Mistress by Midnight

by Nicola Cornick

  Merryn saw Garrick take a step after them and grabbed his arm. “Don’t,” she said. She realized that her voice was thick with tears. Lord Croft’s derisive words rang in her ears.

  Let bygones be bygones, eh, Lady Merryn, for the sake of thirty thousand pounds…

  Everyone, she realized, knew about Garrick’s gift to them. No doubt it was the on dit, spoken of in every club, coffee shop and ballroom in London. Tess had probably boasted of it, told all her smart acquaintance of their newly acquired riches. A pain started in her chest. It was excruciating. She gave a little gasp. Her heart was pounding.

  Everyone would think that she had sold Stephen’s memory for thirty thousand pounds, that she had betrayed him and that she simply did not care that he had died. She felt hot and breathless, the misery clawing at her throat.

  “Excuse me,” she said, and her voice sounded high and tight. “I have to go now.”

  From a distance she could hear Garrick’s voice calling her name and there was anxiety in it and urgency and some other emotion she could not place but she ignored it, ignored him, because all she could feel, all she could think, was that people were right: she had sold her brother, she had betrayed his memory, because she should have stopped Joanna and Tess somehow, she should have seen what would happen, should have known what everyone would think, and she would never forgive herself.

  The late afternoon sunshine struck her in the eyes and she blinked. The noise of the street roared in her ears. Everything seemed too loud and too bright. Faces passed in a blur. She had a stitch in her side, she had been walking so fast. She stumbled a little, straightened, and tried to think. Her mind felt foggy. Simple matters, such as the way back to Tavistock Street, seemed impossible to grasp, so she set off walking again, quickly, to get away. She walked for ten minutes, blindly, thoughtlessly, until the coldness of the air started to penetrate her pelisse and finally made her realize that she needed to get home.

  Merryn looked about her seeing her surroundings clearly for the first time. She had gone the wrong way for she was in Great Russell Street now which was not perhaps the most salubrious area for a woman to find herself alone, but it was only a step back to the main road and a hackney carriage home.

  She turned on her heel, suddenly feeling exhausted and wretched and cold. Back in Tavistock Street Joanna and Tess would be preparing for a dinner that evening and no one would understand how she felt, no one would share her feelings, no one would in all probability notice that she was any different from normal. They would be happy because Alex could afford to make repairs to his estate now and give Chessie a dowry and Tess could buy yet more new clothes and nobody cared that Stephen was dead.

  Her footsteps dragged on the cobbles. It was not much farther. As she reached the corner there was an extraordinary sound like the sharp crack of thunder overhead, then a roar that grew louder and louder until her ears rang with it and the ground beneath her feet shook. She could hear screaming and spun around, and in that moment something hit her with tremendous force, knocking her off her feet. She went down onto the cobbles, tumbled over and over like a rag doll, boneless, like flotsam on the tide. She was blinded by water; or at least it felt like water, but it was dark and it smelled strange, sweaty and brackish. She gulped for air but instead the liquid filled her lungs, making her choke. It tasted thick and malty and she thought it was going to smother her. Then her flailing hand caught the edge of something firm and she held on for dear life as the flow swept past her and dropped her hard, coughing and spluttering, in the doorway of what had once been a house.

  Merryn sat up. Around her the flood lapped in dirty waves, plastering her clothes to her body, washing all manner of objects past her: a broken chair, a child’s toy, even a dead cat. The smell, sweet and rich, was everywhere, filling her nostrils. Her chest hurt from coughing. Her mind felt blank with shock. She did not seem able to think. It was like pushing at a closed door. She struggled to her feet.

  There was another roar of sound, even louder than the first, and she looked up to see a solid wave of blackness rolling toward her. If she had had even the slightest flicker of breath left it would have been the first time in her life that she screamed. Then someone caught her hard about the waist, drawing her beneath him, sheltering her with his body. The wave broke over them, followed by the crack and scrape of falling masonry. The house was coming down.

  It was her final thought.

  IT WAS PITCH-BLACK and cold and wet, and Garrick could see nothing, but he could move and he could breathe. He ached all over but miraculously he appeared to have broken no bones. In his arms, Merryn was still breathing, too. Garrick felt relief, huge and overwhelming, and gratitude, and another emotion that he did not want to define but that grabbed his heart and squeezed it tight like a giant fist. He had reached Merryn in time. He had been able to save her. Thank God. He pressed his lips to her hair for one heartfelt moment and breathed in the scent of her, long and deep. Her softness, her sweetness, steadied him. He felt an enormous, primitive need to protect and defend her, to hold her and keep her safe.

  Very cautiously he shifted his grip on her so that she was settled more comfortably in his lap, her head in the crook of his shoulder. Merryn instinctively nestled closer to him, seeking the warmth and comfort of his arms, murmuring something he could not hear. She was not heavy but for a small woman she was no lightweight, either, and Garrick had suffered untold cuts and bruises when the house fell. His head, in particular, felt like a ball that had sustained a prolonged kicking. He tightened his arms about her, drawing her closer. The movement jarred him but he gritted his teeth against the pain.

  Merryn moved again. Groaned. She was waking up.

  “Where am I?” she said. She sounded frightened. There was nothing but darkness around them and the weight of rubble pressing down on them and the taste of dust in the air.

  “It’s all right,” Garrick said. “You’re safe.” His throat felt thick with the dirt and dust. He coughed, started again. “There was an accident, a flood—”

  “You?” She had recognized his voice and she did not sound pleased. There was an edge to her tone that suggested anxiety and relief together, an odd mixture. Waking in the dark, Garrick thought, in a stranger’s arms would be terrifying. Waking to discover that she was trapped with him only marginally less disturbing.

  He felt Merryn try to move again, levering herself upright, a maneuver that only served to press her rounded buttocks into his groin all the more firmly. She winced. So did Garrick, but for different reasons. For a second the unwelcome stab of arousal was almost enough to distract him from the pain in his head.

  “What are you doing here?” Merryn demanded. “Were you following me again?”

  “Yes,” Garrick said. He was not going to pretend. They were trapped alone together in the darkness. Any pretense between them now was impossible. “You were going the wrong way to get to Tavistock Street,” he said. “You were upset and I was worried about you. I thought you might lose yourself in a rookery and get into trouble. Which you did,” he added, “though not quite as I had imagined.”

  There was silence. Then, “You were worried about me?” Merryn repeated. There was an odd note in her voice.

  “Yes,” Garrick said. “Croft’s words distressed you. I am sorry for that.” He had seen the stricken look in her eyes as Croft had made his malicious remarks. Merryn did not deserve such cruelty. For a moment he felt a wave of utter fury wash through him again. He clenched his fists and wished he had planted the young peer a facer. That would have given the ton something else to gossip about.

  “It is of no consequence.” Merryn sounded prickly, her tone warning him to keep his distance. Garrick knew she was trying to protect herself, that she did not want him to see the depth of her hurt. He suspected that for anyone to imply that she had been bought off in the matter of her brother’s death would be intolerable for her.

  “Yes, it is,” he said. “It is of consequence.”

  Th
is time she did not deny it. She was quiet again for a moment. “You said that there had been a flood,” she said. “I remember now. There was a wave of dirty water…” She still sounded dazed. She put out a cautious hand and touched Garrick’s thigh, recoiling as though burned when her fingers brushed the soaking material of his pantaloons. Garrick grinned to himself as she rolled off his knee with more haste than finesse. There was a splash as she landed in the beer again.

  “Why are we sitting in a pool of water?” she demanded.

  “It’s beer,” Garrick said. “The buildings are flooded with beer.”

  “Beer!” She sounded startled. Then her voice changed. “That smell! I wondered what it was.”

  “I think the vat on top of the brewery in Tottenham Court Road must have burst,” Garrick said. “I’ve seen it happen before when a liquid ferments and puts pressure on the vat. The hoops snap and the beer pours out in a flood.”

  “There was a sound like thunder, or cannon.” Merryn’s voice was still ruffled, a sign of her distress. “I am not describing it well,” she added, “but I have never heard an explosion before.”

  Garrick smiled, there in the dark. How many women, he wondered, would be concerned at their lack of eloquence in a situation like this? Only Merryn Fenner would need the right word for the right occasion. Most other women he had known would be having the vapors or swooning. Not Merryn. She was more concerned with her vocabulary. He felt another rush of emotion, swift and sharp, admiration for her and something more, something deeper.

  He sensed her shift toward him in the darkness although she was careful not to make physical contact again. Garrick could not see her because the gloom was stifling, like a blanket. It felt thick and heavy and it was starting to feel hot as well, as though they were inside a fermenting vat. The air seemed weighed down with the smell of the malt. Garrick could hear Merryn breathing in quick, light pants, and knew she was afraid. She was very close and he sensed she was facing him now. If he lifted a hand he thought it would touch the curve of her cheek. He wanted to touch her very much, and not just to reassure her. There was something knowing about the dark, something intimate that stripped away all layers of pretense and all formality.

  “I assume that we are trapped?” Merryn asked. “Or we would not still be sitting here.”

  “I’m afraid we are,” Garrick said. “The house came down on top of us. We are on the ground floor but there is no way out.” He could see no point in lying to her. She was an intelligent woman. She would soon work it all out for herself.

  “I remember the walls falling.” She sounded a little more composed now but with all his senses alert Garrick could feel other emotions in her. There was the fear she was trying very hard to repress and also to hide from him, as though she was afraid it was a sign of weakness. There was anger, too. He could understand that. He was surely the last man on earth that she would want to be trapped with here in the intimate dark.

  “Is there really no way out?” she said. There was a tiny catch in her voice. “I…I do not care for enclosed spaces.”

  “I don’t know,” Garrick said. “We won’t be able to tell until daylight returns.”

  He had already been thinking about their chances of escape. With all the chaos and destruction from the explosion it was possible that it might take rescuers days to sift through all the rubble but at least the daylight might show up little cracks and gaps in the fallen masonry, a weakness or a way out. There was air in their prison, so he knew it was not totally sealed off from the outside world. In the morning he would start searching for a way to escape. Until then though the two of them were captive.

  “It is night now?” This time the quiver in Merryn’s voice was much clearer. Enclosed spaces combined with the long dark reaches of the winter night… Garrick could almost feel her shudder.

  “Yes,” he said. “It must be some time near midnight now. You were unconscious for quite a long time.” He put out a hand to her. “I should have asked you before—are you injured?”

  “No!” She spoke very quickly, moving a little away from him, rejecting his comfort. Garrick let his hand fall. “I don’t know why I fainted,” she said. She sounded defensive.

  “Shock, perhaps,” Garrick said. “Fear.”

  “That makes me seem dreadfully feeble.” Now she sounded uncomfortable, as though there was more than a ring of truth in his words.

  “Don’t be too hard on yourself,” Garrick said. “Most people with any sense would be frightened in this situation.”

  “Are you?” Merryn asked.

  Damn it. She had such a talent for putting him on the spot.

  “I have been in worse situations,” Garrick said carefully.

  She laughed. “You do not like to admit to fear?”

  “What man would?”

  “Oh, male pride…” She sounded dismissive. “If you had denied it outright I would have thought you a fool or a liar or both.”

  “Thank you,” Garrick said ruefully.

  “Not at all.” She shifted. “Perhaps someone will rescue us soon.”

  Despite her bravado, Garrick could hear how desperately she hoped that would true.

  “They’ll have to tear themselves away from drinking all the beer first,” he said.

  She gave a gasp of laughter. “You think they would put drink above people’s lives?”

  “This is a poor neighborhood,” Garrick said, “and free beer is free beer no matter how it is delivered.”

  Merryn was quiet. The darkness wrapped about them dense and malty and hot. In the silences, Garrick thought, he could sense Merryn slipping away from him, feel her fear creep closer, feel her thoughts turning dark. A moment later she caught his sleeve. Her fingers brushed his wrist, sending a deep shiver of awareness through him.

  “You saved my life,” she said. She took a breath. “I wish it had not been you.” She sounded very unhappy. “I wish it had been anyone but you.”

  Garrick gave a short laugh. “I’ll take that as gratitude,” he said. This time he did reach out and touch her cheek. It felt soft and dusty beneath his fingers. She drew back sharply.

  “When it comes to life and death,” he said slowly, “you cannot afford to be too particular about who saves you, Lady Merryn. That is something I do know.”

  There was a silence. He could hear Merryn breathing again, quick and ragged. He knew she was fighting a battle with herself against the fear that oppressed her. She gave a juddering little hiccup and Garrick felt her raise her hands, scrubbing away what must have been tears from her face. His instinct, fierce and immediate, was to reach out to try to comfort her but he held back. He knew his touch would be the last thing she wanted. Besides, he was having trouble keeping his own mind from plumbing the depths of disaster. He knew that their prospects were not good. No one knew that they were there. They could be walled up until they starved to death, they could be crushed by another fall of masonry, they could drown, they could run short of air and be smothered or they might simply go mad. Garrick closed his eyes and forced away all the images of death and catastrophe by sheer force of will. The effort made his head pound all the more. He tried to think about Merryn, about the need to reassure her. It distracted him from his own pain and discomfort.

  “You do not need to be afraid of the dark,” he said. “It cannot hurt you.”

  “I know.” Her voice had eased a shade, as though talking made their captivity a tiny bit easier to bear. “I was locked in a chest once when I was young,” she said. “It was so small and dark and hot, just like this. I could not move and I thought I would never be found and that I would die like the girl in a Gothic novel I had read.”

  “Which just goes to show how dangerous reading can be,” Garrick said. “Why were you in the chest in the first place?”

  “I was playing hide-and-seek with Joanna and Tess,” Merryn said. He could hear her voice warm into amusement. The memory was distracting her. “I wanted to hide somewhere they would never find me,
” she said, “just to prove that I was cleverer than they were.” Her amusement died. “Unfortunately I chose too well.”

  “Presumably they were cleverer than you had anticipated,” Garrick pointed out, “or you would not be here.” He paused. “Why did you feel you had something to prove?”

  Merryn did not reply for a moment. Garrick waited. It was odd not being able to see her. He had nothing on which to judge her responses other than hearing and intuition. But the darkness seemed to have sharpened his senses other than sight. He could read all the little nuances in Merryn’s voice. Her emotions were reflected in her breathing: her fear, her unhappiness and her determination not to crack and give in to weakness. He could smell her, too, the faint scent of flowers mixed with dust and beer in her hair and on her skin. He ached to touch her.

  After a moment Merryn answered his question. He could hear reluctance in her voice, as though she were confiding a secret almost against her will.

  “Jo and Tess were both so pretty,” she said ruefully, “and I was not. All I had was my book learning.”

  Garrick remembered her telling him that he should address his gallantries to her sisters because she had no interest or experience in the art of flirtation.

  “You look just like they do,” he said. “No one could doubt that you are related.”

  He could feel her amazement. “No, I do not! I don’t look like them at all! I am short where they are statuesque.”

  “You are smaller than your sisters, perhaps, but more of a perfect miniature.”

  She did not appear to have heard him. “And I am fair whereas Jo is dark and Tess has dark red hair.”

  “Blond hair is just as pretty,” Garrick pointed out. “Prettier.”

  “And my eyes are not violet-blue.”

  “No, they are more like sapphires.”

  “And my nose is snub.” Merryn sounded defiant, as though this were the clinching argument.

  “True,” Garrick agreed.