by Julia Quinn
But that night had been the straw that had broken the proverbial camel's back. Victoria didn't realize it, but every time Robert followed her home, MacDougal followed them both, about ten paces behind. Usually MacDougal waited for Robert to seek him out, but that night he had made his way to his employer's side the moment Victoria slipped into her boarding house.
A man had been stabbed, MacDougal said. It had happened the night before, right in front of Victoria's boardinghouse. Robert knew that her building had a sturdy lock, but that did little to ease his mind as he regarded the bloodstains on the cobblestones. Victoria had to walk back and forth to work every day; sooner or later someone was bound to try to take advantage of her.
Victoria didn't even like stepping on ants. How the devil was she supposed to defend herself against an attack?
Robert lifted his hand to his face, his fingers pressing against the muscle that was jumping spasmodically in his temple. Deep breaths did little to ease the fury or sense of impotence that was growing within him. It was becoming obvious that he would not be able to protect Torie properly, as long as she insisted on remaining in this hellhole.
Clearly the current state of affairs could not be allowed to continue.
Robert acted very strangely the next day. He was more silent and brooding than usual, but he seemed to have an awful lot to discuss with MacDougal.
Victoria grew suspicious.
He was waiting for her, as usual, at the end of the day. Victoria had long since given up arguing with him when he forced her to accept his escort. It required too much energy, and she hoped that eventually he'd give up and leave her alone.
Whenever she pondered that possibility, however, she felt an odd stab of loneliness in her heart. Like it or not, she'd grown accustomed to having Robert about. It would be quite odd once he was gone.
Victoria tightened her shawl around her shoulders for the twenty-minute walk home. It was late summer, but there was a chill in the air. When she stepped through the door and onto the street, however, she saw Robert's carriage parked outside.
“I thought we might drive home,” Robert explained.
Victoria raised a questioning brow.
He shrugged. “It looks as if it might rain.”
She looked up. The sky wasn't particularly overcast, but then again it wasn't particularly clear either. Victoria decided not to argue with him. She was feeling a bit tired; she'd spent the entire afternoon catering to an extremely demanding countess.
Victoria allowed Robert to help her up into the carriage, and she settled back against the plush squabs. She let out an audible sigh as her tired muscles relaxed.
“Busy day at the dress shop?” Robert inquired.
“Mmmm, yes. The Countess of Wolcott came in today. She was rather exacting.”
Robert raised his brows. “Sarah-Jane? Good God, you deserve a medal if you managed to keep yourself from clouting her over the head.”
“Do you know but I rather think I do,” Victoria said, allowing herself a little grin. “A vainer woman I have never met. And so rude. She called me a clodhead.”
“And what did you say?”
“I couldn't say anything, of course.” Victoria's smile turned sly. “Out loud.”
Robert chuckled. “What, then, did you say in your mind?”
“Oh, any number of things. I expounded upon the length of her nose and the size of her intellect.”
“Small?”
“Very small,” Victoria replied. “Her intellect, that is. Not her nose.”
“Long?”
“Very long.” She giggled. “I was quite tempted to shorten it for her.”
“I should have liked to have seen that.”
“I should have liked to have done it,” Victoria retorted. Then she laughed, feeling giddier than she had in a long time.
“Goodness,” Robert said wryly. “One might actually think you were enjoying yourself. Here. With me. Imagine that.”
Victoria clamped her mouth shut.
“I am enjoying myself,” he said. “It is good to hear you laugh. It has been a long time.”
Victoria was silent, not sure how to respond. To deny that she had been having fun would clearly have been a lie. And yet it was so difficult to admit—even to herself—that his company brought her joy. So she did the only thing she could think to do, and yawned. “Do you mind if I nod off for a minute or two?” she asked, thinking that sleep was a good way to ignore the situation.
“Not at all,” he replied. “I'll shut the curtains for you.”
Victoria let out a sleepy sigh and drifted off, never noticing the wide smile that had broken out on Robert's face.
It was the quiet that woke her. Victoria had always been convinced that London was the noisiest place on earth, but she didn't hear a sound save for the clop-clop of the horses' hooves.
She forced her eyelids open.
“Good morning, Victoria.”
She blinked. “Morning?”
Robert smiled. “Just an expression. You fell quite asleep.”
“For how long?”
“Oh, about half an hour or so. You must have been very tired.”
“Yes,” she said absently. “I was quite.” Then she blinked again. “Did you say half an hour? Shouldn't we be at my home now?”
He didn't say anything.
With an extremely ominous feeling in her heart, Victoria moved to the window and pulled back the curtain. Twilight hung in the air, but she could clearly see trees, and shrubs, and even a cow.
A cow?
She turned back to Robert, her eyes narrowing. “Where are we?”
He pretended to flick a piece of lint from his sleeve. “Well on our way to the coast, I imagine.”
“The coast?” Her voice rose to a near shriek.
“Yes.”
“Is that all you're going to say on the subject?” she ground out.
He smiled. “I suppose I could point out that I've abducted you, but I imagine you've already figured that out on your own.”
Victoria went for his throat.
Chapter 14
Victoria had never thought of herself as a particularly violent person—indeed, she didn't even have much of a temper—but Robert's oh-so-casual statement pushed her right over the edge.
Her body reacted without any direction whatsoever from her brain, and she launched herself at him, her hands clutching perilously close to his neck. “You fiend!” she screamed. “You godawful, bloody, blasted fiend!”
If Robert wanted to comment upon her less-than-ladylike language, he kept it to himself. Or perhaps his reticence had something to do with the way her fingers were pressing into his wind-pipe.
“How dare you?” she shrieked. “How dare you? All that time you were just pretending to listen to my talk of independence.”
“Victoria,” he gasped, trying to pry her fingers from his throat.
“Have you been plotting this all along?” When he didn't answer she began to shake him. “Have you?”
When Robert finally managed to get her off him, it required such force that Victoria was sent sprawling across the carriage. “For the love of God, woman,” he exclaimed, still gasping for air, “were you trying to kill me?”
Victoria glared at him from her position on the floor. “It does seem a meritorious plan.”
“You'll thank me for this someday,” he said, knowing full well that such a condescending statement would enrage her.
He was right. He watched as her face grew redder by the half second. “I have never been so furious in my entire life,” she finally hissed.
Robert rubbed his sore throat and said with great feeling, “I believe you.”
“You had no right to do this. I can't believe you respect me so little that you would—you would—” She broke off and snapped her head around, a horrible thought occurring to her. “Oh my God! Did you poison me?”
“What the devil are you talking about?”
“I was very tired.
I fell asleep so quickly.”
“That was nothing but a lucky coincidence,” he said with a little wave of his hand. “One for which I was most grateful. It really wouldn't have done for you to have been screaming your way through the London streets.”
“I don't believe you.”
“Victoria, I am not the villain you seem to think me. Besides, was I anywhere near your food today? I didn't even give you a box of pastries.”
That much was true. The day before, Victoria had delivered a stinging diatribe on the wastefulness of one person being given so much food, and extracted a promise from Robert that he would donate any pastries he'd already purchased to a needy orphanage. And as furious as she was with him, she had to admit that he was not the sort to use poison.
“If it makes any difference,” he added, “I had no plans to abduct you until yesterday. I had been hoping that you would come to your senses before drastic measures became necessary.”
“Is it so very difficult for you to believe that I regard a life without you as sensible?”
“When such a life includes living in the worst sort of slum, yes.”
“It isn't the ‘worst’ sort of slum,” she said peevishly.
“Victoria, a man was stabbed to death in front of your building two nights ago!” he shouted.
She blinked. “Really?”
“Yes, really,” he hissed. “And if you think I am going to stand by idly until the inevitable happens and you become the victim—”
“I beg your pardon, but it appears I am a victim. Of kidnapping at the very least.”
He looked down at her with an irritated expression. “And at the very most?”
“Rape,” she shot back.
He leaned back smugly. “It wouldn't be rape.”
“I could never want you again after what you've done to me.”
“You'll always want me. You might not want to want me just now, but you do.”
Silence reigned for a moment. Finally, with eyes like slits, Victoria said, “You're no better than Eversleigh.”
Robert's hand closed around her shoulder with stunning force. “Don't you ever compare him to me.”
“And why not? I think the comparison is most apt. You have both abused me, both used force—”
“I have not used force,” he said between gritted teeth.
“I haven't seen you open the door to this carriage and give me the option of leaving.” She crossed her arms in an attempt to appear resolute, but it was hard to maintain one's dignity while on the floor.
“Victoria,” Robert said in an excruciatingly patient tone of voice, “we are in the middle of the Canterbury Road. It is dark, and there is no one around. I can assure you that you do not want to exit the carriage at this time.”
“Goddamn you! Do you have any idea how much I hate it when you presume to tell me what I want?”
Robert gripped the seat of the carriage bench so hard his fingers shook. “Do you want me to stop the carriage?”
“You wouldn't do it even if I asked.”
With a movement that spoke of barely leashed violence, Robert slammed his fist against the front wall three times. Within seconds the carriage came to a halt. “There!” he said. “Get out.”
Victoria's mouth opened and closed like a dying fish.
“Would you like me to help you down?” Robert kicked open the door and jumped out. He held out his hand for her. “I live to be of service to you.”
“Robert, I don't think—”
“You haven't been thinking all week,” he snapped.
If she could have reached him, she would have slapped him.
MacDougal's face appeared next to Robert's. “Is aught amiss, my lord? Miss?”
“Miss Lyndon has expressed an interest in departing our company,” Robert said.
“Here?”
“Not here, you idiot,” Victoria hissed. And then, because MacDougal looked so affronted, she was compelled to say, “I meant Robert, not you.”
“Are you getting down or not?” Robert demanded.
“You know I'm not. What I would like is for you to return me to my home in London, not abandon me here in—” Victoria turned to MacDougal. “Where the devil are we, anyway?”
“Near to Faversham, I would think.”
“Good,” Robert said. “We'll stop there for the night. We have made excellent time, but there is no sense exhausting ourselves by pushing on to Ramsgate.”
“Right.” MacDougal paused, then said to Victoria, “Wouldn't you be more comfortable on the bench, Miss Lyndon?”
Victoria smiled acidly. “Oh, no, I'm quite comfortable here on the floor, Mr. MacDougal. I prefer to feel every rut and bump in the road intimately.”
“What she prefers is to be a martyr,” Robert muttered under his breath.
“I heard that!”
Robert ignored her and gave some instructions to MacDougal, who disappeared from view. He then climbed back into the carriage, shut the door, and ignored Victoria, who was still fuming on the floor. Finally she said, “What is in Ramsgate?”
“I own a cottage on the shore. I thought we might enjoy a bit of privacy there.”
She snorted. “Privacy? Now there is a frightening thought.”
“Victoria, you are beginning to try my patience.”
“You are not the one who has been abducted, my lord.”
He cocked a brow. “Do you know, Victoria, but I am beginning to think that you are enjoying yourself.”
“You suffer from too much imagination,” she shot back.
“I do not jest,” he said, thoughtfully stroking his chin. “I think there must be something appealing in being able to vent one's offended sensibilities.”
“I have every right to be outraged,” she growled.
“I'm sure you think you do.”
She leaned forward in what she hoped was a menacing manner. “I truly believe if I had a gun right now I would shoot you.”
“I thought you were partial to pitchforks.”
“I am partial to anything that would do you bodily harm.”
“I do not doubt it,” Robert said, chuckling.
“Don't you care that I hate you?”
He let out a long breath. “Let me make one thing clear. Your safety and well-being are my highest priorities. If removing you from that slum you insisted on calling home means that I must live with your hatred for a few days, then so be it.”
“It won't be only a few days.”
Robert didn't say anything.
Victoria sat there on the floor of the carriage, trying to collect her thoughts. Tears of frustration pricked at her eyes, and she started to take frequent and shallow breaths—anything to prevent her tears' mortifying spill down her cheeks. “You did the one thing…” she said, her words tinged with the nervous laughter of one who knows she has been beaten. “The one thing…”
He turned his head to face her. “Would you like to get up?”
She shook her head. “All I wanted was a bit of control over my own life. Was that so much to ask?”
“Victoria—”
“And then you did the one thing that would take that away from me,” she interrupted, her voice growing louder. “The one thing!”
“I acted in your best int—”
“Do you have any idea what it feels like to have someone take your decisions away from you?”
“I know what it feels like to be manipulated,” he said in a very low voice.
“It's not the same thing,” she said, turning her head so he wouldn't see her cry.
There was a moment of silence as Robert tried to compose his words. “Seven years ago I had my life planned out to the very last detail. I was young, and I was in love. Madly, desperately in love. All I wanted was to marry you and spend the rest of my life making you happy. We'd have children,” he said wistfully. “I always imagined them looking like you.”
“Why are you saying this?”
He stared at her, drilling he
r with his eyes, even though she refused to return his gaze. “Because I know what it feels like to have one's dreams ripped away. We were young and stupid, and if we'd had any sense we would have realized what our fathers did to keep us apart. But it wasn't our fault.”
“Don't you understand? I don't care about what happened seven years ago anymore. It doesn't matter to me.”
“I think it does.”
She crossed her arms and leaned against the wall. “I don't want to talk about it any longer.”
“Very well.” Robert picked up a newspaper and began to read.
Victoria sat on the floor and tried not to cry.
Twenty minutes later the carriage rolled to a halt in front of a small inn just off the Canterbury Road in Faversham. Victoria waited in the carriage while Robert went in to procure rooms.
A few minutes later he emerged. “Everything is arranged,” he said.
“I hope you got me my own room,” she said stiffly.
“Of course.”
Victoria declined—somewhat forcefully—his offer of assistance, and she jumped down from the carriage on her own. Excruciatingly aware of his hand on the small of her back, she was led into the building. As they passed through the front room, the innkeeper called out, “I do hope you and your wife enjoy your stay, my lord.”
Victoria waited just until they had turned the corner on the way to the staircase. “I thought you said we have separate rooms,” she hissed.
“We do. I had no other option than to tell him you are my wife. It is clear that you are not my sister.” He touched a lock of her sable hair with exquisite tenderness. “And I did not want anyone to think that you are my paramour.”
“But—”
“I imagine the innkeeper simply thinks that we are a married couple who do not enjoy each other's company.”
“At least part of that statement is true,” she muttered.
He turned to her with a surprisingly radiant smile. “I always enjoy your company.”
Victoria stopped in her tracks and just stared at him, utterly dumbfounded by his apparent good humor. Finally she said, “I cannot decide if you are insane, stubborn, or merely stupid.”
