“Webb is sleeping.” She felt her face heat slightly, which was new and not entirely welcome. “I couldn’t settle. I know it’s stupid. I know we’re not safe here and having me in your room instead of Webb’s doesn’t change that.” She stopped. “I just?—”
She didn’t finish. She didn’t have the words for what she’d come for. The honest version was,in your presence I believe we’ll survive this, and she couldn’t say that without also saying everything else.
Oliver looked at her for a moment. Then he moved to the chair by the window, settling back into the watchful stillness he’d clearly been maintaining for hours.
“Take the bed,” he said. “I’m on watch, anyway.”
She hesitated. Then she crossed to the bed and lay down, pulling the blanket up, and looked at him once across the dark room. He was already staring at the window.
She was asleep within minutes.
Oliver watched her sleep. He recalled his conversation with the innkeeper and the too close a call with Penharrow’s men. He couldn’t bring himself to tell Megan about that.
The common room had been quiet—just a few local men drinking ale and speaking Welsh in low voices. They’d eyed Oliver with the usual suspicion afforded to English strangers, but the innkeeper’s presence seemed to vouch for him.
Oliver ordered enough food for three people. The food had arrived; roast beef, fresh bread, vegetables that tasted like heaven after days of dried meat. Oliver forced himself to eat slowly, though his body screamed for him to devour everything in sight.
He was halfway through the meal when the door opened and three men entered.
Oliver recognized the look of them immediately—the hard eyes, the way they scanned the room, the barely concealed weapons. Penharrow’s men.
His hand went to his pistol under the table as the men approached the innkeeper. They spoke in Welsh, too quickly for Oliver to follow, but he caught one word. Megan.
They were asking about her. Describing her, probably. Asking if anyone had seen an English lord traveling with a fair-haired woman.
The innkeeper’s eyes flickered toward Oliver for just a moment. Then she shook her head, responding in rapid Welsh that Oliver couldn’t decipher.
The men weren’t satisfied. One of them pulled out a purse, clearly offering money for information. The innkeeper shook her head again, more firmly this time.
Oliver sat very still, his hand on his pistol, calculating odds. Three against one. He was exhausted, half-starved, his reactions dulled by a week of hardship. If it came to a fight, he’d probably lose.
But he wouldn’t let them take Megan. Even if it meant dying here, in this Welsh inn, surrounded by strangers who wouldn’t remember his name.
The standoff lasted another minute. Then one of the men said something sharp and final, and they left—but not before casting one last searching look around the common room.
Oliver had waited until they were gone before approaching the innkeeper.
“Thank you,” he said quietly. He’d handed her more coins.
The woman studied him for a long moment. “I don’t know who you are or what you’ve done. But those men—” She spat to the side. “They work for the Earl. And anyone the Earl wants found that badly deserves to stay lost.”
“How do you?—”
“Everyone knows about Penharrow. About what he does, who he hurts.” Her voice dropped. “My niece disappeared five years ago. Went to work at his house in Cardiff and never came home. The girl upstairs? She’s running from him, isn’t she?”
Oliver saw no point in lying. “Yes.”
The innkeeper nodded slowly. “Then you keep her hidden. And you get her away from Wales as fast as you can. Because the Earl never stops looking for what he considers his.”
She’d turned away before Oliver could respond, but he understood. This wasn’t just about Megan—it was about every woman Penharrow had ever hurt, every family he’d destroyed. In helping them escape, the innkeeper was striking back in the only way she could.
So he would do as the innkeeper said. He would keep Megan safe.
He had told himself he was watching the street. The windowgave him a clear sightline to the lane below and the edge of the stables, and Penharrow’s men were still somewhere in this village or close to it, and vigilance was not optional. He had all the rationale required.
He watched the street for a while. Then he watched her.
Her breathing had evened out quickly, with the defenseless ease of someone whose body had finally overruled everything else. She lay on her side, one hand loosely open on the pillow beside her face. The fire in the grate was low, but there was enough light to see her clearly, the curve of her shoulder, the slow rise and fall.
