The Most Eligible Bachelor Romance Collection: Nine Historical Romances Celebrate Marrying for All the Right Reasons
Page 22
A feminine voice floated up the stairs to him—Sally? No, her mother. He paused at the bottom step. Snuffling came from the direction of the kitchen. Softly, he crept down the hall to peer around the corner.
Sally stood at a table, back to him, stirring something in a bowl, but slowly. She stopped, her shoulders lifting and falling with a sigh, and one hand came up to swipe across her eyes.
His heart seized. Sally, crying? Had he done that, or—
Please, Lord, if You will, let her brother be well!
“Sally? Is aught amiss?”
His own voice startled him, and she spun with a gasp. Shadows rimmed her eyes, and aye, she’d been weeping. “Oh—I—nay, all is well.”
He let himself relax but a little. “Your brother?”
Another sniffle, but she waved her hand. “He’s better this morning, thankfully.”
“Ah.” He stood there, stupidly. Come on, man! Find your tongue again.
A scowl marred Sally’s fine brow. “You’re up late, aren’t you? Breakfast is in the great room, if your cousin hasn’t eaten it all—”
“Ah, Sam! There you are,” came Jed’s booming voice.
Sam gritted his teeth. Should he thank his cousin for the interruption, or pummel him?
It was more words than she’d ever heard at one time from the quiet wagon master—and he couldn’t have picked a worse time. Catching her mooning and blubbering over a bowl of blackberries, when she should have had the pies baking already.
Just for a second, though, he’d nearly caused her heart to stop, and for the most unaccountable reason….
She glanced away as Sam’s blustering cousin clapped him on the shoulder. “Late to rise again, I see! How many times have I told you to lay off the drink?”
Sally shot them both a sharp glance. Sam looked—what was that look? His head dropped, a single blond lock sweeping across a jaw gone completely crimson.
Something in her sank. “Where did you get drink? My father doesn’t like to serve anything stronger than watered ale, unless someone’s dying.”
Jed turned a too-wide grin on her. “Oh, Sam keeps a store in the wagon. Don’t you, Sam?”
Why was he so cheerful about it? Men. Bumbling clods, all.
With the possible exception of one…
She turned away. It hurt to breathe. “Begone, both of you. I have work to do.”
The hallway door to the outside slammed, and Johnny’s voice overlaid the patter of his running feet. “Jed! Sam! You’ll never guess! The Highwayman was here last night. In our town!”
Sally’s knees nearly buckled. Sweet Lord, have mercy. Word was out already?
Sam could feel his face blanch, and the sudden weight of Jed’s gaze upon him. “Was he, now?” his cousin drawled. But it was Sally who consumed all his attention—Sally, gripping the table as if her life depended on it, her own face gone pale.
Johnny was still jumping up and down. “Sally, did you hear? The Highwayman!”
“I hear,” she said, faintly.
The lad turned his grin upon Jed. “The chief justice is mad as a wet hen because he said the Highwayman accosted his son last night—but everyone knows that Willie Brown is nothing but trouble. Him and his boys—”
“Hold your tongue!”
The crackle of Sally’s voice yanked them all to attention, her dark eyes wide and more shadowed than before. Sam’s hands twitched with the sudden need to catch her close.
“Do you wish to get us all in trouble?” Sally went on, her voice lower. “It’s bad enough Willie Brown and the others run wild as they do, but this—”
Johnny and Jed gaped at her, but Sam did not move. Johnny said, “Well, the magistrate is fit to be tied. Swears he’ll catch the Highwayman once and for all—”
Fire crawled up Sam’s spine.
Sally reached behind her for a chair, and without thinking, Sam whisked one into place. She glanced up, her eyes glazed with distress, and murmured her thanks.
Her gaze found Johnny again. “What do they say happened?”
He could fix this. He could—
Nay. He should go. Now. Before his presence caught them all in the magistrate’s sights.
“Willie and his boys, they said the Highwayman challenged them. That they was minding their own business, and he stepped out and took to callin’ them names—”
Jed’s gaze was like to bore a hole in Sam. He backed out of the kitchen, taking a better grip on his boots and seizing Jed’s arm. Jed startled as if just now coming awake. “Pardon, Sally, but we’re long past needing to be on our way. Thank you kindly for breakfast.”
Who dragged who down the hallway to the great room was hard to say. They stumbled over each other at the edge of the buffet, and after a quick glance to make sure they were alone, Jed gave Sam a hard glare. “What in heaven’s name did you do last night?”
But Sam was hauling on his boots and pulling a spare cloth from his breeches pocket to wrap up a hasty breakfast from the buffet. Hanged if he’d answer that before being well away from here.
Chapter 4
She needed to compose herself. She had to.
But she stayed rooted to the chair, apron over her face.
She’d thought the affair over with when the Highwayman had chased the last of her attackers into the night. But it had just begun. “You’re naught but a tavern maid.” If Magistrate Brown was after the Highwayman in all this, Willie would make sure she suffered as well. Was there anyone within reach who could stop this madness?
“Lord God,” she choked, “oh God, help me.” A new fear lashed at her. “And help—help the Highwayman, whoever he is.”
Now where had that come from? Praying for someone she didn’t even know, who had played on her girlish affections as surely as Willie had sought to take advantage. Yet, she couldn’t shake the conviction that he needed the prayer.
Wherever he was.
“Sally! Whatever ails you?”
She startled upright, hastily uncovering her face and wiping her tears at Mama’s concerned inquiry. “‘Tis naught. Truly.”
Mama gave her a long look. “Well. See that you finish that pie in time for luncheon, then.”
“Aye, Mama.”
She settled herself at the table’s edge once more, surveying the bowl of sweetened berries, the sack of flour, the rolled-out pie crust at the ready. She should put the crust in the pie dish first—
“Sweetheart? Is all well?”
Her father this time. She clapped a hand over her heart. “Papa! Have a care in startling people.”
He smiled, but his dark eyes still shone with concern, as Mama’s had. And rather than leaving quickly, he took a step forward. “And I ask again, are you well?”
She straightened, wiping her hands on her apron. “Of—of course, Papa.”
He peered into her face, his broad features calm. “Jed and Sam left just now.”
“Aye.” Where was he going with this? She flicked a hand. “They were late getting on their way. Sam—slept too long.”
She swallowed past a sudden burn at the reminder that quiet, dependable Sam was secretly a drunkard.
“Well. It’s interesting, that. Before he left, young Sam asked me to tell you not to believe anything ill you might hear about him.” Her father’s gaze became uncommonly sharp. “What would you know about that?”
Sally swayed a little. Her thoughts were a perfectly clean slate. “I have no idea.”
“So, you know naught about whether the lad harbors some secret affection for you?”
“Sam? Nay!” But even as she said it, she could see again the deep flush that stained his face at Jed’s jibe over the drink.
The little smile was back on Papa’s face. “Nay?” But when she only stared at him, the look turned sad. “You’re nearly twenty, sweet girl. I know you don’t want to be working for your papa forever, that you need a home and family of your own—”
“I’m happy here,” she protested, but his hand brushed her e
lbow, and the smile returned, more tender this time.
“Shh, daughter. I’ll not be offended if you admit you long for a bit more than this.” He started to turn away and hesitated. “And Sam is a good lad. If he ever finds the pluck to speak his mind, you should listen.”
If Sam ever—? Nay. Last night, Sam hardly spared her a look. Men were distractible creatures, true, especially where their feed was concerned, but—nay.
Besides, last night—
“Papa?”
Her father stopped at the doorway and glanced back.
“Papa.” Sally clutched her apron then forced herself to smooth the fabric against her skirt. “There is something I must tell you.”
He turned, waiting.
She took a breath, plunged on before she could lose the moment. “The Highwayman’s appearance last night. He—he defended me, from Willie Brown and his cronies.”
Papa’s gaze narrowed, and his mouth hardened.
“After taking word to the doctor that Mama needed him for Jacky, I stopped at Polly’s. And lingered, when I shouldn’t have, but—I was nearly home when Willie and his boys stopped me.”
“Were you harmed?” he asked, in a quiet, dangerous voice she’d never heard.
“N–nay.”
“Thank the good Lord for that!”
She bobbed a nod. “But, I might have been, if—if he had not come.” She swallowed. “I do not know why he was there, but I was grateful.”
“As well you should be.” He rubbed a hand across his mouth and jaw. “Did he behave honorably?”
“Aye.” The answer was out before she could stop it. Why did she feel the need to defend him?
Papa moved at last, nodding and shifting away to stare at the floor, smoothing back his iron-gray hair tied in a neat queue.
Her hands knotted in her apron again. “Should we—can we—inform someone? I know Magistrate Brown doesn’t have the facts aright….”
“At present, there’s none other to appeal to,” Papa said. “Let me think on this. And pray. It may be—blast it all, anyway.” He shot her another dark look. “Stay close to the inn for now. If we need aught, I’ll send Johnny or Jacky. Understand me?”
She gave a mute nod, her mouth dry again.
“Thank you for telling me, sweet girl. It would break my heart if aught happened to you.”
And then he was gone.
She went back to the table and blew out a breath. Her mind was quite in disarray now, but her hands knew the task of pie making well enough—
A flutter of white on the windowsill—across the room, above another worktable—caught her eye. She frowned. What was that? It looked like a folded paper, but she could not remember anyone leaving anything there.
She crossed the room, reached for it, unfolded it to reveal an attempt at an elegant hand—she could tell for how sloppy it was—written with many scrolls and flourishes. Then the wording made itself clear, and her breath caught.
May I call on you one evening? Not tonight, but soon. Look for me by moonlight.
~The Highwayman
The morning started fine enough, rounded mountaintops shimmering against the sky and birds twittering in the clear daylight, but now the blazing sun set Sam’s head to pounding as he trudged beside the wagon. And a sickness swirled in his gut the farther they got from Brewster’s.
With every step, he was sure they shouldn’t have left.
He tipped his head to squint upward, from under the brim of his plain black hat. Nearly midday. He was used to delays, but this was ridiculous. “Are you sure this track leads back to the Great Road?” he asked Jed, who walked ahead of the team.
When they’d tried to leave town, they discovered the magistrate had men stationed both north and south on the Great Road, searching wagons and saddlebags in his effort to find the Highwayman.
“The hostler said so. Down past the mill, up along the creek, over the hill.”
“‘Twas an hour ago.”
“If you hadn’t been so slow in starting—” Jed scowled. “Why in the world did you run off? And what was so important to discuss with Mr. Brewster?”
“Last trip to the necessary,” Sam said. It wasn’t completely untrue.
But he couldn’t explain any of it, yet. Not his sudden need to have the good will of Sally’s father, nor that other small task he’d decided to carry out before they left. Would Sally even find the note before someone else did?
Better that she not expect to see him again. For her, and for him.
Lord, I believe I’ve made an awful mess of this.
“I thought you didn’t want to do this anymore?” Jed said.
“I don’t. Didn’t.” Sam swallowed his rising bile. “You know how it is, I hear something, and then—I can’t stand by and do nothing.” He chewed the inside of his cheek for a moment. “This time, it turned out to be Sally.”
The annoyance in Jed’s expression bled to shock.
“Apparently these local boys, led by the chief justice’s son, have a habit of causing trouble. They were—well, I couldn’t let them lay hands on her like that.”
“Good Lord.”
“That He is.”
Jed laughed shortly.
“We shouldn’t have left so fast,” Sam went on.
Jed did turn on him at that, stepping out of the way of the team. “You’d rather have those boys search our wagon? We have to finish this run and get home.”
“Nay.”
But when the magistrate’s men didn’t find the Highwayman… what then? What about Sally and her family?
Oh, Lord.
“So.” Jed shot him a sidelong look. “After you rescued Sally, what happened? Did she run straight home, or did you talk to her?”
Despite his best efforts, a grin tugged at Sam’s mouth. The sick feeling disappeared for just a moment at the memory of Sally in his arms. “That, cousin, would be none of your business.”
Jed’s hooting laughter echoed across the pasture.
Chapter 5
Look for me by moonlight.”
And what, pray tell, had he meant by that? A moon had waxed and begun to wane, and still the mysterious Highwayman did not make another appearance.
Sally heaved a sigh and, dipping her rag in the bucket of soapy water, went back to scrubbing the table. Not a breath of air stirred in the great room and no one was about, so she’d shed her apron and gown for the work.
She was so weary of the flipping and flopping of her thoughts. The Highwayman. Sam. One who had rescued her… kissed her. The other who, at least by Papa’s reckoning, was sweet on her. She blew a stray wisp out of her face and scrubbed harder. She’d known Sam since he was a boy, traveling up the Great Road with his uncle and cousins. His uncle, complaining of rheumatism and the need to tend to matters at home, had turned the run over to Sam and Jed a handful of years before either reached their majority. All she knew of Sam before then was that his parents and young siblings perished in some terrible tragedy, and the uncle had taken him in.
Might be no wonder Sam was grave and quiet. It was better than thinking of him as dull.
Better his dullness, perhaps, than the Highwayman… of whom she knew next to nothing. A strong, workingman’s grip. A gentle kiss, despite the way he’d pulled her to him. Terrifyingly accurate with the whip. A smile flitted across her lips. No wonder lads and lasses alike were enthralled with tales of him.
He was gallant, she’d give him that. And apparently possessed of a ferociously protective nature.
Still, ‘twas hardly enough to know whether she could trust such a man. Whether he was not merely trifling with her, as she steadfastly maintained to her heart.
Her pitifully desperate heart. Sally snorted. Truly, she was no better than any other girl—
“Sally?” Mama’s voice was a soft intrusion, but insistent as always. “I believe we are out of orris root. Might you run to the market and fetch some?”
Some of the furor had died over the Highwayman’s appea
rance more than a fortnight ago—at the least, the magistrate gave up guarding the Great Road—but Papa hadn’t yet told her how far she might safely venture. Did she dare run to the market and back?
“Aye, Mama.”
“And while you’re at it, we’re a little low on coffee.”
Sally nodded and slid back into her blue linen gown. Mama lingered as Sally pinned the front closed and pinned and tied her apron back on, over all. “I don’t often tell you, but you’ve been an invaluable help to me.” A sad smile curved Mama’s mouth. “Your Papa thinks I’ve been working you too hard. But I’m glad you’ve always been willing, especially when Jacky was sick.”
Sally reached for her wide-brimmed straw hat and tied it at her nape. “You’re more than welcome, Mama.”
Mama handed her a small pouch of coins. “Your Papa said there’s a young man who might be interested…?”
Sally felt her face go crimson. Her breath seized. He does not know… he cannot know… he’s thinking only of Sam. “I—don’t know, Mama. He’s not spoken.” She slipped the pouch through the slit in her skirt and petticoats, into her pocket.
Mama’s smile warmed. “How exciting, though.”
Sally could almost hear the thoughts of her pretty, plump mother, measuring her angular height and wondering who could possibly want her. “I’ll return soon.”
She gave Mama a quick peck on the cheek then made her escape.
It was a fine, hot day, but she set a brisk pace, glad to put distance between herself and the inn for a bit.
Though the late afternoon warmth made everyone languid at the market, the dry goods seller greeted her with a cheery smile. “Tall Sally! We’ve not seen you in a week or three.”
She gave the older man a quick grin in return. “Mama’s had me a bit busy. But I’m here today.”
“And what is your pleasure this time?”
“Coffee and sugar. And some orris root. Are we still avoiding tea?”
“We are indeed, Miss Brewster, but if your mother has a hankering for it, I have some, properly smuggled and untaxed.”