Mistaken Identity (Saved By Desire 3) (20 page)

“Your mother is still in Tooting, I do believe, and your father is still in Newgate. He provided us with a lot of information about you.” Marcus knew the message was received loud and clear when Sayers sighed deeply. “His only son.”

“What’s going on, Marcus?” Jess demanded. “He says he wants something back that was in my room.”

“I know, but it isn’t his, you see? It is on its way to the War Office because it has been stolen. It doesn’t belong to him so he cannot claim it back.” Marcus didn’t take his eyes off Sayers while he spoke.

In the periphery of his vision, he saw Barnaby appear outside the window, his gun drawn in readiness. Just knowing he had backup made Marcus considerably happier, and able to focus on his part of this operation.

“Get away from her,” Gillespie ordered when Marcus stepped casually into the room to be closer to Jess if Sayers made any sudden moves.

Marcus did as he instructed, but slowly. He knew the man would have no hesitation killing Jess if he felt he wanted to, especially given his dire situation. The last thing he wanted while Jess was on the wrong end of Sayers’ gun was to make any sudden moves that might prompt the man to do something rash like pulling the trigger.

“Put your gun down.” Sayers waved his gun toward the floor.

This time, when Marcus didn’t immediately move, Sayers walked up to Jess and pointed his gun directly at her head. It was impossible for Marcus to get a shot off without Sayers pulling the trigger instinctively as he fell. Nor would Barnaby be able to get a clear shot from outside. His gun was effectively useless now, so Marcus carefully put it onto the floor as instructed.

“Kick it under the table.”

Marcus kicked it but kept his gaze trained on Sayers.

“Get down on your knees,” Gillespie ordered.

“No.” That was the last thing Marcus would ever do.

“Do it,” Sayers snarled.

“No,” Marcus challenged.

He knew that if he were foolish enough to do so he would get shot right there and then. There was no earthly possibility Marcus was going to hand himself over to Sayers on a silver platter. Sayers would shoot him in front of Jess. She would then be too horrified to argue with the man should he want to drag her out of the door.

“Don’t hurt him,” Jess pleaded tearfully.

“Shut up,” Sayers snarled. “He doesn’t give a damn about you. He used you to stay in the house because he knew you didn’t want him here. He bedded you so you wouldn’t throw him out. He doesn’t give a damn about you at all. Look at him. Is he doing as he is told to save you? No, he is thinking of saving his skin.”

“Don’t listen to him, Jess. He has you at the end of a gun. It is hardly the rational behaviour of someone who you should trust,” Marcus challenged. “He has pretended to be an ordinary lodger, but is nothing more than a thief and a charlatan.”

“Tell me who you are,” Sayers demanded.

Marcus looked at him. “You know who I am.”

“Liar!” Sayers shouted. “I saw you in those woods. Nobody moves like that unless they have been trained to do so. You told Lloyd that you had connections to the law.”

When Marcus neither confirmed or denied the accusation and merely stared blandly at the man, Sayers began to wave the gun around.

“You are one of those pests from the Star Elite, aren’t you?”

Jess closed her eyes at the mention of the organisation Marcus worked with. Although Sayers’ use of the name went a heck of a long way toward reassuring her that Marcus had been honest with her, it was horrible to realise that Sayers knew who Marcus was, and of his connections to the War Office.

At that moment, she felt as though she had suddenly received divine intervention. A lightbulb of inner wisdom suddenly flickered on and eradicated all of the shadows of her worst nightmares. Fear suddenly became something to latch on to and use to bolster the raw determination she needed to stay calm and get through this situation alive.

Just knowing that she had the law; the proper law, in the house, eased her doubts and worries. There was someone she didn’t recognise trying to get in through the window. But, given Marcus had seen him and was trying not to look at him, she knew that whoever it was, had a connection to the Star Elite.

“It will be alright, Jess,” Marcus murmured.

“Aahh, isn’t that sweet.” Sayers’ voice was laden with sarcasm.

When the man turned around and began to pace backward and forward in front of them, Marcus risked a quick glance at her. Jess studied him in amazement. She was physically shaking so much that she was feeling nauseous. She was positive that if she tried to stand up, she would end up face down on the floor because her knees shook so much. Marcus, meanwhile, looked menacing but was cool, calm, and collected.

“How do you plan to get out of here, Sayers?” Marcus drawled.

He thought he had just caught sight of Kieran hurrying past the side window, but daren’t look again. The longer he could keep Sayers’ attention focused on him, the more time his colleagues had to get into position around the house to make sure Sayers couldn’t leave.

However, Sayers hadn’t been a thug in one of London’s most deprived areas for nothing. He knew he was being set up and studied the room around them with a dark scowl.

Marcus went cold when Sayers began to block the doorway with various items of furniture. The chairs were stacked up first then were held firmly against the door by the heavy weight of the solid oak table Sayers shoved with his backside while keeping his gun trained on Jess. Once that had been completely destroyed, the man began to break up one of the dressers by yanking out the drawers and stomping on them.

“What are you doing?” Jess cried, horrified to watch such a valuable piece of furniture being anhilated in such a way.

Sayers didn’t answer. Instead, he continued to break the drawers down and threw the pieces into the pile. Once a spill had been lit, he scrunched up several more and put them with some dried kindling on the pile of furniture now blocking the doorway.

“Oh, good Lord, save us,” she whispered. “Marcus.”

“Stay calm,” Marcus soothed.

The room began to fill with cloying smoke.

Sayers hadn’t done yet. He carried several pieces of lit kindling to the curtains and set fire to each one before he slammed the shutters closed, effectively blocking out any possibility Barnaby had of getting inside. The only possible exit from the room was now through a side window.

Pointing his gun at Marcus to warn him to stay away, Sayers circuited the room toward Jess. From the frantic way he glanced around, being cornered was making him desperate. It was imperative now that Marcus got him out of the room, and away from Jess.

Marcus braced himself when Sayers stalked up behind her. However, Sayers didn’t point his gun at her. Instead, he began to untie the binds around her wrists.

“Stand up,” Gillespie ordered.

“I can’t.”

When she hesitated for a fraction of a second longer than he wanted, Sayers hauled her upright and then ordered her to hold her hands out behind her. It quickly became obvious that he couldn’t tie her up with only one hand, so he pointed his gun directly at her head.

“You will do exactly as I say when I say it. If anyone does anything to stop me, I will kill her,” Sayers said to Marcus. “I warn you now that I have a second gun on me, and I won’t hesitate to use it.”

Marcus looked steadily at Jess. “Trust me, Jess. I love you, Jess; more than anything in the world. Just trust me. I will get you out of this.”

Jess nodded; her heart swelled with joy upon hearing his words. She knew time was short. Something catastrophic was going to happen, she just didn’t know what to do to stop it. Determined to say what she needed to say to Marcus while she could, she began to resist when Sayers started to drag her toward the door.

“I love you too,” she whispered. “I do, I really do.”

“You know you are going to have to leave here, don’t you?” Marcus murmured.

Jess nodded. She wasn’t completely sure whether he meant she had to go with Sayers or leave the house like Ben had always begged her to do. After today, she doubted she would ever feel safe in the place ever again, and was glad to go.

“I don’t care where I am, as long as you are with me,” Jess declared.

“Believe me, when I tell you that I am going nowhere, Jess. Nowhere. Do you hear me? I am going nowhere.”

Marcus studied the gun now lying openly in the middle of the floor. He judged the distance. Even if he was careful to choose his moment, he doubted he would be able to get a clear shot off. If he winged Sayers, the man would undoubtedly take a gun to his head rather than wind up behind bars. If he is captured, not only would he be humiliated in the eyes of the people he called upon and commanded, but his life behind bars would be merciless, and he knew it.

Death was his only option, and that made him incredibly dangerous.

Marcus knew that if he allowed Sayers out of the house, with or without Jess, he would lose the very person the whole of the Star Elite had been after for nearly eighteen months.

Sayers was the mastermind; the ringleader of the gang. He would be a veritable treasure trove of information that would be invaluable to the Star Elite. But they had to move fast. As soon as news leaked that Sayers has behind bars, his co-conspirators would disappear like rats off a sinking ship. It would be virtually impossible to trace them again, and then the Star Elite would never truly understand the full extent of Sayers’ crimes.

“Tell me something, Sayers,” Marcus said.

He coughed a little when smoke tormented the back of his throat. A thick fog swirled around them, but he could still see through eyes that stung. The thin shaft of light coming from the doorway guided him toward safety from the flames. He knew that as long as he could get outside to the crisp, clean air, everything would be alright.

“Go to Hell,” Sayers growled as he eyed the window. “I am telling you nothing.”

In one swift motion, he spun around and shot at Marcus. Plaster dust exploded into the room. Marcus threw himself onto the floor and crawled the last few feet across the floor to retrieve his gun. The air was easier to breathe down there, but he was vulnerable to Sayers’ boot, which landed in his midriff with stunning force, and snatched what was left of his breath.

Jess stared in horror and began to fight Sayers’ restraining hold.

“Marcus!” she cried.

She was so desperate to get to Marcus that she didn’t see the fist Sayers swung. It came out of nowhere and slammed into the side of her head with startling force and stole her breath. Stars burst behind her eyes as a jagged streak of pain exploded up the side of her head. The room swirled. She hoped she would faint so the horrible pain and sickness would fade, but she didn’t.

Marcus knew that Sayers would have to re-load. When he loosened his hold on Jess and focused his attention on doing just that, Marcus threw himself at Jess. They landed on the floor behind the table with a heavy thump, several feet away from Sayers. Now that she was safe, Marcus shielded her with his body and immediately tried to take aim. Before he got to fire a shot, Sayers suddenly crashed through the window and disappeared into the garden.

Marcus reached the window in time to watch him race through the gardens toward the woods with Barnaby in hot pursuit.

“Are you alright?” Marcus demanded, hauling Jess bodily upright until she was on her feet.

Jess struggled to get her breath back but nodded jerkily.

“Marcus,” she pleaded.

“I have to go after him,” Marcus ground out.

Capturing the back of her head, he slammed a kiss on her lips that was nothing short of brutal. She didn’t even get the time to return the caress before she was carried outside and placed on her feet far enough away from the house to be safe.

“Stay there,” Marcus shouted.

Jess watched him disappear into the trees, but couldn’t summon the strength to call him back. It was essential that he stopped Sayers from causing any more damage. She knew it. At the moment, she was just so glad that he had come to the rescue, and they were both free of the criminal.

Her lungs began to burn with the stench of the acrid smoke that billowed out of the house. In a daze, she turned around and watched hungry flames begin to lick at the dining table, but she wasn’t going to go back inside to try to salvage anything. She would be perfectly happy if she never went back into that house again.

It had been her family home for all of her life. She had been born there, had enjoyed many happy hours of racing up and down the halls with her brother. She had cried there when her father died, and then her mother. Her life had always been dedicated to running it so it could provide her and Ben with a roof over their heads.

Unfortunately, living there was like feeding a hungry beast. It didn’t matter what she did, or how she did it. It didn’t matter how many long hours she worked, how hard she scrubbed, or how many floors she cleaned. It was never enough.

She knew now that it could never be enough.

It would only ever be a husk of a house; a shadow of its former self; a hint of what it might have been if circumstances had been different.

She knew now that she could spend the rest of her life trying desperately to turn it into a home the likes of which other people took for granted, but she would never be able to. It wasn’t a home. It wasn’t a proper home. It was in a state of disrepair that could never, ever, be put right. It needed an owner with more money than she had, and more time than she possessed.

The longer she watched the dining room being swallowed up by the flames, the more she felt her life start to change. It was as though all of her hopes, dreams, and aspirations in life were turning into ash, and falling at her feet. In doing so, they paved a way toward a new and entirely unexpected life.

She hoped it could be with Marcus, but she wasn’t sure it could be. Even after his loving declaration, she still couldn’t believe that Marcus could love someone like her. But he said he did. Until she could speak with him about it, she just didn’t hope.

She stared blankly into the flames but, rather than feel the wave of helplessness she knew she should feel; she grew stronger. Unfortunately, she had no idea what to do next; how to deal with the situation she now faced. There was only one of her. She couldn’t fight the fire by herself. Even if she could eradicate the worst of the dizziness to fetch the buckets, she wouldn’t be able to carry them fast enough to battle the hungry flames. They threatened to steal her very soul if she went back in there, and she was finished sacrificing herself to keep it.

The flames consumed every ounce of energy, good intention, will, and fierce determination she had ever possessed, snatching it off her with hungry jaws. There was nothing left of the room that had become encased in shadow and smoke. It had disappeared into the thick fog never to be seen again. If she was honest, she wasn’t all that sorry to see it go. Staring, as she was, into the empty carcass of what had once been her life, the place where she could take sustenance, she was cut free of the burden. The confines of her duties, the responsibilities, her desperation to cling to hope, home, hearth, kith, and kin, were cut carefully out of her life, casting her free to become a person at last.

Shaken, she listened to the crackle, pop, and hissing contempt of the flames for a moment before she forced herself to walk deeper into the garden, and a brand new future. The further she got away from the house, the clearer the air became until she was able to breathe again. That fresh air cleansed her very soul; and gave her the ability to work her way through the panic, and focus on what to do next.

What could she do next? Everything she had been was in that house. It was all she had ever owned. For it to be turned into ash like this seemed like the cruellest trick Fate could play. It was as though all of Ben’s prayers had been answered, and she had lost the majority of her life’s work.

Still, her feet wouldn’t move. She couldn’t go back in there, not even to attempt to salvage one small ornament as a momento. Instead, she took a seat on the grass and breathed in the crisp air. The wet grass immediately saturated her skirt, but she didn’t feel it, nor was she aware of the goose bumps on the bare skin of her arms. She didn’t feel anything really. She was shocked, but couldn’t think past the huge wave of relief that stole her senses. The horror of watching her home burn was washed away by the gentle pitter-patter of rain that began to drip around her; cleansing her very soul of everything.

She knew then that she had been a fool. To push to keep a house the size of the lodgings had meant that she had paid a very hefty price. She had spent years of her life hoping for something that would never happen; teased by the ghost of a house that could have been a home. She should have felt like a failure – but she didn’t. She was a person; one being who couldn’t fight everything all of the time.

Nobody would remember the house when she died. Nobody would look at it and understand the sacrifice that had been made to turn it into a home. Nobody would stop to consider just what she had tried to do.

“Ben has been right all along,” she whispered. “I have been so blind.”

She knew then that she had been right to sleep with Marcus. She had taken the opportunity he had brought her with open arms, and revelled in his loving attentions. Mainly because he had been the only person in her life ever to make her feel like a person rather than a sister, a landlady, or a daughter. Deep in her heart, beneath his loving caresses, she had changed beyond all recognition. She had grown stronger, less fearful, and considerably more selfish. She had started to think about what
she
felt, what
she
wanted, and how
she
was going to go about getting it. 

Now that she had stared death in the face, something deep within her, some stubborn refusal to accept the life she had, began to crumble, and the harsh reality of her foolishness was staring her blatantly in the face.

It was a decaying house full of duplicitous strangers who didn’t give a damn about her. The guests never thought about the work that went into putting food on the table. Or the many hours of cleaning, washing, and shopping that was needed to make sure people had warm beds to sleep in at night. Nobody knew what ungodly hour she had to get up in the morning to light fires to ward off the chill within the house.

When the lodgers moved on to their lives, wherever that might be, they wouldn’t stop to appreciate the sacrifice she had made – nobody would. But she had given her all. For a decaying pile of wood and bricks that someone could put a torch to in a fit of murderous criminality, and destroy completely within hours.

In that one single stroke, Sayers had set fire to all of her dreams, hopes, and aspirations.

What she had to do now was decide what she wanted to do about it.

Marcus raced through the undergrowth. He stumbled over the uneven forest floor and fought to regain his balance without losing speed. His lungs, already struggling from inhaling the thick fog of smoke, coughed in protest. Dizziness assailed him, but he couldn’t stop. He could see Sayers’ back only yards ahead of him, and was determined not to lose him this time.

He knew now that the man he had followed all the way from Framley Meadows had been Sayers himself. Cursing his own stupidity, he realised then that he should have done something to stop him ever reaching Smothey. Having said that, though, he would then never have met Jess, or stopped at the boarding house. He would never have met Ben, and would most probably have never had the opportunity to turn either of their lives around.

Jess had taught him so much about hope, home, what he wanted out of life that he needed to stop and consider the full ramifications of her presence in his life. She was that special someone who would always be an integral part of him, and she had made him stop and reconsider everything he thought he was.

His work had always been his life. It was what he did, but also who he was. Or so he had thought. He had always felt that his work for the Star Elite was worth the personal sacrifices he made. Now he understood all too well that he had sacrificed too much.

All of the torment from his work, the residual pain, and anger he carried with him on a daily basis, was emotional and mental. The sheer frustration of working in his job, succeeding in one task by getting one convict to see the error of their ways only for ten more to appear was a heavy burden. He hadn’t realised before just how heavy it was until Jess had made him stop, and experience the softer side of life.

In a way, his work was a thankless job. He had spent the better part of his life fighting the enemy; looking for ways to seek out the truth, in spite of people’s best attempts to hide it. The veritable flood of people always looking for a way to better themselves no matter who they had to step on, or what souls they had to destroy, was endless. While he had always had the satisfaction of being able to put someone behind bars where they were unable to hurt anyone, or steal something someone else had earned or helped themselves to the sanctuary of someone’s home or torment someone’s life with a total and callous disregard for their life, he had sacrificed so much of himself that he had lost sight of what life was really all about.

Unfortunately, nobody would look at a list of convicts and thank the person who put them behind bars. Nobody would stop to consider the sheer weight of paper needed to send notes and correspondence. Or think about the time it took to gather the evidence, proof, facts, and details necessary to ensure that criminals stayed behind bars where they belonged. People always looked toward the convicts, and talked about what they had done, what had gone wrong with them.

The sacrifices Marcus had made of his own wants, dreams, aspirations, and needs were never recognised, and would never be recognised. He was painfully aware that if he were cut down stomping through the wilderness of Mother Nature; yes, his friends would mourn him. Yes, he would be grieved for by his family, but people would continue to live their lives. The criminals would continue to inflict their puerile hatred onto others; innocent souls who had the right to go about their lives unhindered by others’ greed.