“We are under attack. I know as little as you.” At the end of the stairs, he pried open a door, glanced both ways, then urged them into an unlit hall. Within seconds, they ran out a servant exit, where two horses pranced in waiting.
“Make haste.” He helped Bridget onto one saddle, then her onto another. “Ride as far as you can. Do not look back.”
“But you—”
“There is not time. Not enough horses prepared.”
“Ride with me. With Bridget. Please, we cannot leave you.”
He hesitated, glanced up at the flaming manor, wiped his forehead. Then he lunged onto the same horse as Bridget and supported her slumping frame with his arms. “Go.”
His command drove Isabella into action. Kicking her slippers into the horse’s sides, she galloped after him into the night, just as another explosion rattled the air.
She clung to the animal with hair whipping about her face. Cold fear quivered in her bosom. They were escaping, but how many others were trapped in their chambers, or burning, or being slaughtered for mere trinkets and possessions?
This was too unbearable to be true.
The work of demons.
God, help.
A brittle laugh breezed past his lips. So this was it.
The attic bedchamber sported only one bed. Joseph, the footman who occupied it, lay snoring between two chaff-filled mattresses, looking much younger without his white wig.
William pulled off his own wig. He scratched an itch on his scalp and button by shiny button undid his livery. Today, he had served platter after steaming platter to Lord Manigan and his two Parliament guests.
Neither William nor the earl had looked at each other.
Or spoken.
They played their roles well.
William tugged too hard on the last button. It sprang loose and clinked to the wooden floorboards, rolled, fell flat next to the thin pallet.I cannot do this.He shed everything but his shirtsleeves then settled onto the floor and pulled the wool blanket over himself.
He should have left this place.
He should have accepted the charity Lord Manigan offered him and spared himself the torture of such degradation.
But he could not. No more than he could have stayed at Rosenleigh, even when Horace permitted him to.
I have very little left.Nothing, in truth. Except his manhood.
He would not lose that to charity or pity or anything else anyone tried to extend to him. He would stand on his own two feet, or he would not stand at all.
He would not run.
Not even from himself.
She’d been shaking for the last two hours. She didn’t know why. No chill hung in the night air, and the breeze that rippled over them was warm and smelled of fresh-cut meadows.
Are we almost there?The words stuck in her throat. Partly because she didn’t know wheretherewas or what would happen when they arrived. Where was he taking them? What would happen to her reputation when word spread about her reckless journey on horseback with an unwed gentleman?
She clenched her teeth to keep them from chattering. This was ridiculous. That she should be cold like this and that she should be worried about rumors when she had narrowly escaped with her life.
A life she owed to Lord Livingstone.
Whether she liked the thought or not.
