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He glared. “I couldn’t take the chance that you would coerce a servant to assist with your cause.”
“To do what?” she asked, moving the cloth to her neck and her collarbones before trailing it down her torso. “Push me through a porthole?”
“I wouldn’t put that past you.”
“I might be imprudent, Your Grace, but I am not stupid. Where would I go? I have no good soul in Philadelphia to help me.”
“No aunt?” he shot back.
“You know there’s no aunt,” she said mildly and drew the rag over her breasts. The moan that crept past her lips was inaudible, but she sensed rather than saw him tense.
Bronwyn had half expected him to avert his gaze, but the competitive creature in him wouldn’t, recognizing her ploy for the game of seduction it was. His eyes were riveted as the cloth dipped through the valley between her breasts and lower down the expanse of her belly, still moving in small, maddening circles. When that muscle slowly flexed to life in his cheek, she hid her glee.
He glared. “Who was your contact? Richards?”
“She’s a free Black woman with her own troubles. She’s gone.”
“Where?” he demanded.
“Back to Richmond, I expect. To the home of Elizabeth Van Lew.”
Bronwyn saw the moment recognition glittered in that saturnine gaze. Thornbury might not have heard of Richards, but anyone worth his salt as a British operative would have known the name of the abolitionist who had freed her father’s slaves after his death over twenty years ago, brought food and medicine to Northern soldiers incarcerated at Libby Prison, helped them escape, and ferried secret messages to Union leaders.
“Do you mean MaryBowser?” he asked softly, eyes piercing.
“I suppose that is one of her names, yes.”
“The spy?” Thornbury pressed.
“As much as I am, I suppose.”
Recruited as part of an enormous espionage network, Van Lew was the one with ties to Wentworth, but it was Mary whose bravery had stuck with Bronwyn. Risking discovery and her own neck, the courageous Black woman had posed as a domestic servant behind enemy lines and passed on critical information to Van Lew. A huge part of how she avoided exposure was by pretending to be insensible and witless, fooling dozens around her, when the fascinating truth was she possessed a photographic memory. The information she gleaned was vital to the cause. Mary was one of the true unsung heroes of the war.
In truth, Richards’s efforts were the reason Bronwyn had agreed to do this in the first place. She had seen the opportunity as a chance to dosomething. To be part of a changing tide and the revolution that women like Richards so bravely led.
The duke frowned, his brows dipping so harshly that she swore she heard a crash of thunder. “You are not a spy, Bronwyn. You are a girl playing at grown-up reconnaissance games.”
His words stung, but Bronwyn hardened herself against them. It wasn’t the first time she’d faced the disdain of men in her chosen line of work. Some of the longtime operatives who worked for Wentworth had been openly contemptuous of her ability—as a decorous lady of quality—to do anything worthwhile. But she had! She’d risked life and limb to get that message to Richards.
“Think what you will, Your Grace. You have already formed your opinion of me.”
“What did you talk about?” he ground out. “What was the missive?”
Bronwyn ran a hand down the edge of the tub. “There was chatter about an attempt to abduct the president on a certain date at a certain location.”
The duke’s eyes narrowed, likely in disbelief or anger at her prevarication, but she didn’t care what he thought. She’d done what she had to do. The message had been delivered.
“Who do you work for?”
She smiled. “Now that will have to wait until we are back in London.”
“I can get it out of you.”
“What are you doing to do, Your Grace? Starve me? Torture me? Punish me?”
His eyes widened at the lowered inflection on that last word, but nothing else moved, not even the muscle in his cheek. He could be a statue for how rigidly he held himself, but Bronwyn knew better. He was fuming underneath that frigid facade.
“I might be a silly girl in your eyes, but underestimate me at your own peril.” She slid the cloth between her legs and arched lewdly, giving voice to the erotic moan crawling up her throat. “Do. Your. Worst.”
