Wanted: One Scoundrel (9 page)

He and Aaron Smith watched the horses quicken to a trot and the carriage disappear around a bend in the road. They both let out loud sighs of relieved tension, before Smith insisted on shaking Jed’s hand.

“Thank you,” he said simply.

“We shouldn’t have let Bambury get so close to her.”

They walked back into the club, shoulder to shoulder, and into a cannon fire of questions, exclamations and incipient rumor.

Bambury was patched up and carried to a jail cell. He’d turned sullen and refused to answer questions or respond to charges read against him.

Jed was the hero of the hour, a role he detested. Each time he thought of Esme at the mercy of that son-of-a-buzzard, his stomach twisted with nausea. He’d seen morphine and opium addicts. The thought of Esme—bright, challenging, desirable—reduced to a crawling shell of a person made him want to rip Bambury apart.

He scowled at the men who now proclaimed they had always known there was something off about Nicholas Bambury the Third.

All he wanted to do was return to Esme and hold her safe for the next thousand years or so.

Jed and Aaron Smith caught the ferry back from Perth and walked up the hill from the river to Smith’s mansion—and Esme.

Francis met them at the door, accompanied by the three dogs. “Miss Esme told us all about it. Plus the town’s seething with gossip. We’ve had the world and his wife come calling. Nosey parkers. Miss Esme’s refused to see them all. She’s in the library.”

Smith nodded. “Dinner in an hour.”

Esme had changed out of her navy dress and into a rose pink gown with a soft grey shawl tucked around her shoulders. The scratch on her neck had stopped bleeding and she hadn’t bothered with a bandage. She met them at the door to the library and gripped her father’s arm. “Well?”

“Bambury is in jail, charged with attempted murder. We have witnesses enough to that attempt. The attempt to extort marriage from you…the lawyers can’t decide on the charge. Either way, Bambury is ruined. And I got my watch back.” Aaron patted her hands, then transferred them to Jed. “I’m going upstairs.”

His footsteps receded, slow and tired.

“It’s been a long day,” Jed said. He walked Esme back into the library and sat beside her on a sofa. The sofa was positioned to look out across the harbor. With the sun setting, the horizon was a blaze of gold, silhouetting the skimmer-boats and steamships and the old-fashioned sailing ships. He’d watched similar scenes from his family’s San Francisco home. The end of the day, the westering sun and the people you loved.

He put his arm around her and finally relaxed when she leaned into him. “How are you?”

“Regretting that I only got to stamp on Bambury’s toe. I should have kicked him. But your punch was superb.”

“I thought you might blame me.”

She stared at him. “What? For punching that lowdown snake?”

“For putting you in danger. It was my elaborate scheme for revenge that gave Bambury his chance to attack you. If we had simply gone straight to the police rather than confront him—”

“No.” She shook her head vigorously. “If we had handled the matter quietly, there would always have been people who doubted my word, who wouldn’t believe such dastardly behavior of their precious east coast Bambury. This way he condemned himself.”

“But at such a price.” He touched the skin below the scratch on her throat. His hand fisted as he withdrew it. His rage and terror for her were too recent, too raw for his self-control. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I should have kept you safe.”

“You did. It was an ingenious method of rescue—entirely appropriate for an inventor.”

He studied the dimples of her smile. They didn’t quite disguise the hint of teeth. “I have a feeling I’m about to be scolded about something entirely different.”

“Very perceptive. You, sir, misrepresented yourself.” But she didn’t move out of his embrace.

He took heart from that fact, although a firm finger stabbed his chest.

“You let me think you a con artist, when in fact you’re an inventor.”

He captured her accusatory finger. “I would have denied the scoundrel charge, except—when I met you on the Athena, you were so lovely and so obviously committed to your political ideals, I thought agreeing to represent the Women’s Advancement League might be my only chance to spend time with you and hold your attention.”

“Flattery.”

“Truth. You are a beautiful woman, Miss Esme Smith.” He raised her hand to his lips and kissed it.

She sighed and left her hand in his. “Are you really a senator’s son?”

“Yes.”

“Were you ever going to tell me?”

“I started to, when we rode in search of your father. I told you I’m an inventor.” He smoothed his thumb over her bare ring finger, thinking how she warranted sapphires and diamonds to match her eyes. “Back home, my family considers me boring, not a scoundrel. I’m always preoccupied with my latest project.”

“Your kangaroo-inspired car?”

“Among other things.” He paused. “I sell the patents on my inventions. I don’t need my inheritance to support myself.”

It seemed important she know he was his own man.

She rested her head against his shoulder. “And I bet Uncle Henry knew all that?”

“I suspect so.”

“He’s the scoundrel.” But there was no heat in her voice. “You know, you haven’t seemed distracted here in Swan River.”

“Oh, but I have been.”

She looked up at his emphatic response.

“I’ve been distracted by a golden-haired, passionate advocate for universal suffrage.” He stroked her face. “Your skin is as soft as I imagined.” He bent toward her, encouraged by the welcome in her eyes. He would woo his sweet, tempestuous suffragette with all the ardor of a man who’d found, and nearly lost, his true love. His arm tightened, drawing her closer. “And your mouth—”

“Dinner-time,” Maud announced. “Why are you sitting in the dark?”

Esme leapt up like a jack-in-the-box and cracked her head on his jaw. She collapsed back against the sofa, touched the top of her head and winced.

He put a casual arm around her shoulders and rubbed his jaw. “Why are we sitting in the dark? I’m contemplating the perils of wooing a suffragette.”

Jenny Schwartz is a West Australian author, born and bred. She studied Australian social history at university, never dreaming she’d end up rewriting it with a steampunk twist.

We wish you a Steampunk Christmas!

Four stories that combine passion, adventure and intrigue in a reality far removed from our own.

Changed forever after tragedy, a woman must draw strength from her husband’s love.

A thief steals the heart of a vengeful professor.

An American inventor finds love Down Under.

A woman with a secret tries to regain the love of a man she deceived.

Immerse yourself in a Victorian Christmas with a clockwork twist in these four Steampunk novellas. Anthology includes:

Far From Broken
by JK Coi

This Winter Heart
by PG Forte

Crime Wave in a Corset
by Stacy Gail

Wanted: One Scoundrel
by Jenny Schwartz

Stories also available for purchase separately.

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