The Match of the Century

by Cathy Maxwell

  “A glass?” Ben prompted.

  “A glass? Aye, yes.” Osprey hurried back to his bar and returned with a somewhat clean glass he polished with the somewhat clean rag he wore at his waist.

  Ben sniffed the bottle and was pleased to smell the fumes of what might be good brandy. “You surprise me, Osprey,” he said, pouring a bit into the glass and handing it to Elin.

  “I surprise most, Whit.”

  Elin’s brows came together at the name. “Drink,” Ben ordered before she could ask questions. She took a sip, then downed the rest.

  “Gor,” Nate breathed in admiration.

  “Another?” Ben asked.

  “Yes, please,” Elin answered, primly.

  He refilled the glass, and this one she sipped as Osprey set a bowl of his rabbit stew in front of her. Steam rolled off it. “The brandy is good,” she said to him, earning a beaming smile from Osprey.

  “So is his stew,” Ben assured her.

  Elin picked up her spoon and blew on the stew to cool it down. “I’m surprised to see you here . . . Whit.”

  “I’m surprised to find myself here and to meet you here, as well. Tell us your story.”

  “In front of them?”

  “They are good listeners.”

  Elin frowned at Big Roger but didn’t seem put off by the others. She began speaking.

  “We were traveling to London. I’m to marry—” She paused, once again looked around at his companions, and said, “Your brother in a few weeks.”

  Well, that answered one question.

  “Who is ‘we?’ ” Ben wondered. “Was your father with you?”

  “No. He is in London waiting for me. I traveled with servants and a dressmaker, Madame Odette.”

  “Why were you traveling through this area?” Ben had to ask. “Why weren’t you on the Post Road?”

  “There was a bridge out,” Elin said. “Jensen felt this way was as good as any. We were to pick up the Post Road on the morrow.”

  “So, you were traveling through here, and then what happened?”

  Elin stared into her untouched bowl of stew. Ben could see her mind churning as if trying to make sense of events. She was in shock. He’d seen it more than once in men who had feared for their lives, then found themselves safe. He leaned toward her. “Elin?”

  She jerked as if startled. He tapped her bowl. “Eat.”

  “I don’t know if I can.”

  “A bite.”

  Her dark lashes swept her cheeks a moment, then she took the spoon. She still wore her kid gloves, and they gave the movement of her hands a ladylike fragility that was not lost on Ben or the men watching. Who could have known there were so many chivalrous souls in the room?

  She chewed slowly as if not trusting the taste of the stew, then took another spoonful before setting it down. “It is good,” she told Osprey. “I’m just too—”

  Her voice broke off, and she closed her eyes a moment as if unable to describe exactly what she felt.

  Visibly gathering herself, she began speaking. “Father sent this dressmaker to prepare me. Madame Odette. She was accompanying me to London, but we argued, and I was angry enough to stop the coach. I needed a break from her. I walked into the woods a ways, and that is what saved me.”

  “How do you know your father sent her?” Ben asked.

  “Aye, it could have been a kidnapping,” Big Roger agreed, reading Ben’s mind.

  “She had a letter from Father . . .” Elin stopped and frowned, as if questioning the letter had never dawned on her. “I don’t know that it was from Father. I recognized Robbie’s handwriting. You remember Robbie, my cousin who serves as his secretary?”

  Ben nodded. “Are you certain he wrote the note?”

  “I didn’t see him write it,” she answered with a touch of impatience, “but I’ve been reading letters from my father written by Robbie for years. I had no reason to doubt its authenticity. After all, it arrived with the invitation to the wedding breakfast. I knew I was expected to return.”

  “Or someone could have created a ruse to kidnap you,” Ben answered. He didn’t appreciate her testiness. He was trying to help.

  His suggestion gave Elin pause. She frowned, then shook her head. “They want to kill me. They were paid to see me dead. They said as much to Madame Odette.”

  Ben was certain Elin hadn’t understood correctly. What good was a dead heiress? But one held for a ransom could make some desperate men wealthy, and he wondered about the dressmaker.

  “Why would your father send Madame Odette instead of coming for you himself?”

  “He is busy,” she answered, looking away before seeming to decide it might be best to be honest with him. “He is busy,” she insisted, this time in a gentler tone. “And he’s been ill—his gout has been very bad. In the past, when they wanted me to return to London, Mother would come with the dresses. I thought it was a bit odd to send a seamstress to fetch me, but she said she was the daughter of a French count, and the letter didn’t seem out of the ordinary, so I just supposed it was the signal to me that I was expected to do as bid. You know how it was,” she reminded him.

  He did. Whenever Mr. and Mrs. Morris wanted Elin in Town, they always outfitted her first. That way they signaled to their independent-minded, wild, romping girl that she was to act the part of a lady.

  And Elin could play the lady well. She was doing so right now. She appeared fragile and yet resilient. It was apparent that Hooknose, Nate, and Big Roger were charmed by her need for their help.

  As was Ben. Damn it all.

  He’d always had a strong desire to protect her, and her story was playing to his every instinct.

  “Why did you argue with the dressmaker?” he asked.

  Her chin came up, and her mouth clamped shut. Obviously, he had touched a nerve, but before he could chide her, she said, “I asked if she was my father’s lover.”

  “And she said?”

  “She didn’t. She was very coy, as if she had a secret and was extremely proud of herself for it.” Elin leaned forward. “She was very much like my mother in coloring, so I thought perhaps he’d been tempted by her But my father worshipped my mother. He couldn’t have taken a mistress so soon after her death, could he, Ben?”

  “I don’t know. Men don’t mourn like women do,” he had to say honestly.

  Elin rocked back. “I never believed he would fall in love again so soon. My parents were devoted to each other. And I did not like Madame Odette. There was something about her that was distasteful. She was French, or said she was. Toward the end, she sounded as English as you and me. She could go on and on about her family in France but—have you ever sensed someone was trying too hard, so you wondered whether they were being honest? And she was always comparing herself to me. It became quite unsettling.”

  “I could see your not liking her just because she said she was French,” Hooknose observed.

  “I feel that way about French men,” Nate countered. “But not the women.”

  The men laughed, but Elin’s brows came together. “If you want her, she is lying in the road where they shot her.”

  That statement brought the men to their senses.

  “So she wasn’t part of a plot?” Ben said.

  “That is what is so curious. I think she was. She didn’t act surprised when those men murdered the servants. Instead, she chastised them for not waiting. Apparently, they were supposed to meet the coach farther down the road. But the leader said he’d grown tired of waiting.”

  “Your father had outriders with you?” Ben said. She nodded. “Then why didn’t they see these men?”

  She reached for the brandy. “Because of me.” She took a sip, tears welling in her eyes. She forced them back. “When I stopped the coach to be let out, they circled back to check on me.”

  “They shouldn’t have done that,” Hooknosed observed.

  “They were probably stable lads,” Ben explained. “Not guards in the sense that you are thinking. T
hey could shoot, and they would, but I can see them taking a moment to talk to the others.”

  “I took a good walk into the woods,” Elin continued. “When I returned, I’d lost the direction of the coach so I ended on the road well behind it. The men approached, speaking to James, Toby, and the others. When I saw them, something warned me to step back into the tree line. A moment later, the three men shot Jensen, Toby, and James. One of the men, the leader, threw a knife at Craig and struck him right in the throat.” She took another sip of brandy, before confessing, “You are right. It was my fault. Mine. If I hadn’t been so angry at Madame, they would have been doing their duties.”

  A tremor had come to her voice. Ben took the glass from her. “It was their task to be aware at all times. You mustn’t blame yourself, Elin.”

  She didn’t agree. He could see that. “Don’t focus on it,” he ordered. “Tell us what happened next.”

  “Madame was very angry with the men for not obeying what had been planned.”

  “She said that?”

  “Yes. Then she told them I was in the woods. Two of the men went after me. Tucker and Peters were their names. The leader stayed behind, and that is when he shot Madame.”

  “Shot the dressmaker? After she sounded as if she was an accomplice?”

  “The leader said ‘he’ wanted her dead.”

  “The leader wanted her dead?”

  Elin made an impatient sound. “No, whoever had sent them wanted her dead as well as me. And he just killed her as if her life meant nothing.” Ben knew she was just holding on.

  “So there were only three men in the attack?” Nate asked.

  “Attack?” Elin repeated, surprised at the word, and then said, “Yes, I suppose it was. Three. I heard two names. Peters and Tucker.”

  “Is one of them the leader?” Ben pushed.

  “No.” Her shoulders slumped. She had to be exhausted. She yawned, a sign the brandy was doing its work.

  “Osprey, do you have a room?” Ben asked. “Some place private for Miss Morris?”

  “She can have my room,” he answered. “It is off the hall in the back.”

  Ben and the others expected to sleep out on the benches. Over the past year, Ben had slept on the ground or the floor. He’d been leading a rough-and-ready life, but Elin needed something better. Safer.

  Ben had explored the area earlier when they had first arrived. The Oak was comprised of two rooms—the main taproom and another room that was large and empty. Perhaps it was used for gatherings, but considering how isolated the tavern was, Ben couldn’t imagine much call for the space. Off the hall, several tiny rooms were used for supplies. One of these small rooms contained an unmade cot, which the innkeeper used.

  The room had also had a window and a floor littered with shoes, a tap for a keg that was soaking in a bucket for some reason, some leather harnesses, and a number of other things of the sort men collected.

  “Let me straighten it up a bit,” Osprey said, rushing out of the taproom to do so.

  “Try and eat a bit more of the stew,” Ben advised Elin. “He may be awhile at it.”

  She attempted to comply and looked up in relief when Osprey came back into the room and nodded to Ben, a sign that he could take Elin back.

  “Excuse me, lads,” Ben said rising. He reached for Elin’s arm. She was exhausted and had grown uncharacteristically quiet and docile. She allowed him to escort her to the back room.

  Osprey had left a candle burning in his room. The yellow light was a beacon in the room’s shadowy blackness.

  The innkeeper’s idea of clean and Ben’s were two different things, but Elin didn’t raise a fuss.

  No, she had something else on her mind.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked once they had stepped inside the room. “Why are you with those men?”

  Fooled again. He had completely misunderstood her silence.

  “They are my friends,” Ben answered.

  “Perhaps, but they aren’t the sort I would think the duke would admire.”

  Ben bristled. He tried to tamp it down, but the hour was late. “You may dance to my brother’s tune, but I don’t.”

  “I’m not criticizing—”

  “You are not? Of course you are. And here, I thought you were glad to see me. At least, you expressed that an hour ago.”

  “I am happy to see you—” She caught herself and stopped, releasing a breath with great patience before saying, “I am very happy to see you. What is between you and Gavin is none of my business.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Then again, it is obvious you are not complying with what he wants you to do.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “The untamed hair, the clothes, the companions.”

  “Next you will be pointing out that ‘I stink.’ ”

  His accusation, softly spoken, was a direct reference to their last meeting and words he had never forgotten. They burned deep inside him. She didn’t pretend not to understand. A dull stain crept up her cheeks. Her jaw tightened.

  And he could have kicked himself.

  Why was nothing simple when it came to this woman?

  Moments before he was completely sympathetic to her. But he always seemed to be waiting for her to say one thing wrong. To offer any criticism . . . and he didn’t understand himself.

  “That was crude of me,” he murmured. “Ignore me.”

  Now she appeared genuinely confused. “Well, you do smell better than you did that night.”

  “I’d traveled a long way that day and the days before it,” he admitted.

  “And had drunk quite a bit.”

  “I bathed in whisky,” he agreed, and surprised a laugh out of her.

  She covered her mouth as if afraid she offended him again, and he waved her fears away with a motion of his hand.

  “I wasn’t good that night,” he confessed.

  There was beat of silence. “It was a terrible night.”

  “I know.”

  Now it was his turn to pause, to consider carefully what he wanted to say. A year and a half ago, he had attempted to make amends and had not heard one word from her until she’d run into the Oak’s taproom this evening.

  And what did he want to say? She still isn’t yours, an inner voice reminded him. She’d announced in front of Hooknose and the others that she was bound for London to marry his brother and all of her own free will.

  But she wasn’t married yet.

  It was amazing how insidious those little voices in his mind were. How they battled with each other, but only over this woman. Especially when she looked as vulnerable as she did now.

  Her hair was a tangled mess and her face pale from worry and smudges of dirt from her ordeal. However, her dark eyes told him she was grateful to have found him.

  Grateful. What a weak word. Too weak for what he wanted from her, and it was as if the years fell away, and he was once again under her spell. A spell she hadn’t woven because she was oblivious to him.

  Self-pity, anger, and heartache started to raise their ugly heads. He forced them back.

  God damn it all. He was a bloody fool.

  And the sooner he scooted her out of his life, the better he would be. He’d found peace without her twice now. He would find it again.

  “So,” he said, clapping his hands to punctuate the word and return his mind to good sense. “You need your rest, and tomorrow, we’ll take you to your father.” He moved toward the doorway, and half-out of it, pulling the door shut when Elin took a step toward him—and that was all it took for him to pause.

  “Thank you, Ben,” she whispered. “Thank you for being here.”

  Elin had never had guile. She had always said exactly what she thought. It wasn’t her fault that this defenseless side of her ripped all of his good intentions to shreds. He wanted nothing more than to fall on his knees in front of her and beg her to give him another chance.

  But he was a man. Men didn’t beg.

>   “Right,” he said, sounding almost cheery. “Tomorrow.” He shut the door and, at last, took a full breath.

  “Ah, yes,” he muttered to himself. “St. Benedict Whitridge, martyr to lost causes and defender of stray kittens.” He balled his hand into a fist and pounded it into the wood of the wall across from her room.

  The pain felt good.

  It felt manly.

  And suddenly he realized what was missing between them. The love he’d once hoped they shared—and it was strictly all his belief because she had never professed it—had died, lost to his adolescent fumbling and to his foul temper over a year ago.

  And there was nothing he could do about the impression. In truth, Gavin was a better man than he was.

  Never once in his life had Ben had such a thought, and now here it was, full-blown in his mind. His ducal brother was the better man—especially where Elin was concerned and perhaps everywhere else.

  Ben walked back to the taproom, his hand smarting, as was his ego.

  He’d prided himself on his honesty. He knew he resented his brother. He just didn’t want to delve into why. It was enough that Gavin had effortlessly claimed Elin. And if there was more to his resentment, Ben wasn’t certain he wished to examine it—

  Three feet from the light flowing from the taproom door, Ben sensed something was wrong. There were no voices, no idle chatter, no rattling of the dice. Cautiously, he moved forward, and as he did so, Hooknose took up a post in the doorway, leaning against the frame.

  Ben came up behind him. Hooknose was expecting him. “We have visitors,” he murmured.

  Leaning around his friend, Ben’s gaze fell upon three hulking men who looked the worse for wear. They stood at the bar gobbling down Osprey’s stew. In their long canvas coats and worn boots, they would fit anyone’s image of “murderers.”

  Ben wanted to return to Elin, to see her safe. However, the moment he prepared to back up, the tallest of the men caught sight of him in the doorway. For a long moment their gazes held, and if Ben had any doubts about Elin’s story, they were dispelled.

  The leader had removed his hat. Greasy dark hair stood this way and that. He would have appeared comical if not for the growth of beard on his jaw and the menace in his light brown eyes. Wolf’s eyes.