by Ella Edon
“Make sure it doesn’t.”
Emilia’s heart pounded. Opposite her, she saw the Duke lean back in his seat again. He looked furious. He shot a slit-eyed glance in her direction.
“And don’t you try anything clever,” he said. “We’ll be here for five minutes, and I am far more awake than you think.”
Emilia said nothing, just leaned back in the seat. Her heart thumped in her chest and she tried, very hard, to think of something she could do. She had five minutes. Just five. And she had to save the rest of her life from being swamped in nebulous horror.
I need to get out of here. And fast.
She felt in her purse. She had nothing except a sixpence and riding-gloves. What could she do with a sixpence and riding-gloves? As she felt the shape of the three small objects, she had an idea.
“Have you a handkerchief?” she asked.
He nodded and passed her one wordlessly. Emilia took it and wiped her cheeks, then stuffed it back into her purse. The Duke frowned.
“That’s mine,” he said.
“Um…what?” Emilia blinked in confusion. “Oh. The handkerchief. Yes. I suppose it is…” She reached for her purse again, making a pantomime of fumbling with the draw-strings. She felt about in the inside, taking as much time about it as possible. She pulled out a glove.
“Here…oh!” She shook her head airily. “Whoopsie! That’s not it. Wait a moment…”
“Let me find it,” the Duke snarled. He reached for the purse, just as she’d hoped he would. At the same instant, she dropped it, hearing as it hit the floor, the clank of the sixpenny piece on the boards quite audible in the silence.
“Oh, for Perdition’s sake…”
As he bent down, fumbling to find the purse on the floor in the shadowy darkness, Emilia seized her chance. She leaned on the door and pushed it open, sliding down into the forest. As her ankles jarred from hitting the ground, she gathered her skirts up in her hands and started, very desperately, to run.
“Help!” she yelled. “Please! Stop!”
“You doxy…” the duke swore. He slid out of the coach and ran to catch her, calling her names that made her flush with shock, and some she’d never heard of besides.
“Help!” she cried, running into the road. “Please! Help!”
She could hear him behind her on the road. Her legs were aching, her breath hissing in lungs which were constrained by her tightly-drawn stays. She could feel the pain of breathing in, and she knew she absolutely could not keep this up a second longer. She had to reach some sort of safety soon. She had to…
“I’ll get you!” the duke yelled. She could hear him gaining on her. She couldn’t be more than a few paces ahead. She felt her legs reach for more speed, knowing that she couldn’t reach a faster speed. She couldn’t keep going, couldn’t stay ahead of him for much longer…
“I’ll make sure you never forget this,” he hissed.
Emilia started crying as she ran. The pain of breathing in was getting too much. Her legs hurt, and her mind was numb with terror. He would catch her and then he would have ample reason to throw caution to the winds, to be as cruel to her as he might beforehand not have considered.
Every intake of breath was agony. Every breath out was a plea. Her legs worked and her lungs bled and she ran.
“Help!” she screamed.
As she ran up the road, she saw a coach. She knew it was her only chance. He was so close now, she could feel his hand grabbing for her. She put her arms in the air and screamed.
“Help! Stop! Help!”
The coach stopped, the horses rearing. The door flew open.
Emilia stared into the interior, a look of utter shock on her face.
* * *
Luke looked down in horror as the door of the coach opened. He knew that face! He stared in shock.
“Emilia!” he said.
He caught sight of a shadow in the dark, and his shock rolled aside, replaced instantly with practicality.
“Get in,” he said. “Here.”
He reached for her arm and hauled her into the coach. The door slammed shut just as her adversary ran, full-tilt, into it. She was sobbing, her breath coming in low, desperate pants.
“Go ahead!” he shouted to the coachman, beating on the roof to emphasize his point. “Full speed.”
He felt them pull away, becoming more aware of his surroundings as they did. He could feel Emilia, lying with her head on his chest, her body across his knees. He found that his hand was twisted in her hair, his arm bent around her shoulder.
“Emilia, are you hurt?” he asked softly but insistently. “He didn’t…harm you?”
He felt his stomach twist with dark rage. He had to resist the temptation to turn the coach around, to find the Duke and pummel him to within an inch of his life. How dare he? How could he think to harm this gentle woman?
“No…” Emilia gasped. She was clearly struggling to breathe. Luke moved sideways on the seat, helping her to sit upright beside him. As he did so, he felt her body lean against his and his tummy tingled, his whole body on fire with arousal.
I have never been so close to her before.
He bit his lip, wincing at the stab in his loins. He wanted her more than he had ever wanted anything. But she was in pain and frightened. She was also desperately alone.
“Emilia,” he said softly. He could smell the scent of her perfume and tried not to breathe in too deeply, lest the sweet, rose-petal scent break through the last of his self-control.
“What?” she whispered.
“I don’t want to upset you, so you needn’t tell me, if it would be hard to say. But…what happened?”
Emilia just stared at him. Her blue eyes were wet with tears. Spots of red had flushed her cheeks, and she was crying, tears soundless.
“Luke…” she whispered. “You found me.”
He felt the use of his name lance his heart. She’d never called him that before.
“I found you,” he agreed. “I thank Heaven for it, too.”
“He…” Emilia whispered. “He planned to marry me.”
“I’ll bet he did,” Luke said grimly. He’d seen too many such attempts in the past: young adventurers, seeking to force the hand of a woman or of her father, abducting the woman and threatening her and her family with disgrace, should consensus not be reached.
“I don’t know…what to do,” she whispered. “What can I do?”
Luke shook his head. “Nothing, for the moment,” he said softly. “Now, we need to get you to safety. Later, we can plan.”
He felt the coach slow, and he took the opportunity to open the window. “Coachman?”
“Yes, milord?”
“Take us to the Oaktree House Inn, please?”
He saw Emilia’s eyes go wide and he winced inwardly, knowing that she was probably afraid that he planned something like the Duke had done. He sighed.
“Milady, the only way we can be safe is to go somewhere where no one from town will see us,” he said. “I think that inn will be sufficiently obscure to ensure the safety of us both.”
“Thank you.”
He saw tension leak out of her and could have cried with relief for it. She shouldn’t have been so afraid! He felt his rage against Carrington evaporate, replaced by a tenderness of feeling he could barely fathom.
“I assure you that you are safe with me,” he said softly.
He reached for her hand and she slipped her fingers into his. He squeezed her fingertips, surprised at how warm and soft they were. Her eyes held his.
“Lord Westmore…I am so grateful you’re here.”
“So am I,” he said.
They looked at each other and a soft smile lit her eyes. He felt it growing and spreading through his own heart, and knew he had never felt quite this sort of happiness before.
She giggled, running a hand through her hair and scraping a strand of it back behind her ear.
“I suppose I look a mess,” she said. She shook her head, loo
king up into his eyes again. “I’m all disheveled and my hair looks quite wild.”
Luke just smiled. “You will always be beautiful, Lady Emilia…it’s a beauty that comes from deep within you.”
Emilia swallowed hard. Her eyes held his. She looked shyly downwards again.
“You are too kind,” she murmured.
“I’m not,” he insisted. He rested a hand on her shoulder and she tensed, but didn’t move away. Her eyes met his. “Milady…you are beautiful. And gentle, and kind. I couldn’t tell you before because…because propriety would not allow me to. And because I do not know the words, to describe it.”
Emilia blushed. “Now you’re flattering me, milord.”
“No,” he said softly. But he could say nothing more. He simply had no idea what to say. He could feel a strange tingling in his chest, and he had never felt anything of its like.
Emilia leaned back on the seat with a little sigh. It was dark outside, though he judged the sun was likely not quite set. The dark clouds and the trees were blocking out much of it.
“I don’t know what Father would say,” Emilia said slowly. She was looking out of the window and Luke hesitated to interrupt, knowing that she had to express this somehow. She went silent for a long while. At length, she continued.
“In a way, it makes sense. It would be so well organized: I wed the Duke, he accepts me without a dowry, in lieu of my father writing off his remaining debts. I get to be a Duchess, Father is sure I’ll be cared for forever. All very neat and tidy.”
She sniffed.
Luke said nothing. He couldn’t quite believe the depths of the fellow’s scheming.
Emilia blinked back tears. “What?” she challenged. “You think I should agree to it? That I should fall in with the duke’s plans? Is that it?”
“No,” Luke said gently. “Milady! How can you think that?”
“You were looking at me with such a shocked expression…what else could I conclude?” she asked softly.
“I was thinking of what a brave woman you are,” Luke told her, with a rawness in his voice that surprised him. “I cannot even imagine such self-sacrificing thoughts.”
She frowned at him. “Self-sacrificing? No. I would do anything for my father. That’s simply how I am.”
Luke nodded. “I know. You care for him. I understand. But…please. This is your life, first and foremost. You cannot sacrifice your happiness.”
“My happiness won’t keep my father alive when he’s old and frail and indebted.” She sounded bitter.
“That’s where you’re wrong,” Luke heard himself say. “Your happiness is your father’s joy. And being joyful will sustain him far better than being miserable would.”
“You think so?” she sounded curious.
She sniffed, and Luke handed her his handkerchief. Their fingers met. He felt a shiver as some peculiar feeling shot up his arm and through his body, leaving heat in its wake.
“I know so,” Luke assured her. “I recall it when my father was frail. He was cheered by nothing so much as he was by my smile.”
He felt a lump in his throat now. He’d never spoken of it to anyone. Now, he could see it so clearly. The old Earl, his face gaunt and so pale, that the skin almost transparent, his eyes sunk in puffy rings. He recalled how he’d sat up on the pillows whenever he visited, his face transformed by a grin that mirrored Luke’s own whenever he saw him.
Opposite him, he felt Emilia lean forward, her knees shifting on the seat. Her hand wrapped round his fingers tenderly.
“Oh, sir. I’m so sorry,” she whispered.
He swallowed hard. His sorrow for his father mixed with a lump in his throat at the tenderness with which she said his name.
“It’s alright,” he assured her. “I don’t think of it often. I haven’t thought about that in years, now.”
He sniffed. His heart felt lighter, as if some weightiness had gone from within. He felt how her fingers still rested in his palm and squeezed them gently. She smiled at him.
“I’m glad to be here with you,” she said.
He cleared his throat, entire body racing with emotion. “As I am, with you,” he said.
They looked at each other a long moment.
Tenderly, he leaned forward.
Her lips brushed against his. He leaned back swiftly. His response was so strong and so instant, he didn’t want to entertain it a moment longer, knowing what would happen if he did.
He leaned back in the seat, heart thumping.
They sped through the dark, towards the inn, and Luke couldn’t help thinking what a marvelous happening it was that he had found her, and that she was safe.
Chapter Twenty-Three
A New Connection
Emilia sat in the parlor upstairs at the inn. It was warm, the result of a fire burning low in the grate. It was a summer evening, but she felt desperately cold. She drew her coat tight around her shoulders and shivered, glad of the glowing embers of the fire. She allowed herself to think past the horror of the woodlands, and focus on the blissful present-moment.
Luke was downstairs, settling the account with the innkeeper. Emilia was glad for a moment to herself, to think. She drew her coat around her shoulders and breathed in the scent of the meal he’d had sent up. She could smell broth and bread, and the delicious, spicy scent of ale, warmed over a fire with ginger added as a curative to keep out the cold.
“I can’t quite believe it.”
She closed her eyes, recalling the horror of the run through the woods. She was safe now – more than safe. She was happy. She couldn’t quite believe how instantaneously her circumstances had altered. From believing herself in a deadly, frightening situation, she found herself whisked away and into a safe, happy place.
She found her thoughts drifting to Luke, feeling a knot of excitement in her stomach at the merest thought of him. She recalled that moment in the coach, where they’d looked at each other, the way he’d looked at her so tenderly, as if he thought she was deeply precious.
Her body filled with a sweet warmth, as if she was drowning in honey. She heard a footstep in the stairwell, and her attention focused on the entrance, that knotting sensation tugging at her tummy as she recognized the approaching footsteps.
“I hope you’re not still over-cold, milady?” Luke asked from the doorway.
Emilia smiled, feeling her cheeks lift with it. “No,” she said. “I’m warm now. Come…sit down! You will get cold too, else.”
“It’s not really cold,” Luke said, his face flushed and smiling. “I think you must be cold following your exertion in the woodlands.”
“Yes,” Emilia agreed in a small voice. She had no particular wish to think about those memories. He must have noticed her look because he shook his head.
“We shall think about it no more,” he told her. “Now, let us eat and warm up.”
“Yes,” Emilia murmured, then giggled. She wouldn’t have believed it, had someone told her half an hour ago, but she felt happy. Not even an hour ago, locked in that coach with the Duke, she’d thought she’d never be happy again.
How quickly things change.
Luke was pouring the ale – she smelled the spicy scent and heard the glug and gurgle of it in the big pitcher. He passed her a flagon, his brow raised.
“To happiness!” Emilia said swiftly.
He grinned and raised the flagon too. “To happiness,” he agreed.
Emilia took a mouthful, feeling her face flush with warmth. She was happy. She reached for her napkin, smoothing it over her lap. As she did so, the inconceivability of the situation occurred to her. Here she was, alone in an inn-parlor, with a man she at once barely knew, and someone whom she felt she knew better than anyone in the whole world.
“Can you pass me the loaf?” she said in a small voice.
“Of course.” He passed her the bread and their fingers met as he did so. She blushed and looked into his eyes. They held her gaze. She let her fingers slide through his, feeling her
heart almost stop with the contact as she did so.
“It seems very good,” he said. She nodded, buttering a slice of the bread, which was still warm.
“It does.”
She felt his eyes on her and flushed. Under the table, she was acutely-aware of his leg, resting beside hers. She shifted in the seat, but regretted the loss of contact between her ankle and his foot.
