“Go back to bed,” she hissed.
“I’d rather die standing,” he muttered, though he was likely to fall over at any moment. “Those men downstairs are here for me.”
“I was afraid of that.” She lifted the poker again. “I’m ready.”
Hew stared at her. “You are—no. You are not going down there.”
“They are in my shop.” She narrowed her eyes. “You certainly cannot defend us.”
“Give me the poker.” He snatched it out of her hand and had to refrain from rolling his eyes. She thought she would defend them this way? He’d even warned her before he’d taken the weapon from her. “Now go lock yourself in your father’s bed chamber and don’t come out until I—”
“Until you fall over and they finish you off?” If there was such a thing as a whispered shout, Miss Howard had perfected it. “Sir, I did not spend all this time nursing you to have you murdered in my tea shop.”
“I want to believe you care, but I think you are more concerned about your customers not wanting to buy their tea where a dead body lay just hours before.”
“It’s certainly not good for business.” She grabbed a small broom with a long metal handle from beside the hearth. “I’m ready.”
She’d sweep them to death, apparently. He didn’t have time to argue any further. The men sent to kill him would finish searching the shop and be on their way to the flat any moment. Cautiously, Hew opened the door leading down the steps. The staircase was steep, and he’d be at a disadvantage on the way down. But strangely enough, the men hadn’t opened the door at the bottom of the stairs. “This might be an ambush,” he said to Miss Howard over his shoulder. If the men had heard them arguing above, they might decide to simply lie in wait below. “Wait for my signal before opening the door to the shop.”
She nodded and started down behind him, broom at the ready. He held his poker in one hand, his other hand clamped firmly on the railing. He didn’t know why his legs should feel so wobbly when it was his side that had been stabbed.
Behind him, Miss Howard inhaled sharply. “No!”
“What’s—” Before he could even ask the matter, she pushed past him, almost causing him to lose his precarious balance, and raced for the door. “No!” he cried before she could open it. “The am—”
She flung the door open and swung her broom wildly as two men jumped out at her.
“—bush,” Hew finished. “Damn it all to hell.” He raced down the stairs to rescue her, his nose finally registering what she must have smelled moments before.
Something was burning.
At the base of the stairs, Miss Howard batted the broom and waved it about, keeping the attackers at bay. She’d surprised them, which was why the ploy had worked, but there were two of them and one of her. Any moment, one would grab her and the other do away with her. Hew chose the man slightly behind her and lunged, his poker wielded like a sword his ancestors might have used at Agincourt. His would-be assailant, a large man in a wet coat and dripping hat, was armed with a knife. Little use against a poker.
The man didn’t waste any effort trying to fight. He backed up and then ran, toppling over shelves of tea with a crash as he raced for the door. He flung it open and disappeared into the darkness. The door open now, the scent of wet earth mingled with the smell of smoke and bergamot. Hew rounded on the other attacker. That man, short and slim, saw him coming and began to retreat from Miss Howard’s slashing broom. Hew recognized the man as the one who had stabbed him. He couldn’t see the man’s eyes as he wore a tricorn pulled low, but he could see the dark bruise on the man’s jaw where Hew had struck him during the attack.
“You!” Hew lunged for him, but the attacker saw him coming and pushed a tea set off a shelf, causing the porcelain to shatter on the floor and Hew to throw up his arms to shield his face from flying shards.
“How dare you!” Miss Howard yelled, bringing the broom down on the attacker’s shoulder. Hew heard the soft thud, and though the broom didn’t do much damage, he imagined it still hurt.
Covering his head to protect it from further blows, that man fled through the open door too. Miss Howard rounded on Hew. “You should have left me with the poker.”
Perhaps he should have.
“Over there!” she said, pointing to a small fire creeping its way up a far wall. “We need water.”
“There’s plenty of water to be had outside.” Indeed, it was still raining.
“I’ll fetch a bucket.”
She started for the door behind the counter, paused to pat where pockets might be if she was wearing a gown instead of only a shift and wrapper, then swore. “The keys are upstairs.”
“I have them,” came a voice from the stairway. Hew recognized it as Mr. Howard. He turned in time to see the man take a faltering step, miss, and tumble down the last half dozen stairs.
“Father!”
Hew cursed the fever burning through him. It made him slow and sluggish. He had lunged for the stairs but was too late to catch Mr. Howard. The man landed in a heap at the base of the steps. Hew fell to his knees, quickly assessing injuries. Howard lifted a hand to his head, where Hew could already see a large lump rising. “Don’t move,” he ordered.
Miss Howard fell on her knees beside Hew and her father, she reached to take his head, but Hew grabbed her hands. “Don’t move him.”
