The Rogue Who Rescued Her

by Christi Caldwell

  Chapter 10

  She’d kissed him.

  And in the light of a new day, there should be a modicum of shame and shock that she’d done something as scandalous as kiss a man who, until the day before, had been a stranger.

  Martha, however, couldn’t muster even a false showing.

  Their embrace had been… pure wonderment. The magic that young women read of in Gothic tales.

  “You’re no innocent miss anymore, either,” she muttered to herself. Dusting the back of her arm over her damp brow, Martha dunked her mud-stained cloak into the heated water. Scrub. Dunk. Rinse. Repeat. Martha went through the familiar motions. If she wanted to… to… make love or kiss a man, she should be able to.

  Only, this hungering wasn’t for simply that experience with any nameless figure, but rather, with the man who’d cared for her injured hand and spoken so comfortably with her about her love of art.

  Martha peeked over the same wood trough Graham had fetched water from last evening and searched for him on the snow-covered grounds.

  The early morn sun had begun to warm the frosted glass, sending moisture dripping down, blurring the glass. She ducked and turned her head in an attempt to better see.

  Her heart did a little leap as she caught sight of him.

  Scrub. Dunk. Rinse. Repeat.

  Except, laundry forgotten, she watched Graham at work.

  Devoid of a coat, Graham moved through the stable yard with his sleeves pushed up as though it was the heart of summer and not the dead of winter. His muscles, laden as he was with the two bales of hay he carried, strained the fabric of his lawn shirt. How effortlessly he made a task that would have taken her three times as long.

  Her fingers still burned from the feel of those muscles under her hands, the rigidness and strength of sculpted biceps and a flat stomach, both marks of a man who worked with his bare hands.

  Unlike her lazy husband, who’d worked at… nothing. The entire lazy lot of nobles, of which Graham bore not the remotest hint.

  He was direct and forthright and—

  He glanced up, and their gazes collided.

  Martha froze like the doe she’d once painted at the river’s bed. Oh, bloody hell. She resisted the urge to groan at being caught staring after him like some giggling village girl. How was one supposed to be after the embrace they’d shared not even twelve hours ago? Be casual… Martha inclined her head in greeting.

  Graham’s lips eased up into a slow smile that briefly halted her heart’s beating. He winked once.

  “It isn’t laundry day.”

  She gasped, and her cloak landed with a thump in the murky water. It splashed her eyes, and she blinked back the sting. “Frederick,” she greeted lamely, facing her son.

  Did she imagine the suspicion in his eyes? “Yes. Who else would it be?” he asked as though she were dicked in the nob.

  No, she’d not imagined his suspicion. She lifted her cloak and wrung out the excess water and soap. “No one,” she said, forcing herself to speak in smooth, measured tones. “Who else would I greet, silly boy?”

  His brow puckered. “That’s what I said.”

  Martha tamped down a sigh. So much for evenly collected. Alas, Frederick had been correct yesterday. She was rot at prevaricating. “What were you staring at?” he asked, going up on tiptoe to look around her shoulder.

  Martha darted and weaved her body, mimicking his movements in a bid to obstruct his vision. “No one.” Bloody hell. “Nothing,” she squeaked, following Frederick’s stare.

  Gone. She whipped her gaze around the stable yard. Why, she might as well have imagined him. Graham was nowhere in sight.

  “What are you looking at now?”

  “The snow,” she automatically responded, proud at the ease with which that falsehood had slipped out. Martha deposited her cloak into another pot, settling it to soak in the clean water. When in blazes had her son begun asking so many questions?

  “You hate doing laundry. Why are you doing it twice this week?”

  And yet another question. Scrub. Dunk. Rinse. Repeat. Alas, laundry would always be a far safer topic of discussion with her son than… well, nearly anything else pertaining to their lives. “Because this is one of my only cloaks.” Because the other was coming undone at the seams. Reaching behind her, she ruffled Frederick’s hair. “Because it requires laundering given our carelessness this week.” The days of her possessing multiple cloaks of fine quality had come and gone.

  “I wasn’t careless,” he said with a bluntness only a child could manage. “You’re the one who fell.”

  She stopped mid-movement. Frederick’s small trousers in her fingers sent water dripping all over the floor. He’d become increasingly belligerent. The resentment that had simmered in his eyes since his father’s death, and grandfather’s imprisonment, had boiled over into his speech. “Very well. You’re the more careful one. How do I explain these, then?” she asked, lifting the small brown trousers soaking in the trough.

  Frederick blushed furiously. “I told you, I was playing—”

  “At the river,” she interrupted, dropping the garment back into the water with her cloak. “I know what you told me.” Martha gave him a stern look. “When we’re playing at the river, we’re to exercise more care.” She tweaked his nose, softening the rebuke.

  “We don’t play anything.” He tightened his mouth and swatted away her touch. “We used to,” her son added. “Now, all we do is work.”

  That sad and all-too-accurate observation stirred a familiar wave of motherly guilt. This wasn’t how life was to have been. Her marriage was to have provided her the time and resources and energies to be, at the very least, a mother to her children, and not even that had come from her union with Waters. “It will get better,” she promised.

  He scoffed, and that absolute lack of faith hit her square in the chest.

  “I heard you awake late last evening.”

  Just like that, she had the tables flipped on her by a small boy. He’d heard her? Oh, good God. “What?”

  “As in ‘not sleeping.’ Were you working on another sketch to submit?”

  She leaped on that offering. “I was.” His eyes narrowed, confirming he knew more. “For a bit,” she modified. “But then I changed the bandages on my hand.” She paused, giving all her attention to dunking his trousers once more. “And Mr. Malin helped.” Martha peeked out of the corner of her eye, searching for some kind of response.

  “He helped change your bandages?”

  Except, even with his question, Martha could not make out anything of what he was thinking or feeling.

  Scrub. Dunk. Rinse. “He did.”

  “Hmph.”

  Hmph?

  Frowning, she paused mid-dunk. “What?”

  Frederick lifted his spindly shoulders in a half shrug. “Just seems I was right about hiring Mr. Malin, and you were wrong. It doesn’t seem like he’s such a bad man, after all.”

  “I never said he was.” There was a difference between questioning a person’s character and being guarded. Leaving the freshly laundered garments to soak, Martha went over and collected the tattered muslin cloak that hung by the door. “I simply said we should be cautious because…” As cautious as to kiss him wildly? a voice jeered at the back of her mind.

  She forced it back.

  Her son shoved past her and grabbed his coat. “I know why we have to be cautious,” he said evenly. “I don’t need you to remind me.” With that, he shrugged into the garment. “We have work to see to.”

  Work.

  Yes, they did. Every day. Day in and day out, there were tasks for them to see to. Her son had grown up… overnight. Nay, he’d been forced to. Their circumstances had thrust him into a new role where he was neither child nor man, but something trapped in between. Tears smarted behind her eyes, and blinking them back, she made a show of clasping the once elegant garment.

  “Mother?”

  There it was again. Mother. I want to be Mama agai
n. I want to go back to simpler times when I was Mama to not just one child but two little girls and a smaller boy, all joyous… all here. With me. Nay, not here. She’d take them all far away from this place if she could. “Y-yes?” she asked, her voice shaking. She discreetly wiped the back of her hand over her eyes, lest he see those tears for further proof of her weakness, and turned.

  Frederick lingered, looking like he wanted to say more. When he spoke, there was a tentativeness to his voice. “I… heard you laughing,” he admitted, and this time, there was a shocking absence of anger. “Last night, in the kitchens with Mr. Malin.”

  “I… I…” She didn’t know what to say to that.

  “And I”—he studied the tips of his shoes—“liked it. I haven’t heard you laugh in a long time. I’ll see you in the stables,” he muttered. With that, he shrugged into his coat and let himself outside.

  Martha followed his little form through the foggy, iced pane. She wiped her palm over it, dissolving some of the sheen. He sprinted with more enthusiasm than she’d ever remembered to the stables and then, wrestling with the heavy door, let himself inside.

  As he disappeared from view, her heart clenched.

  Frederick was correct: Martha had not laughed or smiled. Not really. When one lost two daughters, had her father carted off to prison, and had only a small boy whose life and safety all fell to her, there were few reasons to smile. But even before that, even when there had been a normality to her existence, with her family intact, sadness and regrets had made it impossible to be the young woman she’d once been. A woman who’d smiled and chased rainbows and believed in happily ever afters.

  The death of her own happiness was something she had come to terms with long ago. She owned that decision to marry the viscount, and any misery she had was her own.

  The heartache that would never go away had nothing to do with her and everything to do with Iris and Creda. And Frederick.

  In longer than she could remember, Frederick had not smiled. He’d not laughed. And she wanted that for him. She didn’t want him to be the cynical little shadow of a child she no longer recognized.

  And what was more… she didn’t know how to restore him to the boy he’d once been.

  Rubbing her hands across her eyes once more, she wiped away the remnants of her tears.

  With a sigh, she set out for the stables.

  *

  Working in stables had always provided Graham a distraction from life.

  When he was tending those stalls, everything fell away—his failings, his father’s disapproval. All of it.

  Until now.

  Now, he was riddled with thoughts of her. Just as he’d been since last evening. Nor were those thoughts solely about their shared embrace, but rather… her.

  “You’re a damned fool,” he muttered. Removing the hay from Scoundrel’s now empty stall, Graham carried the aged bedding and dropped it just outside… when the door opened.

  Martha’s son heaved all his weight into closing the door behind him. “Hullo, Mr. Malin.” The boy cleared his throat. “I’ve come to work.”

  Graham wiped the sweat from his brow and studied the owner of that announcement. Frederick lingered in the middle of the stables. There was a determined set to his narrow shoulders that was contradicted by the hesitancy in the words that had come more as a statement.

  Whereas yesterday he’d dreaded the boy’s presence, now there was less a foreignness to his being here and more of an ease. “Grab a shovel,” he said by way of greeting.

  Quickly, as if he feared Graham might send him on his way, Frederick grabbed the rusted instrument and scurried over. “Now, the first order of business in overseeing a stable is the horses need to be fed, stalls mucked out, and then the horses groomed,” Graham elucidated. By the disorderly state of the stables and grounds, not much of any order had been followed by the Donaldsons. It was as if the boy had flitted from task to task without ever successfully accomplishing one. “That is the schedule that a stable master sets and follows. I’ll start—”

  The door opened once more, dousing the stables in the sun’s light and illuminating the crimson-headed beauty who stood there. The morning rays played off the bright hues of her hair. Graham froze. He’d never given much thought to the color red. It had been just that… a color. With Martha Donaldson at the threshold, broom in hand like some kind of Spartan warrior woman, he appreciated for the first time those burnt-scarlet tones—dusted with copper and strawberry hues and countless others he couldn’t identify or name—that held him spellbound.

  And he, Graham, worthless rogue, rotted scoundrel, had the breath knocked out of him by the mere glimpse of the determined warrioress standing there.

  “You’ll what?” Frederick prodded, giving him a slight nudge.

  “Hmm?” he murmured as Martha shut the door behind her and started toward Guda’s stall.

  “You saaaaaaid, ‘I’ll start…’ What will you start?” the boy asked, jolting Graham back.

  I’ll learn to draw proper air into my lungs and speak again. “I’ll see to Scoundrel’s and Guda’s stalls. I want you to begin cleaning out the empty stalls.” From the corner of his eye, he caught Martha sweeping the clean bedding away from Guda’s stall door.

  Frederick followed his stare. “We both work together at the chores,” he said in hushed tones, misunderstanding the reason for Graham’s silence.

  It was the first time in his life that Graham had witnessed any woman mucking out a stable, and in that moment, he was fair certain he lost a bit of his rogue’s heart to the young widow so in command of this space. And yet… she deserved more. Her cloak indicated she’d once been a woman who’d enjoyed greater comforts and privilege and now tended this stable because she had to. Graham squeezed the boy’s shoulder. “Set the wheelbarrow outside Guda’s stall and then go clean the empty stalls of the hay and straw there.”

  The little boy nodded and rushed off.

  Collecting his rake, Graham started over to Martha. “Good morning, Martha.”

  “Mr.…” She paused. “Graham.”

  Graham. She wrapped that one syllable in her soft, husky timbre, a seductive song composed of nothing more than his name. Desire bolted through him.

  And because of nothing more than the sound of her voice. Good God, I’m a depraved bastard.

  Frederick dragged the wheelbarrow in front of the door and then rushed off.

  When he’d gone, Graham entered the empty stall.

  “What are you…?” Her words trailed off as he scooped the physical droppings from the straw bed and deposited them just outside the stall door. “You don’t have to… I can do that…”

  He paused and swiped his forearm across his damp brow. “I’ve known you just one day, and I suspect you can do anything, Martha.” His pretty words weren’t meant to seduce, but instead, they came from a place of truth.

  Martha’s lips parted, and there was a softening to her usually guarded eyes that sent terror running through him. Graham jerked his focus back to the task, tossing the mount’s soiled bedding out and shoving the clean bedding against the wall.

  Martha set aside her broom and collected a rake. And proceeded to work… alongside him.

  His mother embroidered. His mistresses, as a habit, had shopped. If the lives of any of the ladies of the ton had been dependent upon them mucking out a stable, they’d have promptly asked directions to the hereafter.

  He was filled with equal parts admiration for her strength and frustration that this was her lot. And fury. There was that, too. For the unknown member of the Brethren who was supposedly concerned for the young mother’s fate and didn’t know the lady was mucking out horse shite and donning ripped muslin cloaks.

  Graham stepped in front of Martha.

  With her plaited hair flopping over her shoulder, she stared quizzically up at him.

  “I can do this, Martha,” he murmured. “This is why you’ve hired me.”

  “It is too much for any one person
to do,” she said matter-of-factly, returning to her task. She heaved another batch of clean straw past him. “You’ll not be here long.”

  No, he wouldn’t. Odd that such a reminder should leave him strangely bereft. He’d known her just a day, but even with that logic, the sentiment lingered. Graham settled a hand on her arm, staying her. “You shouldn’t have to do this.” Someone had failed her. Many had. The husband whose name the Home Office hadn’t divulged. The Brethren.

  “But I have to,” she said simply. Martha must have seen something in his eyes, because she frowned. “And I don’t mind it. Really,” she insisted. She fiddled with the handle of her fork. “I…” She hesitated. “I once voluntarily joined the servants to help.” A little laugh escaped her, sad and colored with her husky tones and beautiful for it all at the same time. A damp curl fell over her brow, and Martha brushed it back. It sprang forward, determinedly stubborn, and this time, she let it lay forgotten against her cheek. “What person chooses to muck out a stable when she doesn’t have to?” she whispered. “And yet, I did,” she said, her smile fading, her gaze growing wistful. “I did, because I enjoyed it.” As she spoke, her voice grew more and more animated, like one who’d recalled a lost joy. “I loved the smells of this place, and the quiet of it all, and the company of the animals. These great creatures, just appreciative of your presence, ask for so little and offer so much.”

  A memory tripped forward, shoved for so long to the back of his mind, it had remained dormant until now.

  “What does he think? That he’s a bloody stable boy? For the love of God, he is a duke’s son, Caroline.”

  Seated outside his father’s office, his legs drawn close to his chest, Graham listened to the familiar fight on the other side of that door panel.

  “He enjoys it, Samuel. There is nothing wrong with him looking after the horses…”

  “No, there is everything wrong with it. There is everything wrong with him. He isn’t natural.”

  Martha must have registered his silence, for she abruptly stopped. A pretty blush blazed across her cheeks, washing over the delicate smattering of freckles. “Forgive me. I’m sure that doesn’t make sense.”