Lord Cavendish Returns

by King, Rebecca

  She had never realised before just how romantic the garden was in the moonlight. The gentle rustle of the rose bushes released the fragrant scent of the cabbage roses which mingled with the sweet fragrance of sweet peas that lined the pathway and gave the atmosphere a heady feeling of being embraced. The moon chose that moment to peek out from behind the rain clouds and bathe the garden in a silvery haze that made it look like a magical kingdom and she turned to him with a smile.

  “Beautiful,” Harper whispered. Although his gaze was on the garden, he meant the wonderful woman beside him.

  Arrabella merely sighed and threw the front door a reluctant glance. She knew it would be highly improper to invite him into the house given that she had no chaperone, but the invitation hovered on her lips anyway.

  “Goodnight, Arrabella,” he murmured quietly. Her softly rounded cheek glowed pale in the moonlight and gave her an ethereal look that made him want to touch her just to make sure that she was real.

  “Goodnight,” she replied. Her heart began to thump heavily beneath her breast as she watched his head slowly lower toward hers. At first she thought he was going to kiss her cheek but, at the last moment, his head turned and he drew closer to her parted lips instead. The soft brush of his firm lips against hers captured her sigh of pleasure but, regretfully, his kiss only lasted a heartbeat before his head lifted so he could study the classical lines of her face.

  He couldn’t help it. He knew that he should move away but couldn’t seem to break free of her tempting warmth. Somehow, over the last few hours, she had laid claim to his senses and refused to relinquish her hold, and he wasn’t entirely sure if he wanted her to.

  “Until tomorrow then,” he whispered and placed a gentle kiss on the back of her hand.

  “Until tomorrow.”

  Their eyes locked. Neither of them seemed willing, or able, to break the spell that had woven so carefully, so very easily, around them. Harper had no idea what had just happened this afternoon but knew with absolute conviction that the woman before him had suddenly become very important to his future. He wasn’t going to leave until he knew that she would be alright until he could be with her again. That thought was enough to make him glance around the garden again, but this time study it a bit more carefully.

  “Where does your housekeeper live?”

  Arrabella pointed to a small house on the edge of the woods to the left of the property. “Over there. She will call by first thing in the morning.” She had no idea why she had told him that but she didn’t have any hesitation in trusting him with the information.

  His next words prompted her into motion. “I will wait until you are inside.”

  With a guilty start, she mumbled an apology and pushed the door open behind her. She felt such a fool. All the time she had been staring at him with doe eyes, waiting for his kisses, he had been politely waiting for her to go inside so that he could leave. After one last, lingering look at him she slowly closed the door.

  She slumped against it to wait for her beating heart to settle into its normal rhythm. The sound of soft tapping behind her broke the silence in the hallway and made her squeal in alarm. She didn’t stop to think and yanked the door open, unsurprised to find him still on the doorstep.

  Before she could speak, he stepped across the threshold and captured her head in his palms. She barely had time to draw breath before his lips descended on hers and swallowed her gasp of surprise. There was little she could do except clutch at his shirt and hang on for dear life. A small voice warned her that she should draw away; they were all alone in the house and she barely knew him, but she couldn’t find the will, or the strength, to deny him anything. She felt plundered, branded, and deeply shaken by the wobbliness in her knees by the time he released her.

  “Lock the door behind me,” he growled before he turned around, stepped outside, and closed the door behind him.

  She stared blankly at the closed door and wondered what on earth had just happened. The loud taps on the door broke her out of her trance and she suddenly remembered what he had told her. She slid the iron bolt home with a heavy thump, and raced into the sitting room where she knelt on the cushions of the window seat to watch him climb aboard the curricle. He glanced at the house as he turned the carriage around and lifted his hand as though he could see her. She waved back and remained where she was until he had disappeared from view.

  It was only when she climbed into bed later that she realised that not only was she still smiling, but she hadn’t bothered to light a candle and wasn’t all that worried about the darkness any more.

  Harper was half-way home by the time he realised that he should have checked for intruders before he left her. If he hadn’t been so bemused by their kiss he would have remembered to protect her properly. It was an amateurish mistake to just drop her off at the door and then leave her. His vicious curse broke the silence and he briefly contemplated going back to check the doors and windows from the outside, but he didn’t want to scare her if she was still up and about. Still, his conscience wouldn’t settle until he knew that she was safe. Without further thought he clicked the horse into a trot.

  It was nearly midnight by the time he had stabled his horse and returned to the vicarage on foot. The house was encased in darkness, but he knew from past experience that it didn’t mean that there was no threat of danger. Now that he was there, although he couldn’t see anything untoward, his gut instinct warned him that danger was afoot.

  Why had someone seen fit to lock them in the crypt only to let them out again? Were they trying to warn him off attempting to find the information he was after? Had it been carefully orchestrated to frighten them away from Moldton church? If so, why? Had the Cavendish brothers got anything to do with it? He quickly dismissed that thought as ridiculous. They had come to him with the information about his birth right; there was no earthly reason why they would try to stop him finding proof of their claims. Had the incident been something to do with Arrabella? He quickly dismissed that possibility as absurd. Nobody as beautiful and kind as Arrabella would ever have enemies. It just wasn’t in her nature to annoy people. Right now, he simply had no idea what to think. One thing he did know was that the urge to protect her was so strong that he couldn’t ignore it.

  It was why he found himself standing in the middle of the night watching the vicarage when he should have been in his nice warm bed fast asleep. He leaned back against the thickest tree he could find and settled in to wait.

  His gut instinct was proven correct when, about an hour later, a furtive movement to the right of the house caught his attention. He watched a dark figure leave the line of trees that ran to one side of the property and head toward the driveway. The figure didn’t approach the house, or even look at it as he passed. Instead, he quietly made his way down the short drive and vanished into the darkness.

  Harper studied the distance between the driveway and the house. The figure was either confident that he wouldn’t be seen, or didn’t really give a damn if he was. But why was he watching the vicarage? What did he want? The hooded figure looked slightly macabre in the blackness of the night but he went after it anyway. As he followed, he half expected the man, and he was fairly certain it was a man given the ground eating strides he took, to turn toward the village. He was a little perturbed when his quarry climbed agilely over a fence and disappeared in the opposite direction.

  Harper crept closer to the hedgerow. All of his senses went on alert and he squatted down to study the narrow gaps at the bottom of the hedge to check for legs or feet on the opposite side. Unfortunately, it meant that he was now in the ditch that ran along the side of the road, but he didn’t care. His target had vanished. Without climbing the fence after him there was little Harper could do. Rather than follow any further, he stood in the shadows and waited.

  Minutes later, he was rewarded for his patience when he caught sight of a solitary figure at the opposite end of the field. He was too far away to give chase. All Harper could do w
as watch his quarry climb over another fence and disappear over the hill in the direction of Moldton. His gut feeling warned him that this was the person who had locked him and Arrabella in the crypt. He just didn’t know why they had done it, or who they were, but it was only a matter of time before Harper got the information he needed – all of it.

  Once he was satisfied that the man had gone for now, Harper jogged back to the vicarage and checked all of the doors and windows from the outside before he settled down in a densely shadowed part of the garden to keep watch.

  CHAPTER SIX

  “You look a little tired this morning,” Arrabella said with a frown as she studied the dark shadows beneath his eyes.

  “It’s taking a little time to get used to being in the quiet of the country, that’s all,” Harper replied obliquely. He threw her a tender look that assured her he was fine. There was no earthly reason why he should tell her that he had kept guard over her house throughout the night, and only moved from his hiding place when dawn had started to creep over the horizon, and Mrs Able had left her house in her dressing gown to feed her chickens.

  “You are used to the city noises. It must be completely different to have nothing but the soft hoot of an own and silence to break your sleep.”

  “I have slept in all sorts of places, but it has never really been all that quiet.” He tapped the side of his head. “Too much going on up here.”

  “You must be eager to get back to the city.” She waved a hand to indicate the rolling landscape around them. “I mean, nothing much happens around here. It must be boring compared to what you are used to.”

  “Boring? Do you really think that being locked in the crypt by an unnamed person and then mysteriously let back out again several hours later is boring?” he asked incredulously. “Getting locked in anywhere with a beautiful woman is the last thing I would ever call boring.”

  She was thrilled to pieces that he thought that she was ‘beautiful’ but, before she could say anything, he held his elbow out to her and lifted his brows.

  “Ready to go again?”

  She groaned and rolled her eyes, but rested her hand on the crook of his elbow and allowed him to escort her out to the waiting curricle anyway. She didn’t want to question why she had a wide smile on her face, or the sun felt brighter, or the birds seemed to chirp louder in the trees. Instead, she allowed him to hand her into the curricle and settled back to enjoy the journey.

  The church door was open when they pulled to a stop outside Moldton church. The ladies were already industriously polishing the pews and washing the floors. Having secured the services of one of the ladies, Mrs Finlay, to keep the door open for them, they lit several candles and descended into the crypt for the second time in two days.

  The enclosed place of rest suddenly wasn’t as forbidding as it had been the day before, yet she knew that everything was just the same. She was very conscious of the fact that everything felt a little different today, especially after the kisses she had shared with Harper last night. She didn’t know whether it was because he was beside her again, their relationship had changed, or the cleaning ladies were upstairs and keeping the door open, but Arrabella had no qualms about following him into the darkness and was actually eager to start work.

  Once the candles were safely stored on the wall mounts, and the room lit well enough to see clearly, they began where they left off yesterday, and started to draw boxes away from the wall so that they could peer into the contents. Unfortunately, the next several boxes contained nothing but more papers and a few altar cloths. They spent hours dragging the boxes out, searching the contents and then pushing the boxes back against the far wall. It was mid-afternoon by the time Mrs Finlay appeared and announced that the ladies were finished and ready to head home.

  Harper glanced at the last box and lifted a candle to take a quick peek inside only to curse silently when he found it completely empty.

  “Nothing in there at all,” he announced with a sigh.

  Arrabella frowned at Mrs Finlay, who was one of the village’s oldest residents. “Do you know what happened to the old parish records from Hambley Wood church? They were moved here after the fire but seem to have vanished.”

  “The ones that were moved here after the great fire years back?”

  Arrabella nodded, although wasn’t entirely sure which period the ‘great fire’ related to. “Well, they stayed here for a while and then were put into the Hambley Wood cellars. The old vicar returned them to their rightful place in case anyone needed them, dear. Why do you ask?”

  “We just need some information out of them, that’s all,” Arrabella replied obliquely.

  She was aware that their quest had drawn the interest of the ladies, but none of them seemed as though they wanted to challenge the inappropriateness of Arrabella being in the crypt, alone, with such a charmingly handsome man, and for that she was extremely grateful.

  “I am sorry,” she sighed to Harper later that afternoon when they were on their way back to Hambley Wood. “I feel as though I have taken you on a wild goose chase.”

  “Nonsense,” Harper replied quickly. He would have preferred not to have spent the last day trawling through dusty boxes, but he didn’t regret taking the opportunity to spend some more time alone with Arrabella. “You can only go by what you are told.”

  “I know, but I should have asked someone who knew Moldton church’s history a bit better, shouldn’t I? I feel as though I have wasted your time.”

  In spite of the fact that they were in the middle of a country lane, Harper drew the curricle to stop and turned sideways on his seat to face her. “This has been, by far, the most interesting adventure I have had for a while and I don’t regret a moment of it.”

  Arrabella lifted her brows sceptically and made no attempt to keep the doubt off her face.

  He grinned unrepentantly and stroked a finger down her cheek. “I have rather enjoyed myself.”

  She was still trembling by that single touch when he picked up the reins and clicked the horse into motion again.

  “Is that Joseph?” She asked several minutes later when she caught sight of a man stalking across the field toward them. Even from several feet away she could see the dark scowl on his face. “He doesn’t look very happy.”

  Harper frowned at his brother and read the anger in the way his brother practically stomped across the rough ground. He considered calling a greeting, but Joseph didn’t look up or appear to notice that there was anyone nearby.

  “There is something going on with him at the moment, but I don’t know what it is.” He realised then that he hadn’t paid his brother the visit he had intended to make yesterday. With being locked in the crypt and protecting Arrabella last night it had slipped his mind, but he resolved to drop by the farm at the earliest opportunity. “I am going to go and pay him a visit and see if I can get him to talk to me,” he sighed.

  There was little Arrabella could say to that. She didn’t have a long enough acquaintance with him to pry into family business or put forward her opinion on what he should do. For some reason, Joseph’s behaviour seemed to make it more important that they find the information about Harper’s true birth parents as quickly as possible. Was that what was wrong with Joseph? Was he worried that Harper was no longer his brother?

  She was deep in thought by the time Harper pulled the curricle to a stop outside the vicarage. As soon as her feet touched the floor she glanced up at him. “I am going to take a look in the cellar while it is still daylight,” she declared firmly. “There is no time like the present.”

  If she was honest, she felt guilty that she had taken him on a fool’s errand over to Moldton, when the register he wanted was right on her doorstep. She dreaded the thought of going into the church cellar; it was as bad as the crypt in Moldton, but they wouldn’t find the information if she didn’t face her fears and go down there. It seemed the least she could do to make amends for two wasted days of futile searching.

  “I am
coming too,” he replied with a nod.

  “I am going to get something to eat first,” she added softly. “Would you care to join me? Then we can head over to the cellars and see if we can find that record you need.”

  The heady scent of meat and gravy that emanated from the vicarage kitchen made his decision for him. His stomach growled in anticipation and was loud enough to make Arrabella smile. With a rueful grin he stood back and waved his arm toward the house.

  “After you.”

  It was mid-afternoon by the time they made their way to the church. As soon as they were inside, Arrabella took a moment to lock the outer door. Harper searched the church, and checked the locks on the windows and doors before he helped her gather the many bottles and candles as they could hold and carried them down to the cellar. They wedged the cellar door open with a heavy oak desk that was usually used to sign the registers. Moving it made so much noise that nobody would be able to close the door without alerting them, even if they could get into the church. All too soon, Arrabella found herself standing beneath a church for the third time in two days. Now that the place was so well lit, the presence of twelve large, neatly stacked boxes in the far corner of the large square room became evident.

  She gasped when she saw them. “This is it,” she whispered and rushed over to lift the lid off one of the boxes.

  Her eyes grew round as she read the faded gold lettering: Hambley Wood Parish. Births, Deaths and Marriages. She lifted two heavy volumes out and handed one to Harper. The yellowed pages didn’t look promising and she was unsurprised when he rifled through the pages and shook his head, but there were enough boxes to assure them that the one they were after must be there. Arrabella checked the book she held before she carefully placed it on the floor at her feet.