all the times he’d pretended indifference, and her words held worry—for him. Worry he did not deserve.
“I am in robust physical health, thank you. About Chastain?”
Della picked up the pace. “The less said, the better.”
“You went with him willingly?”
She peeled her hand free of Ash’s arm and crossed the clearing to a bench sitting in the sunshine.
“I went with him of my own free will,” she said, taking a seat. “He wanted out of his betrothal, I wanted to be ever so slightly disgraced. The plan was, after his father caught up with us—which should have happened within five miles of St. Albans—Chastain could go wenching and wagering on his way. I could finally return to Kent, a confirmed spinster who had had a quiet, not-that-close brush with disaster.”
The tale was plausible, particularly given the annoyed attitude of Della’s posture. She hunched forward, hands braced on the bench, gaze on the lush fall grass.
And she was lying.
Ash came down beside her. “Della, you won’t shock me, you won’t disgust me, you won’t in any way offend me, or reduce my esteem for you, but I must know: Did Chastain hurt you?”
She untied her bonnet and set it on the bench, perhaps to give her time to choose her words. “No duels, Ash. I cannot have anybody fighting a duel over this. Nicholas is a dead shot, and Chastain is merely a dull-witted lout. It’s not as if I was as pure as the vestal virgins anyway.”
Something heavy and primal shifted inside Ash, bringing with it both a deadly calm and a banked rage.
“I don’t care if you comported yourself like White Chapel’s most infamous strumpet. According to every immutable law of masculine decency, the lady alone chooses with whom to share her favors. Did he hurt you?”
Della took a deep breath, her shoulders lifting and settling. “Chastain was too drunk, but the notion of turning our shared outing into a true elopement had taken hold of his imagination. He had me on the bed and was fumbling about when his father burst in with the innkeeper’s wife and two footmen at his side. I was somewhat clothed, also in some disarray.”
A woman somewhat clothed could nonetheless be raped. “No duel, then,” Ash said. “But give me the word, and I will hurt him badly.”
She leaned into his shoulder. “You are very dear. Mostly, Chastain frightened me. He’s quite strong, and he’d been drinking for much of the day. I don’t think he could have done anything, but he was intent on trying.”
Ash allowed himself to drape an arm around her shoulders and pull her close. “Give me leave, and I will address the slight to your honor, Della. I will bring you his pizzle on a platter. I will cut off his balls and serve them to Willow’s dogs. You placed your trust in him, and he not only bungled the whole business, he violated your person.”
She curled closer. “No, he did not. He pushed me onto the bed and more or less fell on top of me. Sorting out my skirts defeated his limited coordination, and in another minute I would have applied my knee to his breeding organs.”
That was courage talking, the shaky courage of somebody who’d had a near miss. Applying her knee would have required that Chastain give her room to aim and fire, and even half drunk, few men would have been that heedless.
“Hold me, please,” she said. “Since Nicholas retrieved me from the inn, I have been groped, pinched, and nearly fondled, but nobody… Please just hold me.”
Ash obliged, wrapping her in his arms. She fit his embrace like she was made for him, like homecoming and Christmas and every good and dear thing.
“You need never see Chastain again, Della. He betrayed you, but the worst of his schemes failed. You’re safe.”
She wasn’t crying, not that he could tell, but she was resting against him as if winded and weary.“I’m not safe. Not yet. Another few weeks of pretending to be a woman who has committed no serious wrong, and I might be allowed to slink off to Kent.”
And I will slink off to Dorset. Again. “That’s the spirit. Noli desperare, and once more unto the breach.”
He remained with her on the bench until she sat up a few precious, torturous moments later. “You won’t say anything to Nicholas or Jonathan? About Chastain and the bed?”
“Not a word. You have a leaf…” He untangled it from her chignon. “Better.”