The Marriage Bargain (31 page)

Spence strode toward him. “Cut line, Esmund. What the devil are you trying to say?”

Arjun released him.

Esmund brushed off his sleeves and straightened his jacket before answering Spence. “It was not
this
Keenan who held my debts and made me fight the duel—I do beg your pardon, sir.”

“Never mind that,” Spence snapped. “Who put you up to it?”

“Not
this
Keenan,” retorted Esmund. “The other one. You know, the vicar. Reverend Keenan.”

“Reuben,” Spence moaned.

Blake’s eyes widened and Keenan’s face turned white.

“Reuben!” Spence shouted. He looked from one man to the other, the horror becoming all too real. “My God, I sent her off with him!”

By the time Spence was on the road, he figured to be at least two hours behind Reuben. Leaving Blake and Wolfe to sort things out in London, he’d ordered his horse saddled and changed into riding clothes, all the while chafing at how much time ticked by. The streets of London were even more congested than when Reuben’s curricle had pulled away, and Spence needed to thread his way through carriages and wagons and pedestrians before reaching the open road. He changed horses frequently, asking at each posting inn if they’d remembered seeing a curricle of Reuben’s description. Each time they said yes, and he’d known Emma had been safe that much longer.

It began to rain, just enough to make the road a muddy mess, slowing travel but not halting it. He’d not bothered with a great coat, and it took no time at all for his clothing to soak through. He hoped Emma had remained dry. The rain caused him to fall farther behind. They’d had two hours’ driving on good road before the rains began, two more hours than he’d had.

He prayed Reuben had taken Emma back to Kellworth. He prayed no harm had come to her. He feared his prayers were too late.

The long hours in the saddle gave him plenty of time to think. He remembered the poacher’s shot, his curricle’s shattered wheel. Had Reuben masterminded those events? If so, he’d been heedless of Emma’s safety then, too. What of the other mishaps that occurred at Kellworth? The medicine making Tolley ill? The stirrup breaking? It all seemed patently clear now that these were manufactured events.

What motive could his cousin have for all this treachery? Did he desire the title? It seemed far-fetched, since his father was next in line. Or did he mean to kill his father, too? Had Reuben, professing all through childhood that he was called to the Church, broken the commandment,
thou shalt not kill
? Had Reuben coveted Kellworth so much as to damn his soul?

Rain trickled into Spence’s boots as he rode, but he ignored the discomfort. Spain in winter had been much worse.

Why would Reuben wish to harm Emma? Spence could not figure it. Reuben seemed devoted to her, and she was no threat to him.

Unless she produced an heir.

Spence groaned. Reuben would have known he and Emma shared a bed. There were no secrets in houses full of servants. Emma had been safe only when it was certain she would not bear an heir.

Daylight waned by the time Spence entered the familiar countryside surrounding Kellworth. The rain had ceased, and try as he might to urge the horse into a gallop, its hooves stuck to the still-muddy road. When Kellworth Hall finally came into view, it looked like an apparition through the still-misty air. Spence shouted as he approached the main entrance. He dismounted and burst into the hall.

A stunned Mr. Hale stood there. “Lord Kellworth! What a surprise.”

Tracking mud from his boots and dripping water onto the floor, Spence lost no more time. “Where is Lady Kellworth?”

Mr. Hale’s brows rose. “Why, I do not know, my lord.”

Mrs. Cobbett swished into the hall, her chatelaine jangling. “I heard some shouting.” She halted, spying Spence. “Oh my goodness!”

“Is Emma here?” he asked again, too impatient to credit their surprise.

“She is in London, my lord,” Mrs. Cobbett replied, curtsying.

“Not here?” he repeated, his fear escalating.

“No, my lord,” they answered in unison.

He could waste no time explaining. “I need a dry greatcoat immediately. Bring it here to the hall.”

He raced to the gun room, unlocking a cabinet and removing a pistol and a pouch of cartridges. He checked the flint of the pistol and bit open a cartridge, pouring in the powder and packing the ball with skilled efficiency. He wrapped the loaded pistol in an oilskin against the damp and slung the pouch across his shoulder. His eyes lit on a dagger in an elaborately tooled leather sheath, a relic from one of his father’s foreign trips. He strapped it on and hurried back to the hall.

Tolley waited with the caped coat. “What else can I do, sir?”

“Wait for my friends to arrive,” Spence told him. “Blakewell and Wolfe. Tell them to come straight to the vicarage.”

Tolley helped him into the greatcoat. Spence tucked the pistol into a pocket and dashed out the door to where the horse now munched on a patch of grass nearby. Spence mounted the beast again and set as fast a pace as he could toward the vicarage.

Not more than ten minutes later, he dismounted in front of the two-story house that had been home to Kellworth’s vicars for three generations. Almost slipping in the mud as he hurried to the door, he paused a moment to unwrap the pistol and place it back in the pocket. He then hammered on the door until Reuben’s housekeeper answered.

“Where is he?” he demanded.

The stunned woman said, “In the drawing room, my lord.”

Spence burst into Reuben’s drawing room, where his cousin sat comfortably in a chair sipping a glass of wine. Spence rushed at him, seized him by the front of his coat, and pulled him to his feet. The glass flew out of Reuben’s hand, spraying wine on Reuben’s coat, the chair, the carpet.

“What have you done with her?” Spence growled.

“With—with whom?” stammered his cousin.

Spence lifted the shorter man until they were nose to nose and Reuben could not miss the fury on Spence’s face. “You know damned well who. Where is Emma?”

“Put me down and I will tell you!” Reuben cried.

Spence let Reuben’s feet touch the floor, but he did not let go.

“She did not come with me, Spence.” Reuben’s expression was the picture of sincerity. “She made me drop her at her mother’s townhouse. She never left London. I came on alone.”

Spence put one hand around Reuben’s neck. “Do not take me for a fool. I asked at the posting houses. You were seen. You are a dead man unless you take me to her.”

Reuben’s eyes flashed with panic as Spence tightened his grip on Reuben’s throat. His face red, Reuben tried to pry away Spence’s hand, to no avail.

Finally he nodded and Spence let go.

“I will lead you to her.” Reuben coughed and rubbed his neck. “Let me fetch my hat and an overcoat.”

“Bugger the hat and coat!” Spence said, pushing him out of the room. The housekeeper still stood in the hall wringing her hands.

He pushed Reuben past her and out the door. “Where to?”

“Follow me.” Reuben walked with mincing steps, turning around to Spence. “She’s come to no harm. You’ll see, Spence! This is all a terrible mistake.”

He sounded as forthright as his father, acting as if Emma were lounging in some comfortable haven. In the church, perhaps. Spence tried to hope that was true.

But instead of entering the church, Reuben led him around to the back.

“Where the devil are you taking me?” Spence placed his hand inside his pocket and removed the pistol.

“Not far now,” his cousin responded.

Reuben walked to the gate of the church’s cemetery and opened it. Spence felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end.

Daylight had all but disappeared, leaching the area of any color. They passed tombstones standing like ghostly sentinels. They kept walking until, at the far end of the cemetery, set off in a copse of white willows, the stone edifice of the Kellworth mausoleum loomed a somber gray. Reuben headed straight for it.

Cold fingers of panic raced up Spence’s spine. He pushed at Reuben’s back with the barrel of the gun. “Make haste.”

Reuben tossed Spence a wounded look from over his shoulder.

Once reaching the door, Reuben spent a great deal of time searching his pockets, finally removing the key and turning it in the lock. Reuben pulled the door open.

Spence peered inside, straining to see in the gloomy interior. The scent of blood reached his nostrils. Just within the doorway there was the dark outline of a body lying on the stone floor.

“No!” Spence cried, pushing Reuben inside.

As Spence made his way over to the body and crouched down, Reuben sprang away and dashed to the doorway.

“Bugger!” Spence jumped to his feet, but the door slammed shut as he reached it, plunging him in darkness.

He dropped the pistol and flung himself against the door, banging on the thick wood. “Reuben! You bloody viper! You worthless cur! Open this door!”

He heard the key turn in the lock, echoing loud against the stone walls. “Reuben!” he shouted again, but no sound could be heard. Spence groped in the blackness and felt his boots step in something sticky. Blood.

Dear God. Emma.

“Spence?” A spectral voice drifted from the recesses of the gloomy interior.

He froze. “Emma?”

“I’m over here,” she said, raising her voice.

She was real. Alive. He nearly collapsed with relief. He cast about in the darkness, trying to follow the sound. “Emma!”

“Here!” she cried. “I did not want to sit near that man.”

Not caring what obstacles might lie in his path, Spence took bold steps toward the sound of her voice, until he bumped into a sarcophagus, one of the first of his ancestors to claim a final resting place here. Later relations lined the walls.

“I am right here.” Her voice was very near. “I’m sitting on top.”

He lurched toward her, hearing her crawling toward him. His hand suddenly caught hers, and he grabbed her, pulling her off the sarcophagus and crushing her against him.

“I thought you were dead.” He buried his face in her hair, loose around her shoulders. “I saw that body and I thought you were dead.”

“Oh, Spence!” she cried. “You came for me.”

He kissed her and held her close. “Emma, my love.”

Emma clung to him, rubbing her cheek against the wool of his coat. Hardly able to believe he was here, she thrilled at his words. She returned his kiss, almost missing his lips. If she could not see him, at least she could feel his arms around her.

She eventually felt able to speak. “Reuben said he would leave me to die here. He said he would kill you, too, Spence, as soon as a decent interval passed.”

“Emma,” he moaned. “Why here? Why did he bring you to this god-awful place?”

His body warmed her. The scent of him filled her nostrils, taking away the smell of dank stone and death. “No one would hear my cries for help, he said. It served me right, he said, because I was the one who kept you from being buried here.”

“Now he means for us both to be buried alive.”

She shuddered.

She felt his body tense. He released her. “The cursed viper. I am not going to let you die here. I promise I am not.”

As he embraced her again, Emma smiled at the irony. This was another promise Spence was likely to break, but she would not fault him for it. She was only sorry he was with her to suffer the same fate.

“Blake and Wolfe will come, Emma,” he said. “They are on to him.”

Would it matter? Reuben would steer them away from this place, if he did not kill them, too. Reuben had told her of killing Ruddock. She’d seen him kill the groom, could still hear the shot of his pistol and its echo against the stone walls. She could still hear Reuben calmly discuss his intent to kill Spence and, later on, his own father if the man did not oblige him by dying of natural causes soon enough. Reuben would be earl and the people would love him because he would take much better care of the estate than Spence had.

Reuben had counted on Spence dying in battle, he’d said. When Spence had not obliged him, he’d arranged for him to be killed in a duel. Emma had ruined it all. If only she would have let Spence die, she could have married Reuben and been
his
Lady Kellworth.

The idea made her ill.

There was a skittering sound.

“What was that?” Spence asked.

“Mice,” Emma replied. “That is why I climbed on top of this.” She patted the sarcophagus.

“Let us get back on it.” He lifted her onto it and climbed on after her. The stone cover was carved into the sleeping figure of some long-departed Keenan. They sat on the legs.

Spence tucked her close to his side and cocooned her inside his greatcoat.

She rested her head against him. “The dead man is Reuben’s groom.”

“Dear God.” His words came from deep in his chest and she felt as well as heard them. “Emma, I failed to protect you. I put you right into his hands.”

His clothing was damp against her cheek. “It is not your fault.”

“No,” he said fiercely. “I am at fault. If only—”

She found his lips and covered them with her fingers. “Shh, do not blame yourself. He fooled me, too. He fooled everyone.” She melted back in the comfort of his arms, until the hopelessness of their situation struck her anew. “I wish you were not here! I wish you were safe in London.”

“No.” His voice was deep and firm. “I belong here with you. I will not leave you this time. You will not be alone.”

When Reuben shut the door on her, she’d screamed and railed until almost too weak to stand. She’d crawled on the floor, trying to get as far away from the dead groom as she could, feeling the mice run over her fingers and get caught in her skirt. When she finally climbed atop the sarcophagus, she forced herself to think, to review her life. Rescue seemed impossible.

“I was not as afraid as I thought I would be,” she told Spence. It was incredible but true. “And this is even more frightening than getting lost in Cairo.”

“Cairo?”

She laughed softly. “Never mind.” She turned, still unable to see him, but she put her hands on his face. “Spence, I want to tell you—I had much time to think—you must know that I have regretted nothing.
Nothing.
I do not regret marrying you, or struggling alone at Kellworth, or making you try to give me a baby. I do not regret loving you.”