He was willing to take that chance.
BIANCA LEANED HER head against the wall in the shadowed alcove she’d sought out soon after their arrival. She’d never been so nervous. What if she was wrong? What if he’d changed his mind?
What if that kiss hadn’t made him rethink everything in the entire world the way it had done for her?
One thing was certain, she wasn’t going to find any of those answers while hiding outside the ballroom.
As she came around the corner to rejoin the ball, she saw Hudson making his way toward the gardens.
Why was he going out there?
Her stepmother’s determined face flashed through her mind.
Oh no. What if she’d taken Miss Wainbright’s idea seriously and intended to trap Hudson into some form of compromising situation?
The son of an earl had proved Mrs. Snowley wrong and extended an offer of marriage to the stepdaughter she’d discounted.
Despite her surprise, she’d been additionally offended when Bianca hadn’t immediately accepted.
Was she angry enough to do something drastic?
Even if Hudson had returned to his original plan after kissing Bianca, he didn’t deserve to be a victim of this cruel social game.
Her fingers curled into fists, and she set off down the corridor to follow him into the garden. If he wasn’t alone, he couldn’t get caught.
THE GARDEN WAS DARK, and Hudson immediately felt like a fool.
If Bianca had sent that note, she wouldn’t have brought Lord Brimsbane out here. Something else had lured the viscount, and it wasn’t Hudson’s business.
Curiosity was strong, though, particularly when he heard a muffled crash to his right, followed by a string of grumbled curses. Had Brimsbane fallen?
He moved toward the sound and entered a small, ornate clearing.
Where a man with round spectacles and a round hat was pointing a pistol at Lord Brimsbane.
“Whoa, now,” Hudson said, spreading his hands wide at his hips. He didn’t know what he stumbled into, but he couldn’t leave Brimsbane to face it alone.
The gunman gestured to Brimsbane. “You look too much like your father to be anyone but Brimsbane. I’m not here for you. Move along.”
“I think not.” Brimsbane’s back stiffened, obviously offended at the idea that he’d simply let a madman get at his guests.
“All I want is what’s mine. It was stolen, and I want it back.”
“And you think it’s here?”
“No, but he is, that thieving . . .” The man swallowed hard. “They let me think it was mine, and they took it away.”
An uneasy feeling worked through Hudson. There were no paintings of his uncle, no descriptions other than that he was a madman who wanted what his father had created. That description could fit the man in front of him. Was it possible?
“Who are you here for?” Hudson asked, easing farther into the circle.
The gunman looked him up and down, and Hudson was thankful he’d gotten his mother’s coloring. He wouldn’t look like anyone from this area, not in this shadowed garden.
“Hudson, don’t do it!”
A small but strong body slammed into Hudson’s back, nearly sending him to the ground.
Both Brimsbane and the gunman scurried about during the slight commotion, but Hudson managed to right himself and the woman who’d knocked into him.
He looked down at the warm bundle in his arms. At least he’d found Bianca, though he would far rather she not be anywhere near this situation.
“Hudson?” the man said. “You’re Stildon?”
Should he confirm it? That didn’t seem the smartest plan. “I’m sure there are many men named Hudson.”
“But only one of them stole my horses.”
Horses. Wasn’t the man after the title?
“Who are you?” Brimsbane asked.
“Mr. Albany. I want my horses.”
Horses. Hudson had horses, and if it got a madman away from Bianca, he’d give them away. “I’m sure we can arrange some—”
“Bianca?” a voice hissed in the loudest whisper known to man. “Are you back here?”
This clearing did not need any more people in it.
“Of course she’s back here. She’ll do anything to ruin everything for us, including ruining herself.”
Bianca groaned as her stepmother and sister joined the fracas.
“What is going on here?” Mrs. Snowley asked.
“There’s a man with a gun,” Bianca said.
“Not helpful,” Hudson said, even though it did make him want to laugh.
Miss Marianne screamed.
Bianca murmured, “Now that was not helpful.”
And it hadn’t been. Mr. Albany was nearly vibrating with anger. He didn’t look disheveled or wide-eyed or have any of the other traits Hudson normally thought insane people would have, but there was no question that the man had gone somewhat mad.
“Well, this is not what I expected to find when I heard a woman scream in the garden.” Aaron stepped into the clearing.
“What are you doing here?” Hudson and Brimsbane asked at the same time.
“Moral support.”
“At a ball?” Bianca asked. “You wouldn’t even attend an assembly when I asked you.”
Aaron shrugged. “I didn’t think you needed me there.”
“And now I do?” Hudson asked.
“I’m not here for you,” Aaron said. Then he gestured to the gunman. “Well, I am now. But I wasn’t earlier.”
A loud crack filled the air as the gun went off.
With shrieks and yells, everyone dove for the ground. Hudson shoved Bianca into the edge of the clearing as he went down, trying to push her farther out of the way.
With the shot still ringing in his ears, he lifted his head to see his uncle exchanging his spent gun for another in his coat pocket.
Slowly, Hudson climbed to his feet. The man had a look of desperation about him that made Hudson more than a little concerned about what he was going to do.
“There are too many witnesses,” he said. “If you leave now, you’ve done nothing that will prevent you from returning to Ireland. Plenty an angry man walks free.”
He thought Aaron might have laughed at that, but he didn’t turn to check.
Mr. Albany moved slowly toward the edge of the clearing. Was this going to work?
“I don’t believe you.” Mr. Albany crept closer to the dark edge of the woods. “And what do I have to go back to? I’m training other people’s horses. I was going to breed the best champions they’d ever seen once I had possession of the Hawksworth horses.”
“Perhaps we can work something out.”
The man sneered. “I don’t want your castoffs.” He moved so suddenly that it took everyone by surprise, and it wasn’t until Bianca yelped that Hudson realized his mistake.
He’d pushed her away from him to protect her, but now he wasn’t close enough to keep her safe.
Mr. Albany grabbed her arm and dragged her to her feet, swinging the gun back and forth from the group to Bianca.
If it was possible for a man’s stomach to melt into his shoes, Hudson’s had just done so. He couldn’t lose her. Not when he’d just realized how important she was.
“You stay where you are, and nothing will happen to her. I’ll let her go when I feel safe.”
Hudson wasn’t sure what it would take for this man to feel secure, but anywhere farther than the path leading from the clearing was too far for him to take Bianca. “No.”
Mr. Albany held Bianca tighter. “In this, at least, you don’t get a say. This gun means that right now I’m in charge, and I say I’m taking her with me.”
He dragged her to the path that led from the clearing, and all three men started to move but froze when he jabbed the gun into Bianca’s side so hard that she cried out.
Her gaze found his, eyes wide with fear. “Hudson.”
“Bianca.” He wanted to tell her he lov
ed her, to make sure she knew she’d become his closest friend in an impossibly short amount of time, that she was the person he couldn’t imagine spending one more day of his life without, but he couldn’t say any of those things.
“I’m coming for you,” he promised, though whether he was threatening his uncle or reassuring Bianca he wasn’t sure. Perhaps a little of both.
Mr. Albany growled and then showed the strength of a man who worked with horses by snagging Bianca about her waist and hauling her off her feet. Then he was running into the dark night.
As soon as he cleared the edge, Brimsbane, Aaron, and Hudson were on the move, the sound of their movements covered by the screaming and babbling crying of Mrs. Snowley and Miss Marianne.
Another gunshot cracked the air, and the three men dove to the ground once more. When they scrambled back up, Bianca and her captor were nowhere to be seen.
Thirty-Five
Bianca had never experienced an abduction before, but she had to wonder if they were all this clumsy. Even though it seemed that Mr. Albany hadn’t planned this entire thing, she still couldn’t manage to get away.
And she’d tried.
She’d wriggled and kicked, but despite how strong she was, he was stronger. He tied his cravat around her mouth before flipping her back over his shoulder and running. There was nothing she could do except beat on his back with her fists.
Beneath her she could see the blur of a long expanse of grass and then the edge of a lane before he threw her into the bottom of a small cart. Her head collided with the wall, leaving her dazed for a few moments, just enough for him to bind her wrists and throw a blanket over her head.
Still, she kicked and grunted, until he kicked back. “Keep quiet.” His foot jabbed her in the stomach once more, knocking the air from her body. “I’ve no reason to hurt you.”
A whip cracked, and the cart began to move. Faster and faster it went, bumping about enough to make her question whether or not he was taking one of the roads that led from the east side of town. If he had two horses pulling the cart, they’d be able to cover a great deal of ground very quickly.
And if he was crossing the countryside instead of staying to the lanes, it was going to be even harder for Hudson to find her. She was going to have to get herself out of this. Her captor had to stop eventually. And when he did, she would need to have a plan.
HUDSON LOOKED AT Brimsbane. It was possible, even likely, that they had ideas of marrying the same woman, but right now that didn’t matter. He’d rather see Bianca married to someone else than in the hands of his crazy uncle.
“How many men in that ballroom do you trust to help with this?”
Brimsbane looked up at his house and pressed his lips tightly together. “None.”
“Lord Trent said he was coming,” Aaron added. “And I arrived with Lord Farnsworth. Though, in all honesty, he’s not the best in these types of situations.”
“You’ve faced a lot of abductions, have you?” Hudson couldn’t help asking.
Brimsbane shook his head. “Farnsworth’s leaving will be too obvious. If he’s not here for the announcement, everyone will notice.”
“Announcement?” Hudson asked. “Lord Farnsworth and Lady Rebecca?”
“They met in London,” Brimsbane said.
“I might have gone to Town to tell him to get his lovesick self to Newmarket and do something about it,” Aaron said with a shrug.
“I have questions, but they can wait. I’m going to find Lord Trent.”
“Meet us at the stables,” Brimsbane said.
“What should I do?” Mrs. Snowley asked in a small voice.
“Go home,” Hudson said. “If she gets free, she might go there. Besides, if you go in looking like that, everyone will know something is wrong.”
“What will happen to Bianca?” she asked.
Hudson wanted to ask why she cared, but that wasn’t fair. Just because she preferred her own daughter to the one she’d gotten through marriage didn’t mean she wanted Bianca dead.
Nor was it a conversation he had time to deal with. “Go home.”
Hudson took off through the garden and had to pause to compose himself before going into the ballroom. Sending Mrs. Snowley home would be for naught if he gave the situation away.
It didn’t take long to find Lord Trent. For a man who had decided to live a fairly quiet life, he certainly knew how to be the center of attention.
How was Hudson supposed to get him out of it?
Lord Trent noticed Hudson and gave a small nod.
Within moments, the crowd had dispersed, and Lord Trent was leading Hudson over to the side of the room.
“How did you . . . never mind. Bianca’s been taken.”
Lord Trent gave a nod and started moving through the crowd efficiently but without giving the appearance of haste. “Just need to find my wife first.”
Hudson couldn’t stand the crush of the ballroom. “I’ll be outside.” He retreated to the back corridor he’d entered from and paced. He was on his second loop when Lord Trent joined him. “Let’s go.”
In the stable, Brimsbane handed Hudson a set of reins. Hudson gaped in appreciation of the animal. Strong forelegs, wide chest, narrow head. “Who is this?”
Both of Brimsbane’s eyebrows went up, and he said in a dry voice, “Hezekiah.”
Hudson shook his head. He’d been so focused on doing something that would impress other people, he hadn’t even looked into whether or not they were right about the horse.
He mounted up and joined the others, along with a small handful of grooms outside the stable.
“There are three roads from this area,” Brimsbane said. “Four, if we count the one going back through Newmarket, but I don’t think he’d go that way.”
“He could have also gone cross-country,” Aaron said. “That’s what I would do.”
“In short, he could be anywhere,” Hudson said. “But we’ve got to start searching somewhere.”
They split up and determined routes.
“Ten miles,” Aaron said with surprising authority, given how outranked he was in the group. “We could run these horses ragged in the wrong direction. Ten miles, then you come back to regroup.”
Everyone agreed, and they moved out.
As Hudson rode, he appreciated the animal beneath him, but most of his thoughts were prayers. If he was going to believe that God had a plan and it was better than his, then he had to believe that God knew about this too.
“Okay, God. Whatever happens, I’m trusting you. But please, God, please keep her safe. I need to tell her what she means to me.”
Then he and Hezekiah went galloping off into the night, unsure of what they were even looking for.
ONCE BIANCA STOPPED MOVING, her captor stopped kicking. He then must have decided to take a road, because the ride got smoother.
Still, he didn’t stop.
To Bianca’s amazement, with the rocking motion and her own stillness, she fell into a fitful sleep.
She blinked groggily awake as the cart came to a stop.
How long had it been? Hours? Minutes?
She kept herself still and tried to listen. The feet shifted and then were gone, but the dull point of the gun replaced them.
The feet were preferable.
She didn’t move, barely breathed. What was he doing? She assumed he’d stopped to change horses, but did he intend to simply stand there, pointing a gun at her the whole time?
Anger swelled. What would happen if she screamed? If she threw this blanket off and tried to stand? Were there other people about? Would he risk shooting her?
She hoped not.
It was a bet she had to make.
She wiggled her head first, trying to shift the blanket enough to allow her to take a peek at the situation.
After one look, she jerked her head sideways so that it would be entirely free of the blanket, and then she felt like a veritable idiot.
The cart had been pushed into the c
orner of a stable, and there was no one around. The gun had been wedged against the seat in order to keep it pressed against her.
If she shifted until it fell, would it go off? Could it? It looked like the gun he’d fired as he ran from the clearing, but he’d had plenty of time to reload it.
Had he left her here, or was he coming back?
Where even was here?
She could determine that after she determined what this gun was going to do.
She shifted.
The gun shifted.
Perhaps, if she moved very slowly, she could ease the gun to the bottom of the cart and not risk setting it off.
She held her breath and moved. The gun scraped the side of the seat as it moved down.
Shift. Scrape. Tiniest of necessary breaths. Shift, scrape. Shift, scrape. Shift, clunk.
She dropped her head to the bottom of the cart and took a moment to just breathe, even though the cloth tied around her mouth smelled like a wet horse. That wretched smell meant she was still alive.
Getting out of the cart with her hands tied behind her was something of a struggle, and her skirt was hiked up around her waist by the time she eased herself over the raised side of the cart, but once her feet were on the ground, her confidence grew.
What was she going to do now? She had no money. Depending on how far they’d gone, her name might not even be recognized.
Before she started to panic, Bianca took a good look around. She was in a large stable, though it looked like it was part of a nicer inn and not a private establishment. That was good. People were good, right?
To her left, a black tail swished above perfect black stockings, flicking a fly from a rich, red-brown rump.
She knew that horse.
Either Lord Rigsby hadn’t left the area, or he’d come back.
Or she’d traveled much, much farther than she imagined.
She didn’t really care one way or the other. All that mattered was she knew someone at this inn.
Now she just had to find him.
After being curled up in the floor of the cart, not moving for so very long, every muscle protested as she moved through the stable.
She was going to have to go into the inn. The bound hands she might be able to hide, especially since the ball gown would be a significant distraction.
Vying for the Viscount Page 30
