Dark Deceptions: A Regency and Medieval Collection of Dark Romances(35)

Oh God, Nurse Talbert.

“I’ve returned with His Lordship.”

Georgina scooted out from under the bridge of his arms. Nurse Talbert’s voice grated like fingernails being scraped across a windowpane. She clamped her hand over her ears, trying to blot out the sound.

Nurse Talbert would sack her. She tried sucking breath into her constricted lungs. It felt like someone had dragged her below water and was holding on to her feet, as she was seized by the same desperation she’d felt in Bristol after her father had beat her and left her for dead.

Adam called out to her. “Georgina, it will be all right.”

Even his tender concern couldn’t drag her from the dark abyss. She was sinking. Deeper. Deeper. Soon she’d disappear, forever gone. A panicky laugh bubbled up from her throat. Disappearing was the preferable option to being discovered with Adam here.

Her gaze scoured the room for escape. It landed on a solitary window. She squinted.

Is there a tree out there?

Someone jiggled the door handle. “Open this door.” It was a man.

Georgina could only assume the voice belonged to the Earl of Whitehaven, a mythical beast she’d rather not face. Austere, regal, and polished, he was everything Georgina was not.

She looked to Adam for help. His lips were turned up, revealing even, pearl-white teeth. “How can you be smiling?” she choked out.

“My brother is going to be furious.”

Georgina dropped her head into her palms. Bloody perfect. She was going to have to contend with an austere, regal, polished nobleman who also happened to be furious. Being thrown out in the streets without a reference seemed the more palatable option. Almost.

The earl murmured something to Nurse Talbert, the words indecipherable through the door.

He tried the handle again.

Adam went to open it.

Georgina gasped and flew across the room, her pale white skirts fluttering about her. She reached him before he turned the lock. “What are you doing?”

Adam’s lips twitched. “I assure you, Georgina, we will have to face him eventually.”

How could he possibly find anything humorous about their situation? The wheels of her mind spun. Surely there was something—

“Adam, the door.”

She jumped as Adam allowed the Earl of Whitehaven entrance.

Adam’s lips formed a rusty smile as he greeted the earl. “Hullo, brother.”

If looks could shoot fire, Adam would’ve been nothing more than a pile of ash at the earl’s feet. “What is the meaning of this? When I said you needed a diversion, this is most certainly not what I had intended.” His blue eyes, sparkling with fury, did a quick survey of Georgina. He returned his attention to Adam. “I was called from my board meeting by the head nurse, who informed me that you had abducted one of her…”

“I’d hardly call it abducting,” Adam drawled.

The tight, drawn lines around the earl’s mouth indicted that he didn’t care to debate the merits of word choice. He arched a perfectly “earlish” brow.

Her stomach curled in knots. The Earl of Whitehaven chose that moment to glance her way. His upper lip curled back as he looked down his aristocratic nose at her.

Georgina inched away from Adam, who shifted his attention to the earl.

Georgina saw her chance and took it. She pulled the door open and flew down the hall as though the hounds of hell were nipping at her heels. She might actually prefer those sharp-toothed dogs to the condemnation she’d seen in the earl’s eyes.

*

By the time the thick fog of confusion had lifted, Georgina was gone. His heart threatened to pound a hole out of his chest. He’d not lose her now!

“Georgina!”

Nick planted himself in front of him. “Where do you think you’re going?” he snapped.

Adam took a step around him.

Nick again placed himself between Adam and the freedom he craved.

Adam gripped him by the shoulders and snarled like the caged captive he’d been. “By God, if you stop me from going to her, I will thrash you within an inch of your life. Is that clear, Nick?”

Nick’s mouth fell open, but he remained frozen in place. “There will be a scandal,” he snapped. He waved his hand around the sterile office. “The staff here will talk. The other board members have already caught a whiff of scandal when I was summoned from the meeting. I will be damned if you throw away your reputation for a common maid…”

Red dots of fury nearly blinded Adam. A roar rumbled deep within his chest. He slammed his fist into Nick’s unsuspecting face.

Nick crumpled to the floor, landing hard on his knees. He pressed his fingers to a slightly-hooked nose and winced. He tugged a kerchief from his pocket and blotted the crimson blood. “By God, you broke my nose!”

Adam stood over him. “You’re my brother and I love you. But if you disparage her, I will lay you flat again. Is that understood?” He held his hand out.

Nick knocked it aside and shoved to his feet without assistance. “I will not continue this dialogue in this very public forum. If you don’t have a care for your reputation, have one for mine and mother’s.” He glared around the edges of the embroidered fabric.

A twinge of remorse hit him. Nick was the type of brother who’d battle a thousand foes for his family. But being reunited with Georgina had set a blaze burning within him and his thoughts raged like a conflagration, threatening to burn reason and logic to cinders. His brother would never understand, because he would never know the hell that had bound Adam and Georgina in an unbreakable bond. Still, he had to try. “I need to help her.”