Page 15 of The Rogue and the Viscountess

As if he meant to turn her over to this baronet person and leave her at the mercy of a man she didn’t know and whom she must depend on to protect her from a notorious criminal. Where did he plan to take himself off to, once he’d discharged his duties of kidnapping and delivery?

“And here’s Easton Inn, where Morys found me.” They passed another building made of the stone that seemed to constitute every structure hereabouts. It was almost unbearably quaint.

The countryside was fresh and lovely, an unspoiled view in every direction. The air was clear of smoke and soot from coal fires. Sheep and cattle dotted pastures threaded with wildflowers, while in distant fields farmers moved down rows of crops, harvesting. One smelled the earth itself, rich and whole and giving. And with the number of great houses about, and the nearness to towns, there would be company. One wouldn’t be stranded alone, with no amusements.

Good heavens, she mustn’t fall in love with the place. Not when she’d been brought here as a hostage. Was she forgetting she’d been abducted?

“And this is Rowan Hill.” Pride entered her companion’s voice, as if he had a personal interest in the place. Prunella steeled her heart. He was her kidnapper. She wouldn’t give him the least opportunity to please her.

They passed over a small stream, the bridge little more than a few planks laid on moorings, and he turned down a packed dirt drive lined with rowan trees. The bright green leaves dripped with crimson berries, and birds took flight with a rush of wings that sounded nearly like the opening notes of a symphony. Prunella forgot her heart was steel and gasped.

The house was lovely.

The stone dressing of the front façade shone in the afternoon light, the pale yellow of fresh butter. It was built like the others had been, a rectangle of two stories with a hipped roof, but this was somehow more. The front door stood snug beneath a central porch with a small pediment and column pilasters, like the entrance to an antique temple.

Tall paned windows fanned along the front, each set in a carved sill, the ones of the first floor cupped with delicate iron flower balconies. A parapet hid the roof, but as they neared she saw the wings stretching toward the back, with the roofs of outbuildings visible. And all was set within the most astonishing gardens, rows and regiments of blooms in every possible hue.

“Ye want to sit a minute more? Or shall I help you down, lady?”

Pete’s voice at her elbow was amused, but also satisfied. Prunella blinked away the spell that had fallen over her at the sight of the house. He’d dismounted the gig and come round to help her down, and she hadn’t noticed. The horse turned its head to give her a look that might be inquiring or reproachful, wondering when his work would be done and he could be released from harness to his stable and his oats.

“It’s—you mean to hold me prisoner here?” She leaned toward him, and only when he’d lifted her down did Prunella realize the ease with which he accomplished the move. He didn’t flinch, or stagger, or grunt, because he was twice as solid as she was.

“Don’t think of it as prisoner. Think of yourself as an honored guest.”

Now he sounded embarrassed. At last, a touch of shame at his boldness.

Yet, all said and done, she’d much rather be kidnapped and conveyed to a stately home in the country than to a pitching ship on a tidal river with a storm rolling in from the bay.

“I won’t be a prisoner,” Prunella said. But her protest was as weak as when she told Lydia she’d really rather not drop in on the third party of an evening, and Lydia overruled her, as Lydia always did.

Morys hopped down from the luggage platform and patted her trunk. “Then off with ye. We’ll put ye on the road to Chippenham, and the Black Hound’ll send someone else to take ye when I don’t do the job.”

Prunella glared down at him. “How do I know you don’t intend to turn me over anyway?”

He put his hands on his hips and glared back. “Why would we go to all this trouble to bring ye here? And introduce ye to her ladyship?”

Prunella sniffed. “I don’t know the least thing about how the criminal mind works.”

Pete plucked her heavy trunk from the platform as easily as a blacksmith hefting a hammer. “Iffen ye don’t like it…”

He trailed off, looking baffled. It was an endearing look, big as he was. She wanted to pat his cheek.

She kept her hands firmly grasped around her reticule as he headed toward the front porch, Morys in their wake. Two grooms trotted out to take the horse and carriage. Almost as if they’d been expected.

One astonishing, wonderful thought rose above all the rest of her apprehension and curiosity as Pete, without knocking, opened the door.

No one knew where in the world she was except these two men.

She was apparently to hide from a criminal who wanted to kidnap and extort money from her, and she was expected to stay here, in this lovely home set in an idyllic garden and the most unbearably pretty countryside she’d ever seen in her life.

Lydia would worry, but Lydia would have to wait.

Prunella would not have to return to Lydia, or London, for a good long while.

Chapter Four

She was in his house. And he would get to keep her for an indefinite period of time.