Amanda Scott by The Bath Eccentric’s Son Page A

oddest of them would either have treated me to a fit of the vapors or lost her temper with me the minute I’d said I was abducting her. Why, Carolyn Saint-Denis would have tried to scratch my eyes out, or worse, and my sister, Sybilla, would probably have taken her horsewhip to me. But you don’t turn a hair.”
    Nell cocked her head a little to one side, watching him, her right hand still fiddling in an absent way with her reticule. “Perhaps ’tis because they know you better than I do, sir. I have no cause at this present to claw your eyes out and every reason while you attempt to control a mettlesome team in traffic not to do so. As to taking a whip to you, why, you hold the only whip within reach, you know, and I daresay you would not hand it over without some reluctance.”
    “No, I wouldn’t hand it over at all.”
    “How much is your wager?”
    He flicked her another glance. “What makes you think there is a wager?”
    “There must be. You said you would get money.”
    He said in a grim tone, through his teeth, “One abducts an heiress in order to marry her, Miss Bradbourne, in order to control her fortune.”
    Nell was silent.
    “Tongue get trapped behind your teeth, ma’am?”
    She looked directly at him then and discovered that his eyes were an unusual shade of greenish hazel, set deep beneath his brows. Suddenly more disconcerted than she wished him to know, she turned away again, lifted her chin, and said with forced calm, “I believe that abducting heiresses is an indiscretion upon which persons of refinement do not look lightly, sir. Perhaps it is still done in some circles, but surely here in Bath—”
    “An indiscretion, Miss Bradbourne?” Again there was that note of near laughter in his voice. “You would label such an act as this a mere indiscretion?”
    “I think you cannot have thought the matter out clearly,” she said. She was thinking rapidly, having dismissed her first inclination, which had been to inform him as quickly as possible that he had much mistaken the matter, that she was no heiress, and then to insist that he restore her to her great-aunt at once. She had barely opened her mouth, however, when she realized she could not so easily betray Lady Flavia. After all, she knew nothing about Mr. Manningford and certainly had no cause to trust him. She would have to deal with him in a less diplomatic way.
    They had turned onto the London Road, and his attention was fully claimed at that moment by his team. She waited until he had passed a coach laden with passengers before saying calmly, “I regret that I cannot go any farther, Mr. Manningford. My aunt will begin to fret if I do not return to Laura Place soon, so I must request that you take me back there at once.”
    “Request all you like,” he said cheerfully without taking his eyes from the road. The speed at which they were traveling made her grateful that he was not one of those young bucks who drove in a careless, neck-or-nothing fashion; nevertheless, she had no intention of allowing him to carry her another mile.
    “Mr. Manningford, you are making a mistake.”
    “It will not be the first time.”
    “No doubt, but abduction is a serious offense, and I am not without protection, you know. You surely cannot believe you will succeed in forcing me to marry you.”
    “Do you think I could not? I doubt your family would welcome the sort of scandal that would arise from trying to set such a marriage aside, and they certainly won’t prosecute once the knot is tied. No one would wish to raise that much dust.”
    “Rein in your horses, Mr. Manningford.” Nell’s voice was ice cold, her words crystal clear.
    Manningford glanced at her and froze. “Where the devil did that come from?” he demanded, staring at the serviceable little pistol she held pointed at him in a perfectly steady hand.
    “All that need concern you,” Nell said, still in that calm, frost-bitten tone, “is that I know how to use it and have no