Page 18 of Sinfully Mine
What mattered was what sort of offer Scoggins might make.
Drew patted the letters in his pocket. There was one for his brother Jordan explaining that business would keep him in Lincolnshire for the time being. The other, was to his friends in London. Hester deserved to have a taste of her own medicine.
And he wasn’t going to use a snake.
*
It was alreadymid-afternoon when Drew finished with Scoggins. The meeting with the boisterous gentleman had taken far longer than he’d anticipated. Scoggins was a friendly sort, and their discussion flowed nearly as well as the ale and food at the Maid’s Inn. The excellent roast lamb had been accompanied by carrots and potatoes, along with stewed apples. Not so much as a leaf of cabbage in sight. Scoggins had been a fount of information about Blackbird Heath and Hester Black.
The Widow Black did not have many friends in Horncastle.
Hester Morton had been the only child of a card playing sot with a philandering reputation prior to her marriage to Joshua Black. She’d been raised on a farm just outside of Horncastle that had belonged to her grandfather. Thomas Morton, Hester’s father, knew little about farming. Less about cards or dice. He spent most of his time at a local tavern and not working his land. By the time Hester’s mother died, Morton had stripped his father’s farm of nearly everything that was worth selling. Morton and his red-haired daughter were a familiar sight in Horncastle as he dragged Hester from one hovel to the next as his fortunes declined. Dressed in rags and left to beg for coin, she became a subject of pity and scorn.
Joshua Black had been a confirmed bachelor before his marriage to Hester, which had come as a surprise. Some said Thomas Morton offered Hester as payment for a debt he owed Black but most of Horncastle derided her as nothing more than an ambitious young woman seeking an escape from poverty. The marriage brought her some respectability but not much.
Black was rarely in residence, leaving his young wife to run the farm which he bled to maintain his indulgent lifestyle. It was no great secret in Horncastle. Hester rarely came into town except to visit her solicitor, Martin Godwick. She had no friends to speak of. No family. Not one person or family in Horncastle had ever attempted to help her, judging Hester for her parentage and not for herself.
Drew had listened to the entire tale without flinching. Scoggins spoke of Hester with more than a little disdain, his scorn for her and the impoverished child she’d been evident in every word. An unexpected surge of protectiveness filled him for Hester. Drew knew well what it was to be looked down on. Gossiped about. Treated as if you were something less because of who your parents were. The Sinclairs hadn’t had to resort to begging, but only because Jordan started raising pigs and fighting with his fists to win a purse when he needed. Tamsin raced her horse. Malcolm became a soldier so he could send money back to them all. Drew gambled. Aurora, bless her, tended the much unloved cabbage patch at Dunnings.
He left Scoggins at the Maid’s Inn, promising that the landowner would be the first to know when Blackbird Heath was for sale.
If I sell it.
Drew pushed the thought away. Of course he still meant to sell the farm.
While the afternoon had helped shift his opinion of Hester and gave him a deeper appreciation for her love of Blackbird Heath, it didn’t change his mind. There was no need to keep a farm he didn’t want or the redhead that came with it, not when Worth and the partnership he offered was Drew’s future.
But she blushed so prettily.
Honestly, his annoyance that Hester had stooped to put a snake in his bed had been so sharp that the last thing he’d considered was his nakedness. But the longer he stood before her, watching the soft rose creep across her cheeks to color her skin, Drew felt the pull of attraction to her.
I want to tup her.
“Damn.”
Drew had flirted with the buxom lass serving he and Scoggins earlier. She was nicely rounded, smiled and made no effort to hide her interest in him, yet he’d felt nothing.
Bloody hell.
His theory that he only desired Hester because no other females save Mrs. Ebersole were in the immediate vicinity wasn’t true at all. Drew had wanted to bed Hester Black barely ten minutes after making her acquaintance. She’d survived much worse than Dunnings. A drunkard for a father. Poverty. The sheer determination to keep Black from selling the estate so he could indulge his love of cards alone was a sign of her resilience.
No wonder Hester was so bloody hostile. In her mind, Drew was yet another gambling wastrel determined to take Blackbird Heath. Her home. Likely the only one she’d ever had.
Drew strode down the street and turned the corner into a short alley, ignoring the twinge of guilt over Hester. He’d left his horse near the smithy when he posted his letters, choosing to make the short walk to the Maid’s Inn. As he entered the alley, a stone rolled back into the back of Drew’s booted foot. A push followed, directly in the center of his back as someone tried to force him to the ground.
He stumbled, but quickly regained his footing. Drew lived in London and was often out late at night and was no stranger to thieves and footpads wanting his purse. He only hadn’t expected to be attacked in Horncastle.
The hair along his cheek lifted as the slice of a blade narrowly missed his neck. Drew instinctively dropped to the ground and rolled. Kicking out his leg, the toe of his boot made contact with his assailant’s knee. Rolling to his back, he kicked out with his heel as the thief’s knee gave way and caught the man in the chin. Drew came to his feet and delivered a sharp kick to the man’s stomach.
The thug made an attempt to slash out with the knife again, aiming for Drew’s thigh.
He ground his heel into the man’s wrist. “Drop the knife.”
The man on the ground grunted, wiggling about and trying to dislodge Drew’s hold on his wrist. He wore a mask, one that covered most of his features outside of his eyes.
“If you don’t release the knife, I’ll break your wrist. It won’t be pleasant.”
The thug shook his head and continued to struggle. He grabbed at Drew’s ankle trying to push him away.
