Sarah snorted at the ridiculous account, but then the implications of that accusation hit her. Saint Brides could easily add attempted murder and horse theft to her list of crimes, which would most certainly get her hanged if he was successful in bringing her to London. With that lingering thought, she opened her mouth to explain, but his arms tightened around her, silencing her.
“Were you wounded when my wife attempted to murder you, Mr. Corbin?” he asked in the same steely tone.
“But I didn’t—”
“Thankfully, no,” the blacksmith huffed, cutting off Sarah’s denial.
“And that bruise at your ear; did she do that to you after you dismounted her?”
“Aye, she did.”
“Pity,” Saint Brides muttered. “I would have liked to have had the pleasure of doing that myself.”
“What’s that?” Mr. Corbin growled.
“You what?” Sarah asked at the same time, turning her face up to his.
“I spoke clearly, Mr. Corbin.” Intense, green eyes lowered to hers, and the rage swirling in their depths was frightening, dangerous. She had never seen a fury so quiet yet so fierce, as though he were holding it in check by a single thread. Should that thread snap, she imagined all hell would break loose.
It could very well break loose on her.
She was still in his arms, pressed tightly against him, his face mere inches from hers. A sane woman would pull away.
She wanted to draw closer.
“You are so angry,” she whispered, not entirely sure she spoke aloud, hoping she hadn’t.
One side of his mouth slowly pulled into a crooked, humorless smile. “Oh, yes,” he breathed dangerously. “In fact…” His voice faded as he flicked a quick glance at the blacksmith. Then he gently moved her aside, lifting her to sit on a wooden barrel near the door. “If you move,” he muttered as he handed her his hat and coat, his threatening gaze burning into hers, “I swear I shall throw you over my knee and wallop you.”
He flexed his hands at his sides before he turned to face the blacksmith. There was the smallest pause, a moment of tension, and then he was driving his fist into Corbin’s jaw.
The blacksmith stumbled backward, dazed as he wiped blood from his face. “That was a mistake,” he growled.
“I doubt it, but go on. Give me a reason to hit you again.” Saint Brides moved toward him, his movements smooth and confident.
Though Corbin and Saint Brides were of similar height, Corbin was a much larger man. He swung his giant fist through the air, backed by an arm as thick as Sarah’s waist. Were it to make contact with Saint Brides… She shuddered, pulling her knees to her chest.
Saint Brides dodged the blow, weaving to the side. His gaze was intense, focused on Corbin as though the rest of the world had faded into darkness. As though all his anger and frustration was concentrated on this one fight.
Now was her chance. She could limp away to freedom. He wouldn’t notice she had gone until after the fight. Then he would be far too exhausted to chase her, surely… or too unconscious.
Corbin’s fists were so big, and he was swinging them with such force. A punch like that would feel like a horse kicked him in the head.
A person could die that way.
Another shudder racked her body as she watched them move around each other. She was a fool for even contemplating leaving him like this. How could she when he was fighting this hulking brute because of her? Surely that was the reason she couldn’t seem to look away, and not that she was simply captivated by the bloody display of masculinity—his masculinity.
He was beautiful, his movements calculated, finely timed actions. He moved like a large cat, dodging three more blows before his fist launched out, landing with a satisfying crack.
Corbin staggered, shaking his head as though to clear it. Then he growled, throwing his fists in quick succession.
Saint Brides ducked, somehow avoiding the blows. He was losing ground, forced backward until he was almost against the wall. Any one of those blows could land, and the second that happened, he would be either unconscious or dead.
His back hit the wall, and he lunged sideways a half second before Corbin’s fist splintered the wood where his head had been.
Corbin clutched his bleeding knuckles and turned a steely glare in Saint Brides’ direction before slowly stalking toward him.
The giant was tiring, his chest heaving, and his steps becoming shuffled. When they came together this time, Saint Brides’ punches began to fly with more regularity. Somehow, he knew where and when Corbin was going to strike. He dodged and struck, over and over again until Corbin fell to his knees.
He grabbed Corbin’s blackened collar, forcing him to meet his gaze. “If you ever lay your filthy hands on my wife again,” he panted, his chest heaving, “I shall have you drawn and quartered in your own stables. Do I make myself perfectly clear, Mr. Corbin?”
Corbin growled and nodded, blood trailing from his nose and mouth.
Saint Brides let go and stalked toward the door. His chestnut waves were in disarray, his clothes were rumpled, and he was still without a cravat. He looked utterly disreputable, the most attractive man she had ever seen.
“Can you walk?” he asked, his gaze once again inscrutable and detached, the fire gone.
“I-I think so,” she said, not realizing until she spoke that she had been holding her breath. She scooted off the barrel and immediately gasped in pain.
He grunted. Then he bent down, once again lifting her like a child into his arms and carrying her outside.
Shivers covered her body, skittering over her skin like fiery hot pins.
“This is the third time in the last two days I have had to carry you, Mrs. Tindall. Except, this time I had to also slay your dragon. I do not like where this trend is heading,” he growled as they moved toward the inn. “When I went on holiday, I was worried about something catastrophic happening at the office, not here, damn me. Now look what I got myself tangled up with.”
She scowled. “I don’t remember asking you to hit anyone. Believe it or not, your assistance, while appreciated, was not strictly needed.” It was true. She was no helpless miss. She would have escaped that ogre one way or another.
Well, she liked to think she would have.
He raised a disbelieving brow at her. “Are you telling me you expected to outrun him with that ankle?”
She folded her hands in her lap, resisting the urge to wrap them around his neck, and cleared her throat. “Of course, there was always the possibility he would have caught me, considering I’m wounded and he was very angry.”
“At which point, he would have beaten you to within an inch of your life, I assume,” he returned. “He might have killed you had I not come along.”
“Why did you?”
“I was looking for Gordon,” he said. “And you. You both seemed to have been in a hurry to quit town. Since you weren’t in your room when I returned, I thought he might have found you. I was hoping to catch you both before you left the stables.”
“Mr. Gordon is gone?” she asked, trying not to sound so hopeful.
Saint Brides glanced down at her, his assessing green gaze no doubt seeing everything she tried so hard to hide. “His wrath isn’t what you ought to fear.”
She swallowed hard. “You expect me to hang.”
He stopped in his tracks, mere feet from the entrance to the inn, and leveled her with a hard stare. “Yes, because your salvation is in the details, which you aren’t telling me. Since I cannot prove you innocent without them, and I very much doubt you will give them up in the courtroom, there is nothing I can do. Now please twist the knob so we can get some blessed sleep.”
“Are you still taking me to London?” She reached for the knob and opened the door. It was late, but the public taproom was still filled and even louder than before.
Saint Brides carried her around the perimeter and up the stairs, stopping just long enough for her to open the door to their room.
“You didn’t answer my question,” she said when he set her on the edge of the bed.
“I—” He hesitated as he tossed his coat over a chair. “I have had a change in plans.”
“Is that why you wanted to speak to Mr. Gordon so badly?” she asked, fear coating her throat. “Are you leaving me with him?”
He watched her as he began working the buttons of his waistcoat. “No. I’m not leaving you with Mr. Gordon. The magistrate in Manchester I was hoping to leave you with is no longer able to take you into his custody, or so I learned just this evening.”
“Here in Manchester,” Sarah breathed.
“Yes. Unfortunately, what hope I had of getting rid of you was shot to bits,” he said, slipping out of his waistcoat and laying it over his coat on the chair. “He was murdered in his home last night.”
Sarah’s eyes widened in shock as she watched Saint Brides calmly sit in the chair and tug off his boots as though he hadn’t just said a man he knew had been brutally murdered.
He turned to look at her as he dropped a boot to the floor. “You know why, don’t you?”
She shook her head. “How should I know?”
“Either Gordon had something to do with it, or it was someone else who didn’t want you in safe custody. I would greatly appreciate knowing why someone would feel the need to murder a magistrate in cold blood in order to keep you vulnerable.” Saint Brides set his other boot next to the first and then turned his green gaze to her expectantly. “Well?”
“I don’t know anything about it.” None of it made sense, but then again, she was having a difficult time making logical connections while he was undressing in front of her.
Her captor wasn’t supposed to be handsome. She wasn’t in some silly novel where the hero carries her away to his castle. He was taking her to prison, to her death. He should be ugly as sin, not Prince Charming in naught but his shirt and trousers.
Lud, and his shirt was halfway unbuttoned, exposing far too much of his muscled chest.
“Pity,” he mumbled. Then his brows winged high as he gestured at her. “Are you going to sleep in that?”
Her cheeks flamed, and her heart kicked up in speed. He couldn’t possibly expect her to strip down.
“I am not removing my clothes in front of you, and I genuinely hope you do not intend to remove any more of yours.”
“Use the screen. I promise I shan’t bother you,” he said dismissively. Then he unhooked his cufflinks and rolled up his sleeves, his strong forearms commanding her attention.
She blinked, forcing her gaze to his eyes—his eyes—and nowhere else. “Do you truly expect me to believe that?”
Last night at Barrington Park loomed in her mind. She could feel his hard body pressed against her and his breath on her ear… on her lips. She shivered, but not with rage or maidenly shyness. No, this was something dangerous. This was lust for a man she had no business lusting after.
“Mrs. Tindall,” he said, rising from his chair. “I promise not to take advantage of you so long as you promise not to take advantage of me.”
She blinked. Could he read her thoughts? Did his green gaze truly penetrate as far as it seemed to? “I beg your pardon?”
He held out his hands at his sides. “I know how irresistible a man I am. A living, breathing statue of David, surely, with a most charming disposition.” He flashed a sarcastic smile that was irritatingly charming. “I only hope you will be able to control yourself in my presence.”
She stared back, completely speechless.
Ridiculous. He couldn’t possibly read minds.
“What?” he asked, his brows knit with offense. “You don’t find me irresistible?”
Sarah shook her head. Nothing would ever be irresistible to her again. Not travel, nor any adventure, and certainly not any man.
His hands fell to his sides. “In that case, I’m confident all will be well, Mrs. Tindall, as I do not find you irresistible, either.”
Even as he said it, Drake wasn’t completely convinced it was true. She was stunning and gloriously disheveled from her little adventure, during which she had struck someone, a blacksmith, at that! He had never known a woman who truly knew how to hit, which she must have done since her victim had been hit hard enough to bruise, and he very much doubted that hulking brute bruised easily.
Drake eyed her petite figure. What he wouldn’t give to see her do it.
“All the same,” she said hesitantly, “I think I shall sleep in my clothes.”
“All of them?” he asked, wondering at the note of disappointment in his voice.
He tore his eyes away from her as he pulled a folded blanket off the end of the bed and settled back into the chair. Then he propped his feet up on the hearth, feeling the warmth of the dying fire seep into the soles of his feet.
“All of them.”
“As long as you can sleep in all those fastenings and tapes, Mrs. Tindall,” he said as he closed his eyes. “London is a fair distance to travel without rest.”
He heard her harrumph from where she sat on the bed. “The doors and windows are locked, so please forget any notions of escaping tonight. I desperately need some sleep, and I promise I shall be incredibly cross should you try something.”
“Are you not afraid I shall do something criminally insane?” she asked curtly. “I might set fire to our room while you sleep.”
“No,” he muttered. “You are suspected of homicide, Mrs. Tindall, not suicide. It would be against your modus operandi.”
“If I don’t escape, I shall die by the hangman’s noose. Therefore, it hardly matters, does it? I die either way.”
“We all die. The question is when.” He twisted in his chair to look at her. “If you are innocent, you may outlive us all.”
“I don’t think being innocent is going to be enough to save my neck.”
Drake readjusted himself into a comfortable position and closed his eyes. “Have faith in the justice system, Mrs. Tindall.”
“Considering the only witness wants me dead, your justice system will convict me of a crime I didn’t commit.”
“Because the facts tell a story, and that story may paint a very unflattering picture of you if important facts are missing.”
“Even if they had all the facts, I’m a foreign woman with no connections and no money. No one will listen to me over Mr. Gordon.”
“I listen to facts. If you can prove to me you are innocent with those, I shall handle the charges against you.” He fluttered his fingers in the air. “Your problems will flutter away. Those regarding your husband’s murder, at any rate.”
“My other problems seem so insignificant compared to my quickly approaching death.” She sighed, exhaustion and hopelessness seeping into the airy sound. “Do you truly have the power to clear the charges against me?”
“Let the facts clear the charges against you,” he said. “Give me all the pieces and I shall put them together for the court. I’m quite good at solving puzzles.”
“Good luck,” she muttered.
“I shan’t need it. Now go to sleep, I beg you. We can talk in the morning.”
Drake would at last have her side of the story. All of it.
He fought the urge to pry every detail from her. They were both tired, and he wanted to look at the facts with fresh eyes, though he was aware of the chance she might change her mind by morning and tell him nothing. It was a chance he had to take if he intended on putting the pieces in the right order.
Though the night was dark and the road from Manchester was not nearly as smooth as those more heavily traveled, Samuel Winters pushed his mount as hard as the pitiful beast could go. If he hurried, he could easily reach Barnsby hours before the sun rose, with plenty of time to have a few too many drinks with the wastrels lounging about Holbert’s Gaming House. By morning, no one would remember exactly what time he had arrived. He could say he had been there long before a certain magistrate took a bullet several hours away.
I
f only he had known Davis was just as priggish as Gordon. He had refused a good chunk of coin and lost his life, to boot. And for what? Honor?
Sam snorted. All he wanted was for Davis to take a murderess into his custody, and for said murderess to come to a fatal accident. She was already heading for the gallows.
It was no matter. Sam simply preferred to have his plan solidly airtight.
Though there was the smallest chance Frank’s wife could be found innocent if she were to have a trial, it was laughably minute. If it weren’t so, he would simply find her and kill her himself. Instead, he would secure his alibi and wait. Soon enough, she would be hanged, the murder investigation closed, Sam would be five thousand pounds richer, and no one would be the wiser.
With that encouraging thought came a sinister grin as he jabbed his heels into his mount, urging the animal on at an even faster clip. It was time for him to meet with his men and send them to make a little collection.
Chapter 6
Bells. He heard bells.
Drake’s eyes reluctantly opened after being painfully wrenched from a dream of a much-desired stroll along the seaside. He had been enjoying the sound of seagulls, ocean waves, a breeze whipping through the nearby tall grass, and… bells. They sounded exactly like those he had attached to the window and door after he had discovered his prisoner missing the night before.
“Mrs. Tindall,” he said groggily, “I would appreciate it if you would stop whatever mischief you are in the midst of.”
Faint light crept in through the window. It was enough to illuminate the watch fob he pulled from his waistcoat pocket, which was still draped over the arm of the chair.
“I suggest you lie back down and enjoy our last forty-five minutes of rest before we must squeeze back into the carriage.”
He heard a soft curse before she stalked back to the bed and plopped down upon it.
“Such language, Mrs. Tindall,” he muttered teasingly. “I suggest you rest while you have a comfortable bed to do it on.”
Changing the Earl's Mind (The Lords of Whitehall Book 3) Page 8
