LITMIR.BIZ

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pulled his greatcoat around him and looked again at the house, taking in the yellowed weeds that grew under the darkened windows. Had it been abandoned? That would be an unwelcome twist to his plan. With a grimace, he started for the door.

      On the doorstep, he used the brass knocker three times with no response. He had about decided that the house was indeed empty when he heard the sound of someone fumbling on the other side of the door, which was followed by the door suddenly swinging open. A man, holding a lamp aloft, peered at Nichol. He was wearing a dressing gown over a sleep shirt that was stained with spilled food. The man was obese and stood with his legs braced wide apart, apparently to hold his girth aloft. He had not been shaved, and long scraggly hair floated about his head and shoulders. Even more hair sprouted from his ears.

      Nichol had to swallow down his surprise—it was nearly two in the afternoon and the man looked as if he’d been roused in the middle of the night.

      “Come for the lass, have you?” he asked gruffly.

      Nichol couldn’t say how he’d guessed it. “Aye, I have.”

      The man stuck out his hand, palm up. “I’ll have the money first, then.”

      Diah, but it would appear that Garbett’s cousin was a boor. “May I come in? It’s rather cold.”

      The man grunted. He stepped back and bowed with mock deference as Nichol swept past him into a hall crowded with cloaks and boots and stacks of peat, of all things.

      The man closed the door, then shuffled into a room just off the hall.

      Nichol followed, but he felt a wee bit as if he was entering at his own peril. The room, a dining room, was disgusting. It reeked of spoiled food and dog feces, which, when Nichol glanced down, were scattered about the floor. Uneaten food had been left to rot in bowls around the table, attracting flies even in the cold. Two dogs lay at the hearth. One of them, a long-legged lanky thing, lazily pushed himself up and wandered over to have a sniff of Nichol before returning to his place at the hearth.

      Nichol glanced around him and asked, “Has your housekeeper died, then, Mr. Rumpkin?”

      “Amusing,” the man said. “Has my cousin sent you to entertain me, or to compensate me for keeping the bampot?” He held out his hand again.

      Nichol withdrew the pouch of coins from his coat and put them in Mr. Rumpkin’s outstretched palm. Mr. Rumpkin, in turn, set aside the lamp, opened the purse and dumped the coins onto the table, quickly counting them, and biting into one to assure himself it was gold. When he was satisfied, he pointed to the stairs across the hall. “She’s up there, she is. Barricaded herself in.”

      Nichol could scarcely blame her. “How long?”

      “Two days,” he said gruffly. When Nichol didn’t respond due to his surprise, Rumpkin glanced up at him. “Och, donna look at me in that manner! I sent food up to her but she’ll no’ touch it.”

      No doubt she’d feared contagion of the plague. Nichol couldn’t believe Mr. Calum Garbett had sent his ward to this hell, of all places. His conscience demanded that he remove the lass from here as quickly as possible. “Which room?”

      “The tower,” Rumpkin said grumpily, and heaved himself into a chair at the table, picked up a spoon, and resumed eating whatever was in a bowl there.

      Nichol turned away before he gagged. He stepped out into the hall, over a block of peat, then jogged up the stairs and paused on the landing. There was only one door to his left. Sitting outside the door was a tray of food that had been covered with a cloth.

      He strode down the hall and knocked firmly on that door. “Miss Darby, please do open the door. I am Mr. Nichol Bain and I’ve been sent by your benefactor, Mr. Garbett.”

      Several moments passed before he heard movement. He waited for the door to open, glancing around that dark hall to perhaps identify the source of the odor he smelled up here, and was abruptly startled by the crash of what sounded like glass against the other side of the door. Had the lass just hurled something at the door?

      Nichol put his hands to his hips and studied the door, thinking. He stepped forward, knocked a little more softly. “Miss Darby...lass. Mr. Garbett has sent a proposition for you that I am confident you will want to hear. He should like to see you removed from this...place as soon as possible, aye? Open the door. Please.”

      Silence.

      He braced his hands on either side of the door. He had not anticipated having to convince her to leave. He would think she’d come bounding out of the room, her bags packed, grateful for the opportunity to flee. “On my word, what I have to tell you is better than anything you will find here.”

      He heard the scrape of something heavy against the floor and realized she was pushing something that sounded like a heavy piece of furniture against the door.

      “I warned you, I did,” came the man’s voice from behind him. Nichol glanced over his shoulder. Mr. Rumpkin had come up the stairs with a bottle in one hand. He put that bottle to his lips and took a long swig before saying, “Bloody heathen, that one.”

      Nichol turned back to the door and decided to try authority. “Enough of this, Miss Darby, aye? Your benefactor is quite eager to arrive at a solution for you, and what he proposes will surely satisfy you. But you must open the door to hear it.”

      Silence.

      Nichol was feeling his patience leak from him, and he never lost his patience. He tried the door, but as he suspected, it was bolted shut. He slammed his hand against it in an uncharacteristic display of frustration. “Miss Darby, I must insist you come out at once!” he said sternly.

      He heard something and pressed his ear to the door. Was he imagining it, or did he hear a low laugh from the other side of that door?

      He definitely heard another chuckle behind him.

      Patience deserted Nichol altogether. He prided himself on his ability to stay completely calm when others were at sixes and sevens—it was necessary to the sort of work that he did. But this annoyed him. He could feel the uptick of his heartbeat, the surge of heat to his neck. He would not be treated in this way by a young woman with nothing to recommend her, with no one to help her but him. He would not accept her bad manners in light of what he meant to do for her. He whirled away from the door.

      Mr. Rumpkin was still standing there, still drinking. He dragged his sleeve across his mouth and said, “Told you.”

      Nichol squeezed around him, then strode down the stairs.

      He had also learned in his many years of solving problems that if one avenue for resolution closed, there was always another. The trick was to find it.

      And oh, he would find it.

       CHAPTER THREE

      MAURA BRACED HER hands against the door and leaned in, pressing her ear against the rough wood, listening to footsteps receding.

      When she couldn’t hear them any longer, she pushed away from the door and smiled wryly to herself. How dare Mr. Garbett send someone for her? How dare he not come himself to deliver his apology? Did he truly believe she would simply walk out of this spot of hell with a stranger? Go meekly along after all that had happened? Not without an apology, she would not, and she felt quite determined to never leave this room until she had it.

      Except that she was even more determined to leave this wretched place, just as soon as she figured out how. She would not remain one night longer under Mr. David Rumpkin’s roof than was absolutely necessary.

      Oh, how she despised that man! At first, she’d tried to make the best of it, and though she could hardly stomach her surroundings, she’d tried to be pleasing and accommodating. Just as she’d tried when she’d been taken in by the Garbetts.

      On his deathbed, her father had

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