Realm 06 - A Touch of Love (24 page)

He stood again and turned slowly in a circle. “Or perhaps I was the target. From this distance, the shooter must have used a rifleman’s talents. The second shot came too quickly after the first. Someone possesses exceptional training. Exceptional
military
training.” He paused to examine the open road. “Easy enough to see one’s victim. Just as it was when I was returning from Oxford.” He glanced to the shrapnel he had recovered. “The same type of ammunition as what I discovered earlier. So, who is in danger? The lady or me?” With a shrug of defeat, he set his feet to the task of recovering Hamby. “Two shooters or one? Could someone know of my aiding Mrs. Warren? But that possibility makes little sense. Someone sought me out on Dover’s docks, long before I knew of Mrs. Warren’s plight. Yet…”

A third shot sent a bullet whistling over his shoulder as Carter dove for protection.

The sound echoed through her body, and Lucinda flinched. “What was that?” she squealed as Lady Hellsman clawed at her arm.

“I do not know.”

Mr. Croft turned to the coach. “We be removin’ from here!” he declared as he climbed to the seat.

“No!” Lucinda yelled about the fracas. “You cannot leave Sir Carter!”

“I have me orders!”

She heard Croft’s low whistle and a click of the man’s tongue before the coach rolled slowly forward. Without thinking of the consequences, Lucinda scrambled to the unlatched door and launched herself through the opening. Her body vibrated both with excitement and the jolt of landing unceremoniously on the hard dirt. As the carriage raced from sight, she could hear Lady Hellsman screaming for Mr. Croft to stop the coach, but neither the horses nor
the man responded. With no time to consider her choices, Lucinda rolled to her knees to stand. Hiking her skirts, she ran toward the unknown. With each step, she prayed Carter Lowery had not known harm.

Before Carter could react, his assailant had straddled his back and had pointed a pistol at the base of Carter’s skull. “Move and I will kill you.”

Carter lay face down in the patchy grass. His gun rested on the ground just from reach, while the stranger’s knee burrowed into Carter’s shoulder blade, and he could not turn his head far enough to the side for a closer look at his attacker. Therefore, he used his other senses to learn what he could of the man. The smell of boot polish. A clean scent of soap and sandalwood. The man was likely of the gentry. “You are a smart one, Lowery, but not smart enough.” A subtle accent spoke of French descent. Carter had heard such refinement in Gabriel Crowden’s speech, as if the listener expected Crowden easily to switch to French in mid sentence. So it was with this stranger.

“What do you want from me?” he asked, his voice muffled by the clump of grass in which his nose had been shoved. He felt the panic rise in his chest. The smell of fresh earth brought back the nightmare of being driven to his knees as French soldiers rushed the English lines. He bit his lower lip to drive the images to his mind’s recesses.

His assailant pressed the gun to the back of Carter’s head, and Carter could barely breathe, his nose smashed against the rich soil. Each inhalation sucked in God’s footprint. “I want you to die,” the stranger declared boldly before pressing his weight into Carter’s back.

Carter heard the cock of the man’s gun and felt the cold tip at the nape of his neck. He squeezed his eyes shut and said a quick prayer for his family and another for Mrs. Warren. The thought of never seeing her again brought a severe pain to his heart.

Lucinda clutched at her side. When she was on the Continent, she often walked miles on end, surrendering her place on the wagon to one of the older women;
but she had lost her stamina. Living in London’s cramped quarters had made her weak. “Made you more than useless,” she gasped as she stumbled to a halt. She bent over and slurped in air to refill her lungs.

How much further
? she wondered, but before she could discover an answer, the sound of an angry voice warned her that danger was near. Reaching in her pocket for the pistol Sir Carter had given her, Lucinda stepped softly into the underbrush. When she was but a child, her father had taught her how to walk quietly. “Never know when the enemy is near,” the colonel had warned. Now, she stepped lightly over fallen tree trunks and around patches of dried grass and twigs.

The significance of the voices grew louder. One was muffled, but the other spoke with such ferocity, Lucinda thought to turn back; however, she pressed on. The footman and Sir Carter were close, and she meant to find them. She released the knot from her bonnet and permitted the headwear to fall to the ground behind her.

Stepping past a wild rosebush, whose brambles pulled at her gown, Lucinda circled the base of a rolling hill to come upon a sight she had hoped never to witness again. Sir Carter lay upon the ground, and a masked man held a gun to the baronet’s head. “I want you to die,” the man hissed.

The gun cocked, and she held her breath. Lucinda knew she should look away, but she could not. With an unsteady breath, she stepped into a perilous clearing. “Toss your gun away,” she said with more bravado than she actually felt.

Carter’s heart stuttered, not from the possibility he might die in the next few seconds, but that she–Lucinda Warren–might meet her end, as well. From where had she come? He had left instructions for Croft to remove her and Arabella from danger. Had he not just considered the pain of never seeing her again? Had he conjured her up somehow? He could not permit the stranger to hurt her.

When his assailant had turned his head toward where Mrs. Warren stood, the pressure he had placed on Carter’s back lessened ever so slightly, but enough to shift the advantage to Carter. He bucked like the wildest horse in Lawrence’s
stables, sending his attacker tumbling backward. Carter scrambled to catch hold of the man. They were rolling. Kicking. Punching. A jab in his kidneys stung, but Carter ignored the impulse to reach for the point of contact.

Instead, he brought his knees up to wedge them against the man’s chest and to flip his assailant over Carter’s head to sprawl upon his back. Rolling to his feet, he stomped hard upon his attacker’s chest. The sound of ribs cracking brought a quick end to the fight. The masked man clutched at the pain.

He watched warily, but Carter stepped from the stranger’s reach and opened his arms to the woman who had saved him. Instantly, she was in his embrace, and his world righted. “I thought he would kill you,” she sobbed against his chest. She possessed daring and cleverness, and the woman stirred his protective instincts.

Carter nestled her beneath his chin and carefully eased the pocket pistol from her trembling fingers. “Your appearance saved the day,” he whispered as he kissed her forehead. The gesture reminded him of another kiss–just a brush of his lips across Grace Crowden’s cheek. It had spoken to him of the missing parts in his life, and suddenly his world tilted closer to Mrs. Warren.

She continued to cling tightly to his lapels, but Mrs. Warren’s practical side had returned. “Who is he? Is he the one who threatened me?”

Carter kept the pistol pointed at the man. “I am uncertain.” He nodded toward where his gun rested on the ground. “Could you retrieve my gun and bring it here?”

She dashed away her tears with her knuckles before turning to do as he had asked. If he had had his choice, Carter would have caught her tightly to him to kiss the lady senseless, but danger had not receded. It had only taken a step back. The situation required he remain alert.

When she returned to his side, she also held his assailant’s gun. He smiled at her ingenuity. Mrs. Warren was one of a kind. He regretted she had given her heart and her loyalty to a man of Captain Warren’s caliber. She deserved better. The lady deserved a man who would worship her bravery, her good sense, and her beauty.

He accepted his gun and set it for firing before returning it to her hands. “I plan to remove our attacker’s mask,” he said softly. “If he makes any unnecessary moves, shoot him.” It was an unusual request; a gentleman never exposed a woman to danger, but their relationship had never been one to follow
propriety’s standards. Carter trusted her to protect him, as she trusted him to do the same for her.

She nodded her agreement. “I shall do my utmost to prove myself worthy.” Mrs. Warren handed him the stranger’s gun before adjusting her grip upon his weapon.

Carter leaned closer to say, “You are the most incomparable woman of my acquaintance. I am blessed you have chosen me as one of those you safeguard.” He smiled to ease her nervousness. “Remember,” he said with a tease, “When pointing your weapon, I am the handsome one.”

The lady presented him a serious scowl, but her countenance quickly recognized the mirth in his words. With a very feminine giggle, she countered, “We shall see if that assumption holds true. Perhaps, Sir Carter, the man bears the countenance of Apollo.”

He tapped her upturned nose with a gentle stroke of his finger. “I cannot have my Lady Fair preferring another. If yon stranger is fair of face, I will be forced to rearrange the man’s generous features.”

Mrs. Warren smiled, and Carter’s heart did a double flip. He wondered what it would be to start each of his days with that smile. “I shall endeavor to disguise my reaction to my masked dark knight.”

Pleased that her good nature had returned, Carter left her where she stood some six feet from the man, who had rolled to his side. Glancing to her again, he leaned over his assailant. He caught the man’s mask and jerked it upward. What he found was a man of some five and thirty years with dark brown hair and matching eyes. He had the look of those of Western Europe, with skin pale and pasty, but features finely chiseled. “Who are you?” Carter demanded. “Why have you chosen to make my family your target?”

Although he clutched at his chest, the man defiantly spat in Carter’s face. “I will…tell you nothing,” he growled.

Carter said viciously, “We will see how brave you are when my friends and I have a session with you.” He carefully searched the man’s pockets for additional weapons before standing slowly to survey the situation. Carter would never permit a woman to witness the Realm’s techniques for securing information. He wished for Brantley Fowler’s assistance; Thornhill had a knack for the unusual when it came to questioning prisoners. The scene told him he required a means to transport both Hamby and the stranger to Maryborne.