The Swordmaster's Mistress: Dangerous Deceptions Book Two(9)

There was a loud rattle, a cloud of falling soot and Guin found herself dragged from her seat, thrown, falling, landing with a thud with something heavy on top of her. She struck out, hit a very solid body and then there was a bang and the room shook.

She was under Jared Hunt, she realised. She tried to shake her head to clear it and found he had curled one hand around the left side of her face and they were pressed together cheek to cheek. The full length of his body was over her. Heavily.

Confused, Guin tried to push him away, then realised that he had pulled her forcefully from her chair, thrown her behind the sofa and flung himself on top of her before the bomb –

‘That was a bomb!’ she said, more furious than fearful, her cheek moving against his as she spoke. His skin was slightly rough and he smelt of warm man, coffee and spice. Furious she might be, but it felt safe here. It felt very…

As the echoes died away Hunt hauled her to her feet and dragged her towards the door. The room was full of smoke and soot and small flames were licking the charred area in the centre of the hearth rug.

‘It was an explosive, certainly,’ he said as he turned from a rapid study of the mess.

He had a knife in his hand – Where has that come from? – and when they reached the door he pushed her behind him before he opened it and looked out. Through her ringing ears Guin could hear shouts and the sound of running feet and then they were outside and he was still keeping her behind his body as Augustus and Twite arrived, both wheezing with effort and alarm.

‘Guinnie!’

‘I am here, dear, please do not agitate yourself.’ Augustus looked in danger of a seizure at any moment. ‘Mr Hunt, will you please let me go?’

‘Not until I am certain that whoever it was who sent those explosives down the chimney is not still in the house. Twite, you need footmen and water in there, the rug is smouldering. Where are your armed gamekeepers?’

‘In the kitchen, below stairs.’ Augustus said. ‘No, here they are.’

‘What the devil do you think you are doing?’ Hunt demanded. ‘Who has come in or got out while you have been away from your post?’ The men stood looking sheepish. ‘Make yourselves useful now you are here – cover us while I bring Lady Northam downstairs. Yes, like that, one in front, one behind. My lord, stay close.’

He guided them downstairs in a tight huddle, checking around corners, one of the keepers backing along behind, shotgun raised, then bundled Guin into the scullery. ‘Stay here.’ He took the key from the outside and handed it to her. ‘Lock the door and open it only to me.’ He leaned forward and whispered in her ear. ‘And only when I call you by your given name. Do you understand? No one else, not even your husband. I do not care who it is.’

Then she was alone in the windowless little room with one tallow candle and the terrified pot boy, up to his elbows in a sink full of dirty dishes. ‘Goodness, what an adventure,’ Guin said brightly as she locked the door. She found a smile for the boy. ‘No need to worry, Sammy, Mr Hunt has it all under control.’ I hope. And then she began to shake.



Jared left one of the keepers in front of the scullery door with Lord Northam. ‘Stay there, my lord. You will slow us down.’ Ignoring the furious exclamation from his employer he swept through the house with the other keeper, a footman and Twite with his keys, locking each door as they checked the rooms.

They found the chimney sweep and his boy on the leads, the man stunned from a blow to the back of the head, the lad stuffed headfirst into a sack and too terrified to try and free himself. The man recovered quickly enough, although the blow had been both real and hard: Jared checked the lump, not prepared to take anything for granted. They had seen no-one, they said, heard no-one until they were attacked from behind as they were lashing their rods together ready to fix the brushes. Two men, they thought, or perhaps only one, but they were unsure even of that much.

Jared scanned the surrounding rooftops. There was nothing to be seen now, of course, and the adjoining houses offered an escape route any cracksman or hoist artist could use as easily as his own back stairs. He went back down leaving the footman on the roof with the promise of relief in an hour or so.

Lord Northam had a chair next to the scullery door and was mopping his face with what looked like a dishcloth as he talked in a loud voice to his wife through the door. ‘Anything?’ he barked at Jared.

‘No. They knocked out the sweep and he and the boy saw nothing. My regrets for my curtness just now, my lord.’ The old man grunted an acceptance of the apology. ‘We need a rota of watchmen on the roof,’ Jared said. ‘I doubt they will try the same trick again, but I cannot rely on them not attempting something even more dangerous next time.’ He moved past the red-faced Viscount and tapped on the door. ‘Guinevere? This is Jared Hunt. Unlock the door please.’

She emerged, soot-smudged, dishevelled and with one arm round the shoulders of a snivelling boy. ‘Run along to Cook, Sammy, and tell her I said you were to have milk and plum cake. My dear, are you all right? The shock and the exertion – ’

‘It is not I who sustained the shock, Guinnie, my love. Are you certain you are not hurt?’ The Viscount was patting his wife’s hand as he studied her face.

‘Quite certain. That is entirely thanks to Mr Hunt who threw me very neatly behind the sofa.’

Jared left them to their mutual reassurance and climbed back to the sitting room to survey the damage, dragging his mind away from the all-too vivid memory of just how Lady Northam had felt under him after that neat throw. There had been a faint question in his mind right from the moment the explosion occurred, but securing the house had not allowed him to ponder it. Now he stood in the middle of the room and studied the charred hole in the hearthrug. Strange. Very strange indeed.