The Viscount Meets his Match: A Regency Romance

by Raven McAllan

  “I did,” David said in a tone that curled her toes and sent darts of arousal through her body. “Mean it. But first, I want you to go up. It will give me more room to maneuver Freddie. And you can help me guide him.”

  It sounded plausible, but… “You’re not just trying to get me out of the way for my own safety, are you?”

  His arms tightened for a second and Josephine felt the shudder that went through him. “Of course I am,” he answered, in a tone that made her realize he meant what he said. “Well, partly. But there is more to it than that. I do need the space, you can guide me from up there, and if you are out of here, that is one less person for me to worry about. One less thing to divert my mind from the best way to rescue Freddie.”

  Put like that, she couldn’t do anything but agree. “I was never that good at climbing.”

  “If you slip, I promise to cushion your fall. Just make sure you miss the delicate parts of my body. After all, when we are wed, I do want to be able to give you enjoyment and father our children.”

  That was going a bit too far. “I have not said I will marry you.” Although, maybe she might consider it a bit more later. After all, didn’t his care and concern now show there was more to him than met the eye? Would either of her parents have done even half as much as he had? An almost-forgotten memory of her as a nine-year-old trapped on the upper story of an old barn when the ladder had disintegrated flashed into her mind. Her parents hadn’t even realized she was missing, much less come to her aid. Only the fact that she’d managed to open the door through which bales were hauled inside the hayloft and shouted to a passing cowman had rescued her from a goodness-knows-how-long incarceration.

  She’d been missing for almost four hours. Her governess had been frantic. She had hunted high and low, then had told Josephine’s parents their daughter was nowhere to be found. That Josephine had told Miss Govering she was going to collect leaves for their nature table and would be back within an hour.

  Evidently, her father had merely said, “Well, if someone has the time to look, so be it. She’ll come home when she is hungry.” It was not a comforting thought to think that could be the normal behavior for a parent.

  “I need to think more.”

  “You have a day or so to think,” David agreed. “You haven’t said you will be my wife. Not yet.” He hugged her.

  She gasped at his words. There was no way she could deliberate on any of it at that moment.

  “But I live in hope, my love. You might not believe me, but I love you.” It appeared he’d forgotten Freddie could be all ears and would no doubt report back to everyone what David said. “I never thought I would feel this way about anyone. You are my sun and my moon. Any children would be my stars.”

  Josephine swayed and clutched his shoulders. What a time to say that.

  “Now please,” he added in a strained voice. “Please, up you go and let me get young Fred ready for when the rest of the help arrives.”

  Time to show she was a capable woman, even if her hands shook and her mouth was dry.

  “I don’t suppose there is much point in telling you to avert your eyes, is there?” she said in an attempt to lighten the atmosphere.

  “No,” David replied cheerfully. “I need a good memory to hold on to whilst I get Freddie and me out. Now go. For the sooner you are up, the sooner I have room to move and then once Will is here, we can do what is necessary.”

  Josephine gave in to temptation and kissed David’s cheek. It was the only part of him she could reach with ease. “Right, so the best way is to use the rope as a handrail and sort of walk up? Like Sam did.”

  “Just like that. But I will tie the end of the rope around your waist as well.” He didn’t say why and she chose not to ask.

  Within seconds, she was three feet up the slope, and thankful she’d had the forethought to slip her riding gloves in her pocket and had thus been able to now wear them. The soft leather not only protected her hands, it gave her purchase.

  “Nice ankles.”

  Trust him. At least he hadn’t said ‘nice thighs’.

  Josephine bit her lip as she concentrated. Hand by hand, one foot after another, she inched her way upward.

  “You are doing well, love. Over halfway now. Shut your eyes.” The last three words cracked out like a whip.

  A few pebbles tumbled past her. It was nerve-wracking. Why, oh why hadn’t she been more of a tomboy as a child? Her papa had remarked disparagingly about her boyish figure and lack of curves often enough.

  ‘If it’s not bad enough she’s female, she doesn’t even have a figure to show for it,’ he’d said on more than one occasion. ‘No womanly curves. How will that encourage a husband? Bony, all arms and legs.’

  When other girls of her age had begun to burgeon, she had stayed stubbornly boyish. Of course, she had eventually become shapely, but never to any great degree. Josephine had always thought she was happy in her skin, and her lack of obvious curves didn’t bother her. But perhaps those scathing pronouncements from her papa had stung more than she’d realized. Was it that which had turned her against the sort of things both sexes of children might get up to in the country? Or was it that she preferred sketching and reading to climbing and fishing anyway?

  “Love, Will is above you now and has a hold of the rope. Move again.” She nodded, aghast at how she’d forgotten where she was and what she was doing. As the rope tightened, it became easier to climb, and within a few minutes Will helped her over the edge and to her feet.

  “There now, miss, I mean, my lady. Our Sam has some water for you and a blanket. You sit down a sec, while I see what Davy wants me to do next.”

  Josephine nodded, too out of breath to speak, and let Sam guide her to sit down on a blanket.

  “I’ve got a chicken leg as well if you fancy it,” the lad said as he handed over a bottle of water. “The men brought more food.”

  “Thank goodness, eh?”

  Sam sighed. “Ah, ’cos it’s a long time since yesterday’s scran, ain’t it?”

  “A very long time.” Josephine ate a mouthful of the succulent meat before she spoke again. “I don’t even know what time it is. I seem to have smashed my watch.” The tiny timepiece attached to her jacket had somehow been cracked. Most of the face was missing and only one hand remained. Just as well it held no great sentimental value to her. “It only has the minute hand, which isn’t a lot of good.” Even that was bent.

  Sam squinted at the dark clouded sky. “No sun to tell either.”

  There was a flash of lightning to their west and he began to count. He got to twenty before they heard the thunder. “A goodly long way away. Me dad says if you count slowly like I did you can tell where lightning’s gonna land. Over up the peak, I reckon. So we’re safe for now.”

  “Good.” After all the alarms and excursions of the day so far, and the revelations about David—and herself—the last thing she wanted was to be struck by lightning. There was too much to discover about what might be. “Now, as we seem to be the only two around here, what can we do to help your papa and Davy when they bring Freddie up?” She realized she’d used David’s nickname, but didn’t worry about it. This was not a time for formality, anything but.

  “Mebbes we need to find somewhere for shelter?” Sam suggested. “Or make one. ‘Cos the others haven’t got the trestle back here yet, and if it rains we’ll need to keep Freddie dry.” He made it sound as though there was nothing wrong in him, and others, standing in the open in a thunderstorm, as long as Freddie was dry.

  “True, so what do you suggest?”

  Josephine watched how Sam preened as he realized she needed his advice. She wasn’t going to make any suggestions unless he became stumped. He needed to be kept busy so he couldn’t think about the predicament his friend was still in.

  “Never under a tree in a thunderstorm,” Sam said sagely. “So lemme think. Mebbes we can find sommat at edge of rock face? ’Cos if it rains it usually comes from behind it. A crevice
or a little cave or sommat should keep most of it off.” He grinned an urchin grin that for once made him look his age. “One that’s not gonna fall in.”

  Josephine laughed. “Preferably, eh? Very well, let’s look. Keep your ears open for your papa and Davy if they shout.”

  “Well, what now then?” Will hung over the edge of the cave, a dark outline against the lowering and menacing sky. “Can we get him out?”

  David didn’t bother to give the answer he ought. That there was no ‘can’ about it, they had to, and soon. Even in the few minutes since Josephine had begun to climb, there had been several more falls and now the cave was half its size. The back, where Sam had intimated Freddie had been injured, was a jumble of rocks, stones and earth. There was hardly enough room for David and Freddie in the space left, and David had to stoop.

  “I don’t want to wait for the rescue team,” he said slowly as he considered his options. “This place is falling in. There’s not enough room for me to get him on my back. I think we’re going to have to risk me tying him to the rope and then attempting to push him up until you can reach him.”

  Not the ideal way, but perhaps the only one.

  He knelt down and studied Freddie’s face. It was so dark it was hard to tell but was there a little more color in the lad’s cheeks? He touched one carefully and was rewarded by a faint groan. “Freddie, lad, can you hear me?” Freddie’s eyelids moved a little.

  “Da?”

  “No, it’s Davy, your da’s friend.”

  “Where’s Sam?” The words were hesitant and low, but David could hear the worry behind them.

  “Sam’s up top.” He used the words most likely to work for Freddie in his dazed state. “We need to get us there as well. You first because of your arm.”

  “Me arm?”

  “Don’t move it,” David said urgently. “Sam and Miss Josephine tied it to your body so you don’t hurt it more.” He used ‘miss’ rather than ‘lady’ on purpose, guessing it would be less worrying to Freddie. He wouldn’t want to think he’d caused any trouble for a lady. “So you’ll be a one-armed climber, eh? Well, not really a climber, more a helper. Now, how about we see what we can do to get you out?”

  Freddie nodded and moved one leg. His boot scratched the earth at the side of the wall and a crack appeared above the point he’d touched.

  “Careful,” David warned the youth. “This cave doesn’t want to be a cave anymore. We need to get out before it’s a pile of earth. If I step over you, do you think you can wriggle to the bottom of the entrance? Very carefully.”

  “There ain’t room for you. I’m up tight.”

  “Nonsense, of course there is.” There wasn’t but that was not the point. He had to get Freddie to move. “Once I begin to step over you, you move.”

  David wondered if he dared brace his arm on the roof. There was no dare, crouched as he was, it was his arm or his back, and surely his arm would be best. “Right, ready to move… Now move.”

  David arched one leg across Freddie’s body as the lad obediently wriggled as best he could and left a few inches behind him. Another squirm and David was able to put one hand next to his leg. For all the world, he imagined he must look like a very ungainly crab.

  “That’s it, Freddie,” he encouraged the lad. “A bit more and I can stop hovering over you like a big, bad bat.”

  Freddie managed half a laugh. “Mebbe a vampire.”

  “Grief, I hope not. I prefer ale to blood. Right, so now I’m going to try and lean over you in a better way. Sam’s dad is at the top. He’ll help pull you up. First, though. If I push and shove, can you stand upright next to the opening?” He hoped so, because otherwise the next few minutes would be horrendous.

  Freddie coughed. “Blood…er, blooming mucky down here, eh?”

  “True, so…?”

  Freddie sniggered. “Well, if I doesn’t I’ll be hauled arse up, so I betters try.”

  That was one way of putting it.

  Chapter Twelve

  Josephine would have preferred to pace. To nibble her nail, or bite her lip, and worry. However, one look at Sam’s face told her it might not be a good idea. Not if she wanted even half a chance to keep Sam calm. He bounced with energy, most of which Josephine recognized was nerves and worry over his friend. Plus, she surmised, anxiety over what the outcome of their adventures would be.

  “Probably be told we can’t go anywhere without a grownup ’til we’re twenty,” he grumbled to Josephine once his father was out of earshot. “Or made to take Rose with me everywhere, and she’s a pest.”

  “Without Rose, you’d still be down the pothole,” Josephine said mildly. “She needs a thank you from you, not a moan.”

  Sam had the grace to look ashamed. “Ah, well, for a kid and a girl at that, she’s not bad, I reckon.”

  He’d had a cuff around the ear and a hug from his parent, along with a stern admonishment to do as Josephine told him.

  “He’s been a tower of strength,” Josephine said sincerely. “I would have been lost without him.”

  While Will stayed ready to haul on the rope or not, as David directed, Sam and Josephine scouted around the area. Between them, they decided on a fairly low but deep crevice, which after consultation they concluded would provide the best shelter for two or even three people, as long as they didn’t mind being cramped.

  “Better cramped than drenched,” Josephine said prosaically. “That sky looks very menacing to me, and I swear the thunder is louder and closer.”

  “Ah, or frizzled by lightning,” Sam had said in a straightforward manner. “I durnt fancy that.”

  He’d told Josephine to stay where they were while he went the few yards to collect the blanket and bag with the food and water in it. By the time he got back, the first few fat raindrops had begun to fall.

  “That’ll either chase the thunder away or make it worse,” he said as he thrust the blanket at Josephine. “Here, keep it out of the wet, eh. I’ll just go back and see if me pa needs me.”

  She didn’t even try to stop him. He needed to know he was being useful. “It’s not cold, is it?”

  “Eh? Nah, why?”

  “Because if you took your jacket off and left it here, it would be one more dry thing to use later.”

  “Ah, we could wrap Fred in it.” He shrugged out of the garment and handed it over. “I’ll shout to tell you what’s what, eh? And if you sees th’ others, tell ’em where we are proper.”

  Josephine mock saluted and grinned. “Yes, Captain.”

  Sam blushed and stuttered. Josephine took pity on him. “A true man is decisive when he needs to be, but never afraid to ask for advice.”

  “Then is that t’right thing to do?”

  “It really is,” she assured him. “You go and see what’s happening and I’ll arrange our temporary abode. Home,” she added at his blank expression.

  “Right-o.” He ran across the grass with no regards to the rain, the thunder or the slippery surface.

  Josephine shook her head at the resilience of children. The minute he had been reassured that David would get Freddie out, he’d perked up and become a lot more like she assumed he would normally be. Not that she’d had a lot of interaction with youths his age, even though her brother, at eight years younger than she, would qualify. George and she rarely met, something that was not to Josephine’s personal preference. It was, however, the way things went.

  She folded the blanket so it would be both under Freddie if he needed it, and easy enough to wrap around him. She was somewhat hazy as to how they would carry him on a trestle, but no doubt the men would know.

  A large crack of thunder overhead made her jump and bite back a scream. Over by the place she assumed David would bring Freddie up, Sam flinched but otherwise didn’t move. His father clapped him on the shoulder in a gesture of reassurance. It gave her a pang of envy. Why had she never had that?

  Would David be like that with his children? How could she know?

  What a
time to wonder about such things. But his kisses excited her, his scent teased her and his presence… Oh, his presence made her wonder, what if?

  She wriggled uneasily as her body perked up with those stray—and, at that moment in time, unneeded—thoughts. Time enough to ponder, assimilate and arrange her thoughts later.

  A shout made the lad look up and he waved to someone Josephine couldn’t see. “Ower ’ere. Ower ’ere.”

  She turned and peered through the rain and ever-increasing mist as best she could. The low cloud made it hard to see much past the place Sam stood. Four men carrying a five-bar gate appeared and stood alongside Will and his son. A brief conversation took place, then Sam hopped and skipped back to her.

  “They came down dragon’s back with the gate, but me da reckons they’ll need to go back the long way. I’m off up back to the house to get a wagon to meet ’em over by Becketts. Bert, that’s Freddie’s dad, you know, well, he says our Rose has gone back down with Joe Frankel. Oh, and they’s brought a blanket so you keep this ’un for now. Will you be all right, miss?”

  “Of course I will. I’ll wait for Davy.”

  Sam grinned and, to her surprise and pleasure, gave her a hug. “For a woman, you’re a good ’un, miss.”

  High praise indeed. Josephine smiled as the lad rushed away, obviously pleased to be undertaking something so important. That he might have been sent away in case Freddie’s condition was worse than previously thought evidently hadn’t crossed his mind.

  Meanwhile, she would sit and worry for both of them. Will and two of the men conferred and Will beckoned to her. Josephine scrambled up and made her way across the wet ground toward them.

  “Miss, it could get a might damp around here if it doesn’t stop raining soon,” Will said in a deferential manner. “There’s a stream that appears and cuts across the gorge. Davy says you might want to go up top.”

  “No, thank you. Not unless it is really necessary. Otherwise, I’ll stay here,” she stated. “I have the blanket and your son’s dry jacket.”

  Will hesitated, obviously torn as to what to do.