Bombshell

by MacLean, Sarah

  She stepped down, confusion furrowing her brow as she looked to her driver, Abraham, who’d been with her for two years and knew the South Bank like his own face. “You’re sure this is right?”

  The young man’s look indicated that he was affronted by the mere suggestion that he might have delivered her to the wrong location. She gave a little laugh. “Fair enough,” she said. “I don’t think this will take long, but why don’t you head down the road and find a bit of cake?”

  Abraham’s sweet tooth did not require additional encouragement. Parting ways with her driver, Sesily headed up the narrow path toward a charming, well-tended collection of modest, thatched roofed houses, four in a small half circle, each with a gate and well-tended garden that Sesily imagined bloomed beautifully in the spring and summer.

  Stopping in the little cul-de-sac, she considered the slip of paper she’d committed to memory the night before, knowing that she was looking for number three—the quaint house with the blue door almost directly in front of her.

  Now what?

  “You’re here for the dressmaker?”

  Sesily turned, meeting the curious gaze of a middle-aged Black man, crossing a small, tidy garden toward her. “Pardon?”

  He smiled in full then, his expression matching his kind eyes. “The only time we get ladies we don’t know down here, it’s to see the dressmaker. Mrs. Berry.” He indicated the house with the blue door. “Number three.”

  A dressmaker.

  Well, it wasn’t what she’d been expecting, but Sesily knew her way around dressmakers. At best, she’d sort out whatever secrets were kept within and at worst … well, she’d order herself a new frock.

  “Thank you,” she said to the man, who waved from the other side of the fence and turned back to his business.

  Entering the gate for number three, Sesily approached the door and, having made her decision, knocked.

  It opened within seconds, as though the woman on the other side had been waiting for her arrival. She was tall and dark-haired, laughing at something outside of Sesily’s view—the kind of laugh that felt free and safe. But when she looked at Sesily, she grew serious—smoothing her hair and shaking out her moss green skirts. “Hello,” she said, her posture shifting. Making way for performance.

  For business.

  “Hello. I’m Sesily Talbot—”

  The woman’s blue eyes went wide and her mouth dropped open. “I’ve heard of you!”

  Sesily tilted her head. That was unexpected. “Oh?”

  The woman nodded, the black ringlets framing her face bouncing happily. “I read the gossip pages and you and your sisters are always—” She cut herself off, the wide eyes going horrified. “I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have—I mean to say …”

  She trailed off and Sesily couldn’t help her laugh. “Oh, please don’t stop on my account. When we were young, my sisters and I used to count the words devoted to each of our scandals and compete for the most.” She leaned in. “I am proud to say that I won the most often.”

  The other woman laughed. “Is it wrong for me to say that I always thought your scandals were the most fun?”

  “Not at all,” Sesily said, happily. “In fact, you were right.”

  The woman’s eyes lit up. “Is it true you sat for a nude painting?”

  Sesily laughed. “That was my friend, as a matter of fact. But I did know a sculptor for a while.”

  The woman opened the door wider. “Miss Talbot—Lady Sesily—” she corrected herself with a half curtsy. “I don’t know what brought you to Brixton, but I’m Jane Berry, and I’m at your service. Would you like to come in for tea?”

  Like that, Sesily knew there was no possible way this dressmaker in this pretty house down this pretty lane was the person she was looking for. No matter what Abraham said, they were in the wrong place. New frock it was.

  Perhaps Mrs. Berry could produce one in the same moss green as the one she was wearing. “I would, indeed,” Sesily said, stepping over the threshold.

  “What does bring you to Brixton?” Mrs. Berry asked.

  Sesily shook her head. “Would you believe, I had the wrong address?”

  “Well, it strikes me that you have the right address!”

  Sesily smiled. “You are a dressmaker?”

  “I am!” Mrs. Berry looked around Sesily to see her neighbor, standing by his fence, watching. She waved. “Hello, Mr. Green!”

  Mr. Green returned the wave, and Jane closed the door, shaking her head. “He’s a wonderful neighbor, but adores being in all available business.”

  The words settled between them, and the back of Sesily’s neck began to tingle with awareness. Perhaps she didn’t have the wrong address, after all.

  Perhaps Mr. Green was correct.

  But it didn’t explain who this woman was, or why so many people were interested in her.

  “Tea!” Jane pronounced, leading the way into a charming sitting room appointed for business with fabric swatches and a handful of dress forms in various states of design.

  “Thank you,” Sesily said, distracted, looking around the room, feeling as though she had been handed a box full of puzzle pieces with no indication as to what the final product should look like.

  “I shall put the kettle on,” Jane said, turning to leave the room, just as a boy came bursting in. “Peter! Manners, please!”

  The boy immediately came to a stop, giving Sesily a chance to look at him. He was eight, perhaps nine, and he had an open, easy smile like his mother, which he gifted to Sesily.

  “Hello,” he said happily, his green eyes flashing. Familiar.

  Recognition flared. Sesily’s heart stopped.

  She had the right address.

  This boy was Caleb’s son.

  Tall for his age, with the whisper of the handsome man he’d become in his young face. Green eyes, dark curls. The same smile. The absolute image of Caleb.

  She swallowed, suddenly cold in the warm house, her palms sweating. “Hello.”

  “Alright then. Outside, please. The lady is here to discuss a dress.” Jane’s words came from a distance. From miles away. And then Peter was gone, through the door and into the garden without a care in the world, and Jane was saying more. Apologizing for the interruption.

  And Sesily was shaking her head and replying—whatever was the appropriate thing to say in this situation. Waving away the apology.

  And Jane—

  Pretty, laughing Jane.

  Peter’s mother.

  Which made her … what to Caleb?

  Mrs. Berry. Not Calhoun. Sesily’s gaze dropped to the other woman’s hands and the thin gold band on her finger. She was married.

  Sesily thought she might be sick.

  Was this his secret? Was this his wife?

  Jane disappeared into the back of the house, toward the kitchens to put a kettle on, and Sesily stood in the middle of that pretty sitting room, a roar in her ears as she realized she absolutely could not remain one more minute in the middle of that pretty sitting room.

  She had to get out.

  “So sorry—” she said to the empty room, as though it might pass the message along to its inhabitant.

  She left, moving as quickly as possible, out the door and through the now empty garden—Peter had disappeared to wherever boys went when they were sent outside. Thankfully. She hurried down the path and through the gate, then down the lane, the holly bushes suddenly less idyllic. The sun had slipped behind cloud cover and the wind had picked up, a reminder that winter was round the corner.

  She pulled her cloak tightly around her.

  Caleb had a child. A Peter.

  Caleb had a Jane.

  A beautiful family, out here in Brixton, hidden from view as he lived … where? Marylebone? Boston? Neither? Here?

  Questions roared through her, as fast as her heartbeat. As quickly as she made for her carriage. The horses had been properly hitched and there was no sign of Abraham—of course. That would be too easy,
wouldn’t it? Passing the carriage, she turned toward the town, prepared to go find her driver and drag him back to take her home.

  She’d buy him a hundred cakes when they were back in Mayfair. She’d buy him a whole bakery if he’d return.

  But if she never returned to Brixton, it would be too soon. Brixton, where Caleb had a pretty wife and a beautiful son … a family.

  No wonder he’d left her.

  Did Sera know?

  Had she kept this from Sesily on purpose?

  And what of Caleb keeping it from her?

  He didn’t owe her this secret. They hadn’t made promises to each other. But she’d thought they were more than this. She’d thought he would at least …

  She tucked her chin to her chest, the biting cold of the wind nearly unbearable.

  She’d known he kept secrets, but she’d never imagined him a liar.

  That moment on the hill at Highley flashed, when she’d thought he saw her. Understood her. When she’d feared he’d break her heart.

  She’d been right.

  All that time, he’d had this. A little house. A kind woman. A sweet child, with his own winning smile. With his beautiful green eyes.

  Her breath caught in her chest, and her throat grew tight. Dammit. She wouldn’t let this man make her cry twice in two days. She wouldn’t cry. At least, not until she was in the carriage. She had her pride, after all.

  Her pride, and a seed of anger, taking root. Because he hadn’t just lied to her.

  He’d made her something she’d sworn she’d never be.

  He’d made her reckless.

  And therein was the problem. Because she was so consumed with Caleb, she’d forgotten that there were others interested in this particular address.

  The reason she’d come armed.

  Someone grabbed her from behind, lifting her off her feet and pulling her into a grove of trees at the side of the road. She shouted her surprise, and a filthy hand came to smother the sound.

  “Well, well. Sesily Talbot. Who’d ’ave guessed a lady like you would find ’er way south of the river?”

  Of course. She closed her eyes for a heartbeat, frustration and irritation and no small amount of fury coursing through her at the familiar voice.

  She’d forgotten The Bully Boys.

  Johnny Crouch tightened his grip on her. “But then again, you ain’t a lady, are ya?” She struggled against him, twisting and squirming until he moved his hand, his hot acrid breath at her ear. “No screaming. If you bring the locals coming, I’ll gut them in front of you. The boy first.”

  There was no risk of Sesily screaming. She knew better than to bring others into her fight. She worked best alone. “Your manners are atrocious, Johnny.”

  “They get worse when you’re around.”

  “Careful, you’ll turn my head.” She fought the tight grip he had on her, his arms like a vise around her midsection, keeping hers locked to her sides. She cursed the way she’d allowed herself to get distracted earlier. Johnny was a big brute, but easy to fell if one relieved him of his strength.

  She’d been so lost in thought, she’d lost the upper hand.

  Reckless.

  Which meant she had to use her own brute force, and hope he didn’t see it coming.

  “Why don’t you tell me what you want with the dressmaker?” he said.

  “Truth be told, Johnny, after you put your filthy hands all over one of them, it shouldn’t be so difficult to imagine that I want a dress. You should try bathing,” she added, deliberately attempting to rile him. “It’s all the rage.”

  “You’re awful bold for a lass about to be delivered to the enemy,” Johnny said. “Coleford won’t like the idea of one of you lot lurkin’ about here.”

  Fear thrummed through her. If Coleford got wind of her here, he’d peg the others—Imogen, Adelaide, Duchess. Worse. Maybe her sisters, who had nothing to do with this. Who wouldn’t expect retribution.

  Caleb. What did Coleford want with Caleb? With his family?

  She swallowed around her nerves and brazened it through. “Coleford is opposed to new frocks?”

  “You ain’t here for a dress. Which means Coleford is going to want to know why you are here. And I’ll tell you what—he don’t treat ladies well.”

  She feigned a little laugh around his tight grip. “Coming from you, that’s something.”

  With a grunt, he lifted her clear off her feet and started down the empty lane, toward a small, run-down cottage tucked into an overgrown cluster of trees. Sesily’s heart began to pound and she struggled again. If he got her inside a building, she’d have less chance of escape. “Wait. Wait. Johnny,” she said. “You’ve got me too tight. You’ve broken a rib.”

  “That’s not the only thing I’ll be breaking if you don’t shut yer gob,” he warned, not hesitating. Of course he didn’t hesitate. She’d smashed his face with a table leg at The Place. Turnabout was fair play on the London streets—a lesson she’d had to learn when she’d fallen in with the duchess.

  They drew nearer to the building, and Sesily knew she had less than a minute to gain ground. “Fair enough,” she said, as brightly as possible, knowing her fear would only feed his brutishness. And then she went limp in his arms, the shift of her weight enough to make him stumble.

  She closed her eyes and threw her head back as hard as she could, hoping she’d calculated the correct angle.

  A wild screech sounded, followed by the foulest curse she’d ever heard.

  She’d calculated the correct angle.

  In the heartbeat during which he loosened his hold on her, she spun away from him, reaching into her false pocket even as she turned to face him. Apparently she did require a weapon, after all.

  Johnny was hunched over, his hand to his nose, profusely bleeding. For the second time in just over a week. “Goddammit! You bitch! You broke my nose! Again!”

  “Would we say again if it hasn’t healed from the first time?” she asked, the hilt of her blade cool and welcome in her hand.

  Johnny did not care for the question. He looked up and came for her as she backed away with speed, toward the main road, hoping that Abraham had returned and that he knew how to use the pistol she kept inside the driver’s block of the carriage.

  He lunged and she swerved out of reach with a flick of her wrist, the point of her blade slicing the palm of his hand when he got too close.

  A hiss of pain sounded and he found the last bit of strength and agility necessary to grab her with his unharmed hand, his grip tight on her wrist, twisting her arm until she dropped the knife in the mud with a muffled cry of pain.

  He smiled, rotting teeth flashing. “Not so brave without yer weapon, are ya?”

  She bit back another shout as his hold grew even tighter, willing herself to stay quiet. She couldn’t risk Jane or Peter. Or that nice man who enjoyed others’ business. This business was not for him.

  And she had to stay conscious if Johnny broke her wrist … which was likely to happen if she couldn’t fight him back.

  There was one chance left.

  Using all her remaining strength, she swung toward him, her free hand reaching up, palm flat, to crack his nose one final time, knowing there would be no time to linger if he let her go. Knowing she would have to run, as fast as she could, and pray her carriage was ready when she got to it.

  The blow struck true.

  And she was turning, in motion before Johnny’s wicked howl sounded.

  Running. Straight into a brick wall.

  Or, rather, the brick wall ran straight into her, catching her, turning her and shoving her behind it as it put itself between her and Johnny Crouch—The Bully Boys’ biggest fist.

  Not as big as Caleb Calhoun, though, who put his own fist directly into Crouch’s face and knocked him out cold. Sesily blinked and looked down at the unconscious man, sprawled out on this dirt path in Brixton, gratitude and frustration and something she did not wish to identify coursing through her.

 
; Breathlessness.

  Because even now, even after the horrid events of the last thirty-six hours, even with his hat low over his brow, shadowing his face, she still responded to Caleb.

  Not that she would ever, ever show it again.

  Refusing to look at him, she turned on her heel and started for the carriage, stopping to collect her blade from the mud.

  “No thanks?” he called after her, and she thought she exercised remarkable control in not replying by settling the filthy knife directly into his side.

  “I had it under control,” she tossed over her shoulder, refusing to look back.

  He caught up with her. “He nearly broke your wrist.”

  “And I broke his nose,” she said, ignoring the ache in her wrist. “Three times, by my count. So I think we were even.”

  “You were not even,” he said, anger broadening his accent. Good. Let him be angry. Let him come for her. She would enjoy it. “You are lucky I was here.” He paused. “Fucking hell, Sesily—you shouldn’t be here. What were you thinking?”

  And that was when Sesily reached the end of her rope.

  “Don’t you dare,” she said, spinning back toward him. “Don’t you dare even think of scolding me, as though I’m not a grown woman. As though you have some sort of claim over me—some responsibility to protect me from being roughed up in a deserted lane in Brixton.” Her voice was ragged with her own anger. “You don’t. You don’t have claim or sway or responsibility for me. I’ve never asked you to protect me. Not in the two years I’ve known you, not the other night at The Place, not in Coleford’s study, and not today … minutes after being surprised by the existence of your wife and child barely a day after you left me naked and alone on the floor of a country cottage like a damned …” She searched for the proper word. Nothing seemed right. Nothing seemed bad enough. Nothing seemed like it would hurt him enough.

  And she wanted to hurt him.

  But he’d hurt her so much more. And suddenly all the clever quips and the scathing barbs that Sesily had never struggled to find in her arsenal were gone.

  He’d taken those, too.

  “I thought you were decent. I thought you were good.” A little, humorless laugh bubbled out of her. “I thought that whatever I found here would prove it. That I would fight alongside you to keep your secrets. To make them right.”