Page 12 of Escape of the Highwayman (Escape #3)

“I have never been there, though I have some good friends from that part of the world. Or I did.” He lifted his gaze suddenly to hers. “That is a good idea. Why am I so sure you won’t report it to the local magistrate?”

“I have no idea. He dined with us last night. Though it’s true he may no longer be talking to us.”

“Why not?”

“Because he brought his guest to meet us—Mr. Black, whom he would like to marry his daughter, only my father would rather I marry him.”

“Why?”

“Because Beatrice my older sister is bound to make a brilliant match eventually, and a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, as it were.”

“So Mr. Black—lucky fellow—has a choice between you and the magistrate’s daughter? Is that not a fair contest?”

“Hardly. I am a viscount’s daughter.”

His eyes widened. “Are you indeed?”

“Unbelievable, is it not? This is why no one holds out much hope for my marriage to anyone else. And Mr. Black, after all, would rather marry into the aristocracy than the mere gentry.”

“Why?” he asked again, with all the fascination of a man who had never considered the marriage mart.

“Because he is a cit and wants his grandchildren to be acceptable to the highest in the land, I suppose. Fortunately, there are many indigent aristocrats, so he should probably research a little more before he buys. Besides, my family is more expensive than most, and I would make him a terrible wife into the bargain.”

“Dare I ask why again?”

She shrugged. “I say the wrong thing and act on impulse, and I am also opinionated to a fault. He finds it amusing now, I suspect, but he would hate it in his wife.”

“You must point it out to him.”

“Must I?” she said doubtfully. “Is it not my duty to obey my father and do my best for the family?”

“Not if they sell you off to a man who is beneath you, and I’m not referring to his birth.”

“That is what I thought. I even suggested to Laura that we form an alliance so neither of us needed to marry him, but I think she might want to. And she is right, of course. So is my mother. We are brought up to marry according to our parents’ wishes.

I don’t want to be the cause of my family’s suffering. ”

“And they will suffer if you don’t marry Mr. Black?”

“We need the money,” Chloe said bluntly.

She flushed. “I should not be speaking so freely. But Beatrice would not sully herself with a cit, and my parents would not waste her on him. And though she never admits it, Celia—my younger sister—wants to marry Jack Dunwoody. He’s the magistrate’s son who is up at Oxford but staying with friends just now. I don’t want to marry anyone else.”

The highwayman—Captain Berry—was frowning over the problem, as though taking it seriously. “I see your dilemma. One does have family duties, and I am a living example of what can happen when one falls short. What will you do?”

Chloe sighed. “Marry Mr. Black, most probably.”

“Under normal circumstances I would feel bound by chivalry to make you an alternative offer, especially since I suspect this is the same gentleman who wanted children to be thrashed for freeing the birds at the market. But sadly, that is not currently much of a solution.”

“I appreciate the impulse,” Chloe said warmly. As though awarding a prize, she presented him with the plate of food purloined from breakfast. “You would be considerably more fun than Mr. Black. But I cannot see Papa consenting.”

His lips quirked. “Thank you for even considering the possibility. In fact, I would serve you best by getting out of your hair.”

“Oh, no. Now that I know you won’t die, I am enjoying the adventure hugely. Only think, Mr. Dunwoody had his horses stabled only a few feet beneath the man he wishes to capture.”

“Most gratifying,” he said, and she grinned. “What has happened to the Bow Street runner? I didn’t dream that bit, did I?”

“I think he is still in Greater Lessing, looking for clues.”

“Then it was another foolish idea of mine to come back in this direction. I thought he would follow Cavalo to Brighton or the South Downs. Some of my pursuers did.”

“Well, I am glad you came back here. Now you just need to get your strength back and go to Scotland while the highwayman is forgotten.”

***

J ON HAD NOT MEANT TO reveal quite so much to his saviour. With the clarity of his mind restored by the easing of his fever, he was only too aware of the risks she had taken and still took, and he knew he owed her honesty.

It did not make pretty telling. He was reluctant to watch her open, kind friendliness shutter against him, change to contempt and even fear.

Part of him wanted her to command him to leave, even to run from him to her family, forcing him to bolt before he was captured.

And somehow, his first clear sight of her in daylight, without the woolly edges of illness, made everything worse.

She was beautiful. And not unaware of him as a man, dangerous or otherwise. Behind those dreamers’ eyes he had admired at the market that day, lay humour and intelligence, plus a joy in life that hurt him because he could barely remember his own, and because he had taken advantage of her trust.

He owed it to his family, and to those accomplices in crime that he still thought of as his men, to tell her as little as possible.

And yet once he began, he could not stop.

With fascination, he watched her comprehend what he was, what he had done, and yet still she only looked for solutions that did not involve her running from him in horror and telling her father everything.

Not that she made excuses for him or tried to avoid the reality. She just asked questions and mulled it all over while dressing his wound and watching him eat.

The man who won her would be very lucky indeed.

And he did not like the sound of this Black fellow out to buy an aristocratic wife.

Nor of her father, Viscount Lessing, no less—out to sell his daughters to the highest bidder.

He could not bear the thought of her trapped and unable to breathe with a husband who was not. ..

Not what? he interrupted his own thought savagely. Not you , you deluded, useless fool?

“Under normal circumstances I would feel bound by chivalry to make you an alternative offer.” He had meant those words, which had caused a novel and quite unexpected longing.

Even before he had taken to highway robbery, as his father’s heir, he would have been an only just respectable match for her. Now...

But since he was here and could not easily leave, there was no hardship in listening to her chatter about her family, their dogs and horses and cats.

He was happy to practice standing up and walking across the loft—which he had cleaned by the simple expedient of pushing soiled straw out of the window in small amounts that seemed to blow away in the breeze—and to examine the tiny new kittens.

He liked watching Chloe’s softened face and making her laugh with banter and teasing.

He had already relied on her so much, it was as if he had known her forever.

But as she had looked after him, it was time he at least tried to look out for her.

“Will your family not miss you if you hide up here for too long?”

“Oh, they are used to me vanishing for hours at a time, but I suppose you are right. I’m pretending Molly here is ill, but sooner or later she will stalk back into the kitchen looking fit as a flea and my excuse will disappear! I had better go...”

She seemed gratifyingly reluctant. “I’ll come back later with a book, if you like, and anything else you might need. What do you like to read? Novels? History? Biography? Travel?”

“Any of those would be most welcome.” Recently, he had been reduced to the one book in his saddle bag, a volume of classical poetry, of which he was heartily bored.

She cast him a quick, flashing smile that caught at his breath and set off down the ladder with her bag of used plates and cups and old bandages.

He found he was still smiling as the stable door closed behind her. Jonathan Berry, you badly need to be away from here. Preferably tonight ...

***

W EAK AS HE WAS, STILL , he fell asleep almost as soon as she had gone and only woke when he heard the stealthy sound of someone climbing up the ladder. He sat bolt upright, reaching for his pistol before he remembered it was no longer there. He grasped his walking stick instead.

But he knew her from the faint, pleasing scent that preceded her. Light and floral with hints of lemon. Leaning heavily on the stick, he got himself to his feet just as she reached the top of the ladder.

“There is no one about,” she greeted him. “But tomorrow will be harder. We are all to go for a ride and enjoy an al fresco luncheon by the river, so the lads will be busy here and in the tack room, especially after we come back. I brought you some lemonade and luncheon. And these.”

She handed him three slim volumes—two were parts of a novel, the third was the diary of a traveller in Italy.

“Thank you.” Since he was on his feet, he made himself walk up and down the length of the loft, strengthening his muscles and getting his bad leg used to bearing his weight again. “Is the al fresco treat another scheme of your father’s?” he asked casually.

“No,” she said, brightening. “I’m hoping he has gone off the notion of Mr. Black, because he has not mentioned him to me and neither has Mama.

It was Jerome and Maurice, the vicar’s sons, who came up with the idea, but Laura and Mrs. Dunwoody will come too, so I daresay Mr. Black will join them.

I think Jerome was quite smitten with Beatrice when they dined here last night—which is odd, you know, because he used to pull her hair. Small boys are nasty.”

So are larger ones .

He watched her pour some cream into the cat’s bowl, much to Molly’s loud appreciation, and then dance back to what had become his cosy corner. She sat down, and with the air of a stage conjurer, produced a pack of playing cards from some hidden pocket in her dress.

Laughing, he sat back down beside her, and they drank lemonade and played cards. He acknowledged the return of his appetite as he consumed every morsel on his plate, much to Molly’s displeasure and Chloe’s approval.

“Does your cook not notice all this food vanishing from her kitchen?” he asked.

“Mostly, I’ve purloined it from the dining room by lurking after everyone else has gone.

But I think I’ll have to try to take your dinner from the kitchen this evening.

Otherwise, you will be starving by the time I can bring it.

Oh, I brought you a lantern as well, though you should probably be careful when you light it in case it brings anyone to investigate. Snap.”

He laughed. “That was a deliberate distraction! If you were a man, I should call you out.”

“If I were a man I’d scoff at you for being such a bad loser.”

The childish game was fun, as was the conversation around it, but he was careful not to let her stay too long. When she left, he paced some more, already looking forward to her next pre-dinner visit.