“Aye, Kelly,” the man said. “I’ll say nothing. Not about Samford and not about you. You know I’d never betray you!”
The men embraced quickly before the older one, the killer, retreated inside the building and the younger of the two hopped on the seat of the cart and headed out of the alley. Kitty sank against the boards and wondered if she’d gotten herself into a better situation or a worse one. Either way, for the moment, silence was her best option, at least until she could think of a way out of this situation.
*
Ducking between two other structures, the passage so narrow that at times they had to turn sideways, they came out onto yet another street. This one was most decidedly less appealing and less safe than the previous one had been. Dirtier, seedier, the few people milling about watching them suspiciously, it was evident that they’d stumbled into an area that was not safe.
“Keep walking,” he said. Staying close to him, Prim did as he suggested. Near the end of that row of buildings, they found another small alleyway between buildings. It was marked with a smear of blood at the entrance. Easing their way down the narrow space, aware that they might stumble upon Samford at any moment and that he would likely be very unhappy to see them, she was relieved that Cornelius had drawn his pistol and had it at the ready.
But as they rounded a slight bend in the alley, they realized that the pistol, for Samford at least, was an unnecessary precaution. The man lay in the dirt and grime of the alley, bleeding from a cut across his temple. But it was the large gash in his waistcoat and the blood that pooled there that surprised them. There was no one else in sight and the alley came to a dead end. They were surrounded by brick walls on all sides, with only one way in or out.
“Who did this to you?” Cornelius asked.
Samford didn’t answer. He opened his mouth but only a rattle escaped him as his mouth filled with blood. Then the man’s eyes flared wide for a moment before settling into a sightless gaze.
“Has he been stabbed?” Prim asked. Could Miss Wyverne have taken the ultimate step in protecting herself?
“Shot,” Cornelius replied. “I can smell the powder.”
They hadn’t heard the sound, but muffled through layers and layers of brick, masked by the sounds of a busy working day for most, would they have? Prim didn’t know for certain, but she suspected they’d have only heard it if they’d been in that very alley at the time.
“So where is Miss Wyverne?”
“That is anyone’s guess.” Cornelius rose to his feet and faced her. “We’ll go back to the inn. I’ll write to her father and explain that Lord Samford has been killed and that Miss Wyverne is missing. We’ll summon the magistrate to deal with this and we’ll offer a reward for news of Miss Wyverne’s whereabouts.”
“And then we just return to London?” she asked. “She can’t have just disappeared.”
“There are thousands of people in this city, Primrose. We cannot ask them all if they have seen her. But we will stay for a few days. No doubt, there will be questions about Lord Samford and I will make arrangements to have his body transported back to his family for burial. It’s the least we can do for them.”
A sinking realization came upon her. “We failed her.”
“No. We did not. We did everything in our power to prevent Samford from forcing her into marriage. But she was strong and resourceful and escaped him on her own. We must maintain hope that she is resourceful enough to see herself back to her family, safe and sound.”
“And if she is not?” Prim asked.
“I cannot answer that. I will hire investigators to look for her, Primrose. I don’t think it unreasonable to imagine that her father will not go to any great lengths to do so. But at this point, we’ve lost all sight of her. We were following Samford all along, assuming he was hot on her trail… but now we must assume that he’s run afoul of someone else.”
“Where can she have gone? Will she hear that he has been killed and seek assistance? Or will she just continue running in fear and do more harm to herself than good?”
His lips firmed. “We can knock on every door and ask every passerby we meet. We may still turn up empty-handed, Primrose.”
Prim’s head dropped, her chin resting against her chest for a moment. “She must be terrified.”
“No doubt. And we will continue to do whatever we can to see to her safety. But our active part in searching for her is done. Can you live with that?”
Was there any other choice in the matter?
Chapter Thirty-Four
Disheartened, filled with doubts and fears for what might happen to a young woman alone, Prim walked numbly beside Cornelius as he led her back out of the alley, through the narrow and dangerous streets back to The Old Crown Inn. There was no dashing rescue, no sense of victory. Samford was dead, Miss Wyverne was missing and they were miles and miles from home with nothing to show for their journey except their own exhaustion and the undeniable feeling of failure.
At the inn, Prim took up residence once more in the small room they had claimed for their base of activity earlier in the day. The same serving girl brought in a fresh pot of tea and plate of small sandwiches. Prim had no appetite for them but ate them anyway, mechanically and without thought. She wasn’t so immune to the idea of scarcity of food that she would simply ignore it when placed in front of her.
It was flurry of activity. Magistrates were called, arrangements were made for the body to be claimed by the undertakers and prepared for its journey home. In all, it was hours of talking, of an endless stream of people in and out of their little corner. Prim continued to look out the window the whole while, hoping for some sign of Miss Wyverne who she might now at least recognize. But there was nothing. Outside that window, everything looked normal as people went to and from their jobs and children played.
In all, it was anticlimactic for her. The rush to find the young woman and save her had ended with no prize at all. The villain was defeated, not by their hands or hers, but by some unseen person. And all they were left with was so many unanswered questions.
“Are you all right?” Cornelius asked, finally sitting down across from her.
“I think I’m very tired. I don’t think I realized how tired until just now,” she admitted. “What will happen now?”
“The magistrate sees no need for an inquest since we both stumbled upon him together. As I only had one pistol with me and it had not been discharged, he is not questioning my innocence, at least. That is something. Perhaps he is unfamiliar with my reputation?”
Her lips quirked at his attempt at self-deprecating humor. “You shot one man, Cornelius. That hardly makes you the villain of the century.”
He shrugged. The gesture was deceptively casual but from the dark shadows beneath his eyes, it was obvious that he was as exhausted as she was. It had been more than a day since either one of them had slept or had a decent meal.
“One is all it takes,” he stated simply. “The magistrate has taken a description of Miss Wyverne and will have a group of men scouring the streets for any sign of her. I think, most likely, she has fled and is trying to make her way back home. Descriptions will be provided to the drivers of any public coaches in the off chance that she is attempting to get home by way of the stage. We’ve done all we can, Primrose. Samford was our only lead and, terrible yet unintended pun it may be, he was a dead end.”
Prim asked the one question that kept circling back around in her mind. “You don’t think she killed him, do you? Even if she had, he’d abducted her… but it makes no sense.”
“The magistrate said it himself, and had I been thinking clearly, I would have reached the same conclusion. If Miss Wyverne had been in possession of a firearm, then Samford would never have gotten her out of Bath, much less all the way to Stoke-on-Trent. They were three days in a carriage together. The horses pulling that rented carriage and the driver who is long gone now are done for. He drove them into the ground. I doubt they stopped many places at all, and
I doubt that she would have been given enough freedom at any of them to obtain and secret away a weapon.”
There was more than was being said, but Prim’s exhaustion kept her from being able to hit upon it fully. But then, it was as if a veil lifted, and the horrifying realization came crashing in on her. “The man who shot him might well have Miss Wyverne now. It may very well be that she never escaped from him fully, at all. She simply traded one captor for another.”
“We do not know that.”
Prim’s eyebrows shot up. “I didn’t realize how honest you have been with me from the start until just now. You’re a terrible liar, Cornelius.”
He sighed heavily and then steepled his hands on the table in front of him. “We don’t know it. It’s highly suspected by everyone at hand though. Miss Wyverne, given her limp, the fact that her walking stick was shattered in the street there when she struck Samford, would likely not have been able to get away so cleanly. Not unless she was taken up in a carriage or cart by someone else.”
“It’s all for naught,” she said.
“No it isn’t. Had we not been here, had we not known that Samford had taken her in the first place, no one would even know that Miss Wyverne had even been here, much less that she is in danger. Our role in her story is not to be her saviors, Primrose, but the cryer sounding her disappearance,” he explained. “And for now, we must content ourselves with that.”
“And now what do we do?”
“We rest. I’ve procured a room for the night. Our bags are still with the carriage but the driver will bring them over. We will recuperate here and tie up any loose ends tomorrow. And then we shall go on an adventure together… one that is not quite so fraught with worry.”
A smile curved her lips. “An adventure?”
“Did you know that I own a castle in Scotland and I’ve never set eyes upon it?”
“I did not know that,” she admitted. “But I am not surprised by it. A castle?”
He leaned forward. “We’ll go there for a week or two, enjoy the Highlands together. And if you’d like, perhaps we can send for your siblings and bring them to Scotland in time for Christmas.”
“I’ve never been to Scotland. I imagine it’s a wild enough place to keep Rowan entertained and offers enough vistas for watercolors that Lila would be thrilled.”
He took her hand in his, holding it gently, his thumb stroking over the lines that crisscrossed her palm. “You don’t have your heart set on spending the holiday in London, then?”
“I think that I have my heart set on spending the holiday with you, wherever that may be. This holiday, and every one thereafter. How did you do this to me, Cornelius? How, with little more than a glance and a few stolen kisses, did you sway me so easily that I cannot bear to be parted from you now?”
“Well, I’m handsome. Wealthy. Titled. And I think I was infatuated with you the first moment I laid eyes on you… but I knew I loved you when you demanded that we go haring off on a wild chase to save a girl you didn’t even know.”
Prim’s breath caught. “What did you just say?”
“That I love you. Does that really surprise you?”
“Yes,” she admitted. “It does.”
“Why? Do you think me incapable or do you think yourself unlovable?”
It was a hard question to answer, but Prim tried to answer it honestly. “I loved my mother. I love my sisters and my brother. But I never believed in romantic love. I always thought it was just something silly young girls convinced themselves of and that men used to get what they wanted. That sounds very cynical, doesn’t it?”
“It does, but you aren’t entirely wrong. It is those things frequently… but not always.”
“I know that. But I also thought that if love happened between a man and a woman it was a gradual thing. Attraction, understanding, and then one day you’ve been with this person for so long and you just think they’re part of your family now, part of the little corner of the world you’ve dug out for yourself. I didn’t know then that a person could simply walk into your life one day and instantly be important, instantly be a part of you. But I think you were.” It was a hard thing for her to say, to admit that kind of vulnerability, but she wanted to be honest with him. She wanted him to know that his feelings were returned and she needed him to understand that she wasn’t simply saying it because he had, that she meant it with all of her heart. “I was afraid of you from the first. Not because I thought you were a bad man or because I believed you to be dishonest. I was scared of you, Cornelius, because from the very first moment when you stepped into that little cottage where I’d been so safe and so isolated—”
Primrose stopped. She needed to gather her wits.
“What is it, Primrose? There’s nothing you can’t tell me.”
She nodded. “That day, you walked in and I knew that it was different. Not that you were, but that when you were present, I was different. I don’t want to be that girl anymore, Cornelius. I don’t want to be afraid of who I am and I don’t want to lock myself away behind cynicism and disdain. I think I loved you before I even knew you. I almost feel like I’d spent my whole life waiting for you to appear, only I didn’t know it until it happened.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Those words, uttered so hesitantly but with such feeling, were a balm to both his heart and his ego. He’d almost settled himself with the idea that he would love her and she would only ever tolerate him. It had hurt more than he could say, but the thought of not having her at all was simply not something he would entertain. One-sided love was better than no love at all.
“Come upstairs with me,” he said.
“I know you must be exhausted,” she offered.
“I am tired, Prim. But not so tired that I am ready to pass up this opportunity. I want to make you my wife in every way. No more doubts, no more delays. Only the two of us starting our life together now.”
He didn’t ask for an answer, but held out his hand. When he felt her small hand settle in his, a breath he hadn’t even known he was holding rushed out of him. As discreetly as possible, he led her from the public areas of the inn and up the stairs to the room he’d procured for them. The serving girl had stated it was the finest room in the establishment, but by inn standards that hardly meant much. Still, it was warm, a fire burning in the hearth. The curtains were drawn to keep out the chill and the large bed in the center of the room was freshly made with clean linens. It wasn’t luxurious, but it was private and, for the moment, that was all that mattered.
The door closed, the soft snick of the lock clicking into place was the only sound in the room. Cornelius turned to face her. Not for the first time. Even exhausted beyond measure, disheartened and disappointed by the outcome of their journey, she was still the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.
Closing the distance between them, he simply took her in his arms and kissed her. He claimed her lips and plundered the sweetness there with one intent—to wipe away any lingering doubts and to banish any painful memories. He wanted her to be so focused on what was occurring between them, that nothing from her past would have an opportunity to intrude.
She sank against him, soft, pliant and more tempting than any woman he’d ever known. And she kissed him back, her lips moving beneath his in the sweetest supplication. The tentative touch of her hands at his shoulders, along the back of his neck, then her small fingers threading through his hair felt like a victory that should be shouted from the rooftops.
But he wasn’t content to just taste her lips. He kissed her neck, the soft curve of her jaw, the delicate shell of her ear, and that perfect curve where her neck and shoulder met. When he felt her hands pressing against his chest, pushing him back, he didn’t resist, but his disappointment was short-lived. With an arm’s length between them now, Cornelius watched in utter wonderment as she loosened the front of her gown, and then carefully pushed it down to where the flare of her hips briefly halted its progress. With the dark blue fabric pooled at he
r feet, the white lawn of her petticoat soon followed. Then she stood before him clad only in her chemise and stays.
He wanted to touch her, to feel the indentation of her waist beneath his palms as it gave way to the lush curve of her hips. But when he approached her, she stopped him once more.
“I think it’s only fair that you should be as undressed as I am,” she insisted.
A grin curved his lips. “Never let it be said that I am not a fair man.” Quickly, he stripped off his boots and his jacket. His waistcoat followed and then he stood before her in only his breeches and shirt. “Is this enough?”
“For now,” she said.
He’d thought she would be fearful, but he should have known better. Primrose, despite everything she had endured in her life, was no meek and timid woman.
Lifting her in his arms, he carried her to the bed and placed her in the center of it. As she knelt there, he reached for the laces of her stays and tugged them free. A blush stained her cheeks, but she made no move to pull away or hide herself from him. When the task was done and one less of her garments remained between them, he waited for her to return the favor. He was not disappointed. Her delicate hands reached for his shirt, tugging it free from his breeches and then pulling it up and over his head until it, too, could be tossed aside.
Cornelius paused for a moment to look at her. The linen of her chemise was so fine it was nearly transparent. He could see the curves of her breasts, the dusky pink-tipped peaks beckoning him. He wanted to see all of her, to commit every perfect inch of her to memory. As if she’d sensed that thought, she reached up and released the ties of her chemise, the neck gaping wide. The garment slithered over her skin, finally pooling at her knees on the bed and baring every lush and beautiful part of her in between.
The Awakening of Lord Ambrose (The Lost Lords Book 6) Page 21
