The sharp report of a gun being fired out in the quiet street startled a yelp out of Neville and stopped Spencer abruptly. He still held his wife to his chest and off her feet, but now he stared, horrified, into her frightened blue eyes as her beloved face filled his vision.
“Edward!” Spencer whispered, shock and fear robbing him of his strength. He had sent Edward out front to move the horses.
* * *
In an instant, Victoria was free of Spencer and on her feet. “Could that be Edward who fired his gun?”
“I am about to go find out. Stay here.”
Victoria made as if to bolt for the door, but got no farther than one step before Spencer pulled her back. “No!” He grabbed her arm. “It could be a trick, a way to get us to stupidly step outside where we’d be—”
“But Edward could be hurt—”
“I am aware of that. But I must first think of you.”
“Me?” Victoria tugged against her husband’s hold on her. “I am not in danger. It’s Edward who is. We have to help—”
“I am trying to do exactly that. Do you have your gun?” His voice brooked no argument.
Victoria stilled in his grip and frowned at him. “Yes, of course I do.”
“Then draw it and keep it ready to use. Hold it like this.” Releasing her, standing between her and the door across the room, he demonstrated by pulling his gun from its holster and holding it pointed toward the ceiling, his elbow bent. “Don’t let anyone but me or Edward into this room—”
“I’m not going to be in this room.” Victoria pulled her gun out of her waistband.
Spencer’s eyebrows shot up, making him look like a parent whose child had sassed him. “Yes, you most certainly will be.”
She watched him worriedly glance over to the windows that showed a framed view of the street outside. Already, in his mind, Victoria could tell, he had dismissed her and was several steps ahead in his thinking. And whatever he was envisioning, it did not include her. Stubborn to the end, she announced, loudly: “No, I will not be here, Spencer. I am going with you.”
Tall, dark, muscular … armed and dangerous … he snapped his gaze back to hers and held it in a viselike glare. Clearly he hadn’t expected a second round of disobedience. “I have already spoken, and I expect—”
Neville bayed, lending the sound an impatient tone. Spencer jerked around to face the dog. By sidestepping her husband, Victoria saw the bloodhound had his sensitive black nose pressed hard to the closed door’s jamb. He whined and shook all over in clear impatience to get outside.
Spencer turned again to Victoria, showing her he looked cool and determined. He gripped her arm firmly as though to emphasize his point. “I am ordering you to stay here.”
She yanked her arm from his grip. “And I am telling you I will not.”
Spencer shoved a hand through his hair. “For God’s sake, Victoria, I am trying to think of you and Edward. And you should be thinking of the baby, if you won’t think of yourself.”
“I always think of the baby. Have I hurt it yet? No. The baby is perfectly fine. I’m also thinking of you—and Edward, whom we both care deeply about. So if you’re going out there, John Spencer Whitfield, then I am going with you. What if you leave me here and rush out there alone and get yourself killed, and Edward is already wounded or worse? There will be no one left to defend me. Have you thought of that?”
“Madam, that is the most convoluted bit of thinking I have ever—”
“Is it? Well, then, for another thing—and I have told you this once already today—if you get killed, then I don’t want to live, either. So there.” She pursed her lips together stubbornly and stared, unblinking, at her husband.
Spencer gritted his teeth … no doubt to keep a shout of frustration in check. Then he said, very quietly: “All right, you win. Let’s go. But you stay behind me.”
“I intended to do just that. You make a much bigger target and a better shield than I do.” Frowning in concentration, Victoria checked her weapon, wondering how the devil these things worked. She’d only fired one once or twice before and that was with Jefferson taking care of all the catches and hammers and whatnot. Victoria suddenly realized it was awfully quiet in the room. She glanced up to see Spencer, a dubious expression on his face, watching her actions with the weapon.
“Do you actually know how to use a gun, Victoria?”
“Of course I do.” She held it up as he’d just shown her to do. “I’m ready. And don’t you dare let anything happen to Neville. I’ve loved him a lot longer than I have you.”
Spencer muttered something under his breath that Victoria judged not to be an endearment. Immediately, he drew his own weapon, turned, and crossed the room in no more than four or five bounding steps. Victoria was right on his heels. With Neville nosed against the jamb, he was first out in the hallway as Spencer wrenched open the parlor door that Edward had slammed behind him not more than five minutes ago. Victoria could hardly stand to think about the dear earl, so afraid was she of seeing his bleeding body on the ground outside. And poor Spencer, what he must be going through with the same thoughts.
Her heart in her throat, and herself right behind her husband, who was right behind Neville, they again bunched up at the closed front door. Cursing, Spencer steadily prodded, with a booted foot, at Neville, trying to get him behind him with Victoria. “Madam, hold on to your dog so I can get to the door!”
For once obedient, and more than a little frightened about what truly awaited them out in the street, Victoria grabbed Neville’s scruff and hauled back on him. In the same second, Spencer ripped open the front door. As she had expected him to rush outside, she was already in motion, and her forward momentum was such that she and Neville collided with her husband’s back as he stood immobile in the doorway. In the next second, Victoria realized what he’d done. He’d stopped cold to keep her and the dog behind him until he could see if they faced any immediate danger.
The man stupidly and bravely intended to take any bullets that might have been coming their way. Victoria’s soul twisted itself into knots. “No, Spencer!” She let go of Neville and pounded helplessly on Spencer’s back with her open palm. “Don’t you dare—”
“It’s all right, Victoria. Come on.”
How could it be all right? They’d heard gunfire. In the second it took Victoria to think that, Spencer and Neville vacated the doorway and were gone, darting to their left across the abbreviated porch with its decorative wrought-iron railing. That way led to the steps down from the elevated main entrance to the sidewalk, Victoria knew—and Spencer was leaving her behind.
Waving her gun wildly, she took off after him, all but stumbling down the steps and holding on to the iron handrail. She achieved the sidewalk and squatted behind Spencer, who was crouched behind the hedges that fronted the steps. With Neville standing alertly in front of him, Spencer raised his head only enough to be able to rove his gaze over the street and the square across the way. After several seconds of this, he was apparently satisfied that they were safe because he said: “Come on. Stay behind me and keep your weapon ready. And try not to shoot me.”
Victoria forswore comment as she inched out of their cover and followed his careful stalking northward up the street, looking in every direction at once, it seemed, until they were about two houses away from the Atherton abode. There, he stood in the middle of the street, looking both ways. Victoria surmised that oncoming traffic was not his concern, but any sudden and sneaking movements were. But it was the oddest thing: The street was quiet and empty. And no bleeding body littered the ground … thankfully, of course. “We did hear a gun being fired, didn’t we, Spencer?”
He turned slowly in a circle, looking, always looking. “Yes.”
“Where do you suppose Edward is?”
“God alone knows. But wherever he is, he will have heard the shot, too, and will be taking precautions.”
She felt so vulnerable, being out in the middle of the street. “S
houldn’t we go check on him, just to be sure?”
Now facing south, back toward the corner-situated Atherton house, Spencer directed a long-suffering look her way. “I would love to go check on Edward, who is presumably out back with the horses. However, with you insistently one step behind me I am reluctant to investigate until I know what is afoot. As there have been no other shots fired, the one we heard could simply be someone … just shooting off his gun.”
“That doesn’t seem likely, Spencer.”
“I am aware of that, Victoria.”
Given the irritated tone of his voice, Victoria decided a wiser policy might be to help her husband survey their surroundings. In doing so, she happened to look up and over to her right. Her attention arrested on the frightened faces of the Atherton servants on the third floor. All bunched around one closed and narrow window, their eyes rounded, they gesticulated wildly, as if trying to tell her something. “Spencer, look up there. Why are they doing that, all that gesturing?”
He directed his gaze to where she indicated. “No doubt, they believe we are leaving them locked up there and wish to remind us of their presence.”
Victoria searched Spencer’s face, wondering if he made more of their antics than he was saying. He’d do that, she knew, not to worry her. But he also wouldn’t tell her that was what he was doing. So there was no sense in asking him. Just then, Neville crossed in front of them and trotted over to the parklike square on Victoria and Spencer’s left. His tail wagged as he quickly nosed around the grassy areas and the beds of shrubs and flowers.
“Neville doesn’t seem too concerned,” Spencer said, sounding as if he meant to reassure himself as much as he did her.
“No, he doesn’t,” Victoria replied, just as absently. Indeed the dog merrily nosed every bush or tree trunk he passed. To Victoria’s experienced eye, Neville looked more to be searching for an appropriate place to relieve himself than he did for the telling scent of a bad man. Sure enough, Neville hiked his leg against a carefully chosen tree. Exasperated, she turned to Spencer, opening her mouth to remark on the dog’s—
“Stay where you are—I have you surrounded! Drop your weapons!”
CHAPTER 21
The startling warning had Victoria gasping her shock. Confused, alert, she tightened her grip on her gun and quickly looked to Spencer … who, strangely, looked more perturbed and disgusted than he did alert to danger. At first, Victoria could make no sense of this. But then, her mind finally identified the voice, and she could have cried in relief.
Spencer ran a hand over his eyes. Looking very bleak, he said, quietly, to her: “The man is an idiot. I ought to shoot him myself.”
“Don’t you dare! That’s Edward around the corner of the house, isn’t it?”
“Of course it’s Edward. Do you know any other idiots?” Spencer pointed at her. “Do not feel compelled to answer that.” He followed this by calling out to his cousin: “Edward, you fool, it’s us. Victoria and me.”
“I heard a gun being fired,” he called back from his hiding place, obviously around the far corner of the Atherton house.
Again, Spencer muttered something no doubt unflattering under his breath. “We heard a gun being fired, too,” he called out. “Why do you think we’re out here?”
“You came rushing out to the middle of the street, after hearing a gun being fired? That doesn’t seem too brilliant.”
“We did not simply rush outside, Edward,” Spencer was saying. “And, apparently, whoever fired a gun did so in no relation to us because there appears to be no danger out here now except for that which you pose. Furthermore, since you mentioned being less than brilliant, Your Lordship, I feel compelled to point out that you cannot, by yourself, surround three people—”
“Two people and a dog,” Victoria corrected … without thinking.
Spencer darted his exasperated gaze her way but said nothing to her as he continued his harangue of his cousin. “Unless you have enlisted the horses on your side and have armed them and conveyed your intentions to them somehow and spread them out around us, you alone cannot have us surrounded, Edward.”
To Victoria’s ear, Spencer sounded like an angry little boy who has been forced, yet again, to stop the game in progress and explain, once more, the simple rules to a particularly dull playmate. With Spencer, she waited for Edward’s reply. He always had one. But this time … nothing. She looked to Spencer, who quirked his lips together in a clear sign of impatience.
“Edward?” Spencer’s sharp bark of sound was met with continued silence. Victoria heard the metallic clicking that she recognized as that of a gun being cocked … and it was Spencer doing so. A sudden resurgence of fear tightened her chest and her grip on her gun.
Just then, Neville passed into her line of vision as he padded back across the street. His business in the square apparently conducted, the bloodhound stopped on the sidewalk in front of the Atherton house. His great head was cocked to one side in curiosity as he stared approximately where Edward would make an appearance, if he actually did. As the dog’s tail stopped wagging and he gave an impression of heightened wariness, something fearful quickened inside Victoria.
“Edward?” Spencer called out again, his tone exploratory. He waited another second or two and then added, “Come out this instant before I feel compelled to come over there and thrash the daylights out of you.”
And still, nothing happened. Victoria spared Neville another glance. He stood stock-still, every muscle tensed, his head up and alert. Victoria moved closer to Spencer and clutched at his sleeve. “Spencer,” she all but whispered, “look at Neville.”
Though Spencer never looked away from the far corner of the Atherton house across the way, he said: “I see him. Get behind me.” He darted his gaze to her. “And don’t argue.”
“But Neville, Spencer,” she whimpered, frightened for them all.
“He’s a smart dog. A fighter. He can take care of himself. Now, do it, Victoria. Get behind me. And try not to shoot me in the back with that gun you’re dangling about.”
Minding her weapon, Victoria did as ordered and positioned herself behind her husband … but she did peek around his solid bulk. Several quiet seconds ticked off the clock. Nothing happened. Then, one second he wasn’t there, and the next he was. Edward appeared from around the side of the house, weaponless, his hands in the air. “Oh, Spencer, I don’t like how this looks,” Victoria whispered.
“I don’t, either,” Spencer drawled, his attention still fixed on his cousin. “Victoria, quickly now, get away from me and go to the square. Hurry. Get behind a tree and stay there until … it’s all over and I tell you to come out.”
Fearful heartache gripped her. “No, I will not, Spencer. I won’t leave you. I won’t. Whatever happens, we’ll face it together.”
“This is no time for silly bravery, Victoria. Now, go.”
“You’re the one being brave and silly, making yourself a target like this. Don’t think I don’t know what you’re doing. I won’t go unless you go with me.”
Spencer made a sound of disgust. “I cannot run and hide. It’s too late for that. Whoever is responsible—and I think we both know who is—for Edward being unarmed and with his hands up has already seen us, or he wouldn’t have a need to present Edward as his hostage. I am in a stronger position to remain standing here where he can clearly see me and so may not feel a need to do something dramatic and fatal, like shoot Edward, to get me to show my—”
He’d cut off his own words and inhaled sharply. “Look who’s decided to join Edward. Just as we feared.”
Victoria directed her gaze southward to the Atherton house and saw, standing close behind Edward, a tall, brown-haired man.
“Oh, no,” she said on her exhalation. Though she wasn’t the least bit surprised, though they’d been expecting him all along, she was still shocked. Here then was the showdown. It just didn’t seem real, not here in the quiet, elegant streets of Savannah, surrounded by tall oaks and neat bed
s of flowers. “Loyal Atherton. As sure as I’m alive, he’s got a gun on Edward.”
“Yes, he does.”
From the angle of Edward’s bent head, it was obvious to Victoria that Loyal was talking to him. Apparently, the heartless villain thought his appearance and the gun he held to Edward’s back was sufficient to keep her and Spencer in place for the moment. And he was right—it was. “What is Edward doing?”
“If I know him, he’s trying to talk the honorable”—this said very sarcastically—“Mr. Atherton out of killing him and me. I don’t think he’s going to be able to do so, not at this late date.”
Though despair filled her, making her want to lie down in the middle of the street and curl up in a tiny, whimpering ball, Victoria stood strong. “Sometimes I wish Miss Cicely was wrong, Spencer. She said he would be here. He was the one who fired that gun, wasn’t he?”
“Yes. He was shooting at us is my guess. And I suspect—belatedly, stupidly—that there’s a brick on the Atherton house, one right next to the parlor window, with a chunk shot out of it. He saw us inside, embracing, became enraged and fired his gun; then heard Edward coming, ran off around the near corner of his house and circled around behind him. It’s the only thing that makes sense. However, if the man is a poor enough marksman to miss a target the size of that plate-glass window, then there is hope for us all.”
What he didn’t say, but what Victoria realized, was there was hope for her and Spencer, standing so far away, but not for Edward, who stood mere inches from Loyal. “I hate this, Spencer, that it would come to this. All this time I thought it had to do with Jefferson—”
“It does. But Mr. Atherton has needed you for his scheme to work. And now, with you married, it’s all fallen apart … unless he can eliminate me—and Edward, an inconvenient witness—then concoct some story for the public and the law, and coerce you into marrying him.”
To Make a Marriage Page 34