“You take my son hostage and then you try to kill him?”
“Hostage? A lady take a gentleman hostage?”
Mr. Ffalkes whirled about at the intruder’s voice. He saw a nobleman, no doubt about it in his mind. He could spot a nobleman from two miles away, damn their arrogance, their supercilious attitudes, their drawling voices that made resentment boil in him, for surely he should have been born on a richer blanket, like his cousin, that damned sod of a knight, who was, at least, now long dead.
“Yes,” Caroline said. “I’m surprised Owen hasn’t told you, but I suppose he wanted to protect me. I did take him as my hostage, and he must have seen himself honor-bound to keep quiet in that role. This is his father, Mr. Roland Ffalkes. Sir, this is Lord Chilton.”
“So, you’re her father.”
“What?”
“Well, if Owen i
s her brother, then a paternal conclusion rather jumps to the fore, does it not?”
Mr. Ffalkes drew himself up. He looked rather formidable in his dark cloak and his boots. “I am her betrothed,” he said, “not that it is any of your business, Lord Chilton.”
“Oh no, it’s none of my business at all, though you do seem a trifle old for the young lady. May I inquire why your son is her hostage?”
“He is not her hostage, that is nonsense. He is a man. No, you may not inquire about anything. You are intruding. You may leave now, sir.”
“You are not my betrothed,” Caroline said, rising. “Just stop this nonsense, Mr. Ffalkes. Lord Chilton, this man was my guardian until I became nineteen last week. He tried to force me to marry Owen, but that was ridiculous, then he was going to rape me and force me to marry himself instead. I got away and took Owen with me as a hostage. Then,” she added, looking over at Owen, who was awake now, the covers pulled nearly to his eyes, staring at his father like a boy who has just been caught stealing his father’s money, “Owen got ill.”
“I see,” Chilton said.
“Leave now, sir,” Mr. Ffalkes said.
“How did you find us?”
Mr. Ffalkes looked at his son as he said, “It rained a lot. Every inn you stopped at remembered you. Also, I had five men out searching for the direction you took.”
“I’ll just wager you paid them with my money, didn’t you, you bloody thief?”
“It would seem to me, sir,” Chilton said, seeing that Miss Smith was now alarmingly red in the face and holding a fire poker in her left hand snuggled in her skirts, “that since Miss Smith here—”
“Smith? What is this idiocy? Smith? Her name is Derwent-Jones and I am her betrothed. I believe we will be wed before we leave here.”
“—that Miss Derwent-Jones is of age, thus if she doesn’t want to marry you, she doesn’t have to.”
“Naturally she does. Her reputation is in shreds. She has no reputation unless I marry her and repair it.”
“I would rather marry Owen!”
There was whimpering from the bed.
“Hush, my boy, I won’t saddle you with her. I’ll saddle myself and regret it doubtless, but it will be done.”
North Nightingale, Lord Chilton, looked from Mr. Ffalkes, who didn’t look to be all that bad a man, but did look to be stubborn as a stoat and perfectly ready to do anything to gain what he wanted, to Miss Derwent-Jones, who was ready to raise that poker and strike Mr. Ffalkes on the head, to the whimpering Owen, whose eyes were now tightly closed above the line of blankets, and said, “Do you know, Mr. Ffalkes, that Miss Derwent-Jones has been sleeping in my bed for the past three nights? Did you also know that I invariably awaken her in the morning, my fingertips smoothing over her eyebrows? Do you know how much I enjoy watching her comb her hair and bathe?”
Mr. Ffalkes just stared at him.
Caroline could only stare at him. He’d told the exact truth. It sounded like she was a strumpet. She understood that he was trying to save her from Mr. Ffalkes.
“I want my inheritance, Mr. Ffalkes. I want you to sign over the papers to me right this minute. I want what is mine by right.”
“Nothing is really yours, my girl. You’re naught but a female and thus are incapable of dealing with your own affairs. Your father was a fool to leave things thusly. No, you will have a husband—I—and I will deal with everything, including you and my son. I will even accept you though you’ve consorted with this man whilst your poor cousin Owen was here suffering by himself.”
“Surely this is a melodrama,” North said to the fireplace. “A very bad melodrama, much like the one in London last March where this young man was convinced his love had betrayed him and thus went on a rampage and killed a goat by mistake and—”