Free Death of a Radical by Rebecca Jenkins

broad-shouldered in a way that belied his gentleman’s clothes.He carried a drover’s stick. The face beneath the sweeping brim of his hat combined the nose of a Greek statue with sensual lips and the heavy chin of a pugilist.
    â€œMr. Jarrett!” The heavy staff swung out as the newcomer sketched a satirical bow. The mischievous gaze appeared to alight on the colonel as an afterthought. “And the colonel too.”
    The powers of Woolbridge faced one another across Mr. Bedlington’s yard. Colonel Ison was the gentry’s magistrate; Mr. Raistrick ruled over the rest.
    â€œA word with you, Mr. Raistrick,” the colonel snapped. Jarrett reflected—as he had before—that it was fortunate the two men detested one another. Woolbridge would be a dangerous place if ever those two found common cause.
    â€œYou’ll have to wait,” Mr. Raistrick responded blithely. “I have an appointment.” He looked up at the pair standing on the gallery. “Sugden, isn’t it?”
    This was appalling. It had not occurred to Jarrett that the “big man” Bess had mentioned might have been Raistrick. As a solitary wanderer, free from the connected web of a settled existence, Jarrett had been used to keeping the sole record of the discrete parts that made up his life. It now dawned on him for the first time how the crowded nature of civilian society might shatter that discretion.
    The little manager brushed past him, hurrying to greet the Justice. Bess floated down the stairs in his wake, her fingers caressing the wooden balustrade as she mighther lover’s skin. She paused for the space of a heartbeat by Jarrett’s shoulder.
    â€œHave a care, Bess,” he murmured. “That magistrate is no rabbit.”
    She slid him a side-glance from under heavy-lidded eyes. “No?”
    â€œRaistrick’s more of a wolf.”
    She paused on the step below, twisting her waist to lean in toward him. Her freckled breasts curved up enticingly above the lace of her bodice.
    â€œWell now,” she breathed, “it’s been a time since I’ve played with one of
those.”
    They had the attention of the entire company. Mr. Sugden watched them with a calculating gleam. Colonel Ison looked constipated. Magistrate Quentin Raistrick advanced, swinging out his staff. He looked up from the foot of the stairs. A crusted stain marked the front of his rich red brocade waistcoat.
    â€œIntroduce us, Mr. Jarrett.”
    â€œMiss Tallentyre, Mr. Justice Raistrick,” Jarrett replied, as shortly as he could and continued by him into the yard.
    Mr. Quentin Raistrick, attorney-at-law and Justice of the Peace, swept off his hat. His eyes were a smoky gray defined by brown lashes. With sinuous grace Bess extended a hand across the space between them. He captured it in brown fingers and slowly turned the palm up. He pressed his mouth to the inside of her wrist where the white skin glowed through the gap above the fastening of her glove.
    â€œMiss Tallentyre,” he purred.
    His eyes fixed on her face in a manner that was at once both masterful and hungry. Her lips parted as if the air had grown thin.
    Jarrett watched the color flush Bess’s cheeks. He could not believe what he saw unfolding before him. He had hardly been the duke’s agent six months and here he was, confined in this backwater, watching the biggest rogue in the neighborhood pressing his nose against his past. Colonel Ison was staring at the tableau, his pose of lofty detachment at variance with the avid curiosity in his eyes. Baffled by this unexpected convergence, Jarrett muttered an excuse and fled.
    Voices resonated down the corridor leading to the magistrates’ meeting room. The top note was angry and female. Occasionally the indistinct murmur of a male voice attempted a counterpoint. Framed in the open doorway, the Reverend Prattman, Woolbridge’s most prominent cleric and third Justice of