Vivian held her breath, waiting in unbearable anticipation, as the highwayman hesitated to answer Madame Renarde’s question.

Would he kiss her again? Or, heaven forbid, force himself on her? She remembered the hunger of his kiss the night they’d met. She’d matched him with equal fervor that shocked her to the core. She remembered the dark desires he’d awakened with his embrace.

At last, her captor met her eyes with an intensity that burned.

He shook his head in a firm negative. “I do not bring my attentions where they are not wanted.” He raised his head and regarded Madame Renarde with a wry smile. “Furthermore, although I’m a highwayman, I do have some semblance of honor.”

“Honor?” Vivian concealed her relief at his words with feigned scorn. “You drugged our carriage driver, stole the horses, and abducted us to extort money from my uncle! Forgive me if I do not take your vow to not assault me as proof that you’re a gentleman.” An inane thought flitted through her mind and she voiced it on impulse. “We haven’t even been introduced!”

The highwayman clapped his hand over his mouth and roared with laughter.

Vivian realized how absurd she’d sounded and nearly joined him in his chuckles. Fighting back giggles, she forced a level tone and attempted to bring back reason. “I’m glad I was able to amuse you,” she said drily, “but what I meant to say was... shouldn’t my companion and I have the right to know the name of our jailer?”

The highwayman regarded her with that rakish grin before he rose from his cot and bowed with a flourish. “Rhys, at your service.”

“Vivian Stratford, at your mercy,” she retorted drily, noting that he did not give his surname.

Rhys grinned. “Touché.”

She inclined her head and turned to her companion. “And this is Madame Renarde.”

He extended his hand to shake, then suddenly, he grabbed his arm and hissed in pain. Oh Lord, Vivian had forgotten that she’d shot him. After all, he was quite lively for a wounded man.

“Ladies, forgive me,” he said through gritted teeth. “I must attend to this ball in my arm before we continue this lovely chat.” With that, he opened the box he’d placed on the cot earlier.

Vivian stared in horror at the array of torturous surgical instruments. He sounded so calm about the grisly matter. Rhys then took out a little brown bottle that she’d seen in many noble households. Laudanum. Was that what he’d drugged her and the others with?

Doubt immediately imbued her. She’d had laudanum before, when she’d sprained her knee from a tumble down the stairs. The substance had made her feel foggy, but it hadn’t made her fall asleep. And if he’d given her that same drug, surely she’d be muzzy-headed. Instead, Vivian felt more awake and alert than she’d been in her entire life.

Rhys took a large swig from the bottle, as if it were a dram of whiskey.

Tentative hope bloomed in her chest. If he were drugged, perhaps she and Madame Renarde could escape. She glanced up at her companion and saw that Madame Renarde had the same thought.

Rhys quashed their notion before they could even plan. Even worse, he did not slur from the drug. “Don’t entertain the thought of attempting to depart while I’m occupied. I’ve installed a door in the cave’s tunnel and it locks from the inside. Feel free to have a look.”

Heat flooded Vivian’s face. How could he read her so easily? All the same, she was curious at the concept of a door within a cave, but the idea of fruitlessly poking at the barrier to freedom under Rhys’s knowing smirk was beyond humiliating.

She slumped back against the cave wall, full of impotent anger. “Well, I hope your wound becomes infected and you grow too weak to prevent us from searching for the key!”

His eyes widened in shock at her malicious words. Then he regained his devil-may-care composure. “If my wound festers, that means I shall most likely die. And it would be your fault as you’re the one who shot me. Are you quite certain you can handle having my death on your conscience?”

Vivian’s shoulders sank. The answer was a resounding no. However, she refused to give him that satisfaction. “Oh, just dig out the ball and bandage your arm and we’ll let God decide what trials I can endure.”

His eyes blazed with something akin to admiration. “And so I shall.” The confidence in his voice should have sounded foolish, yet it did not. Rhys withdrew a pair of scissors and bent to his task.

Vivian watched with morbid fascination as Rhys first cut away his sleeve until the wound was revealed in all its gruesome glory. Dark brown flecks of blood were spattered along his muscular forearm. She cringed to see such beauty damaged.

The bullet hole was a red ruin, clotted and revolting. Yet Vivian continued to watch, even when he dug the pliers into his flesh, searching for the ball. She had done this to him. It seemed cowardly to look away.

Fresh blood spurted and ran down his arm, and Rhys had to pause to staunch it with the fabric of the sleeve he’d cut off. His cocksure smile had vanished, lines of pain creasing the skin around his copper eyes.

Reluctant pity swelled Vivian’s heart at his obvious suffering. An apology nearly crept from her throat, but she bit it back. This wouldn’t have happened if he had not kidnapped her.

For a moment, the sight became too much, and she looked back up at Madame Renarde, who also watched the operation with an alarming pallor to her countenance. Yet there was a look of familiarity in the companion’s blue eyes. As if she’d seen bullets pried out of people’s bodies before. From what Madame Renarde had told Vivian about her past, it was likely that she had.

Her curiosity high, Vivian turned back to watch Rhys. He still hadn’t freed the bullet, and fresh blood oozed all over his arm. He groaned in agony as he wiggled the pliers from another angle. She could no longer cling to her belief that she’d been right to shoot him. Her heart ached with guilt and sympathy at his pain.

I’m sorry, she wanted to say, but the words lodged in the lump in her throat.

Finally, hissing through his teeth, Rhys pulled out a bloody lead ball and dropped it into a small metal tray with a clang. After he cleaned the wound with a cloth dipped in water from the basin, she thought he’d bandage his arm next, but instead, he took another pull on the bottle of laudanum and set the pliers aside, only to take a pair of tweezers from the box.

As he dug into the wound again, Vivian must have made some sort of noise, for Rhys paused and looked up at her. “If you are feeling squeamish, you should turn away. I do not want you casting up your accounts on my floor.”

She shook her head. “I am not so delicate.”

He arched on eyebrow. “Are you admiring your handiwork then?”

“No,” she said quickly. “I only...”

“Want to see that I come through all right?” he asked in a mocking tone. “Are you concerned for my fate now?”

Yes. She changed the subject. “Why are you still prodding your wound?”

He frowned at her evasion. “I am removing bits of fabric before my skin heals over them.”

She nodded in understanding. “That sounds practical.” Though surely that hole wasn’t going to mend overnight. Then she looked closer and blinked. For some reason, it appeared smaller. But that couldn’t be. Surely her worry had only made the wound look worse than it truly was.

Rhys picked at the hole more, depositing bits of wool in the tray that held the bullet. At last, he cleaned his wound one more time before wrapping the bandage around his arm. A measure of tension eased between Vivian’s shoulders. She hadn’t known she’d been so concerned.

Her fists clenched in her lap. She should be more concerned with escaping. Her teeth clenched in mute frustration as she observed that, despite having consumed enough laudanum to put down a horse, Rhys appeared to be perfectly alert, albeit quite pale.

He cleaned up his surgical instruments and changed into a fresh shirt from a trunk in the corner of the cave. Vivian bit back a gasp at the glimpses of his bare back and chest, and the planes of muscles kissed by the light of the lanterns. The view made her stomach flutter in the most alarming manner.

“Are you ladies hungry?” he asked in a courteous tone, as if he were their host and not their jailer.

Vivian wanted to refuse food on principle, but Madame Renarde spoke up. “Victuals would be most welcome, as you so rudely deprived us of the meal we would have received at the ball.”

Rhys nodded. “I am sorry about that.” He delved deeper into the cave and she heard a cabinet door opening. It was so dark back there. She wondered how he could see.

He emerged with a basket of scones and two plates. “I also have bread, cheese, and eggs.  And I can put the kettle on for tea, unless you prefer wine.”

Vivian accepted her plate with a nod of thanks. “Cheese would be quite nice.”

“And wine,” Madame Renarde added. “The whole decanter.”

Rhys and Vivian laughed at the same time. The mingled sound made heat flush to her face. She broke off her laughter and took a scone from the basket.

After Rhys brought out the cheese and wine, he started a fire in a cunning hole carved into the cave floor and topped by an iron grate. As the heat from the first flickers of flame reached her, Vivian realized how chilly the cave was. Strange, she hadn’t noticed until now.

She also hadn’t noticed that she was ravenous until she’d devoured her scone and reached for a second one. Guiltily, she glanced up at Madame Renarde to see if her companion had observed her unladylike bites.

But Madame Renarde was occupied with pouring a second glass of wine.

She turned her attention back to Rhys. “Are you not going to eat?”

He shook his head. “I dined earlier.” Once he had the fire going, he sat back on the cot opposite hers. “Tomorrow, I’ll secure a hot meal for you. And if I can acquire some ice, I can better stock the larder.”

“Thank you,” she said, with her ingrained manners.

Madame Renarde eschewed any pleasantries. “It is good that you wish to keep us well fed, but don’t expect that to ingratiate us to you.”

Rhys inclined his head respectfully. “Madame, I had no such lofty expectations. I wish for this ordeal to go as smoothly as possible.”

“How can you call it an ordeal?” Vivian shot him a glare. “We’re the ones being held prisoner.”

He sighed. “Yes, and as the one holding you, I now have two women to look after and contend with until Lord Thornton gives me the money.”

A tremor ran through her limbs at his talk of holding her. Vivian shrugged off the distracting sensation. “And how long do you think that will take?”

“Hopefully no longer than a night or two,” Rhys said. “In the meantime, I will try to make things as comfortable for the both of you as possible.”

Despite herself, Vivian was touched by his attention to their comfort. Madame Renarde also appeared to soften towards him.

Her companion poured Vivian a second glass of wine and then a third for herself. She leaned forward and tilted her head to the side as she studied Rhys. “On our first encounter, you called me an old man. Now you address me as Madame. What brought about the change in manners?”

“At first I thought you were a Molly, or enacting a deception to take advantage of your charge. I apologize for that swift judgement.” Rhys sounded genuinely contrite. “After observing you and your interactions with Miss Stratford, I realize you are like other individuals I met, who feel as if they were born in the wrong form. I can’t claim to understand such a thing, but if you wish to live as a female, I have no qualms with addressing you as such.”

Both Vivian and Madame Renarde gaped at him in astonishment. People like Madame Renarde were generally regarded with amusement, scorn, and virulent loathing. Vivian had heard from Madame Renarde that sometimes if one’s secret was discovered they were brutally beaten to death at worst, and publicly humiliated and driven out of town at best.

Vivian couldn’t imagine facing such prejudice, though she knew very well how one was regarded when they did not conform to their expected role in society.

Rhys’s acceptance of Madame Renarde’s chosen way of life was nothing short of a miracle. Not even Uncle Aldric was as tolerant.

He was accepting of her too, Vivian remembered. He’d expressed genuine admiration for her love of fencing, with not even a hint of judgement. She hid a frown with a sip of wine. It was very difficult to hate such a man.

And him being so unbearably handsome did not help matters in the slightest.

Madame Renarde interrupted Vivian’s dangerous path of thought. “I thank you for your courtesy. It is a pity that we hadn’t met under friendly circumstances.” Her stress on the word reminded Vivian that no matter how charming this rakish highwayman was, he was not their friend at all.

“I quite agree,” Rhys said and drank the rest of the wine straight from the bottle. “But I do hope we can at least be civil.” He rose and took their glasses back to the dark part of the cave, then did the same with their plates. “Now, as it is past dawn, I hope you do not object to my suggestion that we retire. Kidnapping is exhausting business.”

Madame Renarde covered her mouth and yawned. “That does sound agreeable. However, I cannot approve of Miss Stratford sleeping so close to you. I think we should switch.”

“I am sorry you feel that way,” Rhys said mildly, though there was a thread of steel in his voice. “Miss Stratford is my primary hostage and I intend to keep her close.”

Vivian sucked in a breath as her heart hammered against her ribs. She hadn’t thought about sleeping next to him until now. “What about my privacy?”

Rhys gave her a look of consideration. “If you look above, there are curtains that pull down. There are also chamber pots beneath the bunks.”

“Splendid,” Madame Renarde said and reached up to untie the roll suspended from the ceiling.

When the curtains came down, Vivian saw that they were made of thin slats of bamboo and had beautiful paintings of tigers on their tawny surfaces. She’d seen them in homes where the Chinoise trend had been embraced. Utterly beautiful, and more importantly, their captor would be unable to see through them. “These are lovely,” she said. “Did they come from China?”

“India.” Rhys’s voice penetrated the thin barrier. “Before you undress, I do have a trunk of various clothing that may be more comfortable.”

A travelling trunk slid beneath the curtain. Vivian found a dress that may fit her for tomorrow, as well as a man’s night shirt that would be comfortable for sleeping. At first, she wondered how he’d come by the clothing, then realized that he probably stole the trunk from one of the carriages he robbed.

Madame Renarde found a second night shirt with a nod of satisfaction. As she helped Vivian out of her ball gown and unlaced her stays, Vivian couldn’t stop glancing at the bamboo curtain. Even though Rhys couldn’t see her, she could feel his presence behind the barrier as she undressed. A most unnerving sensation.

Even worse, she could see his boots hit the stone floor and hear a rustle of fabric indicating that he too was undressing. Some imp within speculated as to what Rhys would look like without his trousers. Then heat crept to her cheeks as she wondered if he was thinking the same about her lacking skirts. This was far too intimate.

Her discomfort eased as the lanterns were doused and she was tucked under the covers of her narrow cot. Madame Renarde was snoring almost immediately, drowsy from the stress of the night’s events and three glasses of wine. Sleep took longer for Vivian.

It seemed she’d barely slept when Vivian opened her eyes to see Rhys leaning over the top bunk, where Madame Renarde was snoring away. She sat up with a gasp. What was he doing to her friend?

Suddenly, Rhys bent down and met Vivian’s gaze. His eyes glowed amber flame and a trickle of blood trailed from the corner of his mouth. “Go back to sleep, Miss Stratford,” he commanded.

Vivian sank back down on her thin pallet and didn’t awaken until Madame Renarde shook her shoulder, telling her that tea had been made.

Her companion looked calm and unharmed as she helped Vivian dress. When she emerged behind the curtain, Rhys gave her a polite nod as he fried eggs in a pan heated on his clever grate above the fire.

The scene was so amicable, albeit awkward, that Vivian blinked at the memory of what she’d seen from her bed.

It had to have been a dream.