Kisses and Scandal (Survivors)

by Galen, Shana

  She ran along Bond Street, the slavers right behind her. She toppled a costermonger’s cart, spilling fruit in the slavers’ path, and pushed men and women in her way aside. Finally, she crossed the street and glanced behind her to judge how much of a lead she had. The slavers were attempting to extricate themselves from the angry costermonger and hadn’t spotted her yet. Ahead of her was The Greedy Vicar. She headed straight for it and ducked inside.

  “Oh, you look all out of breath,” said the woman who greeted her.

  Raeni was out of breath. She could barely speak. “I need the...the...” She gasped for air.

  “Are you the lady from the tobacco shop? The one that works with Mr. Gaines?”

  Raeni nodded.

  “What’s the matter then? You look as if you’re being chased.”

  Raeni nodded. “Yes. The constable. I need a constable.”

  The woman’s eyes bulged. “The constable? Oh, dear.” She pushed Raeni onto a bench just inside the pub. “Now you wait right here. I’ll go fetch him.”

  Raeni nodded, her lungs burning and her eyes stinging with unshed tears. Why hadn’t she left last night? Why had she waited? She’d put everyone in danger by staying. She should have been far away from London. Instead, she was hiding in a tavern, praying the serving wench would hurry back with the constable.

  The door banged open, and Raeni jumped. She looked up, hoping to see the constable. Her hope died when the slavers stepped inside. The one with the pistol pointed the weapon at her chest. “I’m tired of games. Come with me now or I use this.”

  She knew her father had told the men to bring her back alive, but they looked angry enough not to care.

  “The constable is on his way,” she panted. “You should run now.”

  “Not without you.” The slaver with the burlap sack grabbed her arm and shoved the sack over her head. The world went dark and smelled of her own fear and barley, which must have been the contents of the sack before it had been emptied. She tried to fight, but she couldn’t see, and the men easily caught her. She screamed and pain bloomed in her head. She’d been hit. She reeled back just as a fist landed in her belly. She crumpled to the floor, breathless.

  Limp with pain, she was lifted and tossed over one of the slaver’s shoulders as though she were a sack of flour. They began to move, taking her out of the tavern. Once they were out on the street, they could quickly disappear. The constable would never find her. She heard the bell above the tavern door tinkle and then a voice she knew well.

  “Going somewhere, gentlemen?”

  Thomas! Relief at knowing he’d found her was quickly replaced by fear. They would kill him. She tried to call out to him, to tell him no, but she couldn’t seem to find the breath.

  “Move out of the way or we’ll bring you back with us too.”

  “Give me Miss Sawyer, and I’ll gladly step aside.”

  “Why don’t I give you a pistol ball to the forehead instead?”

  Raeni screamed and struggled, and in the next instant she was falling, landing hard on the floor. She could hear grunts and a scuffle and tore at the sack, finally pulling it off her head. The pistol had fallen to the floor and the two men were taking turns throwing punches at Thomas, who was ducking and throwing his own punches as well. Raeni lunged for the pistol, her hand closing on it just as the slavers noticed she was free and turned to her. Raeni lifted the pistol and trained it on the men.

  “Give me that,” ordered the slaver who had put the sack over her head.

  “Get out or I’ll shoot.” She looked both men dead in the eye, showing them that she would kill them if it came to that. She’d seen her father use a pistol. She knew how they worked, and she cocked the hammer to prove her point. The men raised their hands and backed toward the door to The Greedy Vicar. Raeni pointed the pistol at them until they were out on the street again.

  Then she collapsed into tears, dropping the pistol. Thomas took her into his arms, cradling her head. “Are you hurt? Raeni, did they hurt you?”

  “Not really,” she said. “I’ll be fine. But I have to go. I have to run before they find me again.” She cupped his face, feeling the scratch of stubble under her palms. “You could have been killed. I can’t let that happen.” She pulled away from him and stood on shaky legs. He rose too.

  “I can’t let you deal with those two alone. Raeni, I’ll hire Bow Street Runners to find them. I’ll take you to the Continent. Let me help you.”

  How could she say no to that? And how could she say yes?

  The door to The Greedy Vicar slammed open, and Raeni reached for the pistol again. But it wasn’t the slavers who stood in the doorway but a constable. “Miss, this lady here tells me these men were giving you trouble. Is that so?”

  She looked past him and saw three other constables had the slavers restrained, clubs at the ready in case the men in custody put up a resistance.

  “Yes. They were trying to abduct me,” she said.

  The constable looked at Thomas. “You said there might be trouble, Mr. Gaines. Looks like you were right.” The constable nodded at Raeni. “Are you willing to come to headquarters and give a statement?”

  “Yes,” she said, her head spinning.

  Thomas stepped between her and the constable. “Give her a few minutes to recover. It’s been quite an ordeal. We’ll follow you in a quarter hour.”

  “Very good, sir.” The constable looked at Raeni. “These men won’t bother you again, miss. We have them now.”

  And for the first time in what felt like years, Raeni could breathe again.

  Eight

  Thomas wanted to take Raeni in his arms again. Her hair had come loose from its coiffure and her eyes looked wild, her cheeks flushed with color. “Come. Sit down for a moment. Let me get you some brandy.” He ushered her into The Greedy Vicar and asked the publican for a glass of brandy. He handed it to her and made her drink.

  “I didn’t think the constables would be here in time,” she said after she’d sipped the brandy and made a face.

  “I went to them and asked that they have a few nearby in case we needed them.”

  She sipped the brandy again. “It’s not as bad after the first sip.”

  He smiled.

  “That was clever of you. To have the constables waiting,” she said.

  “I didn’t want to take any chances.”

  “How did you know I needed them? I needed you?”

  “Someone said there was a commotion outside. I didn’t even check to see if it was you. I thought it was safer to act and ask questions later.”

  “I’m glad you did.”

  “So am I.” He took her hand. “Raeni, I know you will never feel completely safe, but I give you my word I will do all I can to make you as safe as possible. I’ll call in every favor I’m owed to make sure those men go to prison, and that your father is warned off sending any more men to try and fetch you back. And if you marry me, I can give you the protection of my name and—”

  “Yes,” she said.

  “I have enough blunt to hire additional footmen to keep watch over you...did you say yes?”

  She nodded. “Yes.”

  He snatched the glass of brandy out of her hand and pulled her close. “What are you saying yes to?”

  “All of it.” She smiled. “The prison, the warning of my father, becoming your wife, the additional footmen.”

  “Go back one. You’ll marry me?”

  She gave him a stern look. “I hope this isn’t the proposal.”

  He stared at her then began to laugh. “You want a proposal? I’ll write you a poem.”

  “Please don’t.”

  “Flowers then.”

  “That I like. Go on.”

  “And I’ll go down on one knee and profess my undying love for you.”

  “And I’ll tell you I love you more.”

  “And you’ll say yes.”

  She pressed her lips together to stop the tears. “I’ll say yes,” she whispered. />
  “Raeni, I love you.” He jumped up, and she caught his hand before he could leave her.

  “Where are you going?”

  “I have some flowers to buy.”

  “What about the constable?”

  He paused. “After the constable then. I don’t want to wait to start my life with you.”

  “Then don’t wait.” And she cupped his face in hers and kissed him.

  If you enjoyed How to Brew a Perfect Kiss, read the book where Thomas Gaines is first introduced.

  About the Author

  Shana Galen is a three-time Rita award nominee and the bestselling author of passionate Regency romps, including the RT Reviewers' Choice The Making of a Gentleman. Kirkus says of her books, "The road to happily-ever-after is intense, conflicted, suspenseful and fun," and RT Bookreviews calls her books “lighthearted yet poignant, humorous yet touching." She taught English at the middle and high school level off and on for eleven years. Most of those years were spent working in Houston's inner city. Now she writes full time. She's happily married and has a daughter who is most definitely a romance heroine in the making.

  Here’s an excerpt from The Claiming of the Shrew.

  Catarina didn’t trust the soldier in front of her. By the same token, she had little choice but to trust him. Her time was up. Little as she liked it, this man was her only hope.

  “I beg your pardon, miss,” he said, one eyebrow arching upward. “I don’t think I heard you correctly.”

  She jerked her chin up. “You heard me.”

  “You need a husband,” he said slowly. He was more handsome in close proximity than he’d appeared on horseback and from a distance. She’d chosen him not for good looks but because he was in command. He was large and strong—a man who could stand up to her father.

  But now she saw he was not quite so large as he’d seemed when mounted. He was probably not even six feet. But she had not been wrong about his commanding presence. Even sitting and at the other end of the barrel of her pistol, he appeared calm and in control. His blue eyes, eyes that had crinkled slightly with confusion, met hers levelly and without any concern or anger. Only his red hair seemed immune to regulation. It jutted about his head in wild swirls and spikes. Catarina had the urge to tamp it down with her fingers.

  “I see.” He began to stand, but she shook her head and raised the pistol higher. The soldier lowered himself again. Slowly. “Miss—?”

  When she didn’t give her name, his expression turned exasperated, but only for a moment. “Miss, must we have this conversation with a pistol between us?”

  “Yes,” she said.

  “I’d rather—”

  She waved the pistol. “I have no time to argue. I need a husband. Please.”

  “Yes, as you said. Help me to understand. Do you mean...ah”—he ran a hand through that wild hair, and she understood why it stuck up—“marido?” His Portuguese accent was horrendous but she was not one to judge. She doubted her English was much better.

  “Husband. That is what I said.”

  “Did one of my men—” He seemed to reconsider. “Has one of my men been too familiar?”

  “Familiar?” She knew the word. Unlike the rest of the people in the provincial town she’d had the misfortune to be born into, Catarina read. She read in four languages, including English. Familiar meant something or someone one saw every day, such as the path to the market. These English had only come to the area recently. They had come to fight the French, who were now in retreat. They were not familiar. “How do you mean?” she asked.

  He looked a bit sheepish, which rather intrigued her. “Perhaps I did not make myself clear. Has one of my men...ah...caused you trouble?”

  She frowned. She’d had to skirt his men in order to gain entry to the camp, but that had not been much trouble. “No.”

  “Has one accosted you?”

  She considered.

  “Attacked?” he said, clarifying.

  “Oh! No.”

  “Then perhaps one of them visited you in the village and did not pay for—er, services rendered.”

  She narrowed her eyes. Not paid? Her father was the mayor of the village, not a merchant. And then it struck her what the soldier meant, and she straightened indignantly. She must have swung the pistol about as well because the man flinched and jerked to one side.

  “I am not a prostitute.”

  He held both of his hands up. “I did not mean to imply that you were.”

  “My English is not so perfect when I talk, but I understand. You did more than imply, senhor.”

  “And you, miss, have more than tried my patience.” He stood, and even when she waved the pistol at him, he did not take his seat again. “Go ahead and shoot me. Put me out of my misery, I beg you, for I fail to see how any of this relates to me.” He came around the table and stalked toward her. Had she thought he was short? He seemed a giant in that moment as the space between them rapidly diminished. She could not back away. If she did, he would have the upper hand. And she did have the pistol, after all.

  “Stop!” she said, brandishing her weapon. To her surprise, he halted. “Do not come any closer.”

  “Is that pistol even loaded?” he asked.

  “Yes.” But she’d hesitated, and he’d seen it. His brows lifted with skepticism.

  “Very well then, shoot me.”

  “I would rather not, senhor. You are more valuable to me alive.”

  “You think to take me as your prisoner? Whom do you work for? The French?” He moved closer. “I assure you, I will never be taken alive.”

  “I do not work for anyone—French or English. And I do not wish to kill you. I need you alive so you can marry me.”

  He was close enough to touch the pistol now, but her words had stopped him in his tracks. “Say again?”

  “Do you not understand English? You will come with me now and be my husband.”

  He stared at her as though understanding for the first time. “You want me to marry you?”

  She cursed in her native Portuguese. Perhaps she had made the wrong choice after all. The man was not nearly as clever as she had thought him. She closed her eyes in frustration, and that was her mistake. The next thing she knew she was flat on her back, her wrist imprisoned in one his hands, rendering the pistol unusable.

  The soldier straddled her, his face dark and dangerous in the shadows. She bucked and struggled, but he simply grasped her other hand and held her in place easily. His broad shoulders were obviously not the result of a padded uniform but actual muscles.

  “Let me go!”

  “Not likely. I think we shall begin our conversation again. This time on my terms and with civility.”

  “I was civil. I said please.”

  His mouth turned up at one corner, and in that moment, she almost forgot she wanted him to get off her. She would have rather he kissed her. A strange thought to enter her mind since he was at least a dozen years older than she. But he did not seem such an old man at the moment. He seemed strong and virile—too strong, she thought as she tried, again and in vain, to push him off.

  “Yes, you did. But perhaps we might begin with introductions. Lieutenant Colonel Draven of the 16th Light Dragoons. And you are?”

  She did not see the harm in telling him. She would have had to give her name during the wedding. “Catarina Ana Marciá Neves.”

  “And is that your real name?”

  “Yes.”

  “Who sent you?”

  He still thought her a spy for the French. “No one. I came on my own. I told you, I need a husband.”

  His grip on her wrist loosened. “Are you with child?”

  Her instinct was to immediately deny it, but the release of pressure from her wrists gave her another idea. She raised her hands, ramming them into his chest. If he hadn’t been balancing precariously above her, the push would have been completely ineffective. Instead, it left him off balance and while he struggled to keep from toppling back she slithered
from between his legs, crawled to her knees, and pushed off for flight.

  She was back on the floor in only one step. He’d caught her ankle and dragged her back. She tried to kick him. He swore and grasped her about the waist, locking her arms beneath his grip. Still kicking and fighting, he carried her across the tent and set her down, none too gently in a chair. She tried to jump up again, but he pinned her arms to the armrests.

  “Miss Neves, what did I say about civility?”

  “Let me go!”

  “Oh, no. You came into my tent. You threatened me with a pistol. Now it is my turn for some answers.”

  He dragged her, still trapped in the chair, toward a trunk, which he then flung open. He reached in and yanked out what appeared to be tack for a horse and used it to bind her wrists to the chair’s arms. When he attempted to secure her ankles to the legs of the chair, she almost landed a kick to his nose. He managed to dodge it and grasped her leg in a firm grip. “That was unwise.”

  She gasped as his hand slid under her skirt to caress the bare flesh of her calf beneath her dress. “Do not touch me.”

  He raised a brow. “What, no stockings?”

  She tried to shake his grip off. “And where would I acquire them? This town is still living in the sixteenth century. I did not give you leave to touch me!”

  He eyed her warily. “Never let it be said I did not treat a woman with respect. I will release you if you give me your word you will sit still and allow me to bind you.”

  She shook her head. Her long, dark hair had fallen into her eyes. She must look as much a peasant as she felt. “And when I am bound, how am I to fight you should you take liberties?”

  He nodded as though considering the point. “Very well, I give you my word, as a gentleman, I will not touch you.”

  “You are a gentleman?” she asked.