To Have A Heart (A New Adventure Begins - Star Elite Book 7)

by Rebecca King

  With a somewhat pompous sniff, Mallory spun on her heel and stalked toward the house. She had no idea what she was going to do when she got there because she had no idea if there was a bed chamber for her to use for the night. But what she wasn’t going to do was stay outside and indulge in any more kisses, or arguments, with Callum.

  He has kissed me. I enjoyed it. I like him. He is handsome. That was the most magical experience of my entire life. He doesn’t want to get married. Right now, neither do I. There is no reason why anything must change.

  But as Mallory settled into her temporary bed chamber ten minutes later, she knew that her life had changed, completely, permanently, and she wasn’t going to be at all sorry for it.

  “Over the last few months I have learnt that I am capable of far more than I ever realised. I am stronger that I believed, and really do want to marry. I want my future husband to be someone like Callum.”

  When she rolled over in bed, and stared blankly out of the window, Mallory was faced with the realisation that her one hope for the future wasn’t at all possible. She doubted she would ever be lucky enough to meet two men like Callum.

  “As soon as he leaves my life, Callum is going to take my hopes and dreams with him.”

  That was enough to make Mallory cry because it rendered her more miserable than anything that had ever happened in her life thus far.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  The following morning, Mallory stood in the doorway of the kitchen in the safe house and looked at the sombre men gathered about the battered kitchen table.

  “Well?”

  “Well what?” Phillip asked.

  “How is Sir Hugo?”

  “He is still with us. The doctor said that he cannot be moved, but Sir Hugo has other ideas,” Oliver replied, throwing her a rueful look.

  “He is awake?” Mallory blinked at him and smiled.

  Oliver’s lips quirked. “Yes, he is awake, and don’t we all know it.”

  Phillip shook his head. “Sir Hugo makes a lousy patient.”

  Will coughed. “He wants to go back to Cornwall, but the doctor has advised against him travelling anywhere.”

  “He has multiple broken bones, and a gunshot wound the doctor stitched up. He has lost a lot of blood but will heal with plenty of rest,” Oliver added.

  “His wife is a healer. Harriett uses herbs and the like, and fixes people. We just can’t get Sir Hugo to her in the state he is in, and he won’t allow her to come to him because this is a safe house. It would mean bringing her into the middle of one of our investigations.”

  “So, what happens?” Mallory asked.

  She shook her head when Oliver lifted a piece of pie and silently motioned if she wanted some.

  “He is adamant that he is going home,” Oliver sighed, dropping the pie back onto the plate. “We were just discussing how to get him to Cornwall, because he cannot go in the back of a cart.”

  “Don’t you have a carriage?” Mallory asked.

  “We can get one, but we need to find Melrose.”

  Mallory also suspected they were trying to decide on what to do with her.

  “We had word last night that Melrose is still in the area,” Will added. “That means he might still be waiting to ambush whoever leaves this house.”

  Mallory edged into the room and glanced around in search of Callum, but he was nowhere to be seen.

  “If we were followed yesterday, Melrose’s men could be watching us,” Oliver said.

  “We have to find a way to get everyone out of the house and away from here in a way that makes it impossible for Melrose to follow, not matter how many men he has at his disposal,” Niall added.

  “We killed a lot of them yesterday, as you know,” Will said. “We just don’t know how many more of them there are.”

  “Who is leaving?” Mallory asked, looking from one man to the other.

  “All of us,” the men replied in unison.

  Mallory quaked at the thought. She instinctively stepped back, a denial on her lips. She wanted to stay where she was. The thought of travelling anywhere was simply terrifying.

  “We have to go today before Melrose can muster any more gunmen,” Oliver added.

  “Do you know where Melrose is? Can’t you go and arrest him?” Mallory asked.

  “We have men trying to find Melrose. While we know he is in the area, Leicestershire and Derbyshire are big areas. We don’t know exactly where Melrose is. We have had men out looking for him all night,” Oliver said. “What we do know is that while we sit here, we run the risk of being attacked.”

  “Even inside the house?”

  “Especially, inside the house,” Phillip replied. “We are sitting targets.”

  Mallory emitted a squeak of surprise when hands suddenly circled her waist. Glancing over her shoulder, her heart blossomed to life when she saw Callum. Their eyes met. He smiled at her, silently asking if they were back on friendly terms. Unable to find any animosity toward him, Mallory smiled back. The sight of him, so tall and incredibly handsome, was enough to steal her train of thought. All she could do was watch him avidly as he stepped into the room and made his way over to the table to sample the pie Oliver had cut.

  Even though they were in broad daylight, the memories of what they had shared last night were still present. When their eyes met across the length of the room, there was a wealth of hidden knowledge that shimmered between them. Mallory had no doubt he was remembering their kisses just as much as she was. Moreover, he was remembering their conversation. Despite the way it ended, there was a connection between them now that was tangible.

  So much so, when Mallory did find the strength to tear her gaze away from him, she caught the knowing looks Callum’s colleagues shared. Colour flooded her cheeks, but she made no apology for it. In fact, she had spent the better part of the night thinking about how little she objected to Callum’s friends thinking she and Callum were together.

  “We have to get you out of the area today, Mallory. Melrose wants you back because you can attest to what he has done with the victims. You are the proof that he is involved with the kidnaps,” Phillip warned.

  “I don’t mind leaving if it makes you all safer,” Mallory suggested.

  Callum’s gaze was sharp when he looked at her. “You are going nowhere alone.”

  The finality was there in his voice. Should anybody try to break that, all Hell would break loose. Oliver coughed to disturb the sudden tension in the room.

  “We are going to go our separate ways. There are plenty of us. If Melrose’s men are mustering, they are going to have to follow more than one of us. The chances of them ambushing us will be limited because they won’t have as much support. If they do engage us in a gun battle the odds are a little more even,” Oliver said.

  “I suggest that we create a ruse,” Philip said.

  “I think that we need to decide who is going to stay here and hunt Melrose. Only two, three at the most, need to go with Mallory and Sir Hugo. If a team escorts you to the county border, you can be on your way without too much bloodshed. Just stay off the main roads. Your journey will take longer but you will be safe. I will try to send word to the local teams to keep an eye out for you. They can make sure you have a safe passage,” Oliver suggested.

  “Can you get word to them in time?”

  “I can try,” Oliver replied.

  “But you cannot promise anything.” It wasn’t a question. Callum knew Oliver couldn’t.

  “So, we could end up being ambushed by Melrose’s men, with Mallory and Sir Hugo in the back, and you expect only two of us to protect them.” Will glared defiantly at Oliver.

  “Do you have any idea what you are asking of us?” Callum growled. “It’s a bloody fool’s errand. You may as well just bury us here and now.”

  “You are going to be well armed, with plenty of ammunition. If we distract Melrose, by the time he realises that this house is empty, everyone will have vanished.”

  Oliver ran a
hand through his hair and tried not to snap at them. He could understand their concern, not least because everyone knew the odds were stacked against them still. When he looked up, he saw the shared frown of concern between Mallory and Callum. They would face it together. Oliver didn’t doubt it. He just had to wonder if Mallory would allow Callum to become a part of her life when their ordeal was over.

  Last night, when they hadn’t returned from the barn like they were supposed to, the men had gone out to try to find them. What they had found was a couple who had been so wrapped up in each other that they hadn’t even noticed Oliver, Rhys, and Niall outside. They had lingered long enough to listen to Mallory recount her ordeal. Unfortunately for Callum and Mallory, they hadn’t left again before the kissing had started. There was no doubt in anybody’s mind that it was those kisses that were responsible for Callum’s somewhat troubled attitude this morning, and the decidedly hungry way he kept looking at her.

  Oliver could only sympathise with the man. He knew from his experience with his own wife just how difficult it was juggling his role in a Star Elite investigation with his feelings for someone as a man and human being.

  “Will needs to recover, preferably before he gets into any more brawls, so he is the best man to drive the carriage,” Oliver suggested.

  Callum inwardly baulked at the idea of sending Will off to Cornwall with Sir Hugo and Mallory.

  “You, Callum, can keep watch,” Oliver added.

  “You want me to go with them?” Callum’s brows shot up.

  It was the last thing he had expected Oliver to suggest.

  “We have found him,” Niall announced as he slammed into the house.

  “Melrose?”

  “He is holed up at Walter Mann’s house as we speak.” Niall checked his gun for shot, as if preparing to go out right there and then and challenge the man.

  “Does he have many men with him?” Callum asked.

  Niall shrugged. “He has enough.”

  “Walter Mann?” Callum scowled. “Isn’t that that pompous oaf whose stomach is as big as his jowls? The man who bellows at everyone and has those thick trout lips?”

  “That’s the one,” Oliver confirmed with a sage nod.

  “Sounds charming,” Mallory huffed without thinking.

  Callum smirked. “He is a pompous ass.”

  “But he is a pompous ass who won’t be all that prepared for the Star Elite to pay him a visit. We can distract him and hopefully put both men behind bars. You, Callum, will use the time we are distracting Melrose to get Sir Hugo out of the area. Don’t stop unless you must. I will send word to the teams along the way and ask them to meet with you and escort you through.”

  “Make sure they make their presence known before they appear before us,” Will growled. “I don’t want to end up shooting one of our own damned men.”

  Callum shook his head but didn’t have to think about whether he wanted to go to Mann’s house or drive the carriage to Cornwall. He couldn’t stay behind while Mallory was vulnerable out on a country road in the middle of nowhere.

  “Shouldn’t we stick to a main road so it is less likely we can be attacked without witnesses seeing the men responsible?” Mallory asked.

  “Melrose will expect us to stick to the main road,” Callum said.

  He paused and squinted at Oliver when he saw the thoughtful look on Oliver’s face. There was more, and he wasn’t going to like it.

  “What?”

  Callum’s gaze slid to Mallory who was staring at her clasped hands. She looked so still, so fragile, that he wondered if he leaned over and breathed on her if she would vanish like a breath of wind. It struck him just how instinctive the need to reach out and place his hand over hers was. The urge to check she was all right, to offer her comfort, was an essential part of him now. Her wellbeing mattered.

  They were all drawn to the soft scuffle of movement in the doorway.

  Callum launched out of his seat when he looked up at saw Sir Hugo wavering in the doorway. Sir Hugo lifted a hand to stop him and glared at everyone.

  “I have been thinking,” he began as he stepped into the room. He wavered a little, as if trying to find his balance, and sidled over to the table. “The only person in this area who owns a house old enough to contain an oubliette is Connor Haugham. He owns Haugham Castle, that huge place up on the Marches. He is also best friends with Melrose’s brother. Go there if anything happens that stops you from arresting Melrose and Mann, and they disappear. I want that oubliette searched, just in case they have snatched someone else we haven’t learnt about yet. I also want the staff questioned and arrested until they can prove they haven’t been involved in Haugham’s activities. Haugham is far enough away that Melrose might turn to him for a place to hide. They are all to be arrested for false imprisonment, kidnap, slavery, and attempted murder. In the meantime, give me a gun. I am not going to lie in the back of any damned carriage helplessly waiting for someone to open the door and try to kill me again. I am not that much of a bloody invalid that I cannot defend myself, or the people with me.”

  There was such disgust rife in Sir Hugo’s voice that everyone heaved a sigh of relief. They all knew that someone who had so much strength of character and determination was never going to give in easily to anything, even death. Sir Hugo was going to do exactly what he said he would do, or die trying, of that there could be no doubt.

  “You must sit down,” Mallory urged.

  She gently pushed a seat out and waved the man into it. He staggered a little, but eventually lowered himself gingerly into the chair and nodded his thanks when Mallory handed him a goblet of brandy. With a hand that shook alarmingly, Sir Hugo took a drink.

  Callum placed a hand on Mallory’s waist; a gesture not lost on Sir Hugo or any of the men in the room. It was proprietary and created a unity that was unmistakeable. Sir Hugo was pleased to see it because he knew how important it was to have someone waiting for the men at home. Sir Hugo knew that if he hadn’t had Harriett to fight to return to, he would have succumbed to the suffocating blackness hours, if not years ago. As it was, the mental image of his stunning wife waiting patiently beside the fire with their children playing at her feet gave Sir Hugo the strength that he needed to fight to return to them all.

  “Melrose has to die if it becomes clear he cannot be arrested.” Sir Hugo’s voice was hard and clipped.

  The men knew they had just received orders that they were to kill Melrose if they got the chance.

  “His death has to be a warning to his cronies that their time is up,” Sir Hugo added.

  “Is there any news on Claude Smidgley?”

  Sir Hugo nodded. “Yes, but he is many miles away. We must concern ourselves with Melrose and Mann right now. We have a team in Gloucestershire watching Smidgley. If he moves, he will be taken down as well. For now, we are waiting to see who meets with him.”

  “How long do you think it is going to be before this kidnapping gang is brought to justice?” Mallory asked, concerned for ordinary women who wanted to go about their lives in their usual way.

  “No gang is impenetrable, or unbreakable. The more people who are involved means there is less chance that everybody can be controlled or prevented from talking about the crimes. There will always be someone who cockily thinks they can stick their head above the parapet and either boast about how infallible they are, or how high their connections go. That unwillingness to keep quiet, and stay hidden, is going to break the entire criminal network. That kind of fool will invariably play their part in bringing the entire operation to a halt because they don’t do what everyone else does. They are fools, who have had their confidence bolstered by having many people around them of the same mindset. It doesn’t mean they are right, just that they are lulled into a delusional sense of false security that nobody can touch them because there are many like them.”

  “They believe that if you take one of them down and put behind bars you take them all, and you cannot do that because there are
a lot of them.” Callum nodded.

  “Well, the English took down the French army, don’t forget,” Sir Hugo grinned. “No army is undefeatable. They just think they are. One thing and one thing only makes a good army: discipline. It is foolish for anybody to go off on a wild tangent and speak out of turn or go off and do their own thing just because they can. It is going to get the entire undisciplined army blasted to smithereens and rightly so.”

  “In essence, this is a kind of war,” Mallory whispered.

  Sir Hugo nodded. “We will disarm our enemy. They are not as clever as they think they are because they can only arm themselves with weapons we too can get hold of. They live in houses just like we do and must go about their business and can be ambushed just like we can. Nobody can just expect to violate people and remain unharmed. Even the most cunning criminal faces justice at some point in their life.”

  “We will defeat them,” Oliver announced coldly.

  “We are going to have to move out of here sooner rather than later. I must get to Harriett because some of these wounds go deep. She has the right kind of poultices that will stop any infection,” Sir Hugo announced with certainty. “When we do leave, we are all going to go in separate directions and go in disguise. Before we do that, Melrose and Mann are going to have a visit from the men. I am going to get out of here but will do my best not to hobble or give any indication that I have been injured. I will need to wear a beard to hide the bruises.”

  Sir Hugo then turned to Phillip and sent him off to fetch everything they would need to disguise themselves. When he had gone, Sir Hugo then turned to Callum and Mallory.

  “You two will have to go separately as well, I am afraid. Mallory, you will have to leave with Will, or Phillip, and will have to be hidden. Callum, you need to ride out with the men. When you are sure you have not been followed, double back. Don’t take any chances.”