A Warriner to Protect Her

by Virginia Heath

  ‘I do not require money for doing a good deed, madam. As the master of this house, it is my responsibility to keep you safe, and after what you have told me, I honestly believe the best way to do that is to hide you here. You will not return back to London until I deem it safe to do so. It is decided.’

  It took a great deal of pride not to burst into frustrated tears at his dictatorial tone. ‘Decided? Am I to have no say in my own future?’ Such a concept was beyond ridiculous. Letty always got what she wanted. He stared back, his steely blue glare unmoved. ‘I am not a child or a chattel, Mr Warriner. I am perfectly capable of looking after myself. You have no authority over me!’

  As parting shots went, she was quite proud of it. His intense blue eyes narrowed as he digested her words and Letty decided now would be the opportune moment to make a well-timed exit. The walls of the room had begun to sway and tilt quite ferociously as she turned smartly to storm back upstairs. Letty took two steps forward, then the floor began to list too. Her grand gesture of defiant independence collapsed the moment her knees did and she found herself crumpling woozily to the floor. Most irritatingly, it was Jack’s strong, capable arms that caught her. He lifted her into them as if she weighed practically nothing, with a distinctly paternalistic, put-upon expression on his face.

  ‘Joe?’

  ‘She’s still weak from her ordeal—she shouldn’t be out of bed. No wonder she swooned.’

  Jack did not even bother responding to his brother, he merely turned with Letty still in his arms and began to walk briskly towards the staircase. It was disconcerting being held so close by him—yet bizarrely not in a bad way. She felt safe, protected and stupidly impressed by his strength and undeniably manly physique. And he smelled positively sinful. Some sort of spicy, fresh, male smell which Letty wanted to inhale deeply while she burrowed her face into his neck. His overbearing, single-minded, irritating neck. ‘You can put me down. I can manage.’ There would be absolutely no burrowing. Not while he was being so...domineering and non-compliant.

  His irritatingly beautiful, blue eyes flicked to hers for a second. ‘We can’t have you swooning now, Letty. Can we?’ The very idea of it seemed to amuse him, which of course, seriously rankled.

  ‘I am not a woman known for swooning, Mr Warriner. Anybody who knows me will tell you that.’ Not that there was anyone left alive who truly knew her. Her parents had. Everybody else saw what they wanted to see and Letty found it easier to hide behind that convenient façade than allow anyone to see she was lonely and unhappy. ‘Had I not been forced to wander in a freezing forest for hours in the rain, after being bound, gagged and abducted, it would not have happened today.’

  He stared ahead, apparently bored. The dark stubble on his chin tempted her fingers to touch it, so she clasped them ineffectually across her middle as he started up the stairs.

  ‘Are you too proud to let me pay for your services?’

  Silence.

  Clearly it was time to become the confident Violet Dunston. Whenever she met a brick wall, and Jack Warriner was definitely a big, thick, brick wall, Violet’s charm had never failed to quietly knock it down. Men, especially, were particularly responsive in her experience. She could not spend a month being dictated to by this stubborn man. She would run mad.

  Letty unclasped her hands and rested one palm gently over his heart, moistened her lips to give them some gloss and peeked up at him through her lashes in the manner which she knew all men found utterly delightful. ‘Perhaps I could fund your brother’s medical studies, Jack?’ For good measure she blinked a little erratically so he could see just how long and lovely those lashes were and how very upset she was by his insistence on being in charge. ‘Surely you would allow me the pleasure of doing that one, small thing out of gratitude.’ Something which would keep this infuriatingly dictatorial male in check.

  He glanced down at her face and she was certain she felt his heartbeat speed up beneath her fingers, but when his jaw hardened and those dark eyebrows came together in a forbidding line, she realised she might have seriously misjudged the situation.

  ‘You might have my brothers falling all over themselves to do your bidding, Letty, and I am sure you are quite used to getting your own way in practically everything with your fêted beauty and piles of money, but your pouting and flirting will not sway me. You can stay here for as long as I am prepared to be your keeper—and once I decide it is safe to take you back to London, then you will go. In the interim, you will do as you are told, Miss Dunston, because I am master of this house and you would do well to remember it. No amount of pretty eyelash fluttering is going to change my mind.’

  Chapter Seven

  Twenty-eight days remaining, give or take a few hours...

  Letty stared at the trunk full of outdated ladies’ dresses with a sinking heart. The heavy brocades and stiff skirts would take hours and hours to turn into anything vaguely presentable, even with her talent with a needle. She had dispatched Jacob up to the attic to find her something to wear, other than Jack’s shirts, and this was the best he could come up with. With amazing forethought for a man unused to having women in his house, the youngest Warriner had also brought his mother’s old sewing basket down too. Now that she was more herself again, altering these clothes would give her something to do while Joe had confined her to yet another day of bed rest, which frankly she did not need.

  ‘Thank you, Jacob. I am sure I can make use of these. I have not been allocated a maid yet. Now that I am feeling better, could one be arranged?’

  ‘A maid? Of your own?’

  ‘Yes—somebody who is handy with a needle and good with arranging hair. And could you ask your cook to vary the menu a little bit? Whilst the roast meat is always very nice, I find the lack of sauces and the boiled vegetables a little bland.’

  Jacob’s face began to split into a wide grin. ‘I have no authority regarding the distribution of staff, Letty, or the menu choices. You should probably ask Jack. He organises all of those things.’ His eyes were twinkling mischievously. ‘However, perhaps he might be more open to such requests if they came from you. You are our guest, after all.’ He looked like he was about to burst out laughing. ‘Aside from that, is there anything else you require?’

  ‘Some tea would be nice, Jacob. In about half an hour? And I don’t suppose you could bring some cake with it?’

  He playfully tugged his forelock. ‘I shall see what I can do, Letty.’

  Left alone, the silence of her lonely room began to feel oppressive. Letty was already way beyond bored with staying in bed, certain that it was Jack who was insisting she rest rather than have her under his feet. For the sake of peace, she would comply today, but wild elephants would not keep her in this bedchamber tomorrow.

  Her only company came in the shape of either Joe or Jacob Warriner and usually only briefly when they could be spared from other chores. They brought her tea or books or whatever else she requested—but those visits were still few and far between. Thus far, she had not had any dealings with the gruff Jamie and she had only seen fleeting glimpses of the domineering master of the house since he had unceremoniously deposited her back on his bed two days ago, after her failed attempt at getting him to bend to her will.

  The fact he had seen straight through the reasons for her flirting was embarrassing. Usually men scurried around Letty to please her, even without her resorting to using her feminine wiles. When she did bestow one coy look or a faint flutter of her eyelashes, even the most hard-nosed gentleman was won over and keen to earn her good favour. She was the Tea Heiress, after all. Judgemental Jack had managed to make her feel like a fool, and what was worse was the fact that she had been the one trying to make him feel off-kilter. Instead, it had been her pulse which had ratcheted up several notches; her kilter that was off.

  Being held in that man’s arms had been overwhelming enough. She had felt
protected, delicate and, despite his grim demeanour, quite special. Galling when she was so determined to be independent. It almost felt like she’d taken a step back towards the old Letty, the one who wanted to marry a man to feel worthwhile. But touching Jack’s hard, warm chest had been, frankly, beyond heady. Letty had never experienced a reaction to a man quite like that one. She had wanted to curl her arms around his neck instantly and experience how splendid she imagined it would be to be draped fully against him, properly wrapped in those magnificent, ungentlemanly muscled arms. Shamelessly staring up into his fathomless, beautiful blue eyes...

  Oh, stop it, Letty! She had a tendency to be prone to flights of fancy and silly daydreams—but to be having such thoughts about a man who saw her as a great inconvenience and was completely immune to her womanly charms was ridiculous. Jack Warriner was not the sort of gentleman she usually favoured. Yes, he was handsome and, yes, he was deliciously burly and easy on the eye—but he was also a stubborn, dominant and unbendable male! Just like her uncle. A man who refused to listen to her—and, although she sincerely doubted Jack shared any of her insidious uncle’s other, reprehensible character traits, Letty was all done with domineering males. Her fanciful mind had no place constantly wandering back to him. She knew exactly the sort of man she wanted and that man was nothing like Jack Warriner.

  He was someone more like the Duke of Wentworth, for example. A polite, solicitous and gentlemanly man. Letty doubted he was that interested in her fortune, because he had a vast one of his own, although one could never tell. She supposed the title could be considered a bonus, except she had little interest in such things any more. The trouble with Wentworth was that he was a collector of all things beautiful and he always had to have the best of everything. The opulent new house he was having built in Mayfair was a great source of society speculation and he had reportedly sent out emissaries to the furthest reaches of the globe to bring back rare treasures to fill it with. Despite his charming manner and seemingly besotted demeanour, Letty had a horrible suspicion his interest in her stemmed from the ridiculous label she had been given of an incomparable. The diamond of the Season. And being desired simply as another adornment to a man’s house, rather than for the woman she truly was, was somehow worse than being merely a source of income. At least money had a use. Ornaments got dusty when their appeal faded and the owner forgot about them. Until Wentworth proved otherwise, Letty was not particularly tempted to become his duchess either. Whoever her future husband turned out to be, he had to be hopelessly in love with her.

  Not a handsome, domineering farmer to whom she was an unwelcome burden. She wanted a man who would put her on a pedestal, didn’t she, not one who put her in her place... Although, in typically contrary fashion, she immediately decided it was quite refreshing that he had not fawned all over her. She quite respected his strength of character even though she disliked his heavy-handed approach. That intrigued her. He was the first man she had encountered who appeared totally oblivious to the fact she was an heiress—in fact, any mention of her money seemed to get his dander up. And he was very, very handsome. Those eyes of his were positively swoon-worthy and his muscles were so...so...

  Clearly, she had to get out of this dull room or she was in danger of running completely mad if she was actually debating the merits of Jack Warriner as a potential suitor! He had three equally handsome brothers, two of whom were closer to her own age and both thoroughly charming. If she was going to have peculiar fancies for a Warriner brother, she would do better to direct them towards the capable, kind physician Joe, or the roguish, flirtatious Jacob. Any Warriner, in fact, who was not Jack.

  With a sigh, she padded across the bedchamber to the large wardrobe and rooted through it for something which would render her decent enough to eventually leave this room. All she could find were more shirts, plain waistcoats and breeches. After comparing a few pairs for size, she pulled on a soft pair of buckskin breeches which were far too big around the waist but fit her well enough everywhere else. A quick rifle in the sewing basket produced a reel of scarlet ribbon. She cut off two lengths. One was tied tightly around her waist to hold up the sagging breeches, the second she used to tie back her unruly hair. With no hairpins apparently anywhere in Markham Manor, and no maid as yet, it was the best she could do with such limited resources. Her request, made via Joe yesterday, for some feminine items to be purchased on her behalf in the village came back, also via Joe, with a terse ‘Are you mad, woman?’ from He Who Must Be Obeyed.

  Now she considered it fully, she was prepared to concede that the oldest, most irritating Warriner had made a valid point. The purchasing of anything feminine for a house filled with men was a tad suspicious and, if she wanted to remain out of Bainbridge’s gnarly clutches, she should probably make do with her ribbon. Although making do was not something she was used to. If she was being completely honest, it was not something she had ever experienced—which made her feel like some spoiled, selfish brat and the sort of woman she loved to loathe.

  But she wasn’t incapable of making do, was she? And she certainly wasn’t useless. Hadn’t she already proved herself to be resourceful by escaping her captors? If she could do that, then she could fashion herself a perfectly serviceable wardrobe without inconveniencing her vexing host further or tipping off Bainbridge’s lackeys as to her whereabouts. Besides, she could hardly roam around the house in men’s breeches, even if they were surprisingly comfortable. Imbued with a self-righteous sense of purpose, she had soon ripped open the sleeves of one of the dated gowns and had spread the fabric pieces on the floor to cut.

  * * *

  Jack tossed his wet greatcoat in the hallway and took the stairs two at a time. His trip to the village this morning had bothered him. The reward money was no longer a generous one hundred pounds. It had been raised to a princely five hundred and the whole village was buzzing with the excitement. Folks in this particular corner of Nottinghamshire rarely, if ever, saw such a vast sum of money in one go and the anticipation of securing those riches had inspired several packs of locals to form teams scouring the forest and neighbouring areas. It was only a matter of time before some of them made their way up the lane towards his house—and if they found the gates bolted to them, they would become suspicious. Hardly anybody trusted a Warriner at the best of times. A wary, non-compliant Warriner would likely result in a siege when five hundred pounds was at stake.

  Much as he railed against the prospect of keeping her here for the entire month, moving her now was completely out of the question. And much as he wanted to avoid the prospect of spending any more time in that minx’s company, he needed to tell her of the heightened danger. While he was about it, he was also going to set some well-needed boundaries. Letty Dunston was running his two younger brothers ragged with her demands.

  No, that was not strictly true. Neither was run ragged—it was more that they were eagerly hopping up and down to do her bidding, which was taking them away from their usual chores and forcing Jack to pick up the slack. Only yesterday, when Jacob was supposed to be chopping wood for the fires, he had learned his brother had, instead, taken himself off to the village because Princess Violet had asked for some biscuits.

  Biscuits indeed! Biscuits were not going to keep the house warm or the sheep fed. And the woman apparently needed a near-constant supply of tea brought to her bedchamber, yet barely drank more than a single cup at a time. Last night, when Joe had helpfully wrapped the pot in some towels to keep the heat in it longer, she had complained that her tea was now too stewed to enjoy properly and sent his foolish brother to bring her a fresh pot. Had Jack not been avoiding the temptress, he would have stormed up there and given her a piece of his mind right away. Tea was an expensive commodity. So were biscuits, when the only place you could get them from was the local bakery because not one of the Warriners knew how to bake the damn things.

  But he was avoiding the temptress—and temptress was the only wor
d for her. Every time he laid eyes on her he was tempted. His mouth dried, his blood heated and his eager groin hardened. When he had carried her up the stairs he had been only too aware of the way her trim waist had curved out to a fine pair of rounded hips. He had also remembered, with far more clarity than he was comfortable with, the soft press of her unrestrained bosom resting against his body as he held her. Carrying Letty to his bedchamber held a great deal of appeal—although his rampant mind and body would have preferred the circumstances to be very, very different.

  However, the woman was quite certain of her appeal towards the male sex, and was not averse to using it to her own advantage. The brazen way she had walked her fingers up his chest when he had carried her back upstairs had been one of the most calculated displays of feminine manipulation he had ever seen. The fact she had tried to use her wiles on him in an attempt to control him, and the fact that his body had betrayed him and reacted instantly to her touch, was beyond the pale. Worse still, now random images of her kept creeping into his dreams and disturbing his sleep. And his work had suffered too. Jack had thought about nothing but blasted Letty all morning and only a small fraction of those thoughts had been concerns for her safety. That hair. Those seductive green eyes and, God help him, those legs! Even avoiding her, she was driving him to distraction.

  He eyed the open bedchamber door cautiously. There was no avoiding her now. They needed to talk about her precarious safety and he needed to stop having errant thoughts about her and remember she was another unwelcome responsibility he did not need. She was a spoiled heiress and an armful of trouble. Mentally fortified, Jack strode purposefully in and stopped dead in his tracks.

  The damn woman was going to kill him!

  First there had been delicate bared shoulders, then the loose hair and long legs and now her fantastic bottom was displayed to him in all of its round, feminine glory as she was, for some inexplicable reason, bent on her knees on the floor rather than recuperating in his bed. At this rate, his imagination would be able to piece her intriguing parts together bit by bit—and it only made him wonder more about the parts he had not seen. And if he wasn’t mistaken, her tempting bottom was currently encased in his breeches. How exactly was he ever supposed to wear them again knowing they had touched that magnificent backside?