Page 31 of Secrets of a Duke's Heart
“What is this?” he said in better English than Clarissa had expected.
“We are breaking you out,” Harriet said breathlessly. “This is Miss Penfirth, Viscount Prescott’s cousin. She stole his key. We’re coming to save you!”
That wasn’t quite a truthful accounting of what had happened, but Clarissa let it pass.
“Mon cher, I cannot allow you to do this,” the smuggler said, sagging back. Harriet seized the key and thrust it into the lock, ignoring him.
“I won’t let them hang you.”
Hanging did seem a rather severe punishment for a man who had kidnapped a willing victim. Clarissa judged the handsome young man to be around her own age, late twenties. Any reservations she had about him being a violent threat disappeared when he took Harriet into his arms and stroked her hair. It was obvious from the way he held her that he cared about her very much.
Her heartached.
She turned her back to give them a few minutes of privacy, as much as was possible when three people were milling about an empty cellar. This must be where Nathaniel stored his ill-gotten goods before he transported them to London. Incredible to think that a peer of the realm would deliberately undercut the Crown on taxes. How American of him, despite being French. Those rogues had tossed tea into a harbor and fought an entire war over having to pay tariffs on imported goods.
Very relevant to the present moment, Clarissa,she chided herself. Anything to avoid thinking about Jude. She ignored a sharp pinch of envy.
“—for your own safety, I must set you free,” Rémy was saying.
“Rémy Desmarais, stop being so self-sacrificing,” Harriet said indignantly. “I still want to marry you. Are you going to get out of that cell and make good on your promise to elope with me or not?”
“When you put it that way, marrying you is a far superior fate to a hangman’s noose.”
Clarissa bit back a grin. “If you have concluded your lover’s quarrel, we ought to be going. Quickly.”
They had been down here for too long. She waved the lovers toward the stairway and tromped up after them feeling like a lost puppy. Harriet’s squeak of surprise and the Frenchman’s muttered warning indicated that they had been caught.
But it was only Nathaniel.
“This is why you wanted my key,” he said.
“You can have it back now that he’s free.”
“Montague will be furious.” He cocked his head. All she could do was shrug, though even hearing his name made her heart hurt.
“There is nothing I can do about that. Harriet has made her decision. The question is whether or not he will honor it.”
Watching the lovers bolt down the drive under a rising moon brought a sad smile to Clarissa’s lips. If Jude loved her with such headlong passion, they might have had a chance together. But tonight, she had irrevocably broken it.
CHAPTERFOURTEEN
Jude bolted down the drive. His arms pumped frantically and his feet propelled him forward at a pace he hadn’t attempted in at least a decade.
Harriet had sprung Rémy not half an hour ago. They’d left on foot, headed for the village, taking nothing but the clothes on their backs. The harsh words he’d spoken to Clarissa for her role in their escape chased him down the empty road.
I know what is best for my niece. You do not. How dare you let them go?
Miss Penfirth regarded him with calm sadness.It was Harriet’s decision to make.
He’d roared, a wordless cry of pure fury, and dashed out into the night in pursuit of the wayward lovers.
The bright moon glared down at him, hung low in the clear night sky.
“I’ll strangle that French bastard with my bare hands,” he panted. The road sloped toward the village. He skidded around a curve and stopped short at the sight of a gleaming black coach stuck sideways in the road. Four horses were pulling in every direction but forward, hemmed in by a stone wall on one side and a deep ditch on the other. The crest painted on the door was familiar, as was the gray-headed old man hanging out the window, shouting at his beleaguered driver.
Old.
To Jude’s eyes, the man had possessed a fatherly air. He was trustworthy. Respectable.
