Hastings (Brothers in Arms #15)

Chapter 1

CHAPTER 1

S tephen awoke to the feeling of being watched. It was still dark out, the only light coming from the moon shining in his window. Which shouldn’t be happening because he’d closed the curtains before going to bed.

A creak of the floorboards next to his bed had him sitting up abruptly. Unfortunately, that was the same moment his watcher chose to lean down over the bed. Their heads came together with an audible thump and the impact left Stephen dazed as he collapsed back on the bed.

“Bloody hell, saint,” the man beside his bed cursed at him. “What the hell are you head butting me for?”

Stephen cracked an eye open, rubbing his aching forehead. “Me?” he asked. “What are you doing creeping around in my bedroom in the middle of the night again?”

“I wasn’t creeping,” Hastings told him. “You sleep like the dead. I could have come through here beating a drum and still you would have slept through it.”

“Obviously not,” Stephen said with a sigh. He started to sit up again, but caution made him hesitate. “Fair warning,” he said. “I’m sitting up.”

“Good,” Hastings said. “I need a place to sit.”

Stephen gingerly sat up and scooted back a bit, making room at the end of the bed. Hastings promptly sat and then fell backward in a sprawl. He was a large man and took up most of Stephen’s bed.

“Are you drunk?” Stephen asked. Hastings smelled like a distillery, but he didn’t want to assume. It might irritate him further.

“Always.”

“And it appears you are naked again,” Stephen observed.

“It’s how they left me,” Hastings said, dejection in his voice.

“Indeed,” Stephen said with a sigh. “You’ve been drunk and, for the most part, naked, for the better part of three weeks. Don’t you think it’s time you did something else?”

Three weeks prior, one of Stephen’s oldest friends had stopped by and left Hastings there to, as Simon had put it, “be healed by the power of Stephen’s ministry.” Stephen was relatively sure Simon had been drunk at the time as well. He had unceremoniously dumped a drunk and naked Hastings in Stephen’s garden at the parsonage and ridden off immediately. Considering Simon’s past, and apparently present, as an agent for a shadowy, secretive department in the Home Office, Stephen assumed Hastings shared the same occupation. It was hard to envision him in the role, however, since he’d yet to see Hastings sober or fully clothed, despite Stephen’s best efforts. Nor did Hastings appear to be interested in anyone’s ministry.

Despite Hastings ill humor and appalling manners, Stephen did feel for him. It was clear he was having personal troubles, and he felt quite abandoned by his compatriots. Hastings clearly needed help and so Stephen had taken him in, and tried to clothe and feed him until such time as he was ready to face whatever he was avoiding. These sorts of things always came down to avoiding something, didn’t they?

“What else is there for me to do besides drink?” Hastings asked plaintively. “I’m in the country, for God’s sake. Why on earth do you live in the country?”

“I quite like Ashton on the Green,” Stephen told him mildly. “Fresh air and lots of pleasant walks. And my garden, of course. Not to mention this is where my parish is.”

“That’s another thing,” Hastings said, pointing at him. Or at least in his general direction. Honestly it was hard to tell he was drunk from his speech, but his coordination was always disastrous. “How are you a parson? Good-looking fellow like you, pleasant to be around, sporting and all that. You look like a proper squire, maybe even a knight. A saint,” he said as if it were a revelation. “That’s right. A saint ,” he repeated, clearly forgetting he’d just called him that not ten seconds ago. He didn’t sound as if that was a good thing, either.

“I’m afraid I’m just the Reverend Mr. Stephen Matthews,” Stephen said. “As for my looks and my disposition, you can thank my parents. Or could, if they were still alive. Everything else is my fault.”

“Orphan, are you?” Hastings said compassionately. “Me, too. In the sense that my mum now has an establishment in Bath and doesn’t wish me to show up and reveal her true age.”

“I see,” Stephen said encouragingly. This was the most personal information Hastings had shared since he’d arrived. “And how do you feel about that?”

“I don’t like Bath,” Hastings said, as if that settled the matter. “I want to go back to London.”

“Then why don’t you?” Stephen asked.

“Can’t,” Hastings said with a huge sigh. “Sir Barnabas said I was to lay low here for a while.”

Sir Barnabas James was the head of the shadowy department at the Home Office. That confirmed Stephen’s suspicions. “When did you hear from Sir Barnabas?” he asked.

“Got a note two days after I arrived.”

Stephen was astonished. He’d had no idea. “He told you to stay in Ashton on the Green?”

“No, he told me to stay with you.” Hastings turned over and crawled fully up onto the bed, half draped across Stephen. “So, I’m staying with you.” He yawned widely and rolled over onto his side. “Far as I can tell, you don’t need protecting and there’s no one to kill here, so God knows what that wily bugger is up to.” He yawned again. “But I do as I’m told.”

“In that case, go lie down in your own bed,” Stephen told him. “This is the second time this week you’ve crawled into mine.”

“I like yours better,” Hastings said. “The sun comes up in my window.”

Within moments Stephen heard a light snore. He sighed and lay back down. He certainly wasn’t giving up his bed again. He turned his back to Hastings and hoped there were a few more hours of sleep to be had.