Chapter Twenty-Eight
Immediately, Rose yanked the sack from her head and gasped at the impermeable darkness surrounding her. There was not a ray of light anywhere. She didn’t feel brave enough to stand up, so she crawled in the direction from which she thought she’d entered — hopefully, toward the door. Perhaps her abductor had gone to get a rope to secure her hands and feet and would return momentarily.
Suddenly, all of Finn’s warnings became very real. She’d been foolish to come to the shipyard.
Crawling forward slowly, hampered by her skirt which kept getting caught under her knees, Rose eventually reached out and touched a wall, cool and firm.Unfortunately,not a door. Working her way up the wall, using her hands to inch higher and higher, eventually she stood upright.
Her pulse slowed a little from gaining her new vantage point. Whatever it was, it was preferable to being in the middle of the enclosure and not knowing what was beside her.
All at once, she heard a sound, a scraping of heels on the floor, down to her left and not too far away. She wasn’t alone. Perhaps that should have calmed her. Instead, it terrified her.
Friend or foe? Man or beast?
Of course not a beast, she scolded her wildly running thoughts,and if not a friend, at least a co-prisoner so certainly not a foe.
“Hello,” she said into the pitch black, her voice coming out in a raspy whisper. She cleared her throat and tried again. “Is someone there?”
“Mmph,” she heard. Someone was trying to speak but couldn’t. Then more scraping sounds and frantic movements came out of the darkness.
“I know you’re there and restrained,” she said as calmly as she could. “I shall come to you.”
With her heart pounding again, she shuffled slowly in the direction of the noise, keeping one hand on the brick wall beside her. Then something touched her head, and she shrieked, ducking and waving her hands above her head. Immediately, she thought of bats and other creepy creatures, yet her hands touched only ropes hanging.
Still, it unnerved her that something might sweep across her face, so she got down on her hands and knees once more and crawled toward the noises.
“It was nothing,” she said, speaking to whomever she was approaching, the sound of her own voice keeping her calm. “Only a rope touched me.”
“Mmph,” came again, closer this time.
Reaching out a hand, Rose touched a booted foot, then another. She ran her hands up the legs, man’s legs, realizing they were bound with rope, tied together securely. She didn’t hesitate in moving closer, feeling her way up to someone sitting, leaning back against the wall, her fingers on his stomach and chest before finally brushing across a mouth bound by a rag. This, she untied, already knowing who it was.
Rose tugged off the gag and ran her fingers over Finn’s cheeks.
“Are you hurt?” she asked, nearly kissing him, so glad was she to not be alone in the darkness.
“Just my pride,” he said, his face inches from hers and utterly invisible. “Are you?”
She shook her head then realized he couldn’t see her response.
“No, only frightened half to death. Who did this?”
“I don’t know. Gilbert, most likely. Quickly, please. My hands are tied behind my back. See if you can work the knots loose. And hurry. I have no idea how long we have, but we don’t want to be here when whoever locked us in returns.”
“What is happening?” Rose asked, working as quickly as she could in the dark to free his hands.
“I’ll explain when we’re somewhere safe. Tell me how you came to be here.”
“I came looking for you,” she said, hearing him swear softly at her admission.
“God, I wish you hadn’t.”
She started to bristle at his words, pausing in her actions, and he urged her to concentrate.
“Come on, love, keep at it. I only meant that I thought you were safely far from here.”
Rose continued to struggle with the knots at his wrists. They were expertly tied as only a seaman could do. Eventually, however, she worked them loose though it seemed like hours had passed when she finally managed to free his hands.
Even in the dark, Finn made quick work of the rest of his bindings around his legs, while she pressed her hands against the firm brick and slowly stood up once again. Tentatively, she made her way along the wall at his back, seeking a door.
