Cecily could not keep up. She slowed and allowed the men to precede her. She would not be made a fool of or treated in such a way, not by the Munroes or anyone else. She ought to leave, now, without a backward glance.
And jeopardize your future here? All she need do was swallow her pride and the situation could yet be salvaged and turned to her advantage. Clenching her fists, she prepared to try once more.
“How sad a thing it is to lose a lover.”
She spun about to face the one trouper she had not noticed among those hovering over Caitlin—the snake charmer, Tamar. Cecily recoiled. The woman had the usual snakes draped about her shoulders like some grotesque necklace, but it was not that which alarmed Cecily. There was something inhuman about her dark, slanted eyes.
“I… I do not know what you mean,” Cecily stammered.
“Oh, but you do.” The snake woman smiled. Her teeth were white and slightly pointed at the tips. “This man you want, this Niall Munroe, is slipping through your fingers.”
“What do you know of me or Mr. Munroe?”
“I have eyes.” Tamar tickled the underside of one serpent’s satin jaw with a red-nailed fingertip. “I know that you want this Niall Munroe. I know that our Caitlin also wants him, though she does not admit it. And I have seen how he looks at her and does not look at you.”
Hearing her own thoughts laid out so plainly was a considerable shock. This woman, a stranger, had seen the sordid attraction between Niall and the little slut. She might not be the only one.
“Why do you tell me this?” Cecily demanded. “What possible reason—”
“You wish to be rid of your rival, do you not?” Tamar blinked, and Cecily realized with a chill that she had not seen the woman do so since the conversation began.
“Maybe there is something that I also wish. Maybe we can help each other.”
“You must be joking.” Cecily glanced with disgust at the snake charmer’s patently false hair, the garish cosmetics, the gown that concealed so little of her generous figure. “How could you possibly help me?”
“You dislike me, no? Maybe you think I am too low for you, like my snakes?” She smiled. “Never mind. You will agree, because you want the circus gone, as I do. And if Athena Munroe gets her wish, the circus will not go away for a very long time.”
“What do you mean? You are to leave Denver now that the performance is over.”
“I think not. Because our Caitlin was hurt, your friend Athena has said that she will ask her brother if the troupe may stay at his ranch in the mountains until she is well again. And that may take all winter, no?”
“Preposterous. Niall would never agree.”
“Would he not?” Tamar shrugged. “He looks at our Caitlin as if he has never seen a woman before. Do you think that he will let her go so easily?”
The swift and obvious answer died on Cecily’s tongue. She became as cold as Tamar and her snakes, examining all the possibilities with calm rationality.
As repulsive as she found the circus folk, and this creature in particular, Cecily had no allies against Caitlin and her tawdry charms. Tamar had presented herself as a fellow conspirator, with keen powers of observation and a cool sense of purpose. She would make a daunting enemy. She doubtless had resources Cecily could not hope to duplicate… if she could be trusted. And if she did not demand too high a price for her services.
“You said you can help me,” Cecily said. “What do you propose?”
Tamar licked her lips with a flicker of her tongue. “I know the circus as you cannot. I can hear what is said, and tell you as I have told you of Athena’s plans. There are many ways that I can… make difficulties for your lover and our Caitlin when they wish to be together.”
Cecily had little doubt of that. “And what do you want in return? You said you wish the circus gone. Why?”
“I, too, have a lover,” Tamar said, her eyes growing as cloudy as those of a snake about to shed its skin. “There is one not of our troupe who casts a spell on him, as the girl bewitches your man.”