Turning, she stifled a scream when she came face-to-face with a young woman, a maid if the linens piled high in her arms were any indication.
“Ma’am,” the girl greeted, her eyes moving to Bertram’s door, then flicking back to her. Lips pursing in a knowing manner, she skirted past and disappeared down the hall.
Pulling the hood of her cloak low over her head, Astrid hurried down the stairs and out into the night, seeing nothing. Nothing save a pair of vacant eyes.
The sight of Bertram, his blood staining the floor, clouded her mind as she stumbled through the chill night, past cottages that leaned slightly in the biting wind, hunkered shapes that seemed to watch her as she hastened past.
Her legs moved automatically, eager to reach the inn and the privacy of her room where she could…
What? Astrid shook her head. Cry? Shout? Permit yourself to feel relief, a small, wretched voice taunted.
All seemed useless, pathetic behavior. The mark of an inept woman.
She drew cold air into her lungs, bracing herself. When the shock ebbed. When the image of Bertram no longer filled her mind, she would dust her hands and move on from here. Like always.
She passed a tavern. Raucous voices and laughter spilled out into the night and she gave wide berth to a group of men entering the establishment, ignoring them when they called out suggestive comments.
Ducking deeper inside the hood of her cloak, she increased her pace, passing the building and turning left—and running directly into a large wall of a body.
“Whoa there.” A familiar drawl filled her ears. Hard hands came up to grasp her arms, steadying her.
Her eyes snapped to his face, to the eyes she knew she would see. Even in the dark, his pale blue eyes flared brightly in recognition…and anger.
_”You,” _ he growled.
She opened her mouth but no sound fell as she stared up into Griffin Shaw’s glowering face.
Moonlight limned the lines of his face, making them appear harsh as rough-hewn granite.
“I thought we were to travel here together?” His fingers flexed on her arm, singeing her through her cloak. “What? Can you not speak? Or would I hear only more falsehoods?”
A strange little mewl escaped her and her legs suddenly went from lead to jam. His hands tightened, supporting her.
“What is it? Are you hurt?” His hard gaze skimmed her, then moved beyond her shoulder, as if suddenly remembering her purpose in traveling to Dubhlagan. “Where is your husband?”
“Husband,” she echoed, shaking her head slowly, as if she had never heard such a word before, as if its meaning escaped her entirely.
“Astrid,” he urged, saying her name as if he possessed the right to do so. And strangely, the sound of her name sounded _right _ falling from his lips. Comforting.
“Dead,” she managed to get out…and not fall apart at the declaration. Squeezing her eyes, she pushed the image of Bertram lying motionless on the floor from her mind.
Griffin Shaw’s eyes drilled into her with a burning intensity, thawing some of the numbness. He drew her close, his heat solace against the night air.
Wrapping an arm around her, he led her to the inn at the end of the lane. “Come,” he encouraged.
“Let’s get out of the cold.”
Nodding, she allowed him to lead her inside and up the stairs.
“You’re staying here?” she asked.
He nodded. “And you?”
“Yes,” she murmured, thinking that perhaps their paths had been destined to cross again.
Whether she willed it or not.
She didn’t protest as he led her to his room, coincidentally, only two doors from the room she occupied. She hesitated for a bare second at the door. It seemed a little late for a sense of propriety to seize her now.
His room was almost identical to hers with its single bed and a utilitarian dresser, table and chairs. He guided her to the table and seated her with care, as if she were some fragile piece of crystal. She almost gave in to laughter. There was nothing soft or delicate about her. Not after tonight. Hell, not after the last five years.
“What happened?” he asked, sitting and pulling his chair close.
She carefully lowered her hood, her fingers playing with the worn edges before splaying on the table’s scarred surface. She frowned at the way they trembled, reprimanding herself to gain control of herself, to fight the distress that threatened to break free.
Sucking in a deep breath, she began to speak, confiding the very shame that she had wanted to keep from him before. That her husband had abandoned her years before. That he thought to marry another as if she did not exist. Tight laughter bubbled up in her chest. Now he knew.
“You tracked him here?” Griffin asked.
“Yes. I confronted him and demanded he end the betrothal.” She shook her head. “He showed no remorse. Offered to buy my silence if I returned to England.” At this she did laugh, the sound ringing hollowly through the room.
“Bastard.”
Her eyes widened at this harsh pronouncement, at his grim expression.
She shook her head, her jaw tightening. “Don’t say that.” God knew she had said it to herself over the years, but now she could not stomach the thought—or sound—of a deprecation against Bertram. Not while his life’s blood stained the hem of her skirts.
“Astrid,” the low rumble of his voice pulled her gaze to his face. He took her hands from the table. His eyes drilled into her, probing, demanding the truth. “You said he’s dead. Did you…”
his voice faded, leaving the question in his eyes for her to interpret.
“No!” she cried, pulling her hands free of his, horrified that he would suspect such a thing of her.
True, she was no saint. She had made mistakes in her life. But murder her husband? “God, no!”
He caught her hands again, holding tight and staring intently into her eyes. “I had to ask. You had every reason to want him dead—”
“I didn’t kill him,” she hissed, indignation sweeping through her. And yet deep in the shadows of her heart, there had been times, in the dark of night, in the privacy of her room, when she had burrowed deep into her bed and wished him dead.
The bitter realization only confirmed that she was utterly and completely irredeemable. And she had thought stopping Bertram from marrying some unsuspecting woman would be a form of atonement. Instead her arrival appeared to have brought about his death.
“Go on. Finish telling me what happened.”
Swallowing, she inhaled and told him everything, her voice rushing out as if the speed in which she spoke would make it somehow less real.
His eyes skimmed over her soiled skirts, and his thumbs rubbed the smudges of dirt on her hands.
“Did anyone see you leave the lodging house?”
Astrid blinked at the sudden question. “Yes. A maid.”
Releasing her hands, he paced the length of the room once, stopping at the window and looking down onto the dark yard. After a few moments, he glanced back at her, eyes pale chips of blue beneath his dark brows. “I recommend you leave at first light. Before even.”
She tucked her hands beneath her skirts, feeling the corners of her mouth pull into a frown.
“You’re a stranger in these parts,” he continued. “An Englishwoman who was last seen coming out of a dead man’s room.”
“You’re saying suspicion will fall on me?” she queried, shocked despite the logic of his reasoning.
“Where’s your driver?” he asked.
“He bedded down in the stables for the night.”
“I suggest you rise early and join him there. Depart before anyone even has a chance to realize your husband is dead.”
As his cold, matter-of-fact words sank in, she realized he dispensed sound advice.
“Very well,” she agreed. There was no reason to dally in Scotland after all. No reason to linger.
Bertram brought her here. And Bertram was gone.
Even if she did not relish the world she inhabited in Town, it was her world nonetheless. She needed to return to her place in it…and begin the messy business of proving her husband’s death.
“Let’s get you to your room.”
At his brusque tone, she nodded numbly, allowing him to lead her down the hall to her room, the slight pressure of his hand on her elbow comforting.
At her door, they both stood for some moments, an awkward silence rising between them as they lingered.
She stared at the dirty floorboards, at the toes of his dark boots, and cleared her throat. “Well…”
She lifted her gaze from the floor. He had not bothered to don a cravat as most gentlemen wore, and she found herself eye level with the base of his neck.
The shirt beneath his jacket was open at the throat, exposing tan, warm-looking flesh. Even in the corridor’s shadow, she thought she saw his pulse hammering against the side of his neck, thought it moved quickly, beating with a rhythm that matched her own galloping heart.
“Thank you for your…kindness.” She was not sure what word applied to him. No doubt he had been helpful, but his current hard stare did not bring forth thoughts of kindness. He looked…angry. Dangerous.
He nodded grimly, his blue gaze as harsh and relentless as it had been when she first collided with him in the village.
“You could have been honest with me,” he bit out. “You needn’t have told me we would journey here together if it was not your intention.”
“You wouldn’t accept my answer.”
“So lying was easier.” He gave a single, hard nod.
Turning, eager to escape him, she fumbled with her key, loathing the way he looked at her…as if she had failed him. She squeezed her eyes shut in a hard blink. Impossible. She didn’t know him.
Didn’t _owe _ him anything.
His hand clamped down on her shoulder just as she managed to unlock her door. He forced her back around, forced her to confront that damning gaze of his.
“Let me go,” she hissed, defiance burning through her chest as he backed her against her door.
His fingers flexed on her shoulder but he did not release her. He stepped closer, those blue eyes intense and burning on her. The hand on her shoulder slid down her arm, circling her wrist. His thumb pressed against her pulse point, holding her, connecting them with that light, burning touch.
Something flickered in his eyes. Something dark and powerful, different from the anger but somehow more dangerous. An answering spark flared to life low in her belly and she ceased to breathe altogether.
After a long moment, his hand slipped from her, freeing her. Yet she still felt bound by the pull of his eyes, branded by his touch.
“Take care of yourself… Duchess,” he drawled in that rich, whiskey voice of his that reminded her of warm nights and the smoky peat scent of fire.
Without another word, he turned away, his boots thudding along the floorboards, echoing through the narrow corridor.
Pressing a hand to her stomach, she regained her breath. Dragging air into her too-tight lungs, she watched as he disappeared inside his room, wondering at the sudden hollow ache in her chest that had nothing to do with the death of her husband. And everything to do with a man she barely knew. A man she would never see again. And yet she did not feel the relief she should over that fact.
Chapter 8
“You have an English woman staying here, Tom?”
Griffin looked up from his tankard at the two men addressing the innkeeper, his pulse spiking at the question. They wore grim expressions on their faces and he instantly surmised they served as the law in these parts. And he had a fairly good idea what Englishwoman they sought.
“I did.” The portly innkeeper returned from behind the bar, wiping his thick hands on a soiled apron. “She settled her account and left early this morning.”
Griffin knew as much. He had knocked on her door at sunup to make certain she was on her way.