by Betina Krahn
“Not a word.” Steig toyed with his fork. “At the mill we saw . . . up north?”
Arthur nodded, watching Steig’s eyes as he considered that news.
“I was south of Betany. It was dark as pitch in the woods. I feared Mercury breakin’ a leg, so I put up in the Hopwells’ barn for the night.” He gave a half smile. “I do like that horse.”
Arthur nodded, then related the details of the fire and the story the Millers told. He paused afterward, watching Steig’s reaction.
“So, the miller’s family . . . they’re all right?”
“Coughing up soot, but they have a roof over their heads. They’ll recover.”
“Good.” It was a firm declaration and seemed heartfelt.
“I want you in the north range tomorrow. We have to know what’s going on up there. There were only four of them at the Crotons’, now there are at least eight. One of whom was a big fellow.” He let his gaze rest on Steig for a moment before rising. “The Viscount Tannehill has come for a stay. He’s a crack shot and a demon with a blade. He’s sent for some help from London. We’ve got to catch these bastards before they kill someone.”
He rounded the table and grasped Steig’s shoulder before heading back to his company. Pausing at the stairs, he looked over his shoulder at the big man tilting a stein of ale. He wasn’t sure if the man was telling the truth. He prayed he hadn’t made a mistake in seeing possibilities in Steig and hiring him.
* * *
The next evening, Reynard’s friend from London arrived just after sunset. He was a burly fellow in a ready-made suit, who walked with a roll to his gait and a tension to his shoulders that said he was ready to punch a hole in the world if it became necessary. But when he smiled, his face lighted with wry humor, and his dark eyes hinted at a dead-on appraisal of every human being in sight.
Reynard introduced him in the parlor, where he shifted feet and seemed uncomfortable, especially under Elizabeth’s scalpel-like regard. He blushed at Sarah’s warm greeting, and seemed oddly awed by Arthur’s stature and bearing. They talked and took refreshments, making plans for the next day. Then Red arrived from the stables wearing western boots and a vest, and carrying a lariat on his shoulder.
“Grycel Manse.” Red rushed to grab his hand and engulf him in a rough-and-tumble hug. “You’re a sight for sore eyes! Reynard said you might be too busy to come, but here you are!”
Grycel gave as good as he got from the old prospector, grinning as he half crushed Red’s hand. “Redmond Strait!” He turned to Reynard. “If you’d told me Red was here, I’d have been here yesterday.”
“You bring yer club?” Red asked, dropping his rope.
Grycel patted a bulge under his coat. “You bring your guns?”
“Never go anywhere without ’em.” Red puffed up his chest.
Sarah shook her head at her uncle’s claim, and Reynard rolled his eyes at their exaggerated display of camaraderie. But it wasn’t long before Arthur, Red, Reynard, and Grycel adjourned to the study with a decanter of brandy and a box of cigars. Sir William was the lone male left in the parlor.
Sarah looked at her mother and sighed. But Elizabeth was busy patting the settee beside her and smiling at Sir William, who quickly accepted that invitation. The two were so busy gazing at each other and talking politics that they didn’t even notice as she exited the parlor. She had never seen her mother show an interest in such affairs.
Left to her own devices, she headed for the stables to check on Fancy. Since his return, it had become her nightly habit to bring her boy a carrot and spend a few minutes with him. The lights were dim in the alley and there was a feeling of calm from the horses in the stalls she passed. But when she reached Fancy’s stall, he was standing alert and arching his neck, then began pawing the floor of his stall.
Something was wrong. She called to him and reached for the latch, just as a burlap bag smelling of grain dust descended over her head and her hands were pulled behind her back and quickly bound.
“Get your hands off me! What do you think you’re—Eddie—Harley—help!” She twisted and cried out as her arms were wrenched higher and she was bent forward. She kicked forcefully at her attackers with the heel of her lady boot. Muffled grunts and swearing indicated her kicks made contact, but it wasn’t enough to stop them from wrestling her to the ground and binding her ankles securely.
From their strength and the sound of their voices, her captors were rough men, but they laughed like nervous children and kept repeating “We done it!” and “Wait’ll his lordship sees what we got!”
“Nero! Nellie!” A hand clamped over her mouth and she was hoisted up and carried like an unwieldy log. She bucked and thrashed, loosening their grasp—just as something barreled into her captors, knocking them—and her—to the ground.
She lay stunned, recovering her breath, then struggled to sit up as growls, scuffling and cries of “Git off—aghhhh!” and “Mace—help!” mixed on two fronts around her. Nero and Nellie had heard her and come! With her hands and feet bound, all she could do was roll onto her aching side and inch away from the fight . . . praying that her dogs carried the day.
The attack lasted only a few minutes, but it seemed like an eternity. The scrambling and the barking receded as Nero and Nellie pursued her retreating kidnappers. She lay listening, hoping the wretches had lost an arm or a leg in the struggle—at least a few fingers. Before she knew it, her dogs were back, nosing her and giving high-pitched yelps of concern.
With a flash of insight, she pressed her still covered head to the ground and made whimpering noises like a hurt puppy, praying Nellie’s motherly instincts would take over. The borderland collie did exactly what Sarah hoped . . . pawed at her head until the bag came off.
“Thank God.” She took a deep breath of fresh air and struggled to sit up. The dogs nosed and licked her frantically, but she endured, feeling grateful for every sniff and sloppy dog kiss that came her way. Eventually, she caught Nero’s eye.
“I need you to go for help, boy. Get Arthur—or Uncle Red.”
He came alert as she repeated it, and then he started away. At the stable opening, he turned to look back at her.
“Get Arthur! Go!”
He took off at a determined run, but Nellie stayed by her side, alert and watchful as she tried to free her bound hands. It wasn’t long before Nellie’s puppies caught their mother’s scent and spilled out onto the dirt track that led into the pasture. They climbed Sarah and licked and jumped on her until she was overwhelmed. “Come on,” she groaned, “give me some room. I’ve just had a rough time.”
If a dog could look sympathetic, Nellie did. She took charge and lay down carefully across Sarah’s legs to keep her babies at bay.
“Ohhh, Nellie,” she moaned as she realized what the dog had done, “do you have any idea how much I love you?”
* * *
In the study, serious talk about strategies for protecting Betancourt had given way to recollections of other fights and one-upmanship in recounting adventures. Brandy flowed and the laughter was almost loud enough to drown out the barking. It was distant at first, but grew steadily louder. Arthur glanced at the door with a frown, wondering where Ned and the servants were. It sounded like Nero was ready to take someone’s arm off.
It was probably Steig coming back, he told himself. The big man was known to Nero and the dog would soon settle down. Instead, the barking grew even louder—downright frantic. Then the focus of it changed and it sounded like it was coming from outside the study’s leaded glass window.
“Just a minute,” Arthur said, placing his empty glass to hold open the map they’d been perusing on the desk. Outside, in the light coming from the study, he saw Nero. And the dog saw him. The big wolfhound lunged through the shrubs to slam paws against the window, barking furiously.
“Somethin’s not right with that beast,” Red said with a glower, rising.
It hit Arthur: Something really wasn’t right.
“Red,
” he said, “you better get those guns of yours.” And he headed for the front doors.
Nero met him as he stepped outside and the dog whirled around like a dervish for a moment, then headed for the stable. Every few yards he paused to bark at Arthur as if demanding he follow.
Arthur heard more than saw his companions exiting the house behind him and following. A hundred things went through his mind. Would the gang dare to move against the manor itself? Why hadn’t he kept guns at the ready? Was the livestock corralled or locked up in the barns? What would they attack first?
He entered the stable and slowed in the alley between the box stalls, his senses sharp and his body taut with expectation. All seemed calm until he reached Fancy, who was pacing and tossing his head and snorting anxiously. More barking from Nero drew him to the cross alley, where the big doors to the pasture stood wide open. Something lay on the ground, just outside the range of light from the stable lanterns.
Nero rushed outside and Arthur saw Nellie run to greet him. As he stepped out of the stable, he heard Sarah’s voice and it struck him like a lightning bolt. She was lying on her side on the ground, surrounded by Nellie’s puppies.
“Thank God you came!” She struggled to sit upright. “They tied my hands and feet so tight, I’m losing circulation.”
He was beside her in a heartbeat, on one knee, working at the rope that bound her hands at her back. It was a demon of a knot.
“Anybody got a—”
Grycel appeared and thrust a knife handle into Arthur’s hand, and then he and Red rushed out into the pasture to look for her attackers. Apparently Reynard wasn’t exaggerating when he said Grycel was always prepared for dangerous situations. Arthur freed Sarah’s hands, rubbed them gently, and then cut the rope binding her ankles.
“Are you all right?” he asked, his heart pounding as he lifted her chin to search her face. Her eyes were big and dark-centered, there was dirt on her face, and her hair looked like it had been clawed five different directions. But he’d never seen her look more wonderful.
His heart paused, gave a powerful thump, and then settled back into a quick and steady rhythm.
“What did they do to you?” he demanded.
She took a deep breath and pulled her knees up so she could reach an ankle and began to rub it. He boldly took her other foot in hand and rubbed her ankle and lower leg. His touch was such a relief she almost groaned.
“I was about to slip into Fancy’s stall, when they came up behind me, put a bag over my head, and all but wrenched my arms out of their sockets. I didn’t get a look at them, but I heard them say they were going to take me to somebody they called ‘his lordship.’” She flexed her ankles and turned her feet in circles. “That could be a nickname, I suppose, like the way people call me ‘the duchess.’ But then, they could have meant a man with an actual title.” He helped her to her feet and it seemed perfectly natural to pull her into his arms. She sighed with relief and melted against him.
A moment later, he looked up to find Reynard leaning a shoulder against the frame of the stable doors, watching them. He was glad the light was poor; his face heated and had to be red as the devil.
“I checked out the stable . . . nothing amiss in here . . . in case you’re interested,” the viscount said dryly. “It could be they didn’t have time to do any damage.” He focused on Sarah. “Or it could be they came just for her.”
* * *
Before she realized what was happening, Arthur had lifted her off her feet and was striding through the stable.
“This is nice,” she said, sliding her arms around his neck and shoulders. “Not strictly necessary, but lovely, all the same.”
“I’m not taking any chances with you,” he said sternly.
“Because I’m so precious?” She looked up with pointed innocence.
“Because you could have . . . internal injuries.”
“Ooooooh. Sounds serious.”
“Potentially.”
“Are you going to examine me?”
“Very likely.”
“I can hardly wait,” she said. “I should warn you, however, that my mother will probably take a dim view of you making free with my person. She’s a bit old-fashioned.”
“I’ll handle her.”
“Yes? How?”
“I’m a duke. I’ll pull rank.”
“Just so you know, she’s not impressed with dukes. She thinks they’re bad luck for us Bumgartens.”
“Horsefeathers. The truth is, Bumgartens are great luck for dukes.”
“We are?” She grinned.
“You in particular. You’re a gold mine of industry and possibility.”
“What kind of possibility?” With her hand on his neck she could feel the heat creeping up out of his collar.
“This kind,” he said, stopping dead, a few feet from the front doors, and covering her lips with his.
Pleasure surged through her body in a hot, tingling wave. He let her feet slide to the ground while holding on to her waist, and she turned to press herself against him with all of the eagerness she had tried to deny.
The partly open door swung wide and there was a gasp of horror that could only have come from her mother. A moment later Sir William edged past Elizabeth onto the step, and when he saw what caused her reaction, pulled her back inside and closed the door with a resounding thud.
“My mother’s not going to be happy about this,” she murmured against his lips. He kissed her again as if he meant to make her remember it for the next hundred years. Her toes curled inside her lady boots, and she suddenly wanted to rub every part of him with . . . every part of her.
“Ye gods”—he paused a moment with a wry look—“you don’t think she’ll do something drastic, like demand I make an honest woman of you?”
A moment later his knees buckled from the force of a huge dog slamming into them from behind. They both staggered and held on to each other as they regained their footing. He turned to look at Nero and could have sworn there was a grin on the dog’s maw.
“You—you—just when I was starting to like you.”
* * *
The darkness and the abundance of hoofprints in the pasture made tracking the kidnappers an exercise in futility. Red and Grycel headed back to the stable and found Sarah and Arthur gone and Reynard strolling the alley admiring the collection of horses that had been born on Betancourt. They reported that their search had yielded nothing, and Reynard sighed and turned back to the horses. “They’re pretty enough. Any of them fast?”
“Oh, yeah,” came a voice from down the alley. A big man was leading a large coal-black horse to an empty box stall near the stable entrance. “They got all the speed you could want. Mercury, here, loves to run. And he can clear a fence or a ditch like a bloody deer.”
Grycel straightened and squinted at the man, then strode down the alley, drawing Red and Reynard with him. The man studied Grycel as he approached, watching his powerful carriage and movement.
“Manse? Grycel Manse?”
“I’ll be damned. Steig Osmussen!” Grycel gave the big man a punch in the shoulder that would have sent most men staggering. “What the hell are you doin’ here?”
They clasped hands and shook hands ferociously until it became clear that neither one would surrender. By mutual consent, they dropped hands and laughed heartily.
“You know this big ox?” Red stepped up, looking almost petite in company with the two tall, heavily muscled men.
“I do,” Grycel said, grinning. “We did some bare knuckle work at Mahaney’s in London, some time ago.” He looked at Reynard and gestured to Steig. “He was a brute in th’ ring. Damn near took my head off a couple of times.” He turned back to his former opponent. “I figured you for big time bouts. What happened?”
Steig expelled a heavy breath. “Got a little too rough. Decided it wasn’t for me anymore.” He clasped Grycel’s shoulder warmly. “But you look like fightin’s treated you well.”
“Nah, I ha
ven’t been in a ring in five years. Got other business now.”
“Yeah? Like what?” The horse grew restless, so Steig opened the stall and began to unsaddle him.
“This an’ that. I help the Fox, here, sometimes.” Grycel tossed a thumb over his shoulder at Reynard. “There’s trouble on Betancourt land—gettin’ closer every day. Tonight somebody tried to take Miss Sarah.”
“What?” Steig wheeled, genuinely shocked. “Here? Tonight?”
“In these very stables,” Reynard said, glancing around. “It went bad—they didn’t get her—but the bastards escaped.”
“Is the duchess all right?” Steig asked, looking like a thundercloud.
“She’s okay,” Red answered, putting a hand on the big fighter’s arm. “But this trouble—it’s getting outta hand. We gotta do something.”
“So, you work for the duke now?” Grycel asked.
“Tryin’ to keep the peace.” Steig gave a huff of disgust. “I was riding the north border, like the duke wanted. Never occurred to me—or him, I reckon—that they’d strike here.”
“It was a stupid move on their part,” Reynard said. “Or desperate.”
Grycel nodded agreement. “Well, I’m damn glad we’re on the same side.” He glanced at the others. “I’d hate to have to fight this big lug in a life-or-death contest.”
Steig’s smile faltered for a fraction of a second as he hefted the saddle and pad onto a rack outside the stall. He made sure the horse had hay and water, then turned to Grycel and the others.
“I’m half starved, but I need to hear more about this attack.” Steig’s camaraderie was firmly back in place.
As the four headed for the kitchen, Red sidled close to Grycel.
“Ossssmusssssen?”
Grycel answered out of the side of his mouth. “Now you know why he goes by just one name.”
Chapter Nineteen
Sarah was starting to like the fiery taste of brandy, she just wished it didn’t always come attached to a trauma of some sort. She dodged her mother’s martyred looks and concentrated on recalling the details of the attack while tracing the bottom of her glass with her fingertips.