At the end of the street, they turned another corner, ran a few seconds more, and then climbed four steps and stopped in front of tall double doors with large iron handles. Hawk pulled on one of them. It didn’t open. He yanked on the other door. It didn’t budge, either.
“Damnation,” he muttered softly, and hit the door with the heel of his palm.
“What is it?” she asked, her chest heaving hard from the running, and her whole body shivering from the wet and cold.
“It’s locked,” he answered on a heavy breath.
Loretta pushed the hood farther up her head so she could see. She still hadn’t caught her breath, but managed to ask “Where are we?”
“At a church.”
“Church?” She choked out the word. She hadn’t been to a church since she left Viscount Denningcourt standing at the altar waiting for her to join him to say their nuptials. A nervous jerk shook her. “Why are we here?”
“You’ll see,” he said, looking from one side of the building to the other. “Keep your hood on and stay here.” He turned away.
She caught his arm. “No, wait. You can’t leave me here.”
Hawk put his hand over hers that held on to his arm. “I’ll be right back.”
Fighting to control her wildly beating heart, calm her breath, and make sense of this, she tightened her hold on Hawk’s arm and stayed him. “Where are you going?”
“To find a window at the back to break and crawl inside. I’ll come around to the door, unlock it, and let you inside.”
“Hawk!” she exclaimed in a hushed whisper, shivering all the more. “You can’t do that.”
“I can. When the hell did they start locking the doors of a church?” He glanced at her. “Sorry about the disrespectful language, but just how are people to get in when they need to?”
Startled by his intense exasperation, she offered, “They wait until morning when the doors are open to all.”
“I’m not waiting.”
“You can’t break into a church,” she said in horror at what he’d planned. “Have you gone mad?”
“No,” he said as calmly as if he’d been talking about the weather as he again looked down one side of the building and then the other. “I’ve finally figured out what you need to do and I intend to see that it’s done now.”
“I do notneedto break into a church!” she said as loudly and earnestly as she dared.
“You’re not. I am. Now stay right here in front of the door.”
Loretta watched, stunned, as Hawk ran down the side of the building and disappeared around the corner. Was he actually going to shatter a window in a church? Moments later, she heard glass crack and fall to the ground.
She gasped.
He really meant it.
She heard a carriage in the distance and quickly turned and put her face to the door, hoping that with the misting rain, the driver wouldn’t notice anyone was standing in front of the church—that had just been broken into! The wind howled and rattled signs, streetlamps, and rooftops. Loretta’s toes started going numb again. She felt as cold as ice that collected on the outside of windowpanes during the deepest onset of winter.
It seemed like hours that Hawk had been gone and longer still before the carriage passed without anyone calling out to her. She kept her body still and faced toward the massive door until finally she heard the latch thrown from inside. Her body trembled with relief. The door creaked open, and Hawk gently pulled her inside.
It was dark. Cold. All she heard were their loud breaths.At first she saw nothing, but then down toward the front, a single small, lamp burned low on a table.
“Don’t be afraid. I’ve checked. There’s no one here.” He took her hand and they walked down the aisle toward the light.
She couldn’t say she wasn’t wary. She was. A church wasn’t a place she’d planned to ever go again. Her last experience in one had not turned out well. She didn’t know what Hawk was planning to do; but in her heart of hearts, she knew she wasn’t afraid. Whatever he had in mind, if he was by her side, she had no fear.
They stopped in front of the lamp and Hawk lowered the hood from her hair. He smiled and said, “You’re wet.”
She smiled, too. “So are you. You didn’t even have a cloak. And what happened to your hat?”
