Chapter One
Bath, 1820
Elizabeth Masters exited the shop on Pulteney Bridge and smiled. It had been a frivolous purchase, a length of ribbon that she would never dare to wear in public. The lovely emerald hue was far too eye-catching for someone who did everything in her power to blend with the wallpaper. She had reason enough to want to vanish, she reflected bitterly. A woman in service could not afford to draw too much attention to herself but, beyond that, it was imperative for her position that no one recognize her from her previous life. Being a companion required being respectable above all things. And as her past forays into society had marked her as rather fast and imprudent, she had created as much separation from those days as possible.
Moving to Bath, as different from her bucolic upbringing in Hertfordshire as one could imagine, and leaving the all too brief acquaintance of the glittering gaiety of London behind, she’d set out to be very different from how she’d begun. Once she’d seen how tarnished and ugly London and its society truly were, it had allowed her to see herself in a new light and to make the changes necessary to become a better person.
Parties, balls, and endless frivolity had masked a deeper unhappiness inside her, a need for approval and attention that had left her easy prey to certain unscrupulous men. It had been a hard lesson learned, but she was the better for it. If her newfound life of piety and hard work did not bring joy, it was because she still needed to attend to the flaws in her own character, she reasoned. She was still allowing frivolous things to hold too much importance in her life. Even with that assessment ringing in her head, she continued to clutch the paper-wrapped length of ribbons as tightly as a child with a prize.
Stepping off the bridge, she crossed toward St. Michael’s Abbey and the nearby Pump Room. Lady Vale had excused her during her daily appointment to take the waters and Elizabeth had been unable to resist the length of green satin that had been calling her name for days. Every time she’d passed the shop window, she’d stared longingly at it. Now it was hers, to be hidden away in a drawer or pinned to some of her underthings as her own little secret vanity.
A feeling of unease stole over her and she glanced over her shoulder to see a large man leaning against a stone railing that overlooked the weir. He was roughly dressed, which was unusual as they were in a more fashionable part of town. Since he leaned nonchalantly there, he clearly was not a workman or in the employ of someone. He appeared to be quite at his leisure. He also appeared to be intently watching her. Immediately on guard, Elizabeth didn’t dare take her eyes off him.
Still looking over her shoulder, she was caught unawares when she walked directly into another person. Elizabeth stumbled, dropped her paper-wrapped package and her reticule and nearly fell on her bottom. She would have, had a pair of strong hands not grasped her upper arms and steadied her.
“Oh, dear heavens! How terribly clumsy I’ve been,” she muttered apologetically.
The man had stooped to retrieve her things as well as his hat which she’d sent flying. Only the top of his golden head was visible to her, but she heard the smile in his voice, as he spoke, “There is no need to apologize. You appeared to be quite deep in troubling thoughts.”
“Not so troubling really,” she denied. “Nonetheless, I do apologize, sir. I have quite made a cake of myself.”
He rose then, hat in one hand, her reticule and packaged ribbon in the other. Hand extended, he offered her items back to her, but it took Elizabeth a moment to quite make sense of what was happening.
The stranger she had inadvertently accosted wasn’t simply a handsome man. He was, in fact, the most beautiful man she’d ever seen. Every feature was chiseled, patrician perfection. And when he smiled at her, her heart thundered violently in her chest. It appeared all the work she’d done to distance herself from the shallow and vain creature she’d once been had been undone with a single glance at what surely was a model for Adonis.
“Forgive me, sir,” she finally managed. “I don’t mean to stare but you seem quite familiar to me.” It wasn’t untrue. There was something familiar in his face, but it wasn’t that which had prompted her to stare. Rather the sense of familiarity had been borne of the fact that she could not drag her gaze away from him in all his golden perfection.
He laughed then. “I don’t think we’ve met. We hardly run in the same circles, now do we?”
She blushed, humiliation burning inside her at the gentle rebuttal. Based on his clothing and deportment, it was obvious he was a gentleman. Given her drab attire, there was no mistaking that they were not of the same class. But that was what she had striven for, was it not? To disappear into the drudgery of a not-quite-a-servant’s life that was, to her, her lot forevermore.
Finding her voice, she replied as coolly as she dared, “Certainly, you are correct, sir. Thank you and good day.”
He frowned. “I’ve insulted you and I assure you it was purely by accident… I don’t mean to imply that I move in exalted circles, miss. Quite the opposite. I only look like a gentleman. I am not one. And regardless of your current employment, I daresay you are always a lady. Good day to you.”
Elizabeth watched him walk away and wondered what sort of man would dress so finely, speak so eloquently and display such pristine manners while referring to himself as not a gentleman. He was puzzling to be certain, but handsome puzzles that piqued her curiosity and her attraction were a recipe for disaster. She could not afford to be intrigued by him. She could not afford to do anything that would sway her from her current bleak but proper course.
Looking over her shoulder once more, she saw that the large workman was gone. “I am letting my foolish imagination get the better of me,” she muttered and turned to make her way toward the baths. It had been a curious day to say the least. Given the appointment she had arranged for Lady Vale for later that evening, it was only destined to grow stranger by the hour.
*
Benedict watched the woman from a secluded doorway. Concealed in the shadows, he watched the large man lumber away, taking a set of stairs that would lead down to the river. It had been the rough-looking man who’d first caught his attention. The ruffian matched the description he’d been given by the porter of the man he’d seen following Mary only a week earlier. In the square, surrounded by fashionably dressed ladies out to shop, pay calls and take the waters, he’d stood out like the proverbial sore thumb with his rough clothes and rougher appearance.
As Benedict had observed him, it had become glaringly apparent that the man was actually watching someone else. He’d kept his gaze glued to a small storefront. When the woman had emerged, dressed in her drab brown with her tightly-coiffed hair, he’d noted that the large man relaxed immediately. She was his quarry, there was no doubt.
Reflecting on the woman, Benedict had determined two things about her immediately. Underneath her drab costume, and he couldn’t help but feel it was, indeed, a costume—an affectation for whatever reason—she was far lovelier than she wanted anyone to realize. She’d also been attuned to the danger that the other man posed. Which begged the question of why she would be familiar with such? Had it been a simple instinctive response, like a rabbit running from a fox? Or did she know him?
The large man emerged again from the stairs he’d taken. Had he ducked out of sight to answer the call of nature or to report his findings to someone else? Benedict considered his options. He could follow the woman and assume that the hulking goon was, in fact, hunting her, or he could follow the goon and see if, perhaps, he’d been wrong in assessing the situation.
The woman piqued his interest. She was a study in contradictions and he had always enjoyed a puzzle. But she was also a distraction, and one that he could ill afford. Following her could confirm whether or not the other man was a threat to her and, by extrapolation, had been a threat to his sister. But if he was wrong, if the lumbering oaf watching her had simply been a coincidence, he would have lost his advantage there. As the miscreant was the more likely source of information if he was to locate Mary, Benedict bid a mental farewell to the vexing woman who had nearly upended them both and followed the thug.