.
Blythe knew she should be comforted by Lord Cottering's solicitous invitations to rest her head on his rolled-up jacket or to feel free to stretch out on the bench, but for some reason, she could not quite see her way to doing so. Instead, she sat upright on the bench opposite his, smiling politely at his attempts to be kind to her.
“Truly, my lord, I am quite well, and when I have returned to London, I will be better yet.”
“Please, Blythe. I feel as if we know each other quite well already, and I would be grateful if you were to call me Gerald.”
It seemed like such a little thing, but something about the request made Blythe bridle at the thought. “I'm sure I couldn't. It is a great honor to be familiar with a peer, and I am afraid it is not an honor that I have quite earned.”
“But you could. Believe me, I have long craved an avenue to get to know you better, and though I know your fleeing of Marrowly Grange to be tragic, I am so glad to be able to help you.”
She smiled at him and let him think what he liked of that smile. There was something about Lord Cottering she liked less and less in close quarters. She reminded herself that she only needed to last until London, or barring that, if she were truly uncomfortable, she could depart his company at the first stop they made to rest the horses at the inn.
The coach moved briskly along the packed dirt road, and it wasn't until they pulled into the village where they were supposed to be resting the team that her feeling of unease bloomed into something resembling panic.
“I'm afraid we will need to stay here for the night. We can proceed to London in the morning. I shall check us into the inn as brother and sister, and that should quell any wagging tongues about our reputation.”
He winked at her, and Blythe nodded uneasily. He was entirely right about her reputation, but still, she could not calm herself. She had encountered strange and dangerous situations in London, but she knew that on the moors and the quiet towns scattered throughout them, she was completely out of her element.
Well, I shall keep my cards close to my chest, and I will simply stay alert. He has not actually done anything wrong yet.
The girl who waited the tables and tapped the kegs at the inn also seemed to serve as the chambermaid, and she led Blythe up to the room set aside for her. The room was cozy with the fire already banked and a quilt thrown on the bed, but Blythe could not shake a feeling of distress.
“Is everything all right, Mrs. Worthington?”
“I... I beg your pardon?”
“I said, is everything all right? Your husband said you were of a delicate disposition, and that you might be feeling poorly. I can have Cook make you up a hot bowl of broth and some toasted bread. That usually sets me to rights.”
Blythe's brain was working furiously. Husband and wife, not brother and sister. It could be something Lord Cottering made up for sheer expedience, but the idea of it sat poorly with her. She came to a fast decision. “Perhaps I am not feeling well after all. Would you please escort me to the garde-robe?”
As it turned out, there was only a drafty outhouse for those matters, but Blythe's sensibilities were robust enough to deal with the shoddy building with only a shudder.
“Are you all right, Mrs. Worthington?”
“Oh, just fine. Do you know, I was asleep on the coach all this way, and I really am not sure how far south we have come. How far are we from London?”
The girl gave her a look, and then to Blythe's surprise, she winked at her. “Oh, and now you are not going to pretend you were heading north all the time? You are two days from London by Royal Mail coach, but what you are truly asking is how far you are from the border. That'll be another four days.”
“The border... what... oh, my god. Gretna Green.”
Blythe's blood froze in her veins. They hadn't been going south toward London at all. They were going north to Gretna Green, across the border into Scotland where a marriage could be made instantly legal with none of the niceties of king or church. She didn't need to know what Lord Cottering's plans were to know she wanted no part of them.
The inn girl looked at her mystified.
Blythe seized her hands. “The man who is here with me, I do not know him. He has lied about us being husband and wife—”
“Well, everyone knew that.”
“He has brought me here against my will. I have no interest in going to Gretna Green with him. I cannot stay in that room with—”
“Ah, there you are, my beloved.”
In the dim open area behind the inn, Lord Cottering had quickly appeared behind them. Blythe realized this was the first time she had seen him without his civilizing disguise, and in the flickering light from the inn, there was something monstrous about him.
“Keep your distance.”
“That's no way for a wife to talk, present or future. If you keep it up, Blythe, I will be forced to discipline you.”
Blythe snarled at him. “Don't come any closer. Reputation or not, I shall not spend another moment with you.”
“Oh, but you will, you little bitch. I had hoped to keep you stupid until we crossed the border, but this is almost better. You sound afraid, and that's what you should be. “
To Blythe's shock, the inn girl stepped between them. “Here now. Clear out. We won't have with no kidnappings here. This is a good place.”
Lord Cottering moved so fast that he was almost a blur. He struck the girl on the side of the head, and she dropped like a rock. “Mouthy little whore. Now, Blythe...”
Blythe knew that she could not stay and help the girl, not if she were Lord Cottering's prisoner, and she refused to allow Cottering to use the helpless girl against her as blackmail. That meant, much as it rankled, that she had to run, and she darted into the deeper night beyond the courtyard. The shadows around the inn and lapping up to the edge of the unknown town were deep and dark, and soon she was into the thick grass of the moor.
She heard Cottering's feet hit the ground as he ran after her, and she pushed herself hard, tearing into the night and knowing there was no one in the world she could depend on for help.
The moon had risen, and Blythe could not decide if that was a mark in her favor or against it. She had escaped Cottering's first lunge for her, making her escape onto the moors, but she had no idea how long she could stay hidden, curled in the tall grass. The moon was coming up, giving the moors an eerie silvery gleam, and if she were doing anything besides being hunted by a madman, she would have been enthralled.
Instead, every cracking branch was his step, and every rustle in the grass was his approach. Blythe forced her breath slow and steady, and if she could have slowed her heartbeat, she would have. It thundered in her chest, calling him, she was sure, right to her position.
He had shouted after her at first, calling her names, trying saccharine promises of truce that she didn't believe for a moment, and finally dissolving into furious rants.
“You were the one who took Honey from me. You had no right to do that, Blythe, you must know that. She was just a whore, and she belonged to me. What kind of life can you give her after what she did?”
As bait went, it was very nearly effective. She wanted to scream at him that Honey was her own person, free and more than capable of making her way in the world, but that would have been suicide. She held her tongue, and after some small eternity, Cottering fell silent too. Now she couldn't tell if he was close by or far away, if he had given up the hunt for her or if he was walking through the grass so softly she couldn't hear him.
When she was a girl, Tristan and Ned's father had taken them hunting at the actual Parrington estate and been more than a little disappointed when she showed no aptitude for it. She could still remember his words as he lectured the boys at the dinner table.
“Every creature on God's earth has its method for survival. The fox knows a thousand tricks to evade those who would hunt it. A rabbit only knows one. If you are going to be a great hunter, you must know which tricks your prey will use for which situation.”
Blythe had always been a fighter, but now she reminded herself that her best trick was hiding. If she could stay still until she was certain that Cottering had given up, she could circle back to the village, try to find some help, and make her way to London. All she had to do was stay hidden.
A loud scream rent the air. It sent chills up her spine, and her mind flashed back to a terrible night in Seven Dials, where a drunk woman had cut herself on a long piece of glass. The scream came again, piercing and with a feminine sound to it.
The bastard. Somehow, he's brought that poor maid out here. He's torturing her!
She scrabbled briefly in the dirt in front of her, but when the scream came again, Blythe could not stand to be still. She sprang up, ready to throw herself at Cottering. Less than a dozen yards away, the man himself, alone and standing like a stone ogre in the bright moonlight, grinned at her.
“A fox, bitch. They scream like women, don't they?”
He rushed her, and Blythe's breath caught in her chest.