“So now I have to enter a dungeon?”
Truly, the indignities of Parkhorne Hall had no end.
“It is not really much of a dungeon.It’s more of a room underneath the house.Come.”
Scarlett swallowed hard.She didn’t care for cramped spaces herself.It had taken her time to adjust to traveling in a carriage, although it did not bother her now.
But she wasn’t about to show her consternation to this man.
They walked in silence back toward the house.They entered through the back and then he opened a door that led to a stairwell.He led her down a staircase, past the levels of the kitchens, and then one level lower.It was merely a corridor with a low ceiling.
He gestured for her to go first, and she did so.
But her heart was beating wildly.
She hated leaving the wide world and the sunshine above.
“It’s the last door to the left,” he said from behind.His body felt even bigger in the cramped space.
She grabbed for the nearest door and opened it.
“No, Scarlett.”
She barreled into the small space, which was pitch-dark, and smacked against something hard.
She let out a scream.The space was her worst nightmare.Small, dark, cramped.Like a tomb.A coffin.
She heard a slam and then, in a moment, strong arms closed around her.“I’ve got you,” Malcolm said into her ear.“You’re fine.”
“Let me go,” she said, but her voice sounded unconvincing, even to her own ears.
“I’ll do that when you stop shaking.”
Of course, she knew that he had held her in an even more intimate embrace, which made this one feel positively chaste by comparison.
“I am fine,” she croaked.“I merely abhor small spaces.”
“You should have told me.I wouldn’t have led us down here, for Christ’s sake.Come, let’s go.”
She realized that this space was so cramped that they could barely stand apart.It was filled, it appeared, once her eyes had adjusted, with various types of broken furniture.
He let out a heavy sigh into the dark.
“What?”she asked, his arm still around her.
“This door.Sometimes it sticks.”
He rattled it, but it was a heavy, old door.When he shook the handle, it didn’t budge.
“We’re trapped?”
“Someone will be down shortly.My brothers will know that Beatrice refers to the dungeon in her ridiculous hunt.”
“We’re trapped,” she repeated, unable to believe it.
“Don’t fret.”
“Don’t fret!Are you mad?”Scarlett cursed the day she ever set eyes on Parkhorne Hall.
