A Notorious Love Page 27

  The bitter realization that he was linked to Crouch by blood hammered in another fact he’d tried to ignore all morning: he would never escape any of this. He might manage to take Helena and Juliet out of here safely, but that wasn’t the same as escaping, not for him. Why had he thought he could struggle free of his free-trading past? Why had he fought to wrest a future from it? This was his destiny, like it or not—to be dragged down into the mire with the likes of Crouch and Wallace and all the rest. His investment concern…a marriage to Helena…they were castles in the clouds.

  Well, he wouldn’t play in the clouds any longer. This was reality, his reality, and it was time he accepted that it would follow him all his life.

  But that didn’t mean it had to be Helena’s reality, too. Once he got her out of here, he’d make damned sure it never touched her again.

  “So,” he asked his companions, “which one of you rascals is Morgan Pryce?”

  “Pryce ain’t here,” the young man called Ned answered. He and three others were playing cards to pass the time.

  Daniel settled back against his chair, trying to appear nonchalant. “Will he be around later? I’d like to meet the man.”

  “Oh, he ain’t been here in weeks.” Ned laid down a card. “He’s tied up with some private project of Crouch’s. Don’t know what it is. Jack’s keeping all mum about it.”

  A surge of relief hit Daniel to realize that Jack hadn’t lied about that. “So you don’t know where Pryce is now?”

  Jack answered from the doorway. “No, he don’t. None of them do.”

  That didn’t stop Daniel from probing further. “How long has he been with Crouch?”

  Shrugging, Jack took a seat at the table. “Awhile.”

  “I hear he’s a gentlemanly sort, so why did he take up with you rough lads?”

  “Boredom, I s’pose,” Jack answered. “A need for money. Who knows why a man of breeding dabbles in free trading? If you want an answer to that, you ought to ask your friend Knighton. He did it long before Pryce ever did.” Taking up a bottle, he poured some brandy into a cup and shoved it at Daniel. “But we don’t want to talk about all that. Have a drink and relax, Danny. Enjoy yourself.”

  Gritting his teeth, Daniel had a drink. And another and another and another as the day dragged on. By late afternoon, he’d been handed more drinks than he could count. Thankfully, they drank smuggler’s brandy—the colorless liquor that hadn’t yet been doctored with burnt sugar to make it brown—so it was easy to water it down without anybody noticing, or pour it into the nearby chamber pot.

  He had to keep his wits about him, try to find out where Juliet was. If he and Helena could escape, he wanted to reach the girl quickly. Unfortunately, Jack seemed to be the only one who knew, and he seemed determined not to let the information slip.

  Late in the afternoon, a timid knock sounded on the cottage door. Ned jumped up to answer, since he wasn’t playing cards just then. “That’ll be the food from the Stag Inn. It’s about damned time. I told them to bring it for three, and it’s long past that.”

  “I’ll fetch us some plates,” Jack said, disappearing through the door into what Daniel remembered was the kitchen. That’s where he’d eaten many a meal. He smiled a bit sadly. What would Bessie think to see her house so invaded?

  Ned entered with a huge tray, accompanied by a spindly maidservant who kept her head down as she brought in a second tray. Since she wore the biggest poke bonnet Daniel had ever seen, he could hardly make out her features.

  “They sent over a new girl,” Ned announced as he set his tray down, and the maid ducked her head even more. “Bashful thing, ain’t she?” Ned swatted her arse, and she nearly dropped her tray. Ned laughed. “You needn’t be shy of us, missy. We’re an amiable lot, aren’t we, boys?”

  Her whispered response, “I’m sure you are, sir,” sounded oddly familiar, but Daniel doubted he knew any Hastings girl of her age.

  She moved up next to him to set her tray on the table, and as her hand came back, something dropped into Daniel’s lap. Bloody hell, a hunting knife! He reacted instantly, sliding it hilt-first inside his coat sleeve. Then he glanced up to find the maid regarding him with a steady blue gaze.

  He didn’t know whether to laugh or shake “her” senseless. Seth Atkins—Christ, was the lad insane?

  Jack reappeared, and Seth turned quickly away. Jack addressed “her” offhandedly as he set down the plates. “Empty that tray there, girl.” As soon as Seth did, Jack filled a plate and put it on the tray. “Richard, you take this upstairs to Danny’s wife.”

  “Aw, Jack, let Ned go. I’m about to win this hand.”

  “Aye,” Ned said with a leer, “I’ll be happy to take it up to the lady.”

  Daniel bristled, but Jack cast him a cautioning glance and said, “I’m not letting you anywhere near Mrs. Brennan, Ned.”

  “I’ll go,” Seth whispered, playing the part of shy maiden with astonishing believability. As long as they didn’t get a good look at his face, that is. Christ, but he made an ugly girl. “I’ll take it for you, sir.”

  Jack hesitated, then shrugged. “All right. The man at the top has the key to the door. He’ll let you in. Tell him I sent you up.”

  Seth bobbed his head, then picked up the tray and left.

  Daniel waited until he heard Seth’s steps upstairs, then stood and stretched nonchalantly. “I think I’ll take my food up and join my wife, if you fellows don’t mind. I’ve had enough of drinking rotgut for the time being.”

  “Then wait until the girl comes back down,” Jack said, eyeing him with suspicion.

  “Come on, Jack, my food will be cold by then.” Daniel picked up his plate and headed for the door. Ned rose to bar his way.

  “P’raps I should remind you, Danny,” Jack said, “that the servants from the Stag Inn are all completely loyal to the free traders, since it relies on us for its brandy. And you wouldn’t involve some poor innocent in an attempt to escape, would you?”

  “Escape?” Daniel laughed harshly. “I’ve no weapon, and my wife is lame. You’ve got ten armed men down here, not counting your guard upstairs. Do you think I’d be so foolish as to take you all on? I just want to dine with my wife is all.” He forced a wicked smile to his face. “You and your cronies rousted me out of the hay too early for me to have my morning’s entertainment, so I thought I’d hurry the maid along and…take advantage of the wait for Crouch.”

  Jack studied him a moment, but apparently remembered Daniel’s appetites well enough. He jerked his thumb toward the door. “All right, go on then. Ned, let him by, but watch him go up.”

  Daniel could feel Ned’s eyes on him as he climbed the stairs. At the top was a burly man standing guard—the one they’d called Big Antony, an Italian as big as Daniel and probably twice as mean. The door next to him was open.

  Daniel spoke to Big Antony as he reached it, but received only a grunt in response. Good, perhaps he didn’t speak much English. It was common enough for foreigners to work in smuggling gangs, and Crouch’s was no exception.

  As Daniel entered, he found Helena seated at a table where Seth seemed to be dawdling. She glanced up, showing by a jerk of her head that she’d already determined the “maid’s” identity. Daniel nodded. He wasn’t sure what use he could make of the lad, especially with Big Antony watching them, but he wanted at least a word with him, if only to send the bloody fool home unharmed.

  Helena was drumming her fingers on the table as he set his plate down. At first, he was too intent on transferring the knife in his sleeve to his coat pocket while his back was to the guard to pay much attention. But when her drumming grew loud and he frowned at her, she slid something ever so slightly out from under the empty tray.

  He saw a fragment of sketch paper and moved around the table beside her. “How are you feeling, my dear?” he asked as he bent to kiss her cheek. Seth shifted into position across the table from them, blocking the guard’s view of what was there.

  Daniel sc
anned the writing and images she’d apparently produced on the back of the sketch she’d done of him. Then he straightened, a slow smile spreading over his face. This was good, very good indeed. Perhaps he and Helena would make it home unscathed after all. Helena pressed the pencil into his hand, and he began commenting on the food as he wrote furiously across the paper, sure that Seth’s body blocked Big Antony’s view of his hands. Then he glanced up to find the Italian watching him with narrowed eyes.

  “Go distract that bloody guard,” he bent low to whisper to Helena. “I need to speak to Seth.”

  She nodded and left the table. As soon as he heard her ask the guard if she could obtain cleaner linens, he folded the sketch paper, slid it across to Seth, then sidled around to stand beside him, both of them with their backs to the door. The guard was trying to make sense of Helena’s words, and she was speaking in loud English the way idiots do when faced with a foreigner who doesn’t understand.

  “Will they figure out that it’s you who came here?” he murmured to Seth. He wasn’t about to risk the lives of Seth or his family.

  “No, I was wearing Mum’s clothes when I showed up in Hastings.” He grinned sheepishly. “I thought they might let a girl inside if I gave ’em a clever enough tale. Then I saw the maid from the inn bringing the food. I told her that her master had sent me after her with news of her family, and that she had to go home right away. It’ll take her a while to find out nothing’s wrong.”

  “Good.” Daniel only hoped it would buy them enough time. He tapped the sketch paper with his finger as he whispered, “Take this to London—I’ve written the direction on it. Give it to Mr. Griffith Knighton if he’s there, and if he’s not, wait at Knighton House until he arrives. There’s plenty of money in it for you, I promise. I told him to pay you a hundred pounds for your service, but I’m sure he’ll be happy to give you more if you succeed.”

  Seth’s low gasp at the amount was followed by a hissed protest. “I want to help you here, now. I couldn’t get a pistol, but I’ve got another knife and—”

  “Certainly not,” Daniel bit out. When Seth drew himself up stubbornly, he added, “There’s too many of them, lad, and you might be recognized.” Not to mention that he still didn’t know where Juliet was being held, and any escape with Helena would prove difficult. “We’ll be all right, I swear, but only if you get out of here with that piece of paper. Now do as I say.”

  “What you talk about?” thundered Big Antony’s voice from the doorway, and it took a second for Daniel to realize he was speaking to them and not Helena.

  “Danny,” Helena said in her loftiest tone, “you had best not be flirting with the maid, or I swear you’ll sleep alone tonight.”

  Following her lead, he laid his arm around Seth’s shoulders. “I’m just being friendly is all.”

  “Hey!” Seth protested, then amended it to a more feminine-sounding protest, though he shot Daniel a foul look.

  Daniel laughed for real and called back to Helena, “Oh, come now, love, it doesn’t mean anything. The lass here knows that. Don’t you, sweetheart?”

  Daniel smacked Seth on the arse with one hand while shoving the paper into his apron pocket with the other, and Seth muttered something in a high voice that sounded oddly like, “Bugger it all.” Thankfully, Seth’s decidedly unladylike response escaped the Italian’s notice.

  Especially when Helena began bellowing her protests over Daniel’s “flirting.”

  “Best go on,” Daniel said loudly to Seth and handed him the tray. “My wife’ll have your hide if you stay around here any longer.”

  Seth fled past the guard, who seemed more interested in the brewing argument between Helena and Daniel than in some homely servant. Determined to draw attention from Seth long enough for the boy to make his escape, Daniel began shouting at Helena about how she was the most jealous wench this side of the Thames. She cried that he was a lecher and a rogue.

  She threw herself into it with such enthusiasm that they soon heard footsteps pound up the stairs. Jack appeared in the doorway. “Here now, what’s all this ruckus?”

  Helena would’ve made Mrs. Nunley proud, for she drew herself up like the bloody queen and said primly, “He was flirting with the maid.”

  Jack chuckled…until Helena glared at him. Then he smothered his amusement. “I’m sure he didn’t mean naught by it, did you, Danny?”

  “Nothing a’tall, but you can’t tell her that,” Daniel retorted in apparent disgust. “Any time she sees me with another woman, her eyes turn green.”

  “What do you expect when you flirt with everything in skirts?” Helena snapped. “What I ought to do is—”

  “See here,” Jack put in with a glance down the stairs, “the maid has gone anyhow, so there’s no need for this fuss.”

  Relief surged through Daniel so powerfully it took all his will to disguise it.

  “I’m sorry, lass,” he told Helena. “You know how I am when I’m drinking—”

  “Drinking!” She snorted. “Well, don’t think that’ll excuse it. And why were you drinking, anyway? Here we are, probably about to be murdered in our beds, and you’re downstairs having the time of your—”

  “I’ll leave you to discuss this in private,” Jack muttered as he backed out. Then he halted with a frown. “I almost forgot. There’s something I got to do before I lock you in.”

  Jack disappeared. Helena looked at Daniel questioningly, and he shook his head, not sure what Jack was up to. They didn’t have long to wonder, however, for when Jack returned moments later and Daniel saw what he was carrying, he groaned.

  A leg shackle. Bloody hell.

  Chapter 19

  Among the pleasant cocks of hay,

  There with my bonny lad I lay

  What lass, so young and soft as I

  Could such a handsome lad deny?

  “Spinning Wheel,”

  anonymous ballad

  “You’re not putting that thing on me, Jack, so just forget that idea.”

  Daniel’s protest was the first thing that alerted Helena to what Mr. Seward carried. She turned to see him holding a long length of chain attached to two wicked-looking iron cuffs.

  “I got to do it, Danny Boy.” Mr. Seward stalked toward Daniel. “I can’t leave more’n three or four men here tonight, because Jolly Roger needs us for the landing when he comes in. And I don’t trust you to stay put.”

  “You’re already lockin’ us up, so why the devil do you need to shackle me?”

  “Because I don’t want nobody havin’ to deal with your shenanigans, m’boy.”

  Mr. Seward stepped closer. Daniel lifted his hand to the pocket where she’d seen him slide a knife earlier. Oh, dear, surely he wouldn’t fight Mr. Seward over the shackle—that would be terribly unwise with an armed man standing in the doorway. He must have realized it, too, for he dropped his hand abruptly.

  Mr. Seward bent to fasten one cuff around Daniel’s leg. “There’s ten feet of chain here so you can move about easily,” he pointed out, “and it’s only till the morrow. But I ain’t gonna leave you in here without something. And don’t be getting any ideas about coaxing Big Antony into letting you out of ’em, because I’m keepin’ the key meself.”

  He straightened, a sudden grin flashing over his face. “It’s not so bad, y’know.” He turned and clamped the other cuff to the iron bedstead. “With it locked to the bed, you oughta have an easier time of mending your quarrel with the missus. You want I should shackle her, too?”

  Fire leaped in Daniel’s face, though she couldn’t tell whether it was anger or something more…interesting. “Don’t you dare,” he said quickly. “She has enough trouble with her leg as it is.”

  A pox on my leg, she thought wickedly. Shackled to a bed with Daniel sounded quite intriguing. She shushed the little murmur of anticipation in her breast. Merciful heavens, she was turning into such a naughty creature. “Can’t say I didn’t offer.” Mr. Seward winked at her. “Now it’ll be up to you to mend t
he quarrel, Mrs. Brennan.”

  “I think I can manage.” They were trapped here until tomorrow, and they’d done their best to prepare for the coming confrontation with Mr. Crouch. It was enough to tempt even the most inflexible woman to err, and she was feeling more flexible by the moment. Especially with Danny shackled to a bed…

  Mr. Seward paused on his way out the door. “I’ll tell Big Antony that nobody’s to bother you, including him. So enjoy yourselves.”

  As soon as Mr. Seward shut the door, Daniel brandished his fist at it. “Damn that Jack! Even if I could trick the guard into coming close enough for me to overpower him, I couldn’t shake this bloody shackle.”

  She chided herself for thinking about lovemaking at a time when she ought to be helping him plot their escape. “Can’t you pick the lock?”

  “I was a smuggler, not a thief. I don’t know any more about picking locks than you do.” He muttered an oath. “I’d hoped for a chance to slip us both out, stash you away, then hunt for Juliet, but that’s impossible now.”

  “You still don’t know where she is?”

  He shook his head. “One thing is certain. None of them know of her but Pryce, and he has the care of her.”

  “That blackguard,” she hissed. “If he dares to hurt her—”

  “Don’t worry—I’ll be the first to wring his neck.” He paced the floor like a bear at a baiting, heedless of the chain that clanked behind him. “Well, at least we’ve got a chance for survival now that Seth is on his way to London.”

  “What did you tell him?”

  “To take that sheet of paper to Griff.” He shot her an approving glance. “You did well, lass. Your sketches and what I wrote will send Griff down here quick as can be. Not to mention that he can use them if we—” He broke off with a curse.