The Belligerent Miss Boynton AND The Lurid Lady Lockport (Two Companion Full-Length Regency Novels) (28 page)

"Lawks almighty," bellowed the footpad who had called himself Bob. "Her's damn near blowed m'leg clear off. An' Oi cain't find m'pistols in all this muck!" More exclamations followed, interspersed with a multitude of dire oaths and thieves' cant as Bob hauled himself up by pulling on his mount's stirrup and painfully hoisted himself into the saddle. Bo watched from the ground as Bob used his good leg to kick some life into his broken-down steed and disappeared in the same direction his mate Clem had chosen minutes earlier.

Bo took a minute to congratulate himself on the successful routing of the hapless hired killer before the realization that he'd had little to do with that success riveted all his attention, and all his fears, in the direction of the coach.

Anne! Where was Anne? He crawled toward the coach on his hands and knees until he saw the gleam of her white dress in the pale moonlight. Quickly he checked her slim form for injuries, and when he saw that there were none, he deduced that she had merely fainted. A still-smoking pistol lay beside her and he gawked at it in amazement.

Anne soon roused from her swoon and threw herself into Bo's arms, earning herself a fierce one-armed hug and an admonition to moderate her enthusiasm, which was well on its way to squeezing the rest of his life's blood out through the hole in his shoulder.

"Wh-where is that awful man?" Anne questioned timidly while applying a ripped-off portion of her petticoat to her beloved's wound with an economy of movement and lack of squeamishness that would have totally astounded her fastidious mother. "When I saw you throwing yourself at his pistol in order to save me I was so enraged that I just shut my eyes and fired. I didn't kill him, did I, Bo? Please say I didn't kill him!"

"Only winged him, more's the pity," Bo answered with the sterling lack of sensibility only a man could show. "Leg wound. Not too bad for a woman, I guess," he added by way of compensation.

Anne looked puzzled. "I shot him in the leg? How can that be? I distinctly remember aiming at his black heart just before I closed my eyes. Ah, well, I suppose I'm just glad I didn't kill him, no matter what, for then I should be," she shivered convulsively, "a murderess."

"Never so, my sweet. A heroine. Yes, a regular heroine," he concluded, and then placed a resounding kiss on her startled, half-open mouth. Their interlude, however, was short-lived, as they could no longer ignore the banging and muffled oaths that came from atop the carriage.

Once freed, Harrow bundled the still triumphant pair into the coach and turned the horses back the way they had come. "Bedlam bait, the pair of them," he consoled himself. "Those coves could come back any time, with fifty more like them, and they're sitting in the mud, billing and cooing like doves in the park." He flicked his whip out over the horses, which were already moving at a spanking pace. "Hie! Git moving, you worthless plugs."

Harrow shot off his blunderbuss as soon as the lights from the Squire's house were visible through the trees, and by the time the carriage plunged to a rocking halt before the main steps the entire party was stationed on the portico.

"We was set upon by murderers, my lord," Harrow shouted down to Jared. "Hired killers, they were, out to stop this carriage and do away with anyone inside."

Harrow was just finishing his tale as Jared flung open the carriage door. The first thing he saw was a muddy male hand gripping the inside latch. Attached to that hand was a chubby brown bear who thus was catapulted unceremoniously to the ground—this time before an audience that either shrieked, fainted from fright, shouted in surprise, or exploded into laughter, depending on their individual spleens.

As Anne decorously climbed down from the carriage she sighed, saying, "Oh, Bo, not again," before the events of the evening proved to be too much for her; whereupon she daintily swooned into Jared's available arms, her father's being already burdened with her mother's more than ample and equally limp form.

It was left to Lady Chezwick to bring some order to the scene, which she did with the speed and precision of a field marshal organizing his troops. Carriages were called for and the guests, pistols at the ready in case there were more highwaymen about, hurried off on their way before, as one pert young housemaid remarked, the cat could lick its ear.

Lady Chezwick's enthusiastic waving of burnt feathers revived Anne and her mother in time to hear Bo's garbled description of the near-tragedy, and his blush-riddled account of his "lucky shot," which had resulted in the ignominious dispatch of one of the would-be murderers.

To be completely fair to Bo, it was due to Anne's urging that he reluctantly took credit for the feat of derring-do. As she had explained to him, Anne did not relish the thought of being touted a heroine or, much worse, eyed askance by the neighborhood biddies who would object to the "blood on her hands." Even more, although she was too wise to say so, she disliked the thought of the ribbings Bo would be forced to endure if anyone were to know that, not only had he failed to protect his fiancee, but that his fiancee had saved him!

The unraveling of the night's events, embellished by the additions of colorful adjectives like "blackhearted murderers" and "bloodthirsty butchers" as they were related and embroidered upon by Amanda in her line-by-line translations of Bo's clipped speech, was enough to send the Squire's good wife into a shrieking bout of hysterics before she could be ushered away to her room.

Once there, a maid dosed her mistress with a liberal two fingers of laudanum in a tooth glass, placed a hot brick at her toes, and left her to moan, "My baby, my poor baby," until she realized she had lost her audience, whereupon she promptly fell asleep.

Across the hall from this chamber the local surgeon, who fortunately had been in attendance at the party, had already surveyed Bo's wound and, announcing it a mere scratch, promptly bled his patient, neatly patched over the wound, mollified Bo by rigging up a rather natty sling, and repaired downstairs. There he helped himself to a heavy snifter of the Squire's best smuggled French brandy.

By now Amanda had recovered from her first flush of excitement (an elation that was justified, since Bo and Anne were quite safe, and since the mere thought of cutthroats in the vicinity provided the first bit of interesting news since the prize sow on Jared's home farm had given birth to a two-headed piglet) and was puzzling over a few of the evening's revelations.

"Jared, dearest," she ventured as the Delaney carriage, its muddy squabs heavily padded with rugs so as not to ruin their fine clothes, once more headed toward Storm Haven, "don't one or two things about this assault seem a bit, um, puzzling?"

"In what way, pet?" he answered, having already made up his mind about the incident and having also decided to keep his opinions secret from the females in his family.

"Well, for one thing, Harrow said, quite earnestly, that the highwaymen were hired by someone. For another thing, they were planning to murder Bo and Anne instead of simply robbing them—an unnecessarily violent way of disposing of witnesses to their crime when masks would have been just as effective. And for a third thing," —once her mind was set rolling it seemed to gather momentum with each turn of the carriage wheels— "I think they were waiting for our particular coach, with its crest so prominently marked. Jared?" she said as she twisted in her seat and grabbed his arm with both her gloved hands, "I think they meant to stop us. Yes, that has to be it."

Jared winced, partly because of Amanda's deductions, which mirrored his own, and partly because she was now squeezing the blood out of his forearm. So much for protecting his simple little wife. He should have known she was about as dimwitted as his old school dean. "Yes, pet," he informed her while disengaging her fingers from about his arm, which was fast becoming numb from her convulsive grip. "I've already deduced as much myself."

A snort came from the darkness on the far side of the carriage. "Easy enough to figure that part out. The question is, Nephew, of the many persons you have offended in your misspent youth, who could have been so insulted as to wish to put a period to your existence?"

"That may be 'whom,' Aunt," Amanda interjected pointlessly.

"Not a who or a whom, my dear, loving wife and not so loyal or devoted aunt, but a
what
. And that what, ladies, is a coward. There is no one, even among those who don't hold me in high esteem for one reason or another, who'd be so low as to employ such base tactics. They would simply call me out, as gentlemen are honorbound to do."

"Gentlemen! Hah! If slapping a fellow silly about the head and face with a glove before putting a hole in him makes one a gentleman, I'm glad I was born a female. Such a bunch of vain, pompous prigs, too stiff-necked to back away from the slightest tussle. Oh, no, far better be it to sully up a fine meadow with their wine-soaked blood than to talk things out man to man." Lady Chezwick pointed a lace enclosed finger at her nephew, who had opened his mouth to debate this statement, and succeeded in shutting it with her next words.

"Be that as it may, there's a grain of truth in what you said, Nephew, if one but looks deeply enough. The person we are looking for is most certainly a coward. And that coward," she intoned in a fair imitation of London's foremost barrister, "can be none other than that simpering ninny, Freddie Crosswaithe. In other words, Nephew, Bo was right all along."

Once delivered of her indictment, Aunt Agatha firmly folded her arms across her unimposing bosom and retreated into the darkest corner of the carriage, from which shortly could be heard the sound of none too gentle snores.

It was the only sound to break the silence for the remainder of the journey, a passage of miles Amanda spent shivering nervously in her husband's firm embrace.

"I was not best pleased by your note, Jared, garbled as it was. But as it arrived in time to serve as an excuse to delay my arrival at that damp cave laughingly called my country estate, I suppose I'm indebted to you." Kevin Rawlings, the new Earl of Lockport, looked deceivingly at his ease, his buckskin-clad legs elegantly crossed as he leaned back in his chair. Sipping from a full glass, he was outwardly the picture of unconcern even as his shrewd eyes searched the drawn face of his host. If the truth be known, he had traveled from London to Storm Haven sans valet or luggage, arriving in near–record time, having ridden his horse almost to the ground after receiving Jared's message relating the attack on Bo and Anne.

After downing three fingers of port he asked, "How stand things now? Is our intrepid hero up and about?"

Jared drained his own glass, then headed for the sideboard and the decanter that stood there. "Yes, Bo's on the mend, thank God, and the hero of the entire county. Anne never strays from his side and, indeed, I believe him to be the happiest of men. He may arrange to have himself shot again sometime, if he's ever feeling neglected," he ended with a rueful grin.

A restless Kevin rose from his chair, as his long hours in the saddle had not served to make prolonged sitting advisable just yet. He crossed the room to look out over the gardens that had been in full bloom before he left but were now showing signs of the changing season. "Perhaps you'd better start from the beginning, old friend. Your letter mentioned a plot of some sort."

"If I'm right, Kevin, it's not a very pretty tale."

"I didn't imagine it would be, with bloody wounds and nasty men woven through the plot. But I want to hear all of it."

"Very well, sit down. I'll see we aren't disturbed." After locking the library doors Jared poured them each another glass, then told Kevin all he knew about the nightmare that was now four days long and showed no signs of abating. "It was supposed to be robbery—at least that was what they intended us to think. Bo decided not to put up a fight because Anne was with him, and Harrow had already been put out of the fray. Poor Bo soon learned the error of his thinking when the highwaymen were overheard discussing the merits of robbery before or after doing away with their victims."

"Good Lord, that's crude," Kevin drawled. "Obviously not very intelligent fellows. I'd as lief kiss a great hoary bear as touch a body not yet cold."

Jared raised his eyes to the ceiling before asking Kevin if he had anything else to say before he, the mere teller of the tale, continued. Kevin relinquished the speaking floor with a regal inclination of his blond head.

"They were riding toward Storm Haven in my carriage. Mine, Kevin. It was Amanda and me they were after, and it was only by the grace of God that Bo's battle yell frightened off the one hoodlum and his single shot somehow found its home in the second one's leg, putting him to the rightabout as well."

"Grace of God, my sainted Aunt Sarah. Dumb luck's more the thing, knowing Bo."

Jared angrily waved the comment aside, unable to locate any humor in the situation. Not so long ago, he would have approached a problem in the same lighthearted way Kevin did now—intent on revenge, but not desperate, not frightened all the way to his marrow and unable to think clearly. Marriage had certainly changed him, matured him—and given him his first real taste of fear. For, if he were ever to lose Amanda...

He ran a hand through his hair, glaring at his heart whole, unknowing friend. "Don't you see, Kevin? My own curst folly, my arrogance, almost ended in the deaths of two dear friends. Bo always said Freddie was no good. Amanda believed him. But did I? Oh, no, I was the smart one. I laughed at the pair of them, and dismissed Freddie as a harmless fool."

Jared's voice took on a tone of desperation as the real source of his agitation was disclosed. "Look what that arrogance has brought me, Kevin. Two good people whose lives were nearly snuffed out just as they are barely started, and my wife upstairs in our bedroom with her mind locked in a dark box to which I can't find the key. She was so brave that first night, but by morning she had turned into a quiet, frightened child. She doesn't speak, Kevin. She barely eats. She just sits there all the day long, and at night she lies beside me like a stick of wood, refusing my arms.