Deepest, darkest, dankest Nottinghamshire
—March 1820
The bullet hole still hurt like the devil, but to add to Seb’s current misery, this morning it had started itching, as well. So badly that he was sorely tempted to poke a buttonhook down the tightly bound, pristine bandages encasing his abdomen and vigorously flay the blasted irritation away. Instead he subtly scratched at the area with his fingers, only to have them slapped away by his diligent hostess who was listening to his chest with something which resembled a miniature wooden trumpet.
‘You have to leave the wound alone, Seb. The stitches have only just come out and the area is still delicate.’
As was he. With a huff he flung his head back on the pillow and, to his shame, pouted like a petulant child. ‘I’m going mad, Bella. Slowly around the twist at the sight of these four walls.’ He’d been in bed almost three weeks. Granted he hadn’t remembered the first ten days of that, he’d been too busy fighting for his life, but he had been improving steadily for the last ten and was desperate to get back to work. He had smugglers to catch and one in particular. The Boss. The elusive nameless, faceless mastermind behind a highly organised, extremely dangerous smuggling ring linked to Napoleon himself, which not only threatened the English economy, but had also been indirectly responsible for killing two of Seb’s best men as well as aerating his chest.
‘How much longer is your husband going to keep me chained to this bed?’ Not that he wasn’t grateful. Doctor Joe Warriner had saved his life. The musket ball had gone deep and the blood loss had been so significant that most physicians would have sent for a parson to administer the last rites. But Joe wasn’t most physicians and had battled to dig the thing out, and had worked tirelessly to snatch Seb from the snapping jaws of death in the week afterwards. Who wouldn’t be grateful? But one could still be indebted for ever and frustrated at being gaoled by the same man simultaneously. Doctor Joe was both a genius and a tyrant...and now Seb was thinking petulantly, as well. Being indoors for long periods of time clearly brought out the worst in him.
‘Actually, after your astounding show of ill-tempered belligerence yesterday, he has agreed you can come downstairs today. But only to sit in a chair. And only for a few hours. Once you’ve taken your medicine, I shall send someone in to help you get cleaned up while I sort out something appropriate for you to wear. I’m sure Joe must have something that will fit you.’
Whilst sitting in a chair didn’t sound the least bit exciting, it was better than lying in a bed like an invalid and, once he was downstairs, they really would have to chain him up to stop him moving around. For a man used to being out in the elements, being cooped up was anathema. Mind you, Seb couldn’t complain about the luxury. A soft mattress, warm blankets, clean sheets and three excellent meals a day were a rarity in his line of work. Ten days’ worth was unheard of. He might be in purgatory, but it was a sweet-smelling, comfortable cocoon-like ordeal and it could be much worse. He could be worm food.
A male servant came in as soon as Bella left, clutching a steaming bowl of water, soap, towels and razor, clearly intent on bathing him like a baby. Seb sent him packing and groomed himself as best as he could, something which proved to be more challenging than he had first thought. Being left-handed, and because the bullet which lodged itself in his ribcage had sailed inches shy of his heart, every movement of his arm sent pain shooting through his body. The repetitive action required to scrape the cutthroat over his unruly new beard was impossible. He briefly attempted it with his right hand and almost sliced his nose off, so Seb settled for clipping it as best as he could with scissors while trying to ignore the worrying image of his pale, gaunt face in the mirror and the dark-ringed sunken eyes that stared back.
He looked ill.
Seeing it for himself certainly gave him pause for thought for a moment, until his legendary stubbornness kicked in and he tossed the mirror on the bed. What difference did it make if he was pale and unkempt? In his job, he had to blend in to the shadows and mix with the flotsam and jetsam. His new complexion only served to camouflage him better, made him appear more fearsome, and the thick beard very nearly covered up the ugly jagged scar than ran down his right cheek. The one Seb hated far more than he loathed these four walls. His permanent reminder of his allotted place in the world. Perhaps he’d keep the beard? Even though that, too, itched.
Gingerly he tugged the clean linen shirt over his head and was relieved to see it just about fitted. He might well have lost weight, but the burly muscles he had inherited from his mother’s family were still there. Farming stock and not the gentlemanly type. The sweat of his people had fertilised the land they had worked. Like his grandfather and his grandfather before him, Seb was still fundamentally as strong as an ox underneath the temporary sickly pallor. He had always been more farm labourer than gentleman and he’d be fighting fit again in no time. Not much ever laid down a Leatham, aside from extreme old age, and neither would one stray bullet. That thought cheered him as he flung his equally sturdy legs over the mattress and planted his big farmer’s feet firmly on the floor.
When he tried to stand to dress himself, however, his legs almost gave way and he had to grab the bedpost quickly as his head spun. Then, for the first time in his adult life, Seb had to suffer the indignity of someone else supporting him as he dressed, and then made his way laboriously down the stairs, collapsing in the nearest chair like a wobbly newborn foal. Exhausted. Humbled. And frankly, a little bit scared at the extent of his deterioration.
There was no two ways about it, his recovery was going to take much longer than a week. Suddenly the safe cocoon of his bed didn’t seem half as bad as it had half an hour ago, especially as the chair was now his new nemesis and one he could barely hold himself upright in. Perhaps he wouldn’t attempt to venture outside today. Being scraped up from the ground would be the ultimate humiliation and one his stubborn pride would never allow. Unconsciously he rubbed the scar beneath his new beard. Seb loathed being beholden to others. He looked after himself and those dear to him. Always had. Always would. Another trait from his proud farming heritage and the harsh realities of life.
A maid came in with a tea tray. ‘Good morning, Mr Leatham. How do you take your tea?’
‘Milk. No sugar.’ He looked down at his hands and cringed at how rude he sounded. ‘Thank you.’ He also loathed his crass ineptitude around women, especially the young and pretty ones. The ability to smile in their presence and be charming was not one he possessed. Seb wished he did, and it was not for want of trying, but each time he steeled himself to be more erudite than the average granite boulder, the awkward shyness tied his tongue in knots and the ability to string more than two words together evaporated. At best he barked at them so fiercely he scared them, and at worst he was simply mute.
Even the safe, married women had a similar effect. It had taken the best part of the last ten days to be able to converse with Bella properly and only because she had made a concerted effort to put him at his ease. He probably had all those gruff farmers in his lineage to thank for that unfortunate trait as well, because his father had certainly never suffered from the affliction. He could charm the birds from the trees to such an extent he sincerely doubted the man’s sheets had ever been cold. Unlike Seb’s, which rarely met any skin which wasn’t his. Yet another depressing thought in a day seemingly filled with them.
He heard the brittle rattle of china and risked looking at the maid out of the corner of his eye. He saw her sunny open smile had vanished because he’d been curt and monosyllabic yet again and all the poor girl had done to deserve it was bring him some tea. The gruff tone was a defence mechanism which hid his shyness from the world, although the maid wouldn’t know that. Only his closest friends knew of his affliction. Seb attempted a smile as she placed it on the side table next to him and muttered another thank you into his lap, then groaned as soon as she left the room. If being fearsome was wholly inappropriate, usually he would be the first person to leave a potentially awkward situation, which was probably why hiding in the shadows came so naturally to him. Normally, when not sporting a debilitating bullet hole, he would have darted out of the room as soon as he heard the click of female heels on the floorboards and returned when the coast was clear—but of course, he could barely stand, let alone dart.
Bella came in next, smiling in that concerned way she and her husband did as a matter of course. ‘I’ve brought you some books. They’re a bit of a mixture, as I didn’t know what you’d like to read, but I thought they might help pass the time.’ She placed them on the side table next to the tea and then poured herself a cup. ‘If it’s any consolation, I know what it feels like to be bored. Joe is insisting that I stay at home and rest for three hours every day despite the fact I feel as right as rain.’ She daintily sat on the sofa opposite him, her hand automatically resting on the increasing baby bump beneath her skirts. ‘At least I now have you to keep me company.’
‘Lucky you. I’m famous for my scintillating conversation.’
She grinned and took a sip of her tea. ‘I’ve arranged for luncheon to be brought in here. I thought we’d both be more comfortable than sat rigid at the dining table. Would you mind if we ate it a little early? Only I find myself constantly starving nowadays.’
‘I could eat.’ Now that she mentioned it, Seb was hungry. Another good sign, he supposed. Evidence of the tiny steps of improvement he was making.
‘Oh, I’m so relieved to hear that.’ Bella grabbed the bell and rang it. ‘I will tell them to bring it immediately and use you as the excuse.’
Five minutes later and the same maid who had brought him tea came in with another tray. This one contained some delicate sandwiches and cakes and, to his abject horror, the dreaded invalid cup he had come to despise. He eyed it with distaste. ‘Please tell me that’s not more of your insipid broth!’
‘It most certainly is and if you refuse to drink it again I shall tell Joe that I don’t think you are quite ready to be out of bed. That broth is a carefully balanced recipe designed to restore your strength and vitality. You do want to get better, don’t you?’
‘Can you at least stop serving it to me through a spout like an infant? I am sat upright in a chair. I could take it just as easily in a teacup as in that monstrosity.’
‘A fair point and one I shall certainly take on board at dinnertime—if you drink that one without...’ The rattling of carriage wheels on the gravel outside made her pause and frown. ‘I’m not expecting anyone... I wonder who that can be?’ She placed her forgotten tea on the table and disappeared to investigate, leaving Seb alone with his dented masculinity, the foul restorative broth and the invalid’s sipping cup. When she failed to materialise after five minutes, he snatched it up and searched for something close by to pour it into. He soon realised that was a forlorn hope and began to pour the tasteless, lukewarm contents quickly down his throat to get it over with.
‘I shall order more tea.’ At the sudden sound of Bella’s voice so close he nearly choked and spilled the last drops over his chin, just in time for the most beautiful woman he had ever seen to appear at her elbow. Bella grimaced apologetically as he swiped the mess away with the back of one hand while trying to hide the awful cup with the other. ‘We have a surprise visitor, Seb. My sister has abandoned the excitement of society to come to stay for a few days... Mr Sebastian Leatham—Lady Clarissa Beaumont.’
The vision, because there was no other word to describe the angelic perfection which had just walked in the room, momentarily appeared as surprised to see him as he was her. Her step faltered and he swore he saw a note of panic in her widened blue eyes before she caught herself. In fascination he watched her transform from startled and almost afraid to supremely confident. She tilted her golden head in acknowledgement, those beautiful eyes now amused at either his clumsiness or the freshly glowing red tips of his ears.
‘Mr Leatham.’
The voice matched the face. Lovely. Lingering over the vowels just enough to sound subtly seductive, although Seb hadn’t needed to hear it to be totally seduced—and mortified to be so. He was a clumsy oaf around most women, but in front of this goddess of perfection he stood no chance of behaving nonchalantly.
‘M’lady.’
To compound his embarrassment, his errant tongue managed to completely slur the words, making him sound every inch the subservient farm labourer from rural Norfolk he truly was. Good manners dictated he stand, because that is what a real gentleman did in the presence of a real lady, and so Seb tried, winced and promptly collapsed back into the chair, winded.
‘No, please. Don’t get up on my account, you poor thing.’
Thing.
That stung.
‘I didn’t realise you had company, Bella.’ She turned to her sister and he saw it again. That crack in her composure. ‘Perhaps I picked a bad time to turn up unannounced?’
Bella threaded her arm through her sister’s and grinned. ‘Not at all. There’s room enough for both of you. Don’t you remember? I wrote to you about Seb.’
‘Yes... Yes, you did. How silly of me to have forgotten.’ The vision turned her perfect head and scrutinised him as if properly noticing him for the first time. No doubt she saw the same things he had in the mirror. The gaunt face. The ratty beard. The lack of both a coat and waistcoat because he didn’t have the strength to shrug them on. The distinct lack of good breeding which he always tried to deny to the world. The ugly, jagged scar he wore like a badge. ‘You must be the brave hero who threw himself in front of a scoundrel’s bullet to save the schoolmistress?’
To nod seemed arrogant, but he allowed his unsightly head to bob once rather than attempt to speak again, not that he had considered his actions particularly brave at the time. He was simply doing his job. Breaking cover and charging towards the gun had given his friend a chance at killing the aforementioned scoundrel and saving the girl. The selfless act had been instinctual. Necessary. To complete their mission and because his friend and an innocent woman had needed him. Only now, with the benefit of hindsight and in view of the fact he had very nearly died as a result, was he privately prepared to acknowledge it had been a ridiculously courageous thing to do. Stupid, too. After weeks to ponder his rash response Seb realised he could have simply shifted his camouflaged position in the bushes and shot the scoundrel himself instead. But then sometimes he did tend to over-complicate things when the simplest solution was staring him right in the face.
‘Bella said you are lucky to be alive, Mr Leatham.’
‘So they tell me.’ Now he sounded typically clipped and unfriendly, his eyebrows already aching with the force of his scowl while the weight of her expectant stare was making his toes curl inside his boots. At a loss as to how to salvage the situation, he stared down at his hands and willed the floor to open up and swallow him.
‘I see you are reticent to talk about it.’
‘Seb is a man of few words.’ He could hear the affectionate smile in Bella’s voice and risked glancing up, only to find his eyes immediately lock once again with Lady Clarissa’s. She must have seen the heat and longing hidden in their depths because the corners of her plump, pink mouth curved knowingly. He supposed a woman like her was used to being admired, but it still annoyed him to be so transparent, so he resolutely stared back at his coarse, callused hands with the most unfriendly expression he could muster. Why had he gazed winsomely at her? Society ladies weren’t for him any more than society was. What a fawning idiot.
‘Or Mr Leatham is merely being mysterious to pique my interest?’
Pique her interest! Now she was making fun of him. Seb lifted his eyes defiantly as he glared, his stubborn pride refusing to let him appear less than he wanted the world to see, or revealing his pitiful shyness. ‘There’s nothing much to tell, my lady. It all happened in a moment.’
‘A significant moment, though.’
‘Which rendered me blessedly unconscious.’ An outright lie as he had lain on the ground in agony in a pool of his own blood far too aware of his life ebbing away. ‘I have no memories of the event. Nothing to entertain you with.’ Splendid. He was barking again. Conscious of the vision’s eyes still on him, Seb sat silently and hoped she’d quickly lose interest, as ladies were often prone to do when confronted with his legendary charm and lack of real gentlemanly credentials.
A waft of something truly wonderful and feminine tickled his nose as she moved to sit on the sofa with her sister. Whatever it was, it altered the air in the room until everything was enlivened by her fragrance, heightening his remaining senses while he avoided directly looking at either of them in case he appeared smitten as well as struck dumb. He heard rather than saw the rattle of teacups. Mumbled thanks as his forgotten one was removed and replaced with a fresh one, then only risked picking it up when the two ladies were happily chatting about the state of the roads between Nottinghamshire and London. When the topic changed to society gossip, Seb allowed himself to relax while simultaneously trying to blend into the wallpaper. As there was nothing he could add to the conversation and nobody was likely to ask him anything, he took his first sip and covertly studied the vision as she talked.
Lady Clarissa was every inch a beautiful and sophisticated titled lady. Impeccably attired in what he assumed were the latest fashions, there wasn’t a single hair out of place on her pretty head despite the fact she had travelled two hundred miles in a carriage. The symmetrical and casually loose ringlets which framed her cheeks were too bouncy, the intoxicating perfume too vibrant. If he were a betting man, Seb would lay good money on the fact she had stopped at an inn close by so that she could repair any damage and arrive looking as fresh as a daisy, rather than as wilted as a wet lettuce leaf like all the mere mortals would after days on the road. Surely nobody was that perfect? Judging by the creaseless silk of her becoming travelling dress, she had changed, too. No fabric looked that good after a jaunt up the Great North Road, especially when it moulded to her upper body like a second skin.
And it wasn’t just the external façade which both bothered and intrigued him. Her voice was like warm honey, slow yet animated at the same time. Perfect for story-telling and he found his own ears hanging on her every word while his eyes kept being pulled by some invisible force to watch her. Whilst that was no hardship, the more he observed, the more he saw.
She had that practised way of moving he had noticed in others of her ilk, only magnified, which showed off her face and figure to perfection, yet the effortless grace didn’t quite ring true either. A tad too choreographed to be natural. Even the position of her fingers as she held her teacup smacked of previous rehearsal, as if she had spent hours sat in front of a mirror, trying to discern the very best position to show off the delicate bones and the slimness of her wrist beneath the gossamer lace at her cuffs. Too perfect once again. Everything about her was too perfect, from her ridiculously long and seductive lashes to the oh-so-casual flick of that precisely positioned wrist.
Seb spent most of his life pretending to be someone else, usually a better man than he was, so he recognised an act when he saw one. Lady Clarissa Beaumont was a good actress. So good that her own sister didn’t appear to notice the brittleness of some of her smiles or the flashes of sadness in her lovely cornflower eyes between blinks. The unconscious jerkiness of some of those movements that suggested she was nervous or uncomfortable.
While there was no doubting the instant and wholly male reaction he had experienced upon first meeting her, because she truly was the most exquisite woman he had ever seen, it was that hidden mystery which now piqued his interest. Those little clues to the real woman she might be beneath the carefully constructed mask she wore so well.
She must have sensed him watching her, because her eyes suddenly locked again with his. ‘Don’t think for a minute I have forgotten you, Mr Leatham.’ Hot tea sloshed out of his cup and on to his leg at his being so hideously caught out. Only sheer pride held back the yelp of pain as he forced himself to return her gaze. For several long moments she searched his almost snarling face, then she picked up her teacup again and slanted him a coquettish glance over the rim.
‘There is nothing I adore as much as a mysterious man. Is there a Mrs Leatham I should know about?’
The sudden and unexpected flirting tied his damn tongue into gauche knots again, although while he faltered he also knew with certainty she had done it on purpose. Another layer of artful trickery to hide the real her.