My Lord Deceived (33 page)

“I have, and I
am glad I did too,” Brian snapped. The look he gave his father had
very little respect in it. “I told Harrison when the shipments were
due in so Harrison would search Bentney on Sea. I told him that
there is a smuggling gang there and told him when the shipments
were due to arrive.”

“You took a
bloody risk there. He could have just turned up to arrest you
during the delivery.”

“I wasn’t there
during the delivery. Harrison is too lazy to get out of bed in the
middle of the night. He wants some of the cargo; it’s as simple as
that.” Brian’s voice was matter of fact. “I leave him a couple of
barrels of France’s finest at the back of his house as payment for
not interrupting delivery. He gets to search the village and looks
for the haul he knows is there somewhere. If he does ever find it,
he will go down in history for uncovering the biggest stash ever to
land on Cornish shores.”

“You told him
because you knew he would search Bentney on Sea, and wouldn’t
venture toward – where the hell are we?”

“Grampton,” the
older man growled.

“It’s worked
this far. Besides, the smugglers in Bentney are an arrogant lot.
Serves them right to get searches every day.”

“You turned
traitor on your own villagers.”

“They aren’t my
bloody villagers. Never have been and never will be,” Brian
snarled. “Stupid idiots scurry this way and that while they try to
hide their stash. Harrison is next to bloody useless because in all
the time he has been looking for the goods he hasn’t found so much
as a piece of lace.” He shook his head in disgust.

Jonathan
thought of his own experience with the vocal reception he had
received from one of the Excise men, and could understand the boy’s
contempt.

“So you got the
manifest from Hawkshurst because you have the most cargo. You then
give a copy to Harrison because you know he will search the village
when it is there. If he finds anything he can keep it and nobody
can complain. If he doesn’t find it, he gets two barrels of the
finest anyway. You get Excise to look in the opposite direction so
you can move your cargo unchallenged. Everyone is happy,” Archie
sighed.

“Except the
people in Bentney on Sea, who have their houses torn apart daily
for no reason,” Jonathan snapped in disgust.

“They are
smugglers,” Brian protested.

“So are you!”
Archie replied with a disgusted shake of his head.

“What do you
plan to do now? Do you want the cargo?” Mr Meldrew asked. He
studied each man in turn and wondered. “Whose gang do you run
with?”

The Star Elite
turned to each other with rueful smiles. “A gang that you will
never be a part of,” Simon sighed. “I am placing you under arrest
for the murder of Mr Barnaby, numerous counts of smuggling, theft
and kidnap.”

A sly look
settled over Brian’s face. “It could be two counts of murder,”
Archie added. He kept his gaze away from Jonathan and knew from the
look on his friend’s face that Brian was within an inch of not
knowing what had hit him.

Brian remained
stoically silent.

“Who has he
killed?”Mr Meldrew demanded.

“Douglas
Barnaby, a fisherman from Bentney on Sea. Your boy here decided
that he wanted the man’s fishing vessel for himself. We understand
from Mrs Barnaby that Brian and a few of the crew had offered to
continue to take the boat out in exchange for giving her a
percentage of the fish sales but, so far, she has received nothing
in payment for either the vessel or the fish. So effectively he has
murdered Mr Barnaby and stolen his boat. Then there are several
counts of smuggling, which is highly illegal in Cornwall, and will
ensure he faces a very long prison sentence. Unfortunately for your
son here, he has also kidnapped Catherine Baird, a young bar maid
at the Shipwright Inn, who has rejected his advances on more than
one occasion.

“Kat Baird?” Mr
Meldrew demanded. He dropped his hand and turned to stare hard at
Brian. “You kidnapped her?” When Brian remained silent and
continued to stare at the floor, Mr Meldrew grabbed him by the
front of his shirt and hauled him upright until they were nose to
nose. The swift change in the man’s demeanour drew everyone’s
attention and tension rose within the room while they watched the
scene unfold.

“What the hell
have you done to her?” Mr Meldrew growled. “Frank Baird was my
friend, and a bloody good one at that. If you have hurt his
daughter –” He shook the boy for emphasis.

Brian’s face
became watchful and wary. He glanced around at the sea of faces in
the room and swallowed loudly. All trace of bravado and
belligerence evaporated and he turned hard eyes back toward his
dad.

“You aren’t any
father of mine. You ran out on mam for that floozy and where did
that leave you? Here in the middle of nowhere stealing goods from
Hawkshurst. How long do you think that can go on until he turns up
to get his money and goods back?”

“The cargo is
stolen?”

Brian realised
then what he had said and wrenched his dad’s hand off his shirt. He
snorted in derision and threw himself back into the chair. When he
leaned back and propped his booted feet up on the table before
them, Jonathan knew that he wasn’t going to provide them with any
more information.

“I know where
she is,” Colin replied.

“You do, and I
will make your life a misery,” Brian growled. His eyes were hard
and feral as they stared hard at Colin, but he jumped when Rupert
bent over to stare the boy right in the face.

“You are going
behind bars for a very, very long time. The judge will throw away
the key and you will be a threat to nobody by the time you see
daylight again, so do yourself a favour and shut the hell up.”

Robert moved to
stand beside Colin. They glanced at each other before they turned
toward the window. “If you want to save her, you will have to be
quick. The tide is coming in quickly and the cave will be swamped
soon.”

“Cave?”

“Aye, it’s
around the bay, that way,” Colin reported. He pointed out of the
window toward Bentney on Sea.

“It is too
late,” Brian sing-songed. “The cave will be swamped by the time you
get there and she can’t swim.”

“Kat can swim,”
Jonathan snarled.

“Not with her
hands tied behind her back, she can’t,” Brian’s smirk was ruthless.
His laughter was cut short by the large fist that landed in the
middle of his face.

Kat moaned
against the pain in her head. Where was she? What had happened? She
frowned into the darkness and tried to remember. A thick fog seemed
to have rolled into her head and had stayed there because
everything seemed to take so much effort. Right now it hurt to even
think much less remember how she got to wherever she was.

Her brows
dipped into a frown. It even hurt to move her eyes but,
nevertheless, she blinked the blurriness away and tried to study
the area around her. It was then that she became aware of the tight
binding that held her wrists secure behind her back. Who had done
this to her, and why?

Where was she?
Panic began to unfurl in her belly as she glanced at the dark stone
walls that seemed to surround her. It took some time before the
cloudiness in her mind began to ease enough for her to understand
that she was in a cave.

She glanced
around her but was fairly certain that the cave was empty. Although
she couldn’t see very much, she could hear the crashing of the
waves against the rocks nearby. The minutes ticked by as she
struggled to think what to do. She was fairly certain that she
wasn’t physically hurt but, for the life of her, couldn’t remember
a single thing about last night.

Her thoughts
turned toward Jonathan, and she wondered whether he was still in
the tavern. She frowned at that and stopped to consider the random
snippets of memory that started to filter through but none of it
made sense. She felt strange, as though she was there but not
really there. It didn’t make sense. If only she could get her mind
to work properly she could probably decide what on earth she was
going to do.

She was fairly
certain that she was in a cave around Bentney on Sea somewhere, but
couldn’t see anything outside of the cave entrance except for sea
and, to the left, a large sandy beach. There were no houses, or
signs of life for as far as the eye could see.

Her eyes flew
wide and she went cold at the sight of the white froth that
appeared in the entrance of the cave and soaked her boots before it
disappeared out to sea. Her stomach lurched and she shuffled back
against the next wave that inched further toward her. She shuffled
back awkwardly until her back bumped painfully into sharp
protrusions on the cave wall. In spite of the pain she pushed
backward and managed to clamber awkwardly to her feet. She sucked
in a breath and fought to quell the panic that threatened to
overwhelm her.

A quick glance
at the cave entrance confirmed that another wave inched toward her
even closer as the tide came in. She knew she had only a matter of
minutes before she was knee deep in sea water, and not much longer
before she was going to be swept out to sea. With her hands tied
the way they were she would drown. Despite the cold water that
began to seep into her boots, she edged toward the cave entrance
and knew that her options had just run out because, unless there
really were mermaids who lived in the sea that was rapidly edged
its way up the side of the cliff, she had no way out of the
cave.

“Help!” She
screamed, as loudly as she could.

A whimper
followed her plea when she realised there was nobody around to hear
her.

They made short
work of tying everyone up before Archie and Jonathan left in search
of Kat. They took Robert, who agreed to show them which cave they
had left her in.

Jonathan had
never rowed so hard in his entire life, but nothing and nobody was
going to stop him from saving Kat. It was now a matter of life and
death. While they had been in the house the sea level had risen
with alarming speed, and it didn’t bode well for Kat’s safety.

Simon and
Rupert had agreed to guard the captives and would wait for Jonathan
and Archie to send for Harper Hamilton-Smythe. They would then
oversee the arrest of Harrison and Hawkshurst, and ensure that
together with Bernard, were transported to Bodmin to be questioned
and wait for trial in the main court there. Right now though,
Jonathan had considerably more important things on his mind.

“It is around
to the right, in the next bay.” Robert pointed to the huge cliff
face that faced them. Even from half a mile away they could see
someone, standing knee-deep in sea water, in the middle of a cave
entrance.

“Kat,” Jonathan
growled. He closed his eyes against the wave of relief but
redoubled his efforts at the oars, forging a way through the caps
to get to her before the tide swept her off her feet altogether.
His mind raced to find a way to get her out of there safely.

“We can’t go
close to the cliffs when the tide is in because there are jagged
rocks under the water. It will tear the bottom out of the boat,”
Robert gasped. His fingers clawed desperately onto the side of the
boat when it dipped and bobbed against the tidal surge.

“How did you
get her up there?”

“Brian carried
her.”

“Why? What has
she ever done to you?” Jonathan demanded. Unless Brian had plans to
return to fetch her once he had delivered the cargo to his dad,
there was no other reason to leave Kat, bound and helpless in a
cave unless he had left her for dead.

“Brian hates
her. He has fancied her for ages, but she has made it clear that
she doesn’t want him. She has loved you for years; everyone knows
it. Brian said that if he couldn’t have her, then you wouldn’t
either.”

“Jesus,”
Jonathan whispered. He tucked away Robert’s news that Kat had
always loved him. A part of him was thrilled and wanted to know if
it was the truth, but he wanted to hear it from Kat’s lips, not
from Robert’s.

Kat studied the
boat as it moved steadily toward her. She struggled to remain on
her feet. The sea was desperate to drag her off her feet and
swallow her up in its watery fury but she was equally determined
that it wouldn’t succeed.

Her gaze
remained locked on the wonderful sight of Jonathan, who was rowing
with such determined strength that she wanted to cheer.

“Are her feet
tied?” Jonathan demanded as he studied the area with experienced
eyes.

“No, just her
hands.”

“She has to
jump,” Archie growled. He could see no other way to get her out of
the caves. If the sea swept her off her feet she could be carried
under by the tide and they would never find her.

“She can’t
jump,” Jonathan argued. “She could land on the rocks and be
injured.”

“Better injured
than dead,” Archie retorted. He glanced at Jonathan and waited for
his colleagues’ nod.

“Jump!”
Jonathan shouted. He handed the oars to Archie, and jumped into the
sea. He clung to the side of the boat and motioned to Kat.

Kat stared at
Jonathan in horror. She staggered as the force of a wave unbalanced
her and slammed her roughly against the unrelenting wall of the
cave. Pain immediately lanced up her side but she knew that if she
didn’t do something soon, she would end up in a watery grave.

“Kat!
Jump!”

Kat hesitated.
In spite of the winds, the raging sea and the desperation, her eyes
locked with his. She knew that if she had any chance of survival,
she had to place her trust in him. There was little choice. She
sucked in a huge breath, sent a silent prayer heavenward and took
several steps back. Her run was hampered by the water around her
ankles but within seconds she was flying through the air.