A Lady of His Own

Nicholas closed the other door; he stood back as Charles threw the bolts. “We’d better check the other doors, I suppose.”

“Yes.” Charles did, confirming that the other doors and windows on the ground floor were secure. Not that that meant much; any trained operative could find a way in, and he was sure, now, of the caliber of the enemy.

Nicholas trailed behind him, watching but not volunteering, also just as well. Aside from the fact Charles knew the house better than he did, Charles wouldn’t have accepted his word for anything, not even that a window was locked.

Finally, Charles climbed the stairs. Nicholas followed. Charles halted in the corridor at the stair head; Nicholas’s room was in the other wing, in the opposite direction from Penny’s.

Nicholas stepped up to the corridor; his gaze moved over Charles’s bare shoulders and chest, slid down to the knee buckles on his breeches, hanging free. Halting, he stared at Charles through the dimness, transparently making the obvious connections.

Charles simply waited.

Nicholas cleared his throat. “Ah…you said you were with Penny?”

Crouched behind her bedchamber door, her ear to the keyhole, Penny heard his question and the inference behind it.

“Damn!” She’d already sworn in both English and French at Charles for having locked her in. Panic of an unfamiliar and unprecedented sort had attacked her when she’d heard the thuds as two men- Charles and the mystery man-had gone flying down the stairs. After that, no matter how hard she’d strained her ears, she’d heard nothing. Her window gave onto the courtyard; she’d seen nothing either.

Now she listened with all her might. The door was old, solid, and thick, but so was the lock; the keyhole, with no key in it for Charles had taken it with him, was large. With her ear pressed against it, with night’s quiet prevailing through the rest of the house, she could hear their words. She had no idea where Nicholas had come from, but he and Charles were standing along the corridor, she thought near the stairs.

“Indeed.” That was Charles at his drawling worst. In the circumstances, pure provocation.

She heard an odd sound-wondered for one instant if Charles was throttling Nicholas-then realized it was Nicholas clearing his throat again.

“Ah…you mentioned you and Penny had an understanding. Am I to take it that there’ll soon be talk of a wedding?”

Behind her door, she screwed her eyes shut and swore at Nicholas. How dare he? She wasn’t his responsibility; he had no right to ask such questions, and definitely no right to prod Charles’s far- too-active conscience to life. Damn, damn, damn!

“Actually…” Charles’s drawl was getting even more dangerously pronounced. “That’s not the sort of understanding Penny and I have. Regardless, as far as I can see, whatever our understanding might be, it’s no concern of yours.”

Yes-precisely! She held her breath, listened as hard as she could. Given the tone of Charles’s last words, Nicholas would have to be witless to do anything other than climb down off his high horse and retreat.

“I see.” The words were clipped. After a moment, Nicholas added, “In that case, I’ll…no doubt see you in the morning.”

Charles said nothing; a moment later, she heard his footsteps, soft for such a large man, returning to her room.

Relief swept her; straightening and stepping back from the door, she uttered a heartfelt prayer. The last thing- the very last thing-she needed at this point was for Charles to decide that he had to marry her out of some misplaced notion of propriety.

He stopped outside her door; she heard the key slide in, turn, then he opened the door. He saw her, stepped inside, closed the door, and locked it once more. Then he turned to her; his gaze traveled her face. She drew herself up, folded her arms beneath her breasts, thankfully concealed behind the robe she’d hastily donned, and narrowed her eyes at him.

His only response was to raise a faintly resigned brow.

“Why did you lock me in?”

He cocked his head, still watching her face. “I would have thought that was obvious-so he couldn’t easily return to attack you if he slipped past me.”

“And so I couldn’t follow you.”

His lips twisted; he looked away and moved past her to the bed. “That, too.”

With a swirl of her robe, she followed him. “What if he’d come back and picked the lock-he did the first time, why not again?”

Sitting on the bed and reaching for his boots, he glanced at her. “I credited you with having enough sense to scream. I would have heard you.”

Faintly mollified-why she wasn’t sure-she humphed. She wasn’t going to even attempt to explain the sudden fear for him that had assailed her. He was used to plunging headlong into danger; she’d told herself that. But she’d never before had to stand by and wait while he did it. “Did you see who it was?”

He shook his head. “I didn’t get any clear view of him, not even height or build. He was fast. When I got downstairs the front doors were wide-open-he went through like a hare and headed straight for the shrubbery.”

“Where was Nicholas?”

He told her. “At least, that’s where he said he was.”

“Well…” She suddenly felt cold. Shrugging out of her robe, she slipped back under the covers, tugging them up to her throat, snuggling back into the lingering warmth. “We do know he hasn’t been sleeping well.”

“Indeed.” Charles had seen her shiver and followed her progress. “What we don’t know is whether he’s so on edge he decided to do something about you, and left the doors open to create a plausible story of how someone broke into the house and attacked you while you slept. He didn’t know until just now that I’ve been staying every night.”

Setting aside his boots, he stood, stripped off his breeches, then crawled over the bed to slump beside her. He looked down at her for a moment, but couldn’t read her wide eyes. Reaching for the covers, he tugged them from her grip, lifted them, and joined her beneath.

He drew her into his arms and she came. He settled her head on his shoulder; she draped one arm across his chest, spread her hand over his heart.

They didn’t immediately fall asleep, yet despite the appearance of the intruder-something they’d both almost expected and so weren’t as surprised as they might have been-there was a sense of peace between them. As if simply being together created a haven of safety and security, a connection of such fundamental rightness no intruder could shatter it.

That rightness closed around them, cocooning them. She fell asleep first. Reassured, he followed suit.

“You can’t seriously mean to keep me with you for the entire day!”

Charles turned his head, simply looked at her, then faced forward and walked on, towing her behind him up the bank to the folly. He’d given up even the pretense of leaving; this morning, he’d quit her room only to go and change, then had gone straight down to breakfast-just in case Nicholas had not got his message last night.

From the shuttered but wary look on Nicholas’s face when he’d joined him at the table, Nicholas had, indeed, got the salient facts quite clear.

Unlike certain others.

She huffed out an exasperated breath. “And anyway, why here?”

“Because I need to think, and I’d just as soon keep Nicholas under observation while I do.” They reached the folly. He didn’t pause but towed her up the steps and along to the chaise with the best view, then faced her and released her hand.

Eyes narrowing, she glared at him, then, with a swish of her skirts, sat. He sat beside her.

“Very well,” she said. “If you must think, then think about this-why did whoever it was come to my room last night? Are we sure it was the murderer?”

He stared across the lawns to the house, screened by the intervening trees. “Why would some man come to your room at…what was it? Two in the morning?”