Chapter One

 

 

“Will you be having supper, sir? The wife’s made a lamb stew which is quite good, if I might say so myself.”

James Dickens, the sixth Duke of Ravenshire, looked up from his book long enough to decline with a small shake of his head. “Just the whiskey. Thank you.”

The innkeeper retreated, and James was left alone with his glass, his philosophy, and the uncomfortable awareness that he was behaving like a petulant child.

He was hiding. There was no dignified way to frame it. One of the most powerful men in England was hiding in a country inn with a storm gathering strength outside, reading philosophy because if one was going to flee one’s responsibilities like a coward, one might as well be philosophical about it.

The Red Fox Inn was not the sort of establishment where dukes typically sought refuge. It was small, worn and aggressively rustic. The floorboards creaked, the fire smoked and the whiskey was serviceable rather than exceptional.

James found it oddly comforting.

Here, no one knew him. The innkeeper had called him “sir” and offered him lamb stew with the easy familiarity of a man who treated all his customers the same. No bowing. No scraping. No mental calculations about his annual income.

It was the closest thing to freedom he had experienced in years.

“You must marry, James,” his aunt’s voice echoed in his memory. “I have arranged a house gathering. Seven young ladies of excellent breeding. Surely one of them will suit.”

Seven. She had invited seven eligible women to his own home, and when James had pointed out that he had no desire to be paraded before hopeful debutantes like a prize stallion, she had simply smiled and said:

“Then you should not have remained unmarried so long that desperate measures became necessary.”

He had left before dawn. Cowardly? Undoubtedly. But James had discovered, somewhere around his twenty-eighth year, that he would rather be a coward than a husband.

Outside, the wind rattled the windows. A storm was coming—the worst in years, they said. Good, he thought, let the roads be impassable. Let his aunt’s search parties fail to find him.

Cold, people called him. Distant. Reserved.

One young lady had informed her mother, in carrying tones, that conversing with the Duke of Ravenshire was “like speaking to a particularly well-dressed wardrobe.”

James had not been offended. He had found the comparison rather apt.

He turned a page of his book without reading it. “Some things are in our control and others not.” He had written in the margin, years ago: How do I want less when I have been given everything?

The question remained unanswered.

Rain lashed the windows now, savage and relentless. The common room had emptied, other travelers retreating to their rooms. Only James remained, watching the fire burn low and thinking about the life waiting for him when this storm passed.

The sort of night, he thought with grim amusement, that seemed designed for dramatic entrances. The kind of weather novelists invented to bring characters together; storms that stranded strangers at remote inns, forcing proximity and conversation and all the things James spent his life avoiding.

Fortunately, real life was not a novel.

Nothing dramatic was going to happen tonight.

 

***

 

“You cannot be serious.”

Miss Emilia Fairborne stared at the rain-battered window of the hired carriage, watching the world dissolve into grey chaos, and decided that indeed, actually, she was entirely serious. Serious enough to have climbed out of her bedroom window in her wedding gown. Serious enough to have bribed a coachman with her mother’s pearl earrings. Serious enough to be hurtling through the English countryside toward absolutely nowhere in particular while the storm of the century attempted to rip the roof from the carriage.

“Completely serious,” she said aloud, to no one.

The carriage lurched violently. Emilia grabbed the strap above her head and held on as the vehicle groaned in protest against the howling wind.

Perhaps she should have waited for better weather. Perhaps she should have packed a valise. Perhaps she should have done any number of sensible things that sensible ladies did when fleeing their own weddings.

But sensible ladies did not flee their own weddings.

Sensible ladies smiled prettily and said “I do” and spent the next forty years discussing crop rotation with men who thought the height of wit was commenting on the weather.

Emilia had sat through three dinners with Mr. Harold Pemberton. Three interminable, excruciating dinners during which he had expounded upon the following topics: the proper drainage of his Sussex estate, the unfortunate state of his Sussex estate’s chimneys, and in what he clearly considered a daring conversational pivot, the promising state of his Sussex estate’s sheep.

The sheep had been the final straw.

Not because Emilia disliked sheep. She was, in fact, perfectly neutral on the subject of sheep. But when a man spent forty-five minutes describing the wool quality of his flock while his intended bride sat across from him in a gown specifically designed to display her décolletage to its best advantage, and he did not once glance below her chin…

Well.

A woman could only take so much.

“I am not unreasonable,” Emilia announced to the empty carriage, the words swallowed by the roar of rain against the roof. “I did not require passion. I did not require poetry. I merely required…”

The carriage hit something. A rut, perhaps, or a rock, or possibly a small mountain. Emilia was thrown sideways, her shoulder connecting painfully with the wall, and then the whole vehicle tilted at an angle that vehicles were decidedly not meant to tilt.

“Oh no,” she whispered.

There was a terrible sound. And then, with the sort of dramatic timing that suggested the universe had a deeply theatrical sense of humor, the carriage gave up entirely.

Emilia found herself sprawled across what had been the ceiling but was now something closer to the floor, her wedding gown twisted around her legs like a silk prison, rain beginning to leak through a crack in the door.

“Wonderful,” she said flatly. “This is wonderful. This is exactly what I wanted.”

She lay there for a moment, contemplating her choices. She could stay in the ruined carriage and wait for rescue that would certainly never come. She could climb out into the storm and likely catch her death. Or she could accept that she had made a catastrophic error in judgment and that this, this sodden, bruised, utterly undignified moment, was divine punishment for the sin of wanting more from marriage than sheep facts.

The door above her wrenched open. Rain poured in, along with the round, panicked face of the coachman.

“Miss! Miss, are you injured?”

Emilia blinked up at him through the deluge. “Only my pride, Mr. Barnes. Only my pride.”

He helped her climb out of the wreckage, which proved more difficult than anticipated given that her wedding gown had apparently been designed by someone who actively hated women. By the time she stood on solid ground, if “solid” could describe mud that reached nearly to her ankles, she was soaked through, shivering, and fairly certain she had lost at least one of her slippers.

“There’s an inn,” Mr. Barnes shouted over the wind, pointing toward a dim light in the distance. “Half mile, maybe. Can you walk?”

Emilia looked down at her remaining slipper, a delicate confection of white satin now stained brown with mud. She looked at the light. She looked back at Mr. Barnes, who was already unhitching the horses with the air of a man who knew this particular adventure was not his problem.

“The wheel is cracked clean through,” he called. “It won’t be fixed tonight, not in this weather. I shall take the horses to the inn stables, find you a room…”

“I can find my own room, thank you.”

He paused, looking at her with an expression that suggested he very much doubted this claim.

Emilia straightened her spine, drew her shoulders back and lifted her chin in the manner of a woman who had been trained since birth to face adversity with grace; or at least the appearance of it.

“Half a mile, you said?”

“Thereabouts, miss.”

“Very well.” She gathered what remained of her skirts, took one step forward, and immediately sank ankle-deep in mud.

Mr. Barnes, to his credit, did not laugh. Though his mustache twitched in a way that suggested he wanted to.

“Perhaps,” Emilia said, with as much dignity as she could muster, “you might point me in the correct direction.”

 

***

 

The half mile was, Emilia became increasingly certain, a lie.

A malicious, bald-faced lie perpetuated by Mr. Barnes and his twitching mustache, possibly as revenge for the fact that she had paid him in jewelry rather than actual money.

She had been walking for an eternity. Her feet were numb. Her dress weighed approximately three rocks with all the water it had absorbed. Her carefully arranged wedding coiffure had collapsed into a sodden mess of pins and dark curls that kept sliding into her eyes, and every third step she lost a foot to the mud and had to wrench it free with a sound that was frankly obscene.

But the light was getting closer.

The inn materialized out of the darkness like a promise; low-slung and ancient, with a thatched roof that was somehow holding against the wind and a wooden sign swinging wildly above the door. The Red Fox, it proclaimed, in letters that were barely visible through the rain.

Emilia had never been so grateful for anything in her entire life.

She stumbled toward the door, pushed it open, and half-fell into the warmth beyond.

For a moment, she simply stood there, dripping onto the flagstones, water dropping from her ruined gown and a feeling of relief as the heat of the fireplace hit her frozen skin. The common room was small, dim, and nearly empty; just a handful of tables, a crackling hearth, and the lingering smell of roasted meat and wood smoke.

And one man.

He sat in the corner nearest the fire, a book open in his hands, a glass of something amber at his elbow. Dark hair, slightly too long, curling at his collar. Broad shoulders beneath a well-cut coat of deep charcoal. A profile that might have been carved from stone—strong jaw, straight nose, the shadow of stubble suggesting he had not seen a razor in at least a day.

He did not look up when she entered.

Emilia found this mildly insulting. She was, after all, making quite a dramatic entrance. A lesser man would have at least glanced.

“My goodness, miss!”

The voice came from behind the bar, where a plump woman in a white apron was staring at Emilia with undisguised horror.

“Look at the state of you! Come in, come in, get by the fire before you catch a cold.”

“I require a room,” Emilia managed, her teeth chattering. “Please. Just for the night.”

The woman’s face fell. “Oh, miss. I’m so sorry, truly I am. But we’ve only got one room left, and this gentleman, ” she gestured toward the corner, toward the broad-shouldered figure who still had not looked up from his book, “he has already taken it.”

No.

No, no, no.

This could not be happening. The universe could not possibly be this cruel.

“Perhaps there’s somewhere else?” Emilia heard herself say. “A private parlor? A storage room? I’m not particular…”

“Nothing, miss. We’re full up, what with the storm. Folk from all over seeking shelter. It’s this one room or nothing, and like I said…”

“The lady may have it.”

The voice was low. Quiet. The sort of voice that didn’t need to be raised to command attention.

Emilia turned.

The man in the corner had finally looked up from his book. His eyes met hers across the dim room, and something in her chest gave a strange, involuntary flutter.

He was handsome. Irritatingly, inconveniently handsome, in the sort of way that made rational thought difficult. Dark eyes beneath dark brows, a mouth that looked as though it had forgotten how to smile and there, running along the edge of his jaw, a thin scar that only added to the general impression of someone who had seen things, done things, been to places that respectable gentlemen were not supposed to go.

“I couldn’t possibly…” Emilia began.

“You could.” He closed his book with a soft snap. “You are soaked through, clearly exhausted, and unless I miss my guess, recently escaped from somewhere you did not wish to be.”

Emilia felt her cheeks flush despite the cold. “I beg your pardon?”

“The dress.” His gaze traveled over her slowly, as though cataloguing evidence. “White silk. Expensive. The sort of thing a woman wears to be looked at. And yet you are alone, on foot, in the middle of a storm.”

“Perhaps I simply enjoy walking in inclement weather.”

“In wedding attire?”

The flush deepened. “That is…I am not…This is entirely none of your concern, sir.”

“You’re quite right.” He rose from his chair with a fluid grace that suggested years of physical discipline. He was tall, taller than she had expected, and when he moved toward her, she had to actively resist the urge to step back. “The room is yours. I’ll make do with a chair by the fire.”

“Absolutely not.” The words came out sharper than she intended. “I am not some damsel in distress requiring rescue. I am perfectly capable of…”

“Freezing to death while your pride keeps you company?”

“I was going to say managing on my own, but thank you for that charming assessment.”

Something flickered in those dark eyes. Not quite amusement, but something adjacent to it.

“The room has a bed,” he said. “A proper bed, with blankets. You need warmth and rest. I need neither.”

“Everyone needs warmth and rest.”

“Do they?”

He said it so flatly, so matter-of-factly, that Emilia found herself momentarily at a loss. What sort of man claimed to need neither warmth nor rest? What sort of man sat alone in a country inn with a book and a scar and eyes that looked like they’d seen the death of hope itself?

A dramatic one, she decided. The sort who probably writes poetry about ravens.

“Well,” she said, lifting her chin, “I certainly need warmth and rest, but I’m not about to take them at your expense. If you insist on being chivalrous, then perhaps we might come to some sort of… arrangement.”

The word landed between them like a stone dropped into still water.

The innkeeper’s wife, who had been watching this exchange with the rapt attention of someone viewing particularly compelling theatre, made a small, strangled sound.

“An arrangement,” the man repeated.

“The room is large, I assume?”

“Tolerably so.”

“Then we share it.” Emilia heard the words leave her mouth and felt a distant part of her brain scream in protest. This was madness. This was scandal. This was precisely the sort of decision that ruined reputations and ended in cautionary tales told to young ladies by disapproving governesses.

But she was cold and tired. And she had already ruined herself quite thoroughly by fleeing her own wedding, so what was one more poor decision?

“We share it,” she continued, “as civilized adults. Separate beds….Or, if there is only one bed, separate sides of the room. A curtain between us, perhaps. Purely practical.”

“Purely practical,” he echoed, in a tone that suggested he found the concept faintly ridiculous.

“I don’t even know your name. You don’t know mine. After tonight, we will never see each other again. What possible harm could there be?”

He studied her for a long moment. Then, slowly, something that might have been the ghost of a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.

“You’re quite insane,” he said.

“I’ve been told.”

“And you trust me? A stranger? You would share a room with me without knowing anything about me?”

Emilia considered this. She looked at him, taking in the expensive cut of his coat, the quality of his boots, the way he held himself with the unconscious assurance of a man accustomed to being obeyed. Everything about him spoke of breeding, education, wealth. The sort of man who did not prey on vulnerable women in country inns because he had absolutely no need to.

“You’re a gentleman,” she said finally. “A gentleman traveling without servants, which suggests you wish not to be recognized. A gentleman with a book of…,” she squinted at the spine…”Greek philosophy, which suggests you are either very educated or very pretentious, possibly both. A gentleman who offered me his room without hesitation, which suggests you were raised with manners even if you’ve forgotten how to use them in conversation.”

That almost-smile grew slightly wider. “You’ve deduced all that from five minutes’ acquaintance?”

“I’ve deduced all that from five seconds’ observation. The other four minutes and fifty-five seconds were merely confirmation.”

He laughed.

It was a short, rusty sound, as though the mechanism hadn’t been used in some time and needed oiling. But it was a laugh nonetheless, and it transformed his face entirely—softening those harsh lines, lighting those dark eyes, revealing a man beneath the brooding exterior.

“Very well,” he said. “We share the room. But I should warn you, I’m told I’m not particularly pleasant company.”

“Neither am I,” Emilia said. “It seems we’re well-matched.”

 

 

 

Chapter Two

 

 

The room was, as promised, tolerably large.

It contained one bed.

Of course it did.

Emilia stood in the doorway, dripping onto yet another floor, and stared at the bed as though it had personally offended her. It was a perfectly nice bed; sturdy wooden frame, thick mattress, pile of quilts that looked warm and inviting. But it was undeniably, irrefutably one bed.

“Well,” she said.

“Indeed,” said her companion, she really did need to learn his name, from somewhere behind her.

“This is… not ideal.”

“I believe ‘not ideal’ is something of an understatement.”

Emilia turned. He was leaning against the door frame, arms crossed, watching her with an expression that hovered somewhere between resigned and amused.

“You could still take the room,” he offered. “I meant what I said. The chair by the fire…”

“It will destroy your back and leave you unable to walk tomorrow. No.” She surveyed the space with a general’s eye for strategy. “We simply need to be creative.”

“Creative.”

“There’s a washstand, a wardrobe, two chairs and…” she spotted it with triumph— “a folding screen in the corner.”

She marched toward it, grabbed the screen, and began dragging it toward the center of the room. It was heavier than it looked, and her arms were already shaking from cold and exhaustion, but she would sooner perish than ask for help.

“Allow me.”

He was beside her suddenly, close enough that she could smell rain and something else, sandalwood, perhaps, or cedar, and then his hands were on the screen and he was moving it as though it weighed nothing at all.

“Where do you want it?”

“There.” She pointed. “Dividing the room. Bed on one side, chairs on the other. You may have the chairs.”

“The chairs.”

“The chairs can be pushed together to form a sort of… makeshift bed. It won’t be comfortable, but it will be better than the common room.”

He regarded her with something that might have been respect. “You’ve thought this through.”

“I’ve had a very long walk in very bad weather. One does a great deal of thinking when one is trudging through mud.”

They positioned the screen. It wasn’t tall enough to provide complete privacy and they could see each other over the top if they stood, but it was better than nothing. Emilia surveyed their handiwork and nodded in satisfaction.

“There. Perfectly civilized.”

“Perfectly civilized,” he agreed, though his tone suggested he found the entire situation anything but.

A knock at the door interrupted whatever he might have said next. The innkeeper’s wife bustled in with an armful of linens and a knowing look that made Emilia want to sink through the floor.

“Hot water’s coming up presently,” she announced, depositing the linens on the bed. “And I’ve found a nightgown which belonged to my daughter before she married. It should fit you well enough. I can’t have you sleeping in that wet thing.”

“Thank you,” Emilia managed. “That’s very kind.”

“And for you, sir.” The woman turned to Emilia’s companion with considerably more deference. “Will you be wanting supper? The kitchen’s closed, but I could manage some cold meat and bread.”

“That would be most welcome. For both of us.” He reached into his pocket and produced a coin that made the woman’s eyes go wide. “For your trouble and your discretion.”

“Of course, sir. Of course.”

She departed with a curtsy that was decidedly deeper than any she’d offered Emilia.

“You should change,” he said, nodding toward the screen. “Before you take ill.”

“I am aware.” Emilia’s fingers were already fumbling with the buttons at her back, but the dress, that beautiful, terrible, utterly impractical dress, had been designed to be put on with the assistance of at least two maids. Getting out of it alone was proving impossible.

She wrestled with it a moment longer, then again, until at last,  utterly vexed, she allowed her hands to drop.

“I don’t suppose,” she said, keeping her voice carefully neutral, “you might be willing to assist me with my buttons?”

Silence.

She turned to find him staring at her with an expression that was suddenly, intensely unreadable.

“Your buttons,” he repeated.

“There are approximately forty of them. They run the length of my spine. I cannot reach them, and if I remain in this dress much longer, I will probably die, and then you will have my death on your conscience.”

“That seems somewhat dramatic.”

“I am a somewhat dramatic person. The buttons, if you please.”

A long pause stretched between them. Then he advanced, closing the space with that same effortless quiet. Emilia was abruptly, keenly conscious of the narrowness of the room, of his nearness, of the way the firelight traced the sharp lines of his features, rendering him like some figure from a Gothic tale: the brooding hero, the troubled nobleman, a man harboring secrets best left unspoken.

Stop it, she told herself firmly. He’s just a man. A stranger. This means nothing.

“Turn around,” he said quietly.

She turned.

His fingers found the first button. They were warm, she could feel the heat of them even through the wet silk, and unexpectedly gentle. He worked slowly, methodically, releasing one button and then the next, and Emilia stood very still and tried desperately to think about something, anything, other than the fact that a man she did not know was undressing her in a country inn.

“You’re shivering,” he observed.

“I’m cold.”

“Is that all?”

There was something in his voice, something low and knowing, that made her breath catch.

“What else would it be?”

He didn’t answer. Just continued down the row of buttons, his knuckles occasionally brushing the skin of her back through her chemise, each contact sending a small shock through her nervous system.

This is inappropriate, the sensible part of her brain announced. This is wildly, spectacularly inappropriate.

Yes, the rest of her agreed. And?

“There.” His hands fell away. “That’s the last of them.”

Emilia clutched the loosened dress to her chest and turned. He had already stepped back, already put distance between them, and his face had returned to that careful blankness that seemed to be his standard expression.

“Thank you,” she said.

“You’re welcome.”

They stood there for a moment, neither moving, the fire crackling softly in the background.

“I should…” Emilia gestured vaguely toward the screen. “Change.”

“Yes.”

“Behind the screen.”

“That would be appropriate.”

“Right. Yes. Appropriate.” She was babbling. She never babbled. What was wrong with her? “I’ll just…”

She fled behind the screen with as much dignity as she could muster, which was not very much.

The nightgown the innkeeper’s wife had provided was plain white cotton, slightly too large, and the most comfortable thing Emilia had ever worn in her life. She stripped out of the ruined wedding dress with fingers that still trembled, from cold, she told herself, only from cold, and pulled the nightgown over her head with a sigh of relief.

Better. Much better.

She found a comb on the washstand and began working it through her tangled hair, wincing as it caught on knots. Behind the screen, she could hear her companion moving about; the creak of a chair, the soft thud of boots being removed, the rustle of fabric.

“I’ve realised,” she called out, “that I still don’t know your name.”

A pause. “Hale. James Hale.”

“Mr. Hale.” She tested the name on her tongue. It sounded false somehow, like a coat that didn’t quite fit. “And are you truly Mr. Hale, or is that simply what you’re calling yourself tonight?”

Another pause, longer this time. “Does it matter?”

“I suppose not.” She worked through a particularly stubborn knot. “Given that I’m not using my real name either.”

“Aren’t you?”

“I haven’t given you a name at all.”

“No,” he agreed. “You haven’t.”

Emilia considered this. Considered the intimacy of sharing a room with a stranger, of having his hands on her buttons, of knowing she would sleep mere feet away from him, separated only by a folding screen and whatever remained of her rapidly deteriorating propriety.

“Emilia,” she said finally. “You may call me Emilia.”

“Just Emilia?”

“Just Emilia. No titles, no surnames, no anything else. Tonight, I am simply… myself.”

She emerged from behind the screen to find him standing by the window, looking out at the storm. He had removed his coat and cravat, rolled his shirtsleeves to the elbow, and the informality of it, the glimpse of forearm, the open collar revealing a triangle of skin, felt somehow more scandalous than the entire button situation.

He turned at her approach. His gaze moved over her; the borrowed nightgown, the damp hair curling around her shoulders, the bare feet on the wooden floor, and something flickered in those dark eyes before he looked away.

“You should eat something,” he said. “The innkeeper’s wife left food outside the door and I brought it in while you were changing.”

Indeed the innkeeper had brought food. A tray sat on the small table by the fire, laden with bread, cheese, cold meat, and a bottle of wine that looked considerably better than Emilia would have expected from a rural inn.

“I’m not particularly hungry.”

“Eat anyway. You’ve had a shock, and your body needs fuel.”

“And you’re a physician now, as well as a mysterious stranger?”

“I’m a man who has seen what happens to people who push themselves past their limits.” His voice was quiet, matter-of-fact. “Eat. Please.”

The way he said “please” caught her off guard. It was such a small word, so unexpectedly soft from a man who seemed to be constructed entirely of hard angles and guarded silences.

She sat and ate. The bread was fresh, the cheese sharp and good, and after the first few bites her body remembered that it was, in fact, desperately hungry. She ate more than was strictly ladylike and found she did not care.

Mr. Hale, James, sat across from her, nursing a glass of wine and watching the fire. He had not eaten anything himself.

“You’re not hungry?” she asked.

“No.”

“You bought the food.”

“For you.”

“That seems a waste.”

“It seems a kindness.”

Emilia set down her bread and studied him properly. The firelight painted him in shades of gold and shadow, highlighting the scar at his jaw, the tension in his shoulders, the way his hands wrapped around his glass as though he needed something to hold.

“Why are you here?” she asked. “Truly. A man like you, travelling alone, without servants, in weather like this…What are you running from?”

He took a long drink of wine before answering. “Who says I’m running from anything?”

“Because I recognise the look. I’ve been wearing it all day.”

A muscle twitched in his jaw. “Perhaps I simply wanted to be alone.”

“Then I apologise for intruding.”

“You’re not intruding.” He said it quickly, almost too quickly, and then seemed to catch himself. “That is……You’ve been perfectly civil. I’ve no complaints.”

“High praise indeed.”

That ghost of a smile returned. “I’m told I’m not generous with compliments.”

“Who tells you that?”

“Everyone who has ever known me.”

There was something beneath the words, a weight, a weariness, that made Emilia’s heart twist unexpectedly. This man, whoever he was, whatever he was hiding, was lonely. Deeply, fundamentally lonely, in a way that went beyond simply being alone in a country inn.

She recognized it because she had felt it herself, sitting across from Harold Pemberton while he discussed sheep, realizing that she could marry this man and still spend the rest of her life utterly alone.

“I’m running from a wedding,” she said.

The words hung in the air between them.

James looked up from the fire. “I gathered as much.”

“Did you also gather that I don’t regret it? Because I don’t. Not even slightly.” She wrapped her hands around her own glass of wine, drawing warmth from it. “Everyone will say I’m ruined. My uncle will be furious. My reputation will be in tatters. And I cannot bring myself to care.”

“Why not?”

“Because the alternative was worse.” She took a sip of wine and let it burn down her throat. “The alternative was spending the rest of my life being invisible. Being nothing. Being a wife in name only, a decoration for a man’s home, expected to smile and nod and never, ever want anything for myself.”

“What do you want?”

The question was so simple, so direct, that it caught her off guard.

“I don’t know,” she admitted. “That’s the terrible truth of it. I’ve never been allowed to want anything long enough to figure out what it might be. But I know it’s not… that. Not a man who looks through me instead of at me. Not a life of small talk and social calls and slow suffocation.”

“So you ran.”

“So I ran.”

He was quiet for a long moment. Then, slowly, he raised his glass.

“To running, then. And to whatever we’re running toward.”

Emilia raised her own glass to meet his. The crystal chimed softly in the quiet room.

“To running,” she agreed.

Outside, the storm raged on. Inside, the fire crackled, the candles flickered, and two strangers sat in a borrowed room and wondered what the morning would bring.

 

 

 

Chapter Three

 

 

“You snore.”

The accusation came floating over the top of the screen, delivered in a tone of deep disgust. Emilia sat up in the bed, shoving tangled hair out of her face, and squinted toward the voice.

“I do not snore.”

“You most certainly do.” James Hale appeared around the edge of the screen, fully dressed in yesterday’s clothes but somehow looking considerably more rumpled than he had the night before. His hair was disordered, his jaw dark with stubble, and there were shadows under his eyes that suggested he had not slept well. “Like a small, congested bear.”

“Bears don’t snore.”

“How would you know?”

“How would you know?”

He considered this. “Fair point. Regardless, you kept me awake half the night with your… breathing.”

“It’s called breathing. It’s what people do when they’re asleep. Or awake, for that matter. It’s generally considered essential to survival.”

Emilia swung her legs out of bed and immediately regretted it. Every muscle in her body screamed in protest, the legacy of yesterday’s walk through the storm, no doubt, and her ankle throbbed with a dull, persistent ache she didn’t remember acquiring.

“Oh,” she said, looking down at the offending appendage. It was swollen. Visibly, noticeably swollen, with a bruise spreading across the top of her foot like a purple sunset.

James followed her gaze. His expression shifted from irritated to concerned in the space of a heartbeat.

“When did that happen?”

“I don’t…” Emilia tried to remember. The walk through the mud, the uneven ground, the moment her foot had twisted in a rut she hadn’t been able to see in the darkness. “Sometime during my dramatic escape, I suppose. I didn’t notice until now.”

“You walked half a mile on that?”

“It wasn’t hurting then.”

“It’s hurting now.”

“Thank you for that astute observation.”

He was across the room before she could protest, kneeling at her feet like some sort of irritating knight-errant, his hands surprisingly gentle as they examined her ankle.

“It’s not broken,” he said after a moment. “But it’s badly sprained. You shouldn’t walk on it.”

“Then I suppose I’ll simply levitate to the door.”

His eyes met hers, dark and not amused. “Your wit is less charming before breakfast.”

“So is your personality, and yet here we are.”

Despite herself, Emilia felt her lips twitch. There was something oddly comforting about this—the bickering, the barbs, the way he treated her as an opponent worthy of engagement rather than a delicate flower requiring protection.

Harold Pemberton had never argued with her. Harold Pemberton had simply nodded at everything she said and then continued talking about sheep.

“Can you stand?” James asked.

“I imagine so.”

“Let’s find out.”

He rose and offered his hand. Emilia took it, his palm was warm and callused, the hand of a man who did things with his body beyond sitting in drawing rooms, and let him help her to her feet.

Pain lanced up her leg. She gasped, staggered, and would have fallen if James hadn’t caught her.

“Steady.”

His arm was around her waist. Her hands were braced against his chest. They were close, too close, and Emilia could feel the heat of him through his shirt, could see the flecks of amber in his dark eyes, could smell that sandalwood scent that had haunted her dreams.

“I’m fine,” she said, too quickly.

“You’re not fine.”

“I’m standing, aren’t I?”

“You’re leaning on me.”

“That’s…” She realized he was right. She also realized that she did not particularly want to stop leaning on him. “That’s only because you’re in the way.”

“I’m in the way of you falling over.”

“A minor inconvenience.”

“I’ll try not to be offended.”

They stood there for a moment, neither moving, the silence stretching between them like something tangible. Emilia became acutely aware of the rise and fall of his breathing, the steady thump of his heart beneath her palm, the way his eyes had dropped to her lips and then, with visible effort, risen again to her face.

Stop, she told herself. Stop this immediately. He is a stranger. This is inappropriate. You are in your nightgown, for heaven’s sake.

But the nightgown was thin. And his hands were warm. And she had not been touched with anything approaching tenderness in so long that she had forgotten what it felt like.

A knock at the door shattered the moment.

They sprang apart—or rather, Emilia tried to spring apart and nearly collapsed again, and James caught her again with an expression of profound exasperation.

“Sit down,” he ordered. “Before you damage yourself further.”

“You can’t tell me what to do.”

“I’m not telling you, I’m suggesting strongly. There’s a difference.”

The knock came again, more insistent.

“Coming,” James called, depositing Emilia back on the edge of the bed, she noted that he was careful not to touch more of her than strictly necessary, and striding toward the door.

It was the innkeeper’s wife, bearing a tray of breakfast and a fresh pitcher of water. Her eyes moved from James, in his rumpled shirtsleeves, to Emilia, in her borrowed nightgown, and her expression suggested she was drawing conclusions that were not entirely inaccurate.

“Morning, sir. Miss.” She set the tray on the table with rather more force than necessary. “The storm has eased somewhat. The roads should be passable by afternoon, if you want to continue your journey.”

“Thank you,” James said. “That’s good news.”

“Is it?” She said it flatly, as though she had opinions about what constituted good news. “I’ll just be leaving you to your breakfast, then.”

She departed with a backward glance that could have curdled milk.

“She thinks we’re scandalous,” Emilia observed, once the door had closed.

“We are scandalous.” James carried the breakfast tray to the bed and set it beside her. “Eat. I need to examine your ankle properly, and you’ll need your strength.”

“For what?”

“For not falling over.”

She wanted to argue, her pride demanded she argue, but the smell of fresh bread and bacon was making her stomach growl, and she was forced to admit that he might, possibly, have a point.

She ate while he watched. And when she had finished, he knelt at her feet once more and began, with surprising gentleness, to prod at her swollen ankle.

“This will hurt,” he warned.

“Thank you for the……Ow.”

“I told you.”

“You could have warned me more specifically.”

“I did warn you.”

“You could have warned me better.”

His lips twitched. “I’ll endeavour to improve my warning technique in the future.”

He continued his examination, his touch firm but careful, and Emilia found herself watching his face rather than her foot. There were lines around his eyes, the kind that came from squinting, or from smiling, though she suspected the former, and a small scar at his temple she hadn’t noticed before.

“You’ve done this before,” she said.

“If I had a woman complain about my bedside manner? Frequently.”

“Examined injuries. You know what you’re doing.”

A shadow crossed his face. “I was a soldier, once.”

“Once?”

“A long time ago.” His voice had gone flat in a way that suggested the topic was closed. “The injury isn’t serious. Cold compresses, rest, and you should be able to walk normally within a week.”

“I don’t have a week. I don’t even have a day.” Emilia’s stomach clenched with sudden anxiety. “My uncle will be looking for me. If I stay here too long…”

“Your uncle.” James sat back on his heels. “The one who arranged your marriage?”

“My guardian. My parents died when I was twelve, and he took control of my inheritance.” The old bitterness crept into her voice despite her best efforts. “He’s been trying to marry me off ever since I turned eighteen. Mr. Pemberton was his latest attempt.”

“The man you were supposed to marry.”

“The man I was supposed to marry. The man I ran away from. The man who is probably, at this very moment, extremely confused about why his bride disappeared halfway through the ceremony.”

“You left during the ceremony?”

“I left before the ceremony, technically. I climbed out a window.”

James stared at her. Then, slowly, something extraordinary happened.

He laughed.

Not the rusty, surprised laugh from the night before but a real laugh, full and warm and utterly altering his expression. His whole face changed with it, the harsh lines softening, the dark eyes lighting up, and Emilia felt something in her chest clench at the sight.

“You climbed out a window,” he repeated.

“It seemed like the best option at the time.”

“In a wedding dress.”

“It was surprisingly difficult. The skirts kept getting caught.”

“I imagine they would.”

He was still laughing—quieter now, but the amusement lingered in his eyes, and Emilia found herself smiling in response.

“It’s not funny,” she said, though she was fairly certain it was. “I’ve ruined my life.”

“You’ve ruined your reputation. That’s not the same thing.”

“In society, it amounts to the same thing.”

“Then perhaps society is the problem.”

She looked at him and saw something there that made her breath catch. Understanding and recognition. The look of someone who had also found society wanting and had chosen, in whatever way, to step outside its bounds.

“Who are you?” she asked quietly. “Truly. Not the name you’re using, but who you actually are.”

He held her gaze for a long moment. Then he looked away, and the walls went back up, and he was once again the distant, guarded stranger she had met the night before.

“Someone who understands the need to run,” he said. “Leave it at that.”

 

***

 

The morning passed in a strange sort of suspended time.

The storm continued; not as violently as before, but steadily, persistently, the rain drumming against the windows like impatient fingers. The innkeeper’s wife had been wrong about the roads being passable by afternoon; the innkeeper himself reported that the river had flooded the main route and nothing would be getting through until at least tomorrow.

Emilia found she did not mind as much as she should.

They spent the hours in the small room, divided by the screen but aware of each other’s presence in a way that felt electric and charged. James read his Greek philosophy. Emilia attempted to repair her wedding dress with a borrowed needle and thread, though the task proved largely hopeless. They exchanged barbs over the top of the screen and pretended not to notice when their eyes met.

“You’re humming,” James observed, sometime in the early afternoon.

Emilia paused mid-stitch. She had not realized she was humming. “I apologise. Is it disturbing you?”

“I didn’t say I minded. I was simply observing.”

“You observe a great deal.”

“It’s a habit. One picks it up, in certain professions.”

“What profession would that be?”

A pause. “Soldiering.”

“You said you were a soldier. Past tense. What are you now?”

Another pause, longer this time. “I’m not entirely certain.”

It was such an honest answer, so unexpectedly vulnerable, that Emilia found herself setting down her sewing and moving toward the screen. She peered over the top of it and found him sitting in one of the chairs, his book abandoned in his lap, staring at nothing.

“That sounds like something a person says when they’re in the middle of a rather significant life change.”

“Does it?”

“In my experience, yes.” She rested her chin on the top of the screen. “I’m in the middle of a rather significant life change myself, if you hadn’t noticed.”

“I had noticed. The wedding dress was something of a clue.”

“I meant the part where I’ve ruined my prospects and will probably be disowned by my family and have to make my own way in the world for the first time in my life.”

“Ah. That part.”

“Yes. That part.” She studied his profile; the strong jaw, the straight nose, the scar that made him look dangerous in a way that probably should have frightened her and decidedly did not. “It’s terrifying, isn’t it? Not knowing what comes next.”

“Indeed,” he said quietly. “It is.”

“But also a little bit thrilling?”

He looked up at her then, and something passed between them—a recognition, an understanding, a shared acknowledgment that they were both standing on the edge of something unknown and wondering whether to jump.

“Perhaps,” he admitted. “A little.”

Emilia smiled. “That’s the first honest thing you’ve said to me.”

“Untrue. Everything I’ve said to you has been honest.”

“Everything you’ve said to me has been evasive.”

“Evasion isn’t the same as dishonesty.”

“It amounts to the same thing.”

“Now you sound like me.”

“Heaven forbid.”

He smiled, a real smile, small but genuine, and Emilia felt something shift in her chest. Something dangerous. Something that felt suspiciously like the beginning of feelings she absolutely could not afford to have.

Stop it, she told herself firmly. He’s a stranger. After tomorrow, you’ll never see him again.

But tomorrow felt very far away, and he was very close, and when he looked at her like that, like she was worth looking at, worth listening to, worth something, she found it increasingly difficult to remember why she should care about tomorrow at all.