“I am coming.” She tried to look defiant but spoiled it by shivering.
“Be reasonable.”
“We are wasting time. My lord, if I may take your horse?”
Will looked from Forrest to Ruby after she’d addressed him.
“She can get you there quicker and likely knows the house’s layout, Howarth. Plus, Miss Knight is correct, if there are others, they will feel more comfortable with her.” He then grabbed her around the waist and threw her up onto his saddle.
“Godspeed,” the duke said. Will climbed up on the seat beside his brother. Nathan helped Miss Khatri into the carriage, then shut the door behind him.
“Veritas scutumtibi erit,” Gabe said.
“Veritas scutumtibi erit,” the brothers replied before urging the carriage on.
Forrest mounted his horse and then drew beside Ruby.
“I am coming.” She raised her chin.
“I can see that.” He shrugged out of his coat and wrapped it around her like a cloak. Forrest tied the arms around her neck so it would stay in place. She looked like a child in a blanket.
“I have a pistol and a knife,” she said.
“I can barely contain my pleasure,” he muttered.
They rode back the way she had come.
“Stay vigilant,” Gabe said. “They will know Ruby and the women have escaped.”
“Tell us what happened and what the place you were held in was like, Ruby,” Nathan said. They were now walking back into the hell she’d just escaped from. He also knew what Will had said was right. She could lead them inside.
“I was drugged to keep me silent, and when I woke, I was forced to take laudanum.”
“Someone drugged you!”
“Forrest,” Gabe said patiently. “I’m sure that is just the beginning. Stop interrupting. She is alive and well and safe with us.”
He snapped his teeth together. Someone was going to pay for what she’d been through.
“So, you spat some of it out?” Zach asked.
“Yes. Then when I woke, I searched the room for a weapon. There was a wood-paneled wall. It was my hope some of that would come loose.”
He shook his head many times by the end of her story. At any moment she could have been found and hurt. Taken from him. He’d not known her long, but the thought of life without her was something he could not and would not contemplate.
“You are a courageous woman, Ruby Knight,” Nathan said.
Forrest couldn’t speak because rage was strangling him; he could, however, reach out and run his hand down her back.
“I love you.” He leaned in to whisper in her ear.
“And I you.”
“Do not do anything unless we tell you to,” he added. She didn’t reply.
“Adam and Ella are well?”
“They are. Of course, they are both worried for you, but are well.”
