Page 72 of The Curious Life of the Unfortunate Duchess
“Do you think I require a bloody guard?” Cooper retorted. “You are the fool who got kicked by a woman! Off with you now. I will not tell you again! I already made the mistake of permitting you to see her and you bloody well nearly set her free!”
“Have you taken leave of your senses? I would not do such a thing!” Mark protested.
“I will not quibble with you over what I saw with my own eyes. Off with you. Do not make me tell you a third time.”
Their voices were directly above and Elizabeth could make out the shadows passing over the slats. There was a grunt of annoyance but Elizabeth knew Mark had obeyed Cooper’s instructions, leaving him alone to deal with the now-freed lady below.
She heard the sound of the door creaking and suddenly, Cooper stood, illuminated with a greyish light at his back. The sun had disappeared behind the clouds, indicating rain was on the horizon but that was truly the least of Elizabeth’s concerns. Immediately, her only thought was of the man looming above. He held the water she so desperately wanted in a canteen, and in the other hand, a satchel she assumed contained food. Cooper blinked, his sardonic smirk faltering from his lips.
“Miss Elizabeth?” he called, uncertainty tainting his voice. “Where have you gone, you cunning wench?”
He had seen the fallen chair and the binds and he slowly descended the steps. His eyes darted around the dim cellar but even with the pale light of the daytime streaming inside, he could not make out every corner of the basement.
“Miss Elizabeth,” Cooper tried again, an almost lyrical amusement in his tone. “You cannot hide here. There is nowhere for you to go.”
She remained in place, holding her breath as she watched him with wary eyes.
“Ballocks,” she heard him mutter but he had had yet to see her crouched among the preserves. In seconds he would see her, however. She had a limited opportunity to escape and she needed to seize it while she maintained the small element of surprise.
“Come out, wench!” Cooper howled, his good mood dissipating instantly. “When I get my hands on your —”
Elizabeth sprung forward, smashing the jar of preserves she was clutching against his face. The glass shattered and Cooper released a gut-wrenching howl of pain as the brine seared his eyes.
Without waiting to see how badly injured he was, she turned and sprinted up the steps and outside. She did not look one way or another, only forward as her weakened legs carried her as fast as she could go, the adrenaline moving her bare feet along the grass.
“Get back here! Mark! Mark, she is getting away!”
Elizabeth did not stop nor did she look over her shoulder. Ahead was a tree-line leading into a thick woods and it was her only destination.
“Stop!” Cooper screamed again and a bullet whizzed by her head. Elizabeth gasped and stumbled but she did not rest, the realization she was being shot at caused her legs to work with supernatural speed. She continued to run but after a few moments, another bullet followed. It was far off its mark, piercing a tree to her far left. It would be the last for Elizabeth made it into the forest and abruptly turned to the right. In her frenzied mind, she had the foresight to change her direction while her pursuer could not see her.
Her feet bled as she jumped over jagged rocks and tripped through logs. Her dress was ripped through thorns and branches but that did not slow her. Elizabeth knew now that Cooper would certainly end her life if he ever caught her. He had already tried with his gun. She would not permit him another opportunity.
Her rasping breaths filled her ears and she tried to listen for his proximity but between the rush of blood through her veins and the bursting of her lungs, hearing clearly was impossible.
Deeper into the woods she ran but there finally came a time when she was certain her legs would fail her. She knew if she did not stop, at least for a moment, there was a good chance Cooper would find her on the forest floor.
Heavily, she fell onto a fallen tree, lines of sweat falling down her face to burn her eyes. She brushed them away impatiently, her head upright as she watched for movement in the thicket. Slowly, her heart regained its normal beat but Elizabeth gathered that she had lost Cooper for the time.
It was only then that she looked about, taking note of her surroundings. There was something disturbingly familiar about the woods, as though she had been there before. But, of course, one forest looked like another. Nothing her mind told her in that moment could be held as fact. Elizabeth did not trust her own mind. She was dehydrated and scared, bleeding, and hungry.
I must find a place to—
“Do not move.”
Terror drenched her and she whirled around, the gun keeping her full attention.
Elizabeth knew it was over—both the race and her life.
Chapter 24
“This is absurd,” Percival whispered. “If we are caught—”
“We shall not be,” David growled. “If you would prefer to wait at the coach, Father, I am certain that His Grace would not mind.”
“I would not,” Leonard agreed. The Viscount had already voiced his discontent at sneaking about Lord Cooke’s estate but Leonard did not much care. He had taken Catherine’s warning to heart, the worry that if Lord Cooke did have some hand in Elizabeth’s disappearance that alerting him might drive him to do something drastic and irrevocable. It had been David’s suggestion that they approach the estate quietly and search for themselves.
“I cannot fathom that an Earl would hide a woman at his home while his dowager mother sleeps beneath the same roof,” Percival had objected but Leonard would not rest until he had explored all his options. He was not entirely convinced that they would find Elizabeth there himself but he hoped to find some clue that Lord Cooke had taken her, a sign. It certainly made sense that Alexander Cooke would have felt slighted not only by Elizabeth but by him and thereby needed to teach them both a lesson. The ransom did not quite fit with such a scenario but it was all Leonard had in that moment.
