His chest tightened uncomfortably at the sound of her aggrieved voice. He’d given her very little thought when conceiving this scheme. She’d simply been one of Jack’s bastard daughters. Now she was here, and he was faced with the reality of her.
Sighing, he gentled his voice and said, “Just hear my proposition—”
“I have a lover,” she blurted. “I’m another man’s mistress. Tomorrow I leave for Spain with m-my protector.”
His chest lifted with a sharp breath at the unexpected words. Disappointment rooted deeply in his chest, settling there like a heavy rock. “You’re a … kept woman?”
An emotion he could not identify followed close on the heels of the realization that he knew nothing of this woman. Not her name. Not her face. Not even a hint of who she was. It had not occurred to him that she might possess entanglements. His hands loosened from her wrists and he pulled back. Her arms fell away from him, and she quickly scrambled back across the carriage.
The fleeting thought passed through his mind that he should return her and forget her sultry-soft voice. Then he heard Jack’s voice, hard and matter-of-fact, whipping through his head, explaining that Ash was not good enough to be his heir. Not good enough …
Now, more than ever, he was convinced their marriage would be good for her. For the both of them. It would save her from her situation as some man’s tart and grant her a life of legitimacy. He offered her freedom. He just had to make her see that.
“You were leaving for Spain,” he began, his voice quiet but firm. “No longer. Now you are journeying to Scotland with me. On the way there, you’ll realize that I’m offering you something this protector of yours never could.” He would convince her of that.
“And what would that be?”
“Freedom. The means to be an independent woman. To go anywhere and do anything you want.”
She held silent for a moment, and he knew he’d baited the hook. She was listening, perhaps for the first time. “You don’t plan to force me to wed you …”
“I won’t have to,” he replied. “You’ll see the wisdom in this. We’ll use the journey to better acquaint ourselves.” He heard her sigh, felt it ripple through him. A good sign. She was relenting. One more inducement and the deal was done. He was certain of it. “We need not even consummate the marriage. It will be assumed. After a few months, you can go anywhere you wish … fully funded.”
“A few months,” she echoed. He did not mistake the longing in her voice.
“Do yourself a favor and take the time to consider what I’m offering at the very least.” His voice fell with a quiet hush, calm for all the tension riddling him as he awaited her response.
“Very well,” she whispered at last. “I’ll consider it.”
His head dropped back on the seat. “You should rest until we reach the inn,” he suggested, feeling suddenly weary, none of the triumph he expected to feel present at her near agreement. None of this had gone quite as he thought … not that he had thought much about how they might interact—about her at all. He certainly hadn’t considered that she might belong to another man. His hand curled unconsciously into a fist.
“When will we stop?”
“We had a late start. It’s nearly dark. We’ll stop just outside the city. Not too long.”
Then everything would be better, he vowed, turning to gaze out the thin part in the curtains, watching the dark shapes fly past. It had to be. He couldn’t accept defeat. Not on this. Even though he couldn’t force some woman to wed him against her will, he would not give up until he persuaded her to agree.
He imagined the evening ahead. They would exchange pleasantries and come to an accord over a fine meal, a cozy fire crackling and warming the air. He would entertain her in a civil manner, charm her, compliment her fine eyes … woo her so that she fell readily into his lap and married him with little fuss.
There was no reason events shouldn’t unfold amicably between them. Sighing, he relaxed back against his seat, letting the merry vision fill his head. And almost believing it.
As she gazed at the shadow of the man who abducted her, Marguerite could no longer deny the truth. No more lying or pretending to herself. It was there, staring back at her. Everything pointed to it. The signs were inescapable. As definite as the hard male body sitting across from her, reality stared her coldly in the face.
Madame Foster was no fraud.
Even as she confronted this bitter truth, Marguerite recalled something the woman had said in her cluttered parlor. Something that gave Marguerite hope and determination to push on, to thwart the scoundrel who sat across from her so confident in her surrender.
No one’s fate is etched in stone. A moment’s decision can alter the course of fate.
Marguerite would do that—she would alter her fate, do everything in her power to prevent the future Madame Foster had divined. She must. Whatever it took, she would not marry the arrogant brute with the mesmerizing voice. As long as that didn’t happen, she would be safe. That, above all else, must not come to pass. Let him think she took his offer under consideration. If he deemed her compliant, it would make him easier to escape.
They sat in silence. She rocked with the carriage’s rolling motion, biting the edge of her thumb, gnawing it the way she used to do when she was a child. First at the bedside of her ailing mother, and then later, cold and hungry, often ill as she slept in a tiny cot on the second floor of Penwich School for Virtuous Girls.
She felt that way again. Not ill, but cold, helpless, a fate not of her choosing pressing in around her, suffocating her in a tremendous dark fog.
Not again, she vowed. Never again.
She wasn’t a helpless child anymore but a woman full-grown, and she wouldn’t die without having fully lived.
She couldn’t trust his promise for a temporary in-name-only marriage. Not for a moment. Too much depended on whether he spoke the truth—her very life. She wouldn’t put anything past a man who dared to abduct her. Let him think she surrendered, agreed to his ridiculous proposition. Then, when his guard was down, she’d leave him in the dust.
She’d have everything she ever planned for herself. Adventure, passion, the experiences she’d never allowed herself.
Life. Finally, life.
Chapter 9
Incredibly, Marguerite fell into a doze against the carriage wall. She napped fretfully, jostled awake from time to time when the carriage hit a rut. She would crack her eyes and assess the shadow across from her, a biting reminder that she was far from the safety of her bed at the Hotel Daventry. Far removed from a trip to Spain with Roger and the adventure of a lifetime she had promised herself.
The memory of her abductor’s voice curled around her, smoky and deep. A bothersome and confusing reaction. Why should she feel anything but fear for the faceless stranger determined to make her his wife? He represented everything she must avoid.
Reminding herself they weren’t too far from London, she rubbed the vestiges of sleep from her eyes. She could still manage to find her way back to her hotel in time for tomorrow’s departure. Roger told her he would collect her at noon. She squinted at the dark outline across from her. He sat still as stone, but she did not deceive herself. She knew he was awake, had likely been watching her the entire time. A cat eyeing its prey. The hairs at her nape prickled. Rather irrationally, she wondered if he could see her. Did his gaze penetrate the dark like that of some predatory beast?
When the carriage finally slowed, she pulled upright, snapping alert, prepared for the first opportunity to escape no matter how the memory of his voice tumbled through her and settled like liquid heat in the pit of her belly. She told herself it was simply her decision to discard propriety, to embrace carnal pleasure that had awakened this hidden part of her. Nothing more. Not him specifically. Heavens, no. She had not even clapped eyes on his face.
“Where are we?” she asked the precise moment a groom pulled open the door.
A sudden draft whipped inside the carriage. She wore no cloak and her wool gown afforded scarce protection. Instantly her teeth clattered, and she hugged herself tightly, squeezing her arms.
Her abductor moved like a jungle cat then, proving that he was indeed quite awake. He descended the carriage with smooth movements, reaching back inside for her. He lowered her effortlessly to the ground, where she could appreciate the full height of him a scant moment before he turned and pulled her toward the waiting inn with its flickering windows that promised light and heat.
She sucked in a great, icy breath, preparing herself for what she knew she must do as her feet tripped, one after the other, through the slushy ground.
She held up her skirts, cold mud splattering up her calves, well past her half boots. With a deep breath, she fixed her sights on the inn’s double doors. She could do this.
She envisioned the scene perfectly in her head. She would unleash an earful on the first person she saw on the other side. In minutes a magistrate would arrive, gripping her arm supportively while her captor was hauled off to the gaol.
She almost felt sorry for him. She almost felt guilty for breaking her promise to grant him time to convince her that marrying him was a good idea. Almost—had her happiness, her very life, not been at stake. Time was something she did not have.
As he guided her across the last half of the yard, she glanced up at his profile, steeped in the deep cover of night. The flickering lanterns hanging outside the inn afforded little relief.
A dog barked, rushing to greet them. Her blood pounded in cold-constricted veins as she practiced various dire proclamations in her head that would stir any soul to action.
She visualized three very large, very mean-looking men sitting inside the inn. The sort of men who loved their mothers and harbored deep-rooted protective instincts toward the fairer sex. They would surge to their feet on her behalf.
“Wait a moment.” His hand on her arm pulled her to a stop.
She blinked at his shadowy form, trying to decipher his intent. A slight popping sound filled the air. She cocked her head, recognizing the sound but not quite placing it. At least not until he splashed her liberally with gin.
He’d uncorked a bottle.
She cried out as alcohol saturated the front of her dress, sinking through her chemise into her very bones. The overpowering aroma wafted up, burning the inside of her nose.
“Forgive me,” he said, popping the cork back in place, and not sounding in the least contrite. “A precautionary measure.”
“What are you doing?” she demanded between chattering teeth. “You’ve ruined my dress.”
“And, I imagine, your credibility. I don’t intend to risk you prattling on that I’ve abducted you. I’ve spent a time or two behind bars as a lad. It’s not an experience I relish repeating.”
She sputtered, at a loss for words. Could he read minds? How had he conceived it was her intention to see him locked away?
He continued, “Should you heap pleas upon sympathetic ears, I shall confess, to my shame, that I have a very drunken wife.” He mockingly clucked his tongue. “Have you ever heard of such a thing? Quite embarrassing. A sickness, really. I don’t know what to do with her.”
“You wouldn’t dare!”
In the gloom, he waved a hand over her person. “Oh, it’s quite done already, my love.”
My love. The empty endearment puckered her skin to gooseflesh. The cad was a stranger, an utter malcontent. His potent voice and empty endearments should not stir her in any way.
“No one would believe such drivel! I’m not a drunkard.”
Taking hold of her arm again, he said lightly, “Why should this bother you so greatly? You promised you would hear me out and give us some time to become acquainted. Unless you lied and planned to escape me all along.”
She snapped her lips shut, unwilling to admit that was precisely what she had hoped to do, and loathing that she should feel a flash of guilt.