“Yes, yes, but one minute, please, let me hear more about what happened to Lady Dorothy,” Mrs. Dorrit said in earnest.
Thanking her housekeeper for her worries, for it bought her more time, Dorothy ran to the middle of the room and looked about for an escape. She had no wish to face Stephen again so soon, not after what had happened the day before. No doubt he had come to tell her that they would face out the storm of the scandal. Knowing how much stock he put in his reputation, he was not going to be cowed by the words of others into any action.
There’s no door!
Dorothy panicked, her hands moving to her hips as her eyes zeroed in on the one escape she could make. The window was open. Darting toward it, she inched it up further. It scraped against the frame but fortunately lifted enough that she could just fold herself up to climb out. Hitching her itchy gown up around her thighs, she lifted her leg and started to clamber out.
“Stephen?” Allan called. “You will speak to my sister in my company this time.”
Whatever Stephen said in reply, Dorothy did not hear, though she imagined it wasn’t a particularly pleasant reply, as Mrs. Dorrit gasped loudly.
“Goodness! Your Grace, what did you say?”
“Stephen!” Allan called again.
Dorothy just managed to fall through the window as the door to the drawing room opened. She staggered through the flowerbeds, looking around as Stephen’s eyes found hers through the open window.
Those intense dark blue eyes found her eyes at once.
“Dorothy?” Stephen called.
Reaching for the window, she slammed it shut. It thudded against the frame, just as he ran toward it.
“Dorothy!” he called again, his voice slightly muffled by the glass.
She backed up as fast as she could, intent on losing him for as long as possible. She turned in the flowerbeds, grabbed the skirt of her gown, and ran.
Sprinting through the knot garden, she leaped over the growing heads of daffodil bulbs and even ran past the gardener, who lifted his head in surprise.
“Good morrow, Lady Dorothy.”
“Good morrow!” she shouted back, listening to him chuckle as she ran on, out of the knot garden and toward the main lawn.
“Dorothy!” Stephen was still shouting for her.
She glanced back as she reached the lawn, just enough to see that he was now in the knot garden, too.
Did he clamber out of that window? Impossible! He would not dare do it. No duke would climb through a window.
She ran faster, so much so that her lungs burned with the effort, her arms flailing at her sides. She took to the parkland and ran somewhere that she was certain Stephen would not follow her. She headed straight for the lake.
When the glistening watery depths came into view, she dared to glance back again. To her shock, Stephen was still following her. He was sprinting across the lawn and, to her dismay, gaining ground on her.
“Oh, for goodness’ sake. Why follow me now?” she cried, unable to stay silent in her irritation.
She ran to the lake and then to a narrow strip where the water was shallow and boggy. Without hesitation, she strode into the water. Having grown up exploring the land, she knew exactly how deep it was and that it was safe. The water reached up to her thighs, and she let her ridiculously ostentatious dress trail behind her in the water, ending up dirty and sodden. She scrambled up to the other side, slipping in the mud, then hurried to stand, with her updo half coming down and a thin sheen of sweat across her brow.
She turned triumphantly just as Stephen stopped on the other side of the strip of water. He was red in the face, too, panting loudly.
“Go back, Stephen.” She waved a hand back in the direction of the house. “I have no intention of walking back across this lake, not for hours yet, so you have wasted your time if you intend to wait me out.”
He held her gaze, the power of that stare intensifying further, and then, suddenly, he shrugged off his tailcoat.
“What are you doing?” she murmured in surprise.
He folded his tailcoat neatly and then laid it across the branch of a nearby sycamore tree. He marched toward the lake and strode into the boggy stretch.
“Stephen!” she yelped in surprise. “What are you doing? This isn’t you. You wouldn’t dare walk into a lake willingly.”
