Marrying the Musketeer by Kate Silver Page B

feeling his way by touch in the blackness of the night.
    He had spoken part of the truth at least that evening.   He did love Courtney – with all his heart – but he was not worthy for her to love him in return.   Did she but know the real reason for his visit to her house that night, his adroit prompting of her to have him a key to the house made, she would rightly revile him.
    She loved him in all her youth and innocence, and he was about to betray her love in the worst possible way.   He would use her love for him to destroy the father she loved as dearly, if not more dearly, than she loved him.
    He had made love to her not as a lover should do – in innocence and passion – but as a coldly calculated act of blackmail.   Should her father refuse to do as was demanded of him, should he prove stubborn in revealing where his ill-gotten gains were hid, they would threaten to ruin the reputation of his beloved daughter.   Courtney’s seduction was but an piece of the whole evil plan.
    Monsieur de Charent had studied his enemy well.   Courtney, his sweet love, was the Achilles heel who would bring her father to his knees.   He, false lover and knave that he was, was the tool used to ruin them both.
    He felt his way blindly into a pitch black room on the lower floor.   Courtney had let slip that her father’s most private study was not attached to his bedchamber as was common, but that instead he used one of the ground floor chambers to do his business.   The door once safely shut behind him, he made haste to strike a small light.
    He was in luck.   Judging by the large mahogany desk in the middle of the room and the shelves of journals on the walls, he had found the study on his first attempt.
    He lit a candle from a sconce on the wall and held it before him to illuminate his search.   The papers he sought would be well hidden, he was sure of that.   He knew his target well enough to know that he had no easy task ahead of him to find what was concealed.
    He took the ring of keys from his pocket – identical to the ring of keys that his Courtney had given him the day before.   In the few minutes he had left her alone, he had taken impressions of each and every one if them in balls of softened wax and had them made up in haste by a blacksmith who had been paid well to keep his mouth shut.   There was no secret in this house to which he did not have access.   He felt a cramp of guilt assail his gut with a vicious pang.   Sweet, innocent Courtney had delivered her father’s head to him on a platter, without even suspecting for a moment what she had done.
    The papers on the desk were innocuous enough.   He riffled through them with unhurried fingers, doubting they were what he sought, but not wanting to overlook the obvious.   He needed to find what he sought and find it fast so he could leave this place which was nothing but a torment to him.
    The drawers of the desk were locked.   A small iron key on his ring fitted the locks and he opened them all with a soft click.
    With a growing sense of impatience, he riffled through the contents of the drawers one after the other.   The papers he sought were not there.   He had to find what he needed.   If he returned empty-handed, the chase would only be prolonged, not stopped and Charent, damn his black heart, would be sure to make Courtney suffer for it one way or another.
    With a sudden chill, he turned his gaze to the fireplace.   The grate was choked with a fine, powdery, gray ash – the ash that comes from burning papers.   He stifled a groan.   Had he come too late?   Had Monsieur Ruthgard been forewarned, or had he suspected that he was being watched and destroyed the evidence they needed to condemn him?   Had all his effort, his wrestling with his conscience, been in vain?
    He would not given in that easily.   He owed a duty to his King that went beyond any duty he owed to any woman.   He would do his duty to his monarch – however painful he