcile the kind of money that might be spent on foot-high oak moldings and curlicues carved round the ceiling—not when, as a boy, he’d known a potato for supper to be wealth.

But, he reminded himself, his business wasn’t to think—no more than the steamies that trundled about organizing the luggage, a veritable army of them.

From around them emerged a human butler, a tall figure clad all in black who approached Boyd obsequiously.

“Welcome, sir, and I hope you enjoy your stay. My name is Riles, and I will do whatever I can to make you comfortable.”

Boyd snorted. “I was told there’s an office. I have business to conduct.”

“This way, sir.”

“And bring me a drink. Then show the rest of my party to their rooms.”

“Yes, sir.”

Boyd went off with the butler, and James watched the tension drain from Miss Delaney’s slender back.

Carter gave him a look from beady eyes. “You know what to do, right? Don’t let her out of your sight. If you lose her, there’ll be hell to pay.”

He went off in Boyd’s wake, leaving an awful silence behind. The steamies, all carrying luggage, moved off also, and very soon James and his charge stood in the sumptuous foyer virtually alone.

I’m not hired to talk to her, James told himself. It’s more a matter of my big body between her and the door. For quite obviously she didn’t want to be here, and presumably she would leave if she could.

But she didn’t move, save to tangle her trembling fingers together. And then the butler reappeared, gave James a carefully guarded look, and focused on Miss Delaney.

“Madame, I will show you to your quarters. This way, please.”

Quarters, was it? James followed the butler, or more accurately the fluttering hem of Miss Delaney’s dress, up a broad sweep of staircase to a sumptuously carpeted hallway and thence to a door at the end of it. Riles said nothing as he opened the door with a flourish and showed Miss Delaney in.

Not a room but a suite of them, all decorated in rose pink and soft gray. High windows dominated the chamber they entered, along with a fireplace flanked by two rose-colored wing chairs and faced by a sofa. Through an interior doorway James could glimpse what looked like a bower of roses—pink flowers splashed across the wallpaper and on the coverlet of the huge bed.

For an instant his mind rebelled. He could not imagine Miss Delaney in that bed alone. He reminded himself he barely knew her and, anyway, he had no reason to believe she would be alone. Presumably, Boyd meant to join her there.

“Sitting room.” Riles stated the obvious. “Bedroom.” He swept them into the rose bower. “And wash room. Also”—he indicated a second room off the bower, a small place that housed a narrow cot, obviously intended for a maid—“for your bodyguard, as requested.”

Bodyguard, was it? James stole a look at Miss Delaney’s face, which had frozen into an expressionless mask, all but her eyes, which were those of a chained dog.

“If there is anything you need, madame, please don’t hesitate to ring the bell beside the bed. Would you like a steam servant assigned to you?”

Violently, Miss Delaney shook her head.

Riles took himself out, leaving the two of them in the bower alone.

Do not look at her, James told himself. Afford her what privacy you can, which from the look of this is to be precious little. He knew for a fact his ruined face did not betray much of what he felt and doubted she would see any of what surged through him—sympathy and dismay. She wouldn’t look at him anyway. Why should she? He must seem even more an abomination in this beautiful place.

He heard her draw a breath and ached to turn his gaze on her, but instead stared away into the air at nothing.

But then she spoke, her voice low and unsteady. “This is nothing more than a prison.”

True. James’ eyes moved to her face without his volition. No longer expressionless, it had contorted with emotion: anger, rebellion, and panic. His heart sank within him. While in Tate’s employ he had supplied no end of security in difficult situations, but nothing approaching this.

Hastily, he debated his options, which appeared few, fought his instincts, and lost.

“Are you here against your will, Miss Delaney? Because if you are—”

Her gaze flew to his again, tangled and held. “Then what, Mr. Kilter? He did say your name’s Kilter, didn’t he? He owns me. Nothing can be done.”

“Owns you? Nobody owns anybody in this country, not anymore.”

“Is that what you think? If so, you have no idea what money can do.”

He did, though, or at least the lack of it. The lack of money could cause a man to lose his pride, could make a woman rise before daylight and work till dark to see her children fed. It could send a boy to a job far too dangerous for him, one that scarred him for life.

“I, Mr. Kilter,” she said bitterly, “have been bought and sold. And there’s nothing you, I, or even God can do to change it.”

James had his own ideas about God, that villain who allowed terrible things to happen in His world. But he would not voice them or any of the other things that crowded his mind.

“You are not my bodyguard,” she added, “but my jailer.”

He’d already figured that out, as well as why Boyd had chosen him: far too ugly to tempt the prisoner to indiscretions.

“Listen,” he said very softly indeed, “if you are in need of help, I will go to my boss. Murphy has a good heart.”

“If you are fond of your employer, Mr. Kilter, you will keep him out of it, unless you want to see him ruined.”

James thought furiously.

She tilted up her chin. “Oh, I know what you must think of me: that I’m his fancy woman, a glorified prostitute.”

James shook his head, even though he had.

“He hasn’t touched me—not yet. He is saving that pleasure for when he thinks it will hurt me most.”

Rage rose in a bubble to James’ head. “That doesn’t have to be—”

“Yes, it does. Please, I appreciate your kindness, Mr. Kilter, but you know nothing of the situation. Just do your job and let me endure my fate.”

No, James thought in utter denial. But out of respect for her he nodded, went back to the outer room, and took up a post by the door, where he composed himself in the required stance, feet wide, hands folded one atop the other.

And he pretended he couldn’t hear the sound that soon floated to him out of the bower—that of Miss Delaney sobbing.