Starlight & Promises (39 page)

“Whoa!” Garrett yelled and jumped back when his stick-probing elicited a crackling and slithering beneath a pile of leaves.

After sending Garrett a black look, Christian turned back to Richard with a cynical smile. “You’re
certain
it was a Smilodon? I would hate to have come all this way because of a dream you had one night when foxed on brandy.”

Richard’s brows lowered. “Most certain, but even are we not fortunate enough to find the Smilodon again, you’ll not return empty-handed. You found Samantha.”

“That I did.” He sighed. “I’ll be paying the price for that lapse in sanity for the remainder of my life.” He pushed aside thoughts of his wife and struggled to refocus on their predicament and the one mystery that still bothered him. “Other than Samantha, to whom did you disclose your discovery?”

Richard frowned. “I’ve asked myself that same question. The answer is always the same. No one. James and I discussed that sticking point and concluded that someone must have overheard us making plans to contact Samantha. The pirates kidnapped us shortly after I sent the missive off to her, requesting her aid in putting together a proper expedition.”

“You came across no old acquaintances in Hobart? A scientist, perhaps, who would understand the significance of your find?”

“No. In fact, James and I spent little time in Hobart.”

“I suppose we’ll have to wait until we return to uncover the name of your abductor,” Christian said. “When we arrive at the village, we can devise a workable plan to remove ourselves from this island and return to Hobart.”

The nightjars began their serenade again, the eerie music a perfect complement to the deep, evergreen forest, black night, sputtering torches, and softly padding bare feet.

A smile played across Richard’s mouth. “Anxious to return to the little woman?”

“Partly,” Christian said, his look more grim than amused. “Mostly I fear for her safety. The last I heard, the mystery man who paid for your abduction may still be hanging about Tasmania. More likely than not, Samantha has been stirring up mischief during my absence. I expect that locked door slowed her no more than an hour or two.”

Hobart

C
ullen slept in a room over the stables at Talmadge House and had taken up the task of caring for the horses and helping Jasper and Pettibone guard Samantha. Cullen carried out the latter duty in his own way. With ships arriving and departing Hobart’s harbor daily, the streets in town saw much activity. Young boys—ships’ cabin boys and settlers’ offspring—swarmed the byways as thickly as flies in a slaughterhouse. Cullen moved among them like a will-o’-the-wisp. He possessed a knack for moving quickly, blending in, and remaining unobtrusive, managing even to avoid the notice of Samantha’s other two bodyguards.

On the day Samantha slipped away from Madame Louella’s, meeting Steven Landry on the docks, Cullen had, as was his usual habit, stationed himself outside the back entrance to the shop. Samantha’s recent passive attitude and willingness to follow Christian’s orders had struck him as suspicious. Less trusting than Jasper and Samantha’s family and being a schemer himself, he sensed she was up to tomfoolery. Therefore, he often tagged along at a discreet distance whenever she went into town.

He was unable to figure out the significance of her assignation with Landry and kept the meeting to himself. After that incident, he subjected Samantha to even closer scrutiny.

Landry made his skin crawl. Even though the merchant was a welcome visitor at Talmadge House, Cullen watched him like the last piece of salt pork on a becalmed ship. The man made numerous visits to the Blue Boar Inn, a tavern no respectable gentleman would frequent. His business there remained a mystery, though Cullen suspected it was dirty business. He debated confiding in Jasper or Pettibone. However, he had no evidence against the man, only suspicions, and after that first meeting with Samantha, she and Landry never met in secret again.

One moonlit night several weeks after Steven Landry became a fixture at Talmadge House, Cullen lay awake on his pallet, the skin of his nape prickling. Something was brewing. Something bad. He wished, as he did each day, that Christian and Garrett would return. They would know what to do. He couldn’t verbalize his unease, though he felt it deep in his gut, like pressure dropping from a storm on the horizon before a typhoon.

When voices in the alley drifted in the window above his pallet, he sat up and strained to distinguish the words. At first only murmuring. Then hooves stamping, horses snorting, clinking bridles, and creaking saddles. He jumped up, pulled on his clothes in the dark, and covered his shirt and trousers with the black cloak he used as a blanket. At the last minute, he shoved a revolver he’d borrowed from the ship into his belt.

Cullen slithered out of the barn with the caution of a hayloft cat. He slipped into the gardens, where he crouched among the rhododendrons, positioning himself within view of the back of the house and the gate leading from the yard. The moon’s light revealed the silhouettes of riders in the alley.

At a motion from the house, he turned his head. A man climbed out of Samantha’s window and made his way down the trellis between the trumpet vines. Another figure, shrouded in a cloak, followed the first. The moon came out from behind a cloud, and Cullen recognized the two—Steven Landry and Samantha. His chest tightened. Samantha was following Landry, not being dragged away or carried off. She was leaving with him willingly, running away from Christian.

His hands fisted. How could she do this to Christian? Bitter disappointment and shattered illusions fell about his feet, bringing the sting of tears to his eyes.

Cullen dashed to the stables, saddled his favorite horse, a fleet-footed black gelding, and took off after the group. From his location behind the riders and off the road inside the tree line, he counted six men in addition to Landry and Samantha. Their racket and the dust they stirred up masked his pursuit.

He followed throughout the night and all the next day. Nonetheless, he fell behind. His twelve short years of life included survival on the London docks and duties aboard a seagoing vessel but lacked the services of a riding master. He slid around on the gelding’s back like a lopsided bag of potatoes. The clatter the horses made kept him on track at first. When they crossed the Derwent and traveled farther from town, however, heading southwest along a roughly hewn road leading to the primitive settlement of Huonville, he lost sight of his quarry. Hours sped by, and his dubious skills as a horseman caused him to lose more ground every mile he traveled.

When night lifted and Samantha’s escort emerged, fully visible in the weak morning light, her earlier reservations resurfaced. She shivered and shot an appalled look at the men accompanying her and Steven. A repulsive lot, ugly, dirty, and scarred, they wore a mélange of cast-off finery and sailors’ breeches swathing their muscled bodies in tatters. Weapons bristled. Daggers in their boots, pistols, and the occasional cutlass shoved through their belts. She transferred her gaze to rest on Steven. Though his features were devoid of emotion, when he glanced her way, he sent her a reassuring smile.

She tried to return the gesture, but her lips had frozen into a clenched-teeth grimace.

They pounded the road as though all the demons of Hades rode on their heels. With the exception of Steven, the men were poor riders. The horses labored under the strain of keeping their bouncing loads mounted. Steven’s trusted friends? They more resembled pirates or footpads than merchants. Her hasty decision to leave Hobart with no word to her family now seemed ill-conceived. No one spoke to her. Only the occasional encouraging smile from Steven kept her moving forward.

They reached Huonville, located on the banks of the Huon River twenty miles from Hobart, and prepared to board a raft. The men cursed fluently, struggling with the horses, whipping them, and having to drag them aboard the tipping craft. Samantha watched in horror the display of inept handling and cruel behavior. When she voiced a suggestion to blindfold the animals, the men snarled and brushed her off as though she were a bloodsucking fly.

She made her way to Steven’s side. “Where are we heading? Who are these men? They look dangerous, and they are incompetent. They know naught about horses.”

He laid a hand on her shoulder and pressed lightly. “From this point, our journey turns westward into wild territory,” he replied, voice calm though his features strained, as though he wrestled with some inner demon. “We require adequate protection.” When he looked at her, his eyes were unfocused. “My men may be rough around the edges. Nevertheless, in a pinch, they are good companions. In the event we meet with hostiles, you’ll be thankful for their presence.”

Though she bit her lower lip and said nothing more, serious doubts bedeviled her. When Steven motioned to her, she boarded the raft, and they pushed away from the shore to catch the river’s westward current.

Dusk settled over the land, and Huonville came into sight. Tracks on the road indicated that the riders had turned and headed for the river. When his horse stumbled and came up lame, Cullen swore. Every nerve and muscle screaming, he slipped off the gelding’s back and checked its hoof. A thrown shoe. The reins in one hand, he hobbled toward the riverbank as Samantha and Steven pulled out of sight down the Huon around a bend in the river.

Cullen approached the rough raftsmen along the shore. “Ye know where that raft’s ‘eadin’?” he asked one man with a peeling bald head and a face like a bowl of bread pudding.

The man glowered as if Cullen were a louse that needed squashing. “What’s it ta ye, nit?”

Cullen cinched up his breeches. “They be friends o’ mine. I was supposed ta meet ‘em ‘ere, but me ‘orse threw a shoe.”

The man studied Cullen with an air of suspicion. “Well, be they friends o’ yourn, I reckon ye know where they be ‘eaded.”

Cullen let out his breath in a noisy exhalation. “‘Ave ye another raft fer ‘ire?”

The man shook his head. “Nay. They’s all promised.”

“‘Ow about a smithy?”

“Nay. Ye’ll ‘ave ta take yer nag ta ‘obart.”

From the look on the man’s sullen features, Cullen had reached a dead end. Perhaps if he had a hefty purse with him, but he didn’t. His shoulders dropped. Gathering up the gelding’s reins, he trudged back down the road toward Hobart.

Three days later, an exhausted, hungry, and very dusty Cullen led his lame horse into the stable at Talmadge House.