The Governess of Penwythe Hall

by Sarah E. Ladd

  Delia was here.

  They were here.

  And after tonight life would never be the same.

  Chapter 49

  Delia discarded her cloak. It was too hot. Too binding. Too dangerous and cumbersome on the cliffs. Her boots were not intended to traverse such harsh terrain, and more than once a cry had escaped her lips as her foot slipped on the wet rocks.

  Adding to the difficulty of maneuvering on the uneven landscape, Thomas’s thick fingers dug into her arm and squeezed with each step. She tried to jerk free, but he gripped tighter.

  “How much farther is it?” he grunted through clenched teeth.

  “Close.”

  They’d already made their way through the cliffs. A man and a boy she did not recognize were on the other side of Thomas, and Mr. Simon trailed behind them. She cast him another look of disgust. Disdain for the man who had betrayed her and Liam intensified with each step.

  All around her narrow caves with walls of stone and rock jutted inward. Some were dead ends. Others opened after small gaps. She set her gaze on the one straight ahead of her as the moon flitted out from behind the clouds. The last time she had been here, Robert had been gripping her hand, refusing to release it. The memory tightened her throat. “There, that one.”

  “You go in first.” Thomas released his hold on her, thrust his lantern in her hand, and pushed her forward.

  Delia looked back at Mr. Simon. Their gazes locked. She could see it in his eyes. Shock. Dismay. Perhaps even regret. Perhaps he’d initially thought himself clever to keep an eye on her in exchange for money. Perhaps he even considered it easy income. But now the wideness of his eyes and the tightness of his mouth told another story.

  He’d clearly underestimated the Greythornes. He didn’t have the benefit of knowing the family’s reputation before he accepted his thirty pieces of silver.

  She thought of Jac’s words. “Everything will be fine. This time tomorrow we will back at Penwythe Hall. All of us.”

  Once at the cave Robert had shown her all those years ago, Delia knelt low to fit through the opening. She had not actually gone inside the night he brought her, but she’d watched him enter. Now, with naught but the small lantern as her guide, she crawled through the black space. As the walls grew tighter, panic began to knock. Her skirt caught and tore on the jagged rock. But then the ceiling lifted, and she could stand once more. Her yellow lantern light flickered on two tunnels.

  “Which one?” Thomas growled.

  “I—I don’t know. I didn’t come in this far.”

  He shoved her to the side, slamming her against the wall, ignoring her cry of pain as a stone dug into her arm. He stomped down the path to the left. A slew of curses rang out, and then he reappeared, the lines of his face hard and ominous. He glared at Delia and pointed a thick finger at her. “This had better not be a trick or so help me, I’ll kill you with my bare hands.”

  Without shifting his glare he pounded down the path to the right, and then laughter, low and sinister, bounced back from the hard rock. “Ah, Robert, you never did steer your brother wrong, did you?”

  The shadows shifted as he reappeared with a wooden crate, as wide as his shoulders, in his hands. “Abraham, get in here. Get this to the shore.”

  Delia pressed her back against the wall, hoping to be invisible as the man he called Abraham carried out crate after crate. What the wooden boxes contained she did not know, nor did she know how Robert had obtained them. But she knew the truth—however he got them was illegal.

  And to him, it had been worth risking his life for.

  Perspiration trickled into her eye. The longer she felt trapped in the darkness, the more desperation crept in. She wanted out of here. She needed to be out of here.

  She forced her mind to picture the orchards. Their overhead emerald canopies and the freedom and lightness she felt beneath their boughs. They would be there soon—all of them. Jac had promised her.

  Suddenly a gunshot shattered the mental image. Loud. Clear. Unmistakable.

  Her hand flew to her mouth and she stifled a scream. Distant shouts resounded, and she snapped her gaze to Thomas. He rushed her, pistol drawn. He stopped inches from her face and hissed, “Who did you tell?”

  “No one,” she lied, unable to look away from the hardness in his eyes. “I told no one.”

  He growled and grabbed a smaller crate and tossed it near the door before he clenched her arm once again. He shoved her toward the entrance.

  She stumbled and fell. Stone ripped through her sleeve and flesh, deeper than before. Searing pain radiated and she scrambled to her feet. He continued to force her through the narrow space until they were clear of the jagged walls.

  Salty air forced its way into her lungs, and she gasped at the freshness of it. She was free of the cave now, but danger still held her captive. Wind whipped her hair in front of her eyes, obscuring her vision. Thomas’s sinewy arm wrapped around her waist from behind, fairly lifting her off her feet, and the cold metal of his pistol raked against her cheek. “I’ll show you what happens to those who inform on the Greythornes.”

  Desperate and at his mercy, she glanced down to her right. The cliffs dropped off steeply to the shadowed beach where crates littered the sandy floor, and a boat bobbed in the water.

  Another shot rang out. And then another.

  Her stomach clenched. She squeezed her eyes shut, thinking she might be sick.

  Thomas’s grip on her tightened.

  Prayer after prayer raced through her head. Safety for Jac, Horace, and Liam. Deliverance for her. Justice to be brought on the Greythornes.

  A bullet fired and scraped against the stone right near her head. She screamed and lunged back, and before she knew it, Thomas yanked her back to the entrance of the cave, where Greythorne’s men had been stacking the crates, undoubtedly in preparation to get them down to the beach.

  He threw her farther into the cave and belted his pistol. He reached for more crates. “Get rid of this. Hide it best you can. Now! Simon, what are you waiting for?”

  When she turned around, she saw Mr. Simon again. In the frenzied activity she had almost forgotten he was there. But his gaze was not fixed on her. It was fixed on Thomas behind her—as was his pistol.

  “What are you doing?” Thomas bellowed, eyeing Mr. Simon’s weapon. He moved to draw his own pistol, but to her surprise, Simon stepped even closer to her brother-in-law, his pistol aimed straight at Thomas’s chest.

  “Delia, get out of here. Now.” Simon’s words were low. His gaze did not leave Thomas. “Liam is at Greythorne House.”

  When she hesitated, he shouted, “Go!”

  She lifted her tattered skirts and rushed from the cave, bouncing against the low walls and scraping her head against the low ceiling in her haste until she emerged outside. The wind caught her and disrupted her delicate balance on the uneven terrain, but without looking back she took the quickest route away.

  She had to get to the top. To the moors. Back to where the land was familiar and she could find her way for help.

  Higher and higher she climbed, then, from the rock above, a strong hand grabbed hers. Upon instinct she jerked to free herself. She struggled and pulled, but the hand did not let go. She looked up.

  Jac.

  Precious relief flooding through her, she scrambled up, leaning on him as she did so. Chest heaving, she gripped him, clinging to him as if he were the key to freedom. The moonlight shifted, and she caught sight of blood soaking her sleeve where her arm had dashed against the rock.

  Jac muttered under his breath, whipped off his coat, ripped the sleeve of his own shirt, and bound her wound with quick, adept movements.

  As he worked she whispered, “What’s going on?”

  “Shh.” He made quick work of the makeshift bandage and pressed them both against the protection of the rocky wall. “The customs men are seizing the property on the beach now. How many men were with you?”

  “Three. And a boy.”
/>   “Where’s Greythorne?”

  “In the cave still. With Mr. Simon.”

  Jac’s eyes flicked up. “Who?”

  Below them, from the direction of the caves, a shot rang out. A man’s painful cry echoed.

  She winced, and Jac’s arm flew protectively around her. Shouts rang out again, and when all was silent, she lifted her head. Jac’s face was close to hers, so close she could make out the blue of his eyes, even in the darkness. She forced the words from her dry mouth. “Liam’s at Greythorne House.”

  “You sure?”

  “I think so. Mr. Simon told me.”

  “And you trust him?”

  “He is the one who let me go.” She angled her head to see down past the cliff to the shore. “Where’s Horace?”

  “He’s down on the beach. Are you sure there were no other men helping Greythorne?”

  “I only saw them.”

  He moved to stand, and she clutched his arm. Jac looked down at her, and his expression softened. He pressed a kiss to her head. “Let’s go get Liam.”

  Chapter 50

  Jac guided Delia to the top of the cliff, gripping her hand as if her life depended upon it, still grappling with what he’d seen. They’d taken the smugglers by surprise. Clearly the Greythornes had underestimated their sister-in-law’s grit.

  He and Horace had waited with the excise men until several crates had been loaded to the boat. They had been the longest moments of his life, waiting until the customs men were ready to strike. Once Greythorne’s men were in the boat, it was an easy ambush, for the free traders had all holstered their weapons in anticipation of a voyage. Jac had seen the rest of the men, like great black spiders, scurrying down from the cliff. Assuming that was where Delia was, Jac had made his way upward.

  Now she was in his arms.

  Thank God she was safe, but the nasty gash on her arm incited fresh anger. They’d injured her, and that could not be forgiven. He pressed his lips to the top of her head again, her hair wild and untethered in the wild moorland winds. There would be time for a proper reunion after they rescued Liam, for they were anything but safe.

  With shots and shouts continuing to ring out on the beach below, Jac clutched Delia’s hand with renewed vigor, and together they continued to climb. Once they were on flat land, they retrieved his horse, both got on its back, then blazed across the black moors.

  He let her take the reins—she knew the marshland and the bogs, the rocky places and the heather. In short bursts she told him what had happened. How Simon and her mother-in-law were in the cottage. How Simon had been the one to turn a pistol on Thomas Greythorne.

  Jac had no choice but to trust that Horace and the excise men would ensure the Greythornes and their men were apprehended. He had no idea if Thomas was injured, or even if he was still alive, but that didn’t matter now. The thought of Liam in the custody of men this dangerous pushed him farther. Faster.

  The churning clouds overhead were dissipating, and the moonlight was growing brighter, shedding an eerie white glow on the moors. The landscape flashed by them as they thundered across it, delving deeper and deeper into the meadows.

  Surely this could not be the way.

  But then, almost as if out of nowhere, a giant black house with squat, square chimneys rose from the barren landscape. Beyond it, the black outline of a forest appeared, and just like that, the moors had reached their end.

  They dismounted at a safe distance and tethered the horse in the forest. With surprising strength and force, Delia clutched his hand in hers. She crept low along the tree line and led the way to a darkened, timbered outbuilding.

  She leaned toward Jac, her breath warm against his ear. “This is the groundskeeper’s lodge. He’ll help us.”

  She tapped on the door and then jiggled the rusted handle, but it did not swing free.

  After several moments, shuffling sounded from inside the old building, and then the wooden door creaked open. A stooped man with shaggy white hair and side whiskers emerged from the shadows and filled the narrow opening.

  Recognition flashed on the leathery face as he beheld Delia, and he opened the door wider. “Mrs. Greythorne! What are you doing here?”

  Still gripping Jac’s hand, she stepped inside, brushing past the man. “I need your help, Philip.”

  Philip reached for a lantern on the table, presumably to light it, but Delia grabbed his hand. “No light.”

  He lowered his hand to his side and cast a curious glance toward Jac before he settled his focus back on Delia. Philip’s gaze landed on her arm. “You’re hurt, Mrs. Greythorne. Let me tend it for you.”

  “There isn’t time.” She tightened her grip on his arm, as if to capture his focus. “The Greythornes have kidnapped a boy, and I believe he’s in the house. Have you seen anything? Heard anything?”

  Once again, Philip eyed Jac warily in the moonlight. “No, ma’am. I ain’t seen or heard nothing.”

  “I need to get inside the house without being seen,” she persisted. “Are the doors locked for the night?”

  For several moments Jac thought the old man would not respond, but then he nodded his head. “Kitchen entrance is usually unlocked, but the house seems dark. I’m not sure if anyone’s about.”

  Delia moved to the cupboard authoritatively, shifting the contents on the narrow shelf. “Thomas took my pistol. Do you have one, any weapons at all in here?”

  “’Course not.” Philip shrugged. “Don’t like weapons on the property. You know that.”

  Delia’s shoulders slumped in disappointment. “It’s important, Philip. Please. Do you have anything to use for protection?”

  “Got me a hunting knife, and there are a few rabbit snares in the back.”

  Jac stepped forward, eager to make their next move and get to Liam. “Can we borrow the knife?”

  Philip retrieved the knife from a cupboard and handed it to Jac.

  “Don’t worry, Philip.” Delia patted the groundskeeper’s forearm, calming him as she would one of the children. “I will explain everything eventually. Just please, stay here.”

  Philip’s expression softened as he and Delia locked gazes, evidence of some age-old understanding between the two of them. Philip nodded and then stepped out of the path of the door. “Yell if you need me.”

  Jac followed Delia back into the cool night and handed her the hunting knife. A filmy mist was gathering in the low-lying areas, and in the distance an owl hooted an ominous song. He gripped the pistol in his hand and gazed ahead to Delia. How odd she looked with a blade in her hand. It appeared much too large for her small frame, and yet she exuded confidence. Her presence of mind in this situation impressed him. They crept along the base of the house, around to the back entrance.

  She stopped and waited for him to join her at a closed door. She turned the handle and it gave way easily. She smiled at the success and pushed her way through.

  They stepped inside to what appeared to be the servants’ quarters. Faint moonlight filtered through the windows flanking the door, and to his left, a low threshold gave way to a dark and silent kitchen. To the right, a wine cellar and pantry. Their steps made little sound on the flagstones beneath their feet, and as they ventured farther in and rounded a corner, darkness completely surrounded them.

  The dim corridor opened to a great hall. A muffled voice echoed from somewhere, and both Jac and Delia froze.

  She lifted her finger to her lips and then pressed closer to him. “It’s coming from the library. Through that doorway, to the left.”

  He saw it instantly. The door was slightly ajar, and warm light flickered from the room. “Do you think Liam’s in there?” Jac whispered.

  She shrugged. “Everything else seems quiet.”

  “I’ll investigate.” He motioned for her to stay put, then tiptoed along the wall, careful to test each foot before he put his weight on it fully, in case the floor should creak. Just outside the door, he paused to listen and readjusted his sweaty grip on the
pistol. The reality—and the danger—of the situation pressed on him, full and heavy.

  He had no idea what was behind that door.

  Liam could be there. Or perhaps not.

  There could be one armed man. There could be twenty.

  There was no way to know. He licked his lips and looked back to Delia. Her eyes were wide, unblinking. She nodded encouragement.

  He sidled against the door frame, keeping his head low. Heart pulsing, chest tight, he pivoted and leaned. His eyes adjusted to the light, and he saw the profile of an elderly woman sitting next to the fire.

  His heart fell, and he lowered his weapon. Surely Liam was not here. They were mistaken.

  He was about to pull back when movement to the left snared his eye. He shifted and his breath hitched. He saw the back of a head. Black hair. Broad shoulders. It was Liam. Desperate for details, Jac leaned in farther. It was then he saw the rope around the boy’s shoulder.

  Rage, molten and fluid as lava, surged through him at the sight. He motioned for Delia to join him. He nodded and pointed inside. When she was close enough, he held up one finger. “Liam’s there. One woman’s inside,” he whispered. “Follow my lead.”

  And then he straightened and stepped through the door.

  Chapter 51

  Delia’s every nerve, every sense pricked painfully with the injustice of the night. Men had died. She was sure of it.

  Such knowledge was eerie. Ghostly. And stung more than the wound on her arm. Furthermore, Jac had just confirmed that Liam was inside the library. Her heart could not bear another loss. He’d also confirmed he was in there with one woman, and she had no doubt as to that woman’s identity.

  Delia breathed deeply. She had to remain strong. Just a little longer and this entire business would be complete.

  Jac held up three fingers, and one by one, he lowered them until none remained. Then, with pistol drawn, he burst through the door.