Hot and Steamy (23 page)

Ashington had given me a look of betrayal as they had disembarked from their carriage, but I ignored him. I'd already extended a dozen invitations to his fellow scientists and inventors, all with daughters of marriageable age. He'd agreed to them willingly enough before the Hastings' arrival. With any luck, one of those winsome lasses would have him in harness in no time.

I'd not wasted the rest of the time either. The new butler, Fredricks, was a gem, and had seen service in the Far Indies and Egypt. He'd fit into the household as if he'd always been there and hadn't blinked an eye at the various explosions coming from the lab.

After a token protest, Cook had relished the challenge of entertaining the new guests with her culinary arts. The kitchen maids were quite flush from all their efforts and the flirting they'd enjoyed with the new lads I'd hired.

Best of all, the head groundskeeper had come into his own. He had managed to hide almost all of the ravages to the gardens. I'd enjoyed a number of walks, discussing the plantings with the various new helpers. If we also discussed certain security issues, well, that was all to the good.

Ashington had a small desk added to his office for my use, and we'd developed the habit of using tea time to deal with the business of the day. It was very comfortable to have him pacing about, expounding on a theory, or some new outrage in the paper as I worked through his correspondence. Of course, the presence of guests meant he had the obligations of a host, but we still managed at least an hour or so each day. I rather enjoyed . . .

I drew myself up short at that thought, and then drove it completely out of my head. Lord Ashington needed a wife of gentle birth, acceptable to his godmother, and willing and able to take her place next to him in polite society. I'd enjoy what I had and be grateful for it. The moment his betrothal was announced, I'd be on my way to a new assignment.

But until then . . .

I fault myself for what happened next. I'd become complacent, at ease even over the last few weeks. It does not pay to let one's guard down for an instance.

In my defense, I should point out that Herr Doktor Girdenstein and his chubby wife seemed the last people on this earth to offer a threat. They'd arrived with two carriages filled with luggage and yapping lap dogs. I'd focused on seeing to their comfort, and not the number of muscular, grim drivers, footmen, and servants they'd brought with them.

On the second day of their visit, Fredricks had gone into town for errands with two of our lads. Ashington and Herr Doktor were in the lab, discussing the various methods of welding, when Frau Doktor Girdenstein came into the office with the terriers, asking for help with some correspondence. I'd been willing, of course, and was perusing her papers when she thrust the muzzle of her firearm up under my jaw.

She'd no compunction of searching under my skirts for my weapons, removing my pistol and two of my throwing knives. Then she frogmarched me into the lab, those damnable dogs yipping at our heels.

Lord Ashington looked up from his plans, and his jaw dropped. Herr Doktor used his astonishment to thrust a gun into his ribs.

“You will order your men to gather,” Girdenstein's voice was low and calm. “We will see to it that they are secured, and no one will be harmed. We wish only the plans and your notes.”

Ashington opened his mouth, but the Doktor pressed the muzzle of his firearm harder into his back. “It will not be you who suffers for any disobedience.”

“There's no need.” Ashington spread his hands, holding them open in a gesture of surrender. “You have us at your mercy. We will cooperate.”

The devil we would. She hadn't found all of my knives. I shifted my weight slightly, eyeing Frau Doktor Girdenstein carefully.

“Haversham,” Ashington snapped.

I glared at him for drawing attention to me.

“Get the plans, if you would. And my notes.” He gestured to the trap door. “Quickly, if you please. I am sure the Herr Doktor and his wife wish to be on their way as soon as possible.”

Frau Doktor pushed me hard, and I staggered forward. With a snarl, I turned, but she had that damnable pistol in my face.

“Please,” Ashington said.

Startled, I looked over. His brown eyes held worry there and concern. Concern for my well-being. A tingle passed through me. I sighed, and started down the steps.

“Hans and the others are outside,” Frau Doktor told her husband.

“Excellent,” Herr Doktor rumbled. “They certainly can assist us in—”

Lord Ashington moved then, leaping forward to push me down into the cellar, jumping in behind me. He jerked at the wooden door and shouted. “Trim the shrubbery!”

The automatons both lifted their arms, and their eyes glowed as the door slammed down, and Ashington fell on top of me.

His weight pinned me to the floor and knocked the breath quite out of me. There was a crashing sound as debris fell around us. I couldn't see a thing, but I could hear the Doktor cursing, the squeals of the lap dogs, and the shrill screams of his wife.

“I was afraid of that,” Ashington said in my ear. “Damn thing stepped on the door.”

I gasped, trying to gulp in air.

“What's wrong?” Ashington asked. “Are you well enough? I'm too heavy for you.”

“No,” I couldn't seem to breathe. “My stays,” I whispered, my vision going even blacker then it already was.

Ashington cursed. He shifted, and I felt his fingers at my collar. He tore my dress down the front, ripping it and my corset open clear down to my waist. I drew a deep breath, cool, dusty air filling my lungs.

“Better?” Ashington asked as the debris above us trembled.

“Yes, but,” I squirmed a bit, trying to adjust. “But your toolbelt is digging into my—”

Ashington coughed. “That is not my tool belt, Miss Haversham.”

“Oh,” I froze, suddenly quite distracted from the distant screams.

“It would be a great help if we both just lie back and think of England.” Ashington said. “Think of our duty to God and country and—”

“Your godmother is going to have me thrown in the Tower,” I said.

“That's quite an effective method of quelling improper thoughts,” Ashington said. “The image of my godmother bearing down on us. Thank you, Miss Haversham, that's rather taken care of the situation.”

The floor above us quaked, and dust rained down as the rafters groaned. We were confined in the wreckage and darkness.

“Sounds like the Germans are having a rough time of it,” Ashington observed. “Serves them right.”

“It's my fault,” I said softly. “They should never have managed to—”

“Who'd have expected Girdenstein of anything other than designs on my pot roast?” Ashington chuckled. “Besides, I am indebted to the man.”

I blinked in the darkness. “Why on earth would—”

“Well, you are well and truly compromised, aren't you?” Ashington sounded very smug, and very satisfied. “There is no hope for it, and I shall do the honorable thing. We will marry immediately.”

“We shall not.” I said, trying to control the tremble in my voice. “Your position, the queen . . .”

“Even better,” Ashington replied. “You will both stop throwing women at me.”

“M'lord?”

“Ash,” he demanded. “Call me Ash.”

I drew in a breath of cool damp air. “I—”

“That last one, Dr. Conrad's daughter, she had a moustache,” he grumbled into my ear.

I choked back a laugh. “She did,” I admitted. “But she also is reputed to have a keen understanding of aerodynamics.”

“Miss Haversham, science can only go so far.”

I laughed weakly as dust drifted down on us from above. But I knew my duty too well. “Lord Ashing—”

He kissed me, his warm lips on mine.

A proper woman would have resisted. I moaned into his mouth, opening to him, wanting more, wanting . . . .

His hand eased up, cupping my breast under the torn bodice. “Yes indeed, well and truly compromised. The niceties will demand that we marry.”

“Ash,” I breathed. “I can't. Your godmother will not be amused.”

“She will,” Ash assured me. “Once I tell her that we are in love.”

“We are?” I blinked in the dust and darkness, sure of my feelings. But did he—?

“Oh yes, my love.” he kissed me again, as thoroughly as I could wish.

The trap door opened, and light poured in around us as many hands pulled away the debris. Audible gasps could be heard from above. Ash raised his head and gazed into my eyes. “Aren't we?”

“Oh yes,” I laughed breathlessly. “I rather think we are.”

“N
ot much to look at this fine mornin', is 'e?”

Filimena Edgars had to agree with the captain. The man snoring on the floor before them was indeed a sorry sight. Of course, sleeping in a heap of straw on the wrong side of a sturdy set of prison bars has never been known to do much for anyone. This individual, however, managed to trump those minor discrediting affectations with an entire roster of others.

“I should say not,” the young lady agreed, her previous list of reservations about their mission that morning suddenly seeming as inadequate as wine from the Americas or promises made by the French.

The object of Miss Edgar's disdain was indeed a sight—his hair long uncut, his body long unbathed. His unshaven face was covered in bruises, his feet were clad in neither shoes nor socks, and what clothing he did possess was stained with such a vast multitude of oils, fluids, and lubricants that their original colors were lost for all time.

“Wake him.”

The captain's order was directed at a guard standing by prepared with a bucket of water. Its relatively quiet splash was followed by a shocking outburst of profanity, coupled with a violent thrashing of the no-longer-sleeping man's limbs, a display which sent wet straw, an assortment of insects, and a small family of mice flying in all directions.

“Roust yourself, lad,” barked the sergeant of the guard, “these kind folk has taken enough interest in you to pay your debts, which means you'll be doing your decomposing somewheres else . . . at least for a while.”

As the suddenly slightly less filthy figure on the floor sputtered, working to pull himself together, the captain said: “AppleJack Stevens, you look like a cheese what got left in the sun too long. Shameful.”

Blinking hard, shaking himself in much the manner of an ill-bred, and possibly drunken, hound, the sputtering fellow replied: “Captain? Captain Dollins?”

Ignoring Stevens, the older man turned to his companion. “There he is, Miss Edgars, the al'round best pilot and gunner the big wide world of lighter-than-air craft'as ever known. One in a million, 'e is.”

Turning her nose upward at the sight of Stevens as he burped, then used a finger to dig at some irritant caught between his teeth, the young woman responded: “Surely there is someone else we could use.”

“No,” answered Dollins in a somber voice. “There's not. And there's certainly no man I'd trust more . . . considering, that is, where we've got a mind to be goin'.”

Burping twice more, rubbing at his eyes as strenuously as if they had been covered over with tar and left to dry, the pilot worked at focusing his attention on Dollins as he asked: “Unnn-hunnnn . . . and speaking of that, captain, sir . . . what god-forbidden pesthole did you have in mind for me guide the
Gibraltar
to this time?”

“The only one that matters, Jack, me boy . . .”

The pilot's head stopped moving, frozen in place by some inner property desperate to hear whatever Dollins was about to say clearly—correctly. Through eyes so bloodshot they appeared as an unbroken scarlet, he stared as the captain finished his sentence—