Chapter 26
Two days of waiting had paid its toll. Under darkness and through a fog laden night, Nicholas with Alexandra moved across the damp lawn of Sutherland estate and sidled up next to the house. The library was a few feet away on the first floor. Convenient.
Nicholas muttered, “I’m totally against this. You are with child and this goes far against my principles to protect you.”
“Will you stop worrying,” whispered Alexandra, and then she yelped, tripping over an unconscious, tied-up man.
His father’s men were efficient.
He made a cradle out of his hands and hefted her up to the window.
“This will look great in the papers if we are caught. ‘The heir to the Duke of Rutland, breaking and entering.’”
“Sh-h. Someone might hear you.” The window opened with a loud screech.
“So much for a quiet, stealthy entrance.” He should have had the man he hired for reconnaissance inside the house, under the guise of inspecting the chimneys to oil the window hinges. His man had learned that there were no guards posted inside, only outside which his father’s men had taken care of like they did with the man Alexandra tripped over. So he allowed Alexandra this fool mission. With the baby and all, he’d never risk her safety.
Her climbing skills acquired on the island came in handy. He watched her rounded bottom disappear over the sill.
“I rather like the view and may insist you wear breeches in the future.”
Alexandra stuck her head back out the window. “At a time like this?”
Nicholas heaved up and into the room. Except for the waning of the moon there was no light.
“I remember this room so well. Some of my happiest memories occurred here. I played with my blocks and dolls in front of the fireplace while my father worked. I can almost hear the scratch of his quill across paper. I can smell the burning of wax before he thumped on his seal for his finished correspondence.”
Alexandra took his hand and led him to the desk. She was shaking and he longed to take her in his arms, but this task was important and they had to work fast before they were discovered.
Alexandra crawled underneath the desk, Nicholas squatting beside her, roving his hand over the smooth woodwork as if divining a drawer to magically open. “I don’t feel a thing.”
“I remember my father holding me on his lap, and as young as I was, saying, ‘Alexandra, very important.’”
Nicholas glanced at the door to the library, did not hear any movement from the rest of the house. Good. At this late hour, the servants slept. His father had come through as promised, and secured an invitation for Lady Sutherland and Willean to a soiree at the Banfield’s, and then the Duke and Duchess of Somer’s ball for the next night. They would be staying at the Sutherland townhouse in London for the weekend. Rutland guards were posted there to keep them updated on their movements.
He eased upward, lit a lamp and lowered it to the floor.
“Won’t the light alert Ursula’s guards outside?”
Nicholas patted his gun in his belt. “They will have enough headache to last them a long time. They were taken care of. I’m very thorough. I do not want to put you at any more risk than necessary.”
Alexandra ran her fingers all around. Nicholas followed. Smooth, satiny moldings, flat surfaces. Not one catch. Not one depression. Not one trip-lever. “Nothing, Alexandra.”
Her fingers shook. “I have come so far and refuse to leave without proof. I know it’s here.”
He hated hearing the pleading in her voice.
“I will not go until I’ve found the proof of who I am. My father and Molly will have not died in vain. This is my obligation to them.”
“Enough. We have been here longer than we have allotted.” He grabbed her arm.
She jerked back, and then fell to her knees, probing, poking, crying. “I cannot leave.” Footsteps pounded in the outer hall.
“Hell. Had his men missed a guard posted in the house?”
As Nicholas rose, he leaned on a brass knob. Click. He stretched his hand beneath the desk. A farthing-sized button protruded. With certainty, there was a correlation with the pressure he put on the brass knob and the button. That’s why no one had figured it out. He unclasped a door and a drawer slid out.
Alexandra grabbed papers, held them up to the light. “This document speaks of my inheritance. This is the evidence I’ve been looking for.”
He stuffed the papers in his shirt, blew out the lantern. The door swung open. He jerked Alexandra to her feet, hauled her to the window. Too late. A light shone on them.
“Lady Lucy Sutherland. Is it really you…not a ghost?”
Alexandra turned and blinked. The elderly gentleman had called her by her mother’s name. She remembered him. Her father’s butler, Andrew Baines, older now, his cheeks furrowed and writhen like rain-washed crags. He had always been kind to her. “Bainey?”
“My God. Is it you, Lady Alexandra, all grown up?” He lifted his light and the rays spread across a portrait above the fireplace. “You have your father’s eyes but you are a mirror image of your mother.”
Nicholas cursed. “By God, if that isn’t evidence enough.”
Bainey placed the light on the desk, his mouth gaping. “I thought you had been kidnapped and died. Where have you been all these years?”
“Molly and Samuel Elwins hid me away to protect me from Ursula.”
“Lady Ursula is an evil woman, mistress. I must tell you, I believe your father had suspicions of your stepmother before he died, and informed me you were the heir. Years later, your stepmother, Lady Ursula and Willean were in their cups. They were toasting each other, and she bragged how she had poisoned your father to make Willean the heir, telling him where she kept the bottle of poison in case he ever needed it.”
Alexandra sobbed. “She killed Molly, too.”
Bainey swore. “I overheard Lady Sutherland saying something about killing Molly. She was a good woman.”
“Why didn’t you come forward sooner?” Nicholas asked.
“Lady Ursula caught me eavesdropping on her poisoning the Baron. She blackmailed me, knowing I stole silver from a former employer and threatened to have me sent to Newgate. Recently I’ve been told by a doctor I have tumors and have months to live. I’d like to do what is right by you, Lady Sutherland, before I meet my maker.”
Nicholas stepped forward. “I’m Lord Rutland. We need you to come with us to attest to Lady Ursula’s crimes. You will be under my protection.”
“A pleasure, milord. I’ve burned to see Lady Ursula pay for what she has done for a long time. What might be helpful is that I swapped a similar bottle and kept the original in safekeeping for evidence.”
“Nobody’s goin’ anywhere because what I ‘ave to say goes.”
Damn. Nicholas whirled around, shoved Alexandra behind him. His stomach rolled, obviously a guard Ursula had posted inside the house. So much for his man’s reconnaissance.
The man gestured with his gun to Alexandra. “’er ladyship thought you’d show up.”
Definitely East Londoners. They didn’t bother to pronounce their “t’s” and “h’s.” They were large men, dressed the same, in dirty breeches and purloined frock coats. They smelled the same too. Eau de Rookeries. They both had hats. Comical. Formal top hats jammed on dirty heads. They were both bow-legged, probably from malnutrition when they were young, yet boasted an intimidating air. One had a scar down the side of his left cheek and his companion boasted a scar down his right cheek. They could have been twins.
The two men moved into the room, stopped six feet in front of him. Nicholas pulled his gun from his belt. One against two wasn’t bad except he had Alexandra to protect. Not good. His father’s men outside, too far to help.
Bainey froze, his hands up, a scared man, resembling an unhappy mastiff. Not much help there.
Both thugs grinned like gargoyles. “You can shoot one of us, your lordship, but you still ‘ave the ot’er bloke to deal wit’.”
Nicholas flexed his left shoulder, ran some muscle tension up through his back and shoulders. “Not if I dispatch both of you first.”
They both laughed. The thug on his left moved closer, waved his gun. Nicholas followed to his left. A candlestick was within reach of Bainey. Would the old servant show courage? He needed a distraction. Keep talking.
“I can double Ursula’s pay. No questions asked. You gentleman could set yourselves up nice in a country house. Take my deal now. You won’t have regrets.”
Right scar laughed. “We’re doing just fine, gent.”
“So, let me guess. You’ll tie us up. Deliver us to Lady Sutherland, and then hide in the Colonies.”
“Brilliant, yer lordship.”
“I have matchless deductive powers, able to read minds, and from time to time, give patronage to idiots.”
Left scar edged closer. “Ye think ye’re funny.”
Nicholas flexed his muscles, he itched for some hard-knuckle fighting. “I am funny.” He moved a little closer to tighten up the triangle. Bainey reached for the candlestick. The ancient butler had more mettle than he thought.
Right scar lowered his gun. Nick hooked a right, thrust Right scar’s arm up. The pistol fired, the round hitting the ceiling. Plaster showered over them. Right scar’s only chance.
An object flew past Nicholas’s ear. The crack of glass against bone. Left scar went down. Effective, whatever it was.
“He’s mine,” Nicholas growled and dove for Right scar. He clubbed his fist into Right scar’s face, drove it through his cheek, toppling both to the floor. Right scar lay limp beneath him, out cold. Nicolas twitched his nose, lifted off Right scar’s body. He brushed off plaster. The lingering odor from Right scar stayed.
Bainey fetched the two guns. Nicholas took them from the servant’s shaking hands. “Two guys. Two guns. Three seconds.”
Nicholas did a double-take. Black liquid pooled around Left scar’s head. She had laid the wretched scum low with an ink bottle?
Alexandra threw her hands up. “What was I supposed to do? Wait until you got around to clubbing them?”
He wiped the sweat from his head, and then wrapped his arm around her. She would always be his Alexandra. “Let’s go before there are any more mishaps. My carriage is beyond the tree line.”