They stopped outside an ancient inn, crooked with age, but otherwise as neat as a pin, with mullioned windows polished to gleaming, a well-swept courtyard and several half-casks filled with flowers on either side of the entrance. There were no fashionable traveling coaches in the street outside, no phaetons or curricles—only a rustic wagon or two and an ancient-looking dogcart. Perfect.
“Wake up, Lady Lily,” he said, raising her gently. He had no intention of letting her realize she’d slept sprawled across him, her head snuggled against his chest, her breasts pressed against him. Testing his self-control to the maximum.
She stirred and abruptly came awake with a jerk, flailing out with her fists. One of them caught him in the eye. “Ouch!” He caught the other fist in his hand. “Gently now. You’re safe.”
Her eyes flew open and for a moment she stared blankly at him. Then the tension drained abruptly from her. “Oh. It’s you. Sorry, I thought you were—”
“I know. But you’re safe now.” He released her hand and picked up the rug from the floor. He tucked it back around her, trying not to notice—unsuccessfully, even with a watering eye—exactly how thin and inadequate his shirt was on her.
Her gaze flew to his eye. “Oh, dear. Did I do that?”
“It’s nothing.”
“No it’s not, it’s all red. Let me—”
He pushed away her hands. “It’s all right. I’ve had worse.” He hated being fussed over. “We’re here. I’ll go ahead and make the arrangements. I want you to wait in the carriage until—”
She glanced outside, frowning. “Where are we?”
He shrugged. “Some village. There’s an inn here where we can pass the night in relative comfort.” More comfortable than trying to sleep with a luscious, far-too-trusting siren draped across his lap.
“An inn?” She gave him a wary look and pulled the rug closer around her. “I don’t want to stay at an inn. I thought you were taking me straight home.”
Ned wanted to roll his eyes. Now she got suspicious. He was simultaneously pleased at the evidence that she did, in fact, have a cautionary bone in her body, albeit a slow one, and irritated that after all this, she should be suspicious of him.
He’d been practically a saint for the last few hours, letting her sleep while snugged up against him, keeping her decently covered, for the most part—she was a restless sleeper. And resolutely ignoring the raging appetites she stirred in his body.
“I am taking you home, but it’ll be dark soon, so we’ll stop for the night here.”
She bit her lip. “It’s just that they will be frantic with worry.”
“Your brother will be on your trail as we speak. He’s not the sort to sit back waiting to hear—and if I know Cal, he’ll have a team of men out looking for you as well.”
She gave him a troubled look. “I think some men came looking for me when we were on the road. I tried to call out, but I was gagged and under the seat and the drug made it difficult to think, and”—she sighed—“they didn’t hear me.”
His jaw tightened. That swine should be rotting in jail, or better still dangling at the end of a rope.
“I’ll send your family a note by messenger; don’t worry, it’ll get to London faster than a coach and four. There’s no need to travel through the night. Your abductor might have done so, but it’s dangerous, especially when there’s no moon, and I have more consideration for my coachman and the horses.” And for his passenger. She was worn to the bone. She needed food and sleep and care before undertaking another long, uncomfortable journey.
Besides, even if they drove hell-for-leather, stopping only to change horses, it would still take all night and part of the next day to get to London.
He hoped to hell Cal had managed to keep the whole affair under wraps, come up with some story to explain her absence. As long as he had—and Cal was no fool—and as long as he could get her back to London with no one else the wiser, the consequences to her would be limited to a nasty experience and a few bruises.
“Besides, we need to get you some proper clothes”—he quirked a brow—“unless, of course, you want to arrive in London naked but for a man’s shirt and a fur traveling rug.”
She gave a halfhearted little laugh. “No, of course not.”
“Good. Then wait here while I make the arrangements.”
Lily waited in the carriage, the rug wrapped tightly around her. Guilt wrapped her even tighter. The sleep had helped, but the drug still lingered like glue in her veins, making her limbs heavy and uncertain.
Her thoughts, however, were becoming clearer by the minute.
Everyone at home would be so worried about her. Rose and Emm and George would be frantic, and Cal—Cal would be out somewhere on the road from London, out in the cold and rain, worried sick, looking for her.
Mr. Galbraith—Edward—had had to turn back from wherever he was going and make the long journey back to London. And deal with a muddy, miserable, droopy creature who couldn’t even stay awake! She was entirely dependent on him.
She wasn’t even a friend of his. He might know Cal, but he hadn’t recognized Lily at all.
All this trouble and anxiety and inconvenience was her fault. Oh, Mr. Nixon might be the villain responsible, but deep down Lily knew she was to blame. If she’d had her wits about her . . . If she hadn’t been fretting about Rose doing something reckless . . .
But the fact was, Rose would never have sent her a note.
You didn’t realize the note was a forgery? You didn’t recognize your own sister’s writing?
She hadn’t been able to bring herself to explain to him about her dreadful inability. As it was, he only thought her careless. Or maybe stupid. Which she was, but in a much worse way than he’d imagined.
She’d hoped that once she left school she’d be able to hide her
