The Runaway Countess
Read The Runaway Countess Online
Authors: Leigh Lavalle
Tags: #Fiction, #Romance, #Historical, #General
Table of Contents
Dedication
For my mom, whose laughter echoes across the sky. I miss you.
I am deeply grateful for my critique partners, Carey Baldwin and Lori Brighton, who offered encouragement and advice. Mirth, sorrow and too many adverbs make for remarkable friendships.
Tessa Dare, Courtney Milan, Jackie Barbosa, Beverley Kendall and Tiffany Clare for reading various portions of the manuscript. I am honored to know such a talented, generous and fun group of women.
My agent, Nalini Akolekar, is a wonderful island of sanity amid my artistic angst. Thank you for everything you do.
Deena, for babysitting, cocktails and dreaming the dream with me.
Blythe, for love beyond measure.
Last but never least, Fred, who always believed in me. I love you.
“Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall.” Shakespeare
Nottinghamshire, June, 1821.
It wasn’t as if she enjoyed stealing from people. It wasn’t as if she took some private pleasure in punishing them. In a world of her design there would be no need for retribution. But it was a capricious world with no judicious captain at the fore, and she could but hold fast to her convictions.
Mazie Chetwyn pressed her forehead against the sole window in her garret prison. She hardly noticed the relief of cool glass against heated skin. Her every thought was centered on the man galloping up the drive, his greatcoat billowing out behind him and his hat tilted against the afternoon downpour. She could not see his face, did not recognize him by horse or style. She knew him by his fury. He rode as if the hounds of hell were slavering at his heels.
Lord Radford had finally come.
Furious as the pelting rain, he galloped past the towering oaks, past the rows of tulips and past the fountain. Mazie’s heart hammered in her chest with the same urgency as the pounding hooves.
It was done, then. Her captor was here.
Radford pulled his mount to a stop in front of the wide marble steps and jumped down. Mazie flattened her bruised cheek against the chilled windowpane and watched him toss the reins to a footman then refuse the umbrella, his arms sweeping this way and that. What was he saying? Her attic window remained stubbornly closed.
Then he disappeared into the house.
Her heart stopped—everything froze—then resumed again with a firmer stroke and beat. Would he come up here, to her garret prison? Would he rant and rave as Harrington had? Would he hit her as Harrington had?
She paced away from the window and combed her hair with trembling fingers. Radford was dangerous and beyond the reach of the law. To him, she was a nobody, an expendable inconvenience. He would get what he wanted from her, then send her to London to be hanged, proof that he was a great Lord Lieutenant.
But there was still hope. There was always hope.
She hastily braided her dark hair and looked around the room for…anything. A weapon, a prop, a diversion. There was nothing. The room was bare save a dresser with a washing bowl and a small nub of a candle, a narrow bed, a scarred desk and a chair in front of a cold fireplace.
A man’s voice rumbled through the wood floor like distant thunder and sent ripples of fear through her belly. He was coming up the servants’ stairs, biting out something about weapons and horses and lists. A space of quiet followed, and she pressed her ear to the door. Someone must have replied, and now he was on again about riding out in the morning. He would gather a militia, then. Search for Roane with an untried gathering of men, each one eager to shoot the famed highwayman and collect the reward.
Radford’s footsteps were heavier now, echoing down the hallway outside her door. He wasted no time in coming to see her. She rushed to the chair, grasped her shaking hands together in her lap and cast her gaze to the floor.
Meek. She would play meek.
She would absorb all his barbed anger and give him nothing to fight against. She would be honey and molasses, everything sweet and slow.
A lock scraped open and Radford filled the doorway, all broad shoulders and dark mood. He brought the mud and rain with him on his clothes.
From the corner of her vision, Mazie watched him step into her room and close the door. He studied her for a long moment. “Miss Mazie, I presume.”
She let her feet shift nervously on the floor but did not move her eyes. “Yes, my lord.”
He walked closer. His muddied boots reached up to his knees and gave way to powerful thighs. He was strong, of a physical nature. “I’ve been dragged all the way from London for this unfortunate bit of business.” Low and firm, his voice played across her nerves like drums before a battle. “My magistrate Harrington tells me you have refused to assist our investigation into the Midnight Rider.”
She lifted her chin and looked up at him, let her expression be round and guileless. She was everything worried and intimidated.
His frown cut deep groves into his otherwise handsome face. The years had changed him, enough that she wouldn’t have recognized him passing by on the street. Gone was the distracted young man she remembered, replaced by sharp angles, dark hollows and glittering grey eyes entirely too piercing for her comfort. His damp hair—almost black in the wan light—let go of a drop of rain. He swiped it away with a rough hand. “It is unfortunate that your reticence is my inconvenience, Miss Mazie.”
He had come to drag the information from her. Of course he had. She had to wonder at the tactics he would use, how far he would push. She slumped in her chair, giving the impression that he need not try hard at all. “I do not wish to be difficult, my lord.”
He circled her chair and his muddy boots brushed her skirts. It did not matter. Her dress had been ruined days ago.
“The highwayman will be hanged for acts of treason.” He stopped behind her, and the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end. She should have known better than to leave the chair in the middle of the room. “You do understand the danger you are in?”
“Yes.” She whispered the word. It was not hard to fake her fear.
Radford did not say anything more. He would wait to see what she did next, give her space to expose something about herself.
She played into his hands. Stood, as if uncomfortable with him behind her—which she was—and smoothed her sweating palms over her coarse black skirts.
He reached across the chair. “What’s this?”
Touch. He was touching her face. Rage jolted to her fingertips. She almost betrayed herself by lashing out.
Not now, Mazie. Wait.
Digging her fingernails into her palms, she let him turn her face to the window and examine the bruise on her cheek and cut on her lip.
“Who hit you?” he demanded.
She did not reply. She wouldn’t be able to say anything without revealing the depth of her fury. Harrington would pay for his cruelty, not only to her but to others in the village. For now, she concentrated on being fluid like melting snow, and not the blaze of fire she wanted to be.
Radford’s grey eyes scrutinized her. The hot stroke of his attention was everywhere on her skin, from her face down to her bare feet. She would not let herself worry. He would not recognize her. Placing her in that very different context—the context of her past life—would make matters even worse. She would push the thought aside.
She shifted her gaze to the slide of raindrops down the windowpane. Radford smelled of the rain, she noticed. The out-of-doors clung to his skin, as did the sweet scent of wet horse and wet wool. And something else, the musk only a man has after a day of physical exertion.
“You have the look of a Frenchwoman.” Still, he touched her. Held her face in his hand. “Where are you from?”
“I was born in England.” She modulated her words to be perfect, sloppy English. Nothing of her maman and her delicious French accent remained.
Finally, he let go of her chin. He paced to the door and she thought he might leave, but he simply opened it and instructed the footman to go to the kitchens and fetch a salve for her cut.
That, she had not expected.
Whether it was a kindness or a strategy on his part, she did not care. His misjudgment would be her gain. In three days, never had her door been without an armed guard. Radford exposed himself in a dangerous way—one she would take advantage of.
He turned back to her, his face set in hard edges—square jaw, sharp cheekbones and slash of brow. Yes, he looked different than she remembered. His handsomeness had power behind it now. “My dear woman, you will fare much worse in prison. Tell me what I want to know and perhaps I could be persuaded to view your crimes with leniency.”
“I-I,”
Meek, Mazie. Softer
. She lowered her voice. “I would like to assist your investigation, my lord.”
“A wise choice. I am glad we shall play this out the easy way.” He leaned back against the wall, his eyes narrowed on her. She knew what he was thinking, his wariness spoke volumes. Harrington would have told him she was a hellion, “all spit and fire” he’d called her. And she was. That Radford watched her with such consideration heartened her. She must be playing her role well.
“The hard way is much more unpleasant,” he warned.
“I regret my earlier defiance against Mr. Harrington, and I…I thank you for offering me protection. He explained it was your choice to hold me here rather than at Radford gaol.” She wrapped her arms around her waist and hunched her shoulders. Inside, she was fair to bursting with anticipation.
She had but one chance. She must play it out to perfection.
A knock sounded and Radford opened the door, took the salve.
“I am desperately hungry.” Her voice shook with nerves. He would assume it was fear. “And some tea.”
Radford paused for a moment, and she feared he would refuse.
“Something to eat for the woman.” He closed the door, walked across the small room and offered her the jar of salve. “For your lip.”
He motioned for her to take it, and she flinched as if frightened.
“I won’t bite,” he said on a long breath.
Mazie stepped forward and took the jar from his hand. Her fingers brushed his palm, such a large and warm hand. It would make a heavy fist.
Don’t think on it.
The salve smelled of calendula and comfrey, and she smoothed some on her lip. Radford watched her as she gently dabbed the bruise and cut at the corner of her mouth.
She was close enough now. She would hit him once, as Roane had taught her. A strong, flat hand to the underside of his jaw, hard enough to stun him, incapacitate him.
His head would snap back. Maybe it would hit the wall. Maybe it would make a sound. She should be prepared for such unpleasantness.
Her heartbeat thundered. She needed to stop thinking and just do it already. She lowered her hand and his eyes jerked to hers, gauging her.
He was too alert, and she was too nervous. She must stop trembling. She must distract him. She must remember he would hang her. He would hang Roane.
Mazie slid her finger over her lower lip as she had seen the barmaids do. She had no idea if her gaoler would be so easily diverted. But, well, he was a
man
.