A Rational Proposal (Furze House Irregulars Book 1)(59)

That could have been me. A great wave of nausea roiled through her. She staggered and fell blindly into Charles’s arms. He held her close: safe, warm, solid and comforting.

“Hush,” he said. “I’ve got you.” Then he raised his voice. “God knows he’s no loss, but who did it? Did anyone see?”

Never let me go. Take me home and never let me go. The thought was so loud in her head she must surely have said it aloud. Then she heard Captain Eastwick’s final words again.

Kit’s book. Get him.

“We have to find Kitty,” she breathed into Charles’s coat.

He gave no outward sign of having heard, but said, “Adam, I must take Verity back to Grosvenor Street. Will you take charge here? Tell the authorities I’ll answer any questions they have later.”

“I’ll do it,” said Lieutenant Crisp. “My men will help. Get Mrs Congreve away. This is no place for a lady.” He started to direct the bystanders, filling out his uniform with the natural authority that had been so absent in the drawing room or at the card table.

Mrs Congreve. Verity swallowed. That was another coil to unravel.

They pushed through the crowd to the hackney cabs.

“Oh, Mr Grimes, is that you?” Verity recognised the patient horse nearest her.

“It is, miss. Missus, I should say. Wish you joy, sir. Grosvenor Street, is it?”

“I’ll join you once I’ve given the lad here a hand,” said Adam to Charles.

Within seconds they were alone and on their way. “What did he say?” asked Charles.

That was the miraculous thing about Charles. She never had to explain. “Just four words. Kit’s book. Get him. I’m scared, Charles.” The hackney juddered over a loose cobble and she cried out in pain again.

Charles cursed himself for not cushioning her. “How bad is it?” He looked down at where her hand was pressed to her side and the bloodstain on her gown.

“I don’t know. I haven’t dared to look. I pressed your pad against it and hoped it would suffice. It felt like a line of fire at first. That’s what comes of being vain and wearing short stays. If I’d worn long ones, nothing would have got through. I think it was just a slice with the blade, not driven in like... like...” She faltered, seeing that seeping pool of blood again.

He pulled her close to his chest. “Hush, love, don’t think of it. Or if you do, think of it with relief.”

“Relief?”

“Relief that your sister is now free of a bad marriage. Also relief that I am not facing the gallows for his murder. I assure you if I could have got to him without compromising your safety I would have hit him so hard, life would have been extinct within moments.”

She had never heard him sound so deadly. Paradoxically, her heart swelled with love for him. “Charles?” she said softly.

He made an inarticulate sound and pressed a hard kiss on her forehead. “God help me, no one is ever going to lay a hand on you again.”

Which was all very satisfactory but, “You do not need to sound quite so grim about it,” she said.

He gave an exasperated sigh. “Verity, you are...”

“Yours,” she said simply, then glanced through the window. “We are here.”

“So we are. Later.” And this time he did kiss her lips - just once and swiftly - before opening the carriage door and helping her carefully out.





CHAPTER TWENTY


The incongruousness of Godmama’s pretty sitting room, with Mama, Mr Tweedie, Kitty and Ann and discovered in the act of eating macaroons and drinking lemonade, made Verity flounder. It was worlds away from the gambling hell and Charles’s desperate game, worlds away from the stinking street with Kitty’s husband’s blood seeping into the ground. For a moment she didn’t know where she was or why she was there. “I...” she began

Charles was faster to recover. “Mrs Eastwick, I am glad to see you and your daughter here and safe.”

Kitty gave a tremulous smile. “Your friend came for us so quickly there was no chance to change my mind. I hope I have not forgotten anything important. When can we be away to Newmarket, please? Simon knows this address.”

Charles’s face changed. He squeezed Verity’s hand, then walked forward and took Kitty’s. “That need not trouble you any more,” he said in a gentle tone. “I must inform you of your husband’s death. He was stabbed in the street by an unknown assailant as we were taking him to Bow Street to face charges.”

Kitty’s hand went to her breast. “Simon is dead?” She reached for her daughter. “Ann, do you hear that? Your father is dead.”

The little girl looked up from where she was sitting on a footstool next to her grandmother. She had the same wariness in her eyes that Kitty often displayed when talking of Captain Eastwick, wariness that should never be seen on a child’s face. “May I have my new doll back then? He took it.”

“Yes, my love, if the pawn shop still has it. Oh, I hardly know what I am saying. Can I fetch the rest of my possessions from Henrietta Street? I left everything as if we had only stepped out to do the marketing. There is not much. Two gowns, cooking pots, bed linen, Ann’s clothes.” She caught her lip. “If they are still there, that is. News travels fast in those streets. With Simon dead, the landlady may already have bolted the door against us and taken our possessions in lieu of rent.”