Game Of Seduction

Chapter 21

"What we need to do is get ourselves invited to the Hôtel de Guise, see if we can't find some evidence at their home." Sir Francis muses.

"How is this going to happen? Henri de Guise can't stand us and can't stand Nate either. He's hardly going to invite us into his home. Let alone give us free reign of his house?"

Nate says quietly. "I've been there more than once. With my mistress."

"She goes to the Hôtel de Guise?" Sir Francis says in surprise.

"Yes, she's close friends with Henriette de Nevers. They often go there for a long weekend."

Sir Francis's eyes gleam at the opportunity. "She'd take you with her? If you hinted-"

"There would be a certain set of circumstances involved-". He sounds reluctant to divulge any further information, though Sir Francis seems to understand. Brad’s suspicions are roused.

"Well then make sure she takes you with her. Get Henriette to invite one of the team to back you up. This is dynamite. Right into the lair of the de Guise family, unlimited access if we play our cards right."

"Would Henriette do it?" asks Walt with a doubtful crease of his brow. “Let us into the inner sanctum?”

"This is where Ray would come in. You can butter her up, can't you?"

Ray gives the rest of the team a smirk. “I can try.”

“Do it. She seems to like you and she’s been more than helpful so far. We just want to have a good scout round and see what we can unearth at their headquarters. It’s the ideal reconaissance mission. Right in the heart of enemy territory.”

When Nate next sees his mistress Margot he knows he needs to subtly suggest a weekend away at the Hôtel de Guise, but frankly he’s reluctant to go there. He knows what’s required of him, but his conscience has picked a fine time to trouble him.

“Nate, you seem distracted.” She remarks after the third dischord as he works on his latest piece on the clavichord. “You’re working too hard again. Come, sit here.”

She moves behind him, massaging his shoulders with practiced hands. He groans as her hands hit a knot of tension.

“You’re as tense as a bow, Nate. What is it?” she says close to his ear, her voice a sultry seduction.

“Things are very overwrought at the palace in the run up to the wedding.” He says, conscious he’s being economical with the truth.

“Tell me about it. So suffocating! I can’t bear it either.” She looks at him slyly, a smile full of sensual promise lingering on her mouth. “It’s about time we had a long weekend away, don’t you think?”

“Do you think we should?” he asks. It would be ideal for the group and their investigation into de Guise’s plot but he can’t help feeling uneasy.

“Henriette and Claude would love our company. I’m sure I can persuade her to invite us for a long leisurely weekend somewhere nice and discreet, far away from prying eyes. I’m sick of being on display at court. Constantly having to avoid Anjou and Mother. And of course, Nate, it would give us time to be alone. Such precious time-”

“Would you want that?” he asks.

She merely kisses him in reply, giving him the benefit of her curvy body against his.

*

“Did she agree to persuade Henriette?” Brad asks at their next meeting.

“Yes, we’re leaving on Friday afternoon, following Mass. I believe Ray’s managed to get himself invited by Henriette.”

“Well done, Master Person. Make sure you focus and bring us some suitable information.” Sir Francis says.

“What were the ‘certain set of circumstances’ you were referring to at the other meeting?” Brad asks Nate curiously.

Nate can feel the blush rising up the column of his neck. “You don’t want to know. Seriously.” He says shortly.

That’s just it, Brad thinks, I do want to know. Only too well.

*

Henriette drops in with welcome news for Brad. “Is Ray in?” she asks a cheeky twinkle in her eye the day before their jaunt.

“He’s working.” Brad says sharply, not wanting his assistant to get distracted.

“Never mind, it’s you I wanted to see anyway.” She says airily. “I was wondering whether you’d like to join us on our long weekend actually, Lord Colbert. What do you think?”

“You want me to join you?”

“Well actually it’s Anne-Marie that wants you to join us. Don’t tell anyone but I think she’s got her heart set on luring you to her bed.”

Brad’s nose wrinkles in barely concealed disgust. “Anne-Marie de Guise?”

“You know: very beautiful, long red-gold hair just like Nate's, ambitious, rapacious lady-in-waiting. De Guise’s haughty sister. Persistently putting herself in your path?” Henriette chuckles, seemingly very amused. “You haven’t noticed her, have you? She will be vexed she isn’t even making an impression on you, Lord Colbert.”

“Don’t tell me, this is all about the Esquadron isn’t it?”

“It could be, Lord Colbert.” she hints, with a twinkle in her sloe-dark eyes.

That’s as much of a warning as he’s likely to get from Henriette, but he’ll take it. He still wonders why she wants to help them since she is a de Guise by marriage. Does this mean she has no loyalty at all? That she is easily bought by Ray’s charm and fine words? Or does she have another agenda, one that the team are going to have to negotiate?

At the Hotel de Guise, Paris

When the team arrive at the Hôtel de Guise, they are amazed at the sheer size and opulence of the place. No wonder Catherine de’ Medici is jealous of the de Guise wealth. The family is rolling in money and to an impoverished monarchy the potential for resentment is very high.

“The servants have your rooms all prepared. We’re going to have a picnic at three and perhaps a little music from Nate? Would you mind awfully?”

“Not at all.” Nate says, polite as ever. “As always I am at your service.”

*

As they enter the sitting room they meet Princesse Claude who the team remember from the first time they attended court. Brad vaguely remembers what she was introduced as. Duchesse de Lorraine. She’s a de Guise too.

“How lovely to meet you all. Welcome to our humble home.” She says regally as they bend over her hand to pay their respects. He can’t help but think she’s very unlike her sister. Careful, composed, regal. He can’t help but wonder how close they are. Was she as distant as Elisabeth de Valois from her siblings?

“Nate, I suppose you’re here with my mischievous sister?” She says greeting him with a familiar kiss on the cheek.

“Yes, Ma’am.”

“Where is she?”

“In the garden, playing with that blasted lapdog of hers.”

“I’m always very distrustful of a dog that small. I have no idea what she sees in that vicious little wretch!” She smiles suddenly making her look less grand, more human. “I’m glad to see you, Nate. Don’t leave it so long next time, will you?”

Nate’s strumming his lute, playing a few idle chords as he bends over his instrument. His hands press against the strings. The sheer joy in his voice as he lets it loose. That golden stream of sound like a siren’s call, luring the unwary ever closer.

“That was quite something.”

Nate gives Brad a smile as he puts his instrument away. He’s so different away from court. More at ease, almost relaxed. Without the baleful presence of Henri de Guise scowling at Nate, he looks at home here in the grand surroundings of the Hôtel de Guise. If it wasn’t for that quirk of Fate, this might have been Nate’s home. These might be Nate’s people. He is a de Guise by blood after all. How must he feel? To be at home and yet still an outsider, shut out from his heritage?

“I aim to please, Lord Colbert. ‘Tis my job after all.”

Brad and Nate are in the garden idly conversing under the shade of the marble fountain. The sun is high and blazing overhead, and most sensible people have retired for a noon time siesta. The perfect time to talk in peace.

"What do you want to be?” says Brad, looking up at the cloudless sky. “If you didn't have to be at court, working for Sir Francis, what would you do with your life, if you couldn't fail?"

When Nate next speaks his voice is wistful. "I don't know. I've lived here in this enviroment, at court since I was a child. I can't imagine living out of this world. I suppose I would like to teach someday-"

Brad is so surprised he fails to hide it. Although thinking about it makes perfect sense now. Nate’s love of knowledge, the way he deals with his pupils with patience, kindness and respect. He would be a born teacher.

"I have had the opportunity to learn so much from the best teachers in the land. I would like to be able to impart that knowledge to a new generation. To be able to study and compose in peace. Sometimes I regret that-“

“You regret what?”

Nate’s voice falls. Brad can’t help feeling honoured that he wants to confide in him. “I regret that things turned out the way they did with my father. I could have been living an entirely different life.”

Brad’s misgivings about Lord Ferrando’s scheme come back in full force. They trained him as their weapon, but he’s only human. What happens when he decides he wants more from life than this dangerous secretive existence?

“I wonder how my life would have turned out if Father had never got involved with Sir Francis. If we had never left Ballykirlan, my home.”

"You've never had that, have you?" Brad says, understanding him. "A peaceable life." And yet you long for it.

"No, I haven’t."

“Nate-“ Brad starts, not knowing what to say. Perhaps nothing really needs to be said, after all. Just this silent understanding between them.

“I long for many things. That I can’t have-”, Brad catches his gaze He pulls himself together, as if aware he was on the verge of revealing more than he should have. “Let’s talk of other things, before I indulge in an inappropriate bout of melancholy, and that won’t do.”

He was a fool to become so infatuated with the man. Brad is an honourable man. You could see it in every gesture he makes. The integrity with which he engages with the world around him.

Why on Earth would he even look at someone like me? Someone sullied and tainted by the work he must do for Sir Francis and Godfather. Not for the first time, he starts to feel ashamed of what he does. The path that his father and his masters chose for him when he was little more than a child.

Perhaps if I could have lived an honourable life, there would be no shame in-

No, I can’t allow myself to think like that. To long for what cannot be. That way lies frustration and madness.

Brad is a hero. What would he want with someone so tainted? He asks himself, remembering Anjou’s kisses in the garden. Those greedy wandering hands. The insinuations he’s had to live with for so long.

I would not stain him with my sins, thinks Nate and turns away though he can’t help one last glance at Brad’s face.

“D’ye think the coast is clear, so we can get on with some snooping? Where is Nate?”

Ray looks awkward. Brad decides to have his suspicions out, find out exactly what Nate is hiding from the team.

“Is he with the Princess?” he asks with a suspicious narrowing of those ice blue eyes. “Is she messing round with him too?”

“I knew you were going to overreact.”

Brad is stung by Ray’s astute little quip. “I am not overreacting!”

Walt walks in and sits down. He looks shocked.

“What’s the matter with you, Walt?”

He shakes his head as if still assailed by disbelief."I opened the door. I didn't even mean to do it and they were -"

Brad frowns, mouth pulled into an impatient line. "What were they doing?"

Walt flushes, a wash of scarlet staining his cheeks at the memory, "The house is so big, it's easy to get lost. The door wasn't locked. Maybe they forgot. In their ardour-"

Brad remembers last night where he had retired for bed early, while they had stayed up playing dice for small stakes and discussing the case.

All at once Brad works out why Nate was so evasive about the requirements for the long weekend at the de Guise house. He could hardly say to the team: I’m here as her stud! He was right to trust his instinct, not to trust the agent further than he could throw him. How could he bear to allow her to use him so? Does he have no pride? Is it misguided love or sheer lust that drives him to her bed?

"Hasser, will you stop pussyfooting about and come out with it!"

"I saw Princesse Margot and Nate half asleep. In bed with one another. Making love to one another-" Walt says in a rush.

"I don't get it. I thought she was meant to be sleeping with you." asks Trombley.

Walt frowns. “So did I. That explains so much about that day we found her in my room.”

“Nate and the Princess, the lad must have a death wish.”

“I opened the door, and I saw the sheets had been kicked off in the night. They were entwined in each other’s arms. He’d probably stayed the night-“

Walt remembered all too well the sight of the two of them in each other’s arms. At first, he was surprised he didn’t feel the slightest tinge of jealousy to see her in Nate’s close unconscious embrace. Her arms wrapped around his body, pressing him close, as if they were one body, one soul. Her face pressed into his bare shoulder. Her hand wrapped around his hardening prick, slowly moving as she wakes up.

“So lovely to wake up next to you-“ She had murmured, with a satisfied smile.

"It was awkward. I didn’t want to be discovered so I retreated behind a screen. I couldn’t just go out through the door the way I’d come in as they would have noticed.”

“What did you see?”

Walt pauses, obviously unsure about exposing Nate and Margot’s secrets.

“Well, you started. You may as well tell us all.”

“They’re lovers.” Walt says bluntly, a blush staining his cheeks.

“You’re her lover, as well.” Trombley points out with more than a touch of envy. “Lucky beggar, getting a piece of that every night at court. She won’t even look at me!”

“This is different.” Walt shakes his head, troubled by the knowledge he has found. “He’s in love with her. She has feelings for him, far more than she ever had for Ray or me. This is a full blown relationship and I don’t feel good carrying on with a woman who Nate is so closely bound to. It just doesn’t feel right.”

“Then why is she messing around with other men if she’s with Nate? Does he know?”

“Oh yes, I think there’s no question that he knows.”

“How can he bear it? Watching the woman he purports to love sleeping with others? Going out into the heart of Paris looking for strangers to swive?”

“Maybe he doesn’t have a choice. As far as I could see, there’s one person who wears the breeches in that relationship and it certainly isn’t him!”

“I’m telling Sir Francis. I’m not doing it.” Walt declares.

“You know he’s going to be furious when he finds out. What about Catherine and the king? Sounds like we’re under royal orders.”

“They can find some other fool to mess around with her because I won’t do it. Not any more.”

“You’ll have to tell her as well. What will you say?”

“The truth.”

Ray shakes his head, although to Brad’s mind he would say he looks pleased by Walt decision to break it off with the princess. “God help you, then.”

*

Henriette passes Brad and Ray on the stairs. She's dressed as if to go out tying on her velvet mask, her fiery curls confined in a gold net in a fantastical style, all intricate coils and braids.

"My lady-" Brad moves aside to let her pass. She drops something into his hand. It's a small iron key.

"If you were to walk past de Guise's office while we were out, you may find this useful-" she says only for his ears. She raises her voice for the benefit of the other ladies who are waiting impatiently at the foot of the stairs. "Claude, Catherine and I are going shopping. we won't be back until later, so do try and keep out of trouble, lads, won't you?"

"Certainly, my lady." Brad grasps her hand and pulls her close for a moment. "Why are you helping us?” he hisses.

Her sloe-dark eyes just stare back at him, challenging as a sabre thrust. He senses that underneath the mask of impudent frivolity and that exuberant coppery froth of curls Henriette de Nevers is a formidable woman. Brad was right to be wary of her. "Why shouldn't I help you?”

“You are one of them, you know what we want and what we are and yet you give us this. Does it not trouble you to betray your own family?-”

She gives him an enigmatic little smile. "Who knows? Maybe I just want a little amusement?"

Henriette pulls away from his firm grasp, calling out to the ladies. “Come, ladies, I will be most vexed if I miss any bargains!

As she brushes past, Brad reads upon her lips the simple phrase: one hour. There isn’t much time to waste. Time for the team to get to work and start doing their jobs. About time!

“That’s our cue. Time to earn our keep and start some serious investigation of the de Guise involvement.” Brad slips the key in the lock. It’s a little stiff, but the door opens. Brad pulls Ray and Walt inside. “Make sure you leave everything as you found it. We don’t want Henri de Guise to know anything about our enquiries.”

“I still can’t work out why she gave you the key to his office. What’s in it for her?”

“Who knows? We mustn’t trust her too readily. If she is prepared to betray her family on a whim, she could turn on us at any moment. We must keep the woman at arm’s length until we find out what her game is.”

Ray’s already rifling through the papers, assessing what needs to be copied and what can be safely left behind.“It’s a shame we cannot organise a little burglary. Just to obtain some of these paper for a longer period.”

“It’d never work. This place is too heavily guarded by de Guise’s servants. We’re only tolerated here because we have the good fortune to be guests of the ladies of the house.”

Henriette lets Nate into the chamber and locks the door behind him. As he enters the room, the aromatic steam from the marble bath in the corner fills the air. She lies in the hot rose and lavender scented water, eyes closed, lost in an amorous reverie. One long leg dangles out of the water, idly tracing a path on the wet stone.

Her dark hair is damp and clinging to her wet naked body, her breasts rosy and half submerged in the water. Her hands deliberately cup her breasts displaying them to his gaze.

She is my sin, my temptress. And God help me, no matter how hard I try to withstand temptation, I want her.

Her eyes slowly open and that secret smile she bestows only on him curves the corner of her mouth as she sees him leaning against the doorway.

"My lady-"

"Take your clothes off, and get in." she says, her voice breathless with the desire she feels.

Nate is already removing his doublet, throwing it carelessly onto the bed. She watches him disrobe, a smile on her face.

He slides into the still hot water and she climbs into his lap, straddling his hips, her lips meeting his as she impales her self onto his body.

"Oh, yes-" she sighs as she sinks down onto him. “This is what I crave, right here. How could I ever have done without this?”

There's water slopping all over the floor but neither of them cares, lost in the moment.

He lifts her up and steps out of the tub. Margot locks her legs around him, clinging tightly to his body. He sinks down onto the bed and she resumes her position on top of him. He can feel the wet silk of the coverlet against his back as she grinds him into the soft feather mattress.

She tightens around him and he loses control, crying out.

Even though they are making love, Nate feels oddly detached from the moment. Is there something wrong with me, because I know this is no longer enough? he asks himself.

"Oh God, I needed that. Didn't you?" she sighs, still catching her breath after their amorous exertions. She reaches up to touch his face, sensing his detachment from her.

"Nate? What's wrong?"

"There's nothing wrong." he says. For a moment he thinks that she's going to challenge him and delve further, but she just lies back on the pillows with a sigh.

"I wish you'd talk to me as we once did." she says wistfully, lying on her back and looking up at the rich draperies of the bed. "Sometimes I feel as if you're so distant from me, no matter what I do. I wonder do you still love me as you once did."

Sometimes he wishes that they would tackle the issue that right in front of them honestly, that he could voice his grievance but it's never the right time. He must hold his tongue.

*

“Nate? Your foreign friends are here.” comes Henriette’s voice from behind the door. He pulls his clothes back on, ignoring the dampness of his hair and doublet.

“Do you really have to go?” she says idly tracing intricate patterns on the hollow of his throat with her fingertips. Just the lightest of touches. “Ignore them. Stay with me.”

“You know I cannot, my lady. They’ll get suspicious. People will start to speculate.” He presses a kiss to her bare shoulder, letting her feel the gentle scrape of his teeth against her skin. “Tonight. I’ll return to you, I promise.”

Nate pulls away from the temptation of her soft mouth. “Who is it?” he calls.

“Stafford and Lord Colbert.”

Nate gets up and unlocks the door.

“Get dressed, Daisy!” he hisses. She reluctantly starts to pull her chemise on.

Brad doesn’t say anything, but one eyebrow goes up at the sight of him. Nate self-consciously touches his hair and his kiss-swollen lips, surely he doesn’t look that much of a debauched mess.

“I hope I wasn’t disturbing you too much, but could we borrow you for a moment?”

Nate agrees before Margot can lodge any objection. “Of course, Lord Colbert. Lead the way-“

"Don't keep him too long, will you?" she remarks with a shameless gleam as the team leave her chamber.

Brad is very careful not to say anything as they make their way back to Sir Walt's quarters, although Nate is perfectly aware that he must know what they were up to. Even a child could probably work it out. He silently prays he doesn't meet Claude or Catherine de Porcian on the way.

"Damp hair?" Brad raises one eyebrow. Nate feels his face growing hot with embarrassment.

"We're not going to talk about this. Do you understand?"

Stafford ducks his head. Nate suspects that he wants to laugh but is just about managing to control himself.

“Well, Ray and I have been working on what we managed to gather from de Guise’s office while the ladies were out, and we have some interesting material here.” Brad indicates the file of purloined material they’d managed to lift during their raid.

“Enough to pin the Funteyn conspiracy on him?”

“It’s a start. But I suspect we are going to have little opportunity to repeat the manoeuvre. I doubt he knows that we are in residence and I don’t think he would be very happy to find out.”

“We return to the palace tomorrow, do we not? Well, let’s copy what we can and report to Sir Francis and Lord Ferrando when we arrive back at the palace.”