Chapter Twenty-One
Dusk had started to fall by the time the reception was winding down, but Martin and Josephine were determined to spend their first night as husband and wife in their new home. Alone thankfully, since Rake, Lucia, and Penelope—yes, even Penelope—had agreed to watch Marcos with Zara, Alberta, and Ronaldo all staying in the hotel to offer support.
Luckily, their homestead was not far out of town, and the sun had just set when they turned down the lane to their new home. An immensely full harvest moon lit the way on the final quarter mile to where the large cottage sat amid the orange groves. The bright light beckoned them to the start of their new life together in their new home.
The main portion of the home with the kitchen, dining room, parlor, bathroom, and a bedroom was finished and partially furnished. In the next few months, as monies allowed, they would add on the other bedroom and nursery, as well as the room where she could write.
With help from some of his fellow Pinkertons and even Ronaldo—or rather, entertainment from Ronaldo, who had shown them how he had once played a carpenter in a skit—Martin had spent every spare moment working on their home. He’d had more time since the Sin Sombra case had gone cold with Sondra’s disappearance. It was believed she’d left the country, and they had yet to find any trace of where she might have gone. The Woman with No Shadow was truly a fitting moniker.
But the only shadow on Josephine’s mind right now was that of her new home glowing in welcome in the moonlight. “It’s so lovely,” she said as the carriage pulled up in front of their home.
“Not nearly as lovely as you,” Martin said and drew her close for a kiss that went on and on until the horse pawed the ground impatiently.
“Give me just a few minutes, my darling,” Martin said and quickly set about unhitching the horse and turning him loose in a nearby corral that he’d built. Being a farm boy at heart, he had also built a small barn and chicken coop.
Josephine had never pictured herself on a farm, but the idea of fresh eggs and milk held some appeal. But not as much appeal as the man swaggering toward her, a very sexy grin on his face and his gaze filled with the promise of what he planned for that night.
As he reached the carriage, he held out his hand to steady her as she rose and took the first step down, but then she found herself scooped up into his arms. She laughed as he whirled them around playfully before rushing to the door of their new home. He fumbled one-handedly for a moment with the lock, but then kicked the door open and strode over the threshold with her.
“Welcome to our new life, Mrs. Cadden,” he said and kissed her again.
They stood there, kissing, until Martin gently released her and let her slide down his body. There was no doubt he was more than ready for their first very special night together.
As they broke apart, Josephine cradled his jaw and skimmed her thumb across his cheekbone. Meeting his gaze, she said, “It seems like we’ve waited for this forever.”
Martin laid his forehead against hers and whispered, “I cannot wait any longer.”
He shut the door and twined his fingers with hers, creating warmth with that simple gesture. With a gentle tug, he urged her to the narrow hallway that led to their bedroom in the rear of the cottage. They nearly ran there, laughing again until they reached the bed and time seemed to stand still.
The faced each other, expectant, hesitant, and Josephine took the first step. She eased her hands beneath the lapels of his frock coat and slipped them upward to ease the jacket from his shoulders.
Martin grabbed the jacket and tossed it to the side while she hastily undid the buttons on his vest, her hands trembling and seemingly uncoordinated on the last couple of closures until with a chuckle, Martin ripped the vest open. Buttons flew off and pinged on the wooden floor.
She jerked off his tie and tugged his trouser braces down while Martin’s shirt met the same fate as the vest, fabric tearing and buttons flying until he stood before her bare-chested.
He is so beautiful, she thought and laid her hands on the broad swell of his pectoral muscles before skimming them down his lean washboard stomach to the fastening of his pants.
He grabbed her hands then, his touch commanding, but tender. “I don’t know if I’ll be able to wait once you do that,” he said and the proof of his desire was greatly evident beneath the fabric of his pants.
“Then please hurry, and help me get undressed,” she said, then whirled, presenting him with the long line of tiny buttons along the back of her gown.
“A gentleman never says no to a lady,” he whispered.
He eased his hands beneath the satin and lace and slipped the gown from her body, leaving a trail of kisses along her shoulders and then down her spine as the dress fell to the ground, the soft, aged fabric puddling around her feet. Grasping her hips, he tenderly urged her to turn around and step from the pile on the floor.
As she did so, Martin worked free the ties of the corset she wore. “Please, Martin,” she nearly keened.
“You are everything I’ve ever wanted,” he said, continuing to undress her down to her thin cotton shift that left nothing to the imagination.
He bent and was drawing the hem of the shift upward when a loud creak came from down the hallway. They paused abruptly, but only silence could be heard. Returning to undressing her, Martin skimmed his hand up over her hip just as a louder thump echoed, the sound of a loose floorboard shifting.
Josephine started, her heart pounding with surprise instead of passion. Was someone in the house?
“Stay here,” Martin said and turned to investigate, but then he cursed beneath his breath, and she immediately realized why. He had left his gun and badge in a kitchen drawer to avoid taking them to the wedding ceremony.
Fear gripped her hard, and she laid a hand on his arm. “Martin, don’t go.”
He put an index finger to his lips and whispered, “I will be fine. Please stay here.”
Gingerly he grabbed a poker from the fireplace in their room and tiptoed into the hallway.
As the soft scuff of a footfall reached his ears, Martin no longer had any doubt that someone was in their home.
He inched closer and closer to the main rooms, gripped with fear. If he was lucky, whoever was out there wouldn’t find his weapon. Let me be lucky, he thought, but as he heard the scrape of wood against wood signaling that a drawer was being opened, he realized this might not be his night to gamble.
Martin had been in his share of dangerous situations during his time as a Pinkerton, but he had never expected that one of the most dangerous times of his life would be in his own home.
The hackles rose on the back of his neck and his heart pumped so wildly, he worried the intruder might hear. Moonlight streamed in through the cottage’s windows, casting the shadow of someone in a hooded cloak onto the wooden floor.
He took another step, wincing as a loose floorboard creaked beneath his foot this time. If he survived the night, he intended to remedy that.
Suddenly the light from a lantern flared to life in the living room and the intruder beckoned him with, “You can come out, Detective Cadden. There’s no use hiding.”
Sondra. Sin Sombra.
He stepped out of the mouth of the hallway, but stayed close as he realized that Sondra had located his gun and was pointing it in his direction. No matter what, she’d have to go through him to get to Josephine.
“What are you doing here, Sondra?” he asked, perplexed about why the crime boss would reappear after so many months of being virtually invisible.
“I was planning to leave for good, you know. Pin it all on Ernesto and start over somewhere else with Lu—” She stopped and growled with frustration. “Well it, doesn’t matter now, does it? You’ve made that impossible. Now I just want plain old vengeance for the trouble you’ve put me through,” she said.
“You may want vengeance, but I want justice, Sin Sombra,” he said calmly and loudly, hoping that Josephine would hear the conversation and the name of their intruder. There were at least two windows in the bedroom through which she could make an escape, and he intended to keep Sondra talking so Josephine could do just that.
Sondra laughed that evil cackle that he’d heard the night of her escape on Rake’s yacht. It sounded maniacal, especially as she said, “Justice, how sweet! Sadly, I think vengeance will be mine tonight. You and your newlywed wife. How tragic that your first day together will be your last.”
No, no, no. This cannot be happening (although of course I knew that we hadn’t heard the last of Sin Sombra). What will our intrepid detective do now?
Martin’s mind raced as he tried to calculate if he could reach her before the bullet took him down, but the distance was too great. “Why, Sondra? Can you just tell me why?”
“Why?” she asked, and followed with that deranged laugh once again before she started talking, giving him the time to prepare for action.
“Do you have any idea what it has been like for me? Having to pretend to be the doting dutiful wife of Ernesto Solvino when I’ve been the real brains behind the Solvino empire? It was me—me—who convinced Ernesto to buy the Palm Beach property,” she said, tapping her chest angrily, almost maniacally.
It let him take a small step toward her as she continued her rant. “It was me who knew Rake’s little hotel and marina with its secret tunnels would be the perfect base from which to expand my reach to all of the Florida territory.”
Keep her talking, he thought. “But all those deaths…those innocent people… Why did you kill Slayton?”
“Innocent? Hardly,” she scoffed, still brandishing the gun in Martin’s general direction. “Insignificant lowlifes and toadies keen for fast money. Unfortunately for them, they either got greedy or a little bit too close. Slayton saw me leaving the tunnel at the Regal Sol and followed me. I couldn’t let him expose me as the real Sin Sombra.”
With another tiny move, Martin edged out into the living room carefully, trying to draw Sondra farther from the back of the cottage. “So why did you take Marcos then? He’s just an innocent infant!”
“I was this close to making my final move,” she said, bringing her fingers together on her free hand. “But I had to make a clean escape. You were too close, always sniffing around the hotel. I knew that if I kidnapped the child, you would focus all your attention on rescuing the little brat.”
“You guessed right,” Martin said, creeping an inch closer.
Sondra huffed with annoyance. “But I didn’t guess that you would put things together so quickly. I was certain that Rake would go to you to clear his name once I planted suspicion in him that his father might be Sin Sombra. Then I was going to kill Ernesto and leave the country. But you’ve been a little too clever, Detective. The other Pinkertons are no match for me. Once I take you out of the picture, I’ll escape for good.” A frown crossed her face suddenly and she cleared her throat before continuing. “Start again on my own this time.” Sondra sniffed, but raised her pistol, her voice going steely once more. “So, now you have to die.”
He realized that he had run out of time. Gripping the poker tightly, he took another larger step toward her.
“Stop right there, Detective,” Sondra warned and waved the weapon around dangerously. “Drop the poker.”
He wanted to resist but slowly bent to lay the weapon on the floor, wanting to eat up more time to allow Josephine to flee.
Sondra smiled, but it didn’t reach up to her eyes which were as cold and flat as a snake’s. Then, to Martin’s horror, in a singsong voice, she called out, “Oh, Josephine! Dearest Josephine, come out, come out wherever you are!”
Oh dear. Remember before when we talked about Martin loving Josephine till he drew his very last breath? I sure hope that isn’t happening anytime soon! Could fate really be that cruel to forever part these two lovebirds on their wedding night?
Josephine had pressed herself to the wall by the bedroom door where it was impossible to miss the entire exchange with Sondra Solvino.
She knew that Martin had been trying to keep Sin Sombra engaged so that she might escape through one of the bedroom windows, but she was not about to let Martin handle this alone. They had pledged to protect each other just hours earlier, and she intended to do just that.
But she didn’t know how.
Martin had taken the only possible weapon in the room—the poker. There was nothing else with any weight except…
She reached out and grabbed her precious snow globe from the rosewood occasional table by the door. There was some heft to it.
Suddenly, her little devil popped onto her shoulder. “Think about Marcos, Josephine. He needs a mother, so don’t do anything foolish!”
Her angel booted the devil off with a swift kick and said, “You’re a fighter, Josephine. It’s the only way to save Martin. You can do it.”
I have to do it, she thought. She couldn’t let the man she loved with all her heart die because of fear. She tucked that hand holding the snow globe into the fabric folds of her shift and inched down the hall, careful to keep to the shadows until she could see Sondra, holding a gun on Martin.
“Come out, come out,” Sondra singsonged once more and angled her head to peer into the hallway.
With another step, Josephine moved closer and drew the attention of both Martin and Sondra even though she was still in the shadows.
“Now that’s a good girl, Josephine. Step out here where I can see you before I have to hurt your dear Martin,” Sondra said and gestured with the gun for Josephine to enter the room.
“Stay back,” Martin urged and raised his hand to warn her, but she wasn’t about to listen.
“I’ll come out when snow falls in Miami.”
At her words, Martin half turned and gazed at her quizzically. With the faintest movement, she drew the snow globe out slightly, and Martin nodded.
“Well, then snow might be falling right…” He paused for a moment, and she prepared for the shot of a lifetime. “Now!” he shouted, and she heaved the snow globe with all her might at Sondra.
It struck Sin Sombra smack in the middle of her upper chest and shattered, water and bits of glass and ceramic flying everywhere. The force of the blow had her reeling, but even before that, Martin launched himself at the woman.
He tackled her to the ground and the impact knocked the gun out of her hand and sent it skittering across the floor. With a quick roll, Martin pinned Sondra to the floor, but she kicked and flailed her arms, rocking from side to side to try to displace him.
Josephine raced for the gun and scooped it up just as Martin jammed his knee into Sondra’s back, driving the air from her lungs. That slowed her and allowed him to grab one arm and then another, pinning them behind her back. But the woman continued to struggle until Josephine shouted, “Stop or I’ll shoot, Sondra. And don’t think for a moment that I won’t.” Sondra didn’t need to know that she had no earthly idea of how to fire a revolver.
Sondra finally quieted and glared at her, giving Martin time to yank the braces off his trousers and use them to tie her hands together behind her back. Once she was secured, he hauled her to her feet and for good measure, used the other brace to secure her hands to the midrail and spindles on a nearby kitchen chair.
As he stepped away, the crunch of glass and porcelain beneath his feet drew their attention to the snow globe that lay in pieces on the wooden floor.
He picked up what remained of the base and walked over to her.
“I’m so sorry, Martin, but it was the only thing I could think to grab,” she said and glanced at what was left of his wonderful gift.
He grabbed hold of her hand and ran his thumb along the gleaming gold band he’d placed there hours earlier. “Seems like a worthwhile sacrifice for a lifetime together, don’t you think?”
She smiled, rose up on tiptoes, and whispered against his lips, “I most definitely do.”
Can it be, my friends? Is Sin Sombra truly vanquished at long last? Will Martin and Josephine finally get their long-awaited happy ending?
Well, of course they will! Did you really think Martin was going to die? Come on, don’t you people know this is a romance novel? Bring on the HEA!