The Postilion (The Masqueraders #2) - S.M. LaViolette Page 0,74

something.” She looked up at him, her blue eyes questioning. “I’m afraid to twist too hard and damage the lock.”

“Here.” He held out his hand. “Let me have a try.”

He studied the key she gave him. “There are scratch marks on the bottom of the bit, where it has stuck before.”

Jago dropped to his haunches beside her and re-inserted the key, steadying himself on the trunk with one hand while he gently jiggled the lock to and fro a few times. There was an almost inaudible click and the lock popped.

“You did it.” She looked up, a smile on her normally serious face, as though he’d done something marvelous.

Their eyes locked and her smile slowly faded, her warm blue irises shrinking, her pupils dark and bottomless.

Jago felt like a man gazing over a precipice; there was still time for him to make the right decision and step back.

Instead, he swayed toward her like a tree bowed by an irresistible wind.

“Dammit,” Jago muttered, and then claimed her mouth with his.

Chapter Twenty-One

February 1817

Somewhere Outside of Carlisle

Nine Months Ago

Wherever they were going, it wasn’t to Scotland.

It seemed to Benna that they were heading west. All that was west of Carlisle were tiny villages and hamlets and miles and miles of desolate coastland.

Willy, who was crammed onto the seat beside her, had fallen asleep almost instantly upon sitting down.

But any hope that he was a sound sleeper was dashed when she shifted slightly and the eye that was on her side popped open.

“What? I’m not doing anything,” she said before he could speak.

“See that ye don’t.”

“Can’t we at least open the shades so that I might look out the window? Or do you have orders about that, too?”

“It’s dark; there’s nothin’ to see.” He’d then crossed his huge arms over his chest and slept.

That had been about four hours ago and he’d scarcely moved since.

There was a gap in one of the louvers and Benna could see a thin slice of the night. Only scattered beams of moonlight made their way through the cloud-strewn sky. The chaise had its lamps lighted but the postilions were observing a sober pace and creeping along. Benna doubted they were traveling more than five or six miles an hour.

It had occurred to her, more than once, that she might open the door and leap out of the carriage before Willy could grab her. But she had no idea what the roadway and verge were like. She knew there was a canal being built somewhere to the west of Carlisle; it would be her luck that the road ran along it and she’d fling herself into a deep, narrow ditch.

So, she waited. For what, she didn’t know.

What would Michael do to her? If he had some other woman locked up already, did he even need her? After so many years would anyone remember what she looked like?

After what Geoff had told her, Benna feared that Michael had already prepared the way to claiming her trust by using the faux Benna he kept locked up in Sussex.

She could just imagine what the trustees in charge of her inheritance would do if they were forced to choose between a scruffy, shorn-headed servant dressed in men’s clothing or the powerful, confident Earl of Norland.

Not that any of that would be an issue as things stood right now.

Whether Michael planned to marry her, lock her up, or kill her, she needed to escape.

The carriage slowed and the road became rutted and bumpy.

Beside her, Willy stirred. He leaned forward and flicked open one of the blinds.

Benna saw a flat expanse of beach, tufted with sparse clumps of grass, stretched out as far as the eye could see, which was quite a distance given the reflection of moonlight on the ocean.

Willy grunted. “Were ’ere.”

“Where is here?”

“At the cottage,” he answered unhelpfully.

When the carriage shuddered to a halt a few minutes later, he opened the door and flicked down the steps.

Benna saw he’d not been lying: there was indeed a cottage; it looked to be no more than four or five rooms. There were no bars on the windows, which made her think her stay there would be of short duration.

“On you go, lass,” Willy said, not rushing her when it was clear her legs had fallen asleep.

Once they were outside the carriage he ignored the postilions, who simply spurred their leaders and turned the chaise in a wide circle before rolling back down the same road.

Willy led her to the cottage, opened the door, and