Queen (Regency Refuge 3)

Regency Refuge: 3

Christmas Eve 1817

Owen crouched low and looked around him. At least four hale and strong men had given chase. He was nursing a bullet wound to his side and a knee expressing reluctance to cooperate.

The alley's darkness provided the illusion of safety. He might yet get out of this alive, if the clouds cooperated and kept the moon concealed.

Leather scraped on cobblestones to his right, and he pivoted, knife at the ready. An old man stumbled down the alley. His stringy grey hair was greasy and his coarse woven clothes tattered. He reeked of liquor, vomit, and… Owen wrinkled his nose as he fought the urge to gag.

The ruffians who'd been chasing him must have heard the old man, too. Or, worse, they'd heard Owen. They stopped their pursuit down the street and began backtracking to the mouth of the alley.

Drat.
Owen slipped back behind some crates. He wanted to call a warning to the old beggar but couldn't risk giving away his position. Instead, he tucked his body as tightly together as his wounds would allow while he prayed.

"Did you hear that?"

"Someone's down there."

"Who's there?"

The old man shuffled his way, with a dragging hitch to his step, toward the street.

Come on, old man. Get out of the way. They're not looking for you!

"Never mind. It's a drunkard. Let's keep searching."

From his vantage point, Owen watched as one of the thugs shoved the beggar down onto the ground and then kicked him full in the ribs. He winced in sympathetic pain but dared not leave his hiding place yet. To reveal himself at this juncture would ensure a far worse outcome for both him and the old man.

The echo of footsteps faded and silence once again fell over the alley, broken only by the yowling of a tom cat. A few minutes ticked by with no indication the group would return. Owen eased himself out from his position, relieved to no longer be wedged between a slimy moss-covered wall and the dilapidated, rotting crates. Pain radiated up and down his side from where he'd been shot, and his knee burned with each step.

The old man hadn't moved since landing on the cobblestones. Stooping, Owen glanced at the man's hair-covered face. Age was kinder to some than to others. Between the faded moonlight and the excessive facial hair, Owen couldn't distinguish any features beyond the large bulbous nose. The poor gent could have used a little more kindness.

A slight movement of the chest caught Owen's eye, and he sighed with relief. Now to figure out how to move him…

The old man was bulky, and Owen was wounded. Could he rouse him? Would he be able to walk? Owen shook the man by the shoulders. His efforts elicited nothing but a high-pitched groan. Seeing no hope for it, he pulled the man over his shoulder and stood, keeping most of his weight on his uninjured knee.

No longer radiating, the pain in his side now pulsed with each beat of his heart, its intensity growing with his exertion. Getting the old man settled across his shoulder as best he could, Owen took a step toward the street. Dizziness swept through him, and he knew his knee was in worse shape than he wanted to admit. Three blocks would still be manageable. Wouldn't it? A back room in the apothecary's shop housed a clandestine meeting place for agents.

The apothecary was barely three blocks away…

Blast it, what had he been thinking?

The distance was too great. Defeat nagged at him. Half a block into the short journey, he stumbled and dropped to his good knee, the dead weight of the old man adding force to his fall.

The soft creak of leather boots told Owen he had company. He thought to protect his burden and turned toward the sound, but was silenced by a gloved hand over his mouth before he executed the move. "Not a word, Owen. Give me your baggage."

Relief gave strength to his limbs as he thankfully hoisted the unconscious form off on Tobias, his boss. Without the old man weighing him down, Owen regained his feet and limped along after his superior.

They passed the apothecary shop and two other small businesses before turning down another blind alley. When they were trapped with no way out, Tobias hooted, mimicking the call of the city's hungry owls — often found picking off rodents at night. Before Owen knew what was happening, a pile of refuse moved, revealing stairs that led down to an open doorway. Tobias handed the old man ahead of them through the narrow passage. They followed and soon found themselves in a warm lantern-lit room. The door — presumably with garbage intact — was pulled back into place behind them.

The woman who pressed Owen into a chair had black hair threaded with grey. She handed him a bowl of hot fish stew and a crusty piece of bread. He dipped his bread and took a bite out of habit, but his eyes stayed busy examining the room and its occupants.

A man with a muscular cut and stormy expression carried the old man over to a pallet on the floor. The woman moved to fuss over the beggar, but nobody made any attempt to remove his hat or loosen his soiled clothes. The beggar's stench soon overrode the smell of the stew, a testament to the strength of his repugnant odor. Owen choked down another bite, fighting the urge to gag. He must have rolled around in vomit to stink as bad as he did.

Once the large man rose from laying the old man on the pallet, Tobias waved him over. The two stood, conferring in quiet tones. This one was built either to fight or to ride the deck of a sailing vessel. He was short, his legs braced wide, and his middle thick with corded muscles from long hours of labor. His red hair had begun to fade with age. However he knew Tobias, he wasn't eager to have Owen in his domain. Whenever he glanced at the table and the intruder with the bowl of fish stew, his nostrils flared and his eyes pinched with distaste.

Tobias joined Owen presently, taking a seat across the scarred table from him.

Owen wanted answers, but Tobias didn't seem inclined to offer any. Try as he might, the younger agent could hold his tongue only so long. "Why not the apothecary's?"

Tobias frowned. "It's been compromised."

"How?"

Owen's boss shook his head. "We don't know yet, but you would have walked into an ambush had I let you go there."

"And Williamson?" The apothecary wasn't an agent, but he'd opened his shop as a safe haven for those in the area. A good man, he was a valuable asset in this part of London.

Tobias' lips thinned. "Gutted."

Owen sucked in a draught of air.
Williamson was dead?
"Torture?"

"It seems so."

"Do we know who?"

Again Tobias shook his head. "I have a short list of suspects, but that's as far as I've gotten."

Owen glanced around the room. He understood now why the red-haired man didn't welcome his presence. He didn't want to end up like Williamson, and who could blame him?

Tobias nodded to where the woman approached. "She's going to clean your wound and sew you up. Is the lead still in you, or did it go through?"

Owen pushed the stew away. He'd rather not embarrass himself if the pain was too much. Not that he'd eaten a great deal to begin with. "Through, I think, but I haven't checked."

The woman — he'd not learned her name — nudged him into a forward lean and removed his coat before he could protest. She gave it a gentle shake, and as she did, Owen could see the glow of the fireplace peeking through two holes dancing within the folds of the material, evidence that the lead ball had traveled all the way through.

Tobias must have seen the same thing, for the first smile of the night touched his lips. "I guess that's an answer."

Owen nodded toward where the old man lay, still unconscious. "Is he going to survive?"

The woman sought the red-haired man's glance first, an unreadable emotion giving luminescence to her dark eyes, before turning back to Owen and nodding.

"What aren't you saying?" Secrets added depth to her expression.

Tobias spoke before the woman could answer. "Too bad you're not a drinking man, Owen, because you could probably use something for what I'm about to tell you…"

Two and a Half Months Earlier

Knowing he would be recognized if he returned to the bank, Owen decided to seek employment as a bookkeeper with one of the families for whom he'd discovered questionable transactions. On par with the way his luck had been running, the first family rejected his request for an audience.

Suspicion would be aroused if he applied for positions with families on his list and no one else. If they were working together somehow, his name would surface. So, after the first family declined to meet him, he spoke with two others not on his list. He botched those interviews significantly enough to ensure no position would be offered.

His next stop was back with one of the families on his list. They had no position advertised, but he hoped to present himself for hire nonetheless.

The stiff and disapproving butler showed him into the study and bade him to wait. Owen took a quick peek at the papers on top of the desk but saw none of any import. Rather than be caught snooping, he chose to act his part — the duly intimidated would-be employee.

Surprise blossomed almost an hour later when a woman came bustling into the room. He jumped to his feet as he took in her appearance. Her blond hair fading to grey didn't detract from her elegant dress or bearing.

"I understand you seek employment?"

"Yes, m'lady."

"What skills do you have?" Her eyes pierced him so sharply, he felt a deep and sudden affinity with butterflies being pinned to a cloth board. "You have five minutes."

Most people of power either wanted you to stand up to them or to be cowed by them, but Owen couldn't tell which she preferred. "I am experienced in accounting, inventory, business management, investments, purchase orders, and even some international shipping and exporting."

"Hm."

He'd discovered the first drawback to working outside the agency's purview: No background information provided on the parties involved.

"Very well."

Owen snapped his mouth closed. "M'lady?"

"My husband died last week, and I need someone to take over the running of his business affairs and household accounts. You will sleep in the servants' quarters and work in this room. I'll have his books from the office brought here. Make sense of it all enough to explain my husband's holdings to me within the week. Accomplish that, or your services will no longer be needed."

Before Owen could feel the sting of being assigned a room in the servants' quarters or ask the usual question about wages, the lady of the house departed, and he was left staring at the polished wood of the closed door. For a blank moment, Owen couldn't even recall the name of the family in whose employ he now found himself. A quick search of the desk drawers produced at least that much information. He found correspondence addressed to
The Right Honorable Rowland, The Viscount Rutherford.
Ah, yes. The Rutherford estate.

Adrenaline coursed through his veins. This was his chance. If he handled this well, his supervisor Tobias would have to accept that Owen was skilled enough to be given a more active role in their investigations and missions.

Owen pushed the thought aside and returned to the task at hand. If the viscount was deceased, who had inherited the title? How did Lord Rutherford die? The list of questions grew.

Movement out of the corner of his eye caught Owen's attention. One of the housemaids stood inside the study's door, holding a tinderbox. "I've come to start yer fire."

Owen nodded. "Of course." The chit was familiar, but he couldn't say why. She had stringy brown hair and a ruddy complexion, far from what most people would consider attractive. Her downcast eyes and stooped shoulders spoke volumes.
She's afraid to look at me.
Truth be told, she acted a scullery maid more than a housemaid.

The flames flickered to life in the grate, and the diffident servant moved toward the door.

"Say, can you tell me something?"

Still no eye contact, but at least she paused her exodus.

"How did the viscount die?"

"I wouldn't know, sir." Her voice revealed knowledge her words tried to hide.

"I'm not an ogre, honest. I was just hired, and I need a little information. Did the viscount have a son?"

A brief nod. "The young viscount is away at university."

"Can you tell me how he died? I need to sort out his business papers, and that may be relevant to some of his business dealings."

"He appears to have fallen from the roof."

What?
"The roof?"

Another quick nod. "He weren't found till morning, but I heard tell he fell from the roof."

"Was he up there alone?"

A shrug, and then the girl slipped away.

Owen stared after her for a moment. The sense of familiarity stayed with him, yet he was certain he'd never met her.

With a quick shake of the head, he returned to the desk and the task at hand. The time had come to pull out the ledgers and business correspondence and start doing the job the dowager viscountess had hired him for. He was going to need to be hired on for longer than a mere trial week. Too much needed to be untangled.

****

"You're to join Lady Rutherford for dinner."

Owen glanced up from his reading to see the butler standing in the doorway.

"Dress is formal. You've been assigned a room in the servant's quarters, and I've laid out the appropriate attire for you."

"What's your name?"

The butler glared. "Chambers."

Owen offered a smile. "Certainly, Chambers. I shall dress for dinner. Thank you to seeing to everything for me."

Chambers' lips thinned, and his eyes narrowed.

He's mastered the art of disapproval, if I do say so myself.

****

Lady Rutherford, her cousin Edward, and Owen were the only attendees at dinner. The lavish spread and well-appointed footmen would have impressed the prince regent himself.

"How is your work coming?"

If Owen were the suspicious sort — which he was — he would think Lady Rutherford wanted him to fail. "I've spent the day sorting through your late husband's papers and correspondence to get an idea of the scope of his business dealings. You said he had an office elsewhere, too?"

"His papers from there should be arriving in the morning."

"Would it be possible for me to visit his other office? To make sure nothing of importance is missed?"

Lady Rutherford tilted her head up until she was looking down her nose at him. "I am certain that won't be necessary, and I suggest you not question my orders again."

Owen bowed his head. "Of course, m'lady. My apologies." He looked back up in time to catch Edward smirking at him.

The rest of the meal passed in uncomfortable silence. Edward occasionally leaned over to whisper something to Lady Rutherford. Sitting opposite them, Owen was able to observe but not participate in these conversations. Having seen the peculiar way in which they interacted, he remained convinced he was better off.

Once the last course of the meal was finished, Owen was not invited to join the other two in the sitting room. He made his way to the servants' quarters to change back into his day clothes so he could go collect the rest of his belongings from where he'd been lodging.

As Owen stepped over the threshold into his small room in the servants' quarters, the hair on the back of his neck stood up as though he'd been too close to a lightning strike. He was alone. Nobody could hide in the small closet-less room. A quick look through his satchel gave him little useful information. No corroborating evidence leapt out to shake him by the collar, but he had the distinct impression somebody had been in his room and through his precious few belongings. They were good at their job, too. Not a single slip of paper was misplaced, and his clothes from earlier in the day showed no crease moved.

Owen left the dinner attire laid out on his bed. Chambers hadn't indicated whether his participation in dinner would be a nightly affair. Were it left to him, he'd rather dine with the servants. They tended to be a font of information without realizing it. The aristocracy? Their skill lent itself a bit too much to parrying razor-sharp words for Owen's taste.

****

The remainder of his belongings collected and the bill for his room paid, Owen returned to the Rutherford house.
Despiadado
, his horse, would need to stay tucked away at the livery. It wouldn't do for Lady Rutherford to know he owned such a fine steed when she so obviously saw him as beneath her. He approached the servants' entrance and found somebody sitting on the narrow steps leading down to the door.

He nodded. "You're the maid from earlier, yes? The one who started the fire for me."

She gave a shy nod and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.

Her uniform's cap was still on, but even so he could tell the poor girl either didn't bathe often enough or had been cursed with greasy hair. Since no stench met his nose, he assumed genetics were to blame.

"It's a fine night, isn't it?"

"Jus' lovely, sir. Jus' lovely."

"I'm Oswald." He witnessed her blush in the dim light cast by the nearby window. Her tangible reluctance suited Owen just fine. He wasn't sure he'd remember to answer to that name anyway.

"Oh, I couldn't."

"Mr. Lobbing, then. Please. I'd prefer it to sir."

A bob of her head.

"Say, that Chambers seems a tough one. Does he like anybody?"
Start small. Gain her trust.

"His nephew arrives in a week. He is coming to interview for the position you got."

That explains a lot.
"Well, Lady Rutherford plans to send me on my way within the week if I can't meet her demands, so the job may yet be open."

"I'm sure you'll do well enough. Mr. Lobbing."

She stumbled over his name, and Owen watched her, trying to gauge if something was amiss or if she was simply the nervous sort.

Before he could decide, she scurried down the rest of the steps to the shadow-hidden door and vanished into the servants' area.

And again Owen was left wondering if there was more to the housemaid.
Hm…

As he made his way to his room he realized something else. He still didn't know her name.