by Wedded Bliss
They were cold, besides. And bored. And cramped, now that they were fully awake. And Willy needed to relieve himself. “I miss Mama,” he said.
“So do I.”
“Do you think she got our message yet?”
“I don’t know. That rider had a mean smile. Maybe he took the letter and ripped it up.”
“She’ll worry, when she remembers to look for us.”
“She might cry.”
Tears formed in Willy’s green eyes. Kendall pretended it was too dark to see, and the noise of the wheels was too loud to hear his brother’s sniffles.
At the next stop, which seemed like ages later, Kendall heard the driver tell Lawrence that they were almost halfway to Oxford. Only halfway? Their jug of cider was gone, and their last apple. And Willy had to relieve himself. But what if the driver was in a hurry and left without them while they were in the bushes?
“We’d better talk to Lawrence.”
So they walked into the inn, Kendall holding on to the back of Willy’s collar. Young Mr. Canover was sitting at a table there, counting out the coins the earl had given him—into the hands of a serving girl who could have used her ample bosom for a shelf. Instead she was using it as a deposit bank, stuffing the coins down the front of her gown. Lawrence’s eyes followed every ha’penny piece.
“Hallo, Lawrence,” Kendall called when they were halfway through the room. “We decided that we want to go home.”
Lawrence dragged his eyes away from the vault he fully expected to visit before his driver finished his meal. When he caught sight of the boys, he leaped to his feet, dropping the rest of his purse. “He’ll kill me!” was all he said, head swiveling from side to side in search of the earl, or a back way out of the inn.
“Not if you take us home,” Willy offered.
Then Lawrence cursed like the army trooper he aspired to become, after he became a rake and a womanizer. The serving girl, laughing, went off with his money. “Come find me when you tuck your little brothers in their beds tonight. Although the older one might be ready for a little—”
Lawrence hauled the boys out of the inn. Tonight? They were not staying another minute, if he had his way. Unfortunately, the hired driver did not see the need to rush back to London.
“I got my orders, I do. I take you straight to your school in Oxford, with no side trips; that’s what the governor said. And what he’s payin’ me for. I ain’t takin’ you nowheres else, nor the kiddies, neither.”
“But they are the earl’s sons! He’ll want them back.”
“Thought you called ’em Hennings.”
Lawrence almost pulled the hair out of his head. “Lord Rockford married their mother. They are his. I swear it!”
“Like you swore you was just askin’ that trollop for another glass of ale?”
“But we can’t leave them here. The earl will have my head on a plate as is, if my brother does not shoot me first. And Lady Rockford will be distraught. You don’t want any countess going into a decline, do you?”
Willy was eating an apple tart. Kendall was watching anxiously. The driver scratched his head. “Well, I suppose we can take ’em along to Oxford. Then I can drive the bantlings back to town tonight. Goin’ there anyway, I am.”
That was the best Lawrence could do. After a humiliating conversation with the barmaid, he got his money back, enough to bribe the driver to let the boys meet their cousins. They had come all this way, he told the jarvey, and it would be a shame for them to leave without seeing the duke’s sons.
Earl’s sons, duke’s sons, it was all the same to the driver, but he waited while Lawrence explained to his headmaster about the need to find two university scholars to take charge of their young cousins. The headmaster saw prospective students and sought the earl’s favor, if not the duke’s, so he sent a note to a colleague of his. Within minutes, it seemed, the Duke of Hysmith’s sons appeared; Magnus, the Marquis of Henfield, the heir, and Lord Bertram Henning, the spare.
Both of the young men had their father’s somewhat stocky build, but neither had his superior air. In fact, they thought their little cousins were game ’uns, full of pluck. They remembered their uncle William, who had been an idol to them when they were no older than Will, and were prepared to befriend his children.
Lawrence happily surrendered the Henning boys into their cousins’ care, who instantly decided that the lads could not be entrusted to a mere hired coachman. They would accompany Lady Rockford’s sons back to London—and get a look at their estranged aunt, besides. Their father would not be pleased with the families’ mingling, nor would he approve their absence from school, but he’d never find out, they told themselves. The little Hennings would never cry rope on their magnificent new cousins, and the driver would only report to Rockford. They were safe.
And they were on their way to London, where one of their friends kept a handy flat and an openhanded opera dancer.
*
Alissa could not get Jake to drive any faster. Then, when he did, one of the wheels hit a rut, and they had to crawl to the nearest inn to have the wheel straightened. The wheelwright had to be awakened and offered a generous bonus to work at night. The moon was covered now, with rain on the way. The temperature was dropping too, so the precipitation might fall as sleet, Jake warned. They might not be able to go on tonight.
Alissa could not, would not accept that. She would hire postilions to carry lanterns. She would hire a horse to ride. She would walk to Oxford if need be. Jake shook his head and told her he would talk to her after supper, after the wheel was repaired.
The food was well prepared and ample, the inn’s best in honor of their titled guest, but Alissa could not eat. How could she, when her boys might be hungry? She had never been apart from them for an entire day before, much less a night. She kept going to the window of the private parlor Jake had taken for her and Aminta’s use, wiping her hand across the fogged glass, trying to see out into the dark night.
Amy had hardly eaten all day and was hungry, so she sampled the innkeeper’s wife’s cooking: the pigeon pie and the turbot in oyster sauce, the loin chops and the steamed pudding. Then she excused herself to use the necessary at the rear of the building.
She never returned.
Alissa thought Amy was back when the parlor door opened, but it was only the innkeeper’s wife with a tray of tea and biscuits. Alissa thanked the woman, then asked her to see if Amy needed assistance.
Amy was not using the convenience, had not gone upstairs to lie down, had not joined Jake in the taproom, had certainly not gone for a walk in the steady rain that was now falling. She was gone. Vanished. Like the boys.
*
Rockford pushed his horses nearly to their limit. He stopped at every tollbooth, and knew he was mere minutes behind his wife. He should have passed her by now, though, he calculated, trying to see through the rain. The roads were getting muddy, the visibility next to nothing, until it was growing unsafe to continue. His clothes were already sodden in the open curricle despite his caped riding coat, with shards of frozen rain finding their way down his back. She had to be somewhere just ahead. He urged his tired horses onward.
At the next toll, the keeper told him that only one carriage had passed by the last hour, a shabby rig that held a man and a woman inside. Their surly, broken-nosed driver had asked about the nearest inns.
Rockford did not care about some battered coachman’s manners, only that his wife had not passed this way. She must have taken shelter somewhere earlier, for he would have seen a mired coach. He was glad—and surprised—that Alissa had sense enough to cease her mad dash through the night and the rain. Jake and Aminta must have insisted, he thought, for Alissa would ordinarily have killed herself, the horses, and anyone coming between her and her sons.
Rockford stayed at the tollbooth, contemplating his choices. He could press on toward Oxford, where the boys must have arrived and must have found shelter either with Lawrence Canover or the duke’s sons. Or he could b
acktrack and spend the night in some cozy inn, with a warm fire, warmed punch, and his warming wife.
He turned the horses back toward London so fast their hooves kicked up a tidal wave of mud and muck. The toll taker cursed until Rockford threw him a coin.
*
The duke did not bother making inquiries. He was wet and tired, and far too old for this kind of derring-do, racing about the kingdom in an open phaeton. His arms ached from holding the ribbons of his high-bred pair—but he’d be hanged before he let Lady Eleanor take them. She was just as wet and cold as he was, his grace knew, the hot bricks from the last stop long gone useless, but she only complained about his driving, not the conditions. He pressed on, rather than let the lady find him lacking in manly fortitude. She said the Henning children were in Oxford visiting his heirs, so he was going to drive her to Oxford, by Hades.
His sons were not in their dormitories, however, not in Oxford at all. They had gone back to London with some country cousins after supper, Henfield’s roommate reported after a bit of intimidation on the duke’s part. They could be halfway there by now, or holed up at some tavern to wait out the weather. He could have passed them on the road if his eye had been on the other vehicles, instead of on his passenger. Blast.
His grace had a choice similar to Rockford’s. He could stay in Oxford for the night, where he was well known at every decent hotel. His companion would be duly noted, and grist for the rumor mills by morning, whether they took separate chambers or not. Lady Eleanor was traveling alone with him, at night, contrary to all the dictates of polite society. Or he could head back the way they had come, finding a smaller, out-of-the-way inn where no one knew either of them, and continue the afternoon’s conversation in private.
“You always were a cow-handed driver,” Eleanor shouted as she clutched the seat rail beside her with one hand and her hat with the other.
*
Rockford recognized his carriage in the inn yard of the third hostelry he tried. He almost did not recognize the distraught woman who threw herself into his arms as soon as he entered the private parlor the landlord directed him to.
“I knew you would come!” she cried. Her eyes were red and puffy, and her hair hung down in damp curls. Her russet traveling gown was sadly rumpled, and her hems were muddied. He thought she looked beautiful. She felt beautiful pressed against him too, so he forgot the cold and the wet and the mud. He could not forget that she’d left London without him, though. He set her aside to take a hot rum toddy from the innkeeper.
As soon as the man was gone, he said, “If you knew I would come, dash it, why the devil didn’t you wait for me? Didn’t you trust me to keep my word that I would look after all of you? Or did you think I was dallying with some Austrian countess?” He’d been trying to honor his marriage vows, and her lack of confidence in him rankled.
Alissa was shredding her handkerchief. “No, no, I never thought—”
“Precisely. Here I have had to worry about you for hours, besides the children. You should have stayed in town while I went to fetch the boys. You would have, if you had any faith in me.”
“I had to go. They are my sons.”
“Mine now, too. Those were your rules.”
“And my sister.”
“Your sister?”
So Alissa had to tell him that Aminta was gone. That the coach was not repaired yet. That the innkeeper predicted the roads would be impassable come morning if the rain kept up. That a scarred man had been seen stepping out of a carriage, but he never came inside the inn.
“Bloody hell. Ganyon. That gatesman said another coach had gone through an hour before me. At least we know which direction he took. I’ll set out as soon as they can find me a horse to ride. The curricle would get bogged down before I reached that tollbooth.”
“I am coming too. Amy needs me.”
“Absolutely not. It is too dangerous for you to ride, much less confront Sir George and his driver, who I suspect is Fred Nivens.”
Alissa shuddered. “All the more reason for me to go.”
“No! Amy is my sister now too, and it is my job to protect her and you and the children, do you hear? Mine, and no one else’s.”
The duke walked in then. “Sorry to steal your thunder, old chap, but I have come to lend assistance.”
Rockford set down his drink and looked past Hysmith to see his sister, resembling something the cat would have left outside on the doorstep. “You brought my sister? I’ll strangle you this time, for sure.”
Eleanor giggled, a very strange, girlish sound to come from the earl’s spinster sister. “If you kill him, he won’t be able to make an honest woman out of me.”
The duke harrumphed a few times, then held his hand out for Rockford to shake. Alissa hugged Lady Eleanor, while the earl told his second-time brother-in-law-to-be about Aminta’s disappearance. The boys would have to wait.
“If that dastard is desperate enough to make off with an innocent female,” the duke said, “then you need help. There are two of them, you say? You might think those are good odds, but you still need someone to watch your back.”
Rockford nodded reluctantly and left to find the innkeeper to see about horses. Before he reached the door, he nearly tripped over Mr. Canover, who was carrying Billy. The boy’s complexion was as green as rotten cabbage. He smelled like it, too. Hugo trailed slowly at the tutor’s side. Four young hounds barked and bayed and bounded at their feet, sliding on the polished wood floor.
“Bloody hell!” Rockford yelled. “You brought my sons—my poor, sickly sons—out in a storm? This time you won’t be merely dismissed; you’ll be decapitated!”
“No, Father,” Hugo said, trying to stand tall despite his weariness. “Mr. Canover did not take us. He came with us, for we were going to come help find Kendall and Willy on our own. With the dogs.”
“Hugo was as bossy as you, Papa,” Billy added proudly, now from Alissa’s arms.
By this time everyone was in the entry of the inn.
The duke raised his quizzing glass as if to examine a new species of insect. “Your heir, Rockford, I presume?”
Hugo squared his shoulders and made a proper bow. “Viscount Rothmore, sir, at your service.” Then he collapsed. Luckily the innkeeper caught him before Hugo’s head hit the inn’s registry desk. Two of the innkeeper’s sons were trying to gather the dogs before they destroyed the furnishings.
The innkeeper’s wife, trying to figure where she was to put so many high-toned guests, and who shared which bedroom, took over. She took Billy from Alissa’s arms as if he were a kitten, and said, “Here, now, I’ll take care of the wee ones. I’ve had seven of my own, I have, so I know all about youngsters and what ails them. My boys will take the pups out to the stable. You folks worry about finding the young miss.”
“The young miss?” Canover yelped, looking around frantically. “You’ve lost Amy?” He turned accusing eyes on Rockford. “You’ll answer to me for that, my lord.”
Rockford groaned. Just what he needed, an overweight duke and a moonstruck tutor.
And his aunt. Lady Winchwood predictably swooned when she heard Amy was missing. Claymore staggered, but caught her. Then he had to lower her to the floor. He sank down beside her, gasping. “Sorry, my lord.”
The duke’s lips twitched, until Lady Eleanor poked her elbow into his ribs. “Well, Rockford, what is our plan?”
“To kill those bastards, of course.”
“Not so fast, my lord,” the Bow Street Runner said, limping into the inn, brushing rainwater off his shoulders. “This is a criminal matter now, and as such has to be handled by the courts.”
“The courts can handle what’s left after I find Ganyon and his bully. Can you ride?” When the Runner nodded, Rockford gestured toward the tutor. “See if you can locate a map of the area. Hysmith, you check with the stables about horses. Claymore, ask about nearby inns. I’ll see what weapons are available.” He told the innkeeper, “We’ll need hot drinks and blankets, too,
whatever you can spare. We’ll meet back here in half an hour.”
Alissa helped him gather an arsenal from the various coaches and the inn, besides the personal pistols he and the duke carried. She handed him Henning’s old pistol, but he made her keep it, just in case.
Then he opened his arms. “I need to hold you, just for a moment.”
But the moment continued. Alissa pressed herself to him as if she might never have the chance again, and he kissed her as if he were drowning and her breath were the only air keeping him alive. Her arms wrapped around his damp shoulders and his hands kneaded her back, then her waist, then her derriere. She reached under his coat to touch his chest, separated from her fingers only by the thin fabric of his shirt. He reached under the neckline of her gown to touch her breast, separated from his fingers by nothing. He groaned. She whimpered. He used his tongue to echo the thrust he ached for; she answered by pressing her hips against his hardness. He whimpered. She groaned.
His hand reached down to lift her skirts. “Now. I need you now.”
“Now?” Her hands fell away and she stepped back, straightening her bodice. Her face was flushed and her breath came in short gasps. “Now? You want to make love now? My sister has been abducted, my sons are missing in the night. Your sons are upstairs, ill, and your sister is facing possible disgrace. You are riding off to face ruthless, barbaric ruffians with a ragtag group of rescuers. And everyone is meeting here, in this very room, in less than fifteen minutes.”
“So…? The door has a lock.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine