by Rebecca King
Ursula wanted to smack him; and his sister too.
“You won’t get away with this,” she declared coldly when she had considered her options and realised there weren’t any.
“I already have,” Alfred declared smugly. “I am afraid that by the time your aunt discovers the maid, she will be too insensible to give them much detail about what happened to her. You will be long gone I am afraid, so will be unable to raise any help at all.”
“Adelaide will not stop searching until she has found me,” Ursula protested. “Trenton will scour every inch of London.”
“Ha! Trenton was too busy with his lady-love last night to even bother with you. What on earth makes you think that he will go to the time and trouble of searching for you?” Hyacinth scoffed.
Ursula looked at her and she tried to think of a suitable argument, but couldn’t. “He has promised my father he will look after me while I am here. He can hardly go back to Yorkshire and say that he has lost me while he was smooching with another woman.” She tried to make her voice sound as indifferent as theirs but failed miserably because it shook uncontrollably with fear.
“I don’t care what he promised your father, that man is a failure. You are a fool if you think that sleeping with him will make any difference to his relationship with Serena. Why, everyone who is anyone knows they are an item,” Alfred snapped scornfully. He leaned forward and braced his elbows on his knees to study her closely. “Don’t tell me that you didn’t know,” he mused wryly as he studied the hurt on Ursula’s face. “Well, well, well, he has managed to fool you too.” He laughed loudly. “Well, I suppose even soiled you will have to suffice.”
“Soiled?” Determined not to be panicked by him, she levelled a glare on him that could have frozen him to the spot. “I am no such thing.”
“Oh, come now. We saw you smooching with him in the street like a common whore. I don’t know why he didn’t pay you a penny for your services,” Hyacinth scoffed.
“Oh, you would know all about offering men a penny for your services then, would you?” she retorted.
The sharp sting of the slap she received across her cheek was loud in the silence of the carriage.
“Now, now, Hyacinth. It will do no good to damage the bride on her wedding day,” Alfred declared. He gave his sister a pointed look. “That will come later.”
“Wedding day?” Ursula stared at both of them and wondered if they had lost their minds. “I am not marrying anyone today.”
“I am afraid you will marry me today,” Alfred declared firmly. “You have no choice in the matter.”
“I will not,” Ursula snorted. “You are the very last person I would ever marry.” She threw a warning look at Hyacinth. “I don’t care how much you slap me, nothing could persuade me to go through with it. You will have to kill me first.”
“That can be arranged,” Hyacinth declared quietly.
“Go on then. Do it, because I should rather that than marry him. You have just wasted your entire day, if that’s what you have kidnapped me for,” she declared. She threw a scornful look at Alfred. “Then again, I am not surprised you have had to resort to actually accosting a woman on the streets to get her to marry you. I doubt there is any woman insane enough to want to marry you willingly. You are, by far, the very scourge of society. No wonder you mother is shunned by decent society. Having witnessed what she has raised, I am surprised she has managed to move amongst the ton for as long as she has without being cast out for being a fraudster.”
The second slap that Hyacinth landed against her cheek made her eyes sting. This time, Ursula wasn’t prepared to allow her to get away with it and landed a stinging blow in return before Hyacinth had resumed her seat.
“Hit me again and I swear that the next time I won’t stop,” Ursula ground out through clenched teeth.
Hyacinth snorted and curled her lip, but thankfully settled back against the seat and turned her face toward the door.
Ursula turned her attention to Alfred and glared hatefully at him. “I don’t care what sick and twisted scheme you have concocted between you. You can force me into the church, but I shall never say the words you want me to say. I will never do anything to commit my life to yours. You shall rot in Hell for this.”
“You will do what you are told,” Alfred declared quietly.
“No, I will not.” Ursula snapped. “I am going to make sure you face justice for kidnap, abduction, false imprisonment. It will put you in jail for a very long time.”
“You have to prove we have done anything first,” Alfred challenged, clearly unperturbed by her threat. “You won’t get the opportunity.”
Ursula didn’t know if he was exceptionally arrogant, totally ignorant, or mentally unstable. Either way, she was seated in a carriage with people who were, with each passing mile, posing an incredible risk to her life. She had to find some way out of there. If only she knew how, she would be fine.
“Why me?” she asked quietly after several moments of worrying.
It appeared that Hyacinth had gone to sleep because her eyes were closed and she appeared completely oblivious to what was going on.
“Out of all the women in the ton; why me?”
“You don’t know, do you?” Alfred murmured after several moments of quiet contemplation. “You seriously don’t know.” He seemed to find this entirely amusing because he threw his head back and laughed almost hysterically. “Oh, this is classic. They haven’t told you. Well, well, well.”
“Told me what? What are you talking about?” Although the need to fidget was rife, she forced herself to remain perfectly still, and not allow him to see how much of an advantage he had over her.
Alfred stared at her thoughtfully. “You really don’t know, do you?”
Ursula refused to acknowledge or deny it.
“How did you like the flowers?” he mused rather than answer her.
She pierced him with a steady stare. “They were beautiful but creepy.”
“They weren’t my idea, of course. I told mother not to bother. The expense was too much for someone like you, but she insisted.”
“Ah, I should have known you would never do something like that. The writing was effeminate enough to be yours though,” she countered, ignoring the flash of warning in his eyes. He looked at her with such hatred that for a moment that she wondered if he would strike her too.
“You know nothing,” he murmured quietly.
“So, you did write them?” She asked in a voice that was laden with disbelief. “You sent those effeminate notes?”
“I wrote them at mother’s behest. She told me what to write. All of that nonsense was her idea,” Alfred sighed. “I knew they would be lost on you.”
“So, first the flowers, then you took to following me,” she mused thoughtfully. She wondered how long he had been following her every footstep without her knowing. Taking a wild guess, she pierced him with a stare. “It was you who broke into my bedroom, wasn’t it? You were also the one who sent me the message to meet you in the conservatory. What, were you hoping to abduct me then?”
“It would have been better for everyone if you had turned up alone. Unfortunately, you had to have that bounder, Calderhill, with you. If we had taken you then, all of this would be over with and I would have been able to get on with my life in peace.”
“You broke into my bedroom later that night when you weren’t able to accost me in the conservatory.” It wasn’t a question. When one attempt at kidnap had failed, they had tried another.
“It was all planned. We had everything ready to take you from the conservatory. When Calderhill turned up, and you left before he did, we had to think of something else. So yes, I broke into your bedroom. I nearly got you out too.”
“Only I woke up when I realised I wasn’t alone,” she finished for him. “How did you hope to get me out of the bedroom? I mean, you could hardly climb out of the window with me over your shoulder.”
“I was going to walk you straight
out of the front door,” Alfred snorted. “Or carry you if you put up too much of a fight.” He said it with such glee in his eyes that she knew he would have rendered her unconscious if he needed to.
“So, when your schemes failed, you decided to follow me around and wait for another opportunity.”
“Mother won’t be thwarted, you should know that, my dear,” Alfred assured her.
“Don’t call me ‘my dear’,” Ursula snapped. “I am not your anything.”
“I shall call you whatever I damned well please,” Alfred countered.
“You have been busy, haven’t you? So, your family followed me wherever we went. Your mother has been trying to make acquaintances with people who really don’t like her; in places where it was evident she doesn’t belong. Meanwhile, you have been busy scouring the ton for someone you could kidnap and force into marriage.” Ursula sat back in her seat and shook her head in disbelief. “Do you really think that you can do something like this and get away with it?”
“I know we will. Mother has said it would work and she always gets what she wants,” he assured her somewhat dourly.
“Sounds to me like you are a little resentful of mother. I take it she carries the purse strings?”
When Alfred turned his face to the door and didn’t answer, Ursula knew she had just hit the nail on the head. Alfred was indeed at his mother’s beck and call, and resented it.
“How did you plan to get me to say the words required for a marriage ceremony? After all, you cannot force me to speak when I don’t want to. Especially in front of a vicar, who wouldn’t marry anyone who had been abducted. Not even your precious mother could manage to scam her way through that particular debacle.”
“We have contacts,” Alfred replied in a voice that was stiff and uncomfortable.
She knew from the look on his face that she wasn’t going to get anything else out of him right now. With nothing else to do, Ursula sat back in her seat and turned her gaze to the floor while she waited for the carriage to stop.
Trenton scowled when the sound of an altercation at the far end of the Ladies’ Mile broke the silence of the park.
His heart began to pound. Had someone screamed?
Without any idea why, he knew instinctively that it was Ursula. He ran toward the tall iron fence that bordered the park just in time to watch Alfred Sinnerton push someone into the depths of a familiar black carriage. A maid, who looked suspiciously like Molly, was now lying prone upon the floor.
He ran down the road as fast as his legs could carry him all the while keeping his gaze locked firmly on the carriage as it raced away.
“How do I chase it?” He gasped, wishing he had his horse with him. He knew that if the carriage got too far away then he would never stand a chance of finding Ursula again.
By the time he reached the main road, his chest heaved as he gasped for air and hailed a carriage that was heading in the same direction.
“’Ere, watch out,” the coachman gasped as Trenton grabbed the reins and hauled himself aboard.
“I need help. Someone has just abducted by fiancé. They are in that black carriage at the end of the road. Follow them,” Trenton ordered. “Please, hurry,” he prompted when the coachman merely stared at him.
“Which way?” the coachman demanded when he realised Trenton was being serious.
“It turned left at the end of the road.” Trenton pointed to the end of the road ahead.
“What does it look like?”
“A regular black carriage,” Trenton replied crisply. “I think the coachman is a woman, rather broad across the shoulder and wearing a dark hat pulled low to cover her face.”
“Good Lord, what are you involved in?” the coachman growled as he snapped the horse’s reins to get it to go faster.
“They are fraudsters and have kidnapped my fiancé and accosted her maid back there.”
The coachman glanced back over his shoulder and swore at the sight of the maid being helped to her feet by several pedestrians.
“Best get after ‘em then,” the coachman growled and turned his attention to weaving his carriage in and out of the traffic.
“That way!” Trenton shouted anxiously as they turned onto the main road and spotted the lumbering black carriage up ahead.
“I see ‘em.” The coachman’s eyes were hard with determination.
“Is there a way around them?” Trenton demanded in desperation when they turned from one road into another but lost sight of their quarry.
He closed his eyes on a silent prayer and tried to steady his nerves. The thought of anything happening to Ursula, his precious Ursula, was enough to make him want to tear his hair out.
“No, guvnor, this traffic is too heavy for it to be too far away though.” The coachman studied the road ahead and began to push the carriage through a narrow gap in the traffic. Neither of them paid any attention to the driver behind, who protested loudly at being made to stop rather sharply. “It’ll be faster if you run for them. They are stuck in traffic too. Up there, look,” the man reported and pointed to their quarry.
“I’ll be back as soon as I can,” Trenton growled as he jumped down. His eyes remained locked on the broad shoulders of the driver who was now sitting at the end of the road in gridlocked traffic. Even if he ran as fast as he could, it would be a miracle if he managed to reach them before they reached the clearer road to the right.
Desperate to get Ursula out the Sinnertons’ clutches, Trenton raced in and out of the traffic and pedestrians, and only just managed to reach the carriage before it moved. There wasn’t enough time to try to yank the door open. Instead, he swung onto the footman’s seat using Herculean effort, and clambered across the roof.
A bitter curse escaped him when he realised that he was drawing attention from everyone around them, but there was little he could do about it. Right now, he had to get the carriage to stop. He wasn’t just fighting for the freedom of an innocent woman. A woman who was the kindest and sweetest he had ever met. He was also fighting for the chance of a future. He knew now that without Ursula in his life, he had no future. Without her, he had nothing; he was nothing.
“Stop this carriage,” Trenton growled when he reached the front of the carriage. His eyes widened when the driver’s head spun around and he found himself staring at Mrs Sinnerton. “You!”
“Calderhill, get off my carriage,” Mrs Sinnerton snarled.
She turned her attention back to the road and tried to ram her shoulder into his chest to unbalance him. Unfortunately in doing so she inadvertently pulled on the reins and startled the horses who slammed to a halt. She immediately flicked the reins to get them going again but Trenton unbalanced her, causing her to tug on the reins again. Confused, the horses started to prance about nervously.
“Stop this carriage, Sinnerton. I shall have you in jail for this. This is abduction.” Trenton’s voice was harsh with rage. “Stop this carriage,” he repeated when the carriage lurched forwards.
When Sinnerton flicked the reins again, he leaned forward and snatched them out of her hands, hauling hard on the reins. The horses, now scared, yanked at their heads and began to trot briskly along the road. Mrs Sinnerton suddenly screeched like a banshee and launched herself at him. Her actions left him with little choice but to release the reins and defend himself.
“Get out of the way,” he shouted at two pedestrians in the middle of the road when it was clear the horses weren’t going to stop. “Get out of the way.”
He had to turn his attention to thwarting Eunice Sinnerton’s desperate attempts to push him off the carriage. While he was bigger and stronger, she was broader and heavier. His breath left him in a whoosh when she rammed her elbow hard in his ribs then lunged toward the reins that now dangled uselessly at their feet.
To his disbelief, she suddenly lost her balance and fell in between the stays, landing on the road with a heavy thud. The carriage tipped wildly as the wheels ran over her. He knew from the screams of horrified pede
strians that she was dead.
Trenton cursed when the horses tried to force their way through the traffic. The carriage rocked wildly as it careered wildly from right to left and back again, and he found himself thrown toward the road. He clutched the seat with desperate fingers and slammed his booted foot down on the reins before they could slither in the same direction as Mrs Sinnerton.
Once he had regained his balance, he grabbed them, and heaved a sigh of relief when he finally managed to guide the carriage to a stop at the side of the road. When he realised he was safe, he took a deep, fortifying breath and clambered down to secure the horses.
Ursula nearly wept with relief when the darkened interior of the carriage was suddenly flooded with light and Trenton appeared in the doorway. She had heard his muffled shouts but could only imagine what had been happening at the front of the coach.
“Oh, thank God,” she gasped. When she began to move toward the safety of Trenton’s arms, Alfred leaned forward and blocked her exit.
“Stay right where you are,” he ordered coldly, and motioned with his gun for her to get back into her seat.
So close to securing Ursula’s safety, Trenton wasn’t about to be thwarted, and hurriedly forced his way inside while Alfred’s attention was diverted. He pushed the hand holding the gun away so it wasn’t pointing at Ursula, and landed a heavy fist right in the centre of Alfred’s face. The man crumpled without a murmur.
The screech that suddenly echoed around the interior of the carriage made Ursula gasp in horror. Hyacinth had been so still, so quiet, that she had forgotten all about her, but watched in horror as the young woman launched across the carriage toward Trenton.
“Trenton!” Instinctively she lifted her booted foot and kicked the woman hard beneath the chin.
Although Hyacinth wasn’t knocked out, she was stunned enough to hesitate, which gave Trenton the opportunity he needed to relieve Alfred of the gun, and point it at Hyacinth.
“Sit down, or I will shoot you,” he growled.