by Sara Bennett
“He’s not getting me into no trouble,” Sutton replied. “This is just a favor. Just for tonight. We’ll be off again in the morning.”
“I’ll pay you well,” John Little’s voice came in, and his words seemed to do the trick. Peggy, whoever she was, still complained, but it was more for show.
“I’ll have to sort out the kiddies,” she said. “I don’t want ’em to see. Leave her out here until I sort the kiddies, and then you can put her in the cellar. But you’re to be gone in the morning, mind.”
“I told you, Peggy, we have a boat.”
“Is Miss Smythe well secured?” Little asked, and he sounded anxious, as if he wasn’t at all sure this was a good idea.
“Tied up good and proper,” Sutton replied. “She’s not going anywhere, Captain.”
Their footsteps faded away, and then there was silence. Tina was just working up her courage to try to open the coach door, bound and blinded as she was, when it was jerked open and the coach dipped as someone heavy stepped inside.
Oddly, she could smell the sea, just a faint tang of salty air. And then she could smell tobacco smoke. Instantly she thought of John Little, and that it must be him returned. A heavy hand pressed down on her shoulder, making her cry out with despair.
“Be quiet,” came an urgent whisper in a voice that was definitely not Little’s. “Get her out, over into those bushes. Quickly and quietly.”
Shocked, Tina felt herself lifted quite gently and carried, her head dangling down toward the ground, so that all she could see were snatches of boots and trouser legs. She didn’t speak, she couldn’t, because the voice she had just heard sounded very much like that of Sir Henry Arlington.
Perhaps, she thought dizzily, she was going insane. Because how could Sir Henry be here?
But it was Sir Henry, for now they were removing the covering over her head, and his face was peering down at her in the starlight, that bandage still wound around his head beneath his hat.
“We’ve been following Little,” he explained gruffly. “Told Richard a man like that couldn’t disappear completely, even if he wanted to, and when he set off for Kent, I knew he was up to no good. Sorry to take so long, Miss Smythe. We wanted to make sure we got the whole lot of them in one fell swoop.”
“Richard?” she whispered.
Sir Henry smiled. “My spies tell me he’s on his way.”
For a moment she couldn’t think of anything else to say, she was so relieved to hear her beloved gentleman wasn’t dead.
“Where are they?” Sir Henry was speaking to one of his men.
Tina managed to sit up, some of the pain returning to her injured hands now that they were free, and there also seemed to be bruises all over her body if her soreness was anything to go by. Through the shrubs and trees she could see a largish house, set back from where the coach had stopped on the road. Lights were shining from its windows, and there was a dark plume of smoke coming from the chimney.
“Little is in there with Sutton and his sister?” Sir Henry said gruffly.
“He is, sir.”
Something occurred to Tina, and she said in a muffled cry, “Don’t let Mr. Little escape, please, Sir Henry. Richard has made a vow to capture his brother’s murderer, and if he gets away, we won’t be able to get married.”
Sir Henry’s mouth twitched. “Oh has he now? That sounds like our romantic Richard, doesn’t it? Well, we’d better capture him then, hadn’t we, Miss Smythe? For the sake of a happy ending, eh?”
Chapter 40
“This is it.” Will pointed toward the narrow track that led off the road. “The lodge will be down there.”
They’d knocked at an inn in Faversham and got directions to Sutton’s sister’s house—Peggy, a widow with two children, owned an old hunting lodge outside the town. The innkeeper seemed to think the goings-on there were less than law-abiding, but no one had been brave enough to have her charged. “She has a brother,” he explained, “puts the fear o’ God into anyone who threatens to haul her up before the magistrate.”
The men urged their horses forward.
“It could be a trap, sir,” Archie said nervously.
“Not if they don’t know we’re onto them,” Richard reminded him. “And if it is . . . we’ll just have to take that chance, won’t we?”
“Please be careful, sir,” Archie said anxiously.
Richard met his gaze. “Still taking care of me, Archie? Well, I thank you for it, and the years we’ve been together. You’ve always been a friend to me.”
He was almost saying good-bye, and Archie seemed to know it. Richard knew he was being reckless again, but he had to save Tina, and if he couldn’t . . . he’d rather die with her than go on alone. He turned away from Archie’s understanding gaze.
“Come on,” he said, and led them down the track.
“Someone coming,” one of Sir Henry’s men gave a loud whisper, pointing down the track. But before they could do more than look, the door to the house itself was opened, and Sutton came striding out, heading toward the coach. Sir Henry edged forward under cover of the bushes, and when Sutton opened the coach door and climbed inside, the men rushed out and trapped him.
Sutton gave one shout, loud enough to be heard inside the house, because a moment later Little ran out, making a run for the trees.
Just as Richard rode up with Will and Archie.
“Sir Henry?” he blurted out, as if he couldn’t believe his eyes. “What are . . . ?”
“No time for questions, Richard.”
A woman was screaming, more with rage than fear, and being dragged from the lodge. At the sight of her, Sutton began to shout and swear, fighting as he was hauled from the coach, and when Richard dismounted to help, he felt a light touch on his arm.
“Richard.”
He turned, and she was in his arms, warm and alive. He could have stood there holding her forever, but in the end he set her away, eyes searching her face for marks, for signs of hurt or suffering, but apart from a weary cast to her features, she looked remarkably well. And she was smiling.
“Your head?” she said softly, reaching as if to touch him.
“My head hurts,” he said, forgoing any heroics.
He saw her hands then and clasped them, turning them over, scowling at the injuries made by her struggles with her bonds.
“They will heal,” she said. “There is nothing wrong with me that will not heal.”
Her meaning was clear to him and despite seeing her hurt like this, Richard felt an overwhelming relief. He swayed and might have fallen, but Sir Henry’s shout reminded him that his night’s work was not finished.
“Richard!” Sir Henry repeated impatiently. “Little is getting away. I thought you’d made a vow to capture him?”
Richard gave Tina’s hands one last squeeze and turned to go, but Tina wouldn’t release him.
“I want to come,” she said frantically. “I need to come.”
He read her eyes, seeing the pain she’d suffered and, more, the desperate need she had to see his promise fulfilled. And then he did something totally unprofessional. Richard threw her up into the saddle, mounted himself, and, ignoring the shouts behind him, set off at a gallop toward the trees where Little had vanished.
At first he couldn’t see him, for although the moon had risen, it was still too dark among the trees. But just as he was considering returning for more men, they reached a clearing. “There!” Tina pointed, and he caught a glimpse of Little disappearing into the trees on the other side. Spurring his horse on, Tina’s arms around him, Richard made short work of reaching the spot.
Now that she saw how close these trees were growing together, Tina gasped and clung tighter in anticipation, but Richard wasn’t going to risk following on horseback. He drew his mount to a halt and jumped to the ground. Reaching up, he caught Tina, already scrambling down after him, and held her against him, feeling the rapid beat of her heart.
“You should stay here,” he said, his eyes d
ark and solemn in the faint light. “You know what sort of man he is.”
“That’s why I have to come with you,” she insisted. “We have to do this together. And then you will give up the Guardians.”
He smiled at the sound of her issuing orders, just like Sir Henry, but, inside, he agreed with her wholeheartedly. Richard was ready to give up his secret life and settle down.
“Show me the way then,” he said, and it was Tina who cautiously stepped into the trees.
The quiet was suffocating, but up ahead they could hear the crackling of running footsteps and once a faint cry, as if someone had fallen. John Little didn’t have much of a lead, and they quickened their pace as best they could.
Once Richard murmured, “Hush,” and drew her back against him, holding her still, listening. Her heart was thudding in her breast, and for a moment she couldn’t hear anything but the whoosh of her own blood, and then she did. Some movement close by, but it had slowed considerably.
Richard’s words were a breath in her ear. “I think he’s injured.”
Tina nodded to show she understood, and then they were moving forward again, guardedly, watchful for Little’s tricks. A moment later he came into sight, just ahead of them. He was stooped over, one hand clutched to his side, the other grasping at the passing tree trunks as if to hold himself upright.
“Little! Stop!”
Richard’s shouted order made him jump, and Tina could see his white face as he turned to stare back at them. He looked from side to side, as if searching for a way out, but there wasn’t one, and he must have known it, accepted it, because he stopped and waited for them to approach him.
“You recruit women in the Guardians now?” he mocked, his voice breathy and thin. “Why am I not surprised?”
“You’re injured, Mr. Little,” Tina said, taking a step forward.
He gave her a blank look and then glanced down at the hand he had clutched to his side. Tina saw to her horror that there was blood all over it.
“Sutton’s sister,” he croaked. “Attacked me when she saw her brother had been taken. The bread knife. She was preparing us some food. I had a boat ready, but we needed to wait for the tide,” he added, and gave a despairing cry, as if only just appreciating how close he’d been to escape.
“Mr. Little, you need a doctor.”
“Do I?” He looked down at his injury again and grimaced. “Perhaps it would be better if I died. I’m going to be hanged anyway. Aren’t I, Eversham?”
Richard met his gaze, his own sober. “Yes. You killed my brother in cold blood, Little; you must have known that one day I’d catch up with you.”
Little nodded, as if in acceptance of his sentence.
“Why did you do it?” Richard asked him, and he meant everything, all of it.
Little shrugged and grimaced with pain. “My father killed himself when I was a boy. Lost everything, though not for lack of trying. Some lord or other decided he wanted what we had and took it—he could, you know, the law is always on their side. My father committed suicide and left my mother and me to fend for ourselves. I always had great respect for the poor, the struggling disadvantaged, fighting against the wealthy and privileged. What would the world be like if it were controlled by the little man?” He gave a painful laugh at the pun. “Imagine, Eversham, if you and your friends had to scrape and bow to the laborers and farmers and bakers and butchers? I think it would be a better place, and I tried to make it happen.”
Richard looked skeptical. “Did you? With all your money you could have really helped those in need, but instead you persuaded them to riot, had them killed and sent to prison, and for what? For the sake of your own sense of superiority. To be pulling strings made you feel important. You didn’t care about the little man. My brother was a kind and generous person, loved by everyone who knew him, and you shot him in cold blood to save your own skin. Sorry, Little, I have no sympathy for you.”
Tina reached for Richard’s hand, squeezing it. Little’s expression was implacable, and Tina wondered if he found it impossible to understand any point of view but his own. And then with a gasp, his knees gave way, and he collapsed in a heap on the ground.
He looked up as Tina knelt beside him, his face ghastly. “I sent them back,” he gasped. “The pearls and the watch. They were kind to me. I sent them back.”
Little did not live to see the doctor. Tina didn’t know whether she was glad or sorry that he wouldn’t be hanged after all, but she supposed Little himself would have been glad. Sutton, in response to Peggy’s insistence he make a clean breast of everything, and before he was wrestled into the coach to be returned to London, admitted that it was Evelyn who had told him where to go, to kidnap Tina.
Evelyn’s days were numbered, thought Tina, with a glance at her beloved’s uncompromising expression. Just as well. She couldn’t imagine sharing Eversham Manor with that woman. She wanted to live there with Richard and make it into the sort of happy place it had once been, when his mother was alive. For now, Evelyn had been restricted to her own rooms, under the close watch of the servants, while Richard and Tina took possession of the manor.
“I wonder if my parents will have to live with us,” Tina said uneasily. Now that she was safe and they were together, it was time to consider the future. And her future meant bankrupt parents.
He gave her a startled look. “Your parents?”
“They may not have a home any longer, Richard.”
“Good God. Well, they can stay until we find them somewhere else, Tina, but I will not live with your mother. She hates me.”
“I’m sure she will grow to love you. How could she not?”
She was teasing him, and he smiled. They were in the sitting room at Eversham Manor, just her and Richard, gazing out at the garden. It wasn’t as exotic as Lady Isabelle’s garden, nor so extensive, but Tina already loved it. And, she promised Richard, she had no intention of turning it into a showpiece.
“Although I may want a folly,” she said, and then giggled when he caught her up and swung her onto his lap.
“We don’t need a folly,” he said. “But you should feel free to change anything you like. It has been so long since I’ve lived here, I feel it’s time for a new start. A fresh start for a new line of Evershams.”
“A new line?” She raised her eyebrows, and tapped her fingertip against his chin. “Are you planning on creating a dynasty, Richard?”
“Of course. At least ten children, I think.”
Tina smiled and kissed him. “If we start with one, we can go on from there,” she suggested practically.
“I am, as ever, putty in your hands, my love.”
Tina doubted that, but she loved him for the man he was, and she knew he loved her. Everything felt right, and although she knew they would argue and disagree, they would always make up their differences.
She’d planned to marry Horace only to discover he was all wrong for her, but in hunting him, she had found someone else. Someone who was perfect.
“Kiss me, Mr. Eversham,” she murmured.
His eyes warmed. “Why?”
“Because I feel in need of more lessons.”
His mouth hovered over hers, teasing. “How many lessons do you think you’ll need, Miss Smythe? You do realize there is a price to be paid at the end of them?”
“As many as possible. I intend to be your only pupil from this moment on. And, Mr. Eversham, I am quite willing to pay any price you may ask of me.”
“Well then,” he said, “I’d better get started.”
Epilogue
Tina was nearly ready. Her dress, a simple, cream-colored satin with ruching about the hem and the sparkle of pearls sewn into the bodice, was quite simply beautiful. She went to the window and looked out at the garden at Eversham Manor, where she had decided to be married. It was a glorious day, and the white rosebushes had been trimmed into neat balls by enthusiastic gardeners, while the fountain, with its dolphin statue, was splashing water, droplets glitterin
g like stars in the sunlight.
Down below her, Tina could see the guests moving about, awaiting her arrival. The wedding was larger than Richard had expected, but Tina had just laughed at his astonishment. “They love you, Richard,” she’d told him, when he understood how many guests would be coming from the surrounding countryside. “They want you here at Eversham Manor, creating your dynasty.”
Archie and Maria had come from London, where they now owned the tearoom in Camden that specialized in Spanish sweets. A big change for Archie, although he seemed happy with his new life. Maria said it was as good as being in Spain. Better, because she didn’t have to leave Archie.
They did seem very happy, Tina thought with a smile.
Her parents were thrilled at her happy union once they’d heard the full story, and Lady Carol and Richard seemed to have overcome their rocky beginnings. Sir Thomas was even more thrilled when Charles announced his engagement to the wealthy Anne Burgess, and it seemed as if they wouldn’t have to leave Mallory Street after all.
Thinking of her parents reminded Tina of John Little, and his last words to her. She hadn’t understood until later what he meant, about sending them back. His last good deed to her parents. It had been a sad life, but Tina agreed with Richard, Mr. Little’s early misfortune shouldn’t be an excuse for what he had done later on.
Below, in the garden, she thought she caught sight of someone with red-gold hair in a violet dress, and grimaced. But Evelyn wasn’t here. She was moving to London and talking about taking up her acting career again.
Tina had a feeling Richard was behind the offer of roles Evelyn received—he still had a great many contacts with the Guardians, and Sir Henry would always look after his favorite spy. She knew Richard still mourned his brother, but the pain had faded, and she knew he now felt that he had kept his promise. And he wanted Evelyn gone from his life.
“You are ready, miss?”
