Slade immediately released her and took two steps back.
“I would never cause you harm, Fifi. The very idea offends me,” he said, unable to account for anything at the moment.
He’d never given her any reason to be afraid of him, mistrust him—why on earth would she be terrified of him?
Her subsequent grin was void of any mirth whatsoever as she wagged the dagger at him, as if he’d been a disobedient pupil and she his reprimanding tutor.
“You are never to enter this chamber again.” Her nostrils flared and her breathing audible.
“Even if you are in need of assistance?” he asked.
“I don’t require the type of assistance you are offering,” she spat.
And what type was she referring to? Wasn’t she the one who’d come to him at five in the morning in need of help? But now seemed an imprudent time to discuss the type of help sheneeded or the type of help she imagined he was offering. He bent down to retrieve the clothes he’d dropped on the floor and deposited them on the bed.
She gripped the weapon like a shield in front of her as she marched towards the door and held it wide open. She was being exceedingly dramatic, like the day at Hortons shooting range, the first day in Bolingbroke’s gardens and even the day of the jewelers. But tonight she’d been through a taxing ordeal at the manor, and her childhood friend had just been about to kiss her and not in a friend-like way.
Slade exhaled audibly. Amiable Peter had told Fifi she could trust Slade with her life, but could she trust him with her virtue?
Fifi eyed him, then pointed to the doorway.
“I’d like you to leave now.”
“There’s food and drink in the kitchen if you are hungry. Take anything you wish,” he said, before exiting her bedchamber.
The door bolted loudly behind him.
CHAPTER 19
Phoebe’s hands shook so violently she nicked her thigh three times before managing to tuck the dagger back into the leather garter belt. The defeated energy spiraling through her chilled her to the bones. The only explanation for her reaction was, she was damaged. Ross had damaged her. The hard, shocked expression on Slade’s exquisite features replayed in her mind over and over sending an invisible razor-sharp knife through her heart. She slammed her eyes shut, palmed her face, and dropped onto the bed’s edge. A sob of unmitigated misery and regret escaped her mouth before she clamped her lips shut, changing the sound to a whimper.
Mind-numbing panic and bone-chilling fear had caused her to overreact. Again. She understood the look of a man who wanted her. But she’d never seen it with such intensity on a cherished face like Slade’s. She’d only seen it twisted with malevolence on Ross’s face and on a few fleeting strangers of no consequence like Bolingbroke.
Had bone-gnawing exhaustion caused her to lose her mind? Had it caused her to reveal to Slade the English plan to use violence in enforcing the abolition of Heritable Jurisdictions Act? Perhaps. But the honest truth was she trusted Slade neverto betray her confidence, despite her body being unsettled around him. Then there was that hatred she sensed in him when he spoke the name Bolingbroke. She trusted that above all else. Besides, the MacLeans were friends of the Dunbars. When she related the English’s latest plans to her father, he would warn the MacLeans and many others in the Highlands.
This thought lingered on her mind as exhaustion took over and she surrendered to a restless sleep.
Hours later, Phoebe faced the small, square mirror on the oak dressing stand in her bedchamber. She gasped at how Slade’s breeches accentuated the curves of her hips. Utterly inappropriate. And there was no place to conceal the dagger. She couldn’t possibly make a trip to the Royal Mail to send a missive to her mother or a coded note to Falcon looking like this!
An awareness pulsated through her at the crispness of the material touching her body, because it had touched his. She imagined she could smell his scent, clean with a hint of cloves and male surrounding her, making her insides liquid. An image of Slade’s rumpled hair, lean, muscled torso, and bronze skin from earlier made her skin flush and breath ragged. He was perfect, with a torso like Michelangelo’sDavid.The ink mark on his right bicep in the shape of a dark coiling viper had added an air of raw, unbridled danger, so shockingly different from the amiable lad she’d known in her childhood.
Should she have gone to Aunt Penelope or to the Movement instead of coming to him? Those distances were far greater. And her aunt would have thrown a conniption at her state of dress. Falcon had saidImpromptu and direct contact for people in our line of work is unwise.That had left one remaining alternative.
When a creaking sounded from the front door to the lodge Phoebe stilled.
“Hello! Mistress Dunbar?”
Phoebe’s head perked up. The woman’s voice was almost musical. Phoebe exited the chamber and darted out towards the receiving area of the lodge.
She was greeted by a smiling, comely, round-faced young woman, dressed in a fashionable coral and rose colored open-frontcontouchegown, revealing a decorative stomacher and petticoat. It was finished off with scalloped ruffles, trimmed elbow-length sleeves and separateengageantes.How impractical for a lodge. The exotic feathers on the woman’s extravagantbergèrehat looked about to take flight.
Phoebe stared at the woman before finding her voice. “Hello, I am Phoebe Dunbar.”
“Oh, you poor dear. You poor, poor dear. When Peter told me of your ordeal I had to come. I am Lucia Horton,” the other woman said.
Phoebe’s lips stretched into a smile at Peter’s wife. Lucia Horton’s gaze became purposeful with a downturned mouth, as if looking at a little bird with broken wings. Phoebe’s appearance must appear pitiful to someone as formally attired as Mistress Horton.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mistress Horton. Peter couldn’t stop singing your praises,” Phoebe said.
