When Gods Die

The jolting weight of the man’s body swung Sebastian around, dragged him back down toward the rushing road. Sebastian had a pain-filled vision of a craggy-faced man with thick, straight brows and a thin nose, his lips twisting into a snarl as he said, “I’ve got you, you son of a bitch.”

Freeing one leg, Sebastian drew up his knee and kicked out hard. His foot landed square in the man’s face. He heard the crunch of cartilage and bone, saw the spurt of blood as the force of the blow sent the man reeling back.

For one moment, he clutched wildly at Sebastian’s booted foot. Then the boot slipped off with a sucking plop and the man fell back to land with a breath-robbing thump in the gutter, the rough country boot of Squire Lawrence’s secretary still clasped like a trophy in his hands.

“ONE OF THESE DAYS,” said Kat Boleyn, dabbing a cloth dipped in witch hazel against the side of his head, “someone’s going to shoot at you and they’re not going to miss.”

Sebastian drew in his breath in a pained hiss. “They didn’t exactly miss this time.”

He was sitting on a low stool beside the kitchen table in Kat’s house in Harwich Street. Elspeth and the rest of Kat’s small staff had withdrawn to spend their evening off in their rooms in the attics high above, leaving the house dark and quiet. In the distance, he could hear the faint, mournful tolling of a death knell.

Bringing up one hand, he explored the open gash that parted the hair just above his ear. She batted his hand away. “Don’t touch.” She was busy for a moment mixing crushed herbs from the apothecary into a salve. Then she said, “You knew it was a trap. Why walk into it?”

“I thought I might learn something. I wasn’t expecting five men. Or a pistol.”

“So what did you learn? That your questions are making someone uncomfortable? You knew that. Someone’s been following you for days.”

“I don’t think my shadow was amongst the men who attacked me.”

“Would you recognize him if you saw him?”

“No. But the men today didn’t know who I was. If they had, my friend with the cudgel wouldn’t have been so anxious to find out who sent me.”

She finished smearing the open wound with the salve and went to pack a clean cloth with a mixture of grated raw potatoes and cold milk. “Are you going to tell Sir Henry about this?”

Sebastian looked up from peeling his shirt off over his head. “Lovejoy? What the devil could he do?”

She came to slap the cold compress on his bruised shoulder. “He could send someone to investigate the Norfolk Arms.”

“That’s just what I need,” he said, reaching up to hold the compress in place. “Some thickheaded constable tromping about the place, asking blunt questions and putting up everyone’s back. It’s the best way I can think of to make sure we never learn anything.”

Her gaze met his, her beautiful blue eyes wide and troubled. “You can’t go there again yourself.”

He touched her face, his fingertips skimming gently across her cheek. “Careful, Miss Boleyn. You’re in danger of betraying an almost wifely concern for my health.”

He expected her to make some quick rejoinder and then flit away. Instead, she leaned against him, her arms coming around his neck to hold him close. “If these people are involved in a conspiracy against the Regent and they think you’re on to them, they won’t hesitate to kill you. You know that.”

He pressed his face against the softness of her breasts. “We know the men at one table in the common room of the Norfolk Arms have a romantic attachment to a dead exiled king. That doesn’t make the entire district guilty of plotting to overthrow the Hanoverian dynasty.”

She pushed away from him and went to assemble the various salves and potions she’d been using. The uncharacteristic moment of vulnerability was gone. She was once more in control, her voice teasing as she said, “I thought you didn’t believe in coincidences.”

Stretching to his feet, he swung his arm in slow circles, working out the stiffness in the muscle. “I don’t. But I can’t see how it fits with what I know of Guinevere Anglessey’s life. Now, if I could find some way to tie my friends from Giltspur Street to Bevan Ellsworth, it might begin to make sense. According to Guinevere’s abigail, he came storming into his uncle’s town house last Monday and essentially threatened to kill her. He also has one hell of a motive—the birth of Guinevere’s son would have disinherited him. With his creditors already pressing him for repayment, Ellsworth could easily have decided he couldn’t take a chance on the child being born a girl.”

“And you never liked him anyway.”

Sebastian looked over at her and smiled. “And I never liked him anyway.” Stripping off his bloodied breeches, he went to tip another kettle of hot water into the hip bath they’d drawn beside the kitchen hearth. “What do you know of Fabian Fitzfrederick?”

“He and Ellsworth are of much the same set, although Fitzfrederick also runs with the Dandies.” She frowned. “Why? You think Fitzfrederick might be involved?”