Sweet Rogue of Mine (The Survivors #9) - Shana Galen Page 0,63
wrong, but being with Nash didn’t feel wrong. Being with him felt right.
She was a woman of three and twenty. She was plain and poor and had no prospects or connections. She would never marry. Was she supposed to forgo all carnal pleasures for the next fifty or sixty years? Why had God given her these needs and the ability to feel as she did if he did not want her to enjoy these feelings?
And she did not think anyone would dispute the changes in Nash the past few days. He’d lost that hunted look. He was doing better, and if kissing him was what it took to keep him from the asylum, then kiss him she would.
Pru was about to knock again, when the Northgate door finally opened, and young Mr. George Northgate stood there. He gave her a long look. “If it isn’t Miss Howard. Come in.” He moved aside, and Pru hesitated before stepping into the house. It was cold and dark and unusually quiet. No servant came to take her coat.
Northgate closed the door and leaned on it. “Not going to Wentmore today?” he asked. Pru did not like the way he leaned on the door, and she suddenly wished she hadn’t come at all. But Mrs. Northgate was expecting her.
“I could ask you the same question,” she said, avoiding his query.
“You are a forward girl, aren’t you?” he said. “The workmen aren’t there because of the rain. Mr. Payne sent them home.”
“Mr. Payne is back?” Pru asked.
“He returned last night. I’m surprised you didn’t know. You seem well acquainted with all that happens in that house.”
Pru glanced at the stairs. The sconces were not lit, even though the day was dreary and the house dark. “If you’ll excuse me, I will go see Mrs. Northgate. I’m sure she is wondering where I am.” Pru started for the stairs.
“Not likely,” Northgate said.
Pru reached the stairs and started up.
“She’s not here,” he said.
Pru paused and looked back. “Where is she?” She had the ridiculous idea that Northgate had done something to his grandmother.
“She’s gone to Blunley town with the rest of the family. You and I are alone,” he said. Pru shivered slightly. She had not liked the tone of his voice. It had sounded...ominous.
“I wonder why she didn’t tell me.” Pru made her voice light and unconcerned as she slowly made her way back down the stairs. Northgate was still blocking the door. He’d said they were alone, but that couldn’t be right. There were always servants in residence, especially in a big house like this one. Except Northgate had answered the door himself, and no one had come to take her coat.
“Why would she?”
Why would she indeed? It was not as though Pru had any standing in this village, and Mrs. Northgate did not owe her any explanations. But the woman had been kind to Pru, in her way. Mrs. Northgate didn’t make Pru feel less than as her grandson now did.
“I should return to the vicarage,” Pru said. “You should have told me earlier. I wouldn’t have taken up your time.”
“I saw you yesterday,” Northgate said, not moving away from the door or acknowledging her obvious wish to leave.
“Oh, where was that?” Pru asked, wondering if she could leave through a back door. Were the servants downstairs? Could she get out that way?
“Wentmore. You walked into the wood with that invalid.”
Pru refrained from pointing out it was an informal garden, not a wood. “Mr. Pope is not an invalid. He has lost most of his sight, but he is still quite capable.”
“Oh, really? And what exactly was he capable of in the woods?”
For a moment Pru couldn’t breathe. Had Northgate followed them? Had he seen them together?
“I see something must have happened in the wood,” Northgate said, stepping away from the door and toward her. “Your face just flushed red. What did you let him do to you?”
So he hadn’t followed them. And he was moving closer, trying to intimidate her. He obviously didn’t know that she had walked the streets of Rome and Paris and London. She could defend herself. She lifted her umbrella, readying it in case she needed to swing it at him. She knew not to swing out. He would just grab the end and yank it away. She had to wait for him to come close enough and then bring it up unexpectedly, hitting him between the legs.