Chapter Seventeen
Elizabeth was quaking with fear as she stood in a circle of women comprised primarily of kitchen maids. Lady Vale stood to the left, watching through the window. There was little doubt that her concern was more for the man fighting the fire than for anything in the house itself.
Forcing herself to be calm, to ignore the rushing of her blood and trembling of her knees, Elizabeth left the gaggle of female servants and approached her mistress. “I’m certain he will be well, Lady Vale. Calvert undoubtedly has things well in hand.”
Lady Vale cocked her head and arched one eyebrow imperiously. “I’m certain that he does… the question remains, Miss Masters, what were you doing alone, in the darkest hours of night, with my son?”
“I went downstairs for a bit of brandy to help me sleep. Apparently, Mr. Mason was suffering insomnia, as well,” Elizabeth replied smoothly. There was no need to divulge anything else. It wasn’t a mistake, but it was not something she intended to repeat either, therefore, she reasoned, there was nothing to divulge. Except that she had given up all pretense of being a well-bred and upstanding young woman and let him take her right there on the library furniture. And might have done again had the fire not been started. In that one regard, perhaps it was a blessing.
“Do you think me foolish, Miss Masters? With all my mystics and soothsayers, undoubtedly I do give that impression to some,” Lady Vale mused.
“I do not think you foolish, Lady Vale. Not in the least.”
“Then mark me, Elizabeth Masters… my brother-in-law may be your employer, but if you are behaving inappropriately with my son—”
“He may not be your son. I know you want him to be. I’ll even grant that there is enough of a resemblance to make one question it. But Lady Vale, what if he is not?” Elizabeth asked. It was a subject that needed to be addressed, but it was also a desperately needed change of topic that Elizabeth seized upon to save her own hide.
“Then he is a man who runs a gaming hell… and while I find no fault with his manners, it cannot be ignored that it is not a respectable occupation. If he is my son, you are reaching far too high, and if he is not, then you are digging your way directly to the bottom, my girl!” Lady Vale snapped.
Effectively put in her place, Elizabeth took a deep breath. “I am doing neither of those things, Lady Vale. While I was getting a drink, I heard breaking glass, as did Mr. Mason. We went to investigate it and someone threw a flaming bottle through the window! There are greater issues at stake right now, Lady Vale, than whether or not you would find me a suitable prospect for a man who may or may not be your son! Someone tried to commit murder this night… whether the intended victim was you, me, or Mr. Mason, remains unknown!”
Benedict emerged from the house then. He was coughing furiously and his shirt was stained with soot and what appeared to be blood. His wound had reopened. They would need to have someone fetch the doctor.
Stepping away from Lady Vale, Elizabeth meant to tell one of the maids to see to it. But the sound of hoofbeats and the clattering of carriage wheels halted her. A feeling of foreboding washed through her and she glanced over her shoulder in the direction of the noise. A wagon pulled by two horses was barreling down on them, heading straight for the crowd.
At the same time, the maids and other sundry servants seemed to realize it. With shrieks of alarm they scattered like birds, leaving Elizabeth alone there, an easy and well isolated target.
The heavy figure of a man was leaning from the back of the wagon, arms outstretched as he neared her. Panic had frozen her, but not so much that she did not recognize him. It was one of the men who had attempted to abduct her outside Madame Zula’s.
“Elizabeth!”
Benedict’s shout of alarm pulled her from her trance. She stepped back, trying to get out of reach of the villain, but it was too late. His hands snagged in her hair, pulling her off her feet and onto the small bench at the back of the vehicle with him.
She struggled, fighting him for all that she was worth. Her nails raked his cheek, leaving bloody tracks in their wake. He cursed under his breath as he tried to subdue her.
Without warning, another man rose from within the small cart and reached for her. He grasped her roughly, pulling her completely into the foul smelling confines of the small vehicle. She could hear Lady Vale screaming even over the sound of the horses’ hooves clattering over the cobbled street. Landing with a heavy thud on the coarse wooden floor, she felt splinters puncture her palms and the rough jolt of the wheels beneath her.
The man who had grabbed her was large and beefy, but not the same man as before. That man had frightened her simply because she felt his gaze upon her, because he had watched her until she became aware of his presence. This man frightened her for very different reasons. Even in the dim light, she could see the speculation glittering in his gaze as it raked over her. Even in her night rail and heavy wrapper, she might as well have been naked for all the good it did. She felt exposed and violated by him when he had yet to even touch her.
The other man, the one who had been in charge the night they tried to take her from outside Madame Zula’s, was climbing over the gate of the wagon, but he hadn’t missed his cohort’s hungry expression. “She’s not for the likes of you. We’ll turn her over unharmed, collect our payment and then you can hire every whore in Bath if you want.”
“I don’t want no whore, now do I? I likes ’em fresh.”
The leader opened his mouth to speak, but a loud crack rent the night air. The sound of gunfire echoed through what were normally peaceful streets. The man let out a pained gasp as he clutched at the side of the wagon. The light color of his shirt grew dark with a spreading stain, his left arm hanging limp at his side. She could see the panic in his gaze as he lost his grip and tumbled to the street below.
Elizabeth struggled to sit up, to reach the edge of the wagon. She’d rather take her chances of being trampled beneath the wheels than with the disgusting man who eyed her so boldly. Within seconds, he’d grabbed her and hauled her back, holding her tight against him. She could smell gin and sweat, the foulness of his breath and the stench of a body too-long unwashed.
“I can’t take you the way I want… but nothing to say I can’t have a little feel, now is there?” he asked, as his hand cupped her breast roughly.
She slapped at him, pushing at his arms in a vain attempt to free herself. It was his laughter that made her stop. She realized immediately that he enjoyed her struggles.
“Every stolen touch will cost you… I will tell whoever it is that has asked for me that you violated their orders and took liberties. These are ruthless men, are they not? Men who are not above killing any who go against their wishes?”
He grumbled against her ear and shoved her away from him. She landed in the opposite corner of the wagon, her head connecting painfully with the wooden side.
“Go on then. Tell ’em, what you like. You’ll be spreading your thighs for someone ’fore the night is through. We’ll see how high and might you are then!”
*
Benedict raced after the wagon. In spite of his aching chest and the smoke that had left him gasping for breath, he pushed on. But he was only a man. With every passing second, the back of that wagon grew smaller and smaller until it eventually disappeared from his sight entirely.
Stopping, dropping his hands onto his knees and gasping for breath, he coughed as he tried to inhale great quantities of air. His lungs had seized entirely, whether from panic or exertion he could not say.
Turning back, the crushing weight of disappointment, of fear and failure, pressed in on him as he moved toward the servants that were once more gathered around Lady Vale. By the time he reached them, they were no longer shocked into silence, but were whispering so loudly it was like a swarm of bees about him.
A carriage had stopped down the street. It had been traveling in the opposite direction from the wagon that had taken Elizabeth, coming into town instead of leaving it. With no room to turn the vehicle, pursuit was not an option. The door opened and a man emerged. Tall, well dressed, his dark brown hair sprinkled with enough gray that even in the dim light of the moon it was visible, he strode purposefully toward them.
“What the devil is happening here?”
“A fire,” Lady Vale said. “I very much fear that it was set as a lure in order to get us outside and put poor Miss Masters once more in harm’s way! Oh, Branson! We must save her!”
Branson, a name Benedict didn’t know but that still felt strangely familiar to him, appeared to be well known to Lady Vale. He reached out as if to touch her, then abruptly drew back, hands at his side, bearing as erect as any military man could hope for.
“You wanted rid of her, didn’t you?”
Lady Vale looked up at him, her shock and utter appall written clearly upon her face. “Not this way! I resented having a keeper, Branson, but I would never wish for that kind of evil and misery to be visited upon anyone! She’s only a girl… she’s barely older than I was when I was forced to marry your worthless brother!”
It all clicked into place for him then. Branson Middlethorp, Esquire. He was Lady Vale’s brother-in-law and Elizabeth’s employer. She’d been naught but a bone between two fighting dogs, he thought. Both Lady Vale and Middlethorp saw her as only a servant, something expendable.
“Sir, if I may have the use of your carriage, I will travel in pursuit of them. It shouldn’t take long with such a fine team to overtake a simple wagon,” he said.
“You’re the hero,” Middlethorp surmised. “The dashing young buck who rushed in to save her before… well, you can’t. The team is worn out from the journey from London. We will go after her, but we’ll need fresh horses to do it. In the meantime, we’re going to interrogate that fellow I just shot and see what we can get out of him.”
Middlethorp gestured to two footmen who were standing on the steps, dazed and clearly frightened by what had unfolded. “You there, get him up, get him in the house… and send someone for a doctor. I won’t have him dying on us before he tells us what we need to know!”
Lady Vale moved closer to Benedict. “Oh, my dear, I know this must be very difficult for you. You’ve grown very close to Miss Masters during your stay with us.”
“I have. And when I leave here, I intend to ask her to accompany me… I will not lose her. Whatever the cost, I will get both Elizabeth and my sister back,” he vowed.
Lady Vale blinked at that. “But you are most likely Lord Vale, Benedict. You cannot think to marry so low when you are the presumed heir to a viscountcy!”
“I’m not an heir to anything yet. Nothing has been proven. And if it means I can’t live my life of my own choosing instead of being bound by archaic class rules, then I’ve no wish to be Viscount anything,” he answered hotly as the two footmen moved past him with the unconscious man carried between them. He turned on his heel to follow them.
He was done with Lady Vale’s games, with her bargains and ultimatums. While he was appreciative of her help, it had only allowed him to determine that Mary had lied to him and that she’d been just as obsessed with this foolish theory surrounding his origins as Lady Vale herself was. He was done with the lot of it. Miss Masters and Mary would be rescued and they would both return to London with him, one more willingly than the other, perhaps, but he was not taking no for an answer.
Branson watched the young man walk away, disappearing into the house. The resemblance, even in the dim light, had been uncanny. For once, he found himself questioning whether or not his own accepted version of events, that Benedict, Viscount Vale, was dead, was, in fact, accurate.
To Lady Vale, he said, “Well, Sarah, whether that boy is your blood or not, he certainly matches you in temperament!”
“This is not a time for jests, Branson! That boy, as you called him, is most likely my missing son, and the woman you hired to keep me from finding him may very well succeed in taking him away from me after all!”
“Not if you stop impeding what is very clearly a love match,” Brandon said. “If he is your son, would you really be so blinded by the rules of society that you would force him to marry without love as you once did?”
She gasped, almost as if he’d struck her and stepped back. “It is not at all the same! James was cruel and vicious. I would never ask him to marry someone who would be so wicked!”
“No, but you would ask him to give up any chance at happiness and break his heart along with hers in the process. Do not repeat past mistakes, my dear,” he warned softly. “Now, let us go upstairs and see what information we can glean from this worthless individual who is bleeding all over the good linens, shall we?”
He didn’t wait to see if she followed, but swept into the house ahead of her. Sarah had been the love of his life. He’d watched her with envy and longing as she’d wed his elder brother. He’d watched her with pity and righteous indignation as she’d endured James’ cruelty. He’d watched her nearly drive herself mad with the need to find her son when all evidence pointed to his no longer being amongst the living. But he would not watch her turn into the thing he most despised… a society matron like her own mother had been—a woman who would rob even her own child of happiness in order to meet the expectations of others.