The Promise of a Kiss

by K. C. Bateman

  The Promise Of A Kiss

  K. C. Bateman

  Copyright © 2019 by Kate Bateman

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  For my three bad rats,

  and M, with love.

  Contents

  The Promise Of A Kiss

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Epilogue

  Afterword

  Also by K. C. Bateman

  About the Author

  The Promise Of A Kiss

  Chapter 1

  London, April 1815.

  * * *

  “I won’t do it.”

  Harry Tremayne, second son of the Earl of Ashton and former cavalryman of His Majesty’s Horse Guards, flicked the corner of his newspaper back up and tried to ignore his Great Aunt Agatha, who loomed in front of him.

  He failed. The Dowager Countess of Ashton was a woman impossible to ignore, despite being scarcely five feet tall. She was a formidable presence; even her closest friends referred to her as a ‘battle ax.’

  “You have to go and find her. She’s your cousin,” Aunt Agatha bellowed.

  Harry scowled and lowered the corner of the Racing Post again.

  “She is not my cousin,” he said testily. “She’s your sister’s step-grand-daughter once removed, or something equally convoluted. I’m more closely related to the king of England. I owe her no familial duty whatsoever.”

  Aunt Agatha sent him a piercing glare. That look had been very effective when Harry was a boy of seven. It was almost as terrifying now, despite him being twenty years older.

  “Well, be that as it may, Henry George Bernard Tremayne,” Aunt Agatha said—and Harry knew she was serious, because she’d used his full name—“you owe a duty to me. I am old and frail and—”

  Harry snorted. “What rot! You’re the sprightliest old bird I ever met.”

  “I’m eighty-one—”

  “No, you’re not. You’re seventy-three. I’ve seen your birthday in the front of the family bible. And you’re as tough as old boots,” Harry finished, unmoved. “Send someone else. I’ve rescued that woman enough times as it is. I spent three years keeping an eye on her in almost every major city in Europe before I went off to serve King and country.”

  Aunt Agatha opened her mouth, but Harry wasn’t finished.

  “Lady Hester Morden has an uncanny ability to find areas of the world embroiled in political strife. She is a magnet for trouble. At first I thought she was just unlucky to stumble into such unfortunate situations, but then I realized the truth; Lady Hester is usually the cause of said strife.”

  Aunt Agatha tried to interrupt, but Harry held up his hand.

  “She is one of those infuriatingly independent women who drive sane men to drink. She is disaster with a capital D.” He raised his eyebrows. “You want to locate her? That’s easy; just look at a newspaper. Find somewhere with a peasant uprising or a nasty revolution, and ten to one she will be there in the middle of it. Instigating.”

  He shook his head and adopted an expression of mock regret. “I’m sorry, Aunt Agatha, but I don’t want to push my luck. I returned from the wars with barely a scratch. The last time I saw Lady Hester, she threatened to castrate me. Or shoot me. Or strangle me. Or possibly all three at once.”

  “That’s because you kissed her!” Aunt Agatha boomed, finally managing to get a word in edgeways. “Two years ago. At Lady Bressingham’s garden—”

  “I had to do something to stop her insulting the Turkish ambassador. She kept telling him how dreadful his reforms were. It was the only thing I could think of at the time, short of clubbing her over the head and dragging her body into the shrubbery. Which, come to think of it, would have been a better idea.”

  Harry frowned.

  Certainly it would have been better for his sanity. Because he’d dreamed about kissing Lady Hester Morden for years, annoying baggage that she was, and the real thing had been just as spectacular as he’d feared it would be. He’d known it would be trouble to allow himself even a taste of her, but he’d been unable to resist.

  Of course, after that very public kiss, he’d quite properly offered to marry her, but Hester had stoutly refused. She cared nothing for the scandal. She’d been about to accompany her eccentric uncle Jasper, an eminent scholar and cartographer, on an extended tour of Egypt.

  Harry had been about to leave the country too, to fight the French tyrant Napoleon, so he’d accepted her refusal with outward good grace and quite a bit of inner irritation. Why didn’t she want to marry him? He was a good catch, wasn’t he? He had a title, if not a vast fortune, and Hester was an heiress in her own right; she didn’t need to marry for money.

  He reminded himself he’d had a lucky escape. He hadn’t been ready to settle down, and he might have been killed in battle and left her a widow. Hester, too, had craved adventure. Since Egypt was far away from the European war zones, Harry had hoped the trip might keep her out of trouble—at least until he returned from the wars and they could continue their delightful sparring.

  He should have known better. Of course she’d managed to get herself into some scrape, even with her uncle’s supervision. The woman was a menace. And yet he was helpless to resist her. Witness the fact that he’d spent the last few weeks organizing his own passage to Egypt, ostensibly to collect some mummies to sell to the Royal College of Surgeons, but in reality because it was high time someone made sure Hester Morden was still alive.

  He shouldn’t care if she’d got herself locked away in a harem or robbed by highwaymen. She wasn’t his problem. But if he was in Egypt, he might as well inquire about her whereabouts.

  Aunt Agatha seemed to scent victory. “The family is very concerned, Harry. There’s been no letter from Jasper for weeks.”

  “You know how long it takes for correspondence to get here from Egypt. It’s probably just been delayed.”

  Aunt Agatha shook her head. “I want you to find her. It’s time she came back to England and settled down.”

  “You won’t get her married off, even if she does come back,” Harry said with conviction. “She’s completely uncivilized. She once pushed me into a canal in Venice.”

  “You doubtless deserved it.” Aunt Agatha sniffed. “You were always teasing the poor child.”

  That was true. He’d been mocking Hester’s Italian pronunciation at the time, and thwarting the amorous attentions of a fortune-hunting Count. Hester hadn’t thanked him for either.

  “You’re going to Egypt, aren’t you?” Agatha barked. “Your mother told me. So it can’t be very far out of your way.”

  “Do you have any concept of how big Egypt is? It’s huge. There are literally thousands of places to get lost and stay lost.”

  Aunt Agatha ignored this logic. “Your mother said you were going to get some of ‘em pharaohs.”

  “Mummies,” Harry corrected. “The Royal College of Surgeons wants mummies. For dissection. They’ll pay handsomely for well-preserved specimens.”

  Aunt Agatha gave a sort of bellow through her nose, which seemed to indicate disgust, bu
t then her rheumy eyes turned sly. “So that’s it! Your pockets are to let. What was it, m’boy? Bad run of cards?” She glanced at the Racing Post. “Lame horse?”

  Harry raised an eyebrow. His elder brother, James, was heir to the Tremayne estates. As the second son, Harry had preferred to join the Army instead of pursuing a career in either the church or academia, but since Napoleon had been packed off to the island of Elba things had grown rather quiet. He’d resigned from the army and received the payout of his officer’s commission, but that wasn’t enough to sustain him forever. A trip to Egypt would settle his more pressing debts and build up a nice little nest-egg for the future.

  “If something’s happened to Jasper, the poor child will be defenseless.” Agatha sighed dramatically. “She’s a damsel in distress.”

  Harry barely restrained a snort. “Lady Hester Morden is the last person in Christendom who needs saving. She’s the most capable woman I’ve ever met. She’d doubtless refuse my help, even if I offered it. I’m sorry, Aunt Agatha. Nothing could induce me.”

  “Not even five thousand pounds?” Aunt Agatha said with faux innocence. “I’ll pay five thousand pounds to the man who returns her safely to England.”

  Harry’s jaw went slack. He slid his hand into his waistcoat pocket, withdrew his favorite silver hip flask—the one Hester had given him—and took a fortifying swig of brandy.

  “Consider me induced.”

  Chapter 2

  Three weeks later. May 1815.

  * * *

  Lady Hester Morden was not having the best day.

  She hadn’t, in fact, thought it could get much worse after she’d been sneezed on—yet again—by her surly camel, Bahaba, and discovered a scorpion in her boot at breakfast, but the universe was often surprisingly sarcastic. Things, she’d discovered, could always get worse.

  She’d climbed down into a dry well shaft to examine an interesting series of late Ptolemaic inscriptions she’d glimpsed carved into a panel at the bottom.

  Like Uncle Jasper, Hester was a mapmaker, and while her main goal was to complete the definitive map of Upper Egypt they’d come so close to completing before Uncle Jasper’s unfortunate death, she was also interested in all forms of ancient archaeology. Maybe she would be the one to crack the mysterious Egyptian picture writing known as hieroglyphics? That would certainly be something.

  Determined to get a closer look at the drawings, she’d hitched up her skirts, climbed down the makeshift ladder, and become so absorbed that it was some time before she realized the ladder had been pulled back up.

  “Suleiman!” Hester shouted. Her throat was parched from the sand and dust. She was ready for a nice cup of tea in her tent.

  But Uncle Jasper’s fiercely loyal Mameluke companion, Suleiman, who modestly referred to himself as ‘the magnificent’, seemed to have disappeared.

  Hester frowned. She’d forgotten her hat again, and the sun beat down, remorselessly hot on the top of her head. She shielded her eyes and squinted upwards. “Suleiman! Where the devil are you? Where’s the ladder?”

  No answer.

  Somewhere in the distance a donkey brayed. It sounded a lot like a laugh.

  Hester put her hands on her hips and let out a long sigh. Wonderful. Here she was. Stuck at the bottom of a well.

  She looked at the curved walls. Perhaps she could climb out? She could wedge her fingers in the gaps between the stones . . . but the thought of the scorpions and snakes that might inhabit those cracks gave her pause.

  And then the distinct crunch of footsteps sounded above and she glanced up, her spirits rising. The dark outline of a male figure, just the top half, head and shoulders, bent over the edge of the well and peered down at her.

  “Oh, Suleiman. There you are. Thank goodness! Someone seems to have pulled up the ladder without realizing I was down here. Could you get it, please? Or failing that, a rope?”

  The sunlight was blinding. Hester squinted upward and frowned. The dark outline, although broad-shouldered, was wearing a European-style hat, not Suleiman’s customary turban.

  Her stomach dropped. That outline seemed awfully familiar.

  No! It couldn’t be. Her eyes were playing tricks on her. She hadn’t seen him for two years. It was a mirage, brought on by too much sun.

  She blinked, but the shadow remained.

  It was so bright she couldn’t see the man’s face clearly, but somehow she just knew he was laughing at her.

  Hester closed her eyes and muttered a fervent prayer to whichever gods might be listening. “Please, no. Anyone but him.”

  If she had to choose the one man in the whole northern hemisphere she never wanted to see again, Harry Tremayne would be that man.

  “What are you doing down there?” the shadow called cheerfully, and the sound of that deep, amused voice confirmed her very worst suspicions.

  “Harry Tremayne!” she croaked. “What in hell’s name are you doing here?”

  “A delight to see you too, Lady Morden,” came the irritatingly upbeat reply.

  Hester ground her teeth.

  The shadow gave a sarcastic flourish of his hat. “I’ve come to rescue you.”

  “You? Rescue me? Ha! That’s rich.”

  “I’m not the one stuck at the bottom of a well,” he pointed out with irrefutable logic. “You shouldn’t be so quick to refuse my assistance. Wait there. I’ll get you a ladder.”

  Within moments the rickety ladder descended into the shaft, and with a sigh of resignation, Hester climbed back out. She ignored the outstretched hand Harry offered her and climbed over the low wall herself, then made a great show of dusting down her skirts to give herself some time before she straightened up to greet her nemesis.

  It was just as bad as she’d expected. Harry Tremayne was as heart-stoppingly good looking as ever. His dark, tousled hair screamed for her fingers to touch it. Those taunting blue eyes both mocked and invited at the same time. And he had a pair of lips she’d dreamed about kissing for far too many nights.

  He was wearing a thin white shirt tied carelessly at the throat, a pair of buff breeches, leather riding boots, and a leather satchel slung across his chest, bandolier-style. He looked like a pirate, like the charming rogue he was.

  Hester narrowed her eyes. She, no doubt, was a dusty, sweaty mess. He always managed to catch her at a disadvantage.

  “Do you know how many miles there are between here and London, Mr. Tremayne?” she said stiffly.

  “Not precisely,” he admitted. “A lot.”

  “If you take the overland route, it’s approximately five-and-a-half thousand. As the crow flies, it’s a little over two thousand.”

  He raised one irritatingly perfect eyebrow. “What’s your point?”

  “That’s two thousand marvelous miles I’d put between you, Harry Tremayne, and myself.”

  He cocked his head and sent her an amused, chiding glance. “You’re not still angry about that kiss, are you? Good Lord. I offered to marry you, didn’t I? You refused.”

  “You only offered because you’d ruined my reputation!”

  “So? It was the honorable thing to do.”

  Hester poked him in the chest with her index finger. “So, I’m not marrying someone who was forced into it because of some stupid scandal. I want someone who wants to marry me.”

  He shook his head, as if this was mystifying female logic at its worst. “And here I was, thinking you’d be happy to see a familiar face.” He clapped his hands over his heart in a theatrical gesture. “I’m wounded, Lady Morden. To the core. One could almost infer you aren’t glad to see me at all.”

  She sent him a stony glare.

  He looked around with a sudden frown. “Where’s your Uncle Jasper?”

  Hester tried not to look guilty. “He’s dead, actually.”

  “Dead! Since when?”

  She raised her chin. “Since five weeks ago. He had some sort of apoplexy. It was very sudden. One minute we were surveying the east ridge of the—”<
br />
  “Five weeks? He’s been dead for that long?” Harry interrupted. “And you didn’t think to send a letter back to England? Or to return to Cairo and inform the British Consul, Henry Salt?”

  “No, I did not. Because I knew that as soon as I did, everyone would demand I come home. I’m not ready. I decided to stay and finish Uncle Jasper’s map of Upper Egypt instead. It’s what he would have wanted. I’m nearly done, in fact. I only need a few more days.”

  Harry’s expression portrayed his shock and annoyance. “Good God. It’s a miracle you’re still alive. You’ve been out here all alone, unprotected—”

  “Hardly,” Hester scoffed. “I have Suleiman. He’s a trained bodyguard. A Mameluke soldier who once guarded Ali Pasha himself.”

  Harry placed his hands on his hips. “So where is he?”

  “I don’t know, actually. It’s most unlike him to simply disappear.”

  Harry rolled his eyes.

  “In any case,” Hester continued, “I also have a letter of protection from Muhammad Bey himself. It gives me free, unencumbered passage throughout his empire and promises dire consequences for anyone who interferes with me or my retinue.”

  “Oh, and I’m sure any bandit’s going to take the time to read a letter before he robs and murders you,” Harry drawled. “How did you get such a thing, anyway?”

  “Uncle Jasper and the Pasha were good friends. We stayed at the palace for a few weeks when we first arrived in Alexandria, and I became quite fond of his wives. They loved hearing stories about England. I gave one of them a simple remedy to treat her head cold and the Bey gave Uncle Jasper the letter of protection in thanks.”