My Lord Deceived (21 page)

For some reason
he just couldn’t see it. He couldn’t imagine Kat wrestling with
carts, barrels and cloth in the middle of a storm. At least he
hoped she wasn’t that stupid. Whatever the price the goods fetched,
and he was sure it was a hefty price; it wasn’t worth the risk to
life and limb, especially Kat’s life and limb.

Kat wiped the
bar down absently and felt sweat bead her brow. She daren’t lift
her gaze, and didn’t need to look at him to know that he continued
to study her closely. Her thoughts turned to the cargo they had to
fetch in tonight and she knew she had to warn the others.
Unfortunately though, she now had one other significant problem.
They needed her help tonight, especially after the demise of Mr
Barnaby. How could she help out when Jonathan was with her? Did he
intend to go straight home to Dentham Hall once he had made sure
she was home safely? Or did he intend to hang around in the area to
see what he could discover? She sidled closer to Harry, and smiled
at him.

“What is it?
What are you smiling at me like that for?” Harry demanded
warily.

Kat kept her
face relaxed, but the smile was fixed to the point that she drew
the concerned gazes of Norman and Charlie, who were watching her
closely too. “He knows about the smuggling.”

Charles choked
on his rum and spat it across the bar. Norman rolled his eyes and
began to slap him roughly on the back. Harry stared at her in
frozen horror. “What? Are you sure?”

“He has just
asked me,” she sing-songed through gritted teeth. She felt the
worst kind of traitor, as though she had just betrayed Jonathan in
the worst possible way. A part of her warned her that her duplicity
would break her heart, but she couldn’t afford to lose sight of the
fact that these people before her now were her friends, colleagues
and neighbours. She had worked alongside them in the tavern and on
the beaches for a couple of years now and they had known her since
she was a baby. Jonathan was always on the fringes of her life,
dropping in or passing by whenever he chose. He had never been nor
would he ever be a permanent fixture. If she had a responsibility
to anyone it had to be to the villagers with whom she shared a
home.

Still, a small
part of her still wanted to rush across the tavern and throw
herself upon his mercy; to tell him everything, and plead for his
forgiveness.

Kat shook her
head at Charlie, and handed him a cloth to dab up the spills on his
shirt.

“Get him out of
here,” Harry whispered.

“How? Why
me?”

“Go home and
take him with you. If you go now, he will get bored and head home.
We can check he is back at the Hall before we go down to do the
business and collect you on the way.”

“What if he
isn’t there?” Kat replied. Panic laced her voice.

They all stared
at each other. “I will ask the others,” Harry sighed. “But you are
going to have to help us tonight Kat. We are already two men down
and cannot cover for both of them. We need extra hands, especially
with the storm.”

“I know,” Kat
sighed. She hoped that Jonathan would drop her off at home and head
back to Dentham. The thought that he might not made her feel
sick.

“Now, go.”

“Now?”

“Yes, tell him
that you have a headache or something. Just get him out of here,”
Harry whispered urgently. He gave her a shove toward the end of the
bar and moved to serve a group of sailors who waited patiently for
their rum.

Kat scooped up
her shawl and with a final pointed look at her colleagues, headed
toward the door.

“Going
already?” Jonathan drawled. Having watched the last few minutes, he
was convinced that there was something amiss, but couldn’t see how
Norman or Charlie could be involved in smuggling anything. Neither
of them were nimble, and were the top end of eighty he was sure of
it, or he wasn’t a member of the Star Elite.

“I have a
headache,” Kat muttered. She swept past him, right out of the
tavern door and didn’t bother to stop to see if he intended to
follow her. She hadn’t made arrangements for him to escort her
home, and she didn’t see how she had the right to stop and see if
his apparent need to escort her home was why he had come to the
tavern tonight. Still, she wasn’t surprised when the tavern door
opened behind her and the rapid footsteps heralded his arrival at
her elbow.

“What is it
Kat? What’s wrong?” He demanded softly. He cupped her elbow in his
hand and drew her gently to a halt. He bent his head to stare down
at her and mentally cursed. If he knew anything about human nature,
he knew when someone was rattled. Kat had been shaken by something.
Was it his questions about smuggling? Was she really involved? “I
cannot help you if you don’t confide in me,” he urged. His voice
was far harder than he had intended it to be but he couldn’t draw
the questions back now. “There is nothing you can tell me that will
bring my censure. I have seen things and done things you cannot
possibly imagine. Believe me when I tell you that I will
understand.”

Kat stared at
him for a moment. She was so tempted to tell him: to hand the whole
sorry mess of her life over to him to see if he could make a better
job of it because right now, she didn’t know where to start, or how
to make sense of it all. She was so far out of her depth with the
smuggling, Harrison and even with Jonathan himself that she just
wanted to crawl off to bed and stay there.

Still, she was
made of sterner stuff and after several moments of expectant
silence, she straightened her shoulders and stared blankly up at
him.

“I am just
tired that’s all. I will be alright. I just have a headache and
need an early night, that’s all.”

Jonathan
sighed. He had read her hesitation and knew that she had, however
briefly, wanted to confide in him, and was fairly certain that she
hadn’t intended him to be able to read her so well. She had wavered
with the need to confide in him only, at the last minute, something
made her draw back and close him out. He bit back a curse of
frustration and eased his hold on her. He couldn’t exactly call her
a liar because he couldn’t prove whether she had a headache or not.
If she did, then she had a very considerate boss in Harry. He
couldn’t think of any other tavern he had been to where bar maids
would be allowed to leave early because of a headache. It led him
to wonder whether Harry had wanted Kat, or himself, out of the
tavern for some reason.

He wondered if
the tavern had received more than kegs of ale to fill the cellars,
and made a mental note to check at the earliest opportunity. His
thoughts turned to Harrison, and he knew that the tavern cellars
would be the first place the Excise man would look, but that didn’t
mean that Jonathan couldn’t check it out for himself.

He escorted her
home in silence. At the door he paused, but didn’t make any attempt
to follow her inside. The room was brightly lit and he could hear
the low murmur of voices through the door.

“Are you going
to read to uncle tomorrow?”

“I can’t
tomorrow. I have things to do here, but I can come the day after.”
With the cargo due in tonight, Kat would be out until the early
hours. Once it was safely home she would spend her morning with her
mother and Billy. Together they would divide the goods up and store
them away. It would be morning before she had the opportunity to
catch up on her much needed sleep. She could only hope that
Harrison wouldn’t be on the doorstep at dawn.

“Bring Billy
with you. I will give him another riding lesson,” Jonathan
offered.

“I don’t think
that is a good idea,” Kat sighed and turned to stare at him. “Thank
you for your kind offer, but I really do think it would be better
if you do not encourage him in that regard.”

“What regard?
Riding? What’s wrong with it?” Jonathan turned to her with a scowl.
Her face was closed to him and, for the first time ever, he
couldn’t read any sign of emotion on her beautiful features, and he
hated it.

“There is
nothing wrong with riding. It is just that I don’t think it would
be advisable for you to encourage Billy to do it,” Kat snapped. She
tried to keep her anger and frustration at bay. While a part of her
was glad he was still around in the village, another part of her
wished he would head back to London. Life had never seemed as
complicated as it had been since he had re-appeared, and she didn’t
like it one bit. If he didn’t head back to his ‘responsibilities’
soon, she would be ready for the asylum, she was sure of it.

“It is a very
valuable skill for anyone to have,” Jonathan countered. There was
nothing wrong with his offer to teach the boy to ride, and felt
that something else was behind her objection to such a mundane
activity. Everyone he knew could ride a horse. It was the primary
moved of transport apart from walking, or having to lumber along in
a large cart. What could be wrong with teaching the boy something
he could use throughout his adult life?

“I know but we
are different to you,” Kat sighed. She hated to point out the
social differences to him.

“How? We all
need to get about? At least if he can ride, he can use the skill as
he gets older. What on earth is wrong with that?”

“Because we
cannot afford a horse,” Kat snapped. “We have Molly but she is a
cart horse. She allows us to ride her to and from her field but
doesn’t accept a saddle. If you teach Billy how to ride, he will
want a horse to ride properly, and that isn’t possible.” She
mentally winced at just how rude and ungracious she sounded but she
couldn’t grab the words back, even if she wanted to.

The familiarity
with which they had ambled up the hill together toward Kat’s house
was not lost on her. It had felt far too comfortable to her to have
him by her side and she knew it was folly to rely on him to stay
around for too much longer. She sensed his objection and sought to
find a way to stem the argument that loomed.

“Please just
respect our position in the village and don’t encourage him. I
won’t bring him to Dentham Hall again and, because of the gossips,
who have now gotten wind of the fact that you are escorting me
home, I think it would be best if you go about your own way and
forget about us.” Kat felt tears sting her eyes but sucked in a
deep breath to hold them at bay for now. “I thank you for your kind
generosity so far, but you really need to go back to Dentham Hall,
and stay there.”

“Kat,” Jonathan
sighed. He took a step toward her and reached out to grab her
shoulders to stop her only for her to pre-empt him. He watched as
she spun around and disappeared into the warmth of the house
without a backward glance.

CHAPTER
TWELVE

Kat closed the
door behind her and paused to listen for several moments. She was
aware of the steady trickle of tears on her cheeks, but made no
attempt to wipe them away. Only when she heard his footsteps fade
into the distance did she slowly push away from the door and open
her eyes.

“What is it,
Kat dear?” Agnes asked softly. She pushed Billy toward the stairs
and turned moved across the room to stand before her daughter. She
had not seen Kat cry since they had buried Frank. Something must
have gone horribly wrong to distress her so.

“Oh, mother, I
have made such a mess of things,” Kat gasped. One look at her
mother’s face was all it took and she burst into uncontrollable
sobs. She was only vaguely aware of being urged to sit down on the
chair beside the fire, and felt her mother move to sit beside her.
Agnes allowed Kat a few minutes to gather herself and patted the
back of her hand while she wept. Billy arrived with a glass of
brandy, but she didn’t attempt to take it off him, merely sniffed
and continued to cry.

“What’s
happened? Why are you back so soon?” It was only ten o’clock. Kat
usually worked until midnight, later if there was cargo to bring
in.

“Jonathan knows
about the smuggling.”

Agnes’ gasp was
the only thing that broke the stunned silence that fell over the
room.

“How?”

“I don’t know,
but he was asking me about it tonight. He knows mother. He knows.”
Kat felt vaguely sick. Was the heavy guilt because she knew she was
heavily involved in the smuggling, or because she had lied to
Jonathan? She wasn’t sure, but she wished she was anywhere else but
here.

“Why don’t you
let me go out for you tonight? You get some rest,” Agnes offered.
She had never been onto the beach before to bring cargo in. That
had been something Kat had volunteered for given that she was
already down in the tavern with the locals. It was easier for her
to get to the beach with the men who all helped each other bring
the cargo ashore and deliver it to people’s houses. Agnes had no
idea how the operation worked, or what would be required of her,
but she had never seen Kat so shaken before. Her thoughts turned to
Jonathan and she wondered if there was more going on than she had
realised.

“Jonathan is
not going to be here for long,” she reminded her daughter. She knew
her suspicions were correct when a look of pure misery darkened
Kat’s eyes. “You know that he doesn’t stick around for long. He has
been here far longer than ever before, so it is time for him to
leave soon. There are rumours that he has a wife stashed away
somewhere in London.”

Kat gasped and
stared at the sympathy in her mother’s eyes. She couldn’t speak.
Her heart shattered into a thousand tiny pieces as disappointment
that swept through her.

“Oh, mother,”
she whispered. She made no objection when her mother gathered her
into a maternal embrace and began to rock her the same way she used
to do when she was a child.

“Sometimes it
is better to cut the ties early and lose a little piece of your
heart than allow things to continue that have no hope of ever
lasting,” Agnes sighed sadly. She had always known that Kat had
held a soft spot for the young lord from the big house. Most of the
women in the village swooned over him, but Kat had always been one
who had tried to ignore the attraction and get on with her own
life. Both she and Frank had been most concerned when Kat had
reached adolescence but, luckily, Jonathan had been sent away to
boarding school and had only returned home for a few weeks at a
time each year. It had set a precedent that had continued
throughout his adult life. He still appeared out of the blue,
stayed a few days and then vanished again for weeks, if not months
at a time. Still, she ached for her daughter’s heartbreak and
wished that there was something, anything she could do to ease the
pain.