Ivy stood up and then sat back down again in agitation. “He asked me a month ago, you see, and I gave him a flat no. He’s got two kiddies, you see, Miss and I- I never liked my own stepmother. I told you I think that I tried married life once before and it didn’t turn out so well.” She quirked an eyebrow at Mina, who nodded. She recalled that Ivy’s husband had turned out to be a bigamist. “Truth to tell it’s not an easy life he’s offering me.” Ivy pulled a face. “I was raised on a smallholding. I’ve got no illusions. It’s hard work.” She twisted her hands. “In all honesty, he’d be better off asking the likes of Edna than me.” Ivy’s expression was rueful.
“I doubt Edna would have accepted him,” Mina said truthfully. “For her aunt means to leave her house to her and the true ambition of Edna’s heart is to own a Crown Derby tea set and raise three cats.”
Ivy gave a startled laugh. “Is it really? Well, she’s an odd duck and no mistake.”
“You’ve a kind heart Ivy, I think you’ll make an excellent wife and mother.”
Ivy’s eyes filled with tears. “Thank you, Mina,” she said, taking her hand. “There’s no two ways about it, though. I’ll be leaving you in the lurch here, doing a moonlight flit. I left it too late to work a decent notice. I daren’t tell Nye. Not when he’s expecting a regular gaggle of folks for Wednesday.”
Mina nodded her head, understanding Ivy’s reticence. Nye would be furious. “I comprehend you,” she murmured.
Ivy flung her arms about Mina’s neck. “Thank you for never standing in judgement over me,” she said fiercely as she hugged her. “There’s not many who wouldn’t have.”
“Oh Ivy,” said Mina. “You will be missed.”
“And you won’t tell Nye.”
“I won’t breathe a word.”
Ivy nodded. “You’ve got the handling of him anyway,” she said with a smile. “Any fool can see that.”
Mina wasn’t so sure about that, but she gave an answering smile of reassurance to Ivy who was plainly in a nervous state. “Is Tom collecting you tonight or—?”
Ivy nodded violently. “I’m to slip down to the side door.” She crossed to her small attic window and looked out. “He’s going to park a way’s down the road and I’m to keep a lookout and go to meet him.”
Mina looked around the room. “You’re all packed? You’ve got everything you need?”
“Yes, for this past half hour I’ve been ready and waiting. He said he’d wait till it turned dark and then to watch for him.”
“Just give me a moment, I’ll be back,” Mina said, letting herself out of Ivy’s room and crossing the passage to her own. Once inside, she made for her stocking drawer and retrieved the half-sovereign she had tucked away. Then she returned to Ivy and pressed it into her palm.
“Oh no Miss, I couldn’t!” Ivy gasped looking down at the shiny gold coin.
“Yes, you can. A good friend gave it to me when I was setting out to the unknown and now, I’m giving it to you. Strictly speaking, I’ve already spent it once, but it made its way back to me. Now I’m gifting it to you. If you have no immediate need for it, then hide it away for a rainy day.” Ivy turned teary again and they embraced. “I will remember you in my prayers, Ivy and perhaps you will write to me at Christmas time?”
“Oh yes,” Ivy agreed. “I will and send you my address so you can write back to me at New Year.” She blew her nose as Mina agreed.
“Shall I wait with you now or—?”
“No,” Ivy said firmly. “You get you to bed. I need to compose myself for a bit. I’ll just sit here in the dark and take my ease while I keep watch for him.”
“Very well.”
They embraced again, and Mina made for bed.
She wasn’t sure how much later it was that she woke, a gust of wind rattling the pane along with a few drops of rain. She lay a moment, listening before she noticed she her head was resting on a warm, muscular shoulder. She was tucked against a big, solid body in the bed.
When she went to lift her head, Nye’s voice spoke out of the darkness. “Go back to sleep.”
Mina blinked. “You’re awake,” she said in confusion.
“Yes,” he agreed. “I’ve learned my lesson. I can’t close my eyes next to you or I’ll never get up.”
She considered this a moment. “What time is it?” she murmured.
He hesitated. “A little before two,” he said briefly.
Clearly, he had to get up before morning for some fell purpose, she thought, but let her own eyes drift shut anyway. It was no business of hers. Her eyes sprang again in the darkness. “Why did you come to bed, if not to sleep?” she heard herself persist.
He didn’t answer that, just clamped a big hand to the back of Mina’s head and dragged her face back to his neck. Had she been sleeping with her face pressed to him like this, she wondered? “Relax,” he said. “I’m not here for anything else.”
Mina frowned. “I wasn’t worried and I’m not afraid of you,” she grumbled, shifting against him. He was wearing his clothes, she realized, feeling the press of his buttons through her cotton nightgown. It was not as comfortable as when he wore his soft flannel.
“You promise?” he said in an odd tone. Mina tried to draw back to get a look at his face, but it was too dark in the room for that.
“I’m not afraid of you, William Nye,” she insisted with quiet conviction and felt him exhale. “So, don’t think you can browbeat me.”
He snorted. “If I ever did think that, you soon schooled me different.” She felt his hand at her lower back, brushing the back of his fingers lightly against the base of her spine. It was strangely comforting, and she let her eyes close again.
“Will it be the same people?” she asked suddenly.
“What?”
“The same people as last time,” she elaborated. “You know.”
“I really don’t.”
She could hear the frown in his voice. “The same people who bore witness,” she said. “That night in the church.” She thought she heard his breathing hitch before it levelled out again.
The shoulder under her cheek lurched in what she guessed was a shrug. “Some of them, maybe,” he agreed.
“Oh.” Even to her own ears, she sounded a little put-out.
“Does that bother you?” The words sounded like they were dragged from him.
Mina didn’t want to answer. Unbidden, the memories of that awful night flooded into her mind’s eye. She felt scalded and raw. “I don’t want to see any of them,” she admitted, her throat closing on the words. She felt his head turn sharply.
“Why? You have nothing to reproach yourself with.”
“I looked a fool,” she mumbled against his shoulder.
“No more than I,” he said, but that wasn’t true, Mina thought despairingly. Every one of his friends had seen the utter contempt he had for her. He had marched right out of the church and left her there and they had all followed him, laughing and carousing. She screwed her eyes shut and to her surprise felt his arms close tight around her, hauling her practically on top of him. “You don’t have to see any of them,” he said tersely. “You’re to stay out of their sight. Understood?” She nodded. It was what she wanted after all. For once their feelings on a subject agreed. “Good,” he said throatily. “Now go to sleep.”
And funnily enough, she did.
*
Mina woke late and reached for her father’s pocket watch on the side table, saw it was eight o’clock already. She felt the familiar constraint of Nye’s arm slung around her waist and looked back over her shoulder to find him fast asleep. Again, she wondered at his insistence that he ‘never slept’ and struggled to extricate herself. His arm tightened, hauling her back against him.
“Nye! We’ve overslept!” she protested. He slung a leg heavily across hers. “Nye! Really! You’re impossible.”
He made a grumbling sound against her neck. “It’s eight o’clock,” she told him loudly and felt his eyelashes flutter aga
inst her skin. “Did you hear what I said?” With an exclamation of annoyance, Mina started squirming and wriggling, only to find herself abruptly rolled beneath him. “Nye!” she squealed in alarm.
He reared back at that and blinked down at her, looking confused.
“Let me up!” she huffed. “It’s gone eight in the morning.”
Nye ran a hand down his face and groaned. “It can’t be.”
“Well, it is. You fell asleep again!”
Grudgingly, he rolled his weight off her to let her up. Mina scrambled out of bed and started gathering slamming drawers and gathering her outfit together. Nye slowly propped himself up on one elbow to watch her.
“Aren’t you going to get up?” she asked pointedly.
“All in good time,” he answered, shoving her pillow behind him and lolling back against it. His eyes followed her with lazy appreciation.
Mina lowered her handful of underclothing with a glower. “I’m not putting on a show here,” she huffed. “I can hardly dress with an audience!”
“That act would never make it on the music hall,” Nye pointed out reasonably. “They’d want to see you take them off, not put them on.”
Only by supreme strength of will did Mina stop herself from bristling like an old schoolmarm. “I wouldn’t know about that,” she said loftily. “I’ve never been to the music hall.”
He gave a slow smile. “You don’t say.”
This talk of music halls made her think of the covered screens she had used previously, which were decorated with flyers and advertisements for similar acts. “If we’re to share this bedroom, I could do with some screens,” she mused. “Maybe I should bring those ones up from the scullery.”
“That tatty old thing,” Nye objected. “It’s not fit for anything but the rubbish tip.”
“Someone clearly went to a lot of trouble to paste those advertisements all over it,” she pointed out. “Who made it?”
He was silent a moment. “My mother,” he said finally. She waited a moment, but nothing more was forthcoming.
“Oh, well, I expect it could be restored with some work.”
He made a rude noise. “It’s hardly worth the bother.”
Mina pulled her drawers on underneath her billowing nightgown. “Maybe I should strip it down and re-decorate it with your news clippings,” she said, then wondered why she was provoking him. He clearly hadn’t wanted her to see those articles. She shot an uneasy look at him, wondering if she had gone too far.
Nye’s eyes glinted at her, despite his relaxed pose. “Well, this is unexpected. Are you teasing me, Mina?”
For some reason, her face filled with hot color. “No,” she burst out vehemently.
“It sounded like you were.”
Was she? Mina shifted from one foot to another. “I just—spoke without thinking, that’s all.”
“Maybe you should do that more often.”
She bit her lip and tied the drawstring at her waist. “Now you’re teasing me,” she said flatly. He didn’t answer but when she sat on the edge of the bed to pull on her stockings, she felt his arms close about her from behind.
“I was in earnest,” he said gruffly, then nuzzled his face to her neck. Mina gasped feeling the rasp of his stubble up and down her sensitive skin. “Don’t be so starchy.” Before she could make any reply to that, he released her with a kiss to her pulse point and ringing slap to her backside that was hard enough for her to feel despite both layers of cotton.
“Nye!” she gasped in reproach as he sauntered across the room to where his clothes lay across a chair back. He just smirked.
“Are those your clothes in the wardrobe?” Mina asked on impulse. “The red silk cravat and the black dress trousers?”
He looked across at her as he drew his collarless shirt down over his bare chest. “Aye, they’re my fancy town clothes,” he said with a wink. “You should see me rigged out in them, I’m a sight to behold.”
“Now you are teasing,” she answered, but looking at him, found she believed him. Will Nye would be a striking figure in that scarlet striped waistcoat and flashy silk tie. Even when clothes covered his rippling physique, they showed his shape was built of solid muscle over an impressive frame.
He did not possess the polite good looks which graced a ballroom or a tea party, Mina realized. But while he did not have the smooth address of his half-brother, Lord Faris, he had something infinitely more disturbing. A sort of earthy, sensual attractiveness. Dressed in his best, he would not cut a respectable figure, but instead the brash kind of figure her father would have crossed the street to avoid.
“I should take you to town,” he said suddenly. “One day soon. We could take in the sights. Eat a meal at a fancy hotel, do some shopping, maybe even a show.”
Mina was so surprised she nearly dropped her stocking. “Which town?” She wondered if he meant St Ives.
“Exeter,” he answered, pulling on his breeches. “Or maybe London.”
“You have business there?”
“No,” he said. “It would be for pleasure, not business.”
Pleasure? Mina’s breathing came faster. He would take her there for pleasure? Or did he mean it would be a pleasure to take her? She hardly dared look at him. It seemed a very intimate thing to be dressing together like this. She slid her plain garters on and reached for one of her petticoats.
“Would you like that, Mina?” his voice was husky and sent a shiver down Mina’s spine. She glanced at him to find him knotting a kerchief about his tanned throat.
“Yes, I would,” she admitted softly and saw by the gleam in his eye that he was pleased by her words. “But that would mean several days away from the inn,” she pointed out. “Is that an easy thing to arrange?” Suddenly, she remembered Ivy’s defection and suffered a pang. They would not be going away anytime soon.
“You let me worry about that.” He drew on his black waistcoat and reached for his boots.
“Do you have any mending you need doing?” she asked on impulse, feeling herself blush and wishing she could control her reactions to him.
“Very wifely,” he said, and Mina lowered her eyes, feeling suddenly rather shy.
“Where do you keep the rest of your things? There’s barely any of your effects in here,” she pointed out, glad to think of a distraction.
Nye seemed to consider this as he fastened his cuffs. “Here and there. I’ve a trunk in the stable,” he said with a shrug. “There’s a bunk in there too. I used to doss down in there for an hour here and there where I could snatch it.”
“I see,” Mina answered, though she didn’t really. Why would he sleep in the stable? It made no sense to her.
As though aware of her thoughts, Nye looked up from tying his bootlace. “I know you’ve seen precious little evidence, but I really am a bad sleeper,” he said. “I can never usually snatch more than a catnap.” He frowned. “For some reason, when I’m around you…” He left the rest of the sentence unspoken.
“You get unbroken sleep at my side?” she said with surprise. She wondered if his poor sleep pattern might be because he always had to rise in the early hours to meet unsanctioned ships.
“I don’t know why,” he said, as though he’d heard her unspoken thoughts. “But yes.” He straightened up. His gaze flickering over her. Mina suddenly realized she must look a sight still half-dressed and all beneath her nightgown. The petticoat was flaring out, giving it a very strange silhouette. “Soon you won’t hide yourself from me, Mina,” he said. “There won’t be any point.”
She made no reply to this, indeed what could she say? He took a deep breath in and then out again. “You can help Edna get the place ready for Wednesday,” he said this in the manner of one making a great concession. Mina looked up quickly. “They’ll start arriving Tuesday, maybe even as early as tonight. We’ll want all the rooms made ready and the bunks in the stable.”
She nodded, wide-eyed, pleased to be making progress. “You could bring your own things in, th
at would free another bunk,” she heard herself say rather breathlessly.
He paused a moment before answering. “You want me to do that?” There was a heavier significance to his words, that she did not want to examine too closely.
“Of course. A husband’s place is by his wife’s side,” she said primly. “A stable is for horses.”
He gave her a crooked smile that said he knew full well she had just told him he was welcome in her bed.
16
Mina had thought it was unlikely Ivy’s flight would be discovered before the afternoon, but she was proved wrong in this respect. She was taking a break from stripping the rooms and pouring tea in the kitchen when Edna appeared flushed and distrait.
“Oh, Mrs. Nye!” she said, wringing her hands. “You’ll ne’er believe what that wicked girl has gone and done! And us expecting a regular swarm to descend on us any minute!”
“What is it Edna?” she asked in a steady voice as she poured a second cup for the agitated maid.
“She’s up and left! Stripped her room bare of all her worldly possessions and disappeared without a trace.” She plunked her hands on her scrawny hips. “Can you believe the like of it?”
“How very odd,” Mina murmured. “Perhaps there is some explanation. A sick relative or something of that nature.”
“Not her!” Enda answered with spirit. “Too steeped in sin and infamy to have a relative to her name!”
Mina hesitated, wondering what to do for the best. Should she take Edna into her confidence and ask her to delay telling Nye for a few hours or not? Ivy had begged her not to tell Nye, but she had not mentioned Edna.
Overall, she decided regretfully that ignorance was probably the best policy to employ. “Perhaps Nye is already aware of the fact,” she said aloud. “And can furnish us with the particulars.”
“Not he!” Edna huffed. “For ‘twas the master himself sent me up there to roust her as we need all the hands we can get.”
“Oh,” said Mina lamely. “Then I suppose he cannot know.”
A heavy footfall behind them, alerted her to Nye’s presence. “He cannot know what?” Nye asked, reaching for another cup and placing it before Mina. She hastened to pour him a drink as Edna took over.
A Bride for the Prizefighter: A Victorian Romance Page 21