Chapter 4 #2
“The Earl of Penharrow is in London,” he forced out, trying to focus on the mission instead of the way lamplight caught in her hair. “By the time he discovers you’re gone, you’ll be beyond his reach.”
She looked at him the way a drowning person looks at shore.
With hope and desperation and the bone-deep knowledge that rescue might be impossible.
She searched his face with an intensity that felt almost physical, and he wondered what she saw.
A rescuer? Another captor? Another man who looked at her and saw someone to possess?
“Who are you?” she asked, and the simple question carried such weight.
Oliver knew his answer mattered. Knew that he could choose to be better than he’d planned. Better than his base desires. Better than Penharrow.
He wouldn’t tell her his title. Penharrow was an Earl and why should she trust another peer?
“Someone who’s going to see that monster answer for his crimes,” he said, and meant it with every fiber of his being.
Let her think it was about justice. Let her think he was noble.
He’d burn in hell for his actual thoughts, for the way his body responded to her presence, for the way he wanted her even as he hated himself for wanting her.
He took another careful step forward, watching her reaction, fighting to keep his hands steady. “You’re coming with me. You can walk, or I’ll carry you, but we’re leaving, now.”
The thought of carrying her, of her body pressed against his, her arms around his neck, sent another unwanted jolt of desire through him. Oliver shoved it down viciously.
She’s not yours. She’s not anyone’s. She’s a person who deserves better than your lust or Penharrow’s obsession.
He expected resistance. Expected her to scream, to refuse, to cling to the familiar horror of captivity rather than trust a stranger who’d broken into her room in the middle of the night.
But Megan surprised him.
She stood with surprising swiftness, and grabbed a heavy cloak, and a small saddlebag from a hook by the window. The movement made her dress shift, revealing the curve of her waist, and Oliver had to close his eyes briefly against the wave of want that crashed over him.
Stop. Stop seeing her as a woman to desire and start seeing her as a person to save.
“Anything is better than staying here,” she said, quiet resignation in her voice. “But I warn you. He’ll hunt us like prey. We won’t be safe over the border either.”
The words struck Oliver harder than any accusation could have. She had no idea who he was, his title or anything. This woman had given up hope. Had stopped believing in rescue. And yet here she was, taking a desperate chance with a complete stranger because any chance was better than none.
The trust implicit in that choice humbled him. Made his earlier thoughts—his base, physical reactions—seem even more shameful.
She chose to trust him. The least he could do was be worthy of that trust.
Even if his body still burned. Even if he still wanted her with an intensity that made him sick. Even if part of him was still planning how to use her testimony to destroy Penharrow.
“I’ll keep you safe. You’ll learn I never lie,” Oliver said, and it was the truth he could give her. Even if he was lying to himself about his motivations. “Can you ride?”
“No. I wasn’t allowed to learn. I wonder why?” she added with bitter sarcasm.
Of course. Penharrow had kept her dependent, unable to escape. The confirmation of how thoroughly she’d been controlled sent fresh rage through Oliver’s veins, rage that warred with the unwanted image of her riding behind him, her body pressed against his back, her arms around his waist.
“Bugger. You’ll have to ride with me and that might slow us down.
” He forced the words out evenly, not letting her hear the conflict raging inside him.
“We have horses waiting, but we need to move quickly and quietly. The guard downstairs is unconscious, but he won’t stay that way forever. And there are exterior guards—”
A shot rang out from somewhere below, shattering the night’s silence.
Oliver swore. Webb must have been discovered. Or one of the exterior guards had spotted something.
“Change of plans,” he said, and did what he’d been wanting to do since entering this room, he grabbed Megan’s hand.
The contact was electric. Her fingers were small in his, cold even through her woolen mittens, yet the touch sent heat racing up his arm. She was real, warm, alive, not a distant figure seen through his spyglass but a flesh-and-blood woman whose hand fit perfectly in his.
Oliver hated how right it felt. Hated how much he wanted to never let go.
“We run,” he finished, pulling her toward the door.
And tried not to think about how Penharrow had touched this same hand. How the Earl had possessed every part of her. How Oliver himself was just another man using her, even if he told himself his purposes were noble.
Even if part of him already knew that somewhere between breaking into this room and feeling her hand in his, his careful plans for revenge had become infinitely more complicated.
Because he didn’t only want to use her testimony.
He wanted her. All of her. In ways that made him no better than the monster they were fleeing.
They burst from the room into the hallway as voices erupted on the ground floor. Shouts in Welsh, running footsteps, the sound of furniture overturning. Oliver pulled Megan toward the servant’s staircase at the back of the house, the narrow stairs used by maids carrying water and linens.
Behind them, he heard boots on the grand staircase. “Upstairs! Check her room!”
Down the narrow stairs, stumbling in the darkness.
Megan’s hand was small in his, but her grip was strong, determined.
At the bottom, they encountered a maid emerging from her quarters, her eyes wide with terror.
Oliver pushed past her without a word, dragging Megan through the servant’s hall toward the eastern exit.
Another shot, this one from outside. Webb, providing cover.
They exploded into the night air to find chaos. Webb was mounted, holding the reins of two other horses, exchanging fire with guards who’d taken position near the stable. In the darkness, muzzle flashes lit the scene in staccato bursts of light.
“Go!” Webb shouted, firing again.
Oliver lifted Megan bodily onto one of the horses, then swung up behind her. He felt her stiffen at his proximity but couldn’t spare the time to reassure her. Gathering the reins, he kicked the horse into motion as another shot whined past his head.
They thundered into the forest, branches whipping at them in the darkness. Behind them, more shots, more shouts. Oliver bent low over Megan, shielding her with his body, trusting his horse to find its footing in the treacherous terrain.
Webb appeared beside them moments later, his mount’s breath coming in white clouds. “They’re organizing pursuit. Can’t be all of them as I shot one.”
“One’s tied up in the guard room.”
“It will be the male staff as well. This puts all of them in danger. Penharrow will punish them all.” Megan added.
“The northern pass,” Oliver said, veering his horse toward the route they’d scouted. “We can lose them in the high country.”
But even as he said it, he knew the plan had already fallen apart. They’d meant to have a clean escape, hours before anyone knew Megan was missing. Instead, they had armed pursuit in the darkness, difficult terrain, and a woman who’d couldn’t ride depending on him to keep her safe.
A branch caught Oliver across the face, drawing blood. He didn’t slow. Behind them, he could hear horses now, multiple riders crashing through the forest.
“My lord!” Webb’s warning came just as Oliver saw the problem. The stream they’d planned to cross had swollen with recent rain, the current moving fast and dangerous.
“We have to cross,” Oliver said. “It’s our only chance to lose them.”
He felt Megan tense against him. “I can’t swim.”
“I won’t let you drown. Trust me.”
It was an insane thing to ask—trust from a woman who’d been betrayed by every man she’d known, who had every reason to fear rather than trust. But there was no time for anything else.
Oliver urged his horse forward into the swollen stream. The current caught them immediately, stronger than he’d anticipated, pulling the horses sideways. Megan gasped, her hands gripping his arm with desperate strength.
The horse stumbled, went under. Suddenly they were in the water, the cold shocking, the current dragging them downstream. Oliver kept one arm locked around Megan, fighting to keep both their heads above water while his other hand searched for purchase on rocks, branches, anything.
His boot struck something solid. Oliver leveraged it, pushing toward the far bank. Beside him, Webb had made it across, was reaching down from his horse. Oliver grabbed the offered hand, felt himself being pulled, Megan’s weight a burden he refused to release.
They collapsed on the far bank, coughing up water, shaking from cold and exertion. Behind them, on the other side of the swollen stream, he could hear their pursuers arriving, could see torches through the trees.
“They can’t cross,” Webb said. “Not in the dark. Not with the water this high.”
Oliver got to his feet, pulling Megan up with him. In the torchlight from across the stream, he could see her face, pale, terrified, but alive.
“You risked your life for me,” she said, her voice barely audible over the rushing water.
“Of course, I promised to keep you safe.” Oliver replied, as if there was never any question. As if he hadn’t thrown away his carefully constructed plan, hadn’t committed himself to protecting this woman at any cost.
“I managed to catch the spare horse. Yours took off.” Webb said as they stood shivering. “But this one has our provisions so that was lucky.”
They remounted, Oliver once again taking Megan on his horse. They rode hard into the darkness, putting distance between themselves and the hunting lodge, between Megan and her captivity.