“You’ve decided to behave,” the man said. “Pity. I would enjoy teaching you a few tricks about how to treat a fellow.”
She wanted to jump up and bang on the window to alert Hart, but she couldn’t see where he was. Suddenly, a thud and anoomphcame from the front of the carriage. The horses lurched and whinnied.
“Eh, what was that?” The rogue opened the door and leaned out.
Thrilled, her stomach fluttering with nerves, Maddie watched Hart drag her jailer out of the carriage. A fist to the man’s jaw sent him reeling back, but the rogue merely staggered and came at Hart with a knife in his hand. Sneering, he waved the blade about. As he lunged, Hart stepped aside and chopped the back of the man’s neck with the side of his hand. He went down like a stone and lay still.
Her rescuer looked remarkably unruffled as he turned to her and held out his hand. “Maddie. Are you all right?”
“I am now,” Maddie said with a faint smile. She put her foot on the step and fell into his arms. “I’ve hurt my knee.” She leaned into him, enjoying his clean, masculine smell and his reassuring strength. So welcome after those who held her captive. Her bonnet hanging by its strings, she gazed up at him dizzily with the urge to laugh.
“We’ll have your knee attended to.” He scooped her up in his arms and carried her toward his curricle just as a smart landau swept by. Three ladies in flowery hats stared back at them. They turned and watched until the vehicle disappeared around the corner.
“The doyens of Bath.” Maddie still trembled as she held onto a solid, muscled shoulder. “Gossip will be everywhere before nightfall.”
Hart settled her in the curricle. “They don’t know who you are.”
She sank back against the seat with a relieved sigh. “They would. I visited my aunt frequently with my mother. We took the waters and went to the theater…and attended…”
“Let them.” Hart untied the reins and leaped aboard the curricle. “Did these men cause you to run away?”
“Yes, they came up to my bedchamber in the night. I was frightened.”
Hart scowled. “I wish I’d known that. They wouldn’t have gotten off so lightly.”
She very much doubted they had. The crumpled, dark-haired man lay like a bundle of dirty washing when they passed him.
He set the curricle in motion. “Shall I take you back to your aunt’s home?” he asked, pulling her back to reality. Her newfound energy at just being with him drained away. What could she do now?
“Yes please, I must get my maid, Jane, who waits for me there. I’m sorry to be such a nuisance.” She glanced at him. “Why are you here? This cannot be a coincidence.”
“When I heard you’d run off with your maid, I came after you.”
“I didn’t just run off, I began to doubt my safety from my uncle’s men. Why did you come after me?”
“Why?” He hesitated. “Because I thought you’d need help. It’s what any decent man would do. And I’m dashed glad I did.”
He made her sound like a flibbertigibbet, an expression Jane used. A helpless woman and a dreadful burden. Despite the thrill at seeing her handsome rescuer make short work of disabling her uncle’s men when she had little chance of escaping, she wished to reassure him she was ordinarily quite capable. “You doubted I could get myself to Bath? I am in Bath, am I not?”
He turned to her, one eyebrow raised. “Maddie. You need my help, don’t you?”
She sighed and rubbed her sore knee through her skirt, a little ashamed at how ungrateful she sounded. “I do. I am indebted to you, Hart.” She sighed again. “If you’ll return me to Jane, we will leave Bath on the next stage. My nanny will take me in.”
“She won’t. When I saw her, she was about to leave to visit her brother.”
“You went to see Nanny?”
“I did. Gracious lady.”
She stared at him. “How did you know about her?”
“The groom, Henry, told me.”
“Oh, yes, of course.” She frowned. “I hope Henry can look after Pearl.”
“He will. He seems a decent enough fellow.”
“Henry is. But I would prefer neither he nor my horse were there.”
