by Rebecca King
Reluctantly, Phillip nodded. He had to agree because he knew from the tone of Oliver’s voice that he had just been given an order. It rankled, though. The last thing he wanted to do was lie down in a nice, warm, soft bed and sleep while he knew Carlotta was out there in the darkness, probably freezing cold, all alone and scared.
‘We have to find her,’ he whispered once he reached the door. ‘I have to find her.’
‘We will,’ Oliver assured him. ‘While we are waiting for daylight to return, maybe you should think about what you are going to do about that father of hers. If she is three and twenty, she can make her own mind up what she wants out of life. Maybe you should contemplate suggesting a few changes.’
Phillip nodded and left his friends a little stymied by how readily he agreed to changing his life to make room for her. He had barely reached the bed chamber he suspected she had used before Oliver called him back downstairs.
‘Have you checked the beach?’ Oliver called.
Phillip froze. ‘Of course not. She wouldn’t be foolish enough to go down there in the dark, would she?’
‘It is the only place she might feel safe,’ Jasper reasoned.
Phillip didn’t hesitate to leave the house and go and check, and was swiftly followed by his colleagues. Jasper and Justin followed him down to the beach while the others went to keep watch over the woods to make sure nobody followed them.
‘She couldn’t make it down here,’ Phillip growled when he was half-way down the path and his feet slid out from underneath him. He grabbed at the foliage on the cliff wall beside him and righted himself only to slip on more loose shale.
‘Let’s leave it until morning and we can see what we are doing. From the look of it the tide is in anyway. Anybody who ventures any lower is going to get swept away if the sea turns any rougher.’
But Phillip refused to give up. Instead, he continued to slide into the impenetrable darkness toward the roaring ocean waves. He was nearly on the edge of the beach when he saw something tucked away at the base of the cliff wall. It was blacker than most of the boulders which shone lighter in the moonlight. Moreover, it was smaller than most of the boulders stretching out to sea. Edging toward it, Phillip tripped and stumbled but eventually was able to squat down beside it.
‘Is it her?’ Justin called.
Phillip eased the cloak away from the tightly curled bundle and cursed when he saw the paleness of the face he most desperately wanted to see. For a moment, all he could do was thank God that she was alive. Choked with emotion, he nodded only to then realise that Justin couldn’t see him clearly enough.
‘It’s her.’ His voice was gruff. While his hand was gentle the nudge that he gave her shoulder wasn’t.
Carlotta gasped in shock when something pushed roughly against her shoulder. She looked up and immediately cowered away from the large man towering over her. It took her several moments for her exhaustion fogged mind to realise that it was Phillip.
‘Get up,’ he growled. Without giving her the chance to move, he grabbed her by the cloak and hauled her to her feet. ‘Move.’
Carlotta stumbled because he pushed her again before she could find her balance. She staggered forward and was stopped from having a nasty fall by the man she had been told was called Justin. Clinging to him, she looked back at Phillip only to gasp when a large wave slammed into the spot where she had been sleeping. Phillip barely had the chance to jump out of the way and got soaked by the retreating ocean.
‘What are you doing here?’ she asked quietly when Phillip had clambered over the rocks to join them.
Phillip glared accusingly at her. ‘I could ask you the same thing. I do believe I left you in the sodding safe house,’ he growled. ‘Do you have any bloody idea how worried we have been about you?’
Without giving her the chance to answer, he grabbed her wrist and tugged her toward the perilous cliff path. ‘Stay close to the cliff face and use the foliage to pull yourself up. It’s treacherous because the stones are wet. We must get off this sodding beach before we all get swept away. You are bloody lucky the stones didn’t drop you onto the damned rocks at the base of this cliff so you could get carried out to sea.’
Phillip was shaking because of how close he had come to being swept out to sea again. He struggled to control his fury that it might have happened to Carlotta. The thought of it was enough to make him want to punch something. Instead, he retreated behind a cold wall of stoic silence and growled: ‘Move,’ in her direction.
‘I did make the trip down here, you know,’ she snapped, with a dark glare. ‘I know how slippery it is.’
‘You go first.’ Justin waved her up the cliff path before him. He too dodged out of the way when a wave crashed and splashed toward him.
Carlotta, glad to have someone between her and Phillip’s temper, hurriedly climbed the cliff path. Her boots were woefully inadequate for the climb; their lack of grip caused her to slip several times. It was only the men behind her who stopped her from falling to her death. Eventually, she reached the top only to find herself swung off her feet and unceremoniously carried into the house. All Carlotta could do was cling miserably to him and try to think of something to say.
Kicking the kitchen door closed, Phillip lowered her to her feet. Thankfully, his colleagues had decided to find other things to do, giving him time to have a private word with her. ‘I think we need to be honest with each other now, Carlotta,’ he began, his voice nothing more than a husky growl.
‘I have been honest with you. It is a shame that you chose not to be honest with me,’ she retorted.
‘I have.’
‘Have you?’ she challenged.
‘I have made you no promises,’ he snapped.
‘I know.’ Carlotta struggled to contain the urge to cry. ‘I didn’t ask for your help.’
‘I know. But you should consider the situation you have put me in. I work for the War Office. The Star Elite. We have a duty to protect people we know are in trouble or being threatened. I know there is a problem with your father. What I want to know is if you have been honest with me about what’s wrong between you and him.’
Carlotta’s stomach lurched. She immediately forced aside all memories of that day but when it came to reply to him, she couldn’t bring herself to meet his steady stare. ‘I have told you the situation with my father.’
‘There is nothing else?’ Phillip knew she was lying to him from the careful way she avoided his gaze. Stepping closer, he tipped her chin up and forced her to look at him. ‘Tell me.’ It wasn’t until he touched her that he realised just how cold she was, but he didn’t allow her to move. ‘Tell me.’ This time, his voice was far harder; unyielding even. ‘I cannot help you if you do not tell me what is wrong.’
‘What do you know about the law?’ she began. ‘How the law stands regarding young ladies like me?’
‘In what sense? Have you robbed someone? Stolen something? Murdered someone?’ Phillip challenged.
Before she could reply, he captured her hand and tugged her toward the study. Once there, he closed the door and lit the fire before taking a seat opposite her. He braced his elbows on his knees and stared at her.
‘Tell me the truth, Carlotta. Have you stolen something? Murdered someone?’
Carlotta mentally winced. ‘No.’
Phillip allowed a heavy silence to settle between them. He knew it was making her uncomfortable because she sighed, looked at the fire, then sighed once again.
‘How long have you worked for the Star Elite?’ she asked eventually.
‘I joined the army and fought in the war. We all did. When the war ended, we joined the Star Elite and started to fight criminals in the country but on a larger scale.’
‘Like the gang of kidnappers,’ Carlotta whispered.
‘Yes. It is what we do, Carlotta. The men we fight work in large gangs, are often violent and have no respect for the law, or law-abiding citizens in this country. Our work is dangerous, requires us to wor
k for long hours overnight, no matter what the weather is doing, and can result in our death, but we do it because we enjoy it. It gives us all a purpose in life, a reason to keep fighting.’
‘You cannot fight every battle,’ Carlotta whispered.
Phillip went still. ‘No, but we can help women like you.’
‘Not by turning me over to him, you cannot. I am three and twenty. I didn’t lie to you about that. Why would I?’
‘Because it makes you older than you are and means the law is different. If you were, say, nineteen or twenty I would be inclined to view the matter differently. At three and twenty things are different.’
‘Why? How could three years make all that much difference?’
Phillip ran a weary hand down his face. ‘Because most young women your age are married with children.’
‘I chose not to marry because I saw how desperately unhappy my parents were,’ she whispered.
‘Not every marriage is the same,’ he replied swiftly. Something within him was eager to dispel that notion.
‘I never found anybody who appeals to me enough to want to contemplate marriage,’ she admitted. ‘We never went out very much. When we did our father was in charge. He can be quite – bullish. He can be overbearing. Loud. His friends were – are – the kind of people my mother didn’t enjoy socialising with because of it. It makes me wonder why they ever married seeing as they had so little in common. Father seemed to have so little interest in her.’
‘They had you in common.’
‘It wasn’t enough to make them happy,’ Carlotta replied. ‘In fact, I think I just added to their problems.’
‘What happened?’
Carlotta contemplated the life she had lived until that fateful afternoon when everything had changed so drastically. But when the memories began to resurface, she realised that she just couldn’t face them. The fear, hatred, anger and raw grief that surged through her added to the heavy burden already weighing her shoulders. Because she was aware that Phillip was still waiting for her to answer him, she told him a limited version of the truth.
‘He changed when my mother died. Horace became even colder. I had thought that he couldn’t be more distant and unemotional. I was wrong. He grew worse and refused to speak to me most of the time. When he did speak he was often overbearing and harsh. He made no attempt to even pretend to like me anymore. I knew I had to leave.’
‘Did you steal any money?’
Carlotta shook her head. ‘I did look around his office before I left because I need the papers about my inheritance.’
‘Why would he send armed men after you?’ Phillip leaned toward her. ‘I want the truth, Carlotta.’
She nodded but before she could speak, Phillip tugged her out of the chair and led her over to the chaise. Once settled, he sat beside her and tugged her into his arms until she was flush against him.
‘We shouldn’t sit here like this,’ she protested although didn’t try to move away.
‘Neither of us are going anywhere,’ he promised her and settled her more tightly against him. Because she was so cold, he draped a blanket over them and allowed the peace to settle between them for a few moments. He could feel the tension thrumming threw her, and knew he had to get to the cause of it while she was willing to talk.
Deeper in the house they could both hear the men moving about. Phillip was glad that some of them had returned because he was now able to focus all his attention on Carlotta, and the answers he needed to be able to make a few decisions.
‘Who owns this house?’ he asked quietly.
‘A man called Henry Palmer. He is my friend’s new husband. I have been friends with his wife, Henrietta, for years.’
‘Henry and Henrietta?’ He lifted his brows and smiled.
‘I know. I wasn’t the one who introduced them,’ Carlotta murmured a little ruefully.
‘They helped you. Why did they not accommodate you in their house? Do they know you are here?’
‘Yes,’ Carlotta sighed. ‘They did help me. They were the first people I turned to because, like I said, I have known Henrietta for years.’
‘Those thugs of your father’s are men you don’t know?’
‘I haven’t seen them with him before I left, no. I don’t even know if they work for him or keep coming to the house for some other reason,’ Carlotta replied.
Phillip knew she was telling him the truth because she was relaxed and at ease against him. The readiness of her reply and the certainty of her tone made it clear she was being truthful. ‘They used your name.’
‘Nobody in this area knows my name. When I spoke to the owners of the grocery store I used my mother’s maiden name,’ Carlotta told him.
‘Why would your father want you scared, Carlotta?’ Phillip asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Carlotta replied.
‘Are you sure?’
She sighed heavily and tried to find the right words to say only to be prevented from speaking by quiet tapping on the door.
‘Damn it,’ Phillip growled when Callum shoved his head into the room.
‘We have seen someone. Do you remember seeing one of the thugs with a grey shirt?’
Phillip shook his head. ‘The thugs I saw earlier were all wearing dark clothing.’ He turned to look at Carlotta only to find her staring thoughtfully into the fire. ‘Carlotta? What is it?’
Slowly, she sat up. ‘I think I know who the killer is,’ she hissed into the deadly silence of the parlour.
CHAPTER TEN
‘What?’ Phillip leaned forward.
Callum stepped into the room followed by Oliver, Jasper, Niall and Justin.
‘Who did you see?’ Oliver demanded.
‘I can remember seeing a man in the village wearing a dirty top. It was an old shirt that was so filthy it looked grey from a distance. I knew I had seen him somewhere before. He was the one we saw in the woods.’ Carlotta looked at Phillip. ‘It must be the same man. He was stocky and had dark hair.’
‘Who is it?’ Phillip tried to remember the figure he had seen in the fog, but he only had a fleeting glance and didn’t see the murderer’s face.
‘My father’s thugs were searching the main street the same day you arrived here. I went to the village for food and found them walking down the opposite side of the road. They passed me but must have recognised me because they began to follow me. To try to avoid them I went down to the harbour side. The man was there. On a fishing trawler. I told him that the thugs were in the village with guns and were looking for trouble. He looked startled and then incredibly angry. He intercepted them and had some sort of angry confrontation with them. He is the only man I can ever remember seeing in the village with a dirty shirt on. It isn’t grey, it is a dirty white and he has a boat in the harbour.’
Phillip shared a knowing look with Oliver. ‘It’s the Captain of the Starling.’
‘He must have left Bladley Weeks and moved his boat here while the gun battle raged,’ Oliver mused.
‘Is he local?’ Phillip asked her quietly.
‘I don’t know. The villagers would be able to tell you if he is,’ she replied.
‘Can you remember what the boat’s name was?’ Phillip asked.
They all knew that Carlotta had just inadvertently at least given them all the most valuable information that might lead to the Star Elite finally being able to catch the mysterious murderer of Claude Smidgley. What they didn’t know yet was what link he had to the thugs who had accosted them in such high numbers.
‘The Starling, or something like it,’ Carlotta replied. ‘I might be completely wrong, and he might not be anything to do with it. What I can tell you is that the man was surly and had no qualms challenging my father’s armed thugs.’
‘What has your father done, Carlotta?’ Oliver asked suddenly.
‘Pardon?’ she blinked at him and went still.
‘Well, if you haven’t done anything, and I don’t believe for one second that you have, your father h
as to have done something.’ Oliver slid a look at Phillip who remained quiet.
Carlotta clasped Phillip’s hand when he reached out to hold her fingers. She took the strength from it she needed and sucked in a deep breath. ‘It feels such a foolish thing to say.’
‘What does?’
‘We have heard it all,’ Justin assured her. ‘There is nothing you can say that will shock us.’
‘He killed my mother,’ she whispered.
Phillip stared at her while he absorbed that.
Oliver edged closer and took a seat closest to them. ‘Did you see him, or hear them arguing or something?’
Carlotta knew she had to be honest with them. While clutching Phillip’s hand tightly, she finally allowed herself to think back on that horrible day when her life had turned on its head.
‘Or something. I knew my mother was unhappy. What I didn’t know until a weeks before I left was that she had taken a lover. I don’t know how long she had been seeing him, but she came to seem me one day and had such a strange look on her face. It was like barely concealed excitement and pure terror. Mother told me she couldn’t bear to live with father anymore, and that she had to leave before she went completely mad. She had packed her things or was going to; I cannot remember which. She said that she was going to start again with this lover of hers. She said I could go with them. I was stunned but was relieved to be able to leave as well. Mother had it all planned. She knew that father was going to go into town to visit friends. He did every weekend and usually disappeared for several days at a time. Anyway, she said that the next time he went we were going to move out and take our things with us and would be gone by the time he returned. We both knew he wouldn’t miss us. If anything, he would be mad that we had left without asking his permission.’
‘You left,’ Phillip replied when silence fell upon them.
