She wore a dark red gown, buttoned up to the throat, and a black shawl draped like a mantilla over her head and shoulders. Her face was white and hard. She strode toward the large table, chin high, silver eyes flashing, and paused a few feet away.
His heart crashed and thundered into a hectic gallop that made it impossible to breathe, let alone speak.
Her glance flicked over his companions.
“Go away,” she said in a low, hard voice.
The whores leapt from his lap, knocking over glasses in their haste. His friends bolted up from their places and backed away. A chair toppled and crashed to the floor unheeded.
Only Esmond kept his head. “Mademoiselle,” he began, his tones gentle, mollifying.
She flung back the shawl and lifted her right hand. There was a pistol in it, the barrel aimed straight at Dain’s heart. “Go away,” she told Esmond.
Dain heard the click as she cocked the weapon and the scrape of a chair as Esmond rose. “Mademoiselle,” he tried again.
“Say your prayers, Dain,” she said.
His gaze lifted from the pistol to her glittering, furious eyes. “Jess,” he whispered.
She pulled the trigger.
Chapter 8
The shot threw Dain back against his chair, which crashed to the floor with him.
Jessica brought the pistol down, let out the breath she’d been holding, then turned and walked away.
It took the onlookers a few moments to make their brains comprehend what their eyes and ears told them. In those moments, she made her way unhindered across the restaurant, out the door, and down the stairs.
A short time later, she found the hackney she’d ordered to wait for her, and told the driver to take her to the nearest police station.
There, she asked for the officer in charge. She turned over the pistol and told what she had done. The officer did not believe her. He sent twogendarmesto Antoine’s, and gave her a glass of wine. The men returned an hour later, with copious notes they’d taken at the scene of the crime, and the Comte d’Esmond.
Esmond had come to release her, he said. It was all a misunderstanding, and accident. The Marquess of Dain’s wound was not mortal. A scratch, that was all. He would not bring charges against Mademoiselle Trent.
Naturally not, Jessica thought. He would lose a court battle against her. This was Paris, after all.
“Then I shall bring charges against myself,” she said, chin high. “And you may tell your friend—”
“Mademoiselle, I shall be honored to convey any message you wish,” Esmond said smoothly. “But you will communicate more comfortably in my carriage, I think.”
“Certainly not,” she said. “I insist upon being jailed, for my own protection, so that he can’t kill me to keep me quiet. Because, monsieur, that is the only wayanyoneis going to keep me quiet.”
She turned to the officer in charge. “I shall be happy to write a full and detailed confession for you. I have nothing to hide. I shall be delighted to speak with the reporters who will no doubt be mobbing the place in the next half hour.”
“Mademoiselle, I am sure the matter can be settled to your satisfaction,” said Esmond. “But I recommend you let your temper cool before you speak to anyone.”
“Very wise,” said the officer in charge. “You are agitated. It is understandable. An affair of the heart.”
“Quite,” she said, meeting Esmond’s enigmatic blue gaze. “A crime of passion.”
“Yes, mademoiselle, as everyone will deduce,” said Esmond. “If the police do not release you immediately, there will be more than reporters storming the place. All of Paris will rise up to rescue you, and the city will be plunged into riot. You do not wish innocent people to be killed on your account, I am sure.”
There was a clamor outside—the first contingent of reporters, she guessed. She drew out the moment, letting tension build in the room.
Then she shrugged. “Very well. I shall go home. For the sake of the endangered innocents.”
By midmorning, the Comte d’Esmond was with Dain, who lay upon a sofa in the library.
