Against her will, she found herself blurting out what she would have preferred to keep secret. "It isn't you that I distrust, but myself. I'm not good at being alone, Lucien. For the first eighteen years of my life, Kira was always there. We were more like two halves of a whole than individuals. We knew that we needed to separate and develop our own lives, but I've done a rotten job of becoming independent. I feel incomplete, like a… a vine casting about for a pole to wrap myself around. I don't think you would like that. I don't like it about myself."
"You underestimate your strength, Kit. What you are worrying about might never come to pass." His thumb made slow circles on her palm. "Don't let your fears of what might happen stand in the way of helping Kira."
Her resistance collapsed. She buried her face in her hands, thinking that he had gone right to the heart of the issue. Kira's safety was far more important than the likelihood that Kit would make a fool of herself by falling in love with the rich, powerful, rakish Earl of Strathmore.
Besides, she had the uneasy feeling that if she didn't tell him what was wrong, he would reach inside her mind and pull the facts out directly. And she really could not bear to have him invading her thoughts more than he already had. She raised her head and said wearily, "It's a long story."
"Then we might as well get comfortable." He got out of bed and pulled a shirt from the wardrobe. "Put this on. It's easier for a man and woman to talk sensibly when they're dressed and vertical."
She emerged from her sheet and complied. The voluminous folds of his shirt covered her almost to her knees, absurdly, she still wore her stockings, so she stripped them off and tossed them in the general direction of her other scattered garments. Then she settled cross-legged on the bed.
Lucien donned a luxuriant blue wool robe that made his hair glow like spun gold. After building up the fire, he dug a flat silver flask from his baggage, poured some of the amber contents into two glasses, and handed one to her. "Drink this."
Meekly she obeyed. The brandy couldn't touch the cold knot in her belly, but it did help steady her hands.
He settled beside her on the bed and leaned back against the headboard. "What has happened to Kira?"
She stared into her glass. "I don't know, and I'm not sure where to begin."
"Wherever you like. We can sit here all night if necessary, and the nights are very long at this time of year."
"Most of what I told you at Jane's was true." She made a face. "Though I slandered Jane herself. She's not the tyrant I led you to believe. Without her cooperation I could never have done what I've been doing."
"She didn't forbid Kira her house?"
"No, though it's true that she was not enthralled by my sister's choice of career. Well, neither was I. But Kira was hell-bent on treading the boards, so I accepted it. We kept in fairly close touch, writing each other every week when she was working in the provincial theaters. When she was in London, we would see each other every week or two, usually when we were going to the market." Kit hesitated, wondering if anyone who was not a twin could understand. "Not necessarily to talk, just to… see each other. It wasn't ever arranged. We just… knew when it was likely that our paths would cross."
She glanced at Lucien's face, but he accepted that matter-of-factly. "Kira lives in Soho?"
Kit nodded. "She owns a small house and uses the ground floor for herself. The upstairs flat is rented to a friend of hers, another actress named Cleo Farnsworth."
When she fell silent, he prompted, "When did you discover something was wrong?"
"On our birthday, the twenty-first of October. We always celebrate it together. Always. When she was working in the provinces, she would come to London. Once when she couldn't get away, I took the mail coach all the way to Yorkshire so that we could be together. This year we had arranged to meet at her house for a quiet dinner." She swallowed the terror that came with the memory. "The night before, I had had a nightmare and woke up feeling horribly anxious, but I didn't connect it with Kira. Yet the minute I let myself into her flat, I knew that something was dreadfully wrong."
"Were there signs of a struggle?"
"No, just… emptiness. Horrible, echoing emptiness, even though everything was exactly where it should be." Kit's hands locked around her brandy glass. "The only thing wrong was that her cat, Viola, was ravenous, as if she hadn't been fed that day.
"After I fed Viola, I went upstairs to talk to Cleo, whom I had met several times. At first Cleo thought I was Kira and scolded me for missing a rehearsal. When I explained that I was Kathryn, Cleo became worried, too. She said Kira had left the Marlowe as usual after performing the night before, and Cleo hadn't seen her since. But Kira never misses rehearsals. She must have been kidnapped on her way home."
After a brief hesitation, he said gently, "Presumably you have considered the possibility that she was murdered by footpads and her body dropped in the river."
"You think she's dead, don't you? Well, she isn't," Kit said fiercely. "You may not be able to understand this, but having a twin is like being connected to another person by an invisible cord. On some level, I'm always aware of Kira. If she died, I would know instantly. She is unhappy, sometimes terribly frightened, but she is as alive as I am."
She expected skepticism, but he said only, "If that is the case, abduction is certainly the most likely possibility. Do you know of anyone who might want to kidnap her and why?"
He actually believed her! Almost dizzy with relief, she replied, "The last time I had dined with Kira, a month or so earlier, she had casually mentioned an admirer who was determined to make her his mistress. She made a joke of it, but I thought at the time that she wouldn't have mentioned the fellow if she hadn't found him disturbing."
"So you think the man decided that if she wouldn't come to him voluntarily, he would take her by force," Lucien said with a frown.
"It's the only explanation that makes sense. The risk to him would be minimal-no one would be very surprised at the disappearance of a young actress," she said with more than a trace of irony. "Since all actresses are considered trollops, everyone would assume that she had run off with some man who had made her an irresistible offer."
"When Kira mentioned the man, did she say anything else that might help you identify him?"
"No, but she has always used a small notebook to remind herself of engagements and things she wanted to remember. After she disappeared, I searched her flat until I found it. Most of it was irrelevant, but there were several exasperated comments about a man who wouldn't take no for an answer." Kit's face tightened.
"Kira called him Lord Hellion. She also made several critical remarks about the Hellion Club."
"No wonder you've been stalking the group." Lucien frowned. "But why have you been taking such appalling risks? Surely you could have engaged an expert, a Bow Street Runner perhaps, to search for her."
She gave a humorless smile. "That's exactly what I did do. Mr. Jones tried his best. He found a drunkard who thought he'd sees a woman forced into a carriage not far from the Marlowe Theater on the night Kira disappeared. But it was raining, and the man couldn't supply any details about the woman or the kidnappers. Mr. Jones hasn't been able to learn anything more even though he has informants all over London. It is as if Kira has vanished from the face of the earth."
"So you decided to take matters into your own hands, risking your life and liberty in the process."
"The best way to learn about Kira's life was to enter it-to become Cassie James and meet the people around her," Kit said defensively. "Since Cleo was the only one at the Marlowe who knew Kira had a twin, it never occurred to anyone that I wasn't the real Cassie James. I'd seen Kira perform often, so it wasn't difficult to pretend I was her."