by Cheryl Holt
ISBN: 9781483553016 (E-version)
ISBN: 9781508740049 (Print version)
Copyright 2015 by Cheryl Holt
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Epilogue
PROLOGUE
“Give us another minute,” Anne Blair begged. “Please?”
There was a sailor guarding the gangplank, and Etherton stoically tarried as the man glared at Anne in exasperation. He’d already given her five minutes to say goodbye to her children and was unmoved by her plea.
“I’ve been more than accommodating,” the sailor told her. “If the captain looks down and sees us, he’ll have my head. We have to make the tide.”
He grabbed her arm to pull her away, and she beseeched, “One more minute! How can it hurt?”
Etherton tried to intervene, but the sailor wouldn’t be deterred.
“I shouldn’t have allowed this much, Mrs. Blair. You’re pushing your luck.”
Anne ignored him and spun to her oldest son, Bryce, who was five. He was a smart boy, a shrewd boy, and she leaned down so they were eye to eye.
“You’ll be in charge of your siblings,” she said. “Take care of them for me.”
“I will, Mother,” Bryce somberly declared, “but…but…you’ll be back soon, won’t you?”
Anne glanced at Etherton, shame in her gaze. They’d explained that it would be permanent, that her felony conviction and banishment to the penal colonies in Australia meant she couldn’t return. But her children were very young, just five, three, and two years old. How could they be expected to grasp the concept of forever?
“I won’t be back, Bryce.” Anne sighed with regret. “We talked about this, remember?”
“Yes, but you know I don’t understand. Why must you go away? Why can’t we go with you?”
There was no time remaining for further clarification or debate. There were only these last poignant seconds of farewell.
“You must be strong for me, Bryce,” she murmured. “While I’m away, I want to always recollect how strong you are. Make your father proud.” At the mention of her beloved, deceased husband, Julian, she shuddered and nearly collapsed.
“I will make Father proud,” Bryce said. “I will, but he left, and now you’re leaving too.”
“Watch over Sissy, especially. The world is hard for girls, harder than it is for boys.”
As if recognizing the import of her mother’s words, the smallest child, Annie, whom they all called Sissy, slipped her hand into Bryce’s. She was blond and blue-eyed, like a porcelain doll, and her sad expression broke Etherton’s heart. How did Anne bear it?
She turned to her twin sons, Michael and Matthew, and she held out her arms. Her wrists were shackled, but she reached out anyway. The twins, being rough-and-tumble scalawags, looked at each other, nodded in agreement that they wished to be hugged, then they let her draw them to her bosom.
Shortly they squirmed away and stared at her, appearing concerned and very solemn. They seemed to fathom—better than Bryce or Sissy—that something very bad had happened that could never be repaired.
Sissy was next. She leaned into her mother, and Anne kissed her hair and rumpled her golden curls.
“My little angel. How will I continue on without you?”
Then she reached for Bryce, but he refused her final embrace.
“Don’t leave us!” he furiously said. “I can’t watch over them.”
“Etherton will help you.”
“I don’t want Etherton. I want you. And Father. I want to go home.”
Anne and Etherton exchanged a tormented glance. Their home was forfeit, their secure existence was forfeit, the life they’d known was forfeit. There was no home for them any longer, no parents or stability or family. From this moment on, there would only be chaos and uncertainty.
Up on the deck, a whistle blew, and suddenly the crew was running and yelling to each other. Ropes were pulled and doors slammed.
“We’re out of time,” the sailor muttered, and Anne had arrived at the end.
She was yanked to her feet, and though she resisted, she was dragged to the gangplank.
She’d promised Etherton she would be composed and circumspect so she wouldn’t frighten the children more than they already had been. Yet she wailed with dismay, and her obvious distress terrified the children.
Sissy began to cry, while the twins scowled and grabbed for her. Bryce called out for all of them, “Mother! Mother!”
He tried to race after her to stop the sailor who was taking her away, but Etherton held onto him, fighting to subdue the boy as he lashed out in a futile attempt to rescue his mother.
In the flit of an instant she vanished onto the ship, and a dangerous silence settled on the dock as they all gaped at the spot where she’d been. They dawdled, waiting for something to transpire, perhaps for someone to speak up and clarify how a mother could be sent away and her children left behind as if they were excess baggage. But there was no rationalization that could justify it.
Down the block, Etherton’s driver cleared his throat, the carriage horses shifting impatiently, rattling the harness.
“Let’s go, children,” Etherton mumbled.
“No,” Bryce insisted. “Not yet. She might…might…”
“Might what?” Etherton barked more angrily than he’d intended.
Their father, Julian, was dead in a suspicious hunting accident that Etherton didn’t believe had been an accident at all. Their mother, Anne, was being transported as a convicted felon, and Etherton was left behind to clean up the mess. He didn’t have children of his own and hadn’t wanted the responsibility thrust on him.
But he’d loved their father, would have d
ied for him, would have killed for him, and he would keep Julian’s children safe. He would keep them safe or he would perish in the trying.
“Bryce,” he stated more calmly, “she won’t be back down. They won’t let her off the ship. I realize it’s difficult to understand, but we must be away.”
Nervously he peered around. He didn’t suppose Julian’s kin would show up at the docks, didn’t suppose they cared enough about Anne’s children to harm them. However he wasn’t taking any chances, and with such fortunes at stake, there was no telling how a greedy person might behave.
“Where are we to go?” Bryce asked. He was blond and blue-eyed like Anne, but he was tough and tenacious too, like Julian. He’d inherited all his parents’ best traits.
“I’ll explain in the carriage,” Etherton vaguely said.
He motioned to two of his servants, and they bustled over. It was a husband and wife, Mr. and Mrs. Wilson, a loyal older couple who could keep secrets. They were accompanied by their adult daughter. Etherton had arranged for the siblings to be separated and sent to boarding schools. It seemed a good way to hide them, and he didn’t know what else to do.
Under the circumstances, they had no relatives he could trust, and he was a bachelor without the means to raise four children.
As Mr. and Mrs. Wilson approached, he tamped down his spurt of conscience. He hadn’t provided any details to Anne about the children’s fate. She’d had enough to worry about, and she’d been too beaten down by events to question his plans.
It was rare for such youngsters to attend school, but the right sort of bribe could open any door, and Anne had given him the last of her money—a substantial amount—and advised him to use it for expenses. The children would be reared in stable situations. They’d be fed and sheltered and educated. They’d be fine.
Wouldn’t they?
Etherton pointed to Sissy and told the Wilsons’ daughter, “You take her.” Then he pointed at the twins and told Mr. Wilson, “And you and your wife take them. You have your instructions, yes?”
The three Wilsons nodded as Bryce frowned and asked, “Where are they going?”
“They’re going with Mr. and Mrs. Wilson for a bit,” Etherton claimed. “You’ll come with me.”
“No, I can’t allow it.” Bryce sounded very much like the little lord he was. “Mother wants me to watch over them. How can I if we’re separated?”
“You’ll see them again very soon.” Etherton hoped the statement was true, but figured it probably wasn’t.
It had all happened so fast—Julian’s death, Anne’s arrest and trial—almost as if Julian’s father had orchestrated the swift resolution. Matters were still unsettled, and Etherton couldn’t guess when they would calm, when he could stop peeking over his shoulder.
“When will I see them?” Bryce sternly demanded. “When?”
“Tomorrow,” Etherton lied.
The entire morning had been too awful, and he gestured to the Wilsons to hurry away, desperate for the horrid interval to be over. He had no idea how to deal with such misery, with shrieking, fretful children who were too young to comprehend what had destroyed them. Would they ever comprehend it?
Mrs. Wilson’s daughter picked up Sissy, and she started to scream and weep. She reached out to Bryce, her plump hands beseeching. Bryce clasped hold and shouted for the woman to put Sissy down, but Sissy was yanked away.
Mr. Wilson seized the twins, but they kicked and struggled, so he looped an arm around each one, hoisted them off the ground, and marched away.
The last Etherton ever saw of the twins, they were peering back, stubbornly and silently staring at their brother and sister. Their blue eyes—their father’s magnificent blue eyes—shifted to Etherton. They were disdainful and condemning, as if they blamed Etherton for what had transpired.
How could two such small boys be so resolute and contemptuous? They rarely spoke except to each other, and they talked in a secret language only they understood. Perhaps they were brighter than they seemed. Perhaps they grasped much more about the debacle than Etherton had realized.
They were little lords too, just like Bryce, but they were all lost lords now.
Their sneering, scornful gazes dug into Etherton as if to say, We’ll get even for this. We’ll get even—and everyone will pay for what they’ve done to our family.
CHAPTER ONE
“I’m here to see the notorious gambler and criminal, Mr. Michael Scott.”
Magdalena Wells, known as Maggie to her friends and family, glared at the oaf guarding the door. He’d just refused her entrance to Mr. Scott’s disreputable gambling club, but she was angry and aggrieved and had no time for posturing or nonsense.
The man studied her gray dress, her stern manner, her imperious deportment. “Who shall I say is calling? The bloody Queen of England?”
Maggie didn’t care for his attitude or his foul language, and her fury soared.
“There’s no need to be rude or crude,” she said.
“If you don’t like my language, you don’t have to stay.”
She had no patience for fools and nearly stomped out, but her quest was important, and she wouldn’t leave until she’d spoken in person to the exalted, obnoxious Mr. Scott.
“In your line of employment,” she told him, “I’m certain you don’t often cross paths with a lady, but I assure you I am one. Behave yourself.”
Her steely tone garnered his attention, and he flushed with chagrin.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Now then, take me to Michael Scott and be quick about it. Tell him I am proprietress of the Vicar Sterns Rescue Mission.”
“Are you hoping to rescue him?”
“No, I’ve come to give him a piece of my mind.”
“That’ll send him into a swoon,” the man muttered, but he stepped back and motioned her in. Outside it was a bright, sunny June afternoon, so it took a minute for her vision to adjust.
The foyer of Mr. Scott’s establishment—hailed far and wide simply as Scotts—was dark and dank, and it smelled of stale liquor, tobacco, and wanton habits. In the main room there were tables and chairs arranged in haphazard rows, and she could imagine it on a busy Saturday evening when it would be packed with inebriated men who would wager away their money.
One wall was lined with shelves holding wine bottles and liquor decanters. The other three were covered with large, garish paintings of nude women. Their bared breasts were most prominent, the reddened nipples seeming to leap off the canvas.
The portraits were extremely disturbing, and she was offended by them, but she kept her expression blank, not wishing to provide any hint that she was unnerved by the risqué sight. And she wasn’t. Not really.
Over the past few years, she’d grown practical and rational, the calm port in any storm. It would take more than the picture of a naked female to fluster her or deter her from the conversation she was intent on having.
“Mr. Scott, please,” she said. “If you’ll show me to him?”
“Follow me.”
The guard led her in, and though it was only two o’clock, there were men lurking in the corners, drinking hard spirits and numbly watching her pass. Their gazes were curious and prurient.
She experienced a stab of compassion for them, wondering about the sorry state of their lives that they would dawdle in such a seedy place. She wanted to speak to each of them, wanted to discuss what had brought them there, what kept them from departing.
But she didn’t. She had no business visiting as she had and wouldn’t remain a second longer than necessary.
They continued on, climbed a narrow staircase, and walked down a hall to the end. They stopped at a closed door, and her escort knocked briskly, waited for a reply, didn’t receive one, then knocked again.
“What?” a surly male bellowed from inside.
“You have a visitor, Mr. Scott.”
“I asked not to be disturbed. Were you confused by my order? Wasn’t I clear?”
“You were clear, sir, but she insisted on talking to you. She wouldn’t go away.”
“She? It’s a woman?”
“Yes.”
“If you couldn’t get rid of a measly woman, what good are you at guarding the door?”
“She’s a wee sprite,” the man responded, “but she seems ferocious. I didn’t think I should rile her.”
“She might bite?”
“Maybe.”
“Is she pretty?”
There was the most awkward pause as she was thoroughly evaluated.
Maggie could have answered the idiotic question herself. At the moment, she was attired in a drab gray dress, white fabric at the collar and cuffs, and buttoned up from chin to toes as any proper British woman should be. Her hair was pulled into a tight chignon, her gray bonnet shielding the vibrant red color and washing out her features.
She might have been a fussy governess, but in light of the dreary, poverty-filled world in which she existed, she deliberately strove to appear nondescript.
But she had a mirror in her bedchamber, and she could see herself in it. With her auburn hair and merry blue eyes, she was very fetching. She was too thin though, work and worry leaving scant time for leisure pursuits, and there was no overabundance of food at the mission, so her diet was rather sparse. Yet despite being slender, she was femininely curved in all the right spots.
While she wasn’t inclined to vanity, she recognized that she’d be incensed if she was described as plain or ordinary, and she snapped, “Oh, for pity’s sake. Just open the blasted door.”
“I wouldn’t dare to.”
Previously in her life she’d been a courteous young lady of good family and good reputation, but seven years spent interacting with street urchins had toughened her. Having shed many of her prior virtues, she reached for the knob and blustered in without considering whether she should.
“Mr. Scott, I presume?” She’d been prepared to march over in a huff, but she stumbled to a halt.
“Who the hell are you?” he barked.
She stood very still, determined not to exhibit by so much as the flicker of a brow that she was shocked or dismayed. Why, oh why, had she barged in? What was she thinking?