CHAPTER 20 #2
Taking in the situation at a glance, he propped the ladder against the railing, a few feet away from the burning staircase, and climbed up easily.
For now, they had a way to get down, but it wouldn’t last. Already the flames were licking along the banister, and in a matter of minutes, they would reach the spot where he had the ladder propped.
Even if he had time to get them down, then what?
By the time they reached the corridor, it might be engulfed in flames, and he didn’t know if there would be another way out.
Up and out the window seemed the better choice.
He jumped over onto the landing and led them back to the nursery, closing the door to try and keep most of the smoke out.
“Do you think you can bear it if I lower you from the window using the rope?”
“I can, but what about Edward? And Nurse…”
“I’ll strap him securely, but I need you to go down first. Then I’ll lower the child to you and, finally, I’ll help the nurse down.”
“No. Help Nurse first, I can’t leave her alone up here. She is terrified.”
“Josephine…” There was a reason for the rescue order.
The nurse would be the slowest to come down.
She would delay them. And if there was no time to get them all down, at least Josephine could escape with the child.
But he recognized the mulish set of her chin, and they would waste more time arguing. “Fine. Nurse, come here.”
The woman just shook her head no, backing away. “It’s either this, or you burn up here,” he said baldly, conscious of the seconds ticking by, of the fire getting closer, and his throat getting sore with the smoke. How much longer did they have?
Josephine saved the moment by placing a hand on the older woman’s arm. “Listen to Michael, Nurse. You’ll be safe with him. We’ll all be safe with him.”
At last the nurse approached the window, and between Josephine and himself they fashioned a sort of harness to keep her secured to the rope.
Then came the most difficult part. Convincing the woman to step off the ledge and trust Michael to lower her securely to the ground.
This is what he was trying to avoid. They were wasting precious time.
At long last, the woman let go with a scream of panic and he slowly lowered her to the waiting arms of the servants gathered below.
When they had unstrapped her, Michael quickly retrieved the rope.
Time to lower the child now. But the little one was crying and any attempt to separate him from Josephine only increased his screams, until he was red-faced and hysterical.
There was no way he could lower the child by himself.
Reassessing quickly, he grabbed one of the sheets and wrapped it around Josephine several times, making sure Edward was tied securely to her chest.
“How does that feel?”
“Good. He feels secure. And look, he stopped crying.”
“Let’s go, then.”
He held the rope with the makeshift harness made of bedsheets tied at one end.
“Do you trust me to lower you securely to the ground?”
In response, Josephine grabbed the harness and secured it to her body, then sat on the edge of the window.
“Ready? Hold on to the rope and push back slightly with your feet, I’ll—”
“Wait.”
“Having second thoughts?”
“No.” To his utter and everlasting surprise, she reached up, cupped the back of his head, and brought it down to join her lips with his.
The kiss was hard, swift, and full of desperation and a thousand other emotions he could not process at the moment because his entire mind was consumed by the need to get them safely to the ground.
It shook him to his core. And galvanized him.
It was over before he could react.
“Thank you. I’m ready now.”
Saying this, she threw her legs over the ledge and, at a nod from him, pushed back without hesitation, putting her life and that of her nephew in his hands.
His muscles strained as he lowered them slowly, safely, to the ground.
Hand over hand, using his own weight and strength to counterbalance their combined weight.
By the time they reached the ground, the entire room was full of smoke and the floor was so hot that he could feel the heat even through the soles of his boots.
Time for him to descend. Checking that the rope was still secured to a heavy armoire, he grabbed the curtain tieback cords and fashioned them into a harness that he wound around his waist with a secure knot.
Then, looping the length of rope through the harness, he got into position and pushed off the ledge.
He kept his legs perpendicular to the wall as he used his left hand under him to control his descent while holding on to the rope for stability with his right hand above his head, using a technique he had learned in the Royal Engineers Corps to navigate difficult terrain or climb walls during a siege.
In no time at all, he was on the ground, drawing deep lungfuls of blessedly clean air. To his intense relief, he noticed the fire brigade had gotten the pump working and were directing a steady stream of water into the broken windows of the burning rooms.
Josephine was by his side in an instant, still holding her nephew.
She was smudged and bedraggled but alive and safe.
It had been a close thing. Too close for comfort.
The fire might be put out soon enough, but if he had not been staying nearby, if he had not caught the fire brigade, if he had taken even five more minutes to arrive, she and the child might have not survived. The thought sent a chill through him.
“Is Edward well?” He frowned as concern lanced through him when he beheld the limp body of the child in her arms.
“He’s fine. Merely asleep. I guess the high drama of the night exhausted him.”
The nurse came over now. Still a bit worse for wear but much better now that she was outside. “I’ll take the little one, milady.”
Josephine passed the sleeping child to the nurse, who took him aside to place him on a makeshift pallet that some of the maids had laid out.
“You came for us.”
He couldn’t tell if the hoarseness of her voice and the brightness of her eyes was due to emotion or the smoke, but either way, his answer was the same.
“Of course. I always will.” She opened her mouth to say something, but he went on. “But if you contradict me ever again in a matter of life or death, I’ll have to discipline you for insubordination.”
He had the satisfaction of seeing her eyes widen in either shock or arousal. Maybe a bit of both.
“And how will you do that?” Her attitude was defiant, but her eyes were soft. Oh yes, she was aroused. He leaned over to whisper in her ear.
“Defy me and you will find out.”
Maybe his nearness was too much, for she stepped back, flustered. “How did I defy you?”
“I told you to go down first. But you insisted I help the nursemaid first.”
“But she’s old and—”
“That’s the reason I chose you to go down first. You are young, strong, and bold.
You could have made it down fast and brought the child with you.
He would have had less exposure to smoke.
Not to mention that if something had gone wrong later on, at least you two would be safe, while I stayed behind to try to help the nurse until the end. ”
Her face paled under the streaks of soot. “I didn’t think of that.”
A twinge of remorse tugged at his heartstrings.
But this was important. It had been so damned close.
Maybe it didn’t look like that to her because they had all gotten out unharmed.
But a few more seconds and either of them might not be here.
“No. You didn’t. But officers are trained to make these difficult choices all the time.
In the heat of battle, it could be the difference between surviving or not. ”
“I understand. And Michael?”
“Yes?”
“Thank you. From the bottom of my heart. For everything.”
It took several hours and the combined effort of the fire brigade, the estate staff, and himself, but the fire was at last put out.
He was exhausted, but his job was not done.
While fighting the fire, he had noticed some patterns that didn’t make sense.
At least not for a natural fire. He had stored the information away for a later time, while focusing on the most important matter: controlling the flames.
Now that the fire was extinguished, it was the time to investigate.
Michael walked through the east wing corridor, hunting for the origin of the fire.
Smoke still lingered, faint and acrid, clinging to the air like a ghost that refused to leave.
As he stepped over the scorched threshold of the room that had sustained the most damage, his boots crunched on a mosaic of ash, glass, and blackened timber.
The scent hit him first—not only the acrid bite of smoke, but something sweeter beneath it.
Faint traces of lavender, orange blossom… and ethanol.
His jaw tightened.
This had once been Josephine’s workroom.
Now it was a shell. The table at the far end—what was left of it—had collapsed in on itself, one leg gone entirely.
Charred stumps of candlesticks clung to warped holders.
Bottles lay shattered in glittering pools, their contents long since ignited or evaporated, save for the clinging, ghostlike residue on the stone floor.
He crouched beside what looked to have been her primary workspace. Here, the damage was fiercest. The fire had flared high, licked up the wall and left a tongue of blackened soot reaching toward the ceiling, which had partially collapsed.
He touched a scorched iron mortar, still warm.
Then, frowning, examined the edge of a wooden drawer.
It was blackened on the outside but—yes—lighter wood was visible within, the grain not fully consumed.
That told him something. The fire had spread inward from the outside walls.
This was not the origin, then. More like a second stage—an escalation.
He stood and moved with methodical care, careful not to disturb too much of the scene.
A shattered oil lamp lay on its side atop an overturned table, but the wood beneath it remained oddly untouched.
He frowned. The wick was barely singed. The spill—if there had been one—should’ve burned hotter, longer.
Staged, he thought grimly. Made to look like the source, but the fire started elsewhere.
His gaze lifted to the windows—one gaping open, its latch splintered. Not burned. Broken.
Wind hadn’t done that.
Nor had a careless servant.
He ran his fingers lightly over the scorched windowsill and found what he’d suspected: faint traces of wax and oil residue in the grain. Not from a perfume bottle. From a torch—or a fire starter. Possibly resin-soaked.
He crouched, fingers brushing over a patch of scorched floorboard. It gave slightly under the pressure—not from the burn, but from something slick clinging to the grain. He rubbed it between thumb and forefinger, brought it to his nose.
Paraffin.
His lips thinned into a grim line. Not lamp oil spilled by accident. This had been poured.
He stood, turning his gaze slowly across the blackened room.
The fire had consumed the side next to the windows, and from there, it had spread in two different directions.
One toward the worktable with the flammable materials, the other toward the wall leading to the next room.
A quick check confirmed it was Josephine’s room, as a few of her possessions remained among the charred debris.
The flames had not raged unchecked. They had known exactly where to go. Exactly where to hurt.
Deliberate. Controlled.
His gut clenched.
He turned back to the perfumery table. The chaos here—the shattered bottles, the melted wax seals, the unnatural bloom of char across the room—had masked the fire's true beginning. To anyone without military training, it would look like carelessness. An accident with alcohol.
But it wasn’t.
It was meant to look like an accident. Whoever had done this was clever. But not clever enough.
He had seen enough in this room to confirm arson. Was the intent to scare…or to kill? Josephine had said the servants’ staircase was engulfed as well. But those were on the opposite side of the corridor.
"Two separate burns," he muttered. One from the corner by the servants’ stairs, the other by the sitting room adjacent to Josephine’s bedchamber.
Not connected by flue or wall, not even a shared draught.
Not natural. The nursery was right above these rooms. The placement of the fire was designed to trap the occupants of this side of the house.
The confirmation of his deepest fears sent a chill down his spine.
From the far end of the hall, a coughing footman approached, soot smearing his livery and face pale. “Your Grace, Lady Josephine asked if—”
“I’ll report to her shortly,” Michael said, his tone clipped but not unkind. “One question. Who locked up last night?”
“That’d be Perkins, sir.”
“Has anyone seen anything out of the ordinary? A rope, a ladder, maybe a stranger roaming the property? Any new workers in the house or the stables?” There were a lot of questions, especially so soon after the emergency.
He’d have to conduct a thorough interrogation of the staff later, but this could be a start.
The footman scratched his head, scrunching his brow as he thought. “The stable boy swears he saw a man by the tool shed before the fire started. But it was just a shadow. Could have been one of the workers. He didn’t think anything of it until after the fire.”
Michael’s jaw flexed. Deliberate ignition. Forced entry. Witness sighting.
The conclusion was inescapable. This wasn’t some tragic mishap. It was sabotage.
Whoever set it had meant to harm Josephine and Edward. And they very nearly succeeded.