“We’ll be here at first light,” Kerr assured him, clapping him on the shoulder. “And try not to worry. If Sophia is anything like Ivy, she’s up to any rig. Those four are the most determined ladies I’ve ever me. I’d stake them against Jackson at his best in a prizefight.”
Ben had to smile at that. Kerr was probably right.
“Tomorrow,” he agreed. “First light.”
As promised, the men were on the road by the time the sun came up, Ben on a borrowed mount since his own had needed rest after the previous day’s hard ride. After a few stops along the way, they made it into Little Seaford an hour or so after luncheon, and rather than go to the vicarage, Ben accompanied Kerr and Maitland to Beauchamp House.
To his relief, their arrival was met with all four of the ladies of the house pouring into the entryway from the drawing room where they’d been gathered.
“I thought you weren’t due back for another few days,” Ivy said, throwing herself into Kerr’s arms.
As Daphne and Maitland enacted a similar scene a few feet away, Ben sought out Sophia, who pulled him into the drawing room so that their reunion could at least take place in some privacy. (Gemma, who had rolled her eyes at the embracing couples and muttered something about lovesick fools, had made her escape upstairs a few seconds earlier.)
Aware that he likely smelled of horse and the road, Ben nonetheless pulled Sophia into his arms as soon as the door closed behind them. It had been a day and a half since they’d seen one another, but it felt like much longer. And as he kissed her, he felt for the first time what his brother Archer had meant when he described his wife as “home”. Sophia was his home. He knew that now as surely as he knew the sun rose in the east.
“I missed you,” she said against his cheek as she pulled back a little. “Don’t go away for that long again.”
He laughed. “I’m not sure I can promise that. Especially given that I spent fourteen of the past twenty-four hours on a horse. A shorter trip to London from Little Seaford hasn’t been made, I don’t think.”
They moved to a large chair where he sat down and pulled her into his lap. “I was afraid I’d come back to find you’d been kidnapped or worse by the Primbles.” He rested his chin on the top of her head. “I have news.”
She pulled away to look him in the face. “If it’s to tell me you think the Primbles are behind the forgery scheme, then I have the same news.”
Quickly, they each explained the conclusions they’d come to about the couple who ran the Primrose Green colony, and how they’d come about them.
“Lady Celeste was working for the Home Office?” Sophia asked when Ben was finished. “I should have guessed. This explains so much—not only about her knowledge of the forgery scheme, but also Daphne’s search for the Jacobite Cipher and even her suspicions about her own murder. She had an analytical mind and it makes a great deal of sense to think the government would want to take advantage of that.”
“It took me by surprise,” Ben admitted. “Though I suppose I didn’t know her as well as you did.”
Sophia frowned at that. “I didn’t know her.”
“I think you did,” he said gently. “You’ve made a study of her work. You’ve read her diaries. I think you know her as well as anyone she met during her lifetime. Excepting her family, of course.”
That idea seemed to please her and Ben felt a warm glow at the notion.
She laid her cheek against his coat and then sat up again. “You need a bath, sir.”
He saw the saucy grin and knew he was in trouble.
“Do I, Miss Hastings?” he drawled. “And how do you propose to make that happen?”
“You’ll need to be very quiet,” she said with a finger to her lips. “And it will involve a bit of subterfuge.”
“Won’t your fellow house-mates become suspicious if you suddenly disappear into your bedchamber?” he asked with a raised brow. “Not to mention that my horse is currently in your stables.”
She looked disappointed at the news. “The housemates won’t be a problem. We likely won’t see Ivy and Kerr or Daphne and Maitland downstairs for days. But the horse is a problem.”
“Would it make you feel any better if I told you I intended to stay at Beauchamp House to offer you my protection regardless?” he asked.
“Why? Am I in any more danger than I was before?” she asked with a frown. “The Primbles don’t know we’ve realized they’re the forgers.”
“But they do know that Morgan’s scheme with the bishop was unsuccessful,” he said. “And I learned in London that Northman has determined Framingham’s murder was the result of a robbery gone wrong.”
“What?” Sophia asked, her eyes wide. “But that’s absurd. Nothing was missing. And no robber would stab a man that many times just because he’d been found out.”
“You have a more sensible take on the matter than our magistrate,” Ben said wryly. “It’s obvious to me that Framingham was killed by one of his conspirators. And to the Home Office, for that matter. But they will let Northman’s determination stand for the moment because they don’t wish to spook the actual killer. If he feels safe, then perhaps he’ll make a mistake.”
“Whether it was Morgan and his henchman or the Primbles,” Sophia said, a furrow between her brows, “they’ll think they’ve got away with it. I much prefer the notion of them quaking in their boots at the idea of being caught out.”
“I know, my dear,” he said, kissing her nose. “But we’ll need just a few more days of playing along with their scheme before they’re brought down for good.”
“Oh, I know that,” Sophia said with a shrug. “I’ve already determined the perfect way to make the Primbles confess. And once they’re caught, it should be little enough trouble to make them turn on Morgan.”
He should have known she’d have a plan. “You’d better tell me all.”
She shook her head. “First, a bath. Then, I’ll tell you everything.”
“You know it’s highly inappropriate for us to even discuss such things as bathing. Much less for me, a vicar, to contemplate creeping into your bedchamber to have my wicked way with you.”
“You’ve got a special license in your pocket, haven’t you?” she asked with a challenging look.
He patted his breast pocket. “Signed by the archbishop himself.”
“Then unless you plan on abandoning me before we can marry, I don’t see a problem.”
The gossiping tabbies of Little Seaford might think differently, Ben thought wryly. But given that Morgan had already spread rumors about them, staying away from Sophia now would be like shutting the barn door after the horse had got out.
Even so …
“As much as I would love to let you have your wicked way with me in your lair, Wallflower,” he said with genuine regret, “I cannot do further damage to either of our reputations. And now that Kerr and Maitland are returned I know you’ll be safe.”
Sophia grumbled under her breath. Something about vicars and propriety.
But he stood firm.
In more ways than one.
Reluctantly, he lifted her from his lap and stood, grateful his coat would cover the evidence of his arousal when he left the room.
Pulling her into his arms, he kissed her thoroughly.
When they were both breathless, he set her away from him. “Now, I must go. I’ll come back for dinner if I may?”
The drowsy, just kissed look she gave him was almost enough to make him gainsay his own decision. But he steeled himself against it.
“Yes,” she said, with a sigh. “Return for dinner. And we can discuss the plan for routing the Primbles and Morgan.”
He left before his desire to pull her into his arms again overcame his good sense.
* * *
Once Ben was gone, Sophia went to the library in search of her sister. If she couldn’t spend the afternoon in the arms of her betrothed, then she could use it to gather more evidence against the Primbles.
Gemma, as she’d suspected she would be, was curled up in a chair before the fire in the room all the heiresses had decided was their favorite in the house. When Sophia stepped inside, she looked up in surprise.
“I thought you’d be…” she seemed to search for the right word.
Sophia gave a shrug. “My vicar has a stronger sense of propriety than I have. And I daresay he has parish business to attend to, though he didn’t mention it.”
Her sister smiled. “He’s a good man, your vicar.”
It was a relief to hear her sister say the words. Sophia hadn’t really discussed her relationship with Ben with her, and despite her own determination that she’d wed him, she did care what Gemma thought of him. She wouldn’t have rejected him if Gemma had done so, of course, but it gave her a sense of inner peace to know that the one person in the world—aside from him—whose opinion truly mattered to her approved.
“He is,” she agreed, lowering herself into the chair opposite. “And I have a difficult time believing he’s as smitten with me as I am with him.”
“Why?” Gemma asked, closing the scientific journal she’d been reading. “It’s obvious to everyone that he’s smitten. Has been since you first met months ago.”
“How did everyone know this but me?” Sophia asked, shaking her head. “I had no idea. It certainly didn’t occur to me until he sought me out at Morgan’s ball.”
“That’s because until you injured your ankle you didn’t sit still long enough for him to speak to you,” Gemma said with a raised brow. “And you were always surrounded by that gaggle of local gentlemen who were trying desperately to catch your interest.”
Sophia frowned at that. She hadn’t attempted to draw in those men. They simply appeared when she attended a local entertainment. Had they really kept Ben from approaching her?
“Though, I’ll add that he himself was busy dodging the lures of every eligible lady in the village,” Gemma said. “You’re both far too attractive for your own good.”
“You make it sound like a liability,” Sophia groused. Though in truth, it sometimes was.
“Can you honestly say you don’t sometimes wish to fade into the wallpaper?” Gemma asked. “I’ve seen you juggling gentleman at a ball. And I’ve seen the look you give when they aren’t paying attention.”
It was true. Sophia did enjoy lively conversation and always had. But there were times when being the center of attention grew tiresome.
“Then I must be thankful that my turned ankle allowed me the chance to finally slow down.” So many things would be different if she’d decided not to take that walk on the shore. “And to let Benedick catch me.”
They were quiet for a moment in that comfortable way between sisters.
Then Gemma asked, “What have you decided to do about the Primbles?”
Suddenly, Sophia realized she hadn’t shared Ben’s news about Lady Celeste with her sister. Quickly she filled Gemma in on Celeste’s work for the Home Office, and the role she’d been playing to stop the forgery ring.
“I should have guessed it,” Gemma said when she was finished. “It did seem odd that one lady would be involved in so many intrigues, but I suppose I thought she was just interested in many different things. The cipher that Daphne looked for made sense because Lady Celeste was herself interested in puzzles. And the forgeries were in her own village so of course as an artist she’d want to find an answer.”
“Now that we know she was officially working with the Home Office, many things make sense,” Sophia said. “The clues to her own murder she left for Ivy, the quest she left for Daphne relating to the cipher. And now the forgeries.”
“But why didn’t she implicate the Primbles in the letter she left you?” Gemma asked.
“We all have blind spots,” Sophia said with a frown. “Even someone as brilliant as Lady Celeste.”
Still, the fact that her benefactor hadn’t named the Primbles specifically bothered her. There was something they were missing as it related to the forgeries. Something that would give them the insight they needed to catch the perpetrators of the fraud.
“I believe I’d like to take a turn in the garden,” she said to Gemma. She’d been outdoors since her injury, but that had mostly been in the carriage, and it was no longer paining her now She needed fresh air to clear her head. “Would you like to join me?”
Gemma nodded, and stood up from her chair. “Come,” she said, slipping her arm through Sophia’s, “let’s go see if the sea breeze will give us all the answers.”
Moments later, the Hastings sisters were strolling through the garden, which had been designed by Lady Celeste herself. Though it was sunny for spring, there was a chilly breeze and it proved more than Gemma could bear.
“I’m going in to fetch my shawl,” she told Sophia once they’d reached the far end of the stand of ornamental trees near the garden’s edge. “Shall I bring yours as well?”
Sophia tucked a lock of hair that the wind had blown loose behind her ear. “Yes, please,” she said, taking a seat on a stone bench between two lemon trees. She’d brought her walking stick, thankfully, but she still needed occasional breaks for her weakened ankle. “And perhaps my pelisse. I’m not sure my wrap will be enough.”
Gemma left with a promise to return in a few minutes. And Sophia, surrounded as she was by the scents of the garden mingled with the sea air, took a moment to simply appreciate her surroundings. It would have been difficult, back when she and her sister had been living with their parents in their respectable, but cramped townhouse in York, to imagine she’d find herself living on the coast in a house that boasted the most breathtakingly lovely library she could have imagined only a few months later. But here she was.
“I’ve always thought this was a lovely spot.”
The voice startled her, and Sophia turned to see Greaves, his hands clasped behind his back staring out at the horizon beyond the boundary of the garden.
“Oh, Greaves,” she said, pressing a hand to her chest. “You surprised me.”
Something about the man’s demeanor made her uncomfortable. But that was likely the residual effect of their quarrel over the letter from Lady Celeste.
“My apologies, Miss Hastings,” the servant said with a bow. “That was not my intention.”
“Has my sister been delayed?” she asked, wondering why the butler had made it to her side before Gemma.
“I’m afraid Miss Gemma will be unable to rejoin you here for the time being,” he said with what sounded like sincere apology. “She’s been detained.”
“Detained how?” Sophia’s heart began to beat faster, though she managed to keep her alarm from showing on her face. “Is she ill?”
“I was forced to give her a bit of sleeping draught in her tea,” Greaves said conversationally. “But she’ll recover, I assure you. I simply needed her out of the way for a bit.”
Sophia was regretting her decision to choose this particular part of the garden for her reflection. With Greaves blocking the path back to the house, and the open stretch of lawn leading to the chalk cliff, she had no options for escape. Not that her ankle would allow her to get far anyway.
“And why is that?” she asked, attempting to sound more authoritative than she felt. “Is there something you wish to tell me?”
To her horror, he stepped closer, and she saw that he’d been holding a bottle and a cloth behind his back. “Miss Hastings, you know I don’t wish to harm you. So please, don’t fight me.”
But Sophia did fight. She tried to block him using her walking stick, but he must have been anticipating it because he ripped it from her hand and threw it aside. Then, with a strength she’d never have expected from the servant she’d come to hold in some affection over the past months, he grasped her by the arm and thrust the sweet smelling cloth in front of her face and she felt herself losing consciousness.
The last thing she heard before she faded was Greaves saying. “I’m that sorry, Miss Hastings. That sorry.”
&nb
sp; Chapter 26
Despite his attempt to stay away, after a bath, a shave and a change of clothes, Ben found himself on the road back to Beauchamp House some two hours after leaving Sophia and her invitation to visit her chambers.
He was a besotted fool, he thought, as he climbed the steps to the front door, but he didn’t much care. As soon as this business with the forgers was over he would marry Sophia and they’d disappear for a bit where no one could find them.
He’d raised his hand to knock when the door was wrenched open from the inside and he found himself face to face with a stern-looking Lord Kerr.
“Good,” he said without preamble, pulling Ben into the house and shutting the door behind him. “I was on my way to fetch you.”
“What is it?” Ben asked, alarm coursing through him a the other man’s manner. “Where is Sophia?”
He’d known he shouldn’t have left her here, but his damned sense of propriety had made him go back to the vicarage.
“We don’t know,” Kerr said, his jaw tight with anger. “And we can’t find Greaves either.”
At this, Ben went cold. “Damn it.”
“What is it?” Kerr asked. “Do you know something?”
Quickly, Ben explained about Greaves withholding the letter Lady Celeste had left for Sophia. “We both thought it odd, but Sophia was convinced he’d done it out of affection for her. To protect her from becoming involved the investigation into the forgeries. But it’s possible that was just an excuse when she caught him out. His affection for her seemed genuine, but your guess is as good as mine whether it was an act.”
Kerr swore under his breath. “I wish you’d told me about this before. This man has been here with all the ladies for days at a time. And we thought they were safe.”
“And it would appear that they were safe,” Ben retorted, thrusting a hand through his hair. “With the exception of Sophia.”
Following the marquess into the drawing room, he found that the rest of the household—minus Sophia, of course—was gathered there. Gemma, her face pale, was lying on the settee looking much the worse for wear.
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