The Black Sheep's Return. Elizabeth Beacon

you’re treating me like royalty,’ she said politely and he told himself it was a good thing the laughing rogue of a few moments ago was back in hiding.

      He preferred her withdrawn and coolly polite, he assured himself. He preferred any youthful and even remotely attractive young woman to stay at a distance nowadays. Indeed, he had felt no more than a soon-dismissed masculine reaction to any other woman since he first laid eyes on his darling Anna. It felt like a betrayal of his own beloved that a feral part of him wanted to know far more about Perdita than the colour of her eyes. After the unmatchable joy of making love to his wife, the rest of her sex had faded into friends, or lusty females to be avoided. He told himself feeling even a hint of hunger for this intriguing female was an insult to Anna’s memory.

      ‘Are you a wise man?’ she asked curiously as he went about the task of adding a pinch of this herb and a dot of that spice with a sweetening of honey to the pot over the fire until he had the right mix to bring her relief from pain, but not leave her drugged and lost in wild dreams.

      ‘Do you think I would be living miles away from my fellow creatures if I had an iota of sense, Perdita?’ he asked unwarily and saw reawakened curiosity light her fine eyes.

      ‘You might, if you had reason enough,’ she said shrewdly.

      He distrusted the speculative glint in her eyes and set about finding what linens he had to spare for the box-bed that a previous owner of the cottage had built so well it was too much trouble to dismantle when they moved in. It had been all that was left, apart from most of the roof, the walls and part of the chimney, when he and Anna had found this place and claimed it for their own, since nobody else wanted it.

      ‘Maybe I don’t like company,’ he let himself mutter loudly enough for her to hear and felt a pang of guilt at the long Seaborne tradition of hospitality he was betraying.

      ‘Next time I run away from a pack of desperate and dangerous rogues, I’ll be sure to bolt in the opposite direction,’ she said with a cool social lightness that set him at a distance and he was contrary enough to dislike it.

      ‘Were they really so desperate?’

      ‘Of course they were—why else would I have run so far and so fast I got completely lost to avoid them?’

      ‘I’m sorry,’ he had the grace to admit, ‘you have been through an appalling ordeal and all that matters is that you recover from your hurts and we somehow manage to reunite you with your friends and family as soon as we can. They must be desperately worried about you by now, so I could make sure a letter is delivered to inform them you’re safe and reasonably unharmed, if you would care to write one.’

      She was silent for a long moment and he began to wonder if she had fallen asleep by the fire. He reluctantly turned to look at her in time to see her shake her head regretfully and look a little mournful and sorry for herself for the first time.

      ‘There is no one,’ she said bleakly. ‘It was a hired coach and the relatives I left behind will not miss me. I thank you, sir, but I will not put you to so much trouble on my behalf.’

      ‘You were travelling alone?’ he heard himself ask disapprovingly and wondered when he’d begun to care what rich and overindulged young ladies did to put themselves in danger nowadays.

      ‘I’m of age, why should I not?’ she asked as if a young lady hiring a carriage and travelling without either companion or protector was perfectly normal.

      ‘For the very good reason it turned out to be such a disaster, I should think. You would have done better to travel post and enjoy the protection of an armed guard and the King’s mails.’

      ‘There’s no post road to my destination.’

      ‘Which is?’

      ‘None of your business.’

      ‘Do you expect me to set you on your way to the nearest village in the morning so you can blithely limp off into more ill-advised and plainly ridiculous escapades? How can I turn my back on a disaster in petticoats like you and leave you to wander about the country with no more idea how to go on than my three-year-old daughter?’

      ‘I know how to conduct myself,’ she informed him in her best mistress-of-all-she-surveyed voice.

      ‘So well you just informed a complete stranger nobody will notice if you disappear for good, so I could make a quick getaway after foully doing away with you or having my wicked way with you, whatever you have to say about it? I begin to think my Sally has more sense in her currently very little finger than you have in your whole head, Princess Perdita.’

       Chapter Three

      For a moment the girl looked disconcerted by the realisation he was right and she’d put herself totally in his power. She rapidly rebuilt her innate assurance she was right and the rest of the world wrong and drew herself up to give him a disdainful look worthy of his grandmother, the Dowager Duchess of Dettingham, in her most formidable glory. Wondering if this aristocrat had ever met the one lady who would be able to stare her down and stand none of her nonsense, Rich tried not to admire the stony dignity she was facing him with. For some reason he liked his granddam a lot more than the rest of the family did and found his unwanted visitor’s steely poise unexpectedly endearing.

      ‘I trust you,’ she finally admitted very quietly. He felt another burden settle on his shoulders and suppressed a gusty sigh.

      ‘You can,’ he promised easily enough. ‘I’m no killer and can imagine nothing more repulsive than forcing myself on a woman against her will.’

      ‘Clearly my judgement isn’t as bad as you think, then,’ she argued gallantly, but he could see the blue shadows under her lioness’s eyes and the stark pallor of her face and knew it was only her steadfast spirit that held her upright in her chair right now.

      ‘Whether it is or not, mine currently tells me you’re very near the end of your tether, Perdita,’ he told her in much the same tone he used on his stubborn little daughter when she was about to fall asleep on her feet after a long day of mischief and mayhem.

      For a moment she raised her chin and looked ready to swear she was fresh as a daisy and ready for her next set of misadventures, then she literally drooped, as if a great wave of exhaustion was about to claim her, much as it did his Sally, who had been known to fall asleep in her dinner only a second after insisting she wasn’t a bit tired. Afraid she might tumble headlong into dreamland in a similar manner, he scooped her out of the chair and up into his arms once more.

      ‘Quiet,’ he ordered when her eyes seemed about to cross with absolute weariness.

      She glared at him instead and he admitted she had a very effective glare by nodding ruefully at the ceiling to remind her they weren’t the only people in the house who needed their sleep tonight. Feeling her relax against him for the short journey from his hearth to the box-bed, he felt that peculiar stir of interest in her as a very desirable young woman once more and sternly ordered his inner satyr back into retirement.

      ‘I’d best unwrap you and bandage that ankle properly for the night, or you’ll spend a very uncomfortable night in a damp bed,’ he said as he set her down on the side of the bed and knelt at her narrow, but sore and scratched feet once more to do so. ‘Keziah has an evil-smelling salve that will do wonders for these blisters. I’ll get some from her in the morning so it won’t be so painful for you to walk on them once your ankle has healed enough for you to hobble about on it.’

      ‘Who’s Keziah?’ she asked and he thought her words were saved from slurring into each other only by her stubborn determination to fight the waves of shock and exhaustion finally catching up with her.

      ‘Keep still,’ he demanded grimly as he realised he was going to have to unlace her gown and strip her, since she was beyond doing anything but pretending she wasn’t half-asleep. ‘Lift up,’ he ordered as if she really was Sally, and perhaps by believing that he could fool himself there wasn’t a mature and very desirable woman under his questing fingers