All About Seduction(92)

A couple more men turned to her and regarded her speculatively.

“Don’t think I’d want to tamper with a man’s wife about now,” said another.

Had her encounter with Whitton had anything to do with his death? Her thoughts swirled. Before he left, Whitton had been sequestered with Mr. Broadhurst. Then that same night, there was that stranger who refused to let a servant take his dripping greatcoat or remove his pulled low hat. He’d said he had business with her husband. What sort of business was conducted so late in the evening? Her hand went to her mouth.

Dear God, had Mr. Broadhurst had anything to do with Mr. Whitton’s murder?

Worse yet, had Jack left of his own free will?





Chapter 18



Jack made his way to the midwife’s apothecary shop. He struggled to open the door without toppling over. The pack on his back containing all his worldly goods exacerbated the precariousness of his balance. The bell jangled and clanked as the door swung closed on him. A shooting pain radiated down to the bone of his broken leg. Gritting his teeth, he held back a cry. Shoving the door off his leg and crutch took almost more strength than he possessed. To make everything worse, except for the change tied in the handkerchief, he was flat broke.

Years of savings—gone in a week. He wouldn’t make it to London in time for his appointment. Hell, without wages he might never make it, might never get out of this mill town, might never be his own man. His only choice now was to go back to the Broadhurst house and hope that Mr. Broadhurst had no immediate plans to rid the world of one useless cripple. Jack had poured out the laudanum just in case.

The midwife arranged bottles on a shelf behind a counter. Brushing back a strand of salt and pepper hair, she turned. Her eyes widened, “Jack Applegate.”

“Mrs. Goode,” he acknowledged. He didn’t know if she’d ever been married, but a woman of her age and stature in the community was accorded respect.

“Can’t say I expected to see you so soon.” She pulled a small dark bottle from a crate packed with straw and stood on her toes to put the glass jar on a high shelf.

Jack crutched over to the stool in the corner and jogged around until he could sit. Maneuvering on crutches was still a learning experience. He expected at any time to pitch onto his face. More than once he’d had to grab whatever was near to stay upright.

“What can I do for you?” She scraped a bit of straw back into the crate and moved it to the floor.

He opened his mouth to ask for laudanum, but the image in his head of his father, bleary-eyed and unrepentant, tipping up the bottle of gin, stopped the request on his lips. “I need a crock of honeymoon ointment.”

Mrs. Goode swung around, her lips pressed into a disapproving line. “For heaven’s sake, Jack, are you already at one of the housemaids?”

“No. Don’t think any of the housemaids would be interested in a cripple.” Mrs. Broadhurst wasn’t interested in him as a lover either, just for his potential to sire a baby. He tilted his head down and sighed.

Mrs. Goode eyed him sharply. He could have told her that when he was bent on seduction, he didn’t need help from ointments. But that wasn’t true with Mrs. Broadhurst. Nor was it the sort of thing one said to a woman—even if she was a midwife who knew things about him no one else knew.

He met Mrs. Goode’s gaze doing his best to look guileless. “I need it for . . . my scars. Dr. Hein says I have to make sure the skin doesn’t dry out and crack.”

“I can just give you the lanolin that would go in it. That’s all you’ll need to keep the skin supple.”

“I want the ointment. Need help with soothing the soreness too.”

Watching him speculatively, Mrs. Goode tilted her head.

Jack twisted putting his crutches together and leaning them against the wall. He might not have known about the honeymoon ointment—good for dryness after childbirth too—if not for his five married sisters’ low conversations to each other. Unlike in the Broadhurst house, where everyone was separated, few secrets were possible in the Applegate home. He pulled out the handkerchief, untied it and pulled out a shilling. “How much?”

She startled and rubbed her back. “It will take me a few minutes to mix it. And I might be called away. Parson’s wife was having pains this morning.”

“I could use the rest while I wait.” Jack wondered if he could even make it back to the Broadhursts’.