by Amanda Quick
Benedict took Amity’s arm and steered her back through the iron gates. Once they were safely outside the grounds he drew Amity to a stop. They both turned to watch the house burn.
“He set a trap,” Benedict said. “Well, now, isn’t that interesting?”
Thirty-one
Amity listened to the frantically galloping hooves of a terrified horse bolting down the long lane.
“So much for our cab,” she said.
She could not take her eyes off the burning mansion. Her pulse was pounding harder than it had the day she and her guide had rounded a corner on a Colorado mountain trail and found themselves confronting a bear. The extraordinary spectacle of the blazing ruins and the knowledge that she and Benedict had very nearly died in the explosion riveted her senses.
“He intended us to die in that house,” Benedict said.
“The driver will no doubt assume that we were killed in the explosion,” she said.
“Yes,” Benedict said. “I believe he will.”
She got the impression that he was doing some intricate calculations in his head. She took her attention off the inferno long enough to glance at him.
“You have another plan in mind, don’t you?” she said.
“Perhaps.”
She turned back to the view of the fire. The flames roared, consuming the interior of the mansion. Even though she and Benedict were some distance away she could feel the waves of heat. The stone walls would stand, she thought. But by morning Hawthorne Hall would be a burned-out hulk.
“Do you think this fire will ignite the woods?” she asked.
“Doubtful,” Benedict said. “There is little to burn in the immediate vicinity of the house and it has been a damp summer. In any event, there is another storm coming. The rain will suppress the blaze.” He studied the dark clouds. “We need to find shelter soon.”
“Surely the driver will summon help.”
“He will no doubt carry the tale back to the village, but there is no way the local fire brigade can defeat a house fire of this size. A few curiosity seekers may show up this evening, but even that is unlikely.”
“Like the driver, everyone in the village will assume that we are dead.”
“Yes,” Benedict said. “And that may prove quite useful.”
“I detect the engineer at work again.”
“We may have something of a grace period tonight, a time to think about what we have learned. I have been overlooking an important piece of the puzzle, Amity. I can feel it.”
“Isn’t it possible that the killer was watching the house and saw us flee into the woods?”
“Certainly, but I’m inclined to doubt that he is anywhere nearby. The village is small. This isn’t London. Around here everyone would remember a stranger who arrived at the railway station, inquired about directions to Hawthorne Hall and then failed to take the train back to London until after the explosion.”
“I see what you mean,” she said. “In order to remain as anonymous as possible, he would have wanted to be seen leaving the village long before the explosion occurred. But you are assuming he came and went by train. What if he hired a carriage?”
“Again, that is a possibility,” Benedict conceded. “But it is a very long trip from London by carriage. No, I suspect that he took the train, just as we did, and that he returned to the city hours ago. At the moment he is no doubt anticipating news of the explosion at Hawthorne Hall and the deaths of three people in tomorrow’s papers.”
A chill swept through Amity. “Dear heaven, the press reports. Yes, of course. My sister will surely see the accounts and believe that we are dead. We must get word to her.”
“We will do so first thing in the morning,” Benedict promised. “There is no hiking back to the village tonight, not with that storm about to break over our heads.”
“But Penny will be worried when we do not return on the midnight train.”
“There is no help for it, Amity,” Benedict said gently. “She is accustomed to losing track of you from time to time due to the vagaries of your travels. She will not panic.”
“I hope not.” Amity paused. “She is aware that I am with you. That will no doubt reassure her.”
“Come, we must find some shelter.”
He started around the side of the burning house. Amity collected the folds of her cloak and fell into step beside him.
“As you pointed out, the nearest farm is some distance from here,” she said.
“We won’t be able to get that far before the rain comes. We will have to content ourselves with that cottage we saw at the far end of the lane.”
“That should do nicely,” Amity said. “I’ve certainly stayed in far more uncomfortable accommodations.”
She tried not to think about the obvious but it was impossible to ignore. She would be spending the night alone with Benedict.
“It won’t be the first time,” Benedict said. “You spent three nights on the Northern Star in the same cabin with me if you will recall.”
She smiled. “There are occasions, Mr. Stanbridge, when I wonder if you can actually read my mind.”
“From time to time I have wondered if you can read mine. But as neither of us claims to be psychic, I think we must look to another explanation for these occasional flashes of mutual intuition.”
“And what would that explanation be, sir?”
To her surprise, he hesitated, as if searching for the right words.
“I think that we know each other perhaps better than we realize,” he said finally. “I expect that lurching from crisis to crisis together as we have been obliged to do lately has that effect on two people. We know what to expect from each other in a pinch.”
“That is very insightful of you,” Amity said.
“You are surprised?” He smiled faintly. “I may not possess Declan Garraway’s knowledge of psychology, and as I have noted, I’m not a fan of poetry, but I can usually add two plus two and arrive at four.”
“Something to be said for a sound foundation in mathematics.”
“I like to think so.”
“What made you realize that Hawthorne Hall was about to go up in flames?” Amity asked.
“I knew there was a problem as soon as I stepped on the trigger mechanism hidden under the carpet and saw the spark. I admit that I leaped to the conclusion that the spark might ignite a fuse, but it seemed prudent to act on the assumption.”
“In hindsight, it was a positively brilliant assumption, Mr. Stanbridge.”
The cottage at the end of the lane was empty, but it was in better shape than Amity had expected. There were no signs that rodents or other forms of wildlife had taken up residence on the premises. The well pump functioned and there was a shed that contained a supply of firewood.
The storm arrived with a crack of lightning and a rumble of thunder just as Benedict came through the door with the last of several logs. Amity closed the door behind him, shutting out the blast of rain.
“I think that the owner of this place probably rents it out at least occasionally,” she observed. “Everything is in reasonably good condition, including the bed.”
She winced as soon as the word bed left her lips. That particular item of furniture stood in the corner, but it seemed to dominate the small space.
Mercifully, Benedict politely chose to ignore both the comment and the bed.
“We will go hungry tonight,” he said. “But at least we will have water to drink and we’ll be warm. I’ll get a fire started.”
Amity smiled, feeling decidedly smug. “We won’t go hungry.”
He was on one knee in front of the fireplace, preparing to strike a light to ignite the kindling that he had brought in from the shed. He paused, looking at her with great interest.
“You found something to eat?” he asked.
�
��I brought something to eat.” She went to where her cloak hung on a peg near the door and opened the folds to display the many pockets sewn inside. With a flourish, she took out two small waterproof pouches. “I long ago learned that one should never set out on a journey without at least some biscuits and tea. One never knows what awaits at the other end.”
Benedict’s eyes gleamed appreciatively when she opened one of the pouches and removed a small packet wrapped in paper.
“I do admire a lady who is always prepared,” he said.
She found a kettle and used it to boil water from the well. When she opened a cupboard, she discovered a pot, some mugs and a few chipped plates. She smiled.
“It is as if we were expected,” she said.
Benedict watched her with a bemused expression.
“I am acquainted with a number of people—male as well as female—who would long since have begun complaining about the poor quality of the accommodations,” he said.
“When one travels as much as I have, one learns that the definition of poor-quality accommodations is subject to considerable flexibility depending on the circumstances,” Amity said.
Benedict glanced at the cloak. “Between the items you carry on your chatelaine and the number of pockets in your cloak it is no surprise that you occasionally clank when you walk.”
She cleared her throat. “You think that I clank?”
He nodded appreciatively. “I think that you are the kind of woman who is able to cope with unforeseen circumstances.”
She smiled and reminded herself that he did not read poetry.
When she had the small repast ready, they sat down at the table in front of the fire to dine on biscuits and tea.
They ate in a companionable silence and contemplated the cheerful blaze on the hearth. Outside, the bluster of the storm turned to a gentle, steady rain.
When they finished, Benedict helped rinse the mugs and plates.
And then they were left with the issue of the single bed in the corner of the room. Amity determined to take a brisk, no-nonsense lead. She was, after all, the kind of woman who could cope with unforeseen circumstances.
“It will be just like camping out in the West,” she said. “Except that we will not have to sleep on cold, hard ground and there will be no need to fret about wolves and bears.”
“Just a human predator who kills with a scalpel,” Benedict said.
Amity looked at him. In the firelight his face was hard and grim.
“Have you changed your theory about the present whereabouts of the killer?” she asked. “Do you think he is out there somewhere in the storm, watching us?”
Benedict looked into the fire for a moment and then shook his head. “No. I think he is being careful now. He got rid of the two people who knew his secret and who might conceivably go to the police. He will have returned to his lair for the time being. In any event this cottage is reasonably secure. The windows are too small for a man to crawl through and he cannot break down the door without an axe. That is not his style.”
“He might use an explosive device such as the one he left behind at Hawthorne Hall.”
“No.” Benedict sounded more certain now. “That sort of trap requires time, planning, access and—above all—the right materials. It is highly unlikely he traveled all this way prepared to set two explosive devices. In any event, he could not possibly know that we would escape the first explosion and seek shelter here.”
She watched Benedict for a moment.
“What is it that worries you so much tonight?” she asked. “Beyond the obvious fact that we are hunting a killer, of course.”
He took his attention off the fire and met her eyes. “Damned if I know. But there is something about this affair that I am not seeing.”
“It will come to you in time,” she assured him.
“I fear that time is the one thing that we do not have in great measure.”
“We have tonight,” she said.
Benedict smiled. It was a wry smile but a real one.
“Yes,” he said. “We have tonight.”
He gazed at her as if he was in some sort of trance. She understood that he was waiting for a response from her, but she was not sure what to say. When she just looked at him, mute, he stirred and pulled himself out of the stillness.
“I got the bed the last time we spent a night together,” he said.
“The bunk in your stateroom, do you mean?”
“Yes. It is only fair that you get the bed tonight. I’ll sleep in front of the fire.”
A sinking feeling came over her.
Well, it had been a rather long and difficult day, she reminded herself. What else could one expect except a sinking feeling?
Thirty-two
Soft, rustling sounds and the scrape of wood on wood brought her out of a fitful sleep. She opened her eyes and watched Benedict add another log to the low-burning fire. He had removed his boots, coat and tie before wrapping himself in the quilt and stretching out on the floor. She could not help but notice that at some point after she had settled down on the lumpy mattress, he had also taken off his shirt. The garment hung over the back of a chair.
She held herself very still, pretending to be asleep, and contemplated Benedict with a sense of wonder and deep, feminine pleasure. The flames illuminated the lean, sleekly muscled lines of his body. His shoulders were broad and strong. He handled the firewood with easy competence and an economy of motion that was at once graceful and masculine. She remembered the feel of his hands on her skin. A rush of longing swept through her. She yearned for him to touch her again.
At that moment he turned toward her. Firelight revealed the scar just below his rib cage. The wound had healed but he was marked for life.
“You’re awake, aren’t you?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said.
“Sorry. Didn’t mean to disturb you. Just putting another log on the fire.”
She sat up slowly. Earlier she had removed her cumbersome petticoats and unfastened several of the hooks at the throat of her traveling gown. But even though she was not wearing a corset, the stiffened bodice of the dress did not allow for any degree of genuine comfort or relaxation.
“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “I wasn’t getting much sleep. I keep seeing Mrs. Dunning’s body and hearing that click that we heard just before the fuse on the explosive ignited.”
“What a coincidence. I’m having the same visions, except mine include the sight of you struggling to run in that cumbersome gown and cloak you wore today.”
She made a face. “I can only be grateful that as a member of the Rational Dress Society, I don’t wear a corset and I limit my underclothing to no more than seven pounds.”
“Good lord. Seven pounds of undergarments?”
She shrugged. “A lady dressed in the first stare of fashion can find herself wearing over thirty pounds of clothing. Fabric is heavy when it is gathered into a great many drapes and pleats. To say nothing of boots and cloaks.”
He smiled. “You don’t dress like that when you travel abroad.”
“No. Only when I am home in London.”
She could see the stark hunger in his eyes. Like some psychic power it elicited a response deep within her. There was a palpable tension in the atmosphere between them. Her pulse beat a little faster. She knew he would not make the first move, not unless she let him know that she would welcome it.
She got to her feet. The skirts of her dress, no longer reinforced with the petticoats, collapsed around her legs.
“You saved us today, Benedict,” she said. “If you had not understood what that click meant when you stepped on the carpet . . .”
“I’ve spent years designing and experimenting with various types of mechanical devices. I know the click of a switch when I hear it.”
“Yes.” She too
k a few steps toward him and then stopped, uncertain how to proceed. “Definitely something to be said for your knowledge of engineering and . . . other matters, as well.”
He frowned. “You refer to mathematics?”
His genuine bewilderment gave her some confidence. She took a steadying breath and went to stand directly in front of him. She was aware of the warmth of the fire and another kind of heat, as well.
“Not mathematics,” she said. She drew her fingertip along the hard edge of his jaw. “I was referring to your expertise in the art of kissing.”
He raised his hands slowly and cupped her face between his rough palms. “If I am any good at kissing you it is because it comes naturally to me, as naturally as breathing. There is nothing I want to do more at this moment.”
She caught her breath. “There is nothing I want more at this moment than to be kissed by you.”
“Are you certain?” His voice was ragged now.
She flattened her palms on the fire-warmed skin of his chest and thought about the nights when she had touched him to see if he was feverish. She had been so worried those first few days on the ship. There were certainly other things to concern her now, but she did not want to think about them until morning. She remembered the question that had been in his eyes earlier when she had gone to the room’s only bed and he had spread the quilt on the floor. She had not known how to answer him then. But now she did.
“We have tonight,” she said.
She stood on tiptoe and brushed her mouth against his.
And that was all the answer he needed.
He pulled her to him and took her mouth with a fierce tenderness that thrilled her senses. She gripped his shoulders and hung on for dear life.
He deepened the kiss until she was breathless; until she could not think about anything else except the deep, aching urgency that was building inside her.
He unhooked the rest of the fastenings on the bodice of her gown. The dress fell away, pooling at her feet. She was left in her stockings, drawers and chemise.
“At least tonight we have a bed,” he said against her throat. “Not a pile of straw.”