The Smoke Hunter

by Jacquelyn Benson

  “You could have killed yourself,” he said, barely containing a shout.

  “I could not,” she retorted. “Hydrogen won’t ignite until it reaches the right concentration—and as I’m sure you’re aware, it rises. I put a lamp on the floor of the cargo hold and left the hatch open until I was ready to leave the boat. It wouldn’t have started building until the room was sealed up. Basic scientific principles. I calculated that I had a perfectly safe window of approximately four minutes before anything burst into flame.”

  “Unless someone shot you,” he snapped back. He shook his head, beginning to pace. “I don’t believe this.”

  “I needed a distraction.”

  “That was a distraction?”

  “I needed to search Dawson’s tent for evidence. Something that would make you believe me. Please, Bates… you aren’t safe here. These men are dangerous. You can’t trust anything they’re telling you, and if you get on that boat tomorrow—”

  “I’m aware.”

  His response stalled the next words in her mouth, which was just as well, since all she could have done was pleaded with him to trust her. He did not have much reason to do that.

  “You are?”

  “I’m not a fool, princess.” He looked over at her, then away again. “Most of the time.”

  It stung.

  “Adam—”

  “Constance. I knew it never sounded right.” He sat down heavily on the cot. She could see the exhaustion etched into the lines of his face. “Why?”

  No more lies. It was the least of what she owed him.

  “I was afraid if I told you about Dawson and Jacobs, you might decide the whole business was more trouble than it was worth. And anyway, I had the map. I thought there was no way they could pursue us without it. It didn’t seem relevant anymore.”

  “It would have been nice to be able to make up my own mind about that. But that wasn’t what I was talking about. Your name,” he clarified, meeting her eyes. There was something unexpected in his gaze, a sort of bleakness.

  “It didn’t seem important,” she protested weakly.

  “Your name didn’t seem important?”

  “I was waiting for the right time.”

  The response sounded lame even to her ears, and Adam turned away from her. It felt like a closing door—and why wouldn’t it? Her excuses were empty. She had lied to him, plain and simple. She couldn’t expect him to simply pretend that had never happened. She had no right to ask for his trust anymore.

  Which meant that distance she could feel stretching between them, thick and uncomfortable, wasn’t going to go away. The realization filled her with an unexpected grief.

  “Anything else?”

  “What do you mean?”

  He turned to her, his expression stony. “Anything else you should have told me before now.”

  “No,” she said firmly, then winced. “Well, maybe one thing. But it’s hardly important.”

  “I’d prefer to judge that for myself.”

  She ignored the quick hurt of that and pushed forward.

  “Your friends from the university—Trevelyan Perry and Neil Fairfax—I sort of… know them.”

  His surprise was genuine.

  “You what?”

  “We’re related. Neil and I.”

  As the words left her mouth, she realized with horror what they might imply—that her meeting with Adam had been something other than accidental. She hurried to explain. “I swear I had no idea who you were until that night on the boat. The whole thing has just been a wild coincidence.”

  “How?” he demanded.

  “How is it a coincidence?”

  “No. How are you related to Fairfax?”

  “We’re cousins.”

  He went still. She saw a strange look come over him.

  “Eleanora. Ellie.” He blinked. “You’re his baby cousin Ellie.”

  “I’m hardly his ‘baby’ anything,” she countered instinctively. “He’s only five years older than—”

  “You’re practically his sister!” he shouted.

  “I’m not his—”

  “You were raised together!”

  “There’s no need to get so upset…,” she started lamely. But she broke off as she saw a look of profound horror slip across his features.

  He dropped down onto the cot again, staring at her.

  “I’ve ruined you.”

  She felt a flush of heat rush to her cheeks. “You most certainly have not!”

  “I’ve been alone with you in the bush for a week. You think anyone is going to believe I kept my hands off of you?” He ran his hands through his hair and gave a half-wild laugh. “I’ve ruined Fairfax’s little Ellie.”

  She wanted to contradict him, but the words stuck in her throat. He was right. If word of their adventure got back to London, the obvious conclusions would be drawn, no matter how unjustly. Maybe that wouldn’t have mattered as much if she had, in fact, been a racy widow, but as an unmarried woman, it was a different story.

  Ellie had never wished so badly for a husband, even a conveniently deceased one.

  But why should it matter? It was her choice, and she was the one who would bear the consequences. Anyway, how bad could they really be? She was hardly the belle of the social circuit as it was.

  Adam would be fine. The world looked differently upon a man who engaged in scandalous episodes. Besides, he spent his days in the bush in a colony populated by criminals and outcasts.

  “I assure you I’ll be fine. And don’t call me ‘little,’” she added sharply.

  “You will not be fine.”

  “I will. It’s of no consequence what the rest of the world thinks of me. I’m already beyond the pale to most of them. What matters if a few more join the club?”

  His gaze darkened.

  “This isn’t just about you. What about your aunt—Florence, isn’t it? Neil used to talk about her all the time. Sounds like a nice lady—not the type who could shrug off being cut out, but you know her better than me. What do you think? Will she be ‘fine’ when all those nice society friends of hers stop calling? When she hears whispers behind her back every time she goes out?”

  Ellie felt her chest tighten.

  “It wouldn’t be like that.”

  She knew it was a feeble denial. Adam was right: Those old witches her aunt had tea with would turn on her like a pack of dogs were her ward to be labeled a woman of loose morals. Raising a spinster was one thing, but a whore.…

  Even the kinder ones, those in her circle who weren’t simply harpies, would have to close her out to preserve the chances of their own daughters. As though disrespectability were a contagion.

  “Oh, yes, it would. And there’s the little matter of your cousin to consider, who happens to be one of my oldest friends. How happy do you think he’s going to be when he finds out I debauched his adopted sister?”

  Ellie felt her cheeks flush.

  “You have not debauched me.”

  “I might as well have.”

  The intensity of his gaze nearly made her knees give out.

  Then a possible escape occurred to her. She clutched at it desperately, without thinking.

  “We don’t have to tell them. They’re all thousands of miles from here. No one has to know anything.”

  His gaze turned icy.

  “I don’t lie to my friends.”

  The words cut. Ellie slumped down to the floor of the tent, feeling defeat wash over her. Of course he wouldn’t. He was a decent person.

  Not like her.

  “So what do we do?” she asked at last, tiredly.

  He gave his reply bluntly, and without hesitation:

  “We get married.”

  Shock silenced her. He couldn’t possibly be serious. But a single glance at his face told her otherwise. His expression was all cold determination, without a spark of warmth, never mind humor.

  Married?

  It was ludicrous. And yet it would technically
solve their troubles. There could be no scandal, or only very little of one, if the business ended with a ring on her finger. Aunt Florence’s friends would simply enjoy it as a juicy bit of gossip, and Neil… well, he would learn to live with it. He might even be happy for her. He’d always told her she wasn’t made for a life of solitude.

  No. It was ridiculous. Ellie had ruled out getting married years before, but even if she hadn’t, she never would have agreed to something like this, something so patently… heartless, she thought numbly.

  “Absolutely not.”

  Something shifted briefly across his expression, a quick flash of what seemed almost like hurt. It was gone before she could be certain, replaced by an even stonier facade.

  “It’s the only way to fix the mess you’ve gotten us into.”

  “By chaining ourselves together for the rest of our lives?”

  “We’d hardly need to see each other. I’d come to London just often enough to keep people from talking. The rest of the time we can pretend it never happened.”

  “You make it sound like a business arrangement.”

  “That’s what marriages are, princess.”

  “Not all of them,” she countered awkwardly.

  “I thought you didn’t want to be married at all.”

  “I don’t!” she snapped back.

  “Then this should be perfect for you. There’s far less attention paid to what a married woman does with her days. Take classes. Lobby for the vote. Hell, get yourself arrested again if you want. You get all of the freedom with none of the chains. It’s not like there’d be any children.”

  “No. Of course not,” she agreed numbly.

  “So it’s settled.” He moved toward the rip in the wall of the tent, and Ellie felt panic well up inside her.

  “Nothing is settled!”

  He stopped. Turning quickly, he strode over to where she sat on the floor of the tent and hauled her to her feet. For the first time she could see the anger in him, burning through that facade of cool indifference.

  “Yes, it is. You want to ruin your own life? That’s fine. But I’ll be damned if I’ll let you drag anybody else down with you.”

  “Aren’t I dragging you?”

  He let her go, stepping back.

  “It’s what I get for being too goddamned trusting.”

  Despair washed over her. She fought it. Crumbling into tears would only make the situation even more unbearable. She wouldn’t let him see that vulnerability, not if it killed her.

  “None of this matters anyway. Those men intend to kill us.”

  “I’ll handle that. You just refrain from getting into any other trouble, and be ready to move when I give the word.”

  He turned and moved toward the exit. She called out, a quick and desperate instinct:

  “Adam—”

  He stopped, turning back toward her, but the impulse that had prompted the cry had died incomplete.

  “Be careful,” she finished instead.

  He nodded tightly in response and left.

  Ellie tried to feel reassured. Whatever else he thought of her, at least he knew better than to trust Dawson and Jacobs. He would be on the watch for any potential threats and, what was more, seemed determined to ensure her safety as well, even if only for the sake of his friendship with Neil.

  She could hardly have expected anything more, after how she’d treated him.

  So why did she feel like crying?

  15

  WHERE WAS SHE? Someone was screaming.…

  The sound resolved itself into the shouting of the men outside her tent, the nightmare fading like a morning fog. She tried to grasp at the last wisps of it. She had been someplace dark and echoing… somewhere underground?

  The notion made no sense, but there was no use worrying about it. The dream had already faded into nothing more than the vaguest sense of unease.

  Outside her tent, someone started hammering loudly. She tried to sit up and froze at the pain shooting down her neck. Falling asleep with her hands tied around a tent post hadn’t been easy. The position she’d finally contorted herself into to escape consciousness for a while was exacting a price in sore muscles and stiff joints. She moved more carefully, wincing her way upright.

  Perhaps blowing up that steamboat hadn’t been such a brilliant idea. It certainly hadn’t been necessary. She had not found anything useful in Dawson’s tent. Just those frustratingly inconclusive articles about the murder of his wife.

  And as it turned out, no sort of evidence was needed anyway. Adam had not been taken in by Dawson’s lies.

  Not like he had been by hers…

  The conversation of the night before came back to her in all its brutal detail, and Ellie wished she could crawl back to the floor again.

  She couldn’t blame Adam for the way he’d reacted. Really, she was lucky he felt any obligation at all to take care of her, after how she’d treated him. He would have had every right to walk away without another word to her, and instead…

  Instead he’d proposed.

  Then again, “proposed” implied a question. Adam’s talk of marriage had been less an inquiry and more like an order.

  An order she intended to disobey, she determined firmly. Whatever Adam said he felt about marriage, she wasn’t going to let him shackle himself into an arrangement with someone he didn’t want to be around. He deserved a chance at real happiness, whether or not he decided to take it.

  She would find some other way to protect her family from her mistake. She could join a convent, or go to Australia, or…

  She’d think of something, anyway.

  Adam’s face came back to her—the distance she had seen in his eyes as he coldly outlined the terms of their engagement. Remembering it made something twist painfully inside her.

  What else could she expect? If anything she should be relieved, but the feeling arcing through her chest was a lot more like bereavement.

  It didn’t matter. The important thing was that Adam had known better than to trust Dawson and Jacobs.

  The flap rustled as a large man entered the tent. She recognized him from the day before, one of the pair who had caught her and Adam in the jungle.

  He moved easily, slowly, ambling over to her and nimbly picking the knot that bound her hands. As it released, she sighed with relief, stretching her aching muscles. Then she looked at the big man’s face and saw the apology written there.

  “You have to tie them again, don’t you?”

  He nodded. Ellie took his lack of movement as a sign that she could at least squeeze in a stretch first, and she did so as best she could before offering him her wrists.

  He tied the ropes firmly but not too tight. At least she wouldn’t have to worry about her hands falling off.

  How long was this going to last? Would she be tethered to the post again that night? Her sore neck protested the notion, but she’d bombed their boat. They could hardly let her roam free after that.

  She remembered the last time she’d spent the day in restraints, chained to the gates of Parliament because she’d let herself go mouth first, brain later. That had been less than a month ago. It seemed like years.

  She pulled her attention back to the present.

  “Not too tight?”

  “No, they’re fine,” she replied, surprised he would ask. “You’re Flowers, aren’t you?”

  “Yup.” He motioned her out the door. She stepped through and waited. He followed a moment later with the cot. A pair of men then began to empty the rest of the tent’s furnishings as Flowers folded the narrow metal bed into a tidy package.

  “That’s your real name? Flowers?”

  “Yup.”

  It didn’t seem right. He didn’t look like a Flowers. He looked like he should have a massive name to match his massive size—perhaps Thor or Crusher.

  “What about your first name?”

  “Wilfred.”

  Flowers it was, then.

  “Here’s Mendez with your rid
e,” he commented as, behind them, the tent fluttered sadly to the ground. Her ride turned out to be a mule. Ellie eyed it dubiously.

  “I’m really fine with walking.”

  “Well, maybe you are. And maybe this is what the boss says you’re going to do. So let’s go,” Mendez said.

  The camp that had sprawled across the banks of the river the night before was gone. In its place was a tumult of men and beasts that rapidly shifted into a sinuous line. Velegas rode up and down the length of the assembling caravan, shouting orders from the back of his quickly trotting mule. It looked bouncy. It also looked like there was very little else left to pack, and therefore no excuse for procrastinating.

  Flowers obviously sensed as much. He lifted her easily by the waist and dropped her onto the saddle. She was relieved that at least the mule didn’t start jolting her around like poor Velegas.

  “Does it have a name?” she asked, frowning down at the animal’s ears.

  “Probably,” Mendez replied.

  “I’ll call him Thor,” she decided. Flowers raised an eyebrow.

  “Fine. Let’s go, or we’ll be left here for jaguar bait.” Mendez smacked Thor on the hindquarters, and with an awkward lurch they joined the rest of the expedition.

  Adam Bates was moving far more slowly than he was accustomed to. At least it was better than his situation an hour ago, when he hadn’t been moving at all. It had taken what felt like an age to get the massive caravan of mules and men organized and mobile, leaving the riverbank for the jungle. Adam could have covered four times the distance they’d gone so far that day on his own. But traveling on his own was no longer an option.

  Well, that wasn’t entirely true. He could have slipped away if he had liked. He was guarded, of course. Not openly, but his watchful eye had identified a pair of armed men supposedly patrolling the long baggage train whose gazes were on him more often than not. All it would take was a moment of inattention on their part—of which there were plenty—for him to make his escape. Bates had spent enough time in the bush to know how to disappear when he wanted to.

  But that would leave Eleanora.

  Ellie, he corrected himself. Fairfax’s nickname for his cousin fit her better than the ponderous Eleanora. Though he was hardly one to say. He obviously knew the woman far from well. Her lies were evidence of that.