A scant mile back on the path trod by the big red-haired man and his retainer, the dark haired woman stopped her cart in the narrowest section of road. She handed a mallet to the man in the back.
The cart bed shimmied and pitched as they both climbed down, the mare rolling her eyes in a foolish fashion.
“Cálmate, querida cora—” She caught herself and stroked the horse’s nose.
She had slipped from the English. She did not usually do that. Seeing the girl with the besotted man she’d taken as a lover was making her heart ache just a bit. How foolish they both were, like this lovely horse, not knowing that she, Mrs. Nichols, was here to help them.
She went to work on the tack, ignoring the man’s stare, while keeping an eye on his movements. He was one of two ruffians she’d hired for a great deal of money.
She clucked her tongue at the horse as she worked, and led her away from the traces. The cart dipped on the shafts.
“Now,” she said.
He grinned, smashing at the spokes, destroying one wheel and pushing the cart on its side, blocking the road completely. Shaldon’s noble son would stop for this cart. He would wonder if the girl had been on it.
The brute picked up the mallet and approached. She slid a hand into a pocket and he stopped, a sly grin revealing yellowed, gapped teeth. “Is there aught else, Mrs. Nichols?”
As a nom de guerre, Mrs. Nichols was working out well. A dropping of the eyelids, a turn down of the lips, a ducking of the head, and no one questioned a soldier’s foreign widow, especially not one so clearly struggling to, as the English said, keep up appearances. There had been those sideways looks, filled with speculation. After all, she was today a Frenchwoman, and not so far past the breeding age.
However, she’d seen right away, with all the laborers traipsing about, she’d stick out following the girl’s path from Scotland.
She whipped her hand out, a coin flying at him. The mallet fell softly, and he snatched up the bit of silver. “That’s the rest of your payment.”
Mouth curling, his gaze on her narrowed. The smaller of the two men, he’d come along for this last bit of work.
After he’d used that mallet on his comrade.
Another coin flew. “And this for that extra bit of trouble.”
He rubbed both coins together. “An’ how ‘bout an extra bit of summat else?”
These English men were no different than the Spanish, no different than the French, no different than the Portuguese, the Austrians, the Italians, the Belgians.
Men were men, and it was blissful they could not see past the shape of her bosom.
“Here we are, all alone,” he growled.
She brought out the pistol, making him smirk.
“Here now. Don’t want to use that. They’ll hear the blast in the next county and come running.”
“Oh.” She let her voice and hand quiver. “You are most certainly right.”
He stepped closer, and she edged back, the brush at the side of the road catching her skirts. Her boot slipped in a muddy patch and she went down on one knee, the pistol hitting the soft dirt a yard from her.
His cackle cracked the silence, his eyes flitting between her and the gun.
“There now,” he said. “Knew we’d come to an agreement.” He nudged the gun aside with his foot and began fumbling with his fall. “Lift up your skirts and let’s have a go.”
She edged further down the embankment, closer to the overgrown hedge of a farmer’s field. “I’ve already paid you.”
“Well, you’re a little bit more, aren’t you, a little thing like you. And then there’s the rest of them coins in your—”
He choked, eyes widening, and grabbed for his throat where the dagger had stuck. He jerked at it, sending an arc of blood over the damp ground, and fell forward, releasing the blade.
She watched until the twitching stopped.
Oh yes, she was at a prime age to take charge of those who crossed her path. Or who crossed her.
She frowned, bent for the weapons, and retrieved her coins. Except for those very few, who would see through the game she played? There were two such in this group of the girl’s pursuers. In the other group—bah, Agruen was a snake in his own adder pit. His retainers had no loyalty. One only had to find the key and the right way to twist it. Money usually, or sometimes a swiving. She had little of the first and would not give away the latter, but she would think of something.
She considered moving the man into the brush and decided against it. Let them find him splattered along the road. His presence would be yet one more distraction.
She dragged the saddle that had fallen from the cart bed. The mare eyed her and ducked her head twice.
“Ah, this is what you like, clever girl.” She stroked the long nose. “If I could I would take you home with me.”
The horse pranced and shook, accepting the saddle, and allowing herself to be led into a thicket, where Mrs. Nichols stripped out of her gown, tied on a neck cloth and mounted.
Paulette strode confidently next to Bink, balancing their gear at both sides, goggling like the rustic she was pretending to be.
She’d never seen so many people in one place at one time. Bink had insisted it would be like this until well into the wee hours, and then had told her to shut up, quite rudely, because they’d been passing some men on the street, and it was his way of making her duck her head.
Along the way he’d explained the geography—Hampstead, and Mayfair, the East End, and the City, just as though he was talking to an ignorant servant boy.
The City was where they would go tomorrow to visit Mr. Tellingford, the solicitor who held her trust. Her trustees were no longer part of her mission. She was married now, and the trust was ended. Their marriage had been recorded at Gretna, and Bink had the proof stored away in a pocket. That much she knew.
She caught the eye of a well-dressed young lady no older than herself and quickly dropped her eyes and her shoulders.
He’d explained she must slump and act servile. That was why he’d saddled her with carrying the small satchels that weren’t truly heavy yet were making her arms ache.
“How much further, master?” She pitched her voice lower. They’d walked for miles, it seemed, since checking their horses in at a stable.
“Shush, boy.”
They turned a corner. Bink stopped abruptly and entered a store. It was a gentleman’s store, thank the Lord. Had it been one of the ladies’ shops they’d passed, she would have been taxed beyond all ability to not ooh and ah.
The shop clerk approached and asked if he could help them.
“My Lord’s arrival from the country is imminent, and he wants his manservants in new livery.”
She’d heard Bink adopt this clipped aristocratic accent before, but never with so long a nose, as if he was his Lordship himself. He’d wiped the haughty look right off the clerk’s face, and explained the hideous coating of road dust they both bore, all in one sentence. For all his dislike of spies, perhaps he’d done some spying himself. She must ask him.
“I’ve hired a tailor for the coats and the trousers, but the other garments—”
“Certainly, we can help you. And this will be for Lord…”
Bink studied a display of linens. “How quickly can you deliver?”
Perspiration dotted the man’s brow. “We have the largest stock in London and tailors at the ready. I could fit out your boy here tonight. Er, how many servants are we speaking about?”
“Four footmen, two houseboys, six grooms, and the butler of course.”
“You are not the butler?”
The gaze he leveled the man would wither the bark off a tree. “I am his Lordship’s steward.”
The man took a step back and bowed. “Of course, of course. Er, which lord is it?”
“You will know that when I return, tomorrow or the next day.” Bink handed him a coin. “For your trouble. Now show us your back exit.”
The man blinked twice.
Bink
handed him another coin. “I shall give you the sale when I return. I shall ask for you.”
What passed just then, Paulette wasn’t sure, but the man’s face went blank and he beckoned them to follow him.
The alley outside was fetid and smelly and darkly shadowed.
Apprehension ate at her gut, just as Jock had described in the stories he’d told, and her tired muscles started to rebel.
Bink took the packages from her and nudged her close to the wall. There was no one around, but later, she imagined this alley would be quite dangerous.
“There are watchers,” he said in a whisper no louder than a breath.
Watchers. On the street. So they must be close, yet they could not go there. Unless…
“The back way?”
She felt his head shake, and with it, she felt his worry.
“An inn?”
Another shake of the head. Of course. They’d talked about that. Agruen would check every inn and public lodging. He’d have spies there, looking for them.
“Do you trust me, love?” he whispered.
“Of course.” The words were out before she could think, and that made her want to laugh.
“I’ve just the place.” He squeezed her hand. “I’ll explain on the way.”
Bink’s gaze swept the alley as they progressed through it. There was no one about, not hidden under a beggar’s pile, or behind a crate. No sign of life whatsoever. Later, when full dark fell, there would be plenty of action, there on that rack of boxes, or there, in that recessed doorway.
He pushed back the fear threatening to swamp him. He must channel it into his muscles, like he’d done before battle. This wasn’t so different. The boy watching the street might not have been Agruen’s, yet he’d lit a warning flare in that sixth sense Bink had honed so well in Zebediah Gibson’s home, in school, and later on the Peninsula.
He led her around, through a series of mews and across into a street, reckoning they’d reached Bloomsbury. Paulette accepted the small bag with her box stoically and kept pace with him. It would be a long walk, though as a country woman, she’d probably walked farther than this every day going back and forth to the village.
He spotted no lurkers about in the street, but kept the pace brisk, checking at corners for more watchers. To her credit, she kept silent. He could see the wheels of her mind turning like the inner workings of a clock, wondering what he’d spotted, what she’d missed, what she should look for.
She trusted him. She’d said that without hesitation, in a way that made his blood soar. And he doubted she was thinking about where they would stay. It would be yet another new experience for her if Betty took them in.
And he would have a great deal of explaining to do.
Paulette’s feet ached and her stockings bunched in the heels of her boots. She did not want to complain though.
“This is Mayfair,” Bink said, still speaking quietly though the walkers had thinned.
She glanced at the large townhouses. At this hour, Bink said, people were dressing for sumptuous dinners, the ladies in fine gowns, the men in their brocaded waistcoats, like the ones they’d seen in the shop windows. Hunger uncurled in her stomach, and the dogged fatigue lifted with a surge of anticipation.
“We’re going to the Hackwells’?”
“No. We’ll seek help from another of her ladyship’s acquaintances.”
“Her friend from the children’s home? Lady…ah, what was her name?”
His silence lasted past a row of carriages, the horses being held by liveried men, their presence distracting her. She checked each in turn in what she hoped passed for rustic awe, surreptitiously looking for evidence of Agruen. Danger seemed nowhere, and everywhere, her ignorance was so grave. Jock hadn’t prepared her for this.
They’d reached a square edged with great houses before he again spoke. “Friends of Annabelle Harris might find succor at places high or low. Where we’re going happens to be one of the low ones.”
The houses were far too grand to be low, but she kept her own counsel and followed him. They came at last to a lane where the houses were, indeed, smaller, closer, yet still genteel. He passed it, turned into yet another back alley, and went on to a plain wooden gate.
She’d tried to store their itinerary in her head, but she was hopelessly lost. She must learn her way around London’s byways, if she was to spend time here with any sort of freedom.
Bink put his ear to the gate, and she copied him. The alley was deserted, quiet, and a good deal cleaner than the ones they had passed through earlier, and there was no noise within.
He opened the gate and they slipped inside.
Paulette looked around. This patch of flagstones and flowers was the first London residence she’d seen on the inside.
Lovely, it was. Someone with an eye for color and balance had put forth an effort here. There, where roses made a heroic late summer burst, and there, where a patch of daisies budded tightly next to a showy phlox. Even her quiet mother would have exclaimed over this.
An outbuilding hugged the walls that hemmed everything in, this small bit of nature in a raucous city. Her mother would have loved the flowers, but she would have hated the smallness of it.
She struggled for a breath and tried to quell a dawning realization. She was a country woman, used to fields and byways, glens and brooks, stretches of ash hedges and thick stands of elm.
Confinement to this space would leave her permanently breathless.
A strong arm wrapped her and rolled her in to a broad chest. Bink stroked over her queue of hair cinched by a thin ribbon, where he’d lopped a full twelve inches with the scissors he’d reached for without searching—because he’d known they were in her case, because he’d poked through it himself earlier, when she wasn’t looking. Of course he had.
She’d chosen to defer the talk about that until later.
She lifted her chin and searched his face. He was as anxious as herself. That she should know him so well, that he’d help carry her troubles…
She dropped her gaze to his wide chest and blinked hard, her courage swelling.
“This house,” he still spoke in his gruff whisper, “used to be home to Lady Hackwell’s sister. The woman who lives here now was a friend to the sister and, in a manner of speaking, a friend to Lady Hackwell.” He dropped his bag and gripped both of her shoulders. “I have only ever visited the establishment on Lord Hackwell’s business. I have never been here… otherwise.”
Blood drummed in her ears. The lady must be another high-in-the-instep matron, another who would be turning cartwheels when she learned Bink was the son of an earl, and not just any earl but the anciently titled, incredibly wily, powerfully influential, Earl of Shaldon.
“Who’s there?” The voice was gruff, and when the man came out of the shadowy gangway, knife in hand, Bink whipped her around, gripping her tighter.
She peered around him and saw a tall, thin man, with a horribly scarred visage.
“Sergeant Gibson?”
Bink’s hold eased. “Rowland,” he growled.
In three strides the man was upon them, saluting, face grim, his eyes fixed on Bink.
She stepped out, and he dragged his gaze to her. He looked. Blinked. His eyes widened and his mouth dropped.
“Who’s about tonight?” Bink asked.
The man’s mouth flapped again but no sound came out.
“I haven’t mollied on you, Rowland. This is my wife and we’re in danger. Do you remember Josiah Dickson?”
Rowland’s face twisted into a gargoyle’s glare. “Aye.”
“So who’s about tonight?”
“No one, nor will there be anyone. Mrs. Townsend sent all of the ladies down to Hastings to take the sea air for a few days.”
All of the ladies.
Paulette’s brain worked through the meaning. Lady Hackwell ran a home for children, so perhaps this was a home for women who were in distress or ill. And wounded ex-soldiers.
She was not su
re that would be so safe. Lady Hackwell’s philanthropic concerns could be found by Agruen and Bakeley, and as easily watched.
“Here now,” Rowland wiped the knife off on his gloves, tucked it into a sheath, and picked up a bunch of cut roses.
She realized it had been a pruning knife, though no less deadly in this man’s hands. How else had he survived the terrible wound that marred what had once been a handsome face? “Your lady’s fair exhausted. Give me your bags, and we’ll go and see Mrs. Townsend.
Chapter 22
Now they were in the safety of a private establishment, Bink felt at liberty to tuck Paulette close.
He’d forgotten Rowland had found a place here. Betty’s clients were gentlemen, and not so above the common that more than one porter was required. Rowland’s face alone, burned by a cannon burst, usually put drunks on the right path, with no need for fists.
In the kitchen, a cook stirred a large pot, while a maid worked at a table—two more to worry about. Though both lived in, were not likely to remember him, and were, in an establishment like this, bribable.
Rowland deposited them in the tidy parlor Bink had visited before. It was stuffy, the sunset and August heat filling the room with otherwise invisible dust motes. He watched Paulette circling, examining the tasteful chairs and settees.
“Is this one of her ladyship’s shelters?” She turned questioning eyes on him, innocent eyes.
The words stuck in his throat, and by the time he dislodged them it was too late. The door opened and Betty swept in.
Paulette’s gaze went to the woman at the door. Tall and handsome, she was plainly dressed and coiffed, but rouge painted her lips and cheeks, and her bodice was cut so shockingly low it revealed all but her nipples.
“Sergeant Gibson.” A smile lit her face and she curtsied, as if he were the only man in the universe.
Jealousy sparked in her and threatened to burst through her fists. The woman was flirting with Bink, her husband. He, in return, was bowing, his hat clutched in his hand, the unruly hair at the back of his neck damp from the stifling heat. Paulette squared her shoulders and clomped over next to him.
The Bastard's Iberian Bride (Sons of the Spy Lord Book 1) Page 21
