As she burst into tears and wracking sobs, all she was able to say was, “K-kidnapped…with my knight.”
Every footstep felt heavy as Edmund stomped along the street until he saw something familiar. There; the King’s Head. He was but a mile away from his lodgings and for every step he took, he was another step further from Molly.
Molly Kimble. Her shock and sadness at his last words were seared onto his eyes, and he could not look away.
She would never forgive him – he would never forgive himself. It was a ridiculous situation they found themselves in, one that he would not have believed, and yet the way they had met, the lies she had told, what he had believed…
So lost in his own thoughts, Edmund lurched suddenly as he realised he had walked past his lodgings. The repeatedly mended door was slightly open and the smell of thinly watered stew was pouring from it.
Edmund’s nose curled as his stomach rumbled. No matter how hungry he was, he was rarely famished enough for Mrs Bird’s lodgings.
But if she was in the kitchen, that meant he could probably sneak past her, and…
“Mr Northmere, your rent is due!”
Edmund flinched. He had only managed to put one foot on the stairs but instantly Mrs Bird had appeared in the hallway, glowering at him with a menacing ladle in one hand.
“Your rent is due and it has been due for three days – and I have not seen hide nor hair of you to demand it!” Mrs Bird spat, her eyes narrowed. “Give me my money!”
Fury and bitterness had been simmering just below the surface as Edmund had walked home, the pain of his last encounter with Molly still burning in his heart, and so he did not respond as he typically did.
“You will have your money,” he said coldly, taking another step up towards his bed chamber, where there would surely be warmth, and soft though hardly clean linens for him to collapse into. “Just give me a few more days, Mrs Bird, and I can – ”
“Days?” Mrs Bird did not speak, but screeched. “You are no good, Mr Northmere, and you are no good for your rent money!”
Edmund swallowed down his temper, forcing himself not to pour all his bitterness and resentment at her. Whatever Mrs Bird was, she was not the one who had broken his heart.
The thought of it made him shiver.
“I am always good for it, Mrs Bird, you know that,” he said, allowing the exhaustion to seep into his words. “But I have had a very tiring few days, and all I wish to do at this moment is sleep. You will have your money.”
He held his landlady’s gaze and eventually she looked away. “Busy Christmas then, by the sound of it. Did you get anything nice?”
Edmund bit his lip. He had unwrapped the most fantastic, the most unexpected gift in the whole world. Now he had lost it, and he doubted whether he would ever be permitted to unwrap Molly Kimble again.
“Yes,” he said, holding his voice steady as much as he could. “Very nice. Good morning, Mrs Bird.”
Edmund had taken just one more step towards his room when Mrs Bird’s voice cut through his thoughts like a hot knife through butter.
“I told them to wait.”
He paused. The words did not quite make sense, but what was perhaps more concerning was the gleeful, slightly mischievous tone of her voice.
Edmund looked down and saw that an evil glint of a smile was on Mrs Bird’s face. “What do you mean, madam?”
Mrs Bird’s smirk grew wider. “Them two men who arrived for you. Knew you by name, they did, and asked where the knight was. I told them there were no knights here, but I did have an Edmund Northmere, and that they could wait.”
Ice fell into Edmund’s heart as he croaked. “W-Wait?”
She nodded, her smile broad. “In your room. Which you have not, at this moment, paid for.”
His frozen heart now stopped. Surely not; why had the Bletchley brothers followed him here, how had they known where he was lodging?
Had the last few days been part of something bigger, something more devious and darker? Had they known about him for days, weeks, months even, and now the next stage of their plan is about to come to fruition?
Edmund stared into the grinning face of his landlady, and found to his surprise that his pain came not from the imminent fear of meeting Tom and Jack again…but that Molly Kimble had truly played him for a fool.
Well, he could not avoid them forever. Not if they knew where he lived.
His heart heavy and footsteps unsteady, Edmund reached the top of the staircase and turned, as was his habit, to the left. One, two, three doors he passed until he reached the fourth. His room.
The door was slightly ajar and through it he could see a tall figure with his back to him. Edmund took a deep breath and opened the door.
“I thought I had just said my farewells to…”
Edmund’s jaw dropped open and he was unable to speak. The two gentlemen had turned to face him and they were not Tom and Jack Bletchley.
They could not be more different. The gentleman on the left was tall, with chestnut hair and fierce eyes; the one on the right had similar features, but his hair was darker and his jaw was tight. Both of them wore greatcoats with gold thread, and one had a top hat of the highest quality under his arm.
Edmund blinked, but the mirage of two brothers did not disappear. But they were not Molly’s brothers.
They were his own.
“L-Luke?” He said, his voice croaked from exhaustion, thirst, and now utter shock. “George?”
Neither spoke, but Luke gave a curt nod. Edmund’s stomach clenched; of course it would be impossible for Luke to give him a friendly welcome. With Edmund’s banishment from the family, it had been Luke, as the second born, who had risen into his place.
Title, wealth, and fortune. He had never looked back, but now he looked into the face of the brother who had, to all intents and purposes, taken them from him.
“Good morning,” said George awkwardly.
Edmund could not help but grin. George, the baby of the family. He had never enjoyed the fights between the brothers, had always avoided them if he could.
Edmund coughed and moved into the room, throwing down his coat. When he turned back to face them, he found to his surprise that they were still there.
“What in God’s name are you doing here?”
As soon as the words were out, he could hear the callousness of his tone, but he could not help it. Being utterly abandoned by your family and ignored by your brothers will do that to a man.
“That is all you can say?” George sounded hurt, and his eyes were wide. “After five years?”
Edmund’s room had never been large, but it had only ever needed to be large enough for himself – and occasionally, a lady visitor. Three tall, broad, and angry men rather filled the space, and Edmund could not help but feel caged, like three tigers pacing up and down.
“It was hardly my fault,” he said tersely. “You knew what happened, you knew why I left. Did you think that being banished meant only seeing each other at Christmas and birthdays?”
“No, you are wrong.”
This time it was Luke who spoke, and Edmund marvelled a little at the strength and calm in his voice. When he had been forced out of the family home, Luke had been a man, it was true, but he had been young, awkward, unsure of himself.
That vision of Luke had gone. Before him stood a strong, determined, and self-assured gentleman.
That did not stop the hairs on the back of Edmund’s neck from bristling. “What do you mean, wrong? Wrong to think our father was a fool, and a dangerous fool? Or wrong to allow myself the pleasure of being ostracised from my family?”
Luke held his gaze as he sat onto the bed and leaned back, arms folded. “No, wrong to think that we knew what happened. We only discovered why Father threw you out a twelvemonth ago.”
The words echoed around the room as Edmund tried to comprehend them. “A – a twelvemonth ago? Just one year?”
George nodded. “Christmas Day of last year. I as
ked Father whether you would ever forgive us for whatever it was we had done – I was a child then, remember, I was not even aware for four months that you were not returning. I thought you had gone back up to Oxford.”
“And that was when he revealed his nature to us,” Luke said succinctly. “I prevented George and the younger ones bearing the brunt of it, but the story came out. We have been looking for you ever since.”
Edmund stared between them and saw no lies in their features. It was not like a Northmere to speak a falsehood, anyway. Far better to face the music than to swathe yourself in deceit.
“You…you honestly never knew?”
Luke shook his head. “You are a damned hard man to find, Ed.”
Edmund flinched slightly at the childish nickname. He had never liked it then, and Luke, as his nearest brother, had never lost the opportunity to use it.
But it felt strange now. Like a whisper to home, like a reminder of the life he could have been enjoying the last five years.
“It was only yesterday we received news that an Edmund Northmere was a regular at the King’s Head,” said George quietly. “We rode down last night, and was pointed in this direction. Your Mrs Bird said we could wait.”
Edmund felt unable to speak, unable to process the arrival of two members of his family in this room. It was as though two worlds were colliding; the life he had left behind, and the life he had built for himself in poverty and anonymity.
And through it all was the pain of Molly. His heart was full, too full, and it was all too much to comprehend.
He lowered himself onto the only other piece of furniture in the room, a rickety chair. “Why are you here?”
George and Luke exchanged surprised looks.
“Why, to restore you, of course,” said George.
Edmund snorted. “Oh, so Luke does not mind losing the family name? He is happy to forego the title – what was it, Marquis of Dewsbury? – as well as the income? ‘Tis a pretty purse you have become accustomed to, Lukey, I bet.”
Luke’s eyes narrowed. “That is for discussion. Discussion between brothers.”
“No, it is not,” Edmund said flatly. It hurt to say these words, but they had to be said. If not now, he would not have the strength to speak them later. “I have found my own way, gentlemen, and it may not have the power or prestige of the typical life of a Northmere man, but it is my life. Being a knight is more than enough for me.”
He saw their glances around the cramped and moulding room.
“You would rather have this?” Luke’s lip curled.
“No, I would rather have Molly!”
There was silence in the room and then Luke sighed heavily. “Women troubles?”
Edmund glared at his brother, the old rivalry returning, but then the heat dissipated and he sighed himself. “You have no idea.”
And yet it took but five minutes to explain the entire thing to his brothers, and he stared at them hopelessly as his tale came to an end.
“Ah, I see,” said George slowly, who evidently did not.
Edmund tried not to smile. Poor George, always awkward with the ladies. Had that changed in the intervening years, or was he still just as tongue-tied with them.
Luke sniffed. “I do not understand the problem.”
Anger started to rise again in Edmund but he tried to quash it. “Other than the fact that she lied, she betrayed me to her brothers, and any alliance with her would bring the Northmere name into disastrous disrepute?”
“She likes you,” said Luke wearily. “You clearly love her. You both have horrible brothers. And?”
Chapter 11
“Come on, Mr Porter.” Molly hated to wheedle; it was what desperate people, and children did.
She was no child, but she was desperate.
“No,” Mr Porter said firmly. He walked around the bar of the King’s Head but Molly followed him, unwilling to allow the conversation to end so quickly.
“Mr Porter, I know that you need the help,” Molly said quietly. She knew that begging was not going to convince the old man of anything. Any publican heard his fair share of sorry tales, usually to escape a large tab. “I have seen this place grow in popularity over the last year, even if you have not. You are busy.”
Molly looked over her shoulder as if to prove her point. The King’s Head was almost full, and it was only six o’clock in the evening. When the apprentices finished their work for the day in an hour, it would be standing room only in here – the height of success for any London pub.
“And you work too hard,” Molly continued, turning back to face the old man. “Do not think I do not see it, Mr Porter, but you run yourself ragged keeping everyone happy here. You need a barmaid, someone who will learn quickly and take the strain from you.”
Molly paused, worried that she had overdone it. Her heart was thumping in her rib cage. She could not betray how desperately she needed work, any work – any work that did not involve her walking up and down the streets with her skirts hitched high.
Her stomach rumbled and she tried to ignore it. Tried not to think that it was two days since she had eaten.
Mr Porter shook his head. “I have no work for you, Miss Kimble.”
“Mrs Kimble,” Molly corrected automatically, and then censured herself silently for what must have appeared to be rudeness. “Mr Porter, I am not asking for work just because I fancy it. I need the work, and I can see you need a worker.”
“But not you.” Mr Porter spoke with an air of finality and lowered his gaze to the glass that he was now drying.
Molly’s heart sank. There were few ways that a woman could pay her own way in this world, and working behind the bar of a respectable pub like the King’s Head was her preferred option.
And Mr Porter had not disagreed with her. It was evident to anyone with half a mind that he would not be able to run this place alone for much longer. The poor man grimaced every time he moved a barrel, and that simply wouldn’t do.
But it was the personal distaste of her that hurt the most. The Kimble name coming back to bite her, as she should have known it would.
God, if only she had never married him. If only she had been wise enough to see Charlie Kimble for what he was; a rogue, villain, and scoundrel.
Now he was gone, and she was left to pick up the pieces of her life.
“Take her and leave me here. I have no wish to see her again.”
Molly bit her lip. There was nothing more that she could do about Sir Edmund Northmere, save wish she that she had never met him. The fact that her heart was bleeding for him, bleeding of love for him, was another matter.
He was gone, and he would never want to see her again, that was certain. No, she was alone in this world and that meant she had to find her own way in it.
“Mr Porter,” she said quietly, and the old man looked up unwillingly. “Have you never made a mistake and regretted it?”
Something glinted in his eye; a flicker of recognition, perhaps?
Molly pressed home her advantage. “Have you ever made a promise to someone that you came to repent, or said something to someone that you wish you could take back?”
She held his gaze unflinchingly, refusing to look away.
Eventually Mr Porter coughed. “Of course, lass. Everyone has, I do not think anyone could claim perfection who walked on God’s green earth.”
Molly smiled sadly. “I cannot regret anything more than my husband, Mr Porter. I know now that he was a bad man, that I should have stayed away from him. But even now that he is dead and gone, I cannot escape his name. I ask you, Mr Porter, do you think that you can look past that?”
Mr Porter hesitated. His eyes raked her face, and Molly tried not to allow the tears, so eagerly pressing at the corners of her eyes, to fall.
She would not allow herself to be accused of manipulating this old man. He had to make the decision on his own.
“My sister once married an evil man,” Mr Porter said unexpectedly, his voice low. “I asked
her not to marry him, and you know what she said to me?”
Molly shook her head.
“You have to let me make my own mistakes, Arthur,” said Mr Porter with a wry smile. “And I let her, and he beat her half to death before I could get her out of there.”
Molly’s heart broke for him, and she reached out a hand to take his own. “Mistakes are just that, Mr Porter. Mistakes. If we had the knowledge of hindsight, we would never make them.”
They stood there for a moment, hands clasped, in mutual silence and understanding.
Then a glass broke behind Molly and a loud cheer went up as the unfortunate man who had dropped it was ridiculed.
Mr Porter dropped her hand and coughed gruffly. “Job, is it?”
Molly’s heart rose. “Bed and board would be more than enough, Mr Porter. Somewhere to stay, something to eat, and plenty of hard work.”
A wooden tray was handed to her and Mr Porter actually smiled. “The table in the corner – they have been loitering there for nigh on two hours, and only one round purchased. They have to order again or move on. Off you go, lass.”
Molly took the wooden tray in her hands and took a deep breath. She needed to, to prevent the tears from falling.
“Thank you, Mr Porter – I cannot thank you enough,” she began.
“Oh, go on with you.” Mr Porter’s smile had disappeared but as he spoke gruffly, two pink dots appeared in his cheeks. “And expect long hours mind, we do not sleep until this place is empty.”
Molly bobbed a curtsey and smiled as she turned. She had a feeling that she and Mr Porter would get along very well, over time.
Her eyes moved to the corner table where she had been first instructed – and saw Sir Edmund Northmere staring back at her.
Edmund’s throat was dry and his mouth seemed unable to move. He had known sitting here was a mistake, knew that Molly would not want to see him. He could tell by the look on her face – the shock, horror almost – that he had been wrong to come here.
“Go on then,” said Luke matter-of-factly as he drained his tankard. “Finally, I thought she would never arrive.”
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