The King's Man Read online

  The King’s Man

  Alison Stuart

  www.escapepublishing.com.au

  The King’s Man

  Alison Stuart

  The second in a tantalising trilogy from award-winning author Alison Stuart, about warriors, the wounds they carry and the women that help them heal.

  London 1654: Kit Lovell is one of the King’s men, a disillusioned Royalist who passes his time cheating at cards, living off his wealthy and attractive mistress and plotting the death of Oliver Cromwell.

  Penniless and friendless, Thamsine Granville has lost everything. Terrified, in pain and alone, she hurls a piece of brick at the coach of Oliver Cromwell and earns herself an immediate death sentence. Only the quick thinking of a stranger saves her.

  Far from the bored, benevolent rescuer that he seems, Kit plunges Thamsine into his world of espionage and betrayal – a world that has no room for falling in love.

  Torn between Thamsine and loyalty to his master and King, Kit’s carefully constructed web of lies begins to unravel. He must make one last desperate gamble—the cost of which might be his life.

  About the Author

  Alison Stuart fell in love with the English Civil War when her father read her The King’s General by Daphne Du Maurier. She has been writing stories set in this period since her teenage years, but it was not until 2007 that the first edition of By the Sword was published. It went on to win the 2008 EPIC Award for Best Historical Romance. Alison has now published six full-length novels and a collection of her short stories. When she is not writing she is travelling, and has dragged her family around the sites of every major battle of the English Civil War.

  Alison lives in Melbourne, Australia. She is a lapsed lawyer who has worked in the military and fire service, with an obvious obsession for men in uniform, which may explain a predisposition to soldier heroes.

  Readers can connect with Alison through her website alisonstuart.com, Facebook, Twitter, or Pinterest.

  Acknowledgements

  The author would like to thank Kate Cuthbert and the team at Escape Publishing for their support and encouragement.

  This book is dedicated to the memory of my father, Arthur,

  who taught me a love of history.

  Contents

  About the Author

  Acknowledgements

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Author’s Note

  Bestselling Titles by Escape Publishing…

  Chapter 1

  London

  February 1654

  Thamsine Granville had not begun the day with the intention of killing Oliver Cromwell.

  Around her a jovial crowd pressed against the barricades, determined to enjoy the spectacle of the Lord Protector’s ride in state to dine with the Lord Mayor of London. But from across the road, he had seen her. A triumphant smile crossed his handsome face and he raised his hand to his hat, doffing it as he bowed. She saw him mouth her name and push his way towards the barricade. Thamsine swallowed, her mouth dry with fear. She only had a few moments to make good her escape, but the press of people to her rear hemmed her in, pushing her towards the barriers.

  The bells of London, silenced for so many years, rang out, and above her the flags of the City Guilds flapped in the chill wind. A roar went up from the crowd as the coach bearing Cromwell approached.

  From where she stood she could see the Lord Protector, clad in a reddish-coloured suit embroidered with gold. He inclined his head to acknowledge the cheers of the crowd with all the aplomb of a man born to such a station. She could see no trace of the simple farmer he had once professed to be. Thamsine’s heart beat a rapid tattoo. Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector, the false King, was about to become Thamsine Granville’s personal protector.

  She stooped and gathered up the broken piece of brick at her feet.

  Oblivious to his fate, Cromwell smiled, his right hand raised in a parody of benediction as if forgiving them their sins. At the sight of his face, solid and pudding-like, framed by the open window of the carriage, she raised her arm and threw with all the strength that she could muster.

  The brickbat hit the body of the coach barely inches from the open window. She got a brief impression of surprise on her intended victim’s face. The coach stopped, the horses rising in their traces, whinnying in alarm. The crowd, stunned into silence, held its collective breath, every eye fixed on the ugly graze on the coach’s paintwork where the brickbat had struck.

  A roar of approbation went up, but Thamsine Granville had disappeared. In the instant her fingers uncurled from the missile, someone had grabbed her from behind. Strong fingers dug into her arm and drove her with force through the crowd that parted before them like the Red Sea. She was only dimly aware of a commotion in the press around her. Soldiers yelled and a woman screamed but all she felt was utter despair. It had all been for nothing; somehow he had reached her.

  The world roared in Thamsine’s ears. Her knees buckled and she could feel herself slipping into unconsciousness, only to be drawn back by a sharp, agonising tug on her arm as it was cruelly and expertly bent behind her.

  ‘Don’t faint, don’t you dare faint.’

  She didn’t recognise the voice, and nearly screamed with relief. It wasn’t him.

  ‘Now, unless you want to end your life on a gibbet on Tower Hill, you will co-operate fully in what we are about to do,’ he said.

  Her rescuer thrust her down a dark, noisome alley, pressing her back against a wall. The rough brickwork dug into her spine as he pulled her around to face him, pinioning her arms at her side. His body pressed against her and she closed her eyes, bracing herself for the blow or whatever punishment was coming her way.

  She did not expect to be kissed.

  Her instinctive reaction was to resist, but with her arms and her head immobilised she was reduced to trying to kick her assailant. He responded by placing a booted foot on her instep. She gave a muffled yelp of pain.

  ‘Who’s down there, then?’

  A voice from the entrance to the alleyway caused her assailant to break off, allowing Thamsine the luxury of taking a deep breath. The fingers holding her arm tightened, digging into her flesh. It was a warning not to move, not to make another sound.

  The soldier gave a ribald whistle. ‘Got yourself a tasty piece, then?’

  In the shadows she saw her assailant turn his head towards the soldier. ‘Now then, sergeant. Can’t a man get a bit of privacy around here?’ he said in low and well-modulated voice, with an unusual undertone to the accent that she could not place.

  ‘What’s her charge?’ The sergeant’s voice again.

  Thamsine squeaked in protest but the firm and painful pressure on her upper left arm deepened and she kept her peace.

  ‘My dear sir, there are some pleasures beyond price.’

  ‘We’re looking for a woman.’ The soldier’s voice became clipped and businesslike. ‘Just tried to kill the Lord Protector. Has she come this way?’

  ‘I doubt I would have noticed. I have been otherwise occupied these minutes past.’

  Thamsin
e squirmed in the tight grasp. The easy, lascivious intonation of his voice made her want to slap him.

  ‘Well, good day to you, sir. I wish you joy of it.’

  ‘He’s gone,’ her rescuer said, removing his boot from her foot

  Thamsine found her voice. ‘Let me go. You’re hurting me.’

  ‘Hurting you? Is that gratitude for saving you from the gibbet?’

  He released her and took a step back. She straightened, rubbing at the place where his fingers had pressed.

  ‘Maybe I didn’t want saving.’

  He stepped back and waved at the entrance to the alleyway. ‘Very well. No doubt you can catch up with the good sergeant, if that’s what you wish.’

  To her embarrassment she started to tremble with cold, with fright, and with delayed shock, as the audacity and foolishness of what she had done began to sink in.

  She had tried to kill the Lord Protector. Men had hanged for less.

  In her desperate bid to escape him she had given no thought to what penalty she may have had to pay had she been apprehended. She owed this man thanks for her deliverance, but the words stuck in her throat.

  She looked up at her rescuer. In the gloom of the alley it was hard to make out his appearance, and he wore a wide-brimmed hat that hid his face, but she could see that he was clean-shaven, his hair, dark and rough-cut, skimming an immaculate, white collar.

  ‘You do realise what you just did?’ he asked.

  She nodded.

  ‘May I ask why?’

  ‘Because I wanted him dead,’ she said, without much conviction in her voice. It was not the Lord Protector she had wanted dead.

  ‘Well, I’m sure there are plenty who would share the sentiment, but hurling brickbats at a coach is hardly the best way to accomplish that end.’

  She drew herself up to her full height. ‘And what do you care?’

  ‘I don’t,’ he answered. ‘I really don’t care at all. I have enough problems of my own without rescuing dim-witted whores who choose to hurl brickbats at the Lord Protector.’

  ‘I’m not a whore.’

  He touched his mouth. ‘Well, you certainly kiss like one.’

  She raised her hand but he caught her wrist. ‘Now, now, mistress. I apologise for calling you a whore. Perhaps you prefer ‘failed assassin’?’

  He let her wrist go and her arm fell to her side.

  ‘I have nothing more to say to you, sir,’ she said stiffly. ‘Thank you for saving my neck from the gibbet. I bid you good day.’

  He made no attempt to stop her, standing aside to let her pass. As she did so, he bowed. ‘Good fortune to you, mistress.’

  She gave him what she hoped was a withering glance and stepped back onto the street. It seemed unnatural that the crowd had resumed its normal bustle. Soldiers mingled with the passers-by, occasionally stopping a person to question them. Thamsine, in her threadbare cloak and patched and faded dress, attracted no attention.

  With dragging footsteps, she traced the familiar way to the dreary, rodent-infested hovel on the outskirts of Blackfriars where she had lodged for the last few months. She had not eaten since yesterday, and even that had been no more than a morsel of stale bread and a thin broth bought with her last coin. The smell of cooking coming from the shops and homes she passed made her stomach growl in protest.

  If she wanted to eat, if she wanted to keep a roof over her head, she had only one choice. The man who had rescued her had called her a whore and she, with her last shred of dignity, had denied it. She could never deny it again. She had sold everything worth selling and now she had only one thing left.

  A couple of streets away from her lodging, she stopped in a boarded-up doorway. She loosed her hair and shook it out. With shaking fingers she unlaced her bodice a little way, displaying a hint of her almost-flat chest. She hitched one side of her skirts to show what she hoped was a tantalizing glimpse of ankle above the cracked shoes. It was not, she thought, a very alluring picture, but it would have to do.

  She took a deep breath and stepped back into the street, tossing her cloak back over her shoulders and adopting the hip-swinging saunter she had observed others of her newly adopted profession use.

  Prospective customers should be in no doubt as to what trade she was plying. What they would not see was the way her heart hammered against her ribs and her stomach had become a hard ball of fear and self-loathing. The part of her that still remembered who she was and where she had come from hoped and prayed that the men who frequented the dismal streets of Blackfriars would pass her by without a second glance.

  A hand grabbed her shoulder and she gave a small yelp of alarm as she turned to face the man who had accosted her. A bearded face scrutinized her closely, his fingers digging painfully into her wrist.

  ‘What’s yer charge?’ His breath smelt as if it came directly from the pits of a Hell charged with rotten teeth, onion and stale wine.

  Her eyes widened. ‘Charge?’

  ‘For your body.’ His hand slid down her bodice and grasped her breast with such ferocity that she cried out in pain and pulled back.

  The fingers tightened, drawing her towards him.

  ‘Half a crown.’ Her attempt at bravado sounded pathetic even to her ears.

  He gave a guffaw of laughter. ‘Half a crown for a tight, skinny little arse like yours? Sixpence is all you’ll get and count yourself lucky!’

  Sixpence would buy a wedge of stale bread and thin broth.

  Thamsine nodded.

  ‘Got somewhere to go?’

  The thought of plying her trade in the pathetic room that had been her lodgings for the past month horrified her more than the thought of what she was about to do. She shook her head.

  ‘Never mind. Down ’ere will do as good as any.’

  Propelling Thamsine by the arm, he thrust her down a filthy alley. A small part of Thamsine’s brain registered the irony that it was the second time in one day a man had dragged her down just such a laneway. This time there would be no escaping the consequences.

  The bearded man pushed her up against the slimy wall. His mouth clamped on to hers, his beard rasping her skin. His tongue, hard and insistent, penetrated her mouth, thrusting inside her while his spare hand grappled with her skirts.

  She felt his hand on her thigh and his fingers between her legs. His vile, stinking breath, the taste of him, the insistent probing of his tongue began to suffocate her. Nausea rose in her throat and she tried to twist away but he held her too close. Her struggles were as useless as a reed against the wind.

  He leered at her. ‘You’re a tight little bitch. I reckon you need a bit of softening up.’

  The blow came with such ferocity that she fell sideways, her head ringing, her world exploding into a thousand different-coloured lights. Hard fingers closed on her arm, hauling her to her feet.

  She heard her own voice pleading with him not to hit her again, and sensed rather than saw the shadow of his hand ready to strike. With the last of her strength, she braced herself.

  The blow did not come. Instead the man gave a strangled cry and released her arm, causing her to fall to her knees in the stinking mire. She cowered away, covering her face with her hands as her client said ‘Oi! What’s yer game! There’ll be plenty left for you,’

  ‘Leave the lady be.’

  At the sound of the familiar voice, Thamsine felt tears prick the back of her eyes. For the second time in the day the stranger had come to her rescue, completing her humiliation.

  ‘Lady … ?’

  The sound of fist on bone cut short the scoffing voice. A heavy body fell to the ground beside her. Through her fingers she saw the man rise and heard the sound of feet scuffling and the grunts of a struggle in progress. Someone spat at the ground by her feet.

  ‘Take her! She’s yours if you want her that bad, but you’ll get no joy of her. Not worth a farthing.’

  ‘Get out of here!’ The words were followed by the soft hiss of a sword loosened in the scabbard. S
he heard the sound of running feet and then silence.

  A hand touched her shoulder. ‘Let’s see the damage.’

  ‘I can’t,’ she mumbled into her hands.

  ‘Come on, lass, he fetched you a mighty wallop. You weren’t much to look at before. I doubt your appearance has been much improved by his handiwork.’

  She screwed her eyes tightly shut as he pried her hands away from her face and gave a low whistle. With surprising gentleness, his fingers probed along her right cheekbone. She flinched.

  ‘You’ve the makings of a truly spectacular black eye but I don’t think anything’s broken. Now, open your eyes and look at me!’

  With a supreme effort, she obeyed. Her saviour had crouched down on his haunches and now surveyed her with a pair of grey-green eyes. Nice eyes, she thought, with the lines of humour crinkling at the corners. But she saw no humour in them now, only pity, and pity was the last thing on Earth she wanted. The shame overwhelmed her and the last of her rigid self-control evaporated. She lowered her head to her knees and began to weep, slow, silent sobs that wracked her thin body.

  He made no move towards her; just let her cry until there was no more misery to expend. She brought herself back, wiping her eyes on the sleeve of her dress and forced herself to look up at the man who still crouched beside her.

  Her nemesis had a sharp, clever face dominated by a nose that was slightly too long and a mouth that curled as if about to break into a smile. He could not have been much above thirty.

  His hat lay on the ground beside him and a cowlick of dark hair fell over his eyes. He pushed it back and reached out a finger, curling a lock of her hair in a gesture that was more paternal than sexual.

  He shook his head. ‘You’ll be dead by week’s end if you persist in this chosen vocation,’ he said. ‘Whoever you are, you’re no whore by nature or, I warrant, necessity.’

  ‘You’re wrong. I’ve no choice,’ she mumbled.

  She wiped the back of her hand across lips that felt bruised and swollen. The vile taste of the man who had violated her rose in her mouth. She leaned away and retched onto the revolting cobbles.