Page 11 of Lyon on the Lam (The Lyon’s Den)

M atthew woke with a start. He hadn’t meant to fall asleep, but the warm weather and the rocking carriage had worked their usual magic. Well, there had been the escape from London, too.

After he’d put Tavie to bed in his cabin, he’d prowled the deck for hours looking through a spyglass as he completed each circle, searching the dark for shadows. Even after he’d dropped into his hammock, his ears had ached from straining to hear anything that might hint that they were being chased.

Thanks to Hildie’s protectors, they seemed to be safe. The sun was fading, but it hadn’t quite set. He checked his watch. They were making good time.

Tavie was asleep, curled into the seat like a cat, her woolen socks peeking from the hem of her cloak and her empty boots lying on the floor.

Dorinda Fowler would be shocked to see her daughter in secondhand clothes, wool socks, and work boots. If she learned that Tavie was traveling alone, in hired coaches and ships, and hiding amongst the working class, she would likely take to her bed.

“We’re nearing Hintlesham, Mr. Foster. Are you stopping?”

He’d enjoy sharing a drink with Lord Savage and sharing information about what each had missed during the past few months.

And the hall would be a suitable place for Tavie to stay.

But his wife was known to gossip worse than a matron at Vauxhall, and their servants stared a bit too hard at visitors.

“No. The inn will be fine, Jacob.”

“Inn?” Tavie asked. She muffled her yawn with the back of her hand before swinging upright. Her cloak pooled in her lap, and her hair escaped its pins—but only on one side. “Oh, bother.”

She undid it so she could straighten it again. Her brows knitted together in concentration as her fingers flew about her head, alternately smoothing and pinning.

“How do you do that without a mirror?” Matthew asked.

“Years of trying to look presentable after reading under a tree.”

More like trying to climb them. And skipping stones in the river her father used for irrigation. And spinning in the sunshine to create her own breeze.

That was what she’d told him the first time they met.

Father had been meeting with Rupert, and Matthew had grown bored.

At ten, he wasn’t as interested in yield per acre as he was now.

He had wandered into a barley field, tempted by the heads bobbing in the slight breeze in a wave that reminded him of the ocean.

Then he’d seen a dervish whirling in the middle, her braids whipping around her and her laughter tempting him more than grain ever could.

I’m making my own wind. Look! The barley’s tilting in the other direction .

“Mother would have lectured me from teatime to supper if I’d come into the house with my hair in my face,” she continued.

Matthew liked her hair in her face, and he liked it even better now that it was shining in the sun. Her eyes were brighter too, and her cheeks had reclaimed the glow he remembered. Every day she was out of Burridge’s grasp, she bloomed. And that made Matthew wonder…

“Tavie?”

“Hmm?” Despite her best efforts, wispy copper strands slipped from the pins and brushed her nape.

“I’m sure it’s been a hardship, haring halfway across the country with no maid, in hired coaches, and everything you own in one bag.” He pointed at the pile of carpet scraps bound together by a handle.

“Are you trying to make me cry, Matthew?”

“No.” He was trying to find a way to ask a question that was too foolish, and too dreadful, to consider.

“I’m just… It has to be difficult to go from having a maid, a cook, and a housekeeper to doing dishes in a rooming house.

” He leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. “You have all those, don’t you?”

She rolled her eyes. “Albert did not marry me to make me a scullery maid. Yes, Matthew. I had a cook who made wonderful meals, and a maid who brought me chocolate in the mornings and tea in the afternoon. I didn’t even have to do my own washing up.”

Her last words were almost wistful. “Did you actually miss it?”

“Sometimes,” she said, sighing. “Society is rather boring. There’s not a lot to do that makes much of a difference from day to day. It’s always the same people, the same gossip, the same routine.” Her eyes narrowed. “What are you asking me?”

“Did you spend any time in the kitchen? I suppose your cook couldn’t have stopped you from doing dishes if you wanted.”

Tavie snorted a short laugh. “Mrs. Pugh barely let me plan the menus. And there was no changing it. She’s been with the family so long that she might as well be a piece of the furniture. All the servants have.”

“Even your maid?” Matthew didn’t know an awful lot about Society families, but he always thought the ladies chose their own personal servants. Mother always said so, at least.

“Albert offered me one of his servants—Trudy, who had been the maid for the dowager baroness. And Mother thought it would be ideal.” Tavie pulled herself upright, tilted her chin, and put her nose in the air, imitating Dorinda.

“‘Trudy can help you be a baroness, Octavia. Belinda can only prepare you for a country dance.’”

The impression, with its overblown accent and drawn-out syllables, was meant to be funny. However, Matthew saw the glimmer of sadness in Tavie’s eyes. She’d been alone in a house full of strangers.

“I’ve never known you not to win someone over if you set your mind to it.” He’d seen her charm everyone from farmhands and mill workers to dance partners from the demimonde. He’d also seen her take charge and be stern when charm failed.

“It’s more difficult when everyone is reading from the same hymnal but you can’t find a copy.” She put up a hand to stop his next question. “Enough about me. I’ve been wondering about something completely different.”

Matthew masked his frustration. Something told him that the answer to Tavie’s concerns lay less in Baron Burridge’s ledgers and more in the rooms of his house and whatever food and drink his staff was serving her. “What, then?”

“It was clear that Mrs. Dove-Lyon wasn’t aware of our history together, so why did she choose you? And why did you owe her a favor?”

Matthew shifted in his seat, considering how much to tell her and how she would interpret the story. It was foolish to lie. He had nothing to hide, and she didn’t seem to be holding anything back from him.

“I know little of her motives, but I can explain the favor. Four years ago, one of my father’s longtime customers convinced him to let him take the grain he’d purchased and pay me the next day, when his servant arrived from the country with his funds.

Due to his relationship with Father, I let him. ”

“And the funds never arrived,” Tavie surmised.

Matthew shook his head. “I suppose he thought his loyalty to my family stopped at the grave.” His gut still burned at the memory. “When I sent the bailiffs after him, he went into hiding. It left me no option but to track him down myself.”

“Where did you find him?”

“In Paris at the gaming tables, losing most of what he’d stolen from us.

” He shrugged. “Then an acquaintance approached to see if I could find someone who was ignoring his requests for payment. And then someone else. I met Mrs. Dove-Lyon when I was searching for a lout who had walked out on his expectant fiancée, the daughter of one of my friends, so he could pursue a wealthy earl’s daughter. She helped me track him down.”

“So she thought that if you were good at finding people, you might excel at hiding them as well.”

He thought he was failing spectacularly. Tavie had been left on her own in a strange part of the city, almost accosted by thugs sent by her husband to find her, and now she was nearer to home—the one place they would look for her. “Perhaps I was simply someone who owed her a favor.”

She stared for so long, her eyes so clear, that he fought the urge to squirm.

“I think she has plenty of people who owe her favors.” Her words were almost lost in the jostling of the coach, forcing Matthew to lean forward to hear her better. “And I’m very glad she called on you for this one.”

Last night, after he was certain they hadn’t been followed, he’d climbed into his hammock and lain under the stars.

His body and brain had settled into something he could only describe as contentment.

It had been years since he hadn’t spent his days searching for what was around the next corner or over a looming hill. “As am I.”

Because, despite the stress induced by hiding a baroness in almost plain sight and the exhaustion caused by multiple trips over the Thames each day, he lay awake each night wanting nothing more than to be in the boardinghouse with Tavie, having tea in the kitchen. Following her upstairs…

He knew whom he was looking for. He’d always known.

Tavie shifted toward him, her cloak slithering to the floor like a stream of spilled ink. She was light and sunshine, the girl spinning in her father’s field. Trying to affect one part of her world but causing more ripples than she knew.

“Matthew—”

“The inn’s just ahead, sir,” their driver called down.

Matthew marshaled his thoughts. Any reflections of what might have been would be dangerous for this next part of their journey.

“Tavie, this innkeeper has a reputable establishment, and I believe we will be safe here for the night. However, his clients are mostly farmers and merchants, and, given your father’s business, I can’t be certain they won’t recognize you. ”

“What do you suggest?”

He was going to have to tell a lie large enough that, should he die in the night, he would be sent directly to hell. “I’m going to weave a tale that will explain why I’m traveling unescorted with a woman.” His neck warmed. “One that explains why your face is covered.”

Her eyes widened as understanding dawned. “Your mistress?”