Always a Maiden (The Belles of Beak Street #5)(38)
*
Susanah frowned at the teal half boots she’d laced on. She’d opted for ballroom slippers before now. Their softer soles made less noise as she wound her way down the stairs and through the marble entry hall. But Evan had said wear boots. She hoped they weren’t going to tramp through a forest or something that would require a sturdier pair than the walking boots on her feet.
She checked the clock and once the hands showed midnight, she slipped out of her room. Hugging the shadows she made her way down the stairs. The clicks of her soles on the stairs seemed loud to her ears, but no one emerged to see her descending to the ground floor.
Stealthily, she opened the front door. Evan was there in the shadows just a few feet away. Her stomach fluttered wildly. Her knees almost buckled in relief as if she half expected he wouldn’t show up at all. But then he’d insisted they meet, so she didn’t know why she doubted. But if that dark-haired lady he’d danced with at Almack’s had wanted to meet with him tonight, he’d probably be with her.
After sliding through the small opening she allowed, she inched the door shut. She had to lock it before leaving, but she almost couldn’t take her eyes off of Evan.
Her heart thundered in her aching chest. This would be her last adventure with him. But she wished it wasn’t so. She pivoted to insert the key in the lock.
“My lady.” Evan’s hands and a heavy cloak landed on her shoulders. When she turned to face him, he smiled at her and pulled up the hood and tied a bow under her chin. “I’m pleased you decided to join me.”
His words seemed oddly out of place. It was the sort of thing one might say to a guest that hadn’t committed to attending an event. “Why wouldn’t I?”
“You said you didn’t want to meet with me—that you didn’t think we needed to talk.”
What good would lessons in how to catch a husband be when her parents were insisting she marry Lord Farringate? “I don’t know that it matters now.”
Evan frowned, but he extended his arm and led her down the street. “Who caught you the last time?”
“The housekeeper.” Susanah recalled the woman’s unexpected entry into the drawing room last night with confusion. “I don’t think she told anyone. She may have thought I just snuck out early in the morning to purchase some oranges.”
A few houses down two horses stood. Their reins were looped over the wrought iron rail preventing an unsteady pedestrian from falling into the servants’ area. Evan stopped. The horses were saddled. No.
Her muscles seizing, she blankly looked past the corner for the carriage. Usually, the carriage was waiting at the cross street, but nothing was there. Her heart jumped, then thumped frenetically in her throat. Cold ran through her veins. One of the horses shifted, and she jerked back. They looked huge and powerful and deadly. “You don’t expect me to ride, do you?”
“Yes. Is there a problem?”
Horses terrified her. She never rode—almost never. There had been that time in finishing school where a group of them had spent a weekend at a nearby estate of one of the girls. They’d all decided to go for a ride, and she hadn’t been able to dissuade them. Her mount hadn’t wanted to follow her commands, and she’d had to use the crop she’d been supplied. She’d known from some of the looks the other girls had given her that she’d done it wrong. But she had scarcely been able to breathe let alone properly manage a spirited mount.
Backing away, Susanah stared at him, not that he could see her alarm with the way the heavy hood of the cloak he’d provided was shadowing her face. “Where is your carriage?”
“I’m afraid I sold it,” he answered.
Because he was leaving town, and he hadn’t bothered to tell her. A dark desperation flared in her. If she could summon anger then she wouldn’t have to give into her rising panic. She wouldn’t scream and run as her body was insisting was the right course of action.
“I don’t see any reason to continue meeting with you. I cannot risk it.” Her shaking hands plucked at the strings of the cloak he’d put around her. Her whisper quivered. “I didn’t want to meet with you at all.”
She’d knotted the stupid cloak, so she gave up and turned back toward her house. She’d cut the strings of the cloak with her embroidery scissors if she couldn’t get it undone before she got inside. It was barely a hundred feet to the front door—where it wasn’t any safer inside. It was as if she ran into an invisible wall when she started back home. She should go back and forget this ever happened, but her home was a prison. And this was her last taste of freedom.
“Susanah,” Evan caught her shoulders. “What is—you’re shaking.”
He pulled her back against him. He was so steady and solid, she just wanted to sag against him and stay in his arms forever. For a few seconds, nothing was said.
Her heartbeat slowed, and she realized she was behaving like a ninny. Not only that, but she owed him an explanation. “I don’t ride.”
“You don’t?” The skepticism and surprise made the low tones of his voice crest upward.
After all, what good English woman worth her salt didn’t ride? The English were horse mad. Everyone knew that. “I don’t suppose you’d believe me if I told you I’m from Venice where they take boats or walk.”