Graham rested a shoulder against the wall. “Yes, but this is one you enjoy.”
Martha didn’t blink for several moments. He expected a curt dismissal at his bold supposition. “I do,” she conceded, surprising him at every turn. “Or I did.” She added that last part more as an afterthought.
Graham was not long for this place. How she lived her life or raised her child was not his concern, in any way. And yet, in Frederick, he saw so much of himself. Graham couldn’t leave without attempting to make it better where he could for the small child. “You discouraged Frederick from speaking to Guda.”
Martha’s upper body went whipcord straight. She stood slowly. “Is that a question?” she asked, a warning there.
He’d be a fool to fail to hear it. Nay, to ignore it. Hold your words. What directives she gives to her child aren’t your business. That the Donaldsons were safe, looked after, and accounted for was to be the extent of his dealings with them. In the end, he ignored those warnings. “He’s a boy, and there’s no harm in his speaking to his horse.”
Just like that, the barrier went up between them. Martha stepped away from Scoundrel and handed Graham the knife. “You’ll need to clean the stables. When the weather warms, portions of the roof will need to be replaced. We need the livestock cared for.” With that detailed enumeration, she studied him intently. Did she expect him to balk at that list? All the displeasure at his current state he’d already reserved for his superior. “And…” She wavered, troubling at her lower lip as she was wont to do, a telltale mark of uncertainty in an otherwise undaunted woman. “I’d ask that you instruct Frederick on the proper care of the stables.” She held his gaze. “We’ve servant’s quarters off the kitchens. You’ll stay there as long as you remain. If at any time I ask you to leave, I want your belongings packed and you gone. If you can honor those requests, then you may remain. Does that all sound… agreeable?”
In terms of his assignment, it sounded convenient. “It does.”
She nodded and then turned to leave. “Oh, and Mr. Malin?”
He inclined his head.
“If you intend to remain, then I’d advise you to not presume to speak on what you cannot possibly know.”
With that, she stalked off.
Graham waited until the stable doors slammed shut behind her before grinning.
He’d gained entry.
Chapter 8
Later that evening, with Frederick abed, Martha stood at her easel.
Her hand ached from both her fall on the Birch Path and the porcelain she’d crushed in her palm.
But, if she were being truly honest with herself, her inability to sketch had nothing to do with her throbbing, bandaged hand. Her mind, just as it had been since earlier that morn, remained firmly entrenched in her and Frederick’s exchanges with Graham Malin.
Graham Malin, who’d proven to be an expert stable master, who knew not only how to care for horses, but also knew equine history. “He also speaks to animals,” she whispered, her voice barely meeting her own ears.
You can always tell about a man’s character by the way he treats his animals, Marti. Never, ever trust a man who is cruel to even one.
Martha stared emptily at the canvas. She’d first received that lesson from her father as a girl of five or six, sitting raptly at his feet, while he spoke about the care they ought to show for their livestock. He’d given her that lesson and, then twelve years later, with dreams of a title for his daughter, had forgotten it. Or perhaps he hadn’t forgotten. Perhaps, he’d seen just what Lord Waters had been, and his desire for a noble husband for Martha had proved greater than… all else.
“Your boy is strange. He was speaking to my mount. See that it stops.”
“He is not strange, and he is your boy, too. He’ll speak to whatever or whomever—”
The crack of Lord Waters’ meaty palm striking her cheek, ending her defiant words, reverberated around her mind, and she recoiled.
She forcibly thrust the memory back into the darkest chambers where Lord Waters and all his evil would forever dwell, trapped there, let out only when she allowed it. Or when she was not strong enough to keep thoughts of her marriage at bay. Do not think of him. Do not think of any of it.
Through the mire came another memory, this one recent, of her son with another man and another horse. In a moment that had been born of tenderness.
Of its own volition, her hand went to the page on the easel.
Some of the tension eased from her, and she surrendered to the calm that always came from her art. She let the charcoal fly over the previously empty sheet, covering the composition. Martha stopped periodically to smooth the gray-black into the background and then added layers to the shading as she went. At last, the lines and shading began to take the shape of familiar forms.
She continued her strokes until three figures dominated the page.
Martha paused to study the trio: a boy, a man, and a horse.
Her fingers stained black, Martha traced a jagged nail around that proud, noble creature.
With icy flakes pinging the windowpanes, she angled her head, staring at Mr. Malin’s horse.
You can always tell about a man’s character by the way he treats his animals, Marti. And never, ever trust a man who is cruel to even one.
Her father’s booming tones continued to echo in her head, nearly deafening.
And yet, her father, who’d sworn by those very words, hadn’t given thought to the viscount he’d found at the White Stag whose mount had come up lame. The moment the pair of them had arrived, walking the viscount’s gelding, everything she’d needed to learn about the nobleman had been there. Rather, it had been—the ears.
Lord Waters’ horse had continued to flick his ears back and forth, rapidly swiveling them. Those restless movements had spoken to the sweated creature’s fear. Having cared for the livestock as she had, she’d become expert at reading the nuances of each animal’s habits and behaviors. As such, she’d seen the horse’s unease at first glance, and instead of recognizing it for the telltale marker it was, instead of trusting that adage her father had told Martha as a young girl, she’d allowed herself to believe that the foreignness of the situation and surroundings had been the reason for the horse’s anxiety.
And while she’d cared for the mount, rubbing him down, feeding him, her father had ushered the gentleman into their modest cottage. So had begun the start of the rest of her life.
Only, all these years later, she acknowledged every other detail she’d failed to heed: the elevation of the horse’s head. As if he’d sought to flee. As if he’d wanted in that moment, with his master otherwise occupied, to be set free.
Martha pressed her eyes closed.
She’d ignored every last instinct that would have ensured her preservation. She’d ignored every last lesson she knew to be true about horses and the subtleties of their body movements.
With that chance meeting, everything had changed. She’d met the man to whom she would give herself, body, name, but never soul. The soul, however, proved useless in marriage. It was the one piece a woman retained that offered no protection or shelter from the hell of those unions.
She should have known. The lone white scar along the horse’s shoulder should have alerted her to the truth of the viscount’s character. Or rather, lack thereof.
How very different one man should treat his mount than another.
Martha’s gaze crept over the easel, over to the kitchens and Mr. Graham Malin’s small quarters. She didn’t want to trust him or his motives, because she’d been burned enough by her own folly and life to see how ultimately every person failed you.
Martha sucked in a shuddery breath and forced herself to resume her sketch. Yes, all the signs had been there. But she’d ignored them. And there could be no undoing that. All she could do was focus on that which she could control in her and Frederick’s present.
As Martha worked, the bandage she’d assembled with her left hand slipped and sa
gged. With a quiet curse, she tossed her charcoal down. Unwinding the scrap stained with remnants of both blood and charcoal, Martha attempted to draw the fabric tighter.
To no avail.
Removing it altogether, she quit her art station and made for the kitchens to replace the bandage.
Go gather what you need and be on your way…
After all, Mr. Malin’s quarters were just off the kitchens, separated only by a small oak door. At this hour, their new servant was likely sleeping. Even if he wasn’t, he’d not be so bold as to leave his quarters.
Why did all those truths send a wave of disappointment through her?
Because you are a damned fool. Because you are lonely. Because you’ve never seen a man who was not your father treat Frederick with the kindness and patience Graham Malin did.
She strained her ears, searching for some hint of sound from the long vacant servant’s quarters. The faintest scratching slipped into the quiet, so faint she struggled to bring clarity to it through the hum of the nighttime silence and the ice pinging against the windowpane.
If she were being completely honest with herself, at least in this moment… she’d been lonely. Oh, she had Frederick, a gift she didn’t deserve and for which she’d be eternally grateful. But there had been… no adults with whom to speak, or share her worries or thoughts, or anything. Her discourse in the stables earlier that day about her son’s regard for horses had been all that she’d shared with… anyone since her family’s scandal had come to light.
That was why, moments later, when Martha entered the kitchens to tend her injury, she secretly hoped that Mr. Graham Malin might be awake and join her.
*
As a boy and then a young man at university, Graham had always struggled to put words onto a page. It wasn’t because he didn’t understand words or possess a vast vocabulary. He did. There had, however, always been something about him trying to order his thoughts so he might properly assemble them on a page that had always eluded him.
It had almost been as if his mind were… hopping, while he sat there, a young student trying to keep each idea still so he could capture it.
His father had towered over Graham’s desk, refusing to move until Graham mastered his studies. When that had failed, Graham’s tutors had bloodied his knuckles more times than he could recall. Those assaults on his hands had lasted only as long as it had taken his mother to learn of that treatment and sack the tutors.
It had all been to no avail. None of it had worked. The words had been trapped there, filled with a restlessness that countermanded all those efforts his father had made to make Graham a “proper student” like his brothers.
This time, while he was seated at the small oak table in his temporary quarters, the empty page before him had nothing to do with that struggle and everything to do with the woman he’d been tasked with watching after and reporting on.
Before, she’d been an assignment.
Now, she was a person. A mother. A woman tormented by people without a shred of her strength or spirit. One rightfully wary of him, but who, despite those reservations, had still allowed him to remain on.
And he felt like a bloody bastard for it.
He straightened as he caught the faintest tread of footsteps in the kitchen, the delicate steps he’d come to recognize as hers.
The irony was not lost on him. He, Lord Sheldon Graham Malin Whitworth, who wagered too much, drank even more, and bedded scandalous beauties, and who’d long believed himself past feeling anything, suddenly felt a modicum of guilt.
And at a time when he acted on behalf of the king and Crown. Any other agent would have entered this household and carefully disengaged any feelings for the people involved.
Graham scrubbed a hand down his face. Mayhap the Brethren had been wise to reject him at the onset. Whoever had looked over his file and made that decision had surely seen the same failings within him that his father had. Ultimately, Graham failed. That had been the true state of his existence. Nor was that just a self-pitying sentiment. It was grounded in the reality that had been his existence.
Of course you should fail to secure a post in the Home Office, Sheldon. There is no further help I can offer you.
She continued flitting about the kitchens.
Bloody hell. Enough. She’s a woman you’ve known for not even a day and your assignment at that. You’re a damned agent for the Crown, man. Act like it.
Graham let his hand fall to the nicked surface of the tabletop. Firming his jaw, he forced himself to write.
Miss Martha Donaldson, “Marti” to family, is in dire financial straits. The widow’s cottage, stables, and connected buildings are all reflective of her economic struggles. Her mounts have been sold off but for one, older mare. The lack of feed and the condition of hay are also indicative of her depleted funds. The cottage is also in a sad state of neglect.
Graham paused and reread the statement for his superior.
It was completely accurate. Methodical.
And it was a coolly emotionless account of the two people who dwelled here. It conveyed nothing of Martha’s wary green-blue gaze or her pride. Or her son’s desperate need for companionship.
And he wasn’t supposed to care. About any of it. About them. Martha Donaldson and her son represented the means to an end, so that Graham might then move on to his next and more anticipated assignment. After all, any task would be more anticipated than looking after the Donaldson pair.
With that reminder, Graham made himself finish the meticulous accounting, including the piece that mattered most for this assignment and information his superior required immediately.
I’ve reasons to suspect Miss Donaldson is at risk. In addition to the universal dislike and cruelty she is subjected to from the local people of High Town, Miss Donaldson was followed by two unknown subjects.
It was why Graham was needed here in High Town. The usual frustration with his assignment, however, did not come this time.
He folded the note. Mindful of the woman who still moved about in the kitchens, Graham reached for the silver wax seal, careful to not strike the cylindrical tray as he sprinkled puce powder upon the Brethren’s mark. When he’d finished, he stuffed the note inside his satchel.
Stretching, he rolled the tense muscles in his shoulders.
All the while, his body remained attuned to Martha Donaldson, separated from him by only that slight oak panel. The woman who was his assignment and nothing more. That was what he reminded himself as he came to his feet and walked over to the door. It’s what he told himself again as he opened it.
Seated at the modest kitchen table, with a scrap of linen fabric clenched between her teeth, Martha stared back, a delicate blush staining her cheeks. She would be the first of many widows of his acquaintance who’d ever managed one. “Huhlo,” she mouthed around that piece.
“Hello.” Of course, his former lovers and mistresses would not have brushed their own hair, let alone bandaged any injury. He alternately marveled at Martha Donaldson’s strength and loathed the world where she had no one to rely upon except herself. Wholly unaware of his thoughts—she’d no doubt blister his ears for them—Martha gave all her attention back to that torn strip.
“May I—?” The gentlemanly request died as, with a frown, Graham took in the wound he’d failed to note earlier. An injury she’d said nothing about. “You were hurt,” he said quietly, joining her at the table.
“If’s fine,” she said, the fabric still tucked between her teeth as she continued to wind it around her left palm. A palm stained with the remnants of blood and… and charcoal.
Ignoring her assurance, Graham sank to a knee beside her bench. “May I?” he asked, already reaching for her hand, but making no move to collect her stained fingers. Wanting her to grant that touch. Refusing to force her. She was a woman who desperately sought control of her own world, and he’d allow her that where he could.
Martha held her injured hand close a moment and then, in a remar
kable show of trust, laid her palm in his.
Graham inspected the heavy gray dusting upon it, the black inking the beds of her jagged nails, her fingers also caked with…? He lifted his head.
“Charcoal,” she murmured, having followed that wondering.
“Ahh, you are an artist, then.” He knew that much about her. It had been a detail, more an afterthought, within her file.
“An artist,” she echoed in a quiet murmur. She contemplated that for a moment. “I… I never thought of it in those terms.”
“What other terms are there to think of it in?” Curiosity drew the question from him.
“Well…” She fiddled with the strip of fabric now stained black. “I’ve always loved sketching. I have since I was just a girl who’d discovered my late mother’s charcoal.” She pointed to the wall beyond his shoulder, and Graham followed the gesture to an ambiguous mural along the right side of the doorway to the main living quarters. He squinted, attempting to make sense of the amorphous shapes there in faded greens and blues.
Martha took mercy. “It’s a tree.”
“And a bird?” he hazarded.
“A flying squirrel.” She gave a playful toss of her head. “I’ll have you know, they are a thing. I read of them. They aren’t like bats or birds, but rather, they glide between the trees.”
Her hand momentarily forgotten, he stared up, entranced by the teasing glimmer in her eyes. This was who she should be. This lighthearted imp with mischief in her eyes and a smile on her lips. This was likely who she had been before… whatever event had required intervention from the Brethren. Her smile slipped, and he was besieged with an urge to call that levity forth once more.
He forced his gaze away from her lush, crimson lips. “I take it that was your first masterpiece?”
Just like that, he restored them to their earlier ease.
Martha grinned, displaying slightly crooked front teeth and a dimpled cheek that held him enthralled all the more. She pointed to the artwork below the window. “My second.”
They shared another smile.
The Rogue Who Rescued Her Page 9