Barons, Brides, and Spies: Regency Series Starter Collection Volume Two

by Mary Lancaster

  “It is only the wearer who can make a piece of fabric and thread look so fine,” he told her and she blushed.

  As far as he was concerned, Olivia could be wearing nothing at all and still be beautiful. His mind conjured an image of that possibility. Not helpful at this point in time, he told himself.

  He enjoyed seeing her blush as well and considered teasing her about it, but the local band of men and women with guitars, violins, flutes, and concertinas began to arrive to start setting up in their allocated corner of the barn.

  Adam offered his arm to Olivia and left the musicians to a discussion about which song they should begin with.

  *

  Olivia welcomed the arrival of the musicians. She felt the heat of her blush stain her cheeks, not simply from Adam’s compliments – after all, pretty words could be had for a ha’penny – but rather, it was the look in his eyes as he said them to her.

  She accepted his arm and they walked in silence onto the high street and down toward the green.

  He’d only been gone for a little over a week, but she’d missed him even though she had plenty enough to do with a final packing of her belongings and moving into the inn.

  Before she left Kenstec for the last time, Olivia had offered a farewell to Constance, even though folklore said ghosts only haunted the place where the spirits left their bodies.

  All this week, she was struck by the sensation of time slipping through her fingers. It seemed that once the summer was over, all that would be left to her was a lifetime of bleak winter.

  “How is your new job in Plymouth?” she asked. Adam was silent a moment.

  “It feels good to be doing something useful again,” he answered.

  “I imagine it must feel strange after having been at sea for so many years.”

  Adam offered a winning smile. “At least I can help make the ships more resilient and more maneuverable.”

  “All the more important for the war effort.” Olivia hadn’t though anything of her answer but she was surprised to see Adam’s expression harden briefly. Perhaps he did wish he was back on his ship. Maybe he worried about his friends still serving.

  The silence between them stretched on until even the music from the band’s rehearsal reached them.

  “Tell me about you,” said Adam. “Have you had any replies to the inquiry letters you sent?”

  For a horrible moment, she wondered whether he knew about her letter to St. Thomas’ Hospital until she realized that he was talking about her applications for a new position as governess.

  “No, not yet. Perhaps, by the end of summer…” her voice trailed off. The end of summer. She mentally shook her head to re-gather her thoughts.

  “Olivia?”

  Adam was wearing that intense look once more and little pleasurable butterflies in her stomach fluttered.

  “I have a question to ask—”

  She was struck by the similarity – a private meeting in a park, where the result was a proposal of marriage. She held her breath.

  “—Did you see Squire Denton’s will?”

  Olivia blinked rapidly. The will? “Uh, no, I didn’t actually see it. But I was at the reading of it.”

  “Were all the beneficiaries named?”

  What a strange turn this conversation was taking.

  “I imagine so,” she replied. “The bulk of the estate went to Miss Lydia as heir. There was a residue for Mistress Caroline, and small bequests to the butler, the housekeeper, the Ponsnowyth church, and to me.”

  “But to no other members of the family other than the widow and daughter?”

  She frowned. “There are no other family members. That’s one of the reasons why the house is being sold. There’s no one with the Denton name left to inherit.”

  She watched him take in her words and waited for additional explanation but none was forthcoming. Twilight had deepened, making it difficult to see his full expression.

  “Perhaps we should return,” he said. “The pork smells delicious, and I find myself famished.”

  She nodded and started back toward the inn without waiting for Adam to offer his arm.

  Olivia warred with herself.

  She was annoyed, although she had no right to be. In fact, she wasn’t even sure who she was annoyed at. Was it at Adam, who had taken what she thought was a romantic moment and reduced it to an interrogation on Squire Denton’s will? Or was it at herself for being such a silly romantic fool in the first place?

  Adam had fallen in step with her but was keeping a respectable distance between them. Her curiosity still burned deep.

  “Why did you ask about the will?”

  For three solid paces, his only reply was gravel crunching underfoot.

  “I wanted to see if Beaufort Denton remembered his eldest daughter,” he said at last.

  Olivia was grateful the darkening sky hid her embarrassment. Of course, Adam would want to know whether Constance was remembered in her father’s will.

  She was ashamed she hadn’t considered the same thing herself. Squire Denton might have left a bequest for a marker for Constance’s final resting place. But no. Bitter to the end, the squire had cast off his daughter as completely as a worn out pair of shoes and abandoned her mortal remains to an unmarked grave.

  But there was more than just Constance. There was her son.

  Their son.

  Perhaps, it was Adam’s way of asking whether the child survived infancy. She chanced a glance his way. He was walking at her side, eyes ahead but thoughts a thousand miles away, no doubt.

  She thought of the letter she had sent to the superintendent of St. Thomas’ Hospital. Should she tell him of it? Would he hate her for meddling in something that was no business of hers?

  Chapter Seventeen

  Half a lie is better than a full lie.

  Adam repeated the phrase several times to himself on the walk back to the barn but it didn’t make him feel any better.

  He wished there were no secrets between them, but Olivia had put him on the spot with her question. Let her believe it was Constance he thought about, not the boy who was their child.

  He hoped for Olivia’s sake that reuniting him with the writing box and delivering news of Constance’s sad passing had been enough, and she didn’t think to dig further. If there was someone else poking into his past, the last thing he wanted was for Olivia to start asking questions, too, and attracting the attention of the wrong kind of people.

  He chanced a glance in her direction. She was withdrawn. Did she think he was still in love with Constance?

  Before them the barn was ablaze with light, alive with the laughter of villagers who, for one evening, would put all their cares aside and celebrate. The thought appealed to him greatly and, tonight, he planned to be one of those merry souls.

  Tonight, he vowed, Olivia would be left in no doubt that his past was in the past.

  Where it belonged.

  And his future? To hell with that – he had no more control over that than he did the weather.

  Eat, drink and be merry! For tomorrow we may die!

  The smell of roasting pork and the sound of the band rehearsing a lively reel was more than enough to banish any worries.

  He took Olivia’s hand and steered her around the group of people lining up around the spit, guiding her inside the inn where he claimed a corner bench. He retained a hold of her hand.

  “You said you feared a spill on your dress, so I thought you might want to dine in here, instead of risking the benches outside.”

  Adam watched her expression change from confusion to surprise then gratitude.

  “You’re a good man, Adam Hardacre,” she said in a low voice.

  Her words warmed him from within. He squeezed her hand, then brought it to his lips before rising from the table with a promise to be back with their food.

  He could get used to this, Adam thought as he joined the end of the spit serving line. A quiet life in the country with a wife who loved him, to
be given “this day, our daily bread.”

  He picked up two plates and smiled at the Angler’s Arms maid who placed a generous slab of bread on each. Out of newfound habit, Adam looked at the faces around him. Some he knew, but not too many. It seemed that the Trellows’ dance attracted everyone within fifteen miles of Ponsnowyth.

  The line moved slowly toward the freshly-roasted meat. Then he saw a face that caused him to pause before it disappeared in the crowd. Adam searched for the black hair and the figure of middle height until he was nudged in the back by a man behind him who nodded ahead where a gap had opened.

  He walked a few paces forward and accepted the roasted potatoes and carrots then stepped forward again to wait for the freshly-carved pork.

  There! Adam could only see the man’s back but it looked like Grunt – Dunbar, he corrected himself once again. What the hell was he doing here? Spying on him? Was there another message he was to receive? He found himself become resentful. He was off-duty tonight. Wilkinson be damned and Ridgeway, too.

  “Hey, Mr. Hardacre? Adam!”

  He turned to the mildly exasperated face of Will Trellow.

  “Do ye be wanting gravy?”

  By the sound of the question, Adam knew it had been asked more than once. He nodded curtly and, with the plates in hand, he walked the long way around to the inn.

  And Dunbar was nowhere to be seen.

  Adam shook his head. Perhaps he had imagined it.

  Olivia offered him a smile and before them stood two full glasses – paler than ale, it must be cider. He placed the plates before them and picked up the glass closest to him. Cider it was.

  During their meal, music for the first dance started, the sound of accordion and violin filling the night air. He watched a wistful expression cross Olivia’s face and he wondered at it.

  *

  It wasn’t only the dress that was “new.” This evening was new.

  How dreadful to think that after ten years in Ponsnowyth, this was her first attendance at a village dance. For years, she had seen their villagers make arrangements for their regular events but had never been to one. Of course, she had helped Mistress Denton host the family’s annual summer garden party, but as a governess – a model of probity, of discretion, of watchfulness over her charge and nothing more.

  Squire Denton had made it clear at her first interview that he had very particular ambitions for his young daughter and allowing Lydia to mix with the common folk more than duty required was not part of it.

  Olivia knew all the fashionable dances so she could drill Lydia in learning them to appear effortlessly graceful on the dance floor. The truth was, Olivia herself had only ever danced on rare occasions. And even then, those dances were only at Kenstec dinner parties when she was expected to make up the numbers to ensure an equal distribution of men and women.

  But tonight, she was free of the obligations of her profession. Tonight, she could be like every other woman and dance to her heart’s content.

  Tonight, she wanted to dance with the man before her.

  “Would you care to dance?” he asked.

  Tonight, she could say yes without reserve. And she did.

  Adam looked pleased by her answer. He escorted her from the table into the cool blackness of the evening as they crossed from the inn to the neighboring barn, the sound and light and warmth drawing her into a world where she finally felt she belonged.

  They milled with other spectators on the edge of the floor waiting for the start of a new tune when she spotted a familiar face.

  “Is that your friend over there?” she asked, nodding in the direction of the far end of the barn. Adam turned swiftly, the furrow of his brows marring his features.

  Lieutenant Harold Bickmore made his way toward them.

  “Good evening, Miss Olivia! I’m here to save you from letting this oaf trample your toes.”

  “Aren’t you bit far from home?” Adam grumbled.

  Harold offered a broad, mischievous wink in her direction. Olivia worked hard to suppress a grin. She’d never met two men so unalike who were still, by all accounts, friends.

  “Have pity on a poor sailor! The Andromeda heads out to sea in three days. It might be months before I see a pretty girl again, let alone dance with one.”

  Olivia was too old and too experienced to have her head turned by a pretty speech, although she had to admit to a certain thrill in having one man flirt with her and another jealous of the attention.

  “Will you take pity, Miss Olivia, and grant your humble servant this boon?”

  “Perhaps the next dance, Lieutenant,” she said. “I believe this one is taken.”

  She looked to Adam only to find him paying no attention, his focus somewhere amongst the crowd of revelers. Apparently feeling the weight of two sets of eyes on him, he shook his head as though to clear it.

  He smiled, but it seemed to her it was a false one.

  “I’m going to let you take pity on this pathetic wretch,” he said with forced levity. “Let him have the first dance. I claim the second, then you’ll discover what a true delight it is to dance with a real man.”

  The dance floor emptied. Other dancers filled their places. Olivia felt a gentle tap on her hand. She allowed Harold to escort her to the floor but when she looked back to where they had been standing, Adam had disappeared.

  She lined up beside Harold, her left hand in his. The music began with all the dancers doing a hop step forward around in a circle before both hands were joined. Pairs danced around each other before the lady was handed off to her next dance partner and the steps continued.

  She smiled with each new man who took her hand, but her attention was elsewhere. With every turn about her partner, she looked. Every move forward through the circle, she searched for Adam. As tall as he was, surely he couldn’t disappear in the crowd. By the time the dance concluded, he was still nowhere to be seen.

  “I’ve been wondering the same myself.”

  “Wondering what, Lieutenant Bickmore?”

  “Harold, please,” the young man said in a gently reproving voice.

  She acceded to the familiarity with a nod of her head and accepted his arm. They strolled toward the refreshment table at the back.

  “I’d wondered, too, where Adam went,” he said. “It’s just a little bit out of character.”

  “Why do you think that is?”

  “I’m not sure. I haven’t seen him much lately. But it seems something has been bothering him. Perhaps you could tell me.”

  Olivia found herself frowning. What exactly was he asking?

  “A ginger beer, Miss Olivia?” he asked. That wasn’t the question, but she nodded and he eased his way through the knot of people and returned with two glasses. “What I mean,” he said, handing her one of the drinks, “is that you will have seen him more often in the past five weeks than I have.”

  She was still uncertain how much the two men shared with one another about personal details of their lives. Did Harold know about Constance and her death?

  Olivia remained circumspect. “I know he’s found work in Falmouth, so he’s away for days at a time. And perhaps, we worry over nothing. No doubt, he’s found himself engrossed in conversation.”

  “In that case, would you care for another dance?”

  *

  Adam found Dunbar smoking a pipe on the other side of the hostelry stables.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” he demanded.

  Dunbar looked him up and down while he drew smoke from his long-handled clay pipe.

  “This is still England, innit?” he replied, a stream of blue-grey smoke streaming from his mouth. “Don’t I have the right to be wherever I wish?”

  “Well, I object to being followed, being spied upon. Tell Wilkinson he can come to me himself if he has a problem. I don’t answer to lackeys.”

  The big man snarled and lunged at him but he was too big and too slow. Adam simply side-stepped him. Dunbar stumbled forward before righ
ting himself into a wrestler’s stance.

  “I’ll tear ye in two!”

  “Then I won’t be much good to your employer, will I? Go on, get out of here.” Adam swept his arm as if shooing away a dog, then he pushed his luck by getting right into Dunbar’s face. “Tell Wilkinson…no, tell his boss – that if I catch even the smell of you again, the deal is off. He won’t even catch a glimpse of the plans for the new Artemis-class frigate.”

  Up close, even in the semi-darkness, it was easy to see the man’s face was puce.

  It would be interesting to see how much self-control the man had, Adam thought. How far could he be pushed?

  Dunbar shoved him in the chest, but Adam’s legs were braced for it. He bore the assault wordlessly and stared him down.

  “One day, ye’re goin’ to end up with a knife in yer back,” said Dunbar, walking away. “Ye’d better deliver, otherwise I’ll slice yer liver out – and do it gladly.”

  Adam counted to ten then silently followed Dunbar as far as the churchyard on the road to the village of Flushing. It could be that the man had rowed across from Falmouth, or Wilkinson had a bolthole in the newly-constructed houses on the eastern side of the river.

  Adam listened to the man’s trudging strike on the road while he softened his footfalls on the grass, then came to a halt. The light evening breeze carried notes from the violin.

  Tempting though it was to follow further, Olivia waited for him.

  Adam listened to Dunbar’s booted steps become fainter and hoped he’d been forceful enough with the cur to make his message plain, not only to him but also whoever was in charge of this den of spies.

  As he walked back to the inn, his first instinct was to tell Harold everything. Onboard the Andromeda, if he needed to go to a higher authority to get something done, Harold would be the man he spoke to.

  The lieutenant had the knack of translating his plainly spoken demands into a more socially acceptable form to smooth over the sensibilities of some of the other senior officers.

  But he wasn’t in the Navy now. And he didn’t need a go-between. All Adam needed was someone who knew him and could keep his confidences. Someone he could trust.