I've Got My Duke to Keep Me Warm (The Lords of Worth) by Kelly Bowen Page B

even in the dimness, and her eyes flashed. “I’ve sent a woman away from a criminal in the care of two good men,” she hissed. “Men who have done, and will continue to do, everything in their power to see Polly to safety. Men who will see her to a place where she will never have to suffer again the way she suffered at the hands of the one person who should have protected her.”
    Jamie didn’t have an answer for that. His declarations of chivalry yesterday morning suddenly seemed laughably naïve now that he found himself standing in the stark reality of his ideals. She’d given him fair warning, and though he’d listened, he hadn’t heard her.
    Gisele was still watching him, as though waiting for him to respond. “Do you wish to leave, Jamie?”
    “Leave?” He jerked.
    “You can keep the horse. Consider it payment for services rendered. I only ask that you do not speak of what you saw here tonight. For Polly’s sake.”
    Jamie stared at Gisele, something angry and defiant rising within him. She expected him to run—to just fade away in the face of adversity and complication. Dammit, was that the kind of man she thought him to be? Given where and how she had found him, he supposed it probably was. If he was honest with himself, it was exactly what he had done a year ago.
    But he would not do it, not this time.
    With deliberate movements he stalked over to the struggling fire in the hearth and withdrew a burning stick from the edge. He thought of Polly and the abuse that had hurt her but had not broken her. He thought about the child she’d lost and the one she would have a chance to know, thanks to what Gisele had done and the risks she’d taken.
    Jamie retraced his steps to where Gisele stood in the doorway and came to stand directly in front of her, forcing her to look up at him. Without taking his eyes from hers, he tossed the flaming stick into the pile of oil-soaked thatch. “No, I would not like to leave.”
    Something shifted in her eyes, and the corners of her mouth curled slightly. For one wild moment, Jamie wondered what she would do if he kissed her right then. To prove to her just how much he wanted to stay. The urge to taste her was almost overwhelming.
    Behind him the fire caught and began to lick greedily,smoke beginning to curl. He touched his finger to the side of her cheek. “I gave you my word. And I don’t scare that easy.”

    They’d ridden hard all that night, stopping only once to water their horses. Sebastien had caught up with them some miles south of Leicester, and he hadn’t spoken, though he wore a look of satisfaction. Jamie was quite certain that this wasn’t the first time Gisele and Sebastien had spent a night on the backs of horses, putting distance between themselves and suspicious circumstances to avoid thorny explanations.
    Yet as they traveled south, in the direction of London, the vague sense of unease and urgency surrounding the pair seemed to grow, not lessen. It was a disturbing sensation for Jamie, and it was not unlike the one that plagued men on a battlefield waiting for dawn to reveal an enemy that had amassed before them under the cover of darkness.
    Jamie watched Gisele now out of the corner of his eye as they handed their horses over to the stable hands at the inn where they’d finally stopped. All of them desperately needed food and a few hours of rest, as did their horses. She and Sebastien had inquired about rooms at two other guesthouses, smaller, ramshackle establishments farther outside of town, but neither had had any vacant chambers to offer. This one, in the heart of Northampton, was bigger and busy, with quite a few carriages and mail coaches waiting in its sprawling yards.
    Jamie could see that neither of his companions was happy about having to seek shelter at these finer lodgings. Gisele was visibly nervous, her eyes darting across thecourt as if searching for something or someone. Before she’d even dismounted, she’d pulled the hood of